April 27-28, 2007

April 27, 2007

The Fifth Teaching – Renunciation of Action

Arjuna asks for clarification: Which is better, discipline or renunciation of action? Krishna responds right away that disciplined action is better than non-action. Explains Ghandi better.

Aha! And here is where Krishna clearly says that if you follow raja or jnana yoga you'll end up practicing both; they lead to the same place:

Simpletons separate philosophy [jnana]

And discipline [raja], but the learned do not;

Applying one correctly, a man

Finds the fruit of both. v. 4

And:

Renunciation is difficult to attain

Without discipline;

A sage armed with discipline

Soon reaches the infinite spirit. v.6

One cannot really let go of desire and attachment, (preference), without discipline, which in this case means yoga – jnana, karma, or raja – meditation and/or one-pointed devotion. As part of seeking, one should meditate using raja yoga, and also do what is taught in the Upanishads – jnana yoga, or reflection on the fact that one's self is not one's true Self.

Seeing, hearing, touching, smelling,

Eating, walking, sleeping, breathing,

The disciplined man who knows reality

Should think "I do nothing at all."

When we engage with sense objects – eating Cheerios, standing in front of the class, etc., we should think, "It is the senses that engage with sense objects." Not I. I am something other than what I feel, sense, taste, do.

And a reminder of what it is like if we don't – we are then driven by our desires – to eat pie and ice cream, to have sex, to be loved by students. Desire drives us from one thing to another; we are not in control of them, freely choosing which things would be good to do.

Relinquishing the fruit of action

The disciplined man attains perfect peace;

The undisciplined man is in bondage,

Attached to the fruit of his desire.

The only way to get that peace, to be successful in letting go of the pleasures and pains of the senses is to meditate. To be disciplined. One learns through meditation, and it alone, that one should and can run one's own brain. We do not have to allow the mind to think three thoughts at once, to yell about what it wants. Through meditating we come to realize we can, and begin to do these renunciations. First one must control one's thoughts, then one's senses, and ultimately, one's desires.

I have been doing it on and off – and I have one more week of classes, so one more week to play at it this way. Then no more excuses.

April 28

Have been up since 6, talking to J. First about the government and the new corruptions and atrocities each of us learned about yesterday, then switched into religion, since I wanted to share my insight of last night with him, and then it went from there to range widely but ended with the subject that we need a community of fellow believers/seekers. J is using the web now to try and find something – a temple, a meditation center, something.

It is so difficult to not be outraged at our government. Last night I was thinking about my tendency to see this administration as the worst ever. And I realized (again) that it is nearly always this bad. As long as there have been states, there have been corrupt, evil, exploitative people. The little people have been robbed, abused, exploited, lied to and more by the people they trust to protect them. I'm sure there are cycles – one can see them all through history – of times that are really bad and times that are better, but it probably isn't worse now than at many times in history.

It is important to know that, because it makes clear that I can't use these terrible times as an excuse. Things were really awful in China at the time Lao-tzu wrote that we must accept things the way they are. What does it mean that things are always bad all over? It doesn't mean we shouldn't fight, or there would be no balance. The bad guys would win. What it might mean is that the world is supposed to be like this. It is a training ground, remember? A chess game. If the two sides in a chess game were just having a picnic together, instead of fighting one another, there'd be no game, thus no point in playing it.

So we are exactly at where the Gita begins: I must do my dharma, my sacred duty, by picking a side and staying on it, fighting for it with my body – my senses, intelligence, actions – but at the same time accept how things are. Act with the body because it is the right thing to do, but do not expect or even desire, a particular outcome. Remember that ultimately, I am not the chess piece, down in the muck of battle, but the player – which means I am God itself, and I am Bush and Rumsfeld and Erik Prince as much as I am whitethoughts. Wow. I just had a split-second of truly grokking that. So back to our study of the Gita. The second stanza from where we left off:

The lord of the world

Does not create agency or actions,

Or a union of fruits with actions;

But his being unfolds into existence. v 14

Whoa, so in this version of creation even Brahman, God, does not act. He/It/She did not create the world; rather it came to be out of God. It naturally unfolds out of God because that is what God is. So you can't really say, for example, that an ember that shoots out of the fire was "created" by the fire – at least not in the purposeful way people usually mean. They mean that God thought out, designed, planned a universe, and purposely brought it into being. Not with hammer and nails but something like it.

