RAJA YOGA , MESSAGE 26

                     Raja Yoga, Message 26

The section ‘Mental Obstacles’ now resumes...
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Environments are not actually bad, but your mind is bad. It is not disciplined properly. Wage a war with this horrible and terrible mind. Do not complain against bad environments but complain first against your own mind. Train your mind first. If you practise concentration amidst unfavourable environments you will grow strong, you will develop your will force quickly and you will become a dynamic personality. See good in everything and transmute evil into good.  

If you can give up idle talk and gossiping and idle curiosity to hear rumours and news of others, and if you do not meddle with the affairs of others, you will have ample time to do meditation. Make the mind quiet during meditation. If worldly thoughts try to enter the mind during meditation, reject them. Have steady devotion to truth. Be cheerful. Increase the sattvic materials in you. You can enjoy everlasting bliss.  

Watch your mind always very carefully. Be vigilant, be on the alert. Do not allow waves of irritability, jealousy, anger, hatred and lust to rise from the mind. These dark waves are enemies of meditation, peace and wisdom. Suppress them immediately by entertaining sublime, divine thoughts. Evil thoughts that have arisen may be destroyed by originating good thoughts and maintaining them by repeating any mantra or the name of the Lord, by thinking on any form of the Lord, by practice of pranayama, by singing the name of the Lord, by doing good actions and by thinking on the misery that arises from evil thoughts.  

When you attain the state of purity no evil thoughts will arise in your mind. Just as it is easy to check the intruder or enemy at the gate, so also it is easy to overcome an evil thought as soon as it arises. Nip it in the bud. Do not allow it to strike deep root.  

In the beginning of your practice of thought-control you will experience great difficulty. You will have to wage war with them. They will try their level best for their own existence. They will say: "We have every right to remain in this palace of your mind. We have had a sole monopoly from time immemorial to occupy this area. Why should we vacate our dominion now? We will fight for our birthright till the end." They will pounce upon you with great ferocity. When you sit for meditation all sorts of evil thoughts will crop up. As you attempt to suppress them they want to attack you with redoubled force and vigour, but positive always overcomes the negative. Just as darkness cannot stand before the sun, just as the leopard cannot stand before the lion, so also all these dark, negative thoughts, invisible intruders and enemies of peace cannot stand before the sublime thoughts. They must die by themselves.  

When you are very busy in your daily work you may not harbour any impure thoughts; but when you take rest and leave the mind blank, the impure thoughts will try to enter insidiously. You must be careful when the mind is relaxed.  

In the beginning all sorts of evil thoughts will arise in your mind as soon as you sit for meditation. Why does this happen during meditation, when you attempt to entertain pure thoughts? Aspirants leave their spiritual practice of meditation on account of this. If you try to drive a monkey, it attempts to pounce upon you with vengeance. Even so, the old evil samskaras and old evil thoughts try to attack you with vengeance and with redoubled force only at the time when you try to raise good, divine thoughts. Your enemy endeavours to resist you vehemently when you try to eject him out of your house. There is a law of resistance in nature. Do not be discouraged. Go on with your practice of meditation regularly. These evil thoughts will be thinned out.  

Suppose the evil thoughts stay in your mind for twelve hours and recur every third day. If, by daily practice of concentration and meditation, you can make them stay for ten hours and recur once in a week, that is a decided improvement. If you continue your practice the period of stay and recurrence will be gradually lessened. Eventually they will disappear altogether. Compare your present state with that of last year. You will be able to find out your progress. The progress will be very slow in the beginning, so it will be difficult for you to gauge.  

Make no violent efforts to control the mind, but rather allow it to run along for a while and exhaust its efforts. It will take advantage of the opportunity and will jump around like an unchained monkey at first, until it gradually slows down and looks to you for orders. It may take some time to tame it down at first, but each time you try it will come around to you in a shorter time.  

If evil thoughts enter the mind do not use your will-force in driving them away. You will only lose your energy, tax your will and fatigue yourself. The greater the efforts you make the more the evil thoughts will return with redoubled force. They will return more quickly and will become more powerful. Be indifferent, keep quiet, they will pass off soon — or substitute good counter-thoughts, or think of the picture of God and the mantra again and again, and pray.  

