Does anger arise in the mind or in the soul?
So, say emotions like anger, do they arise in the mind or do they arise in the soul? And then if you have to distance them, who is to distance and from whom? Yeah, the soul is the source of consciousness. But what it is conscious of is determined by the mind. Going back to the earlier example of say computer browser, on which there is one page that is open but other links are also there.
So, like that the person is observing, the person is reading the article and at that time the reader can choose which of the links to click. And no link is going to open automatically. The reader has to click the link.
So, the reader is like the soul and the screen on which the various links are coming, that is the mind. So, that means when I say that we should distance ourselves from the emotion, that means if anger has come, that means, like sometimes you have seen when you are reading something or maybe visiting some shopping site, suddenly a pop-up window comes up. Now, we didn't click anything, suddenly it came up.
So, like that certain emotions pop up in our consciousness. That means those thoughts, those desires, those emotions are coming in the mind. The mind contains many things but this is one thing just popped up.
So, when we say we should distance ourselves, that means, I don't just impulsively click on it and go there. Okay, I came here to read this. Do I really need to read this? I think about it and then I evaluate.
So, the soul is conscious, the soul is the chooser. The soul is the chooser of the emotion. But in the conditioned stage, the soul is not the origin of the emotion.
There are spiritual emotions in relationship with Krishna which will come and the soul becomes purified and the spiritual consciousness becomes awakened. At this stage, the soul is the chooser of emotions. That means, there are various things which we can invest our emotions in.
Say, right now I am sitting here. I can be thinking, oh intelligent questions are coming up. Or I can think, I travelled so much, I am so tired right now.
Or I can think, oh this chair is so uncomfortable. It's not. I am just giving an example.
See, there are many different thoughts that can be going on in the mind. So, now it is for me to choose what I focus on. So, like that, when I decide which one I focus, then that grows.
So, when we say that we should distance ourselves from the emotion, that means that anger or whatever causes that anger, that whole stimulus, that is present in the mind. It is like one clickable link that is there. But then, I distance myself means I don't click on it.
I don't invest my thoughts, I don't invest my emotions in it. When I avoid doing that, then gradually I value it. Okay, should I click on this, should I not click on this? Okay, not now.
I will think about it later. So, distancing ourselves means that presently the mind is the proposer of emotions. Think about this, think about this, think about this.
It is a proposer of emotions. The soul is a chooser of emotions. So, among the various proposals the mind offers, the soul will choose one of them.
So, if we are intelligent, if we are self-aware, then we can choose which emotion will I focus on or which thought I will focus on. It may not be emotion, it might just be a thought. So, distancing ourselves means recognizing that everything that is present in the screen of the mind that is not me.
So, by observing that, by recognizing that, then I can distance myself and make the right choice. Yeah? The soul has made a choice of a particular emotion and now we are saying that the soul should now distance from that choice. Okay, has the soul made the choice? Not necessarily.
The soul has observed that as an option. That means I can see that I have now, okay, I am feeling angry. That means in one sense you could say that the choice has been made.
That means some portion of the consciousness has been invested there. But it is not that the consciousness is fully invested. The more the consciousness is invested, the stronger it is going to become.
Okay, I will give another example which will make this clear. Most of us know the chariot body analogy in which the horses are like the senses and the charioteer is the intelligence, the soul is the passenger. Now say the five horses are going in a straight direction.
Suddenly one horse sees, oh, there is a fruit or a vegetable, juicy lettuce over there. And the horse starts rushing in that direction. Now the moment the horse starts rushing in that direction, the whole chariot starts getting pulled in that direction.
Now the charioteer says, oh, I wanted to go here, this horse is going in this direction. And although the chariot has started moving in that direction, the charioteer still has the capacity to check, pull the reins and get the horse to slow down, pull the reins, get the horse to come back on track. Now the more the horse is allowed to run, the more momentum it gains.
And the more work is required for the charioteer to bring it back on track. Now in one sense, this is never an irreversibly damaging process. Even if the chariot goes off the road and the whole chariot overturns and still the charioteer can come out, turn the chariot right side up, get back on the road and move on.
But the amount of effort required, the amount of trouble undergone is much more. So initially it is done, the better it is. So like that, the best way, the best time to win the battle against temptation is before it begins.
Before it begins. That means before the horse starts moving off in that direction, pull it back. So like that, as soon as I start seeing, oh I am getting angry about something, stop it.
In one sense, the horse has already started moving. When the horse has started moving, that's when I can sense, oh the horse is going off track. But the earlier we can get it back, the better it is.
So by being alert, Krishna says repeatedly that be alert. At any moment the senses can drag us away. So we have to be alert.
So by being conscious, by being alert, we can evaluate when the wrong choice is happening and we can check it as soon as possible. Does it answer your question? Thank you very much.