​Your worst enemy is inside you and so is your best friend

​Talk at Krishna House, Gainesville, USA

PPT

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
thank you your best friend is inside you it’s a power point so I will be speaking on this topic of your worst enemy is inside you and so is your best friend so that’s the topic now the Bhagavad Gita, one of the main themes in it is the mind, so I will speak on 6.8 in the Bhagavad Gita this verse basically means that when we control the mind at that time we attain God we become peaceful we become joyful and we attain God so let’s look at this concept so the mind is something which is a great mystery so as Krishna said that the mind is a thing which can make heaven out of hell and hell out of heaven and as a materialist philosopher he said that I refuse to study the mind because it has no locus no locus means we don’t know what it is, where it is so we know that there is a brain but apart from that there is a mind what is it, where is it so the Bhagavad Gita offers us a 3 level model of the self the 3 level model of the self which comprises of the body, the mind and the soul so this is like if you compare it to a computer, there is a hardware that is like the body, there is a software which is like the mind and there is a soul which is the user of the computer so in this 3 level model if we see most of modern society focusses on the bodily level we have abandoned means for caring for the body now the mind is a big concern and how to care for it that is a major subject because people are afflicted by mental health issues quite often people may be physically fairly healthy but if they are depressed if they are afflicted by any mental health problem then they become dysfunctional so that is something similar to how a computer’s hardware may be perfectly functional but if its software gets corrupted then the computer will not be able to function at all so like that the mind is the software within us and the software can get corrupted when it gets corrupted we become dysfunctional just as a computer becomes dysfunctional so now quite often in western intellectual circles western philosophical tradition the soul and the mind they are considered to be one so the idea is there is the body and there is something beyond the body and that something beyond the body is called as the mind so there is a famous philosopher Rene Descartes he said that his idea was that there is mind matter duality so mind is there and matter is there so the bodies matter and beyond that whatever is there is called as the mind but the Bhagavad Gita divides whatever is beyond the body into two levels there is the mind and there is the soul so I will talk about the difference between the two the soul is the root of consciousness R-O-U-T and the mind is the root R-O-U-T of consciousness so a simple example to illustrate this say if I give the example of a computer like somebody is using a computer to play a game then the person is sitting on a chair and then there is the computer screen through which the consciousness is getting going inside the game maybe there is a virtual reality game where somebody is flying a plane so then they identify with the character and they are flying the plane and press the buttons and the plane moves left, plane moves right plane moves up, plane moves down so like that the person is watching the game the person is playing the game now that person’s consciousness is getting connected with the character in the game that is through the interface, that is the monitor through the monitor and through the software associated with that the consciousness is going inside the game wherever it is so the mind is like the interface by which we connect with that reality that game, virtual reality so where the person is the source who is playing the game the mind, the computer’s input output device that is the route by which we go inside we enter into that game so like that the soul is the source of consciousness the mind is the channel for consciousness and then that consciousness is expressed in the body and from the body it is expressed outside now usually when we are awake the consciousness comes from the soul through the mind into the outer world now when we are asleep the consciousness comes from the soul to the level of the mind it doesn’t come to the level of the body that’s why when we are asleep we usually don’t sense anything a little bit consciousness comes out but not much now within this the mind acts as the software interface, so interface means the Bhagavata says in 15.9 that at the five senses we can say like the five fingers of a palm now the five fingers are centred around the hand like that the five senses are centred around the mind so right now you are sitting now there is information coming in from all the senses say from the ears you are hearing me speaking but you may be hearing some vehicle going back you may be hearing someone talking behind in the kitchen so there are various inputs coming in from the ears at the same time you are seeing something you may be looking at me looking anywhere else inputs coming in from the eyes you are sitting on a seat, the seat may be soft, it may be hard it may be cold, there is input coming in from there from all these senses the input comes in and when the input comes in that is integrated at the level of the mind and then wherever the mind focusses so another example assume we have five doors over here so now as long as the rooms are locked your consciousness is over here, if one door opens suddenly the consciousness goes over there somebody coming in, somebody going out so like that these five senses are like the doors and from the doors information comes in and then wherever our attention goes that is where we focus so sometimes we sit down and we are studying a book our eyes are going over the text but maybe we are thinking I want to meet my friend in college or I met my friend and he said like that, she said like that so the eyes and the book are meeting each other but if the mind is not there then we don’t perceive anything, we read the book for 15 minutes I read the book, what did I read, I am on the same page or sometimes some people say I am busy reading the book but actually they are thinking about somebody else and then they look at it and another friend comes along, the book is upside down so they don’t even notice that the book is upside down because the eyes and the book are coming in contact but if the mind is not there then we don’t perceive anything so that is why the mind is central for our functioning in the world so for our functioning in the world how much we are able to regulate and focus the mind that is vital so the mind often acts as our enemy enemy is one who harms us who hurts us Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita 6.5 so he says uplift yourself with your mind don’t degrade yourself the mind can be your friend, the mind can be your enemy both are possible