From despair to hope thru Gita wisdom Bangalore Sarjapur

So grateful to be here with all of you today. Am I audible behind? How many of you can hear me? Okay, I think it's a little less. Okay, how many of you can't hear me? How many of you don't want to hear me? Today, I will speak on the topic of how the Bhagavad Gita can help us to deal with emotional blockages.

Emotional blockage, what does this word mean? Any thoughts? Or there is a blockage? Have you heard the word emotional blockages? Is it familiar? How many of you have heard this word before any time? Okay, what do you think it means? It is an emotional loop that we hook to a particular emotion and our mind restricts it like sadness or despondence. Yeah, so is it, it is like emotional loop or you can say an emotional lock in the sense that we get locked in that emotion. Yes, that is true.

Anything else? This emotional blockage, we cannot express. So are you saying you cannot express what is emotional blockage or in an emotional blockage, we cannot express our emotion? Okay, there is some kind of blocking, yes. Can I do things effectively? Is it emotional? Can't do things effectively.

Yeah, I think, yeah, okay, that's true. I can't see what I am trying to do. Maybe make it like this.

So can't see things effectively. So in that both are coming, maybe you can come a little closer. They are coming both? Yes.

So anything else? You can't do things effectively, one aspect of it is decision making. Yes, you are saying something again? How are we going to handle our emotions? Emotions like failure and loss. Okay, so we can't handle emotions, the emotions become too strong for us and they overwhelm us.

Okay, emotional blockages could be like we put defensive walls around us where we don't let anyone in. We are afraid that others will hurt us. Okay, so we feel there is a deep confusion about which time we should go into.

Thank you. Yes? Okay. Not being able to see things as they are.

So it blocks emotions and then it blocks our visions. We can't see properly. Yes? Layers of illusion.

Layers of illusion. Okay, so there are blockages and there are, it's not just like one illusion, there are multiple illusions which block us, which interrupt us. Not able to forgive.

Not able to forgive. Okay, that definitely can lead to emotional blockage. We may get caught in feelings of vengefulness or resentment and then get locked in that.

Yes, thank you. I think this is all summing up to amitya. Amitya, so it becomes a very general term.

Amitya can mean many things. Yes, true. Self-pity.

Self-pity. Okay, so now there are two different things that are happening over here. One is if there are like this explanation of what is emotional blockage and then there are examples of emotional blockage.

So self-pity is an example of emotional blockage. Inability to forgive can be an example of what might cause emotional blockage. So thank you.

These are all very relevant answers and you can see that even if you are not familiar with this term, this is something we all have probably experienced. Sometimes now when we normally get very angry, we don't say blockage. Anger does not cause a blockage, it causes a barrage.

Is that speaking too much or acting too much? But the idea is overall that if we consider in the start of the Bhagavad Gita, Arjuna was just ready to fight and suddenly he just couldn't fight. So there were multiple factors that were involved that led him to not fight. But overall, we can see that there was a strong level of emotion involved.

Like Gandhiji from his start, his hands were trembling. He just couldn't function. He said, I can't stay over here.

My mind is really here then and I don't know where to go. So basically, Arjuna was blocked from doing his duty of fighting by the emotions, that overwhelming emotion that came about. So basically, when you talk about emotional blockages, all that you said is very relevant.

Wait for this blockage to go. So basically, we want to go in a particular direction and the emotions seem to block us. They specifically block us by locking our thoughts in something, locking our desires in something.

But emotions become a significant obstacle. That time a person may or may not become active, inactive. Like in anger, a person may become hyperactive.

But they are becoming active in a way different from what they wanted to be. So our emotions can overwhelm us and block us. Q. For Arjuna, what exactly was the emotion that was blocking him? A. Confusion about duty.

Q. Confusion about duty. A. Perplexity of future. Q. Perplexity of future.

Can you elaborate? Confusion about duty, what do you mean? A. He had two conflicting thoughts. One was coming from his family relations and the other was coming from fighting for the kingdom. Because he was seeing that fighting is for fighting for kingdom.

So he was not including such ideas and this one was overpowering him. He was thinking it to be a selfish thing. Q. Exactly.

So what happened was, so basically, Arjuna was certainly overwhelmed by very strong emotion. And some people, especially if they are of a more martial nature, there are people who like to fight, in today's language they are called war hawks. The current American law is coming up.

So who is joining the list? Are they hawks or if they want to set off wars in different parts of the world? And they are hoping that Mahalakshmi will exert some pressure and the hawks come and they have already stabilised everything. So people like wars, like to fight. So now, some people who are little hawkish mentality, they feel that Arjuna lost his nerve.

Arjuna became fearful. That is just an attack of cowardice. Now, if you see, was Arjuna being cowardly? How do we know that? We like Arjuna, so he can't be cowardly.

He has already fought many wars. In fact, you can say the wars he has fought in the Virat war, the odds were far tougher. So the thing is that Arjuna certainly had strong emotion and the emotion was fear.

But in the entire first chapter, Arjuna doesn't even once mention fear of his own death. The fear was of doing the wrong thing. He had two choices and he was extremely overwhelmed by how massive those choices were and the cost of those choices.

Say, in 1967-68, the world has come closest to a nuclear war. Now, also it is dangerously close to World War III with Russia and Ukraine using advanced weapons against each other. But at that time, basically, the American censor has detected that Russia has sent a nuclear weapon against us.

If Russia has sent a nuclear weapon against us, we should send it against them. And they have 3-4 levels of clearance. Okay, the president says this, the commander says this, the commander says this.

And then you press the button and the press will go. So, I think they call it left-hand reading. So, they have almost come to the final level.

At that time, they stopped. Now, in America, I have a devotee friend, his cousin was in that team. In the elite security, they have to decide, should we press the button or not.

That is a huge choice. If you don't press the button, the opposite side will be sending a nuclear weapon in a large part of the country. And if, say, that alert is wrong and you press the button, then you make a large number of people on the other side.

Thousands and millions of people will be killed. So, the choice is huge. And at that time, the fear of doing the wrong thing, it actually comes from being very responsive.

Somebody is a reckless person, he just gets something. No, they are not. It is just some devilish joy people get in killing people.

You know, so, Arjuna was going to fight a war and fighting meant great destruction. So, for him, on the other hand, if he didn't fight, it was unlikely that the other party was going to settle peacefully. Now, if he decides not to fight, it is unlikely even that the war will not happen.

But he is not fighting. Now, maybe some people would support him. Now, he had some influence on Yudhishthira.

