The Problem And Solution Is You

The Problem

THE PROBLEM IS YOU- THE SOLUTION IS YOU

Swami Dayananda Saraswati

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The Problem

1. THE PROBLEM Two Types of Problems There are two types of problems in life; one is a problem of which the solution lies outside the problem; the other is a problem for which the solution is within the very problem. The problems of food, clothing, shelter, etc. belong to the first category; one has to seek solution outside. Take the problem of hunger. One has to go in for food in order to appease the hunger. Here the solution, food, lies outside the problem hunger. If you do not have a shelter, you have to get since it is not available with you; it is outside you. Therefore you have to seek the solution in an external situation. There are many problems of this kind in our individual life, in our social life, in our national life. These may be called situational problems and they can be solved by planning and effort, taking into account the resources at our disposal. Now suppose someone gives you a jigsaw puzzle involving four pieces which when arranged in a particular manner, form the letter „S‟. Each piece has its own shape, angularity, etc., and individually none of them makes any meaning; they become meaningful only when arranged in a given manner. But when you are juggling with these pieces, trying different arrangements, they do not form the letter S. When you are not able to solve the puzzle in spite of repeated attempts, when you are not able to see the pieces falling in their place, you may construe that a piece may be a missing. You may feel that the solution lies outside the problem, the four pieces, and that, may be a fifth or even a sixth piece is necessary to solve the puzzle. But that is not the case. The four pieces alone are required. This is the second kind of problem where the 2

The Problem solution lies within the problem. Solution of this kind of a problem requires a àpta an informed or an enlightened person who knows the solution. He has the solution in his head; he can see the letter S within the four pieces even when they are not assembled. The àpta has to tell you that the solution is within the problem and that you have to arrange the pieces in a particular manner to arrive at the solution. It is this second kind of problem – where the solution is within the problem – we shall be talking about. If the solution is contained in the problem and it is still a “problem”, the problem is purely due to ignorance. The problem is caused by the ignorance of a fact and therefore we have a problem instead of a fact. The knowledge of the fact alone solves such a problem. The Problem of Human Sadness The problem of human sadness is a problem that has the solution within itself. Generally we think that the solution of this problem lies outside because we always manage to find a reason for our sadness, external to ourselves. It seems there is a factor other than myself that causes me sadness and that factor has to be corrected, mended, amended or even destroyed to remove my sadness. A reason for sadness is easily sought and found also. Why are you sad? Because I do not have a job; because I am ill; because I am not married yet; because I am married; because I do not have children; because I have one too many; because someone has not written; because someone has written! The ingenuity of the human mind is able to discover the causes for one‟s sorrow outside oneself. The conclusion is that sorrow or sadness is a problem for which solution is outside. Let us examine whether a solution can come from outside. 3

The Problem If your conclusion is that you are sad because you do not have a job, it means that lack of job is the cause for your sadness which should go away totally when you get a job. The job should be able to make you free from sadness. But when you do get a job you find you have a new problem, the place of work is too far away. You have to spend half your time in travelling; go to the bus-stop, wait for the bus, travel by bus for one hour and again walk to the factory where you work. It would be really nice if you had a house close to the factory. You try for a house and get one right in the colony of the factory workers. But now you discover another problem. The air is totally polluted on account of the smoke from the factory chimney. How can anyone stay in a place like that? The old house was definitely better and you return to the old place. So the problem of transportation is back again! You solve one problem and another one crops up in its place. The problems of job, transportation, accommodation are situational problems – or they are situations and not problems. But sadness is not something caused by a situation. If you think given situation is a source of sadness, you will find it is also a source of comfort. Mother-in-law is always a source of sorrow but when you want to go to a movie or listen to a Swami, you prefer to leave the child at home and the mother-in-law becomes very hand as a babysitter. So even mother-in-law is a source of comfort. Any given thing which you look upon as a problem also offers you advantages and vice versa. There is nothing in the creation that is one-sided. You examine anything or any situation. If you become a Swami there is an advantage when you are amidst people; people spare you from questions – certain questions at least! But then you are bothered with other kinds of questions: Swamiji, do you see palms? Can you tell me when I will get married? And so on. The other day, I was taken to a famous zoo in Milwaukee in the United States and I heard a youngster saying to 4

