Hari
Om
Each 'Choose-day' we will investigate the process by
which we can reassess our activity and interaction with the world of plurality
and become more congruent within our personality.
Continuing
posts prompted by the prasaadam grantha, "Gita in Daily life" by Sw.
Tejomayananda.
At
the close of last week's post, it was shown that we have to act upon what we
learn in order to gain benefit from that learning, in the same way that
medicine must be taken for our ills to be eased. In the Bhagavad Gita there is a
reminder of this; " ज्ञात्वा शास्त्रविधानोक्तं कर्म कर्तुमिहार्हसि /jnaatvaa shaastravidhaanoktam karma
kartumihaarhasi" (16:24), 'having understood the scriptures, act
accordingly'. That is fairly plain!
It
seems a simple sentence does it not? Think it through a little and what it
means in daily life. We all experience life at various times in sorrow and in
other times less sorrow. There are multiple reasons for the sorrows, but one
key aspect is that of thoughtless action. We all know this - the mind is not
focused on the task in hand, for example, so we cut our fingers or burn
ourselves. That is in the very practical sense. It can be carried into the more
psychological and emotional levels also. If we are not paying full attention,
troubles will arise. Conversely, there is the actionless thought - "oh yes
that is to be done, no worries, later…" Are we not all guilty of this at
some point in each day? Mostly it is harmless, in respect to the world around
us. However it harms us, in terms of our spiritual nature.
If
we do not act according to our knowledge and understanding, not only is there
implied hypocrisy, but also there lies a danger of the knowledge and the
understanding starting to change as they get tainted by the actions we are taking. How so? Take the example that we
all know the value of rising early, doing exercise, meditation, perhaps some
study and such like. Let us say we set 5am as our time to rise each day in
order to cover all the necessary actions listed. We will certainly start out
well. At some point though, we will find that 'not this morning, I didn't sleep
so well…'
Been
there done that? Now, we may pick ourselves up from this, either from guilt or
because there was genuine case of poor sleep. So we set back to our 5am
routine. All good. Till the next falter. There are those who
will continually correct themselves and keep getting back to the routine. There
are others, though, who will let several mornings go by. The longer this
happens the more difficult it becomes to correct the behaviour. What happens
then?
There
comes an altering in the knowledge and understanding in that the thought may
arise "What use this early rising? Birds and animals rise early but where
does it serve them? Are they any wiser? How is it serving me?..." It is
not that the question is being asked from high philosophical reasoning, but
from the perspective of the rationalisation and justification for sloth! Our
knowledge has become miscoloured by our behaviour. Instead of acting according
to the guidance of our tutors, parents, scriptures, Guru…. We are acting on our
own preference and calling it logic.
When
knowledge is correctly absorbed, properly assimilated, it naturally becomes a
part of our life. The problem lies in the fact that we mistake simply reading
or hearing a thing as 'knowing' it. NOT SO! To read the words of Yeshu or
Krishna, to hear the words of the minister or Guru is to know that they have knowledge, but is not yet our
knowledge. We
must become as though we are spiritual scientists. This requires that we put
the knowledge to the test thus making it our own. This is the true import of
that sentence from the Gita.
This
implies that we are making a full and conscious choice to learn about bettering
ourselves and advancing our connection with the spirit. We can choose to hit
the snooze alarm. Or we can choose to "Arise! Awake!..."
