Ecology & Spirituality- Bhakti worldview for a better world

 

Ok. So, please come back to that a little later.

I'll definitely talk about it. Spirituality and mental health issues. Do you have any thoughts on environment and spirituality as such? No.

Would you like to share something? I think everyone already… My name is Becca. Sorry? Becca. I think everyone, I really like what Ivy and Leslie said about spirituality and how your spiritual environment influences your physical environment and outside of yourself it does to the world as well.

Ok. So, let's maybe, those of you who have not answered this, maybe one further question. How has being here shaped your experience of spirituality or of the environment? Anything that you have gathered while being here? So, I believe it's interesting to see the connections between ISKCON and the environment around them.

It's a connection between the earth and a higher power that I have never observed before. And so, seeing that has helped me realise new things about my own environment back home. And so, I hope to take some of that back home because of how the environment is treated so much better here through spirituality and spiritual connection than ignorance in the West.

Yes. That's nice. So, I'll come to your question later.

Let's just look at these points, very thoughtful points about the environment and spirituality. Now, I'll just take a slight historical detour. Whether it's in the East or the West, what happened in general was, we humans were always tiny beings in front of the vastness of nature.

Whether it is just a physically large mountain or whether it is a tornado or whether it is an ocean, whether it's an earthquake. So, we humans, just living in nature constantly reminded us of the immensity of some reality beyond us. And that brought a certain level of reverence, reverence towards nature.

And this reverence meant that we humans took things from nature. We took fruits, we cultivated agriculture to get grains. But at the same time, we recognised that there is nature is something far bigger than us, far beyond us.

And we need to, while we take our needs from nature, we need to live in harmony. This reverence had two aspects to it. One is harmony and the other is humility.

That there is a bigger hole out of which I am a part and I need to play my part. This was more or less the worldview specifics apart across the East and the West. Nature was seen as sacred and humans need to harmonise with nature.

Since the time of the advent of science, especially the scientific revolution, Francis Bacon is famous for one of his quotes, knowledge is power. Now, that particular quote has become very well known but often the original context in which he said it was lost. His idea was that he considered nature to be almost evil.

So, traditionally nature was seen as a mother but his idea was nature like as an evil step-mother. Like Cinderella has her own step-mother, so like that. And he thought that knowledge in the sense of technology will give us power over nature.

That will enable us to bend nature to our will. So, this brought a fundamental attitudinal shift that nature rather than being seen as an object to be harmonised with was seen as an object to be controlled. And the greater the technology could develop, the greater would be our control.

And ultimately full control over nature would be the triumph of humanity over nature. That was the broad idea. So, now, if we look at nature itself, there are two broad ways of looking at it.

One is, nature is all bad or largely bad. And the only way to deal with it is to control it. That was the attitude which is there through, which animated the modern worldview which led to lot of, say, exploitation of natural resources, destruction of rain forests and desertification of top soils and so many other things.

The idea was, the more we can control nature, the more we can get out of it. Now, the other extreme is to also go to the opposite and say, nature is all good. Now, nature, if you consider all good, well, it's a bit naive.

Because nature is characterised by a struggle for existence. And it's often quite a bitter and not exactly a bitter but a brutal struggle. One being is a food for the other being.

So, there is the idea that all nature is idyllic. Well, coming close to nature is nice. But here, we have nature but we have a certain semblance of peace, of protection.

If nature is filled with dangerous snakes and dangerous animals, going to that nature would be risky. So, one is to consider nature itself to be like paradise. And the other is to consider nature to be like hell.

So, the idea is that if nature is like hell, then from that hell, we will make heaven in this world. That we will create, basically the idea was, a tech paradise. We will create a high tech paradise through technological advancement.

So, now the challenge with this is that when we are looking at nature, these two extreme views. In one sense, if you just accept that everything in nature is good, then that can make us powerless. Are we not meant to change things? If it's freezing cold, are we just meant to stay in cold? Should we not try to create an environment which is warm? We all survive, we don't do that.

Then, if we just consider nature as all good, then it takes away all room for human initiative, human intelligence, human creativity. Because in one sense, human creativity is about making our environment better. And that is required for our survival, for our thriving.

At the same time, when we start focussing on nature as an antagonist and try to control and dominate it, then we trigger forces that we are not aware of. We disturb delicate balances that actually enable our very existence. So, basically, the understanding in between we could have is if you consider pendulum with two extremes that nature can be a pointer to paradise, it can also be a competitor to paradise.

Pointer to paradise means that when we come close to nature, we are reminded of the immensity, the beauty, the intricacy of realities far beyond us. And that sense can point us towards higher realities. On the other hand, when we look at nature, we might either think that, oh, this is itself perfect.

But for our living, nature has many dangers. So, the world view that the bhakti tradition of which we are a part, the bhakti tradition in India, it operates on a premise that if we consider, so this diagram will summarise everything that I'm going to talk about today, that there is this world and there is another world. Now, this world is real.

That's one theory. Another world is real. That's one aspect of the theory.

Now, based on this, we could have broadly four different world views. And almost all the world views across human history and geography can be put in this broad rubric. Of course, details can vary immensely.

But let's consider the world view that this world is real and there is no such thing as another world. That is the prominent world view. We could call this as materialism.

And quite often, this world view has been enhanced by time. It's called scientific materialism and science boosted by science. Actually, more precisely, it can be called as scientistic materialism.