The Problem another, “Hey, look at this new one!” So being a sàdhu also has its own advantages and disadvantages too. If you get married, there are advantages and some disadvantages too. If you do not get married, there are many advantages but some disadvantages also. Having children gives a sense of fulfillment but bringing them up has its own problems. If you examine any situation, you will find both advantages and disadvantages and so if any situation can cause sadness to you, you can look up on that very situation as a source of comfort too. The one who is comfortable because of situation will also become sad because of situation. Can Positive Thinking Remove Sadness? Anything can be looked upon in more than one ways. Looking at a rose, one can say, “The rose is beautiful but it has thorns,” or “In spite of thorns rose is beautiful.” Both the views are alright, because they are based on facts. This brings us to the so called “positive thinking”. People talk about these days. It is a way of looking at things. “Rose is beautiful, but it has thorns” – this is the complaining way of looking at a rose. “In spite of thorns, rose is beautiful”, is a positive way of looking at it. There are many people who propound this thinking as a means of overcoming sadness. But this cannot solve the problem of human sadness for good because where there is a positive thinking, there must be a fact that makes it a factual positive thinking. If this is so, there is going to be another fact forming the basis for negative thinking. Take the cause of this man who had a very poor self-image. He always looked down upon himself. He had concluded that he had not made his life, that he was a failure. People around him also contributed to making this a firm conclusion and so nobody could really helping him out of it. He went to a Swami and told him his state of mind. The Swami told 5

The Problem him, “You positively look at yourself. See what all things you have. You have a pair of eyes that sees properly, a pair of ears that hears properly, a nose that smells properly. There are so many people who have no eyes; there are many who are deaf; there are noses which do not sense smell. You have all the senses intact, a healthy body, and (what should be called) a normal mind. How many people are there who are not privileged to have these? And you have a good education, a good parentage. There are so many orphans who do not even know their parents and countless other who have no education at all. And you have a nice family, a job and a house. Really speaking, you are blessed. Why do you have such a low image of yourself? You have so many positive things about yourself.” Told thus by the Swami, the man was really convinced. He admitted, “There is really nothing to complain about. I am very happy now; no more sad. Thank you Swamiji.” And he walked out. As the man was even leaving, he saw someone stopping his Mercedes car on the kerb and coming out. When our man, now equipped with positive thinking, saw this person, he noticed that this man also had a pair of eyes, a pair of ears, a nose, a healthy body and all such things that he had and plus a Mercedes car! He became sad again! He realized that the other man had everything that he had and a Mercedes car whereas he did not have a scooter! The positive thinking evaporated! Positive thinking does not work. It is stilly. If positive thinking is based on facts, so is negative thinking. It is a fact that one man had the car whereas the other did not have it. The first one had all the advantages of a car which the second one did not have. Thus as long as there are facts, negative thinking will always exist along with positive thinking and the conclusion, “I am sad” will ever remain with you because you think that

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The Problem sadness is caused by external world. Positive thinking cannot erase the conclusion, “I am sad”. Can Change in Situation Remove Sadness? If external world is the cause for your sadness, you cannot get rid of that sadness even if you create a new situation or go to a new place. Let us say you go to heaven which is equipped to be an ideal situation for everyone. There are different concepts of heaven. According to our scriptures, there is no hunger or thirst in the heaven; nobody is afflicted with hunger or thirst, old age or death in the heaven. So obviously there is no need for food and so there would be no restaurants in heaven! There would be no bhel – purÑ, no pan purī in fact no purÑ at all! So you cannot get things there even though you love them. All you have in the heaven is dance and music. You will get bored. According to a religious sect in the West, the faithful will go heaven and have eternal dinner with God. Now a typical Western dinner starts with soup and so the eternal dinner would also start with soup. But since you must be eternally there on the dinner table, you cannot take even one sip of soup because if the dinner is started, it will end also. So you will have to keep the soup-spoon near your mouth but never even taste the soup! You will not proceed at all. So you are struck with soup! In the heaven also, different residents have different status and therefore they experience different degrees of joy because the status can also give you happiness. Our scriptures give a detailed account of the degree of happiness associated with different status. Imagine a young man who is strong, healthy, brave and clear-thinking. He is well brought-up, well educated, leads a life of dharma and so has no conflicts in his mind. He owns the entire earth with all its resources, with no rival to share or to 7