Yudhishthira might even agree with him. But Bhima was not going to agree with him. He is not fighting.

So, by his not fighting, the most likely result would be that his side would have to fight a tougher war and there would be more casualties on his side. Maybe his loved ones would be killed on this side and he would have a large castle. We fought, then we killed him on the other side, on this side also.

So, the heaviness of the choice and not knowing at that time what is the right thing to do. That's what led him to give over to them. Basically, for him, what happened is that, in general, for us, there are positive emotions inside us and there are negative emotions inside us.

Now, in one sense, you can go and say, actually, I will get no emotion negative. Every emotion gives us some information that is of some value. But the emotion can become overwhelming to the extent of having a paralysing or a detrimental effect on us.

So, in that sense, certain emotions can be called negative. Fear is not a negative emotion. Fear is information that there is some danger.

But sometimes the fear comes even when there is no danger. So, then that fear becomes unhealthy. So, no emotion intrinsically is negative.

Say, you have a child and the child is peering out of the window, bending out. I don't do that. I don't feel any fear.

The mother will say, that's why I feel great fear. So, fear should be there. Fear is not a bad thing.

When there is danger, fear is a part of mechanism that gives us an emotional element. But sometimes, maybe we have been bitten by a dog a long time ago. And then we see a dog.

We see a small, tiny, cuddly poodle. But still, for that, the dog becomes a sharp teeth. We feel fear.

So, there, the fear is unwarranted. So, no emotion itself is a bad thing. But sometimes, when there is some stimulus from outside, and that triggers some emotion inside us.

Now, the emotion itself is not bad. But the emotion can be sometimes, the emotion can be warranted or the emotion can be unwarranted. So, even anger is not a bad thing.

Anger indicates that something is seriously wrong with something that is seriously important for us. And there are wrong things in the world. Say, we are passing by a school area and we see a bee terrorising a small little kid.

Now, if we don't feel that there is something wrong out there, then there is something wrong in here. We should feel. Now, should we feel anger? Well, it is terribly wrong over there.

Now, that does not mean that after that, I am going to try to read a book. What we do, that we have to decide ourselves. But emotion is basically information.

Sometimes, that information is coming from, it is coming from some source. But is that information reliable? That we have to investigate. So, for Arjuna, his fear became a grid.

So, for all of us, there are positive emotions and there are negative emotions. In the sense that emotionally, if they are positive means, they energise us. If they are negative means, they exhaust us, they burden us, they drain us.

So, we have both kinds of emotions. And in general, for us to be in a relatively emotionally healthy state, our positive emotions need to be more than our negative emotions. Say, for example, at a fundamental level, a positive emotion is hope.

A negative emotion is despair. So, hope is things will become better. Despair is things are never going to be better.

Now, for all of us, in whatever area it might be, it might be our own health, it could be some relationship, it could be our professional growth, it could be our spiritual growth, there is hope that things can become better. And there is fear is there, but much more than fear is despair. Maybe this will never improve.

So, now there are many emotions that could be warring within us, but broadly speaking, even if we get angry, there can be hope that I will be able to get a better handle on my anger. There can be despair that I will never get a handle on my anger. Or if we feel our anger is because of genuine reasons, some genuine grievances or concerns, then there is hope.

Others will understand. Others will take my concerns serious. Sometimes what happens is we are disturbed about something and we go and tell the other person.

And the other person just remains very calm and very cool. First we were disturbed over what happened and now we are disturbed because the other person is not disturbed. So, we may have a hope that someone will understand me.

And we may have despair that, oh, people just label me as short-tempered and irritable. They will not understand my anger. So, basically, in whatever situation, there is hope and there is despair.

Hearing this class, there is some part is hoping, you will understand what is going on. Another part is saying, maybe all this is too complex. I don't understand this.

So, now, this may not be happening at an overt level, but covert and a more concealed level is happening. And when despair becomes way, way greater than hope, that is ultimately can lead a person to end it there. When a person feels that there is nothing to look forward to in my future, whatever to look forward is all dark, what is the point of living? Or if you are in a positive way, then what is the point of being here? So, for Arjuna, at this particular point, he is not exactly suicide, but his, for him, the hope becomes much, much lesser than the despair.

And this is especially conveyed in 2.6. 2.6 is I don't know whether I should fight or not fight. And the next, what was the next line says that, even if I attain the heavens, so basically for Arjuna when he fights, when he is going to engage in that battle, there are two results possible. One is he wins and he gets the earth.

The other is he loses, he dies and he gets the heaven. So, Arjuna is not philosophically ignorant. It is not that Arjuna doesn't know that there is a part of me that will survive and go to heaven.

So, even Atma Gyan or at least some level of Atma Gyan, that there is a part of us that will survive and go to heaven, that is known to Arjuna. So, but he feels So, he says that in this situation, neither of these options are palatable for me. That even if I fight and win, unless I am convinced that this fighting was a good thing, Arjuna, that the fact that I fought and caused the killing of so many people that he wanted.

Or if I fight and die, even if I go to heaven, he says that is not going to satisfy me. Because maybe I should not have fought, winning or losing. So, basically he is saying that in the pathway that he is there, there is no bright option that he sees ahead.

So, at this point, Arjuna becomes overwhelmed. And the question that he is asking, his question is So, his question is about Dharma. He does not ask should I fight or should I not fight.

He does not even ask What is my Dharma? He asks what is Dharma? What does that mean? Dharma in this context, the word Dharma has many different meanings. In the Bhagavad Gita itself, there are at least half a dozen meanings of the word Dharma. And none of those refer to the meaning that we generally use.

But in this context for Arjuna, Dharma means the right thing to do. What is the right thing to do? What should I do in this situation? Now, when you think of the word the right thing, it can be in two different senses. One is in the sense of moral or morality.

One is in the sense of morality, but the other is in the sense of meaningfulness. So, morality means this is ethically right, this is ethically wrong, that is the moral dimension. But in terms of meaning, meaning means what will be more meaningful for you.

For all of us when we do actions, we all initially want our life to be meaningful. We want that whatever we are doing should matter. If tomorrow I die, we may have some fear that oh after I die where will I go? Along with that, the fact that I live, my life made some difference to someone.

We inevitably want our life to have some meaning. So, Arjuna feels it is a crisis of morality, but for him it is also a crisis of meaning. What is the value of it? Sometimes we feel in this particular situation whatever I do, nothing seems to be of value.

So, that kind of situation is where Krishna speaks to Arjuna. So, his crisis is a crisis of morality, it is a crisis of meaning. So, generally speaking, at a conscious level when we make decisions, many decisions we make at an unconscious level.