Scientistic means it is based on scientism that that's now science is basically a tool for knowledge. Science is a way of looking at the world. Science is a very powerful resource, the scientific method for us to gain rational understanding of the world.

But scientism is basically what makes science omniscient. Basically, it makes science into a god. That all knowledge can be acquired only through science.

And if something cannot be known through science, then it has no existence at all. So, this is one world view that the materialistic world view. And this is the world view that is very prominent in today's world.

Now, while it seems logical that yeah, who knows if there is any other world at all. Let's focus on this world. That's true at one level.

At the same time, we will see that the world we live in whether it is urban in cities or whether it is rural in villages or right out into nature, there is always something which is unsatisfying about the world we live in. And that is why we try to improve it. And we see what science and technology has done is that if we took we tried to improve the world and make it a tech paradise and to some extent, yes, science has transformed the world.

We have air travel, we have road transportation, we have electricity, we have telecommunications, lots of things. At the same time, what we have found is that while comforts have increased, at the same time, misery also seems to have increased. Especially when we talk about mental health problems.

At the physical level, diseases may or may not be increasing. Many have decreased, many have come up. At a mental level, problems have become enormous.

So, one of the results of this materialistic worldview and the attempt to make this world itself into paradise. We all want to live in a better world. The attempt to make this world into paradise is that we have people today who are comfortably miserable.

We have a lot of physical comfort but there is a lot of inner distress. And many times, addictions are just ways to get away from the emptiness and the distress. Even if there is physical comfort.

So, this is a paradox. Another thing that we have tried to do is that, this world is all that is real but we have used technology to create fictional worlds. Now, if you consider say, some archaeologists from a thousand years back, they were to explore what is typical, what is most representative of 21st century humanity.

There could be many things that could be sought out. But one thing which might be striking to them is our obsession with entertaining. Many of these big budget Hollywood movies, 200 million dollars, 300 million dollars, so much money is spent for just a few hours of entertainment.

And, what are we trying to do? Essentially, through these fictional worlds, we are trying to enter into another reality. Experience some other reality. So, that long and many times, this other reality is filled with all kinds of things which might not be considered rational.

So, in Star Wars, there is a force. In Marvel Universe, various beings have their own particular powers. And if you look at it from a rational perspective, nobody has these kind of powers.

It doesn't make sense. But what happens is, we do accept that. There is a suspension of disbelief so that we just want to enjoy the entertainment.

So, basically, our fascination with entertainment and not just entertainment, creating elaborate fictional worlds. And for those who are fans of those worlds, you have these comic cons and you have Harry Potter thing and so many things like that, people live this as if it's real. In fact, you could say for them, the way they live it, it's more real than reality.

You take that more seriously. I saw one cartoon a man is telling his friend, yesterday my broadband entertainment went down. So, I spent some time with my family.

They seem to be like nice people. So, basically, entertainment has been there throughout human society. But entertainment is a break from the monotony of life.

But today, entertainment is pursued so feverishly that reality is a break from entertainment. People think the virtual world, the fictional world, the movie world, the video game world, the simulated world is what is real. And this world is just an annoying necessary break from that world.

So, the point I'm making over here is that, it seems our attraction fictional world suggests that attraction to the, you could just use the word, broad word, paranormal. Somebody having some mystical power, some extraordinary powers, a force, choke, or creating a spider-like web, or whatever, Superman has his own powers, all of this attraction to the paranormal is normal. That we all long for something more than what the world around us offers.

And then, if through the prevailing world view we are declared that there is no other world, then we create another world through our technology and try to immerse ourselves, even lose ourselves a bit. So, this is one world view. I just go through these four world views.

That's the first. The second world view is that neither this world is real, nor is there any other world. And this we could call as nihilism.

This is an extremely dark way of living. We all need something of value, something of meaning, something that will enable us to function in our lives, to face life's challenges. So, philosophers, many modern 20th century philosophers, existentialists, they saw through the promises of technology and the glitter of modernity.

They said, this is all pointless. And they, once they had rejected the spiritual world, there is no other world, there is no other reality, there is nothing spiritual. And the promises of this world of pleasure, of paradise, all of them, they were disappointed.

So, they became nothingness. So, Albert Ducamo, for example, he said that, existence is suffering. I am paraphrasing broadly.

Existence is suffering. The more we try to alleviate the suffering, the worse it becomes. Therefore, the only philosophical question worth asking is, whether to commit suicide today or tomorrow.

Existence is pointless. We just can't live with a nihilistic world. And unfortunately, scepticism is good, but cynicism is not.

Scepticism is basically like, if I am driving a car, I have brakes in my car. So, if I am going in the wrong direction, I have the brakes to stop. So, scepticism is what helps us to prevent falling for false ideas, false beliefs.

But cynicism, cynicism is where somebody is basically using the brakes for driving. If you only keep pressing the brakes, you will get nowhere. And most people nowadays, they grow up with a materialistic world view and sooner or later, if they don't get anything higher, they soon become nihilistic.

So, what is even the point of living? This world, no matter what you do, things don't seem to improve. Every attempt to make it better seems to only make it worse. We may join the feverish zeal, some activist movement, this movement, that movement, but even the environmental movement for that matter, it started off as a very valuable movement for protecting the environment, but now it has become highly politicalised and commercialised.