The Problem threaten. All these will obviously give him the highest degree of happiness that a human being can ever hope to enjoy. Call it one unit of happiness. Multiply this by one hundred and you get one unit of happiness enjoyed by Manuùya Gandharvàs. The happiness enjoyed by Deva Gandharvãs is a hundred times that of Manuùya Gandharvàs and so it goes. You keep multiplying by one hundred each time and you can get an estimate of the degree of happiness enjoyed by the Pitçs, the Ãâjàna Devàs, the Karma Devà (who serve the Devàs), the Devàs, Indra, Brahaspati, Prajàpati, Brahmà. The idea is that different status give different degrees of joy and so even in the heaven, you will feel inadequate due to comparison. Most of our youngsters entertain ambitions of going abroad. First choice is of course, U.S.A., failing that, Canada. If not that, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Dubai, Bahrain. If none of these, well Malaysia, Singapore, Hongkong .. somewhere. That is the vision, the ambition of most of the youngsters – there are exceptions I am sure. Now listen to this. There is this man from Kerala, who is in Kuwait and who has made it. Once when I was in Kuwait, he says, “Swamiji, how if we go out for a spiritual picnic, a satsaïga?” “But where can we go? You drive for one hour in any direction and you reach the boundary. Where can we go? “Swamiji, we shall go to a place five miles from here.” “What is there?” “Swamiji, there is a tree there. We can all sit under the tree and have outdoor satsaïga for a change.” Imagine a person coming from Kerala which is one of the most green states, running around for miles in search of one tree! What ànanda, joy is there? You can make some money there but you cannot get everything. Therefore, wherever you go, whatever changes you bring about, the situational happiness will always be relative. Every situation has two sides where one side is fine but the other one s not. In fact, all the 8

The Problem situations, the whole life, is like a Gujarati pickle which is sweet and hot simultaneously! Every situation, like a coin, has two sides. If you have one side, you also have the other. This being the case, there is no way of solving the problem of sadness by any situational change.

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The Seeking

2. THE SEEKING Two Types of Seeking Anything that is considered desirable by us becomes an object of seeking. There are two types of seeking in our life. First is the seeking of things which I look upon as desirable and which I do not have. Things like comforts, money, power, progeny etc. to fall in this category. I search for these things, and make efforts to gain or accomplish them with help of the knowledge, skills and resources available to me. These things appear very desirable to me at the moment and so become sàdhya, to be achieved. Later on, I may change my view about them. The second kind of seeking also pertains to objects which we consider desirable. But there is a difference. Whereas the first kind of seeking pertains to objects we do not have, this second kind of seeking is for the objects we have but we think we do not have. Here also, the seeking is the same as in the first case. I think I do not have the thing and so I seek it. It is like the case of that man searching for his lost glasses. This man, one Sunday morning, wanted to read the newspaper. He needed his reading glasses. He opened the drawer of the desk, took out the glasses, wore them and started reading the newspaper. While he was reading, a friend happened to come to see him. He placed the newspaper on the side, lifted the reading glasses so that they rested above his forehead and started talking to his friend. The friend went away after half an hour and this man wanted to resume reading the newspaper. He lifted the paper, discovered the need for the reading lasses and started to search. Where are my glasses? He searched in all the usual places; the glasses were not on the table, nor in the drawer or on the floor. When he could not find them anywhere, he started shouting “Where are my glasses? …” The wife came out from the kitchen and stood there staring 10

The Seeking at him. The children also came out and dispassionately watched the drama. “Finally, the youngest son could not hold it any longer and pointed at the glasses which were on the father‟s forehead! The man realized that the glasses he was searching for were with him all along. Now this seeking was there not because the man did not have glasses. He was the problem and he was the solution. He was the problem because he thought he was the non-possessor of glasses. There is no physical distance between the non-possessor and the possessor of glasses. But still there is a distance which makes him a seeker. This; is the distance created by ignorance. Therefore one can seek for what one does not have and one can seek for what one thinks one does not have. If one thinks one does not have a given thing and one considers it desirable, one cannot but seek. The Seeking in Human Life If we look at our life and enquire as to what it is that we seek, we find that all the varieties of activities that we undertake are prompted by an urge to acquire something or get rid of something. All the urges that a human being feels, falls under three basic categories: (1) to life – to live a day longer, (2) to gain happiness, and (3) to acquire knowledge. You carry out a set of activities to keep your life going: I do not want to die today; about tomorrow, I will see. That means there is no tomorrow at all – every tomorrow is today. I am alive at the present moment and I cannot think of decimation of my existence. There is a natural love to be. “I want to live” is a natural, universal urge, not planted b someone else. Even a new-born baby has an urge to life; there is a great attempt on its part to sustain itself as a living being. There is definitely an attempt to avoid death and therefore aging also. But then we also find some people who feel like committing suicide and 11