Okay, this new movie has come and I just want to watch it. I just want to entertain people. But when we make conscious decisions, generally there are those two factors, morality, what is the right thing to do and meaning.

Now, one meaning can also be pleasure, one level of meaning. We all want some pleasure in our life, but with respect to meaning when we use the word, that is actually Artha. Now, there are many levels of Artha in life.

So, for example, for a small child, Artha is, for a newborn baby, the only Artha is breathing the mother's milk. Child grows up playing with toys. Child grows further up, okay, you know, I want to be good at sports, I want to be better than other at sports.

Child grows up for that. For your meaningfulness, you have to go with purpose? What is this purpose for you? Meaning and purpose are two slightly different things. They are related, but meaning is like what is, how to make sense of this.

I am going to talk about purpose later. Make sense of things. Purpose is more about my role in things.

Meaning is what is going on over here. Purpose is what am I meant to do over here. The two are related, meaning and purpose, we talk about it.

So, but they are slightly different. So, sometimes there is a quarrel going on between two people. So, meaning means people are going to say, okay, why are you doing this quarrel? Purpose means, okay, what am I meant to do over here? Should I try to stop them? Should I call a third person? Should I just amuse myself by watching them fighting? That is not something you should do.

So, purpose is more, meaning, you could say, meaning is more cognitive. Cognitive means, with that cognitive capacity, that intelligence, it is more, meaning is more associated with Gyan Indriyas. They are trying to make sense of things.

Purpose is more acting. It is more associated with Gyan Indriyas. So, meaning and purpose are both important.

My point I was talking is that when we are talking about meaning, it is, I want to make sense of things when something is happening, what is going on. But then I want to do something which will make things better, which will add value to things. So, basically, we could say that if I can make sense of things, then I can play a better role in things over here.

So, there is, I am talking about making sense of things. I do not know if you are able to make sense of what we are talking about over here. So, there is making sense of things and there is making sense in things.

Now, what does it mean? Say, imagine there is a fire. I have a friend in California, a firefighter. So, he, that, some American, so he said that whenever there is a fire, America, California, there are a lot of fires that occur.

So, whenever there is a fire, the first thing they would like to know is what caused the fire. Was it some fuel? Was it electricity? Was it arson? Was it accident? So, we want to make sense of things. But sometimes, we just cannot make sense of things.

We cannot know what caused the fire. So, even then, what we have to do? Okay, this fire is here, there are civilians over there, cut the fire off over there, attack it over there. So, sometimes we can make sense of things, but sometimes we need to make sense in things.

Say, if we come home and say two of our children are fighting together, yelling at each other, about to hit each other. Now, whatever, who is right, who is wrong, that would be the first stop fighting. So, at that time, we make sense of things afterwards.

But first, we cannot fight like this, stop it. We pull both of them over. So, that is the sense of action.

So, basically, when I am talking about the meeting over here, it is when I do, when I know what is going on, or at least I get some sense of my role over there. Like a firefighter's role is that I am supposed to fight this fire. If I know what caused the fire, that is good.

If I am a parent, I am supposed to maintain order in the home. And how do I maintain the order? Yes, there is a time for understanding everyone, but right now, stop fighting. So, basically, the idea is Arjuna has to find his own truth in the war.

And at one level, he knows, okay, that Durga Nana is obstinate and that is why this war is happening. But still, it is a very painful situation. There is Bhishma and Drona on the opposite side, there is Guru and there is teacher, and then Guru and his grandfather.

These are the people for whose pleasure he lured Arjuna. They encouraged him, they taught him. There is a part of us which always remains like a child.

We all want some approval and appreciation from our seniors, our elders. Now, somebody might be a parent with many children, but still, they want appreciation from their parents. So, Arjuna is a celebrated warrior, he is probably the greatest archer of his times.

Still, this is like the most nightmarish scenario for the people for whose pleasure I learned fighting. Now, I have to fight against them. What am I doing wrong here? Why do I have to be here at all? So, at that particular point, the emotion became overwhelming.

Should I be here now? What should I be doing? So, from this situation, if you see, Arjuna at the start of the Gita was filled with his ownness. He was filled with despair. Now, we have our Gupti and we have our Manu.

The intelligence is associated broadly with reason, with the head, the rational faculty. The mind is more associated with emotion. So, in terms of his Gupti, he was confused and he was hopeless.

By the end of the Gita, the same Arjuna picked up his bow and ready to fight. So, he had become convinced and he had become confident. So, what did the Gita offer Arjuna? From that situation where he failed, there is just no point.

What am I to do here? Either I have to kill others or I have to be killed and my loved ones will be killed on this side or that side. What is the point of being here at all? So, from this point, how did the Gita take him on the way? So, that is what we are going to discuss today. Broadly, we talk about three building blocks of the worldview of the Gita and how these three building blocks can help us to also move from that state of here despair is greater than hope, is much, much greater than hope, but here hope becomes much, much greater than despair.

So, that emotional blockage stopped Arjuna from fighting, that stopped Arjuna from doing anything. How was that overcome? So, when we talk about the Bhagavad Gita, broadly speaking, there are three truths, there are three fundamental elements of reality. There is the Jagat, there is the Jiva and there is the Jagadish.

So, Jagat is the material world, the material nature. The Jiva is to be the soul. Jagadish is Krishna, the Supreme Lord.

Now, the Jagat, it affects us in many different ways, but I focus primarily on one of its effects, that is the mind. The world comes to us primarily through our knowing. Something happens in the outer world, but it is through our mind that impacts on others.

The Jiva refers to our identity. Jagadish is the divinity. So, many people, they have, especially when they come to 35, 40, 45, 50, they have something which is called a midlife crisis.

What happens is we have lived a significant part of our life and at that time we start thinking, did I really do something meaningful with my life? If I am moving forward, how can I, whatever life is ahead, how can I maximise the being that way? So, that time what happens is we start thinking, you know, this is going to be in the family, this is going to be in the job, this is going to be in the social circle. We are going to be here, sometimes people make big career shifts, sometimes people try to think and do some different things, people escape into some unhealthy habits. So, these are the three elements.

Arjuna was in the mid of the two armies and he was internally in the middle of a crisis. So, we will talk about how these three, understanding these three concepts, the mind, what our mind is and how it functions, understanding our identity and understanding divinity. Now, these three can help us to find hope, to generally when we have some artha in our life, something that makes our life worth living.

There are many things wrong in everyone's life. This one thing is so important. For this sake, I will continue.