so when we say the mind can be your enemy how is that possible say if some sports player is playing a sport playing a match, say a baseball match is going on and the ball is being thrown and just as the ball is being thrown the person who is going to hit instead of watching at the ball suddenly the eyes get distracted somewhere in the stadium towards the spectator so at that time the player could have hit the ball but because of the attention getting distracted the player cannot hit so here there is one thing which could have been done and if it had been done well the game could have been won but if the attention gets distracted then the person who could have won the game loses the game so by distracting our attention the mind can harm us so the mind harms us primarily by taking our attention away from that which is important for us to do to other things which are not so important and the mind as I said earlier is like a programme now it is a programmable device and once it gets programmed it starts functioning in the same way again and again now for example in my computer I use google chrome as a browser use it once, twice, thrice and then it gets set as my default browser and next time whenever I click a link I may have other browsers I may have safari, mozilla, opera whatever else but as soon as I click a link that browser will open so what has happened this has become the default programme for opening any link so when some particular programme is repeatedly used it becomes the default programme so similarly when we do any particular activity repeatedly the mind makes it its default activity so the default activity means whenever say if a person becomes an addict of something say person becomes alcoholic or a drug addict so how does that happen nobody is born an addict so when they first time consume the substance, second time consume the substance third time consume the substance each time they consume there is a that habit that is being formed which means there is a programme that is happening in the mind and that programme every time it is selected it becomes more and more strongly selected as a default programme once it becomes a default programme deeply rooted default programme sometimes if we instal a particular software along with it some other programmes get installed so like that here what happens once a particular activity is done again and again that becomes a default and what does it make a default enjoyment means taking drugs if I am stressed I want to get some relief there are many other ways more healthy ways in which one can get relief but once that programme is fixed in the mind then by default as soon as I want some relief as soon as I want some pleasure the programme gets activated I should take some drugs and then even without one’s thinking one does that activity many of us may have experienced that sometimes we do something why did I do that? I didn’t plan to do that now suppose sometimes we are eating and we decide I am not going to over eat I have become obese I don’t want to gain too much weight and I suddenly find why did I eat so much? so actually there is a programme within us which is equated eating with enjoyment and then whenever I want to enjoy immediately there is comfort food if I am stressed out and I want some relief so I think comfort means I have to eat so that programme gets activated once it becomes default it gets activated even without our conscious attention now I use a text to speech programme so when I write articles and after that when I want to proofread them I have the computer read it out so I once wrote the soul is sat chit ananda sat chit ananda means it is eternal, it is full of knowledge and it is full of bliss now sat chit ananda is an English word so when I wrote the soul is sat chit ananda then I got my computer to run the programme again and when the programme was running the computer read it as the soul is Saturday chit ananda so it converted SAT which is Sanskrit word meaning eternal it converted that to Saturday now this is the autocorrect gone incorrect, this is the autocorrect of the computer but computer thinks that SAT is there oh you must be meaning Saturday, so it is converting it but it is gone wrong, so this is what happens when there are some default settings so I am typing sat but by default it is becoming Saturday then I will have to go back and delete that urday and make it sat again so once something becomes a default setting it requires great effort to correct that so even if I start with the correct thing because of the default the correct will become incorrect and then I have to recorrect the incorrect to make it correct that’s how many times we make resolutions to do particular things ok I am not going to over it, I make a resolution I am not going to over it but then at a subconscious level we have made an equation, oh eating means enjoyment and then even without our conscious awareness suddenly start eating, eating, eating and then afterwards what did I do, so that’s because of the default programme acting, so basically our habits are nothing more than the default programmes in the mind and changing our habits is not a matter of just changing physically certain actions, no it’s a matter of changing the default programmes within the mind as long as the default programmes are not changed no matter whatever we do the habits there will be a relapse so within the mind so the mind because it has several negative default programmes within us because of that it often harms us, because of its negative default programmes it makes us do things which are undesirable for us so before I move on are there any questions or comments in this stage I heard it takes two weeks to change a bad habit ok, yeah if you want to change the programme how long does it take ok, yeah, so if you want to change a habit does it change in two weeks yeah actually there are different surveys which talk about different time durations and two weeks is I would say the minimum we have to do it consistently but it also depends on how deep rooted is the habit that we are trying to correct, so if we do something consistently gradually that activity becomes ingrained and then that pattern gets set within us so in two weeks certainly some amount of impressions are formed by which at least some inclination will develop to start doing that activity again and again so the duration in which we do it continuously that is important but more important is also how often we do the opposite of that so if we can avoid the opposite then that say somebody is dieting and this dieting means something very simple diet there is a normal diet and then there is bingeing so to develop a regulated diet for some time but if we go to the opposite extreme in between then it becomes very difficult to come back to the normal level so I will give another example to illustrate this say somebody has a pet dog and they love that pet dog very much and now we come to know that this dog has got