Topic: Harmony in Self – Understanding Myself Human being is the co-existence of self and body. The body is the instrument of self and self is the seer, doer and enjoyer. Self is continuously active to fulfill its need for happiness. Why Should I Study Myself Knowing ourselves better helps us in the following ways: 1. The self is the basis of everything we do. All the desires and expectations we have are all there in self. For e.g. to be famous, to get good marks, get great job, having good relationships in our family or wanting ‘rasgulla’. Hence, it becomes important to understand these desires, thoughts, and activities in self, so that we know whether they are right. 2. To understand happiness better and the causes for unhappiness because happiness and unhappiness are states in self. 3. It helps us have more clarity about how we are within. This helps us become self- confident. It also helps in establishing proper synergy between the self and the body. 4. Study of self unable us to know our weaknesses and how to remove. 5. The more we understand ourselves, the more we understand other person as well and our relationship with them. 6. It helps us to better understand our program, i.e. what is valuable to us, or what do we ultimately want and how do we fulfill them. Activities in Self The self is conscious in nature while the body is physico-chemical in nature. The interaction between the ‘I’ and the body is in the form of exchange of information. So the focus of attention is on two categories of attributes of the self, namely, the powers of the self and the corresponding activities as the manifest outcomes of these powers. 1. Power: This means the basic capacity in the self (‘I’). They are: desires, thoughts and expectations. 2. Activities: The activities are: imaging, analyzing, and selecting/tasting. The activity of analyzing means breaking down the image into various parts or to open it up. Selecting/tasting is with the expectation of fulfilling our desires with the expectation of happiness. The activity of selecting/tasting is the basic level via which the self interacts with the body. Activities in self are related There are two possible flows of the activities and both keep taking place: Form outside (the body) to inside (in ‘I’) 1. Self receives sensations from body tasted in ‘I’ e.g. our self see a car through the information via ‘eyes’. 2. Based on taste, thought could be triggered e.g. we start thinking about the car. 3. Based on these thoughts, desires may be set e.g. when we starts thinking about the car it forms an image that we are leading a good life by using a car and this way a good life by having a car becomes a desire. Selection leads to Thoughts leads to Desires Form inside (in ‘I’) to outside (the body) 1. When desire is set we start forming thoughts about fulfilling this desire. E.g. with the desire of a good life via the car, we start thinking about how to get the car, what is the cost of the car, how can I have that car, etc. 2. Based on this we make selection to fulfill these thoughts e.g. we choose the car its shape color etc and then end up buying it. Desires leads to Thoughts leads to Selection Together we call these activities as imagination. Activities in self are continuous. Selection leads to Thoughts leads to Desires leads to Thoughts leads to Selection We make choices with the external world based on our imagination today. Imagination = Desires + Thoughts + Expectations This activity of imagination in ‘I’ is continuous and not temporary. The power may change but the activity is continuous. The object of the taste may change but the activity of selecting/tasting is continuous. Also what we analyze may keep changing the activity of analyzing is continuous. E.g. my object of taste may change from rasgulla, to engineering or nice looking bike, etc. similarly I may analyze about my personal life at one moment and about my surrounding at the next moment and may start thinking about my relationships. These activities keep going on in us irrespective of whether we want them or not. This is what happens when we say “I was going to the exam and that song kept repeating itself in me, it was so distracting”. What is the problem today? Desires, thoughts and expectations are largely being set by pre-conditioning and sensations Preconditioning: Preconditioning means we have assumed something about it on the basis of prevailing notion about it. We have not verified the desires in our own right. As a result, we are not clear about what we will get out of fulfillment of that desire. What is the issue with that? Unless we verify our desires, we may not even know whether they are our! We may end up spending an entire lifetime accumulating desires that are not our, and in running abut trying to fulfill them! Sensations: A perception associated with stimulation of a sense organ or with a specific body condition: the sensation of heat; a visual sensation. A term commonly used to refer to the subjective experience resulting from stimulation of a sense organ, for instance, a sensation of warm, sour, or green. Suppose you had seen the bike and not associated it with ‘greatness’; rather you only liked the way it ‘looked’ – then this is based on the sensation. This is largely the case with us today: either we are operating on the basis of preconditioned desires (set from outside) or on the basis of sensation (coming from the body). Effects of the problem… A. Conflicts and contradictions in ‘I’ as a result of pre-conditioned desire We have not verified the desires, thoughts and expectations in us on the basis of our own natural acceptance. As a result, these desires, thoughts and selections are in conflicts. Since the desires are in conflict, the thoughts they give rise to, are also in conflict and in turn, the selection from the thoughts are also in conflicts. This conflict affects us in different manners: 1. Wavering aspirations: Our goals keep shifting as the inputs from the outside also keep changing. Our desires thus keep shifting, because their source is outside and these preconditioned desires may come from what we read, see, hear, from media, friends, society, etc. hence, we are always wavering in what we want; we are not able to be certain about it. 2. Lack of confidence: Since our desires are shaky, we are not sure about them. As a result, we lack self confidence, in the true sense. Our confidence seems relative i.e. we keep comparing ourselves with others in order to feel confident. 