We just had the biggest snow storm of the season, in terms of how much fell at once. And the Farmer's Almanac predicts we will have a very snowy March. But at least it IS March! Hurray! The month in which spring will officially arrive. Things are as busy here as ever; trying to get as much grading and prep done as possible, and am still woefully behind on everything. I don't know if I really believe in prayer lists, but I certainly could use whatever positive energy and thoughts you could send my way. I am fairly certain that I have some more stuff going on that will require me to make a decision about which body parts I would like to keep and/or how much pain I would like to tolerate. I'm sharing before I know for sure because I am feeling pretty weak, streched pretty thin (ha-ha; I replaced nearly my entire wardrobe this weekend at Goodwill. I never thought I would complain about losing weight!), and I could use some support even if it is silent and free-floating and from strangers.
June 11, 2007
[I was whining about how poor we were going to be over the summer, and how unfair it was]
This is jumping ahead, but it is so relevant to what I just said – I've read ahead and in the 5th Dialogue, I was just reading on a smoke break.
To think that through diligent labor
You will avoid pain
Is a silly fantasy v.18
Couldn't be much clearer than that, could it? The problem is, as usual, that I was indulging in full identification with the little self, this whitethoughts, and ignoring the larger Self, which is exactly opposite of what I "should" be doing, of what will bring joy and fulfillment.
To back up, in the Fourth Dialogue, Krishna finishes his story about the young Brahmin/sannyasin. It begins with the latter saying:
The true source of misery
Is the acquisition of anything
That you hold dear v.1
He points out that he himself has no family, no wife or children to whom he is attached, and he has freed himself from all other worldy distractions. "One should go along through life," he says, "making no noise." He gives other instructions – about meditation he says that regular practice will quiet the mind.
They center the mind on the Self
And slowly it will cease its activity.
Both rajas and tamas
Will be submerged into sattva v.12
Those are the gunas – passion and inertia subsumed into lucidity.
He reminds us that this creation will be destroyed – but really he says it will be sucked up, submerged into Brahman, the undifferentiated One, and then creation will occur again. His description supports the idea, the image, that I was beginning to get in the B. Gita.
The One, through the power of Time,
Begins the next creation cycle
By summoning the primordial vitality
Through maya
This vitality rouses the gunas,
Calling into being a world
Which appears to be
Made up of multiplicities v.19
This will be helpful when I'm in the mood to think about how the creation works, and why this happens. But I'm not feeling like that right now.
He does talk about embodiment, and what great teachers our bodies are, saying no matter how frail, the body – the human body – is "still the means of attaining final liberation." The king to whom he was speaking thought about his words and achieved enlightenment.
In Dialogue 5, Krishna goes back to speaking directly to Uddhava, reiterating what the sannyasin said. His message seems to be about distinguishing the self from the Self, and shifting one's identity from the former to the latter. So he repeats, in condensed form, much of what the sannyasin said, pointing out the multiplicities we see are illusion – they come and go, bound by the rope of the gunas. He repeats how one devoted to brahman, to him, ought to live, and there are more good reminders here than I can copy out.
He makes reference to the yamas and niyamas, which the translator defines thusly:
Yamas – contract with society
Ahimsa – non-violence
Satya – truthfulness
Asteya – non-stealing
Brahmacharya – living as a seeker of Brahman
Niyamas – contract with self
saucha – purity
santocha – contentment
tapas – regular practice
Ishvarapranidhana – aligning with the Infinite
June 12
Jim is reading me horrible things from the paper.. . More about the immigration ordinance, even though they've been advised they don't have the legal right to pass one. It makes me so sick I can hardly stand it. I feel outraged at the dishonesty, the outright lies they are telling, the abuse of words that is meant to hide and disguise the abuse of people. I feel sad the world, the state, the city has so much hatred and ill-will. I feel angry, and most of all, I feel helpless. What would Krishna advise? Try to see the Self in all of these people. But how does one go on . . . I mean, saying, "Well, that's their path" hardly seems enough.
Do you just stand by while people are beaten, tortured, jailed, deported, killed, because that is their path? This is always the place I get stuck, and I know I've found the answers before. I guess maybe I can still have my path be to fight injustice. Maybe that is my dharma. Could be, right? And Krishna urged Arjuna to pick up his weapon and fight. I don't have to worry about my enemies souls – that isn't my business. I only need to worry about mine. Have to figure out a way to respond to those I perceive as bigoted idiots in a way that is healthy for me.