Your mind will sometimes shudder when evil thoughts enter your mind. This is a sign of your spiritual progress. You are growing spiritually. You will be much tormented when you think of your evil actions committed in the past. This is also a sign of your spiritual upheaval. You will not repeat the same actions now. Your mind will tremble and your body will quiver whenever a wrong samskara of some evil actions urges you to do the same act through force of habit. Continue your meditation with full vigour and earnestness. All memories of evil actions, all evil thoughts, all evil promptings will die by themselves. You will be established in perfect purity and peace.  

An aspirant complains: "As I continue my meditation, layer after layer of impurities rise from the subconscious mind. Sometimes they are so strong and formidable that I am bewildered as to how to check them. I am not perfectly established in truth and brahma-charya. The old habits of speaking lies and lust are still lurking in the mind. Lust is troubling me vigorously. The very idea of women agitates the mind. My mind is so sensitive that I am not able to hear or think of them. As soon as the thought comes in the mind, all the hidden samskaras of lust rise up. As soon as these ideas come in my mind the meditation and also the peace of the whole day is spoiled. I advise my mind, coax it, frighten it, but it is of no avail. My mind revolts. I do not know how to control this passion. Irritability, egoism, anger, greed, hatred, attachment, etc., are still lurking in me. As far as I have analysed the mind, lust is my chief enemy and it is a very strong one too. I request you to be kind enough to advise me how to get rid of the same."  

Passion is lurking in you. You may also ask me the reason why you become frequently angry. Anger is nothing but the modification of passion. When passion is not gratified it assumes the form of anger. The real cause for anger is ungratified passion. It expresses itself in the form of anger when you deal with the mistakes of your servants. This is an indirect cause or external stimulus for its expression. The currents of love and hate are not thoroughly eradicated, they are only attenuated or thinned out to some extent. The senses are yet turbulent. They are subjugated to a small degree, but there are still under-currents of desires and cravings. The outgoing tendencies of the senses are not totally checked and you are not established in sense-control (pratyahara). There is no strong and sustained discrimination or dispassion. The aspiration for the Divine has not become intense. Rajas and tamas are still doing havoc and there is only a small increase in the quantity of sattva. Evil thoughts are not thinned out, they are still powerful. Positive virtues have not been cultivated to a considerable degree. That is why you have not attained perfect concentration. Purify the mind first and concentration will come by itself.  

Positive always overcomes the negative. This is the law of nature. Negative evil thoughts cannot stand before positive good thoughts. Purity overcomes lust, patience overcomes anger and irritability, and love overcomes hatred. The very fact that you feel uneasy now when an evil thought comes to the surface of the mind during meditation indicates that you are growing in spirituality. In earlier days you consciously harboured all sorts of evil thoughts, you welcomed and nourished them.  

Persist in your spiritual practices. Be tenacious and diligent. If you are regular in meditation these thoughts will gradually die by themselves. Meditation is a fire to burn these thoughts. Do not try to drive out all worldly thoughts. Entertain thoughts concerning the object of meditation. You are bound to succeed. Even a dull type of aspirant will notice a marvellous change in him if he keeps up the practice of repetition of a mantra (japa) and meditation for two or three years in a continuous stream. Then he cannot leave it. Even if he stops his practice of meditation for a day he will actually feel that he has lost something on that day. His mind will be quite uneasy.   

Increase your period of japa and meditation, and strengthen non-attachment and discrimination, too. Pray fervently. Live on milk and fruits. All these obstacles will pass away like a rent cloud. With the removal of all troubles you will shine gloriously. The improvement will be known to you. There will be a change in the mind, in speech and in all your actions.  

Obstacles on the Spiritual Path  

Every aspirant will have to face various sorts of difficulties in the spiritual path. Buddha, Uddalaka, Sikhidvaja and others also experienced great difficulties.  

Just as volunteers obstruct the path of those who want to enter a conference without tickets, so also the old tendencies of enmity, hatred, lust, jealousy, fear, honour, respect, etc., assume definite forms and obstruct the path of aspirants. You need not be discouraged on this score. Never despair. Failures are stepping stones to success. Muster all your strength and courage and march afresh on the path with redoubled vigour and energy. No impediment can stand before a man of fiery determination and iron will.  