The Seeking there are some who do commit suicide. Thus, it looks as though the urge to live is not such a universal urge because there is a contradiction – someone is ready to give up one‟s life. So I add one more clause: I want to live and live happily. If I consider my entire life and come to the conclusion that the future does not hold any promise of my being happy and that sadness alone is my lot, I become depressed. This wrong process of thinking can prompt me to commit suicide. One commits suicide to escape sadness. Thus to live happily as powerful an urge as the urge to live. Again as a human being, one cannot stand ignorance. From childhood onwards, there has always been an attempt to know. You give a child a toy to play with and the first thing it does it opens it. Questions such as why? what? How? arise in one‟s mind without being prompted. There is a love for gossip, for reading newspapers, magazines, etc., because nothing should go around without your knowledge. Thus ignorance is one thing you cannot stand. You are in a great hurry and speeding in your car but if you find a group of people gathered on the side walk, you slow down, stick your head out and try to see what is happening there. If you want your wife to miss her sleep during the night, just tell her, before going to sleep, that you have an important thing to tell her but that you could not tell her at the moment and she should wait until the next morning. She will urge you to tell her at least something about it because she cannot stand ignorance. This is how these magazines and television-serials keep your curiosity alive by cutting off the story of drama when it has reached a critical point so you will want to read the next issue or see the next showing. We do the same thing in our talks too! So ignorance is bliss only when it is total. If you know a little, you want to know more.

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The Seeking Thus, all activities in life are towards fulfilling these three natural urges. There are activities to stall death and old age because I have concluded that I am mortal. There are activities to make myself happier than what I am, I want to get rid of unhappiness, because there is conclusion, “I am unhappy”. I feel I am incomplete and so there is an attempt to be free from incompleteness, unhappiness. There are activities to make me more informed, more knowledgeable because I have a conclusion that I am ignorant. These three conclusions – I am mortal, I am unhappy – or incomplete, and I am ignorant – form the basis of all my activities. This three-fold conclusion is the problem. Vedãnta says this is an unwarranted problem. In the vision of Vedãnta, you are just the opposite of what you take yourself to be. “I am sad is the problem and that is solved only when I see that “I” as other than sad, as free from sadness. Vedànta says that “I” is free from sadness and we shall presently see how that is. The problem of Sadness is Centered on „I‟ Sadness arises out of the notion, “I am sad”, and so the problem of sadness can only be solved by seeing the fact, “I am not sad.” In the vision of Vedànta I am just the opposite of what I take myself to be and have to see that fact. If you say you are bound, you have to be free. If there is bondage in the „I‟ sense, there should also be freedom – freedom from hunger, freedom from thirst, freedom from being bullied by the world, freedom from being impinged upon by the world. That freedom has to be centered on your „I‟; it cannot be outside you, much less inside you. It has to be you. If the sadness is due to the world, happiness is also due to the world only. You find yourself sad when you view one side of a situation; but there is the other side also, which is as good a fact as this side and which 13

The Seeking can make you happy. This is what we call sa§sàra. SukhÑ aha§ (I am happy); duþkhÑ aha§ (I am unhappy). Now understand: sukha§ (happiness) is one thing and sukhÑ (happy) is another. Duþkha§ (unhappiness, pain, sorrow) is one thing and duhkhÑ (unhappy, sorrowful) is another. This is an important thing to know. Duþkha§ is sorrow while duþkhÑ means, “I am sorrowful”, “I am sad.” Now all our attempts are to remove duþkha§ to remove sorrow by bringing about changes in the situations. But the problem is not duþkham, sorrow; the problem is the notion, “ahৠduþkhÑ – I am sorrowful.” The animal has only the sukha§ and duþkha§, pleasure and pain. It does not have the notions, “Aha§ sukhÑ” – I am happy” or “aha§ duþkhÑ - I am unhappy.” A cow can be a luck cow if it has a master who feeds it well, maintains it well. It is a healthy cow and does feel the pleasure, but it does not have the notion of sukhitva§, the notion, “I am happy”. It does not have a complex, “I am a superior cow, I belong to such and such family” etc. A cow does not have any sense or notion or judgment like this, centered in itself. If another cow has crooked or ugly horns, it does not think, “I am ugly, other cows are good-looking, I don‟t know what to do. I am struck with these horns because I cannot remove them or else they will call me a bald cow” etc. Cows do not have a problem like this. If a cow does not get food, it does feel pain and if it gets food, there definitely is some pleasure. Cows do suffer and they do experience comfort, but they do not seem to have the notions of duþkhitva§ or sukhitva§, of being sad or elated. The human being, on the other hand, has a judgment centered on “I” and that gives rise to problems. The white man wants to be white but not all that white. This is a complex and so he goes to a beach and bake himself in the scorching heat to become a little less white. The black has his own complex: he wants to be a little white; he wants to be a little 14