Oh! The most important thing, I nearly forgot. Identify with the Self, not the self. Of course. And with that identity, one has perspective. An eternal perspective that sees the point, where the whitethought-self doesn't – of all the pain and ignorance. This should always be my main goal. Then everything else will become clear. It seems counter-intuitive, that the way to handle the world's problems is to turn inward, to be more self-focused for time.
But here in the 5th dialogue, which I started yesterday, Krishna couldn't be more clear that this is the right thing to do. What I am seeing as multiplicity is just a dream Brahman is having.
Identification with the body,
Which is created by the Supreme
Through the mysterious power of maya,
Is the cause of human bondage
To birth and death and rebirth.
Only knowledge of the Self
Can release one from that bondage v.10
Therefore, step by step,
Detach yourself from
Identification with the body;
Let your attachment be
Identification with the indwelling Self v.11
This is what I need to be doing. And once again I note to myself that the intellectual understanding I am developing is not enough. I need the experiential knowledge that will only come through meditation. And it takes years, so what am I waiting for?
In verses 14-20 Krishna says that if we believe what we are seeing, hearing, etc. is the only reality, we will be, not only deluded, but unhappy. In verses 21-29, he says even working for the reward of heaven will only get you to heaven – which like earth is bound by maya and will end. Funny thought – J's mom is very concerned with me getting to heaven, and I am in a position to argue that heaven is a paltry prize, that I am headed for more than heaven and she's the one to be worried about. Don't think she'd like that much. Tho she may actually be aimed higher, since I believe her heart's true desire is to be with God. Surely that devotion can move one along the path – Krishna says so.
Only the wise know
That what is called
The individual, or time, or the scriptures,
Or even the heavenly spheres,
All of that
Is the undivided and complete Self
I've read on, into the 6th Dialogue, and it is exciting stuff, but I'll save it for tomorrow.
June 13
I just have a short time to reflect on the U. Gita. We are at the 6th. At the end of the 5th, Uddhava asks, "Sometimes we are described as eternally bound by maya to samsara; sometimes you say we are eternally free. Which is it? Eternal bondage or eternal liberation?" Pretty spunky, that Uddhava! And Krishna has an answer that is shocking, and yet we totally should have expected it.
His very first words:
Neither bondage nor liberation is real.
Subject to the gunas – the three boundaries of nature,
The mind thinks of itself now as bound, now as free.
But since these boundaries are themselves illusory,
I tell you, there is neither bondage, nor liberation.
It is all a dream of the One Reality; it is an illusion, remember! I am also reading Salmon Rushdies Satanic Verses, and his characters keep asking themselves "What kind of an idea am I?" And that's it, isn't it? We are all just ideas in the mind of god. Everything about us and our situations is an idea, an illusion, and all we have to do to be free is to remember that. To really know it. By shifting our identification to the Self, we see that, we know we are ideas, and are therefore free to truly enjoy this idea-world we live in.
The rest of this dialogue is Krishna explaining that. Explaining how once one realizes they are free, they can "live a spontaneous life, free from the need for scheming and planning." They can soar like the wind, shape reality, be totally unaffected by the condition of their bodies, impervious to pain, torture, hunger, cold, etc. And, of course, knowing who they really are, they rejoice, they love to discuss the One Self, they love the scriptures and communing with others who know, and instead of withdrawing out of the world they are a vibrant part of it.
Who wouldn't want this? I want it! I so passionately want it. So I will stop holding myself back and go after it! But not today. Today I have to pull 12-14 hours of work.
June 14
We are in the 6th Dialogue, and Krishna is saying that this life is like a dream. The wise are those who have awakened and no longer cling to the dream. After describing best practices, as in the B. Gita, the compassionate Krishna says:
Old friend, if you are unable
To hold your own mind steadily on the Self
There are other ways of achieving wisdom.
Uncaring of the outcome for yourself,
Offer all that you do each day
To the one ineffable Self v.22
He always allows for imperfection, lets people begin where they are. As the translator notes, up to here Krishna has been describing jnana yoga which is faster, better. But here he begins describing bhakti, and he clearly isn't looking down his nose on it. He says this devotion will also bring one to wisdom, to awakening.