For all of us, we often think that we are pleasure-seeking. That is true, but we are not just pleasure-seeking. There is sath, chit and amrita.

So, first, the first thing we seek is existence. Because we are spiritual beings, so first thing we want to live. Chit means consciousness.

And when we are conscious, with our consciousness, we want to make sense of things. We want meaning in our life. And then we seek pleasure.

First I want to survive, then I want to have something meaningful in my life. And afterwards, I want pleasure also. The problem with modernity, many problems are there, but one problem is that what has happened is pleasure has become prioritised over meaning.

So, for example, there is such a compulsive need for entertainment for people. Because it is like there is no inner meaning in their life. So, what happens is, find something which is somewhat titillating, something which you want to enjoy.

There is an American comedian who said that, my wife and I, we eat at different tables, we live, we sleep in different rooms, we enter and exit the house through different doors, we watch different TVs, we drive different cars. We are doing everything possible to keep our marriage together. But what happens is, for many people, their real life is so empty and devoid of meaning that they seek pleasure desperately.

Now what happens is, when we seek pleasure at the cost of meaning, slowly that pleasure goes down by diminishing returns. And that is why sometimes, suppose we are very exhausted or frustrated or drained, we say, okay, I want to watch some TV, I want to watch some comedy shows, I want to laugh. How many of you like humour? Anybody who doesn't like humour, very dangerous person.

We all like to laugh, we like enjoyment, we like the pleasure. There can be inappropriate humour, that's the wrong thing. But the point is, say, okay, watch a comedy show.

You might watch a good comedy show, a few jokes, you might want to watch it for some time. But then, if somebody says, from tomorrow onwards, you have no financial obligation, no family obligation, no social obligations, not the thing to do. For the rest of your life, just sit in front of a TV and watch comedy shows for the rest of your life.

Now, would you want to do that? Maybe for half an hour, one hour, maybe a few hours, if you are really fed up, maybe for a whole weekend. But after that, I want to do something. Isn't it? Because we want pleasure, but we want meaningful pleasure.

So, what entertainment offers us is pleasure that really has not much meaning. So, why I am talking about this is, that for Arjuna, he had a difficult war to fight. But he wanted to add some meaning to his life.

And we all come to situations when we start feeling, does my life have some meaning or not? So, our mind, when we talk about meaning, it is our mind which seeks meaning. Now, when I am using the word mind, I am here not legitimately differentiating between the buddhi and the mind. I am talking about the subtle body entirely.

Like the whole subtle body, there is an interface with the matter, mind and consciousness, the three levels of reality. So, we will talk about subtle differences over a period of time. But there is a part of us which tries to make sense of things.

The Darwin's idea is that we are all simply, that we are biological machines driven for survival. That is true, we want to survive. But we want to not just survive, we want our survival to have meaning.

So, now, sometimes meaning is so important that meaning can become more important than survival also. So, Darwin's idea was survival of the fittest. Isn't it? But if you see human society, it is often characterised by sacrifice by the fittest.

Sacrifice of the fittest. When the twin towers were collapsing, the firefighters were inside, they were safe outside. When they knew they might not come out, the twin towers will collapse.

They are fit and brave, they will sacrifice. So, sacrifice, if it brings meaning to our life, they are ready to risk our very existence. So, meaning is so important for us.

Now, of course, our mind may find or seek meaning in meaningless things. That is the, where we seek meaning is a different thing. But the point is, we all need meaning.

Some kid may think, what was that, some games, there was some, like sometimes, kids whole purpose of life becomes, I want to, blue whale, blue whale challenge. I want to get to number one stature in this game in the video world, in this video game. And that is what becomes the source of meaning for them.

So, their whole driving purpose, entertainment is always been a part of human society. But generally, entertainment was a break from life. But for many people today, life is a break from entertainment.

So, I had to go here and do this. The real thing is come back, come back and watch, play this video game, watch this, go on social media, do this. So, the point is, we all need meaning.

Now, our mind is such a thing that it can seek meaning in various things in life. And that is why there is, at our work, there is Artha and there is a hierarchy of Artha. There can be many things in which we can find meaning.

And then there is Paramartha. Paramartha is the source of the highest meaning. The thing which will make our life worth living to the greatest degree.

So, for Arjuna, at this particular level he was functioning, he was thinking that, okay, my meaning of life comes from being a warrior. That is my job. That is why my work gives me that sense of, I am a warrior.

But then I am also a responsible legal member of this dynasty, Kuru dynasty and I have to protect that dynasty also. So, what do I do at this time? So, generally, whenever at a basic level there is a mental health problem, what happens is that we seek wrong meaning. Now, what I mean by wrong meaning? Wrong meaning means that some event has happened.

The event has happened to us. But the meaning that we, our mind finds in that event, the meaning that we find, that is wrong in the sense that it is actually wrong or it has a wrong effect on us. So, what do you mean by this? Some of you may have heard, one of my friends in California, he is in mental health care.

So, during, at one time, as a part of the service, they have to be in this suicide, I would not call it, suicide watchline, suicide helpline. So, we have to pick up calls. So, one day, there is some young woman screaming.

He says, you know, I do not want to die, I do not want to die. He says, what happened? She says, you know, I have taken pills throughout my life, but I do not want to die. Then, he goes, where are you exactly? She told him, he sends him there.

The first responders were there, we just raced there. And then, she was brought to the hospital. She said, she survived, she had taken too much sleeping pills or whatever.

They managed to get her out of the body. He asked her, what happened? So, she said, you know, I called my boyfriend and he did not pick up the call. You know that? That is why I committed suicide.

He said, you know what? Yes, yes. How many times we have called someone and they have not picked up our call? Most people who want to commit murder, not suicide. How dare you not pick up my call? Not most, some people.

But why did you say, why? What is the big deal? But what happens is, then she went, okay. You know, I was in a relationship with this boy for many years, and we were not in this relationship, but our relationship got really strained. And when he did not pick up my call, I started thinking that maybe he has left me.

You know, he will not go to be with me at all. Maybe there is something wrong with me, because of which he does not care. Maybe there is something terribly wrong with me, because of which nobody will want to be with me.

Maybe 10 years down the line, all my friends will be in a healthy, happy relationship, and I will be all alone. And you know, all of them will look at me with pity and feel sorry for me. I do not want to be an object of pity.

Instead of living such a miserable life, let me just end my life. Now, at one level, it can seem an utterly foolish decision. But then there is a logic to it.

It is a tragic logic, but it has a logic to it. So, what has happened is, from a small phone call to the point of ending one's life. Now, could that be a possibility? Anything can be a possibility in the world.