rabies and it’s not curable rabies means when a dog bites it can be extremely painful even fatal so now when the dog comes and dog wants to lick us and wants to touch us and wants to play with us as usual and we tell the dog go away go away till now we have been patting the dog fondling the dog caressing the dog now what is happening here so the dog again comes go away now if we do it 10 times 15 times 20 times and after saying no to the dog 20 times one time when the dog comes my heart softens I just fondle him he is playing with me she is playing with me and then after that even 20 times I say no still the dog will not be convinced so if I want to get the dog to go away it’s not so easy because I have some attachment to the dog but if I want the dog to go away I have to consistently say no to the dog and once I say no to the dog consistently then the dog gets it I am unwanted here no matter how many times I come and proposition this person is not going to pet me this person is not going to caress me so better let me go away better let me go somewhere else so like that we can compare our habit to a dog and if we resist it but in between again indulge in it then it takes much more time to get rid of it but if we consistently avoid it for a substantial amount of time it’s like saying no to the dog again and again the dog goes away at that time does that address the question? any other questions or comments? yes yeah so is the mind living or dead? the mind is non-living but it is not exactly like gross matter the gross matter means if I have a computer over here the computer itself is not going to move from here to there but if I consider the software in the computer I might just be working on the software I might be typing a word file and suddenly something might pop up the computer might give some notification do you want to update this or your power has gone down so software has the potentiality for activity much more than hardware so the mind is like software now if we consider the software how does it function somebody else has programmed it to do that every time some update notification comes up so like that the mind based on our past actions has got some default programmes and those programmes they just pop up automatically and once they pop up all that we need to do is just make one click and a whole programme will run after that so like that the mind although it is non-living but it is not exactly like gross matter subtle matter is like software and it just waits one click and then a lot of things can happen after that so that’s why in the in the bhakti tradition the mind is often personified although the mind is non-living it is quite often treated as a person and by personifying it we can distance ourselves from it and we can deal with it in a more mature way that is your question yes so the last question I was curious is the mind solving based on the functions of the brain and like is the personality of the person depends on the mind is the personality of the person passed on to the next life one word can be part of it so does the personality come from the brain or does it come from the mind the personality originally comes from the soul the source of consciousness and the source of personality that is the soul the soul at present is covered by the mind which is the subtle body primarily and then there is the gross body gross body is what we see and both of these shape the behaviour shape the existence of the soul over here so if we consider say a virtual reality game now there are different people playing different games so in a particular game somebody might become a warrior maybe a air force fighter somebody else in another virtual reality game might become a police somebody else in another virtual reality game might become a baseball player so now depending on what particular game is being played the appropriate contraptions will be there things will be there by which the person will enter into that experience so like that around the soul there is the mind and the body the mind and the body act as the interface between the soul and the world and depending on the kind of desire that we have the soul acquires a particular kind of body and mind and the present personality the spiritual personality is almost subdued so right now who we are is shaped largely by our mind and secondarily by our body so the brain is simply the tool for consciousness to function in the body just like if I have to speak I need this throat and this tongue so it’s a tool for that function similarly for the tool similarly for the function of information processing the brain is the tool brain is the physical tool so we could say the mind is like the software the brain is like the CPU the central processing unit of a computer so it’s important but the computer may have a CPU but if there is no user there is no software the computer cannot function so the soul and the mind they are primarily required the brain is simply the physical instrument there is a physicist John Lorber, neurophysicist actually he has written an article in science called Is your brain really necessary? and what does this mean? there is a peculiar malady called hydroencephaly hydroencephaly means hydro is water encephaly refers to the brain so sometimes some people their cranial cavity their brain cavity is normally our brain is surrounded by fluid but in some children it has been found that their brain is filled with fluid their cranial cavity is filled with fluid so there is excessive water in it there are some cases where the whole cranial cavity had less than 1% of brain substance whether it is grey matter or white matter and there have been dozens of people like this so these people have no brain at all practically speaking physically speaking and yet they function perfectly well University of Sheffield there was a student who actually did a PhD in mathematics and he had a large brain so Lorber writes about this in his book so he asked him as a matter of routine enquiry do a brain scan so they wanted to check his brain they found he had no brain at all you know you send the light in from here, light comes out I am giving a metaphorical example here so he had no brain at all and yet he was functioning perfectly well so how is that? That means that the capacity to function does not depend on the brain. Usually the brain is the tool by which we function but the capacity itself does not come from the brain so in exceptional situations the soul can function directly with the body so the brain is the tool and because the mind goes from one body to the next body so whatever personality we acquire in this life that will go on to the next life so and this is evident especially in the case of what is called monozygotic twins. Normally when twins are born there are two ways in which they are born one is there are there are two the semen and the egg they twice unite and then there are two zygotes that are formed and then two embryos grow from that.