He has slammed religious rites a bit before. Here he says "do them if you must, but do them for the sake of the Indweller of all" v.24. He says clearly to listen to the stories of avatars, hang out with sages, study scriptures, but do it all for him, for the Self. It seems prayer is not wrong. And it should consist of offering. Offer each day, with all its worries, successes, failures, emotions, etc., offer them up to God, to Self, to the Indwelling Radiant One.
Uddhava asks him to describe a sage, how to recognize a good teacher, and Krishna responds with long descriptions. And once again, it sounds an awful lot like the instructions Jesus gave his followers. It also sounds like Patanjali in the Yoga Sutras. And like Lao-Tzu in the Tao te Ching. And like Buddha in the Pali Canon. Must be truth, right? All the sages of all the hugely successful religions give the exact same message. That concludes the 6th dialogue. Krishna says, "There is no more straightforward road to the Self than this path of devotion." v.48. Clearly putting bhakti on the same footing as jnana.
June 15
In the 7th Dialogue, Krishna reveals what he says is a great secret, and it is startling. He says that satsanga, association with the wise, will bring one closer to Him than even sanyasin! Even meditation. All the scriptures of all the religions tell us to associate with those who are likewise seeking god, but this is the strongest statement I've heard. He points to a bunch of people in Hindu mythology and hisotry who attained union with the One in that way – just by hanging out with saints, sages and avatars, knowing nothing of the scriptures or the practice of meditation. But also in there is another injunction against rites and rituals:
Give up all the injunctions and prohibitons,
All that you have heard or may hear
Related to scriptural dos and don'ts
And take shelter in your heart;
There seek the Self. v.15
When Uddhava asks for clarification, Krishna answers with another description of how the world works, how the One becomes and is the multiplicity of forms we see around us. I don't really see how this answers the question I thought Uddhava was asking, or exactly how it relates to the idea of satsanga. Certainly it does explain how really we are one, and as the translation says, offers beautiful, incredible images for contemplation, but I'm not getting the connection, exactly. Well, it'll be cool when I get that next level of wisdom next time or two around.
Anyway, it still is super intereting. Krishna describes the chakra system. Or more correctly, refers to it.
He says the One is the prana (energy, vitality, life-force) that flows through the sushumna nade, the spine part of the inner body in which the chakras, the "spinning wheels" exist. He refers to the "most gross manifestation" as the muladhara chakra, which the translator explains is the lowest one, located around the perineum, where Kundalini Shakti "the primal power" sits. And he refers to the "most subtle" as the anahata, the heart chakra, "where It is the subtle, celestial sound and the parts of speech."
Like the spark "resident" in a potential state in wood, so the One is resident in us and "manifests by degrees, even through the sounds that are uttered" and through the actions we take.
He explains again, as in the B. Gita's final teachings, how the creation is a tree. Deep roots are desires, the gunas are its support, and the panchatattva are its five sturdy branches. They are earth, water, fire, air and space. Interesting they recognized space as a thing whereas the West ignored it 'til the 20th century for the most part. The branches yeild sap, which are the senses – smell, taste, sight, touch, and hearing. Do they correspond in that order? Earth would be smell, water taste, fire sight, air touch, and hearing space. Yeah, that makes sense. Then the panchatattva have 2 branches each which correspond to the indriyas, the "organs of action" – the nose, tongue, eyes, ears, skin, throat, hands, feet, anus, sexual organs, and mind.
The mind, hidden in its branches, has two birds in a nest, the supreme One, and the ahamkara, the "I-maker," the "idea-of-I." This tree has 3 layers of bark – wind, bile and phlegm (humors) and it bears two fruits – joy and sorrow. Did I mention its seeds are good and bad deeds? That makes sense. Then Krishna tells Uddhava:
With a quiet and watchful mind,
Sharpened by service to your guru,
Take up the axe of awareness
And cut this tree down
Thus free the Self
And remain totally identified with the Self v.24
Wowie. Same advice he gave to Arjuna. But the beauty of the tree he's described makes it hard to want to cut the tree down! The roots are desire, and are deep.
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