Why do you go to that level of need? You see, our mind, when we say our mind is out of control, what it means, there are many aspects to it. But one aspect is, we often talk, in our devotional circle, we often talk of controlling the mind, which is controlling our desires. But, while our desires need to be controlled, our emotions, they have to be controlled, they have to be calmed.

It is like a child is crying. If the child is crying, it is because the child is full of temper tantrum. Then, you have to sternly tell the child to be quiet.

But, if the child is scared, telling about something, the child is in pain about something, and at that time, the child is crying, shut up. That will be cruelty, isn't it? So, the approach that we use for dealing with desires of the mind cannot be simply imposed on emotions. They are two very different things.

So, desires, sometimes they will be unhealthy, I am not going to control them, no, I am not going to do this. But, emotions, when they arise in certain situations, and they need to be tamed. So, it is not like somebody has a hammer, a child discards the hammer and says, ok, I hate the name.

But, the name goes inside. When the child finds the power of a hammer, then what happens? Everything becomes a name. So, for some people, everything, the solution to all mental health problem is self-control.

You control yourself, discipline yourself. That can be cruelty. Krishna did not tell Arjuna, just shut up, become a man, control yourself.

Krishna addressed his emotions. Krishna did not pander to his sentiments, but Krishna addressed his emotions. So, when we are talking about the mind, see there are desires, when the desires are going wild, it will be controlled.

But, when the desires are going wild, but when the emotions are going wild, at that time, we may need to be comforted, not controlled. Now, this is not an absolute categorisation. Sometimes, emotions also need to be controlled.

But, if somebody is angry, you have to control that person. But, also, your anger, whatever has hurt you, that needs to be comforted, that does not need to be addressed. So, Jiva Goswami says, what is the purpose of Krishna in speaking the Bhagavad Gita? He says, we can understand the purpose of a book by looking at its start and at the end.

Like, if there is a class, the speaker is organised, he says, today I am going to speak on this topic. And at the end, he says, this is the topic I spoke. So, he says, we can know the purpose of the Gita by looking at the first words that Krishna spoke and the last word that Krishna spoke.

So, in 2.11, Krishna has spoken a few words before this, but they are more conversational words, they are not like instructional or philosophical words. So, a-shu-jaan and ma-shu-jaan. Now, shu-jaan can mean lament, it can also mean fear.

Ma-shu-jaan, Prabhupada translates as, do not fear. So, a-shu-jaan, that not worth fearing and don't fear it. So, the purpose of the Bhagavad Gita, he says, is to free us from fear.

There are many things in the world that cause fear to us. And the purpose of the Bhagavad Gita is to free us from fear. So, let us say, our child is sick and there is some lump on the body and we come to know that it is cancer.

And the child is completely panicking and we go to the doctor. And the doctor says, a-shu-jaan. So, this is a treatable disease, a curable disease.

And the doctor outlines the process about how to cure it. And then he says, ma-shu-jaan, do not fear. This is what we do.

So, basically, what Arjuna is, what the purpose of Krishna is to, in one sense, deal with Arjuna's overwhelming emotion of fear. And the first thing with respect to the mind, the mind, it makes me about things. And generally, mental health problems come when the mind starts constructing false or even destructive means.

Destructive means, we say, we go to some gathering and we greet someone. And that person does not greet us back. We might feel a little annoyed, we might feel a little disturbed.

That is understandable. But then, from there, we actually know, these are all terrible people. They have no culture, no etiquette.

They cannot greet properly. Now, maybe that is not the healthy meaning to take from it. Another healthy meaning might be, actually, nobody respects me.

Nobody will ever respect me also. And just somebody not greeting us back might make us feel terrible. So, it is a small thing.

Now, somebody is doing a small thing, I say, it is not a small thing. Now, is it a small thing? It is not a small thing. It depends on the kind of meaning that the mind is constructing.

So, when the mind constructs meaning out of events, what happens is, there is an event that happens. But the mind assigns some meaning to it. And a healthy mind is able to assign a constructive meaning to it.

Okay, this has happened. This is what we can do. Let us see why this has happened.

So, for us, when Krishna talks about, many times we talk about mind control. But that is definitely important. But in the Western world, they stopped using the word mind control.

Why? Because in the West, when people hear the word mind control, they think of others controlling our mind. Like there are cults, which break off your programme. So, they have the idea that mind control means that somebody else is going to take control of your mind.

The typical mind control cults are there. So, now sometimes we may think the mind is an enemy. But it is a normal enemy.

It is destroying. Isn't it? It destroys the enemy. So, Israel is fighting with Palestine or Hezbollah.

There are some leaders who are terrorist leaders or insurgent leaders. Israel just killed them. So, does Krishna say kill your mind? What does Krishna say? Control.

Is it control? What is the end result? So, the point here is, the mind is what is going to construct a meaning for us. Now, we can go towards two extreme meaning of the mind. One is, we become its slave.

If we become its slave, that is definitely an anti. But the other is, make it our slave. If we become its slave, we will stagnate.

We will degrade. Whatever the mind says, we have to eat. But if we make it our slave, we will suffocate.

Suffocate means, every single emotion that is coming, shut up, shut up, shut up. Every single concern our child says, shut up, be silent. How will the child grow? We want a healthy relationship with our mind.

That is the idea of friendship. So, the mind constructs meaning, but the mind can construct destructive meaning. So, controlling the mind or managing the mind, making the mind afraid, means that the mind is able to construct, find a constructive meaning in situations.

So, when Prabhupada was in America, and he was with this David Allen, who was the person with whom he was staying, and he was the first person who might become a devotee, you see. Prabhupada even letters to India saying that he is likely to become the first devotee. And that person went on a drug high and attacked Prabhupada.

There are few things which can be as devastating to the morale of someone. It is one thing to be just attacked, that is scary. But the person whom we are trying to train, whom we are trying to help, that person, the person for whom we do a lot, and that person turns and attacks us.

It can just make a person lose faith in humanity itself. Why should I care for you? From the person I was doing so much, that person is doing this to me. I am careful enough.

Prabhupada could have just abandoned over there. Prabhupada could have constructed that meaning. He, Prabhupada said, let me try.

Is there some option open for me? I have come here to serve, this is very bad, let me do this. So, Prabhupada called some of the people who were attending the programme, and he said, and there is some alternative accommodation. So, basically, for us, mental health or a healthy mind, what it means is, the meaning, we always construct some meaning.

