C: I don’t mean to compare myself with Ram. My life isn’t easy, it is a nomadic sort of life – the obligations that come with what society calls comfort. I declined the offer, so to speak. That doesn’t mean I was always smart about the route I seem to have taken, yet whatever the result; the consequences bothered me way less than a seeming ‘safe life’. This goes for relationships and stuff, both. I love but hardly attach. I commit but don’t promise – something like that. A friend of mine once said; your problem is that you neither follow nor lead – you should make a choice. He clarified a dynamic between me and people, those with authority and those without. I don’t feel to be in either category; I never made a choice, it wasn’t a problem, not to my mind. These are worldly experiences.
S: It sounds like you have the natural disposition of a sannyasi, one who has renounced the world but not removed himself from it. Sannyas is a form of asceticism marked by the renunciation of material desires and prejudices, represented by a state of disinterest and detachment from material life. It has the purpose of spending one’s life in a peaceful, love-inspired, simple spiritual life. There are two basic types of Sannyasi. The first type is the temperamental sannyasi who has no karma in the world, is not interested in relationships, sex, money, owning stuff, etc., so they do not need to do karma yoga. They are natural renunciates who usually remove themselves from the world. Then there is the lifestyle sannyasi who lives in the world and has a normal life but also does not need to do much karma yoga because there is nothing they really want or need. As an inquirer, such a person usually only needs to do srvanna, manana, and nididhysana.
Either way, this is not something that the desire-driven world understands or approves of. In the world of duality, one is required to want things, objects, status people, etc. If you are indifferent to having or owning anything you are considered weird! I had this problem too, and my family did not understand me. I didn’t understand ‘me’ for a long time either. I just had no material ambitions; my main drive was always spiritual. This is not to say that security (artha) was not an issue. For a long time, it was until I realized that there is no such thing as security in this world. I am it. After that, I threw away all security several times to follow my svadharma, and then Vedanta came along. Seeking love had also been a problem, but by then the need for the ‘other’ had completely disappeared also, which is what qualified me for Self-realization. But as we know, that is only the start of self-inquiry, really.
C: About Isvara helping those who help themselves … A nitty-gritty question, a ‘real’ situation, but I mean it more general; – it is the Artha thing, it is ok, but I want to understand it better – if possible because on the one hand I have to be smart in this world and at the same time I have nothing to do with it. There is something in me, jiva, that doesn’t know how to do that. I am fine with ‘me’ – but I don’t/didn’t understand the difference between taking care of me and selfishness, I think … This plays into a sense of ‘lack’ and being able to go on with little to nothing, both. A plus and a minus 🙂
Sundari: It’s really simple. There is no problem with doing or not doing anything if you are not identified with the doer. Following your svadharma means taking appropriate action to achieve a specific aim, but a true sannyasi does so knowing that Isvara is the giver of the results of action. When you are not identified with the one who wants, there is no problem with desire because all desire will be in line with Isvara. The Advaita shuffle is when people say ‘well, I am not the doer, so why should I bother doing anything? It’s all up to Isvara’. All well and good. But as Isvara does not mind either way, if this means you starve to death or never use your God-given potential to do anything noble in life, so be it. It doesn’t affect you as the Self one bit.
C: This ‘problem’ is leaving me – as jiva knows how to wait things out and I remove many doubts.
Sundari: As a true sannyasi, this is what happens. You do not need to resolve anything because you are naturally attuned to not being the doer. Isvara takes care of all of it naturally.
C: Mithya seems to be an either ‘either, or’ pattern – for jiva – because it is limited. The optional character of Maya, brings, experientially, the making of choices. Doing something for results is one aspect, dealing with what is another, in a way – but there is a control over-responding. To give an example; I needed a new pair of trousers, a new pipe for the fireplace and new boots. There is hardly any money for all this. But I bought it anyway to get through winter – instead of fixing it, again.
