Gita 17.16 Purity has to be cultivated as an austerity before it can be savored as a state

Transcript

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Thank you. Bhagavad Gita 17.16 manah prasadasam yatham maunam atma-vinigraha-bhavasam shuddhir itath tapo manasam ucyate Krishna is talking here about austerity of the mind and therein he puts bhavasam shuddhir, purification of existence as austerity of the mind. devadriya-purupragya-poojanam saucha-marjamah ahimsa-satyama-krodhas tyagah shantira-paishunam So earlier in 17.14 when he was talking about austerities of the body, he has talked about saucharam shuchi, cleanliness.
So external cleanliness is important at the level of the body. Purification, however, is a matter of the mind and it’s an austerity. You know, purity is not just a state, it’s also a choice.
This is a consistent feature of the characteristics that comprise of the activity that comprise the austerity of the mind as Krishna is describing over here. He’s stating here that tapo manasam ucyate, these are ways in which we can perform austerity of the mind. So all of us, when we say do what we like to do, that is what we consider pleasant.
That’s a comfort, that’s a luxury, when we have a very comfortable bed to sleep on, when we have a very relaxed situation to be ourselves in, where we like to do, where we can do abundantly what we like to do, that’s what we call a luxury and austerity is the opposite of that. Let’s say somebody has to sleep on the bare floor or just on a hard floor without much, on a hard bed without much comforts, that would be austerity. Something which we don’t like to do, but we do, girding our will, that’s an austerity.
Applying that principle at the level of the mind, Bhav samshuddhiratye tat, tapo manasam ucyate, this means that we all have the choice of what we think about. By default, our conditioned mind will rush towards the object of its conditionings. By default, it will move towards whatever it is that it is attracted to, it is attached to.
So if we are attached to money, the mind will go to money. If we are attached to sensuality, the mind will go to sensuality. Now amidst such a situation, so we all have things that direct, that create impure desires within us, that aggravate the impurities that are there within us.
And our thoughts may naturally go towards that. So not thinking about those things, and more importantly, thinking about pure things, directing our thoughts towards those things which are pure, even if it requires some determined and voluntary application of force, that is what is required. And sadhana bhakti, in a sense, is a function of voluntary force.
Voluntary force means that, compulsory force means say, we have a job and we don’t feel like doing it. But if we don’t do it, we’ll be fired. And we won’t be able to view our livelihood.
Our bread and butter would be in danger. So for the sake of roti, sabji, bread, butter, we do that job. So that job we are forced to do and it’s not voluntary.
It’s almost mandatory. But self-transformation is largely voluntary. Even when we suffer because of our impure thoughts and desires, we can’t really get rid of them unless we make a determined effort to do so.
And the determined effort means that we put aside the natural gravity of the mind and cultivate an educated or enlightened gravity. In other words, gravity refers to say, the gravitational force of the earth. So things, if they’re left alone, if they’re left in mid-air, they fall down because of gravity.
And still, the more important thing is that gravity can also mean a disposition, a disposition of heaviness, grave, as we say. Now, we can say that we need intellectual gravity to counter mental gravity. So our mental gravity refers to the gravitational force that occurs within us, which pushes us down towards worldly things, even against our will.
Just as things, when left in mid-air, automatically fall down, even against our will. Similarly, our thoughts will go in impure directions naturally. Just as things fall down naturally.
So austerity is an object that is falling down to hold it up, to move it up further. Especially if the object is weighty, it’s heavy. And that requires exertion of our energy.
It requires exercise of our muscles. And that could be an austerity. So like that, we need to do inner austerity, to lift our thoughts in pure directions and to not let them go in impure directions, which they would go by the default gravity of the mind.
And for doing this austerity at the level of the mind, we need intellectual clarity and gravity. What happens is that when our intelligence is strong, when we have contemplated the truths of life, when the temporariness of everything material has registered deep within us, then we don’t get too worked up about small, small things. We don’t get either worried by anxieties too much, nor do we get tempted and distracted by pleasures.
Because we understand both ultimately need to be transcended. If we want to achieve something purposeful in our life, that purposeful achievement requires intellectual gravity, by which we, when we recognize that something is serious, when we become grave about it, when we say realize that a particular sickness is serious, when we become grave and then we take the medicines diligently, even if we sometimes don’t feel like taking them. Similarly, when we are going through the daily routines of our life, if we understand that letting our mind go in impure directions is going to cause us enormous suffering in the long run, it is going to make us stay bound to material existence, maybe even become increasingly bound, then we will have to work for purifying ourselves with diligence.
We will work because we understand the consequences of impurity, of impure living and we understand the consequences of pure living. So as sadhakas, to the extent we work on these things, to that extent we will be able to move onwards steadily in spiritualizing our consciousness, in krishnaizing our consciousness, because we will determinately fix our mind on Krishna and on things related with him and thus we will keep moving steadily towards him. By cultivating intellectual gravity, we will counter the mental gravity and countering that mental gravity is the austerity of the mind, which will bring about purification of our existence, because the essence of our existence is our consciousness, is our thoughts.
External cleanliness is good, it is an important starting step, but we become pure not just by having pure externals, but by having pure internals. And having pure internals means changing not just our thoughts, but changing the direction of our thoughts, changing ultimately the gravity of our thoughts. So presently it is as if by gravity pull our thoughts go in impure directions, but if we keep consistently practicing bhakti, gradually the mind as an austerity, even if we don’t feel like doing it, then that practice of austerity will gradually redirect the mind from the world to Krishna.
It will become attached to Krishna increasingly and when that happens, the mind becomes attached to Krishna, then we will find that we have become truly joyful, that we have become pure and in that purity we will relish the ecstasy that is innate to our souls, which are eternal blissful parts of the eternal blissful absolute truth Krishna.