Either it is a helpful meaning or it is a harmful meaning. And philosophy is ultimately meant to help us construct a helpful meaning, not a harmful meaning. So, I will just make two more.

We have a lot to discuss, but I will shorten it. I will talk about the concept of meaning, and then we move forward from there. That if you see, Krishna spoke to Bhagavan Ketu Arjuna, and he said, that do not plan it.

He talks about, but then, Abhimanyu dies, and when Abhimanyu dies, Arjuna just collapses, and Arjuna lashes out at his brothers. There were several, dozens of words, at least more than a couple of dozen verses, that are there in the Mahabharata, describing Arjuna's lamentation. And now Krishna doesn't say, just 14 days ago, I spoke the Bhagavad Gita.

Have you forgotten it? What a dumb fool. Maybe I could have chosen someone else as a candidate to speak the Bhagavad Gita. Even this is a reference to desires and emotions.

Desires, we can prove it. But in the Arjuna's degree, Krishna does not use philosophy to pile on top of it. See, philosophy is one way to construct meaning of life.

But at that time, Arjuna lashes out at his brothers, and he says, are all your weapons just ornaments? Could not one of you protect my son? Shame on you. Yudhishthira and Bhima, they just, they feel as if they have been lashed on their very self. And at that time, Krishna pulls Arjuna to his side.

And so, Partha, in this world, distress befalls everyone, the wise and the unwise. What differentiates them is that amid distress, the unwise act in ways that make things worse. The wise act in ways that make things better.

He says, oh Arjuna, look at the faces of your brothers. They are in pain. Just as you are.

Please don't speak words that will increase their pain. Please don't speak words that will increase their pain. So Krishna does not go into elaborate philosophy over that.

At this point, he says, if this has happened now, let us not make things worse. So, Arjuna could have constructed meaning at many different levels. He could have said, you know, you Yudhishthira, you made this plan.

Or you allowed this plan to happen. He, the meaning that he sought over there was, okay, that the point of was, his ancestors had made a sensible plan. Chakravyuh had to be stopped, otherwise Yudhishthira would have been arrested.

He is the king. They had made a sensible plan. Now, who killed Abhimanyu actually? Six people attacked him simultaneously.

That's how he became disarmed and wounded. But finally, it was Duryodhana's son, Dushyasana's son Durjaya, who did the final blow. Now, Arjuna could have said, no, I will go and kill Durjaya.

But Arjuna, he targeted whom? Chakravyuh. Chakravyuh. So, basically what happened is, at that particular time, he said, you have made a plan and that plan was deliberately altered by Chakravyuh.

And Chakravyuh could have shown his power at any time. But at that particular time, by showing his power, he basically sentenced Abhimanyu to his death. That Abhimanyu fought for so many hours alone to his glory.

But as soon as Chakravyuh closed, Abhimanyu's sentence of death was finalised. That's why Arjuna, the meaning he constructed over there was Abhimanyu is being killed. Jaidrath is the person who foiled the plan for protecting Abhimanyu.

So, I will remove him from the army. So, instead of lashing out at his brothers, he constructed more armies. So, when we talk about meaning over here, there is something which is ultimate meaning of life.

That is, we want love and Krishna and Abhimanyu. But then there is some immediate meaning. Okay, what are we going to do in this situation? What can I do in this situation by which I can make things better? So, Satyogona will be continued that our mind goes more towards constructivism.

In Tamogona, it will always go towards constructivism. So, the mind plays a very, very big role. So, the whole idea is philosophy and association.

All these are meant to help us construct a healthy meaning in whatever situation we are in. I will talk about the last two points quickly. What are the last two points? Identity.

So, now, mind is fundamental because it is a question of identity. It is our mind which reflects our sense of identity. Now, sometimes it is said, the focus of Krishna talking about is that Arjuna, you are not the body of the soul.

That is the message for us from the Bhagavad Gita that Prabhupada gives. Arjuna did not need to know that. Arjuna already knew he was not the body of the soul.

And actually, even after that immediately, Krishna addresses Arjuna with a designating claim based on his body. If Arjuna is not the body, then he is not the Samakunti. If he is not the body, then he is not in the Bharata dynasty.

So, actually, the sense of identity is that we have multiple levels of identities. We have functional identity which is more of vivaharik. So, we may be males or females, we may be South Indians or North Indians, we may be middle aged or teenagers.

So, we have many functional identities and underlying them is a fundamental identity. So, what happens is, now when the mind constructs meaning, so we are just going to build using these two points. The way the mind constructs meaning is based on what we identify with the most.

Like say, somebody might be a professional and somebody might also be a parent. Now, if they have an urgent meeting in the office, and at that time they come to know that child has got in trouble in school and the teacher has called the mummy at the school. Now, what should we do? What should we do? It depends on what we consider more important.

So, we consider job more important, that is where the Artha is coming and says, I cannot go and come back. He says, okay, job is all right, I have to go, my child needs me right now. So, we all construct identity based, we all construct our sense of meaning based on what we identify with the most.

Somebody can be very successful professionally, but if the child goes into depression or the child gets into bad habits, then that will create a great sense of failure within you, because that is also an identity. So, what happens is, what Krishna is telling Arjuna through talking about the soul is that you are thinking, if you fight, you will be a failure based on your identity and the number of the Kuru dynasty. If you do not fight, then you will be a failure based on your identity.

So, sometimes there is just no willing over there. So, Krishna tells Arjuna, you have to go down to your fundamental identity. We have many functional identities.

We have many different identities. The fundamental identity is your soul. You are a part of me.

We are a part, we are souls, we are indestructible. So, when we are constructing meaning, what does this mean to me? So, if somebody identifies himself as a cricket fan, India loses the cricket match, it is the end of the world for them. It is not the end of the world, but we construct because we identify ourselves strongly as a cricket fan.

So, we may have many identities, but if we identify too much with our functional identity, the meaning we construct will be destabilised in the future. So, our meaning has to be constructed fundamentally based on our identity as a soul. I am primarily a soul.

As a soul, I might be a mother or a father. As a soul, I might be a software engineer, but I am first and foremost a soul. And when our sense of identity is clear, then it is more helpful to construct positively.

The last part is divinity. Now, what does divinity mean? It refers to God essentially, but there are two things which are meant to happen when we study the philosophy of the Bhagavad Gita. Then we could call it that God is with me.

This should lead us to I will be with God. So, God is with me is the vision of faith. And then by faith, we understand God is with me.

Surrender means I will be with God. So, we go through many, many difficult things in our life. And we may memorise many shlokas, we do many pujas, hear many kathas.