Getting the pipe, trousers, and some boots to come did make me feel good; a karma yoga for me? This was a conscious choice; an effort to change the ‘lack’ behavior. Some bills must be paid too: a dentist and other stuff, also very needed, but must now wait, so I meet with another problem; risking fines. Unless I crawl through another eye of the needle. So, my mind goes like this; ‘Both, and’ is the best approach to life. The ‘either/or’ is included by the former, at times, but not vice versa. Nonetheless, where the rubber hits the road, in terms of choices to make, is often an ‘either/or’ – a fork in the road, optional and unknown – the result-thing: Isvara. Internally the ‘both, and’ rules my vision. The ‘either, or’ rules action – to a degree, it seems.
Sundari: Mithya is essentially about either/or. Vedanta is about both/and. It all depends on which level you are talking about. The jiva who knows it is the Self acts naturally in accordance with Isvara because it is Isvara. At this point trusting Isvara is first, not second nature, so choices are easy. You always choose dharma because you are dharma. In your case, you needed a new pair of trousers, boots, and a working fireplace to keep warm for the winter, so you did what needed to be done, it is dharmic. If you had squandered your money on gratuitous desires instead, that would be adharmic.
C: I must quit smoking which takes two weeks of not working because the physical response (withdrawal) is intense – I cannot handle, and should not handle machines or drive, and probably not people …, yet I cannot really afford to not work. So, nonetheless, I think I will choose a good momentum to risk the money and do something good for my body – for how else would I get rid of smoking? We’ll see.
Sundari: This is a practical approach, although it is a catch/22. Perhaps for now to sin intelligently is more appropriate, so cut down on smoking.
C: Because I see my jiva and I am love, I am fine, even if all goes to hell – the mind has its natural calm. Certain rajas maybe painful, or ‘pain-like’ – and to purify the mind, the subtle body some ‘more’ is only good for jiva. But jiva then thinks, ‘ok, but how exactly?’ If I buy boots my feet are warm and dry – so Isvara has to make sure the money gap will be solved somehow… or not, but fuck it; I need boots and not worry about the bills. There is no good answer it seems.
Sundari: The answer is always to trust Isvara to provide what is needed and go with what makes sense.
C: My doubt/question is; is this gritty example what it means to help one self? So, if Isvara wants me to continue, live a life, but jiva doesn’t take care of the basics, legitimate needs, Isvara has a ‘hard time’ supplying the necessities. But if jiva ‘does’ it, it goes easier? It all boils down to karma yoga; but in making such choices, I never know where to put the surrender precisely. Weird sentence, sorry – But I may as well have warm feet, the dentist must wait.
Sundari: See above. I second that motion! The surrender goes to Isvara in every thought word and deed. So, you surrender the buying necessities you require more urgently now over paying for other necessities that can wait, and trust the Isvara supports the process, while doing what you need to do to take care of your short and long-term karma.
C: Being carefree … I enjoyed a bunch of ‘sins’, and lived an edgy life – plenty of speed, weed, and all that. Mushrooms, ayahuasca. Sniffing powders and drinking vodka while building movie sets all night long. It supplies a nice flow. Happy days, but I am happy these days are over 🙂 I didn’t trust it either – I saw too many broken people. Peace of mind is the joy I love the most – and certain pleasure brings that. It is the temporal removal of desire. Certain substances seem to be a fake or gross samadhi.
Sundari: It is good that you went through all those experiences. Because you have the nature of a sannyasi, as Ram did, you were never truly hooked by any of them, you just observed them.
C: These days, weeks, I can see the guna’s (and vasana’s) and only nonsensical thinking/feeling are given a slam. In themselves, it is just stuff. What you said about sattva being the nature of the mind clarified a lot. Satva for satva :)…The gunas give the perfect description of what experience feels like, what it is, and how they endlessly mix and un-mix in countless combinations like colors do. I am not that, essentially, but vice versa, it is, it may be.
Sundari: Well put. It’s all a trick of light!
Sundari: As an artist, you must have experienced synaesthesia.