Perfection cannot be attained in a single birth alone. Perfected sages are the products of the sum-total of virtuous actions done in several births. Lord Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita: "The yogi labouring with assiduity, purified from sin and perfected through manifold births, reaches the supreme Goal." (VI-45)  

When the mind is sattvic you can get flashes of intuition. You will compose poems. You will understand the significance of the Upanishads beautifully. But this stage will not last long in neophytes. Rajas and tamas try to obstruct meditation. The mind that was calm owing to the preponderance of sattva during the course of meditation, begins to tremble and quiver owing to the entry of excess rajas. Thoughts (sankalpas) increase in number. Restlessness increases, thoughts of action manifest and planning and scheming come in.  

The petty obstinate ego which actuates the human personality is a serious obstacle in meditation or the path of Self-realisation. This little self-arrogating principle supports all surface thoughts and dominates the habitual ways of feeling, character and action. This is rajasic and tamasic egoism which conceals or covers the higher divine sattvic nature. It veils the self-luminous immortal Soul or Atman.  

In the beginning the stage of progress may be like the frogs, never steady and continuous. You may think that you have almost reached the goal, and experience for the next 15 or 20 days nothing but disappointment. There will be a jump from position to position, but not a continuous development. Take a little rest. Again do japa. Pray and meditate. Have sustained, intense dispassion and do intense protracted sadhana. Be under the direct guidance and in close contact with your own guru for some years. You will have steady and continuous progress.  

Make ceaseless enquiry of the Atman. Mark well the word 'ceaseless'. This is important. Then only will there be the dawn of spiritual knowledge. The sun of knowledge will arise in the firmament of consciousness.  

A microscopic minority only are fit for whole-timed meditation. Only people like Sadasiva Brahman and Sri Sankara can spend the whole time in meditation. Many sadhus who take to the path of renunciation have become completely tamasic. Tamas is mistaken for sattva. This is a great blunder. One can evolve beautifully by doing karma yoga in the world if he knows how to spend his time profitably. A house-holder should seek the advice of sannyasins and mahatmas from time to time, draw a daily routine and adhere to it strictly amidst worldly activities. Rajas can be converted into sattva, but it is impossible to convert tamas into sattva all of a sudden. Tamas should first be turned into rajas.  

Young sadhus who take to renunciation do not stick to routine. They do not hear the words of elders nor obey the orders of the guru. They want absolute independence from the very beginning. They lead a happy-go-lucky life with no one to check them. They have their own way. They do not know how to regulate their energy or how to chalk out a daily programme, so they aimlessly wander about from place to place and become tamasic within six months. They sit for half an hour in some asana and imagine that they are realised souls.  

If an aspirant who has taken to renunciation finds that he is not evolving or improving in meditation and that he is going into a tamasic state, he should at once take up some kind of service for some years and work vigorously. He should combine work along with meditation. This is wisdom, this is prudence, this is sagacity. Then he should go into seclusion. He should use his common-sense all throughout his sadhana. It is very difficult to go out of a tamasic state. He should be very cautious, and when tamas tries to overtake him he should immediately do some sort of brisk work. He can run in the open air, draw water from the wells, etc. He should drive it off by some intelligent means or other.  

Samskaras turn into actualities when opportunities crop up, but the aspirant should not be discouraged. They will lose their force after some time and die by themselves. Just as the dying wick burns with intensity just before it gets extinguished, so also those old samskaras show their teeth and force before they are eradicated. The aspirant should not get unnecessarily alarmed. He will have to increase the force or momentum of spiritual samskaras by doing japa, meditation, study of scriptures (svadhyaya), virtuous actions, satsang and cultivation of sattvic virtues. These new spiritual samskaras will neutralise the old vicious ones. The aspirant should be intent on his sadhana, he should plunge himself into spiritual practices. This is his obligatory duty.  

When the aspirant does intense sadhana to obliterate the old samskaras, they try to rebound upon him with vengeance and with re-doubled force. They take forms and come before him as stumbling blocks. The old samskaras of fear, moha (delusion or extreme greed), hatred, jealousy, prejudice, fault-finding, self-justification, back-biting, building castles in the air, evil thoughts and passion assume grave forms.  