Ultimately, through whatever we do, whether we are hearing the philosophy or we are in rituals, these twin convictions, they come within us. God is with me and I want to be with God. So, Arjuna at the end, 1873, he says, I will be with you.

When we say God is with me, what does that mean? That through whatever is happening in our life, it may be terrible, it may be chaotic, it may be a complete carnage, but through whatever is happening, Krishna is in charge. Krishna is making things work out. So, God is with me.

I am not just alone and a bandit. God will guide me through. So, sometimes you just put in situations which don't make sense.

But just because they don't make sense to us does not mean that they don't make sense to God. Just because we are lost does not mean that we are lost to God. God is still with us and he will get us to what is right.

Sometimes it may be because of someone else's mistake that we are in a particular situation. Sometimes it may be because of our mistake. Sometimes a combination of our mistake and other people's mistake.

Whatever be the reason we have got there, God has got us. Whatever the reason, say for example, to conclude this point, God is with me and I will be with God. An example I think I gave last time with GPS.

Now suppose say we want to go to a particular destination. We are going there, the GPS tells us to turn left. And somehow we think our left is not the right way.

We turn right. Or we ask someone, we think our GPS is not reliable, we turn right. Now whether it is our decision or somebody else's guidance, we find out it's wrong.

Now if we have got to the wrong place, we have taken the wrong turn, what does the GPS do? It doesn't obey me, I get lost. So the GPS doesn't do that. So ultimately, when we say God is with me, that means we are always within God's positioning system.

And from that, no place that we might be in our life, because somebody else has cheated us, somebody else has misled us, it could be because we made mistakes, whatever has happened, we are never out of God's position. Wherever we are, God is with us. And when we are within God's position system means that some territory may not be mapped by Google, like deep in the Sahara desert or somewhere, but there is no territory that is not mapped by God.

We are always within God's positioning system. And we are with God, that means, okay, now let me listen to the GPS and let me sum it up. So it is not that Krishna gives Arjuna some esoteric explanation based on a previous life.

You know, Bhishma was so and so in that life, and Drona was so and so in that life, and you did that over there, you did that over there. And that's why now all of you are fighting. In one sense, we talk about making sense of things and making sense of things.

It is not that Krishna gives a special sense to Arjuna, why this war has to be fought. He says the war is there, fight it. Now make the best of it.

I am with you. So for Arjuna, this I will be with God, what does this mean? That means service attitude. Krishna Vachinantava is an expression of service attitude, I will be with you.

Now what service attitude could have a specific meaning. That is, we come and do some seva. Okay, we come to temple, we do it professionally, but we come and we clean the temple floor, wash the utensils, that's good.

But at a broad level, if you understand that Krishna is our Guru, Krishna wants to make things better. And Krishna wants us to be a part of his plan to make things better. So service attitude means at one level, it is a simple question, how can I serve? It's like this, how can I make things better? Or sometimes we think things are so messy, they can never become better.

Okay, then how can I contribute to make things better? Maybe things cannot become better, at least I act in a way that doesn't need thinking. So, if you keep this attitude, then dadhavi buddhiyo gandhava ye nama upayanti te Krishna says, I will be your intelligence. That even if life doesn't make sense to us, Krishna is still the child of our life.

And he will guide us. So mamai vamsho jeevano ke jeeva bhutah sanatanaam So when we use this, we often use this philosophy, this statement, to emphasise its philosophical application. That we are not God, we never become God.

We are always parts of God. So that is a philosophical point, but it has a psychological application. Psychologically, what does it mean? That we will always have parts in Krishna's life.

If we are always parts of Krishna, that means we always have parts in Krishna's life. It's like somebody selected in the Indian national cricket team. If they are in the team, that means they will have a part in the team.

And that part will be a bowler, a batsman, a cricket keeper, whatever. So like that, we are always in Krishna's team. There is no action that we can do that will cause Krishna to throw us out of his team.

सपिछेत सुद्राजारो जितेमामन्यवा साधुरेवसमन्तव्यत संव्यत्यवसितोऽविष्या There is nothing we can do to ourselves or others can do to us that can ever make Krishna stop loving us. There is nothing we can ever do by which Krishna will say, you are no longer my part. So we are always parts of Krishna.

We are always on team Krishna. And we have a part there. So in this service attitude, in this situation, what can I do? How can I contribute to make things better? So small levels of Arthak, we start okay.

In this situation, this person has become hurtful to me. I go and get back at them with harshness. That's not anything to do with things better.

So what can I do to make things better? I'm sick and I just don't know how my disease is going to cure. No medicines will keep working. Okay, what can I do in this state to make things better? Maybe my medicine is not working.

I can eat healthy, I can do some exercise. I can keep my mind calm so that mind doesn't contribute to body health, ill health. What can I do right now? So if you keep that attitude, that service attitude is something like a torch for us.

The emotion it causes a blockage, it causes a darkness. Instead of why is this happening to me? We focus on how can I contribute to make things better? That amid the darkness that has come, the question itself will be like a flashlight. It may not show us the full meaning.

But it can show us one step ahead and one step after that and one step after that. We take that one step, the flashlight will show the next step ahead and the next step ahead. And that way we can go through even the darkest phases of our life.

And we can move much stronger through it all. So this is how our understanding, Arjuna understanding that Krishna has a higher plan. Even if I can't make sense of things, Krishna has a higher plan and he has given a path for me in this life.

So I will do my part. That's what restores Arjuna's confidence. That's what gives him conviction.

That's what helps him to go beyond that emotional blockage. And similarly, it can help us also. So we talked about the Gita's wisdom, about what it does.

Gita is already with emotional blockages. So I talked about broadly four points. I started with what is the purpose of the Gita.

So we discussed elaborately. We talked about emotion and emotional blockages. So the Gita started with Arjuna being filled with fear.

And that was blocking him. So from the point of being hopeless to the point of being confident, that was a dramatic change the Gita brought about. So in one sense, the Gita is offering a worldview, a worldview for emotion management.

It is meant to help us manage our emotions. So how does it do it? We focused primarily on the acronym M.I.A.D. Sometimes in the middle of a life, they have a midlife crisis. So like that.

So M was what? M.I.A.D. We talked about the mind is the most practical or most effectual manifestation of the Jagat Shlokas. And we said, what does the mind do? The mind assigns meaning. Assigns meaning.

And sometimes the way the mind assigns meaning, it can be destructive or constructive. So we talked about, we were talking about dealing with the mind. It's not a one approach for everything.

Desires, they need to be controlled. Emotions, comfort. Emotions, it's not the same approach.