The Seeking whitened. In India, we have our own complexes. “The girl is beautiful, but dark!” Cows do not have such complexes. There are these two cows which belong to the same breed, are about the same age and give an equal amount of milk. But there is a great difference in their selling price. Why? Because one cow has shapely horns and the other one has crooked horns! The cows themselves do not seem to be aware of that difference and so they do not have any complex. It is the owner of the cows who has problems! This problem of complexes is a human problem. The human being is aware of himself or herself as a person and in the person, one sees sukhitva§ (the state of being happy) and duþkhitva§ (the state of being unhappy). So there arise such complexes as, “I am sukhÑ (happy)”, “I am duþkhÑ (unhappy)”. “I am bound.” “I am being held down by others,” etc. These are problems. That I am dependent upon a hundred million things for my security and happiness, is a problem. The world is infinitely vast and independent of me and it has the capacity to limit me. I was born dependent upon the world, limited by it, conditioned by it. I will ever remain limited and conditioned by the world. The world definitely limits me and if that is the problem, if that makes me duþkhÑ, the problem of duþkhitva§ can never be solved. If the duþkhitva§ arises from the world, if my unhappiness is because the world limits me, I should always be duþkhÑ sad, bound, sorrowful. But in spite of my being small, being limited by the world, being deprived of many things I wish to have, I do find myself occasionally, a happy person. During those moments the very person who looked upon himself or herself as sad, looks upon the self as happy. What change has taken place in the world or the self, for me to become happy? The body has not changed, the emotions, the knowledge, the memories have not changed; they are all the same. The world has not changed, the job has not changed; the environment has not changed; the government has not 15

The Seeking changed; I still have any number of complaints against the community. Thus, the world still very much limits me and still I am able to laugh. I become happy now and then which means those are the moments when I look upon myself differently, entirely differently. Formerly, I saw myself as duþkhÑ and now I see myself as the one who is free from duþkha§. This happens even when I laugh at a simple joke. There was this man who thought he was a cat. He was afraid of coming out of the house because there were street dogs and he thought they would chase him. He was taken to a psychiatrist who convinced him, by comparison with an actual cat that he was not a cat; that he had none of the features of a cat. And by comparison with himself, the psychiatrist convinced the man that he had all the features of a human being, that he was a human being. Being thus convinced by the psychiatrist, being relieved of the complex, the man came out happily. But the next day, he refused to go out of the house anyway! He was again presented before the psychiatrist, who asked him. “Aren‟t you convinced that you are a human being and not a cat?” “Yes, I am convinced.” “Then, why are you afraid of coming out of the house?” “I know I am not a cat but how do I know that the dogs know it?” You laughed at this now. What change has happened in you? What problem have you solved? Your job is the same; your wife is ill; the mother-in-law has not yet left! All the problems are intact and still you laughed. It is true that there are problems which have to be faced factually, objectively. But the problem of sadness has nothing to do with the external world. The problem of sadness is centered on you and your 16

The Seeking vision or notion about yourself and the world. You are the problem when you say, “I am sad.” And when you laughed, what are you? You are the solution. There was no fulfillment of a desire nor a solution of an external problem when you laughed. All that happened was that they looked upon yourself as you are. All that is required to be free from sadness is that you look at yourself as you are. It is said in our scriptures that the mind is the cause for both bondage and liberation. Mind here means your notion about yourself – your conclusion, “I am this much alone.” This notion, this self-judgement is the problem and therefore self-clarify, self-knowledge is the solution. In the vision of the Upaniùad, the self is free. Like even in the case of the jigsaw puzzle, when you thought the solution of the puzzle lay outside the problem, the àpta, the one who knows, could see the solution in the very problem. Here, in the vision of the àpta, the çùi, the upaniùad, you are the solution. The vision of the ÷àstra, scripture that I am the solution seems valid enough in view of the fact that in spite of all the problems, I do not see myself happy occasionally. If all these problems and notions were real, I could never give them up. And I can never be happy unless I give them up. The fact that I feel happy means it is possible to give up the notions about myself. Now consider this boy who thinks that his teeth are not presentable. His teeth are not in alignment and he has two extra teeth. He does not accept his teeth and is conscious that his teeth are ugly. He deliberately avoids laughing and closes his mouth as soon as he remembers his teeth. But even this boy laughs sometimes. Do you know why? Because at that time, he is the person that he really is; he has given up the notion that he is ugly. That notion being not real, sometimes he catches himself laughing and so it is clear that the boy is not ugly in

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The Seeking reality, that he is looking upon himself wrongly. The vision of ÷àstra is valid. My natural longing to be free from unhappiness is the further proof of the validity of the vision that I, the self is free, happy. There is a natural longing to be free from being unhappy. I love what is natural and I want to get rid of what is unnatural. If unhappiness, littleness, were natural to me, if they were the essential characteristics of àtmà, the self. I could never give them up. But in deep sleep and in moment of happiness, I do give up all the notions that make me feel small, limited. I find myself happy when those notions are absent.