And so, things start going downwards. Now, the third world view is what in the Vedic tradition is called as the impersonalism. Impersonalism is the idea that this world is false and there is another world that is real.

And that world is basically seen to be an unending ocean of white light. And the idea is we merge into that. Now, it's more like you can have entertainment for escapism and just watch movies and forget all about life and its challenges and its dissatisfactions.

So, we can have escapism through entertainment, but there can be escapism even through enlightenment. So, this escapism through enlightenment means focus on some other reality, just deny, neglect the reality of this world. And this form of spirituality is often associated with Eastern spirituality, even Indian spirituality.

That ultimately everything in this world is just what the word uses, Maya. And if you heard this word Maya, Maya basically means illusion or falsity. So, everything is just illusion.

And this world view is also very it's world rejecting, it is world degrading. And many thinkers, many western philosophers who read about Indian philosophy, they came to India and they found all these thinkers, their thoughts were so lofty, but the way they people in India live is so filthy. Why this mismatch? Because the idea became yeah, there is another world that is real, this world is false.

So, whether there is poverty, whether there is distress, whether there is environmental chaos, this is matter because this world is false. Now, the fourth world view is the Bhakti world view. The Bhakti world view holds that this world is real and there is another world also real.

And this world is a pointer to that world. So, when we when we focus on taking care of the environment, here we have many eco-friendly projects over here, we have encouraged eco-friendly farming in the broader community. But at the same time, this is also a spiritual or a devotional place.

In fact, in the Bhakti understanding, the ultimate reality as we know by the name Krishna, Krishna is an eco-friendly divinity. Is it not eco-friendly, eco-loving divinity? Krishna as ultimate divinity lives within nature. Krishna is conceived of as a cowherd who personally takes care of cows and takes care of nature.

And the idea is that that reality is reflected in this reality. So, the way we care for the world reflects our care for the one who is the source of the world. Care for… So, we live in this world in a way that is a replica of the other world.

So, here we have eco-friendly community, but we also have a replica of a place which is very sacred in our tradition that is Vrindavan. Have they made that forest also very nice? The mountain? Yes. The circumambulation.

So, the idea is that we conduct ourselves in this world in such a way that we access, we progress towards the other reality. So, it is life-affirming because how we live in this world matters. But our aspirations are not tied alone to bringing about a change in this world.

So, now the idea of another world might seem very abstract. Let me bring it down. There is an outer world for us and there is an inner world for us.

And there are things around us. So, say the chair we are sitting on is not very comfortable, then that is not a physically comfortable place. That causes us some disturbance.

But, if we consider that the things around us, they matter. But they don't matter as the thoughts inside us. The thoughts inside they matter much much more.

our… So, when we focus… I'll make two points. I'll try to bring together what I've been driving at through this discussion. That when the quality of our life, it depends primarily on the quality of our thoughts.

Somebody may be eating delicious food. Say, suppose after this meeting here, later on you have lunch and there is a special feast. And this feast every one of you has a different delicacy in your head.

Maybe one of you has a cake, another one of you has some other pastry, another one has chocolate, another one has something else. Now, you may be eating a cake which is delicious. But you are looking at, oh what does he have? And what does she have? Now, will you be able to enjoy the cake? What do you think? No.

Why? Because the thing outside, the cake is tasty. But the thought inside is what? Why does he have that? Why does she have that? So, our happiness, our well-being, our wellness is determined much more by our thoughts inside than the things outside. And most people spend their entire life trying to improve the things outside.

I want to gain more wealth. I want to gain more following. And nowadays in social media, everybody wants to be an influencer.

And everybody wants more and more following. It's okay. Improving the things outside is fine.

But somebody may have 1 million Instagram followers and they are looking at all the people who have 2 million and they feel dissatisfied. So, if we do not put enough effort to improve the quality of our thoughts, then no matter how many things we will improve, we will not be satisfied. So, spirituality is about to some extent science focusses on making things better.

Spirituality focusses on making thoughts better. Spirituality involves various practises. It could be mantra chanting.

It could be silent meditation. Whatever practises we are having, it could be praying. It could be affirmations.

Whatever it is, the purpose of spirituality is to enrich, enhance, elevate our thoughts. Now, if our thoughts are not elevated, then we end up consuming more and more things in the hope of making ourselves feel better. So, if I believe that, oh, that person is having a better life than me, then what happens is, I may just eat a lot of food or I may just watch a lot of TV or just consume containers of food.

Why? It's just a way to try to get away from the unpleasant, unhappy thoughts that are inside us. And this, the negative thoughts inside us, what they do is, they, there is, in one sense, there is inner negativity and that leads to outer, not just consumption, there's consumption, but more than that, there is outer compulsivity. So, we often eat a lot of food because something is eating us from within.

I want to get away from that. So, at a fundamental level, the environmental destruction that humanity has brought through various means, often unintentionally is our desperate attempt to try to medicate ourselves, to anaesthetize ourselves, to give ourselves a painkiller for our inner pain by trying to gain more outer control, trying to have better outer consumption. And this is never good to it.

Because no matter how much we consume, as long as our thoughts inside are not addressed, we just want more and more and more consumption. And that is why environmental organisations at a particular time, initially the idea was that we just make people aware of how dangerous the environmental situation is, and people will change their habits. People will adopt more and more eco-friendly living.

People will adopt more and more choices that are not environmental hazardous. But just knowledge didn't lead to that change. That's why many, many environmental activists are also now turning towards spiritual.

