​How to deal with the mind if it traps us in the same behaviour repeatedly?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
So, the mind’s impulse is trapped in some situation and it takes a long time for us to realize that I have got into this unnecessarily. What can we do? So, it’s good if we know what are the standard ways in which the mind distracts us or traps us.
It’s good to create obstacles between ourselves and that object. That means that, say for example, somebody is a recovering alcoholic. Another thing they are told is clear all traces of alcohol from your house.
If you are staying near a bar, move away from that bar. Don’t stay at that place. So, don’t make acting on that impulse easy.
Rather, make it difficult. There are people who are shopaholics. Just want to shop, shop, shop, shop.
They go to shop 10 things and they come back with 50 things. And those 50 things, sometimes they don’t even see those things after they purchase it. Just they are lying there somewhere in their warehouse or some part of their house.
Sometimes you may laugh, but for people who get into that, it’s compulsive. So, then they are told that if you have a shopaholic, when you go to the shop, don’t go with your credit card. Just go with cash.
So, what happens at that time is that even if I see something to purchase, I can’t act on it immediately. Then I have to come back again and I’ll go and purchase it. By that time, do I really need to purchase this? So, our intelligence starts getting activated.
So, we have to find out what it is that our impulses are. Where it acts and creates some obstacles. So, for example, if somebody has that tendency to surf the net and waste a lot of time on the net, then create some internet filters where we can access only some sites or access only some part of the day or whatever it is.
So, there are ways in which we can help ourselves. So, the external regulation or external obstacle cannot stop a person from doing an undesirable. But, it can create an enough amount of time like a pause during which our intelligence comes back.
If I’m determined to do something, I’ll do it anyway. But, if my intelligence awakens that I don’t have to do this. So, we find whatever it is that is distracting us repeatedly, then we can try to create some obstacles.
And that is very helpful in giving that even there is a little respite. You see, when impulses come, the impulses are like spikes. They come for a short while and during that time, they are irresistible.
And after some time, they go down. And after that, it’s much more easier to resist it. So, if the obstacle just holds us back during this period of the spike, then we will ourselves hold us back after that spike goes away.
That’s why these external supports are helpful. And in the traditional culture, often there were those external supports in the sense that, you know, if we are living in a culturally conservative society, if we do something which is wrong, there are so many people who will frown at us. And just not wanting to earn their displeasure, you know, protects us from doing that.
But when those sort of protections are not there, everything in a culturally conservative society, some of the things may be restrictive also. Some of the things may not be good. I’m not talking about in a broad sense.
But in the principle over here that, you know, in a society which is culturally very liberal, which is what most of the society today is, then we need our own protection. Because the society is not going to protect us. Sin or wrongdoing has always been there.
But the difference between Kali Yuga and the earlier ages is that, in Kali Yuga, sin is made glamorous. To be sinful is to be fashionable. So, that actually completely skews people’s values.
You know, if in a movie there is a, there are some very obscene scenes. Now, this has very bold scenes. You see, this is a subtle misappropriation of language.
When somebody is actually is dressing in an obscene way or showing themselves off, it’s obscene. But when you call it bold, what that means is everybody wants to be bold. Isn’t it? And subtly, how it is being positioned is that those who dress modestly, they are not modest, they are cowardly.
So, in this way, our values are distorted. So, that’s why in this culture where sin is glamorized, where the cultural protections against temptation are very much off, at that time, we have to create our own protections, our own systems of protection by which we don’t succumb. Does that answer your question? Thank you.