But what if the meaning is closer to that of "the fire created the ember"? That's true, there wouldn't have been an ember without a fire; the fire is it's Source. And thus the ember has the qualities of the fire, is part of the fire.

Krishna is also saying God did not create cause and effect, it is simply How It Is, how god-stuff is structured. God didn't make a list and say "I like these things, I'll call them good and reward humans for them." Or "I don't like that so I'll call it bad and punish those who do it." No! It just is.

All the next 4 stanzas are wonderful, saying once you realize this, realize you are in fact the fire, god, then life becomes really sweet. Full of light. Knowledge "illumines ultimate reality" like the sun. One's atman, god-self, becomes one's identity, and "that becomes their understanding, their self, their basis, and then goal, and they reach a state beyond return." I guess that means they can never go back to seeing the old way; the new/old, real self connot fit back into the tiny ego. And then they see all as one.

If you didn't understand the context, you might read this next first line as life-denying, see Hinduism as joyless, but that isn't what it means at all.

He should not rejoice in what he loves

Nor recoil from what disgusts him,

Secure in understanding, undeluded, knowing

The infinite spirit, he abides in it. v.20

Detached from external contacts,

She discovers joy in herself;

Joined by discipline to the infinite spirit

The self attains inexhaustible joy. v.21

So far from being grim! Or selfish, as one might also read it. It means don't rejoice in what one loves more than you rejoice at what you don't love. Obviously I'm not even close to being there, but I get it. Intellectually. Back to the chess game. If you are playing both sides, it doesn't make much sense to rejoice at one side's winning move, when that means failure to the other side. Don't be swayed by emotions, it also means.

And then the promise: through disciplined meditation, you can use the link inside you, that piece of god to unite with Ultimate Reality. There is a well inside each of us, a well of infinite, brilliant joy. It takes discipline, practice, effort. But once found, one can drink from it as much and as often as one likes. Repeated trips to the well beats a path to it, strenthens leg muscles, so the more you walk the path, the easier it is to go there.

Inexhaustible joy. Whenever we want it. Who would forgo that in order to continue hating and despising one's fellow humans? The answer to how to deal with corruption, waste, dishonesty, etc., is to fight them with the body, sure, we've established that. But really the answer that will sustain you through all battles is – meditate! Discipline the mind and find one's way to the well. Tapping into infinite joy will make things not only bearable but acceptable, understandable. The following stanzas essentially say that. A person "able to endure the force of desire and anger" will be joyful.

The man of discipline has joy,

Delight and light within

Becoming the infinte spirit,

He finds the pure calm of infinity.

Hardly a life and joy-denying religion.

I was just thinking about how I've been guilty of pulling Bible verses out of context to "prove" something negative about the Bible to Mom or Dad and being reminded that it isn't fair or truthful practice. It is easier now to imagine someone like Mom finding comfort in the very verses I didn't like, because like these lines in the Gita, they are leading up to something bigger, a seeming paradox, perhaps. Don't rejoice in what you love . . . because controlling your preferences will lead you to TRUE, infinite joy:

The pure calm of infinity

Exists for the ascetic

Who disarms desire and anger,

Controls reason and knows the self v.26

I don't know if one truly must become an ascetic fully, but again, desire and anger must be disarmed. Okay, we can easily understand that (if not do it!). but control reason?

J and I were just discussing ways faith is hard for us, especially J, because of our intuitive grasps of logic, and especially for J – dedication to rational, deductive thought. So what is the Gita saying here? It is an immanently reasonable document, which largely tells people to think for themselves. But here reason must be controlled. "Truly free is the sage who controls his senses, mind and understanding, who focuses on freedom and dispels desire, fear and anger" v. 28.

I'll keep pondering. I think I know the answer to my question but don't feel like writing it out. I also haven't written out all my meeting with Phyllis and some other things, but I feel eager to get to work.