They say we need to infuse nature with the vision of the sacred. We want that people need to find non-material forms of enrichment. So, if our thoughts are unhealthy, then we'll have an unhealthy craving for things and that will eventually damage the environment.

Just keep looking for new, possessing new, consuming new, and then we'll ruin the environment. Now, that's the last point I'll make is that spirituality has at least in that world view where this world is real and the other world is real. So, spirituality has a two-pronged approach.

One is we improve the thoughts internally. So, we adopt practises which enable us to animate our thoughts. And simultaneously, so this is the inner world.

So, when I talk about another world, we could also equate the spiritual world with the inner world. So, we improve the inner world through spiritual practises. And the inner world is real and the outer world is also real.

So, therefore, we try to improve the things also. However, the priority remains on including our thoughts. We try to improve things, but many times when we try to improve things and they don't work, the things don't improve, then we become bitter.

We become frustrated. We become cynical. And that leads to even darker thoughts internally.

I have travelled across the world for the last 10 years. I've been studying spiritual for 30 years, but last 10 years I've been travelling across the world. And one thing I've noticed is that people who have a zeal, people who are activists, having a zeal is good.

But I notice a small and significant number of people who are activists, they often become so vicious and bitter about anyone who doesn't share their activism. I am doing so much to improve things. Why don't you help me? Why don't you understand how important it is? And they are trying to improve things, but their attempt to improve things has actually worsened their thoughts.

And then they end up, often, they are trying to remove outer toxicity, but they are creating inner toxicity, unfortunately. They become bitter. So, in their attempts to remove outer toxicity, they are trying to decrease the outer toxicity, but it leads to inner toxicity increasing.

But this is counterproductive, this is unhealthy. Sometimes, environmental activists nowadays, they destroy art forms and they do all kinds of things, not just environmental activists, any kind of activist. So, what we need, what Bhakti Spirituality offers us is an inside-out approach.

That we try to improve outer things, but we focus on doing inner things. So, we improve our thoughts and we improve things. Now, in one sense, when we improve our thoughts, that gives us happiness.

When we improve the things around us, that gives us success. The ideal is, we get both happiness and success. The quality of our thoughts improve and the quality of the things outside improve.

But, if both come together, that is the best. But, what spiritual growth enables us to do is, we can have happiness even without success. That means, sometimes, our endeavours to improve the outer world may not succeed.

And yet, if we are spiritually connected, then that very spiritual connection will enable us to find inner contentment. Yes, I am a part of a reality far bigger than myself. I am doing my part.

Now, my part may sometimes be enough, my part may not be enough. But, by playing my part, I will be connected spiritually and I will be contented internally. So, that way, that inner bitterness can be avoided.

And when we are internally positive, we can actually help create outer positivity also. And bring about outer positive change in the healthiest possible way. So, I will summarise what I discussed.

Broadly, I made three distinct points over here. I talked about, first of all, we are discussing about the relationship between the environment and spirituality. So, the first point was about history.

That how the vision of nature changed with history. From treating nature to be like a mother to be revered, it became like a step-mother to be controlled. And controlled primarily through technology.

So, these are two opposite world views. Views of nature are, the nature is it's all bad or it is all good. So, if we consider it to be all bad, then we try to overpower it and then we disrupt, we become disruptive.

But if we consider it to be all good, we become passive. There is no room for us to do anything. So, the balanced view of nature is that, nature is a pointer to a higher reality.

To the inner reality. And it's also a competitor. So, what does it mean pointer and competitor? For that, I discussed these four broad world views, where this world is real and the other world is, we could say this world, we could call it broadly the outer world and the inner world.

The other or the inner world. So, discuss it. This world real, other world false, what is that world view? Materialism.

Materialism, yeah. Now, we can't live with this world view, that's why we end up creating fiction and try to escape through technology from this world view. This world is false, other world is false, what is it? Nihilism.

Nihilism. This is a very dark world view. Life itself is pointless.

This world is false, other world is real. Impersonalism. Thank you.

What happens in the outer world doesn't matter. As long as, internally, all that matters. So, then this is the Bhakti world view is that there is the inner world where there is divinity within us but the outer world is also an expression of that divine's blessings.

So, this is this is nature caring, life affirming because this world is also, it also matters. It's also a part of who we are. And then lastly we discussed about what are the practical implications because of this world, the outer world to be real, the inner world to be real.

Then we understand that we want to improve our thoughts and we want to improve our things. So, both but we are clear that improving our thoughts is more important because that is what affects us more. Why is this more important? It affects us more, the state of our thoughts and it is more in our control.

And so we improve our thoughts through science, through spirituality. We improve our things through science. Now, if we try to only things, if we try to improve, quite often, what it makes us? It makes the thoughts worse because when we try, we are trying to make things better and people are not helping, people are not cooperating, people are not understanding and we start becoming bitter.

That's how we see that people who are activists can very easily become zealots. So, activism is good. But from activists where okay, I am passionate about this cause to becoming zealots where I hate anyone who doesn't share my cause, doesn't agree with me.

This is good, this is not. So, what spiritual practises do is spiritual worldview, spiritual practises, they help us to both we work on improving our thoughts, that's the source of happiness, and we work on improving the things around us. That is what is success.