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The Solution

3. THE SOLUTION What is the Nature of “I”? The question is asked, “What is the nature of „I”? What is the dividing line between I and the world? I feel limited by the world which is vast and other than me. My existence is confined within certain limits: I occupy a certain space and no more, and the world begins from the boundary. It is true that the world begins where “I” ends, and it is my conclusion that „I‟ is confined to the physical body. My awareness of myself stops with the physical body and so I conclude that I am the body. My awareness of myself stops with the physical body and so I conclude that I am the body – I am short, tall, fat, lean, etc. Other than the body is the entire world consisting of the five-fold sense objects. Now this physical body was not there before a given point in time and during the period of its existence also it keeps on changing; it is subject to aging and death. This being the nature of the body and because I have concluded that the body is „I” – I am as good as the body – I am subject to disease and death. There is always a fear of death. I am mortal. The physical body has certain features, certain abilities and also many limitations. It is limited in height, weight, health, etc., and since I am the physical body, these limitations become mine. Timewise, I am limited. Spacewise, I am limited – if I am here, I cannot be elsewhere. Sexwise I am limited – if I am a male, I cannot be a female and vice versa. Again there are limitations colourwise, racewise, nationwise .. hundreds of limitations. As though this is not enough, we have added complexes like the concept of beauty. The marketing media have created notions about norms of beauty: how the eyes should be, how the eye-brows should be, what the colour of the skin should be and so on. All this creates further complexes about ugliness. As we said earlier, a cow with crooked horns 19

The Solution does not have a complex about ugliness; this is strictly a human problem which is an unnecessary infliction. The Lord has given a body that is alive and is able to perform various functions for me. It is a gift and there is nothing more to it. Thus, with reference to the body there are limitations at every level. I am a wanting person at every level, insecure and frightened all the time and so I add a few things to myself to become secure. But an insecure person remains insecure – adding or subtracting a few things continue to keep him insecure. Acquisition does not make a person secure nor does renunciation – by giving up everything, a person may become a beggar which is an additional problem; formerly he was begging for happiness and security and now he begs for food too! Just as the body limits me, the sense organs also limit me. I also feel limited by my mind. I am wanting emotionwise, I want to remain cheerful but I cannot – how can I be happy with this kind of a body? I do not want to be sad but I become sad. Again knowledgewise also I am wanting and I am going to be wanting all the time because there will always be something that I do not know. More one comes to know, more does not become aware of all one does not know. Memorywise also I am wanting – I cannot even remember what I ate yesterday~ And there are things you wish to forget – like what your brother-in-law told you – but you cannot get them out of your memory! You remember all sad incidents and go over them again and again – in fact the keep coming back whether you like them or not! Thus memorywise I am a wanting person. I also find I am ignorant of so many things and that makes me frustrated. Thus, there is a conclusion that I am wanting in terms of time, in terms of knowledge, in terms of fullness. øàstra, dismisses this conclusion. 20

The Solution All the things that are enumerated above – the body, the senses, the emotions, the knowledge, the memories, the ignorance – are known to you; you are aware of them. They are all objects of your knowledge. They are there because you know them. They are not self-proving. The sun exists because you know it to exist. The wife exists because you know she exists. The physical body exists because you know it exists, that it is fact or lean, male or female, ill or healthy, is it all known or not? If it is all known, to whom is it known? To you and to others as well. Others also know this physical body and you also know it – in fact you know it much more intimately than others. Thus the body is very much an object of your knowledge like even a sunrise or a sunset. This physical body is known to you as well as other physical bodies are. And so when you say, “I am tall, or I am short,” it is just a point of view – you are looking at yourself from the standpoint of the body; then you become tall, short, dark, fair, etc. All these are conclusions from the standpoint of the physical body. If you go a little beyond the physical body and look at yourself, you become father, son, grandfather, husband, brother, etc. Everything you are; the standpoints differ. From other points of view such as money, etc. you have further concepts of rich, poor, etc. These are all loaded notions from different points of view. There is no harm if you know they are points of view. The problem is the points of view become the view; they become the very vision of the self, the very knowledge of the self. If the physical body is an object of knowledge, if the body is seen by you as an object, it is definitely not you. You have a close association with his body, which is no problem. There is no problem even if you say, “This is my body.” Then it is like your car. When the car gives trouble, you send it to a garage for repairs; similarly you can send your body to a hospital when it has become trouble – the difference is, you 21