3. Unhappiness/conflicts: Since our desires, thoughts and expectations are in conflict, it becomes the cause for our unhappiness, leading to stress and tension. Such desires will also be in conflict with our natural acceptance 4. Lack of qualitative improvement in us: We focus largely on fulfilling the needs of the body. As a result, we live with a sense of lack of fulfillment. We are doing many things, accumulating a lot, progressing on paper, but we don’t feel that we have improved, that we have become better. It seems that only the things around us are changing! 5. State of resignation: Because we do not understand ourselves properly and have contradictions within, we slowly start getting disillusioned (pleasant but mistaken beliefs). We feel that there are no solutions to these issues, and end up in a state of resignation. To sum up, if our desires, thoughts and expectations are based on pre-conditionings, we are generally in a state of great confusion. This leads to confusion, unhappiness, conflict and stress. We have lack of clarity about the self, relationships, society, nature and existence. We have lack of confidence. We have a feeling of being unfulfilled, unsettled. We operate largely on the basis of the environment, driven from the outside – either from sensations, or based on pre- conditionings. B. Short lived nature of pleasure from sensations: The pleasure obtained from sensations is short-lived. We are driven by five sensations (sound from the ears, touch from the skin, sight through eyes, taste from the mouth, and smell from the nose) and most of the time we are busy trying to get pleasure from sensations, from the senses. We have so much dependent on sensations that instead of giving us some sensory pleasure, it becomes the source for our happiness. Then what is the issue with this is? This can be understood as follows: The external object is temporary in nature the contact of the external object with the body is temporary in nature. The sensation from the body to ‘I’ is temporary. And at last the taste of the sensation from the body in ‘I’ is also temporary. The need of the ‘I’ is continuous, i.e. we want to have happiness, and its continuity. Therefore, if the source for our happiness is temporary by definition, then our need for continuous happiness will never be fulfilled. Hence, any sensation we have from the body can’t be the source for our lasting happiness. No matter how much you try to be become happy via the senses, or via bodily sensation, it does not last. This does not mean that we stop these sensations from the body, or that we stop tasting from the senses. It only means that we need to understand the limitations of happiness or pleasure got from the sensations from the body and need to understand what is there use or purpose. If we confuse this purpose with the happiness, we are in trouble, since something that is temporary can’t be the source for our continuous happiness. We can thus understand that living on the basis of preconditioning (“good life means having a nice car”) or sensations (happiness out of taste from the body) means being in a state of being decided by the others or outside, i.e. enslaved (partantrata). We are at the mercy of the preconditioning and the sensation. Whereas, we want to be in the state of self-organization of being decided by our own self, in our own right (svantrata). What is the solution? The solution is to start verifying our desires, thoughts and expectations on the basis of our natural acceptance. So how does the accessing of natural acceptance resolve this solution? • It becomes possible for us to have the right understanding of the harmony at all levels of our living. • When we have the right understanding, we are able to see our “true nature”, and what we truly want. Our desires thus start getting set on the basis of this right understanding – instead of being driven by preconditioning/ sensations. • This put us at ease (freedom from anxiety and pain, conflicts). We are no longer struggling or are in conflict at the various levels of our living. Operating on the basis of our ‘natural acceptance’ thus leads to operating on the basis of our ‘realization’ and ‘understanding’. Realization: Means to be able to see the reality as it is. Understanding: Means to be able to understand the self organization in all entities of nature/existence and their inter-connected organization “as it is”. These are the two activities in the self (‘I’) (placed at point 1 and 2 in the figure) When we have (1) realization then (2) understanding becomes according to the realization. When this happens, then (3) imaging or desires get set according to this understanding. Consequently, (4) analysis or thoughts become according to the imaging/desires and hence, the (5) expectations or selection/taste are according to the thoughts/analysis. This is called self- organization or svantrata. This leads to happiness and its continuity. In realization and understanding, we get the answer to “what is the reality?” This, for each one of us, translates into the answers to “what to do?” and “why to do?” Then what remains to find out is “how to do?”, which comes from imagination (activities 3, 4, and 5). Is we see today we are focusing on “how to do?”, without trying to first verify “what to do?” and “why to do?”! It is just like traveling in a comfortable AC vehicle on a smooth road without knowing where we have to go! The problem today is that our activities of (1) realization and (2) understanding are inactive, we are unaware of them. As a result, we are not able to operate on our own right and keep operating on the basis of preconditioning and sensations i.e. we are operating only at the levels of (3) desire, (4) thought and (5) expectations today. This is not sufficient for us as human being. We thus need to operate at the levels (1) realization and (2) understanding as the basis on which (3), (4) and (5) get definite.