So, ideally, we see both happiness and success but even if success doesn't come immediately, understanding that we are a part of a bigger reality, we are playing our part helps us to stay internally content. So, that way we can work on improving our external environment while also ensuring that we work on our inner environment, our thought world. And that is enriched and we can be happy and then we can be sources radiating joy into the world that we live in.

Thank you very much. So, I think I obliquely addressed your question about mental health problems. So, what spirituality does is that it provides us spirituality is meant to provide us access to a reservoir of positive thoughts.

So, mental health problems, we can have many specific causes generally what happens is negative thoughts are killing our consciousness. So, now what do we do when negative thoughts are killing our consciousness? At one level, we try to address what is the cause of negative thoughts externally. But we need to be able to get positive thoughts inside us.

So, those positive thoughts come from spiritual practises. So, when we do musical meditation, when we do mantra chanting, when we do spiritual practises, that gives us access to positive thoughts. And that addresses mental health issues from the bottom up, from the roots.

Along with that, some other specific issues may require specific forms of treatment. But the more we have access to a reservoir of positivity within us, the more we find that the negativity won't have such a strong hold on us. So, any questions, comments? Yes? I was going to touch on the word thoughts.

Yeah, generally when you think of thoughts, you think of knowledge in the mind, thinking of those thoughts. So, I'm just wondering, is thoughts equated with consciousness, spirituality, and thoughts? Because knowledge and thoughts around knowledge is more towards the scientific side of it. That's a good way of looking at it.

Pointing out the difference. So, we can start with an example. Some of you noticed when I came in, I needed crutches for walking.

So, when I was one, I got polio. Basically, I was walking normally and I fell down, and I was never able to walk afterwards. Normally.

I don't remember that, I was too small. But one of my earliest memories of my having polio is some neighbours or some relatives coming to our home and they are consoling my mother, saying, oh, it's so sad your son got polio. And I remember the clear voice of my mind of my mother, filled with conviction.

She said that whatever he lacks physically, God will provide him intellectually. I was probably two and a half or three at that time. I don't know what signs of intellectual ability I had shown for my mother to make a statement like that.

But somehow that statement stayed with me. And over the years, my focus of the statement has shifted. God will provide intellectually.

So, initially, for at least the first 15-17 years of my life, it was just intellectually, not so much God. Who will provide? I will provide intellectually. So I always identified with my intellectual side much more.

And I was good at studies, I liked to read, and although I couldn't play sports like other kids, it didn't matter much to me, because I was good at my intellectual side. So, basically, when I am talking about thoughts, it's not just information-based thoughts. There is a cognitive level of thinking where we analyse and where we think about subjects.

It's nice, it's important to have knowledge in that cognitive or informational sense. But below that, at a deeper, almost existential level, is are the thoughts that define who we are. The thoughts that… So, okay, we'll put it this way.

The word thought itself can have two distinct meanings. I'll use two sentences and then you can tell me what is the difference between these two. I just got a thought.

I have given this a lot of thought. What is the difference between the two? Time. Sorry? Time.

In what sense, time? Day. In what sense, time? Well, I just got is like instinct. I've given it a lot of thought.

It's more like I have pondered and I've really given it time to think through. Okay. That's a striking difference.

Good point. I hadn't thought of it in these terms. But time.

So, here time is less. It's just moment. We are putting a lot of time over here.

Anything else? I just had a thought. I just had a data point. Information.

The second one is internalisation of that. An internal understanding. Okay.

So, this is more you could say in inner it's almost like analysis, comprehension, contemplation. We are investing ourselves in it. And this is almost like an inner occurrence.

A data point just popped up with me. Yes? I just got a thought. It's a lot more of just like an idea while I have given this a lot of thoughts.

It's very decisive and inclusive. So, this is just an idea. This is much more decisive, conclusive.

Thank you. So, in terms of the bhakti world view, what it says is that in our inner world there is our mind which is like an inner screen. And beyond that is our soul.

The essence of who we are. And on this mind which is like an inner screen if I consider my phone right now. So, on my phone some notification can pop up.

So, a notification popping up my phone is very different from my opening a book and consciously reading that book. So, when you say I just got a thought means it's almost like something pops up over here and from there it comes here. I got a thought.

So, there are many pop-ups which come in our mind. Some of them are interesting. Some of them are distracting.

There are pop-ups over there. That's got a thought. But given this a lot of thought means there are many pop-ups over here.

Maybe one of these, I decide to think about it. I consciously I have given this some thought. So, when we are talking about being thoughtful for example.

We are always full of thoughts. But we are not always thoughtful. There are so many thoughts which are coming up and going around.

In fact if somebody has ADHD, their mind is working overtime. But they are not very thoughtful because they have impulse control issues. Whereas thoughtful is not the same as full of thoughts.

So, full of thought means there are so many pop-ups coming in. Thoughtful means this is what I want to focus on. This is what is important.

This is not so important. So, we could say that when we are talking about our inner thoughts and improving our inner thoughts, it's more of in terms of being thoughtful. Thoughtful means basically focus on things that matter.

When we are thoughtful, we focus on what matters. When we are full of thoughts, then we are carried away by whatever glitters. There is what matters and there is what glitters.

So, there will always be thoughts inside. But improving our thoughts means having thoughts that matter, focussing on thoughts that matter and thereby improving the quality of our inner world. Any other questions or comments? I was just thinking about the word thoughts and working on our thoughts and having the positive thoughts that you were talking about.