The Solution have to go along with it! The problem is when you say, “I am the body”. Then you become a mortal. Thus you may be a mortal from the standpoint of the body. You may be blind or deaf from the standpoint of the senses. You may be restless from the standpoint of the mind and wanting in knowledge from the standpoint of intellect. But from the standpoint of “I” that is aware of the body, senses, emotions, knowledge, memories, ignorance, what are you? Who are you? The problem is that you are mortal, restless, ignorant, sinner, etc. There are so man complexes which arise when you look at yourself from different standpoints. Look at yourself from the standpoint of “I”. What is that I? When you look at it, you can only say, “I” am a conscious being, an awareful person”. “Do you require a proof? I ask you, “What is this?” “A flower” “How do you know?” “Because I see!” Thus you know things existing and non-existing. Now I ask you, “Do you exist or not? “I”? I have no doubt that I exist.” How do you know you exist? You exist because you cannot but exist. Everything else requires proof for its existence whereas you require no proof. The existence of everything is proven because you exist. If you needed proof of your existence, you would have no knowledge. “I” is self-evident, being simple consciousness or awareness. Awareness has no form. When you see my hand, the hand is within your awareness. Hand has a form but awareness has no form. So the “I” of which the meaning is Awareness or Consciousness, caitanya has no form – no height, no width. This is what is meant by aparichinnam caitanyam, limitless awareness. Awareness. Awareness is limitless with respect to space and time too. The physical body is in time and therefore it is mortal – it comes now, it is gone now. But when time is, Awareness is. When time goes away, Awareness still is. You are aware of time. Time is object of your awareness. Time is something that can disappear – 22

The Solution there is no time between two thoughts; there is no time when you are in ecstasy; there is no time when you are asleep. You are thus aware of time. You are also aware of space and time and space exist in Awareness. Everything falls in awareness. The known, viditam and the unknown, aviditam, both fall in awareness. The I-notion is the Problem It is clear that the body is wanting, the mind is wanting and I think I am all these. Therefore, if you look back at your own life, just remember from the day you can remember and tell me if there ever was a single day when you were pÒrõa, totally free from desires. Look back and see if there was one waking day when you were totally free and from being a wanting person, that is, when all your desires were fulfilled. On any given day, you will find you had some desires which were not fulfilled. On any given day, you will find you had some desires which were not fulfilled. As a child, you wanted to eat one more candy; no. You did not want to go to school; no. You did not want to play, go. You wanted to play, don‟t. As child, you had a number of unfulfilled desires; you were a wanting person. As a young man, a wanting person. As an old person, also wanting: nobody listens to me, nobody behaves properly etc. Logically, it is impossible for you to be happy even for a moment because all the time, you are wanting. At any given time, you have any number of desires which are not fulfilled or which cannot be fulfilled. There always was a situation when you had thing that you did not want or you did not have things that you wanted. Thus, logically, it is not possible to be happy even for a moment. But you do become happy occasionally. That is your experience. You got something you wanted and you become happy. You heard a joke and you became happy. You solved a problem and you became happy. Someone said, “You wonderful.” and you became happy. Thus logically it is impossible to 23

The Solution be happy but it was always possible for you to be happy. It these moments were not there, man would commit suicide. These moments keep life going. And you gather these moments not by fulfilling all your desires. You gather them in spite of desires. The world does not disappear when you are happy; it is very much there. Whatever you confront is the world for you. The world may be sky, stars, any sense object, anything you confront at a given time. Your child makes an enlightening remark, you are surprised and happy. You lift the child. At that time, the child is the world for you. At the time of joy, the world is, the senses are, the mind is and I am very much present. My situations have not changed and complaints have not gone away. The problems are there; the roof is leaking, the sewage does not work etc. Really speaking, no problem is solved, but I am still happy. What does that mean? That only means that, at any moment when I am happy, I am not a seeker; the conclusion, “I am wanting” is not there. With reference to the world, I am always a seeker. I want the humanity to be different. I want the government to be different. I want the people who are near and dear, to be different. Thus with reference to everything, I am a wanting person, a seeker – moneywise seeker, powerwise seeker, namewise seeker, influencewise seeker, friendshipwise seeker etc. Rolewise also I am a seeker; as a daughter-inlaw, as a mother-in-law, as a father, as a son, I am always a wanting person. I want the world that I am related to be different. All the time, I am a seeker. What happens at the moments of joy? I cease to be a seeker. There is no division between me and the world. The seeker – sought division disappeared at this moment. At that time there is no judgement about the self – how lonely I am; how useless I am; how worthless I am; how ugly I am .. and so on. All these conclusions are 24

