Bhagavatam-daily 87 – 11.08.03 – Don’t spend more mental energy on the body than necessary

Thank you Srimad Bhagavatam 11.8.3 Shaitaha Nibhurini Niraharo Anupakramaha Yadino Panaed Graso Mahahiriva Dishtabhok The Avadhoot Brahmana is continuing his instructions to Maharaj Yadu and he is telling what he learned from python so shaita shaita means remain peacefully like lying down ahani for days ahani is multiple plural days for many days so one should lie down for many days Niraharo Anupakramaha Niraharo even if one does not get any ahara any food Anupakramaha one should not make any endeavor to get the food Yadino Panaed Graso Yadino Panaed if one does not get Graso is food Mahahir Mahahir so that which has a giant mouth that is a python Yiva Dishtabhok so one should stay like that Dishtabhok is destiny book enjoying or accepting whatever is allocated by destiny so essentially the verse is saying while lying down like a python if one does not get any food even for many days then one should still continue to lie down like a python without making any endeavor and depending on destiny now this may seem like a very extreme thing we find it difficult to stay without even one meal and here it is being talked about being without any meals for several days how is this possible actually food is definitely necessity for us but at the same time often it is not a necessity of the magnitude that we imagine it to be so there is an old Egyptian saying and similar sayings are found in various traditions also that saying is that we live on one fourth of what we eat on the remaining three fourth lives our physician so in general we often eat more than what we need and over eating causes a variety of problems because of which we need to go to physicians so now you usually think of fasting as austerity but it is an austerity but actually it also helps for healing the body in general the body has its own healing mechanism but it does not get the room to activate that healing mechanism if we are continuously operating it by say providing by ingesting food just like if a machine is constantly involved in processing taking input and giving output then it cannot work on its own maintenance similarly if the body is continuously taking in food and transforming it and sending it out then it doesn’t have the it doesn’t have the room the time to maintain itself so when we fast actually it may seem an austerity but for the body it is a much needed reprieve so when we fast then we come out of the way of the body for healing itself so the body starts healing itself because it doesn’t have to now keep processing other things which are coming in and which have to be sent out so fasting has a healing effect also and there are some naturopathy doctors and even in Ayurveda it is said fasting is a medicine similarly it is also said that by fasting there are fasting retreats where people fast under medical supervision and they actually get cured of many diseases which are very difficult or incurable by conventional pathic means so there are people who fast for 5 days 10 days 15 days 20 days by fasting it doesn’t usually doesn’t mean not even water it means no solids so in the Vedic literature there are descriptions of in the past sages so so this comes from the Govind Damodar Stotra the sages who eat that means only wind is water and leaves so they eat leaves also so it is described that when Vishwamitra when he was a king he went to Ashistha’s ashram at that time he saw that different levels of sages and some sages were living only on wind others were on water and those who were even less austere they were taking leaves leaves have fallen from the trees so now we may think this sort of things are impossible but if we look at what is possible now living for 10 days 15 days 20 days without food that may seem impossible for most people but even today people have done it and not only done it they have often improved their health by doing it so it is possible now coming specifically to our context here so sometimes people may fast because of wanting to purify their body now in general here some people may fast because they want to do it as an austerity to raise their consciousness here the brahmana is talking not so much about an austerity as something consciously chosen for example when we fast now food is available for us but we basically decide to say no to food so for example ekadashi generally food is available but somebody would have said I will fast with jal or I will fast with only some fruits or whatever so in all these cases food is available but we choose not to take food and that availability of food itself is some it can be a background temptation but it can be a background security also if I don’t get food if I feel too weak I can always eat it’s possible so in that sense there is security in that now here when one adopts the ajgar vritti there is no such security because it is not that one is desisting from food even when it is available the idea is one is not bothering about food only so ajgar vritti can be adopted by those who are so absorbed in the absolute truth they feel what is the point of any other endeavor so they are not it is not that they are stalking food and then they are desisting from food nor is it that they are deliberately cultivating pride saying that oh I have eaten so much I am not going to eat and I have not eaten for so many days, no the essence of ajgar vritti is to be so absorbed in the absolute truth that one feels that any endeavor for anything else is pointless so now when we are absorbed in the absolute truth then that gives us non material nourishment we ourselves may have observed that sometimes if we get very busy in some work which is very interesting then we forget food also people get in the project and they are coming towards the red line and they are absorbed and then they forget their lunch also because they are so absorbed in it so we have example that a small level of absorption enabling us to transcend bodily urges such as hunger so if that can happen even through another material absorption that means one material absorption is enabling us to transcend another to transcend a material urge so if matter itself can enable us to some extent transcend matter so when we have spirit when we have spiritual absorption in the absolute truth then how much more transcendence is possible Krishna is all attractive and absorption in him is so fulfilling so therefore it is possible for to fast for several days also as it is being talked about over here and for many days one can fast now for us the principle that we can apply is that we can also try to absorb ourselves in what we are doing whether we are doing direct devotional activities or whether we are doing our worldly duties in service to Krishna if we can absorb ourselves in them then we don’t dissipate our mental energy on food so that principle of not dissipating energy on bodily necessities that is applied in ajigarbhutti at a very high level but we can also apply it at our level that whatever we are doing we absorb ourselves in it and don’t dissipate mental energy on it often when there is food before the meal we think about the meal so much oh what will be there and how will it taste and then we may be look at the watch a dozen times when is the lunch time or if we don’t have a fixed lunch time then we ourselves may go to some snack stores and eat something in between also whenever the urge comes along and in that way before the meal, during the meal and after the meal we spend so much mental energy on food so what we can do at our level is this book so accepting the will of destiny at our level doesn’t mean that we don’t do a job we don’t try to we don’t arrange for food no that is not the application which we can do at our level but we can avoid spending unnecessary mental energy on food yes there is food I made arrangement for it and when the time comes I will go and take a meal but beyond that let me not be too obsessed about it let me not worry too much about it let me focus on my service to Krishna my absorption in Krishna and in that way we too will see how the bodily urge of hunger can be transcended according to our level by absorption in Krishna