Nothing Dies (Q. 308)

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Q. I’ve been thinking about death for a long while and last night something came to me that I wanted to share with you. It’s not so much a question, though. Rather, I’m just wondering whether my thinking is ‘on the right lines’.

 Ok, imagine a dead body lying in a coffin. Let’s say that this person lying there is called John Doe. Many people would believe that now John Doe is dead, something would have left the body, that this ‘John Doe’ identity is no longer there. My thinking from what I’ve learned about Vedanta so far, is that this ‘John Doe’ was probably never there as was perceived in the first place. Continue reading →

Fundamentalism vs the eclectic

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In common with many people in the West who are pursuing a spiritual path, I went down a couple of blind alleys before finding my present teacher, Swamni Atmaprakāśānanda, who had been given the vision of the truth of the Self by her guru, Swami Dayānanda Saraswati.

Of course one doesn’t know that one is going down a blind alley at the time and some alleys are so long that it takes several years before you bang up against the wall beyond which there’s no understanding. This was the case for me. The first alley was long. In the mid 70s, I came across a Philosophy School in London that offered a tantalising and a balanced diet of Upanishad and Gita study, meditation and other practical exercises and disciplines, Sanskrit, fine music, fine food, opportunities for service, regular retreats and the guidance of a ‘realised master’ from India (whom we didn’t personally meet, but received transcripts of his ‘Conversations’ with the founder of he school. These had been translated from Hindi and edited before we got to hear them – and the original recordings erased so no authentication possible). It took several years before discovering that all the right ingredients without an experienced cook will serve up a meal that might satisfy the hungry for a while, but is eventually one that’s lacking in real nourishment. I eventually left to follow my own direction. Continue reading →

What about karma yoga?

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Back in the early days of my spiritual seeking, I used to think that there were three main approaches to enlightenment: karma yoga, bhakti yoga and j~nAna yoga and that any could be used successfully, according to the particular personality and capabilities of the seeker. (I later found out about rAja yoga but let’s not complicate things!) The fact that j~nAna and bhakti effectively and inevitably ‘go together’ to some degree has been written about elsewhere by people such as Dhanya and Peter. Swami Dayananda also often writes about the need to understand the place of Ishvara in one’s spiritual pursuits if they are to be fruitful. So I will not mention bhakti again. I am looking in this article specifically about where karma yoga fits in the scheme of things. Continue reading →

Spirituality

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Today we bundle everything that is considered spiritual under the term New Age. There are even people, who consider psychotherapy as spiritual and again others who would call their traditional religious practices spiritual. Thus „spirituality“ is a broad field. Advaita Vedanta provides a very specific definition for spirituality that sets limits to this broad field. In Advaita Vedanta someone is considered spiritual only, if he/she wants to realize truth – the key to truth being realizing my true nature, who or what I am – as distinct from body and mind. Everything else may lead to spirituality, but will not provide the realization, that I long for.

Spiritual search 

All humans are seekers, all humans want to grow beyond themselves. Some want to multiply their possessions because they assume that thereby their limits extend. Others want to increase their quality of life because it helps them over the inevitable limits of human existence. Again others believe that such outer changes won’t be effective as long as one does not have a psyche that is able to enjoy possession as well as quality of life. These start to work at the psychological level to thereby grow beyond themselves. Others aim to extend their limits by exploring subtle phenomena and experimenting with them. Continue reading →

Why do I Feel Unhappy? Why do I Feel Depressed?

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Questioner: “I am Brahman” is the simple and straightforward message of Advaita. Brahman is synonymous with Beingness, Consciousness and Happiness. If I = Happiness, I should be always happy, should never be depressed. But I am overcome by the feelings of unhappiness, I get depressed. How come?

***

Well, the answer is “You” (I) can never not be Happy.

Out of Beingness – Consciousness – Happiness, the first two are self-evident. We do not require an external proof to tell me that I exist or that I am conscious. Can you ever say “I am not here” or “I am not conscious”? You have to be there and be present to say, “I am not here.” Similarly, I have to be conscious to say, “I am not conscious.”

In the same way, “I” can never ever be other than Happiness.

What is then the “feel” of unhappiness or depression that arises?

The “feel” cannot be “I” nor can it belong to “I”. That “feel” must obviously be something other than “I”. That is to say that such a feeling cannot be real because Brahman is the only “thing” that is Real. If the feeling is not real, it has to be an imaginary thing for, “I” would never say: “I am unhappy.”

But a Ramesam or a Tom or Dick do “feel” unhappy and say: “I am unhappy; I feel depressed. I am suffering.”

Continue reading →

Living rightly with others

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Have you ever wondered why it is people find it so difficult to get on? From the outside it seems we are rigged for war. There is conflict between husbands and wives, parents and children, teachers and pupils, bosses and employees, fellow workers. So much friction and so much unhappiness. Is there something innately wrong in people that they can’t learn to live happily with one another?

According to my past training, I would have gone along with the common orthodoxy which tells us that that the cause of this friction and unhappiness is that we are suffering from low self esteem, lack of love, deep psychological problems, mental illness or the absence of the right kind of drug which is supposed to restore our brain chemistry to right functioning.

Since being introduced to the teachings of Vedanta, however, I now see that the root cause is that we are suffering from a misguided UNDERSTANDING of what is important in living a happy and satisfying life with others. As a consequence we have insufficient PRACTICE in living in a WAY which, in itself, brings about a quality of mind which is happy and is directly the result of a certain way of associating with others. Below is an extract from a longer article of mine entitled ‘Living Rightly With Others’. Continue reading →

How to be really, really, really happy

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In the Taittiriya Upanishad we are told that 1 unit of human joy is that enjoyed by a young person described as being in the prime of life, fit and healthy, possessed of strong mental faculties, amazingly good looking and incredibly well read, spiritually disciplined and ethical, and in possession of untold wealth (not exactly the person next door). Try to imagine the effort that would be required to have untold wealth and untold wisdom. Imagine the effort required to live a highly ethical and spiritual life. It can take a whole lifetime – by which time we will have lost our youthful vigour. The other person, however, who enjoys the same level of joy is ‘a follower of the Vedas, unaffected by desire’ (which can be anyone who makes the effort).

100 times that unit of human joy is one unit of the joy of a being called a Man Gandharva in a higher loka [realm]. In this embodiment as a celestial musician there will only be the experience of subtle enjoyment and no pain. To attain this loka one needs to have accumulated a huge amount of punya [merit] from leading a value-driven and prayerful life. The other person, however, who enjoys 100 times the unit of human joy is the follower of the Vedas, unaffected by desire. Continue reading →

Where the mind cannot reach (Q. 307)

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Q: I am allowing life to teach me as I go through it, but I’m not finding it easy.  Most of the time I feel I don’t want to even speak because I feel nothing I say is ‘correct’.  At the same time, however, I feel that even if I do speak, whatever I say would not be ‘wrong’ because ‘right’ and ‘wrong’, ‘correct’ and ‘incorrect’ do not exist.  Words and concepts are a massive hindrance to my understanding, yet I cannot overcome them.

 I want to say that I know that everything is Brahman, but then something says, ‘you can’t ‘know’ that everything is Brahman because that cannot be known with the mind’, so I’m always hitting a wall. Continue reading →