The Solution completely forgotten; I have forgotten my height, my weight .. suddenly I became one with the world. Both I and the world become complete, whole. This is called PÒrõa. What I confront is pÒrõa and I who confront also is pÒrõa. There is no bheda, division between I and the world. I become pÒrõa, whole, complete, I am happy because I am whole. That is the I, Awareness that is full in spite of the body, senses, mind, world. We never say that the world is duþkha§, sorrowful, Sa§sàra is duþkha§, is what we say. And sa§sàra, is this notion, “I am a seeker”, born of ignorance of what I am. In the moment of happiness, this notion is absent, there is no seeker-sought duality, there is fullness. What I am saying is that the fullness, all the time, is you. Fullness does not belong to the world. Fullness is not a particular object. Your body is not fullness, your mind is not fullness because they have their limitations. The „I” is fullness. In the moment of fullness you forget yourself. Which self? The notion, “I am so and so.” “The fellow who feels useless, frustrated, is forgotten – ahaõkara is forgotten, and you are happy for a moment. You all experience the Self that is happiness but you do not know. Since there is experience, you want to do the same thing again and so what do you do? You make arrangements. You arrange the world. You manipulate so that the same experience comes to you again. But the same thing does not come a second time. We go on manipulating the world but it does not work. God alone knows when you will be happy again. In the moments of joy – whenever they happen – you are yourself. You don‟t have any wish; you don‟t want anything to change. The whole problem, therefore, is the I-notion, the notion – “I am unhappy” and the solution is the knowledge “I am happiness.” In fact, in the unhappiness itself lies the solution. The person who is unhappy, has 25

The Solution the solution just as there is the solution in the very jigsaw puzzle. Once the pieces fall in their place, the problem is solved, it is no more a puzzle. Similarly, the world which is a threat to me, has to fall in its place in terms of the reality it has and I have to fall in my place in terms of the reality I am. When this happens, you find there is nothing but solution; there is no problem at all. There remain only the problems such as hunger, thirst etc., which are factual problems. But the problem of human life is entirely different – it is not removing sorrow, it is removing the notion, “I am sorrowful.” Duhkham, pain is not the problem, dukþitvam, “ I am sad,” is the problem. Bondage is not the problem; “I am bound” is the problem. So you are the problem and you have to seek solution within yourself. You are the Solution Suppose you are in a place which is beautiful. There is luxury of nature. There is the mountain and greenery all around you. The place is clean and the people around you are also good. Everything is beautiful and you find yourself happy. Do you know why? Because you don‟t want the mountain to be different; you don‟t want the colour of the sky to be different; you don‟t want your senses to be different, you don‟t want your memory to be different. In fact, you just are. Aren‟t you? You accept yourself totally because you find yourself acceptable. The “I” is but awareness. It is already full, limitless. You experience it whenever you are happy. Whether it is viùayànanda, joy coming from senseobjects, or yogànanda, joy coming from yoga, or vidyànanda, joy coming from knowledge or brhmananda, joy that is Brahman, it is yourself alone that you experience, the you that is fullness. You are limitless because Awareness is limitless, ananta, which is the same as ànanda.

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The Solution It is the limitlessness, ãnanda, the fullness that I am, that I experience in different degrees. Now the important thing is that I should know I am ãnanda, limitlessness. I am limitless timewise and so I am not mortal. I am limitless spacewise and so I am not incomplete. I am the Awareness that illumines both knowledge and ignorance and so I am neither knowledgeable nor ignorant, to be limited by them. Thus I am the very three things – free from death, incompleteness and ignorance – that I want to be. Therefore I am the very solution. And this is you. If you are the problem. You are the solution. This is the insight into yourself that I have given to you. And it makes one thing very clear – that you have to know. We don‟t say that you will become something. We say that you are everything. That means that you require clarity. The problem is centered on “I” and the solution is centered on that every I the reality of which is entirely different from what you take it to be. Therefore the solution lies in the very problem, it is not outside the problem. The human problem is that regardless of what you do, you find yourself a wanting person. That is because the conclusion, “I am wanting” can never be given up. It can only be forgotten. So what people generally do is try to forget themselves. People go for holidays, go as far as Hawaii, spending a lot of money and time. For what? For forgetting themselves! That is what happens when you find yourself happy. There are a lot of things you can accomplish in this life to improve the quality of life, to make the living better than what it is. But for being happy and free from being unhappy, you are the problem and you are the solution. “I am unhappy,” is the problem; “I am free from unhappiness” is the solution. This is not a delusion; it is reality, the reality which one should become alive to.

Om Tat Sat 27