Fear is a very great obstacle in the path of God-realisation. A timid aspirant is absolutely unfit for the spiritual path. He cannot dream of Self-realisation even in a thousand births. One must risk one's life if one wants to attain immortality. Spiritual wealth cannot be gained without self-sacrifice, self-denial or self abnegation. A fearless dacoit who has no false identification with the body is fit for God-realisation. Only his thought current will have to be changed. Fear is an imaginary non-entity. It assumes solid forms and troubles the aspirant in various ways. If one conquers fear he is on the road to success, he has almost reached the goal. Tantric sadhana makes the student fearless. This is one great advantage in this line. He has to practise in the burial ground, sitting over a dead body at midnight. This kind of sadhana emboldens the student.  

Fear assumes various forms. There is fear of death, fear of disease, scorpion-phobia, fear of solitude, fear of company, fear of losing something and fear of public criticism in the form of' what will people say about me?' Some are not afraid of tigers in the forests, they are not afraid of gunshots in the battlefield, but they are awfully afraid of public criticism. Fear of public criticism stands in the way of the aspirant's spiritual progress. He should stick to his own principles and convictions, even though he is persecuted and even though he is at the point of being blown up at the mouth of a machine-gun. Then only will he grow and realise. All aspirants suffer from this dire malady — fear. Fear of all sorts should be totally eradicated by contemplation on the Atman, enquiry, devotion and cultivation of the opposite quality — courage. Courage overpowers fear and timidity.  

Moha (delusion or extreme greed) is very hard to overcome. First comes desire, then comes anger, then greed, then moha. Desire is very powerful, so prominence is given to it. There is an intimate connection between desire and anger. Similarly, there is close relationship between greed and delusion. A greedy man has got great deluded attachment for his money. His mind is always on the money-box and the bunch of keys he has tied to his waist-cord. Money is his very blood and life. He lives to collect money, he is a gate-keeper only for his money. The enjoyer is his prodigal son. Money-lenders are the favourite tools of our friend greed. He has taken his stronghold in their minds. These are the Shylocks of the present day. They suck the blood of poor people by taking enormous interest (25 per cent, 50 per cent and even 100 per cent at times). Cruel-hearted people! They pretend to show that they are of charitable disposition by doing acts such as opening poor-feeding houses, building temples, etc., but such acts cannot neutralise their abominable sins and merciless acts. Many poor families are ruined by these people. They do not think that the bungalows and palaces in which they live are built out of the blood of these poor people.  

Greed has destroyed their intellect and made them absolutely blind. They have eyes but they see not. Greed always makes the mind restless. A man possessing ten thousand rupees plans to get one hundred thousand, a millionaire schemes to become a multimillionaire. Greed is insatiable, there is no end to it. It assumes various subtle forms. A man thirsts for name and fame and applause. This is greed. A sub-judge thirsts to become a High Court judge and a third class magistrate thirsts to become a first-class magistrate with full powers. This is also greed. A sadhu thirsts for psychic siddhis. This is another form of greed. A sadhu thirsts to open several ashrams in different centres. This is also greed. A greedy man is absolutely unfit for the spiritual path. Destroy greed of all sorts by enquiry, devotion, meditation, japa, contentment, integrity, honesty and disinterestedness, and enjoy peace.  

Moha is also infatuated love for one's own body, wife, children, father, mother, brothers, sisters and property. Like greed, it takes various subtle forms. The mind gets attached to one name and form. If it is detached from one name and form, it clings tenaciously to another.  

Look at the attachment of monkeys. If the baby monkey dies, the mother monkey will carry the dead skeleton for two or three months. Such is the power of attachment. If a father receives a telegram that his only son is dead, he immediately gets a shock and faints. Sometimes, he dies also. This is the power of attachment — the whole world runs through it. It is through attachment that one is bound to the wheel of samsara and gets pain. It is a kind of powerful liquor that brings intoxication in the twinkling of an eye.  