I kind of identify that as my identity or myself. Who I am. a perfect version of me.

A higher version of myself. Higher self. Who I want to be.

How I want to be. The impact and the intentional life that I want to live. But in cases of that desire and that want to live that way and also imperfect.

There are parts of me that end up being like making mistakes. Being a less intentional self or being a selfish self. Being a less humble self.

But I think as we are able to identify the kind of person that we want to be and identify that higher self and that identity and those positive thoughts we can create that. I kind of had that connection to something I thought about in the past. When you were talking about the identity that you created for yourself with the belief that your mother had in you.

I personally think that was an identity that you created but if your mother told you the other way, it could have been different. I think the same way for ourselves too. Those positive thoughts we have about ourselves and the true identity we create for ourselves or who we can become.

Like we talked about in the other quadrants, if we have those negative thoughts that's what we become. I just think that I wanted to point out that we're imperfect and we do need to acknowledge those parts of ourselves that are not a higher self or the true identity that we want to be. Because if we just ignore them they're more likely to creep in and make an impact on me than if I just don't accept them but acknowledge a choice to try and be a higher version of myself.

It's very introspective and insightful. Thank you for sharing that. Let's add a couple of points to it.

This is actually one of the themes from the Bhagavad Gita. That we have a higher self. The self is quite complex.

And then we have a lower self. Now different terms can be used to refer to this. But the Gita in 6.5, the Bhagavad Gita is one of the texts that we follow.

What it says is that let's put it another way. The higher self and lower self might seem a little abstract. But say this is the functional self.

The daily self we function. But there is a part of us which can observe ourselves. Say I may get angry at someone and yell at them.

But afterwards, another part of me seems to get activated and says, I shouldn't have spoken like that. I need to go and apologise. I need to make things right.

So there are these two selves within us. And what the Gita says is we need to elevate ourselves. We need to elevate the lower self with the higher self.

Not degrade the higher self with the lower self. So basically each time I am at a decision point. Whether I listen to my lower self or the higher self.

I feel annoyed with someone. A part of me seems to speak harshly to them. Another part of me says, be kind to them.

Like if one of my roles is as a mentor or a counsellor and somebody has some unhealthy behaviour they keep doing the same thing again and again. It's easy to lose patience. One way to ask the question is, why do you do this? And while the question is understandable, the effect is very rarely healthy.

Although it doesn't make the person defensive and try to come up with lame reasons for justifying what they do. But, if I can ask, why do you do this? This is something which I can ask someone else whom I am counselling but I as a higher self can also ask my lower self. But another way to ask this question is that what does this do for you? Now this is a much more this actually opens the person.

Okay, now why do I spend so much time on social media? Why do I spend so much time gossiping? Why do I spend so much time doing that? Instead of asking that question, ask the question, what does it do for you? Okay, what need is it serving? Now, maybe I just feel bored and I want some stimulation and I just binge TV watching on that. Now, is there any other way to deal with that? So, basically what happens is the higher self needs to look at the lower self with kindness not harshness. But that doesn't mean the lower self is good.

See, sometimes spirituality can just be equated with sentimentality. Like I saw a teacher, I just came from America I was in college. I saw a teacher, a young man.

He says, I practise radical self-acceptance. Which is nice, but below that, you I am perfect as I am. Well, I am good as I am, I am valuable as I am.

It is fair enough. If I am perfect as I am, is there nothing that I can improve in my life? Who among us can say that? Isn't it? It's like denying the very existence of a lower self that needs to be elevated. So, in our, we often talk about relationship with others, but it's important that our relationship with our self, it can go into extremes.

One is self-condemnation. Self-knowing. Lot of people do this.

I am like this, I am like that, I am so terrible. But the other is also unhealthy, which is self-congratulation. It's like, I am perfect as I am.

No, I can't see that. There is a part of me which is far from perfect. And there is a part of me which is not even looking for perfection.

It left to itself, it can take me to a very dark place. So, what we do is, what spiritual practises are about is, if this is my higher self and my lower self, then the elevation, spiritual growth means both my higher self and my lower self rise up. That means that, say, I have a short temper before.

And previously, when I had a short temper, if I would get angry, I might just maybe punch someone or speak a profanity, use some swear words. Now, I may still get angry. But even when I get angry, I am not going to become physically violent.

I am not going to use swear words. So, what has happened is, even the lower self has got infected. So, this is a healthy way of growing.

But the unhealthy way of growing is where the higher self is going upward and the lower self is going downwards. That means, there is a part of me which is so dark and dreadful that I even deny its existence. And then, when that part comes up, I do such terrible things that I can't even speak that to anyone.

And I conceal that completely. And then, there is a part of me which can be so noble and so selfless and so kind and that becomes my public person. There is always going to be tension between the lower and the higher self.

But if our growth is in terms of simply propping up the higher self and burying the lower self, that causes a lot of stress internally. And this will eventually lead to a breakdown, where the person who has put on the facade of the higher self, the higher self will be dragged down by the lower self. So, basically, we have a lower self, but both parts of us need to be elevated.

Yes, please. So, three things. Number one, you were mentioning about scientism and materialism being harmonious.

Not exactly harmonious. Scientism is one way that it boosts or justifies materialism. Not exactly identical.

They are different. So, with that in mind, if… So, the majority of the world I have noticed is materialism and they practise materialism. And they agree with that.