So in this case because two different semen have come in so there is some genetic difference between the two twins but there is something called monozygotic twins monozygotic twins means one semen enters into the womb unites with the egg and during normal reproduction instead of the egg simply growing the egg bifurcates into two and then two twins grow. Now when this happens the two twins are genetically not just similar they are identical 100% identical and although they are 100% identical still the two monozygotic twins also have their distinct personality. Each of them is an individual one of them may be introvert another may be extrovert one person may be very express one person may be expressive the other person may be very silent whatever it is.
So if our personality where biologically determined where genetically determined then if the genes are identical then the personality should also be identical but even when the genes are identical the personality is different that means that there is the source of our personality transcends our genetic makeup. Does it address your question? Any other questions? Should I go ahead? Ok. So I will take one more concept about I talked earlier about how we can personify the mind in order to deal with it Ok.
So most of you know about a ventriloquist Ventriloquist Ok. Everyone knows about ventriloquist? Ok. Fine.
Ventri is distance loquo is voice. Ventriloquist means sometimes in a circus it is shown there is a dummy and there is a ventriloquist who speaks but when the ventriloquist speaks he or she has the art of projecting one’s voice and so it appears as if the doll is that particular dummy is speaking. So now when the ventriloquist projects the voice if a person, the audience is not very alert they will actually think oh actually how is this doll speaking? How is this puppet speaking? How is this dummy speaking? But then if they look behind, maybe the ventriloquist is somewhere behind a curtain they look behind a curtain.
This is exact the ventriloquist is speaking and the words are coming from there That is basically projection of voice So now the mind if we treat it as another person Now if we treat it as a software we may not understand how close it is and how influential it is for us. So we can take another metaphor to understand how the mind functions. That is the metaphor of a ventriloquist So as a ventriloquist what is the mind normally ventriloquists they exhibit a show.
Ok I will show how the dummy speaks like that. But the mind when it acts as a ventriloquist it makes us its show That means the mind speaks and we identify with the mind and when we identify with the mind we think of its desire as our desire and once we accept that desire as our desire then we basically start doing the thing which the mind wants us to do So this is how the mind misleads us So before it, now I will talk about the first person and second person There is a very interesting, can you go to the next slide There is a very interesting verse in the Bhagavad Gita 2.62 and 63 So this is So what he is doing over here is that as I was talking about trajectory to tragedy means how we engage in self-defeating activities So consider say an alcoholic who is recovering, who wants to give up alcohol and that person has maybe taken some therapy has taken some resolutions and decided I am not going to drink and so say if it is a student going from home to college and along the way there is some advertisement or there is some bar So at that time the first thing that happens is contemplation Oh see that So when we see something which promises pleasure There is a voice inside That’s nice That’s nice Now if we compare that with somebody say who has never drunk alcohol or that person is not related to the habit of drinking alcohol So that person, for them the voice itself will not come That’s nice But because this person is indulged that programme is there inside So that is Sangha At that time some attraction is coming So at that time it is like the ventriloquist is here So we can compare the wine to the ventriloquist The person is here, this person who is trying to recover from alcohol And then from inside something says hey that’s nice And then if he keeps thinking of it more This voice becomes stronger That’s nice, what do you think about it Yes, no, maybe Yeah, it’s nice I want it I want it So at this time two things have happened It is not just that’s nice I want it means it has become a desire And at this stage it’s like say the mind has shifted its voice from the second person to the first person Why don’t you go and drink it Say a friend tells us why don’t you go and watch that Why don’t you go and watch that movie, why don’t you go here for this party At that time I am thinking should I go or should I not go But somehow the friend tells that idea to me That I want to go for the party So like that the mind when we contemplate on something What happens is I want it So from the second person somebody else proposing it to me It has become my own idea, I want it But it’s not my own idea It’s like say if I am working on a computer And suddenly some I am reading some website and suddenly some window pops up Some pop-up window comes, read some news, interesting news article is there or whatever It’s not that I want to read that article But if I am not careful, once the pop-up comes up, I click, immediately I go to that tab And then I start