The Power of Thought

Sunahu Sadhak Pyare - Part 12

Uddhav asked Shri Krishna “What is happiness”?

क: पण्डित: कश्च मूर्ख: क: पन्था उत्पथश्च क: ।
क: स्वर्गो नरक: क: स्वित् को बन्धुरुत किं गृहम् ॥
भा 11.19.31

ka: paṇḍita: kaśca mūrkha: ka: panthā utpathaśca ka: ।
ka: svargo naraka: ka: svit ko bandhuruta kiṃ gṛham ॥
bhā 11.19.31

"Who is learned, and who is a fool? What are the true and the false paths in life, and what are heaven and hell? Who is indeed a true friend, and what is one’s real home?"

When you realize that both worldly happiness and worldly unhappiness is unhappiness, and you get detached from it, that is happiness. Just like virtue and sin both are sin, similarly happiness as well as unhappiness of this material world, are unhappiness, because that so called happiness is temporary and eventually causes sorrow. Moreover, there is a concoction of discontentment, while true happiness is unlimited and everlasting. We suffer with three kinds of agonies: mental and physical, induced by others and induced by forces of nature. The only reason of all these sufferings is unawareness of God, which naturally causes various desires, anger, greed, attachments, pride, jealousy etc. Hence we start burning in anger and losing the balance of mind, upon hearing one single sentence.

क्रोधाद्भवति सम्मोह: सम्मोहात्स्मृतिविभ्रम: |
स्मृतिभ्रंशाद् बुद्धिनाशो बुद्धिनाशात्प्रणश्यति ||
गीता 2.63

krodhādbhavati sammoha: sammohātsmṛtivibhrama: |
smṛtibhraṃśād buddhināśo buddhināśātpraṇaśyati ||
gītā 2.63

This process is described very well in the Gita – Anger gives rise to illusion (moh), due to which one loses one’s memory, which causes a loss of one’s balance of mind, after which the person loses all control. Anger causes you to fall to this level of devastation. What do you do in anger? You call ill names to someone in your family or neighbor etc. Later, after you cool down, you regret your actions done in the state of anger. You curse yourself for having said all that you did. Then you realize your mistake. . At that time if your neighbor said, you are getting angry and that is bad, you would immediately justify your action saying I am not angry, I am merely stating the facts. Since, it is not possible to be judicious at that time.

We also suffer from physical sufferings such as fever and diseases for which there is no cure. We have to face it and noone knows when which disease will grip us. All the machinery is inside. It cannot be seen. A person is walking around, joking and in a second had a cardiac arrest and died on the spot. Even if he does not die still he has to bear the pain. We also suffer from pain inflicted by others for instance, when somebody scolds us, hurt us, steals our property etc. We are incapacitated, weak, cannot do anything and just have to bear the pain.

Then the seasons also inflict pain on us, sometimes it is burning hot, sometimes it is cold, it has been raining for a week and so on.

And then we are pained by the sufferings of our father, mother, brother, sister, son, daughter etc. We are not happy even for a moment. And still we are alive. That is the miracle! And when somebody asks, “Hey how are you doing?” Our answer is “Oh I am doing alright”. ALL right? Not a single thing is right in our life and the answer is all-right. I am perfectly fine. As if I am experiencing blissful trance in this material world. We tell white lies. Try to fool each other, shake hands smilingly. Inside, we are unhappy, disturbed and depressed. So, we experience all these pains.

We go through so much pain and misery in the human form. These miseries are nothing as compared to the miseries inflicted in all other 8.4 million forms of life. A human being may claim to be very rich and affluent; he can afford to provide food for several people every day. Compare his situation to that of a stray dog that has no certainty that he will get food to eat or water to drink. He may die of hunger or thirst. One cannot imagine that pain. And one has to go through the 8.4 million forms of life, to repent for one’s sinful actions. The human body is given to us occasionally.

कबहुँक करि करुणा नर देही, देत ईश बिनु हेतु सनेही ।

kabahum̐ka kari karuṇā nara dehī, deta īśa binu hetu sanehī ।

You get it occasionally, when the Supreme Lord is very merciful and kind to you. This human body is desirable to the demi-gods who live in celestial abodes. So being turned away from God we are controlled by Maya. And being under Maya, we have forgotten our identity and started considering ourselves to be this body, and started loving our bodily relatives. We have to bear the fruits of our actions, selfishness and performing evil deeds in hell for billions of years. and as the result of performing pious deeds (Satva guna) we will be sent to the celestial abodes, where we cannot do anything except enjoying the fruits of good deeds. We suffered all this and are still suffering just because we are turned away from God!

So what is the remedy? If you know the cause then you can find a remedy. Simply if we turn towards Him with a complete faith He alone is mine. HE ONLY. We say in the temples

त्वमेव माता च पिता त्वमेव त्वमेव बन्धुश्च सखा त्वमेव।
त्वमेव विद्या द्रविणं त्वमेव त्वमेव सर्वं मम देवदेव ॥

tvameva mātā ca pitā tvameva tvameva bandhuśca sakhā tvameva।
tvameva vidyā draviṇaṃ tvameva tvameva sarvaṃ mama devadeva ॥

This is offering of only lip service to God. If we really mean what we say, we have nothing more to do. In other words, if you say you alone are my mother, then if the worldly mother dies, you won’t be unhappy. If you truly say, You alone are my father then if physical father gets hurt, meets with an accident or dies, you won’t be unhappy. You will perform all your duties without being attached to the outcome. If you truly believe that God is your real wealth then you will be detached from your worldly wealth. O Shri Krishna! You are my wealth. You may turn towards God when consider Him as your one and only relative.

So, how can we exclusively love God? We can love Him exclusively only by constantly pondering of the truth that He alone is mine.

विषयान् ध्यायतश्चित्तं विषयेषु विषज्जते ।
मामनुस्मरतश्चित्तं मय्येव प्रविलीयते ॥
भा 10.14.27

viṣayān dhyāyataścittaṃ viṣayeṣu viṣajjate ।
māmanusmarataścittaṃ mayyeva pravilīyate ॥
bhā 10.14.27

Your mind gets attached to that person or thing, about whom you think repeatedly. You have not attained happiness in this world, but since you have always thought that there is happiness in this world, your mind has gotten attached to this world. Just like a little child licks his thumb. Does he get milk in there? Nope. Still the child licks it. His mother tries a variety of ways to get him to stop, but he does not. He is under the illusion that the saliva that touches the thumb and goes in the mouth is actually milk.

So ponder, you are attached to this world where there is no happiness and where you undergo nothing other than constant abuse from everyone. But there is happiness in God. So if you start walking towards the path of God, He will give you what He has. He is the eternal giver and the world is the eternal taker. God descends on earth, He sends his saints, who come and explain the philosophy to us, and we nod our heads, but do not leave our attachments behind. So if you attach your mind to the source of all happiness and repeatedly think “He alone is mine” then the mind will get attached to God. And you will attain true happiness. You will be able to experience that happiness. In the state of practice (Sadhana) also you will experience bliss and in realized (Siddha) state also you will experience bliss.