Right? So, my question is, if there are people who are unwilling to change and see that there is another world, or they don't believe it, how do they achieve inner thought, spirituality? How do they attain an inner peace without the belief of another world? That's a good question. So, first is, materialism can be of two broad kinds. One is functional and the other is fanatical.

So, functional materialism is called as matter is all that matters. So, all that matters is how much wealth I have, how much prestige I have in society, what kind of possessions I have. That is all that matters.

And all this stuff about spiritual business, maybe some people want to believe in it, some people want to practise it after death. I don't care about it. But fanatical materialism is matter is all that exists.

So, in my observation, fanatical materialists are actually very few. There are some, but most people are of the idea matter is all that matters. And that is how it was in most of history.

However, while matter is what matters for most people, there is an understanding. So, if there is this material domain and there is the spiritual domain, whatever is the definition of the spiritual, and if I am here, now my vision might be focused on the material domain only, but at a basic level, I may see the spiritual as a means to improve the material. So, for those who are very materialistic, they may not value the spiritual intrinsically.

Oh, there is another reality that matters. But that reality, can it help me improve this reality? So, for example, in the past, say in the western traditions, in Christian tradition, the idea was God is the provider. And we pray to God for our father, he was our daily bread.

So, the spiritual domain with whatever divinity was there, that was seen as a provider of the material. Now, with scientific and technological progress, and most people, a significant number of people have risen above the poverty line, we may not think of God as the provider right now. Most people don't.

But, in the past, it might have been the spiritual was the provider of the material things. But now, the spiritual is seen as a therapist. When I travel across the world, I have spoken at Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and I know most of the people there are not really interested in spiritual growth or spiritual growth things.

And certainly the companies are not inviting monks to speak because they want their interest in spiritual growth. They are interested primarily in their bottom line. They find that if their employees have some spiritual practises, they are less stressed, they are more able to function better, their health insurance, healthcare costs go down.

And that's where they come. And the sales force in the Bay Area has got an entire floor for mindfulness and meditation. And some other companies are also adopting this kind of things.

So, people may not value the spiritual for the spiritual's sake. But, if they can see the spiritual can help improve the material. I want to succeed in my life.

Students, for example, they want to study and succeed in their lives. But, when you just read a book, sometimes we are reading a book and the pages have not moved but our mind and thoughts have moved all over the universe. We get distracted.

So, if we can learn to focus our mind a bit more and spiritual practises help us in doing that, then we can value the spiritual for its capacity to improve our functioning in the material. Thank you. Thank you.

So, I have a second question. So, we have a sense of our own inner thoughts and the improvement of our own spirituality, which in turn will improve the outer world and things, as you mentioned, right? So, my question to you is, you have a sense of individual spirituality. Where does collective spirituality tie into that and how do they both live harmoniously or not harmoniously? Excellent question.

So, I think it goes back to the world view. If you go to that world view that this world is false and the other world is real, then my individual spirituality becomes disconnected from social spirituality. Because my liberation, my salvation, my enlightenment, all that matters.

Everything else is false. So, this idea is that when people's personhood is false, it's all an illusion. So, that is a very world rejecting kind of spirituality and that can become quite self-centred.

However, if I understand spirituality holistically, in that world view where I said this world is real, the other world is real, the inner world is real, the outer world is real. What it means is that the spark of spirituality that is there inside me is a similar spark of spirituality that everyone has. And, in one sense, you could say that spiritual journey.

Initially, there is excitability. Excitability means something good happens, we are delighted. Something bad happens, we are rejected.

So, it's like life has its dualities but inside us what happens? Well, something good is we are way up and we are way down. So, this is excitability. And, often people who are very excitable, they are not very emotionally stable.

So, in the spiritual journey from excitability, we come to equanimity. Equanimity means that, okay, the world will have ups and downs but our consciousness stays relatively stable. Yeah, you know, these things keep happening, bad things happen, good things happen but everything will pass, things are temporary.

So, don't get too worked up about it. But, beyond that, the third stage is empathy. So, with equanimity, what it does is, okay, somebody else gets worked up about something, I don't care.

It's all temporary. But, empathy means yeah, this person is worked up about it and I care for this person. That doesn't mean I have to get worked up about what they are worked up about.

But, I want to help them. So, we, just like if a person is drowning, they cannot help others if they are drowning. But, suppose somebody is drowning and maybe they have found an anchor and they are holding on to that anchor.

Now, they are they are no longer drowning. So, even if big waves are coming, they won't be shaken by those waves. But, one thing is, okay, I protect myself by holding on to the anchor.

But then, others are still being buffeted by the waves, others are still being knocked down. Then, I try to get them to also hold on to the anchor. It's not that I stretch out my hand, I tell them, you hold on to me, I will save you.

That's a different thing. I hold them so that they can hold on to the anchor. It's a different thing.

It's like, say, in a wave there are oceans and say, if I am here being tossed up and down, if I can find an anchor that I can hold on to and then, others who are being tossed up and down, I also pull them towards the anchor, point them, pull them towards the anchor. So, individual spirituality can also promote or stir social spirituality. Because we find the stability, we value the stability that comes from spirituality, we want others to have that also.

And those who don't have that, we try to share it with them. Okay? One more thing. So, we as people in this current world, in our current stage of life, have our own individualised interests.