reading that And sometimes people just spend hours surfing on the net One click, one click, one click, one click Lost, so like that there is a proposition that has come Once I accept it, I want it Sangat Sanjayate Kama So first there is attraction, there is obsession, I want it And then when there is obsession Then you may remember, oh you should not be doing this Maybe the parents have told, maybe the counsellor has told And you should not be doing it There is irritation, who can stop me from doing it Who can stop me, there is anger, there is irritation So at this stage The idea that I should not have a relapse That is meant to protect But at this stage, one starts thinking of it as an obstacle When a mother embraces her baby The mother wants to embrace the baby and love the baby So the embrace is an expression of love It’s meant for protection But if the child is very restless The child may see the protection as a restriction The mother embraces the protection But the child may see it as a restriction So at this stage, in this krodha The very principles that are meant to protect us We see them as obstacles, we see them as restrictions And we become irritated, we become resentful about them Krodha, then after that, next Krodhaad Bhavati Sammoha Sammoha is delusion, delusion means At this stage you forget, oh last time I drank I got such a terrible hangover It was a splitting headache, I embarrassed myself I just, no, I want to enjoy it So there is delusion, there is confusion About what I should do, what I should not do So now what is happening? It is, I am thinking I want to do it And whatever force is there, whatever my intelligence is there Whatever my conscience is there saying don’t do it All that is getting suppressed Smriti Brahmashad Buddhinasho Sammoha Smriti Vibhrama So Smriti Vibhrama means memory lost Sometimes it happens that we resolve to do something And then afterwards, not only we forget to implement the resolution We even forget the resolution itself So there is a complete wipe out of the memory All the times I did something And I had problems because of that, I embarrassed myself Because of drinking too much or whatever it may be I forget that And actually our memory is our weaponry In the inner war our memory is our weaponry And once we lose our memory Then we become like Defenceless warriors, armless warriors In a war It is just, we will be slaughtered Smriti Brahmashad Buddhinasho After that there is Buddhinasho, stupefaction, we become like stupid We become like stupid, what does that mean? That we do things which are self destructive And we do it thinking that This is what I want to do And then afterwards there is stupefaction At this stage our whole programme Our whole internally we are being sabotaged Completely taken over And then we become puppets, like the programme has taken control of us And we are just acting according to that programme And then there is Pranashyati Pranashyati means self destruction So self destruction means we end up doing the things that We have decided not to So all this happens because we identify with that world So if I understand that Inside my mind there is a programme And that programme is not very friendly to me It is hostile to me, then we can be on the watch out Once we are on the watch out then we check ourselves Whenever that happens So I conclude with one last point This will require some elaboration So actually Krishna is also present inside us He is the inner seer The super soul is present inside us As a super soul he is a coach Not a critic, that means we all commit mistakes The purpose of a coach is aware of our mistakes But the coach helps us to grow, to become better So Krishna is like a coach He knows when we do wrong Aspect of God is present within us But his purpose is not to catch us, hey you did wrong, I am going to punish you That is not the kind of God Krishna is His purpose is to catch us when we fall Not to catch us when we are wrong That means his purpose is to help us Even if we do wrong, Krishna is there within us And he will guide us, he will help us become more and more aware So when we practise mantra meditation, we chant Hare Krishna At that time our consciousness becomes attuned And then we can hear the voice of Krishna from within and we can protect ourselves So I will summarise I talked about the mind in this talk How the mind is our enemy and how Krishna is our friend who can help us So for talking about how the mind is the enemy I talked about the metaphor of the self in the Bhagavad Gita Three level existence, the body is like the hardware, the mind is like the software The soul is like the user And the mind has many default programmes which hurt us And we need to correct those default programmes And for that purpose we need to give another example of the ventriloquist Wherein the mind makes its voice seem to be our voice So the default programme has to be countered And for that we need alertness So just as the mind is there within to mislead, there is Krishna who is there within Who can lead us properly So the more we practise meditation, the more we hear scripture Then Krishna’s voice inside becomes active So whenever the wrong voice starts coming, whenever the mind’s voice starts telling Do this, Krishna’s voice comes, don’t do this And we get the alertness by which we can counter the mind when it starts misleading us Thank you very much. Hare Krishna