C: Yes, especially seeing and touching. Seeing is touching, touching an object called ‘distance’, let’s say – and touch gives me a visual impression. Sound too becomes form sometimes – colored mostly. And now that you mention this sense organ effect, maybe that’s how a riddle, or a rhyme came to mind years ago:
‘Instant distance dividing evidence.’ That meant something, and I ended up using these words and their place as a device to analyze space. The aim was to use space as the very material to make sculpture, apart from the usual approach to form and matter. It worked – I now have works in mind that refer to space as matter. It was a way that helped my mind, later, to understand the teachings also; that is, for jiva. This analysis was a beautiful adventure for my mind 🙂 When ‘my’ mind seems tamasic, sadhana feels like hacking into stone, with some rajasic force and a sattvic meaning. But in so many ways all this is unreal, so nothing is needed, except correcting odd thinking patterns.
Sundari: I would be interested to see those pieces when ‘you’ make them!
C: Beginningless: because how can ignorance ‘begin’? But if this is correct, then something made space; an ‘idea’ prior to space, but an idea or thought, known, is also matter … Does this notion make sense? Or do I confuse something here?
Sundari: Beginningless ignorance means it never began because it is a power in Awareness, which never began because it is not in time or space. Time and space are objects known to Awareness.
C: Ah, there’s the logic; Awareness has no beginning, so nothing has a particular beginning; but the impossible made possible, does end; because it isn’t, yet is.
Sundari: Yes. Beginningless ignorance as Macrocosmic Maya does not end, it just goes unmanifest when the mithya movie ends. It will reappear ‘one fine day’ and another show will begin. But personal ignorance, avidya, ends because Self-knowledge removes it. When it does, that particular Subtle body or program is no more.
C: This, it seems to me, also accounts for the notion that ‘things’ seem self-contained objects, a rock is a rock, a tree a tree, laughter is laughter – yet, on analysis, none of it remains or breaks apart. Sadhana/knowledge is like an intentional entropy of ignorance, destroying it – removing it. So, knowledge is Isvara making, maintaining, breaking it all down. At times my jiva gets the impression that there is only one Day, one moment, of this event – a blip, and no more.
Sundari: You are right, there is only one day, it is the same day every day. It’s Groundhog Day! There are only three states of experience available to the jiva, awake, dream, and deep sleep, and though they seem to be discrete experiences, it is always the same day for the Self. When all ignorance has been removed by Self-knowledge, there is no more karma for you because the association with your identity as a jiva is as good as non-existent. Karma may come to the jiva, but it does not come to you as the Self. And because there is no benefit from breaking dharma because it’s all you, you never do, so the jiva’s karma is pretty peaceful. Peace of mind is paramount. Time no longer has the same meaning, though the Subtle body still goes through the motions of waking dreaming, and sleeping, and entropy.
C: I think, in hindsight, that this is why I didn’t feel all too bad or guilty about certain failures or ‘wrong results’. I could see how things worked out well or not – a lot of the time, it has nothing to do with my particular action; and/or it does, jiva’s portion, but then still… If one is sincere it is good enough – whatever the result.
Sundari: There are no bad results or ‘failures’. Just results. You can take appropriate action at the appropriate time with the karma yoga attitude and still fail. Isvara gives results according to the needs of the Total and our karma stream. We do the best we can in each situation with the knowledge we have. Sometimes that involves ‘failing’. But who fails? Nobody fails. Ignorance causes us to misunderstand what is required of us, so we seem to fail. But both failure and success, like the poet, Rudyard Kipling said so eloquently in his poem IF, are both imposters just the same.
C: It is, it must be, so – my jiva feels (finally) an internal ‘capacity’ and a trust within to understand this, know Myself – as I am, as All is – Existence. Truth.
Sundari: I am so happy for you, you deserve it. Go with that and trust Isvara to take care of all your getting and your keeping, while doing what needs to be done. You know, chop wood, fetch water…
Much love
Sundari