Attachment troubled even Sri Sankaracharya. He had to attend the sick-bed and funeral rites of his mother, even though he was a sannyasin. A great sage, Pattinattu Swami of South India, sang when his mother died: "There was a fire at first in Tripura Samhara. Then there was a fire in Lanka due to Hanuman. Now the death of my beloved mother has caused a burning fire in my stomach and heart. Let me also apply fire to this corpse of my mother." This attachment should be eradicated by discrimination (viveka), dispassion (vairagya), enquiry (vichara), contemplation of God, devotion, seclusion, study of vedantic literature, etc. It can only be completely removed by renunciation, sannyasa and Self-realisation.  

Hatred is the deadliest foe of an aspirant. It is an inveterate enemy. It is an old-standing associate of the jiva. Contempt, prejudice, sneering, taunting, teasing, ridiculing, mocking, frowning and showing wry faces are all forms of hatred. Hatred bubbles out again and again. It is insatiable like lust or greed. It may temporarily subside for some time, and may again burst out with redoubled force. If the father dislikes a man, his sons and daughters also begin to hate that man without any rhyme or reason whatsoever, although that man has not done them any wrong or injustice. Such is the force of hatred. If any one even remembers the figure of a man who has done him some serious injury some forty years ago, at once hatred creeps into his mind and his face shows clear signs of enmity and anger.  

Hatred develops by repetition. Hatred ceases not by hatred but by love only. Hatred needs prolonged and intense treatment, as its branches ramify in various directions in the sub-conscious mind. It lurks in different corners. Constant selfless service combined with meditation for a period of twelve years is necessary. An Englishman hates an Irishman and an Irishman hates an Englishman. A Catholic hates a Protestant and a Protestant hates a Catholic. This is religious hatred. There is communal hatred. One man hates another man at first sight without any reason. Selfishness, jealousy, greed and lust are the retinue of hatred. In Kali Yuga the force of hatred is augmented. Pure unselfish love should be cultivated. It is unknown in this world amongst worldly people.  

One should have fear of God. Solomon says: "Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." Service with the feeling that everything is the Self can remove hatred completely and bring realisation of the oneness of life. Prejudice, contempt, etc., will completely vanish by selfless service. Vedanta in daily life when put into actual practice can eradicate all sorts of hatred. There is one Self hidden in all beings. Then why do you frown at others? Why do you treat others with contempt? Why do you divide and separate? Realise the unity of life and consciousness. Feel the Atman everywhere. Rejoice and radiate love and peace everywhere.  

Prejudice is unreasonable dislike for something or some person. Prejudice makes the brain callous, it cannot vibrate properly to grasp things in their true light and one cannot endure honest differences of opinion. This is intolerance. Religious intolerance and prejudice are great obstacles in the path of God-realisation. Some orthodox Sanskrit priests strongly think that only Sanskrit-knowing people can have God-realisation. They think that English-knowing sannyasins are barbarians and that they cannot have Self-realisation. Look at the thick foolishness of these bigoted priests! Incorrigible, petty-minded, narrow-hearted, crooked sectarians! If a man has prejudice against the Bible or Koran he cannot grasp the truths of these books.  

His brain becomes hard, stony and callous. A man can realise God by studying and following the principles that are laid down in the Koran, Bible or Zend Avesta or the Pali books of Lord Buddha.  

Aspirants should try to remove prejudice of all sorts; then only can they see the truth everywhere. Truth is not the sole monopoly of the Sanskrit priests of Benares. Truth, Rama, Krishna and Jesus are the common property of all.  

Sectarians and bigoted people confine themselves to a small circumscribed circle or area. They have no large heart. They cannot see the good points in others on account of their jaundiced vision. They think that only their principles and doctrines are good. They treat others with contempt. They think that their sect is superior to others and that their teacher only is a man of God-realisation. They always fight with others. There is no harm in praising one's own guru and sticking to his principles and teachings, but one should pay equal regard to the teachings of other prophets and other saints. Then only will the feeling of universal love and brotherhood manifest. This will eventually lead to the realisation of God or Atman in all beings. Prejudice, intolerance, bigotry and sectarianism should be thoroughly eradicated. Prejudice and intolerance are forms of hatred. Even highly educated people are very mean and petty-minded.  

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