I am gradually coming back to life. Man, that was a tough recovery, and I'm getting to be pretty knowledgeable about various recuperation periods from surgeries. But I trust that will be the last one! Forever! I have learned some things, and had some really intense insights that are going to profoundly change the way I live my life due to this last round. I hope to write it all out for y'all soon. Right now I'm trying to dig myself out of the hole missing two weeks of work created. Thanks for all your kind wishes - I sure used them!
April 29, 2007
Sixth Teaching – The Man of Discipline
Know that discipline, Arjuna,
Is what men call renunciation;
No man is disciplined
Without renouncing willful intent
There you go. You cannot be disciplined without giving things up. One has to be willing to sacrifice what one's senses say they must have. And as discussed before, one can make this easier by consciously sacrificing willful desires to someone. Much easier to give things up out of love. And the other tool is to realize that the self who craves ice-cream and brownies is not the Self. A kind of confusingly worded stanza gets at this:
He should elevate himself by the self,
Not degrade himself;
For the self is its own friend
And its own worst foe.
In Easwaran's book on meditation he talks about how good the mind and senses are at distracting us, and how talented they are at manufacturing desire for sense objects . . . like ice cream. But once one achieves discipline - control - the mind and senses become one's loyal servants. And crave brown rice, for example, instead of baked potatos with butter and sour cream. To get to that place, one must be firm with them, tell them no and don't give in. And here is Krishna on the subject:
The self is the friend of a man
Who masters himself thru the self.
But for a man without self-mastery,
The self is like an enemy at war.
"Thru the self." It is no good keeping one's self on a diet by, say, locking the refrigerator, or having one's stomach stapled. Those external means may help you lose weight, but they haven't changed who you are. As soon as the lock is removed, or one finds another means of satisfying one's gluttony, one is right back in the same situation. So with every other "vice."
And I do find myself at war; one part wants pie, another part wants to look like a model. One part wants to just lie on the couch, another wants to go spend money we don't have. My body is literally a battle zone in which nerves want to fire all the time, the immune system wants to – well, does – attack the virus and anything else that gets in its way. How do I stop the craziness and bring peace and control to my mind and body? The following stanzas show the way:
First, he says seclusion, isolation (10) I can't do that. But I could find moments of it. Then find a good place to sit – firm, pure, not too high or low, with a covering (11).
He should focus his mind and restrain
The activity of his thoughts and senses (12)
And
He should keep his body, head,
And neck aligned, immobile, steady. (13)
He also suggests staring at the tip of one's nose, but I prefer other strategies that the scriptures also support.
But that third thing, in stanza 12, that is hardly easy! In fact right now it seems downright impossible. Easwaran and Ram Dass and everyone else say it improves with practice and only with practice.
Then Krishna says to sit in discipline. With thoughts fixed on Krishna, intent (14).
Disciplining himself,
His mind controlled,
A man of discipline finds peace,
The pure calm that exists in me. (15)
Going overboard on anything, even piety and extreme asctecism, is not discipline (16). I know I'm often guilty of that, so I'll have to watch it. Meditating all day is not necessary or helpful at this point. Half an hour a day is enough. Again, the rewards are great.
When a man disciplines his diet
And diversions, his physical actions,
His sleeping and waking,
Discipline destroys sorrow.
One becomes truly free when one can make choices instead of being driven by tastes and preferences, cravings and desires. Easwaran says one can have total control over sleeping and waking, even over dreams. That's where I'm going to leave it for the day. Only let me remember this, that all of the great sorrow I feel can be dispelled by the simple expedient of sitting down for half an hour every day.
April 30
I guess it's time to think about discipline again. Krishna continues to offer a picture of what a disciplined person is like, and the rewards of such discipline.
Absolute joy beyond the senses
Can only be grasped by understanding [jnana]
When one knows it, he abides there
And never wanders from the reality. v.21
Why would one leave? Joy beyond the senses means better than sex, better than pie and ice-cream, better than a sunset, better than teaching, than gazing into a lover's eyes – once one's had that, why would one ever trade it in for the petty fun of one-upmanship, or a cigarette, etc.?
He gives explicit instructions that would be really useful, I'm sure, if I was meditating daily and knew where the pitfalls or difficulties further along the path lie.
Arming herself with discipline,
Seeing everything with an equal eye,
She sees the self in all creatures,
And all creatures in the self. v. 29
I'm going to make the language female-oriented from now on. It's important to me. Phyllis and I talked about how, though they may be small traumas, the words of exclusion, belittling, un or undervalue, they do add up, making little dents and bruises on the soul. About the verse – all things are One. Since we are selfish creatures, use the self to understand the reality. When I see a person or a dog or whomever, I should be saying "There I go" and also seeing them in myself. This is the start of real liberation. If I could truly enjoy another's success as mine, and see my success as truly theirs, I'd be in good shape.
And from there (or simultaneously) I should turn from self and see God. I love this passage. And isn't it like what Jesus would say?
She who sees me everywhere
And sees everything in me
Will not be lost to me,
And I will not be lost to her. v.30
Throughout the Gita, Krishna is often so tender, it is no wonder he attracts so many devotees, including me.
I exist in all creatures.
So the disciplined man devoted to me
Grasps the oneness of life;
Wherever she is, she is in me
When she sees identity in everything,
Whether joy or suffering,
Through analogy with the self,
She is deemed a person of pure discipline.
At bottom, this is the same as Jesus' command to love others as you love yourself. Of course, it goes further; others ARE oneself! And like with Christianity, it is easy to love kittens and people who think like we do; much harder to love our enemies. But both Jesus and Krishna say it is necessary. Not because you will be rewarded by God, in Krishna's case, but because it is True. It is just accepting reality. Dick Cheney is me. I am Karl Rove. George Bush is me. Whoa. That is tough! How do I come to love them as I love Indy? As I love J? As I love Mom?
Maybe we don't expect perfection all at once? Especially from someone who is not meditating faithfully yet? This is the goal though. "when she sees identity in everything." Not "in the things she likes the looks of." Okay. Practice closer to home. With each student that walks into my office. Each faculty member who speaks to me. My doctors and their staffs. Okay. And the members of my family.
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