And in these interests, we find internal happiness, which could be or could not be considered as temporary. So, when we connect with other people within a certain interest point, how does that reflect our spirituality through interpersonal connection and through interests that we have? Are those interests something wrong in the path to spirituality, or is it a connection that we bring and hold to along the way? Okay, let me re-articulate. So, we are connected spiritually, ourselves.

But then we connect with others, and we all have our particular interests, and based on those interests, we connect with others. So, are you saying that the connection based on interests, is that good or bad? In a way, yes and no. I'm asking as part of an element, is interests something that can help bring collective spirituality together? Is it a connection point for people to reach happiness, or is it something that is inherently selfish because it is interests that we hold? That's a good question.

In general, a gift in one can be a gift for everyone. You see, somebody has singing ability. Now, if they develop that singing ability and they make some beautiful musical compositions, isn't that something that can transport everybody? Somebody has speaking ability, writing ability, drawing ability, whatever it is.

Even architectural ability, engineering ability. A gift in one can be a gift for everyone. But it depends on how you see the gift, the vision.

If I actually see it as a gift, if I see it as a gift, then I will use it for contribution. This is something which is given to me. These are my interests, and I'll use it for service, for contribution.

But, if instead of seeing it as a gift, I see it as a right, as a claim, something which I'm entitled to, then we will often use it for domination. Not only I want to create some music that will help others, I want to create music that will be better than others. And is my, like, when I'm creating music, is my focus on the music, or is my focus on the world? Of course, it'll be both.

Because we're creating music for the world. If I'm creating art, I'm creating art for the world. But, if I think, you know, I'm such a great artist, and I want, why does the world not recognise how good I am? How dumb is this world? So, if we have that attitude, then what will happen is, somebody else might be creating some art which is being appreciated.

Our focus will be, why are people so dumb? They're looking at that person's art and appreciating, why they don't appreciate mine? So, it becomes competition and domination. So, we want to avoid that competition and domination. We focus on contribution.

So, yes, our interests don't have to be selfish. They can be selfishly directed. But intrinsically, the interests are not selfish.

They are gifts. And those gifts are meant to be developed. Thank you.

Good questions. Kind of along those lines, you said, can there be good competition? I kind of find myself, as I've grown up, I kind of avoided competition. I felt like, when I was competing, sometimes I was putting other people down.

Not intentionally, like verbally, but just like, oh, I won, and I feel bad because there's loss, or like, that kind of mindset is, can there be a better outlook on competition? Or is it, in general, it's okay. Okay, so, comparison and competition, they are just facts of life. Because anywhere we go, maybe apply for a job, there are other people applying for the job.

We seek a relationship. There are other people also who might be interested in the same person. Many people might be interested in us.

Whatever it is. Basically, comparison and competition are just facts of life. And denying that is not going to be very helpful.

Because there is also some objective reality to it. Like, somebody might be a better singer than another person. Somebody might be a better manager than another person.

So, if we say, if you come on the strip of India, now, say, one of you is a good organist. And then, that person takes up the responsibility of organising logistics. That's better for everyone than someone who is not good at organising.

They make a mess of everything. So, in one sense, these are facts of life and they are not necessarily, sometimes they are necessary facts of life to evaluate. So, if I am sick and I want to go to a doctor, now, comparing which doctor has what kind of reviews, that's a sensible thing to do.

Now, of course, the reviews could be false, they could be biassed. But, basically, evaluating who is a reliable doctor, who is a competent doctor, that's necessary in life. Now, having said that, the problem is when the comparison and competition becomes our defining identity, when it becomes the basis of our self-worth, that is when it becomes a problem.

So, in one sense, I differentiate between comparing and having a comparing mentality. Comparing mentality is where the mind just doesn't stop comparing. Comparing for functional purpose is required.

But, as soon as I see someone, the first thing I think is, oh, is this person better than me or am I better than this person? You know, is this person smarter than me? Is this person prettier than me? Is this person slimmer than me? Is this person taller than me? If the first and the constant, not just the first and the constant, basis of our interaction is this comparison, then that is very unhealthy. So, we cannot avoid comparing, but we can avoid having a comparing mentality, where comparing becomes the basis of our self-identity and self-worth. Now, can there be, with this foundation, we come to your question about can there be constructive competition? Yes, of course.

If I see someone who is good and if I see they have some gifts and they are developing their gifts, let me also develop my gifts. In tennis, there are these three players, Federer, Djokovic and Nadal. And they had this age of what they call the big three in tennis.

And all three of them had a fairly healthy respect for each other. And they said that the rivalry brought both of them up. All three of them basically.

Neither of them was really whatever the rivalry, rivalry never became enmity. There was always healthy respect for each other. And each of them tried to become better.

So, the different competition can lead to rivalry, but rivalry is different from enmity. Rivalry, the focus is some common goal. In enmity, the focus is the goal itself is destruction of the other person.

So, enmity is very unhealthy. And, that enmity can be towards the other person or it can be towards myself also. If this person wins, then that means it's my destruction.

If this person turns out better than me, then my existence will have no value. Not necessarily like that. So, if competition breeds a rivalry that inspires both to become better, then that's not a problem.

But if competition breeds enmity, where each person is trying to pull down the other person, destroy the other person, then that is definitely toxic. So, thank you so much for your thoughtful questions and your active participation. I wish you all the best on your remaining stay in the eco-village as well as in your journey across India.

Thank you very much.