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Belur Math News Vedanta Society of Toronto (Ramakrishna Mission) 120 Emmett Ave. Toronto, ON CANADA M6M 2E6 Tel: 416-240-7262 Fax: 416-245-3764 Email: [email protected] Website: www.vedantatoronto.ca Newsletter November 2010 Words to Inspire Bondage is not outside. It is within. Bondage is in one’s own mind, but it mistakenly appears to be outside. Once can understand this clearly when one’s mind becomes pure through good karma and God’s grace. But the intellectual understanding is not enough to get rid of bondage. It is through the grace of the guru and intense self-effort that one becomes free from bondage. -Spiritual Treasures - Letters of Swami Turiyananda- At Peace With Oneself (Practical Spirituality – Swami Lokeshwarananda, p 5-6) Life is a torment with most people. A satisfy his desires and he satisfies them, the same continuing, unremitting torment. They find life such a desires will attack him with redoubled fury as soon as cruel joke that they wish they could get rid of it. The they are fulfilled. Hindu philosophy compares desires sooner, the better. The reason varies from individual to to fire. Just as fire is never extinguished by the individual. It may be poverty, disease, bereavement, or addition of fuel to it, so also desires never got rid of disappointment, but ironically, the reason, in some by satisfying them. The more they are satisfied, the cases, is one’s own self. The torment, in other words, is more they grow in intensity. Also, if one desire goes, self-inflicted. It is self-inflicted in the sense that it is not another immediately takes it place. Thus man is real, it is imaginary. If you ask such people what is constantly plagued by desires. An odd aspect of the hurting them, they will say they do not know. That does situation is that some of the desires remain not make the suffering less painful. There is also no easy unidentified; they hide themselves somewhere under relief for the suffering because the cause is not known. surface of the mind and never show up till an The fact of the matter is that the cause, if there is any at opportune moment arrives. It is such desires that give all, is not objective. It is in the mind, embedded the most trouble to man. A man with such desires is somewhere in its depth. To outsiders, it does not exist, it always unhappy but he does not know why he is is imaginary, but to the sufferer it is real, very much so, unhappy. the only reality. Hindu philosophy advises equanimity under Why is it so, why do people suffer when there is all circumstances. It says, man should try to remain no reason, no apparent reason at least, that they should calm in face of both pleasure and pain, success and suffer? It is understandable if a man suffers because of failure. Whatever may happen, he should remain some misfortune, which throws him completely out of unperturbed. But is it possible? According to gear, but when there is no such calamity, why should he Hinduism, it is possible if man can rid his mind of suffer? Hindu philosophy has an explanation for this, desires. Desirelessness is considered an ideal state of which however fantastic it may sound, deserves a close mind. To attain this state he has to practice look. It says that man suffers because he has too many discrimination. Most of the time he craves for desires, some prominent and some not very prominent ephemeral things; instead, he should struggle to get but no less pressing. There are desires which get things that last long. What are those things? In one fulfilled, and there are desires which never get fulfilled. word, perfection. There is no short cut to perfection. It is good that all his desires are not fulfilled, but he does One has to struggle hard for it. Hinduism does not not think so and he begins to fret. The unfulfilled desires believe in any miracle except the miracle of hard keep nagging at him constantly, and he never has a work. To be at peace with himself, man has to have moment’s peace of mind. If he is a person with means to this perfection. Freedom through faith – Part II (Delivered by Swami Swahananda at the Vedanta Society of Toronto) Your mental attitude controls the external situations there is a God, who will protect us, gave people because all the enjoyments and sufferings of the some hope to survive. Although God did not world are not so much in the body as they are in the actually protect many people, but still that hope mind. Say you have a heavy cold. You might kept them alive. So faith in God proved complain of body ache and fever, and you start beneficial. feeling that God is so unkind to you. Then you read the newspaper that one million Americans are suffering from the flu. Immediately on reading this Faith gives courage and freedom. The more news, you start feeling better, not because your courage you develop, the more free you feel. fever and body ache has lessened, but you now Arnold J. Toynbee in his book ‘Civilization on know that one million people are with you. Your Trial’ said that modern people do not mind has now gone out of yourself and related itself understand how much of their freedom is to the other one million people. curtailed. Previously if anybody wanted to travel anywhere it was so easy. But nowadays it That is why when somebody dies, the near and requires so much documentation to be filled in dear ones are asked to do service to other before you can travel. This way the freedom is people, so that their mind gets diverted from curtailed. themselves and they feel less pain. Thinking about ourselves results in suffering. But once Now we discuss about faith on the lower level we start practicing unselfishness, we start – political and social level. There also, if the considering what is beneficial to others and as a people do not have confidence in their result our suffering is reduced. government, the government cannot last. It is one of the axioms of jurisprudence that a The mental attitude that there is a God, can be majority of the people must agree to the law. of great help to us. If you have faith in God, Otherwise the law will not have any validity. then even when you are sick, you start thinking They may punish you if you break it, but still that God is there to protect you and you feel that law has no validity in the minds of the better. So faith will save you from anxiety: that people. is the main benefit of faith. Any belief or any theory that gives confidence to man, is worth When the Second World War took place, I was considering. It need not be the truth, but if it in India. Due to shortage of food the British can impress the mind and give it confidence, government introduced rationing. The monthly then it will do good to us. For example, a child ration was so little that it would only cover us has complete faith that his mother is there to for 20-25 days. After that there was no food. protect him. The mother may know that in But just 25 miles away, there was a ration-free reality it is beyond her ability to protect the zone and one could buy any amount of food child. But the child feels sure that his mother there. So most of the people would travel there will protect him. and bring a small quantity of food from that place and would sell here. In 1946 there were riots in Kolkata. Hundreds of innocent people were killed. Hostels were We used to manage a children home with about attacked and many students were killed. Later 167 students. The food was always scarce – on the police came in and controlled the how could we feed the students was our main situation. But during this period, the idea that concern. We complained about the food shortage to the Government. They advised us to close down the hostel. Meanwhile the local the weaker power. So if by freedom we refer to magistrate issued an order that this law of political freedom, whether we have freedom or rationing was immoral and the Minister then not depends on what the social circumstances lifted the ban. Here also since we had faith in are. But from a spiritual point of view, your God, we did not starve. Faith will sustain you. very nature is freedom. We are always anxious about our future; in fact You may say that it is not your experience. But a major part of our suffering is for the past and there is an important teaching: ‘As you think, the future. All the time we repent about the past so you become’. Having faith in the teaching and are anxious of the future. In fact, we should will help you to realize it. It is not true that we always enjoy the present, and not spend all our are bound or that we are sinners. Sri energy in worrying about the past or the future. Ramakrishna said that one should not repeat If we have faith in God, then we will be free such things as ‘I am a sinner’. To call from these anxieties. somebody a sinner is sin itself.
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