They have been comforted. So we talked about how? In one sense, the Gita's message is a message of comfort. Do not fear.

That is the conclusion. And not worth fearing. So basically, we are in a particular situation in our life.

What kind of meaning are we constructing? And how do we go about constructing it? So then we talked about I was identity. So the meaning that we construct is based on our conception of our identity. So the identity conception that determines our identity.

So if I have a job, just because I want to earn some money. I lose that job, okay, I find some other job. But if my whole life was invested in, say, I want to become a lawyer, I want to become some, I want to become XYZ.

And then we lose that job. If I invested very much in that job, then losing that job will be devastating. So when we have an indestructible identity, when we realise our identity is indestructible, then what happens is, we also have indestructible meaning for us.

Like I am a soul, therefore, there's always something I can do. And last part of the G was? Ability. So ability means, two things, when we understand the role of the divine, what happens? First is, God is with me.

God is with me, for example, Krishna's GPS. No one is lost to Krishna, even if we are lost. Krishna has mapped out all the territory.

Even despite our mistakes, others' manipulations, God is with me. And therefore, I will be with God. So I'll be with God means what? That this is the vision of faith.

This is the action of surrender. I'll be with God. The way we do it is by service attitudes.

And service attitude can refer to specific services that we do, direct devotional service that we do. But it can also refer to, how can I contribute to making things better? And if this is the question we focus on. So now, everybody with their mind, they can try to construct some positivity.

But sometimes there is so much negativity, how do they construct meaning? That's where you need to have them understand that God exists or cares. How can we contribute to making things better? So this can be like our flashlight. And by that flashlight, we can find light even in the darkest situations.

So life can be very complicated. And we will face very different situations. But whatever karma may get us, my karma, somebody else's karma, my present karma, past karma, whatever it is, gana karma, whatever karma may get us through, Krishna will get us through.

Whatever karma may get us through, Krishna will get us through. Thank you very much. Praise the Lord.

Please raise your hand. Please pass on the mic. Please reach me to ask questions.

Yes, Vrindavan Kumar. Thank you for this beautiful class. Very, very positive and really a lot of insights.

You gave an example of God's positioning system. I want to just ask my question using an example. Suppose I'm leaving from my home and I'm going to temples and I'm using GPS.

For whatever reason, I take multiple round turns. And finally, I come to a point where I see that the temple now from where I am is like 20 kilometres, like a two-hour ride. And just around the corner, there's a mall.

And I'm a struggling devotee. I'm struggling with my desires in the same time to practise. Now, how not to be overwhelmed looking at the 20-kilometre distance? And tempted by the Lord.

Tempted by the Lord. So, guilty pleasures are so easily available. How not to be overwhelmed in the same time? Yeah, okay.

Good question. Basically, when we say that we are never lost to God's position system, that does not mean that choices don't have consequences. We, every round turn that we take in the GPS, it will take us further.

We take more time, more fuel. Choices do have consequences. It's not that just because we are always in God's position system, everything is fine.

Do whatever you want. Every action is fine. No, actions have consequences.

So now, in general, the kind of choices we are making at the most will take us further not force, but push us to make similar kind of choices. So, in our position that we are in, we need to be able to find out how can I make the right choice. Do choices.

And in some sort of, for some people, some choices may be almost difficult to make. Impossible to make. Except that sometimes some patterns you just can't do.

Just because we can't win some battles, does not mean that we should stop fighting the war. So, in that particular situation, it may be that we feel that it's great, just I'm not going to go to the war. So, I'm just going to go to the war.

That can happen. But that doesn't mean, okay, I'll never go to the war. So, it is possible that sometimes some situations in such that we just lose the war, lose the battle over there.

But then, next battle happens, next opportunity happens. So, we don't have to beat ourselves up too much when we make a wrong choice. Okay, I made the wrong choice.

There's something I want to learn, let me learn from it. Otherwise, we also have to consider circumstances. Sometimes in certain circumstances, certain actions may just be what we end up doing.

We accept that. That situation happened. But afterwards, we move on.

So, being willing to accept our weakness, that is not a sign of weakness. It is a beating ourselves up. Why am I so weak? Why am I so weak? And by beating ourselves, we make us further, make us further, we make us weaker.

That's not good. It's okay, except sometimes we cannot make new choices. But okay, that particular episode, in the next episode, we make better choices.

Thank you. Thank you so much. And one Prabhupadaji, one Mataji, we do like that.

Two, we come to you in this. Prabhupadaji, you mentioned about sacrifice, that human life is characterised by sacrifice. No, so what I was saying is, I'm not saying human life is characterised by that all the time.

What I mean by that is, see survival is a value for us, no doubt. But is that the only value that drives our decisions? No. Many of the noblest actions that inspire others are not necessary for us also.

So what? There is no sacrifice, isn't it? Soldiers fighting. Soldiers fighting. The idea is that even if some aspects of the evolutionary theory are verifiable knowledge, if they survive to the fittest, species adapt themselves, some aspects of it do.

But even mainstream scientists, they find it very difficult to explain why should we go against our biological invention as humans. They say there is some genetic misfiring or some gene has come or this or that. But it's more like a, it's not a very coherent scientific theory.

It's just like giving some cause and saying explain it to me. So the point is, there is some part of us which values something more than survival. Is that part present in everyone? Not necessarily.

Or is that part active in everyone? Not necessarily. So it depends on, when we talk about Satchitananda also, you know, how much such aspect is manifest, how much chit aspect is manifest, how much ananda aspect is manifest. That depends on how much the covering of suffrages someone says they don't need.

Like if we always want to exist, why would somebody want to commit suicide? So that's because at that particular point, the lack of happiness, the lack of meaning has become so great in their life that they start thinking what is the point of it all. So the chit aspect which seeks meaning, even across the receiver, that is present in some people. The point I was making is that meaning is so important for us, that we are ready to sacrifice other things for the sake of meaning.

Yeah. I have a question in terms of, I think in Gurdwara 15.15 it is said that Lord Shiva I said in your heart, from me emanates remembrance, knowledge and forgetfulness. And any thought which comes to your mind which might be to hope or to spirit, if Krishna says that every thought, you know, the forgetfulness or memory comes from him, then what choices does the soul have? What are the choices that the soul has? See Krishna also says, right in the beginning of the Gita, ye khamam prapadyate, so the knowledge, remembrance and forgetfulness that we get, it is the source of our happiness.

It is all in response to our freedom and specifically our desires. So based on what we desire, we get some remembrance and we get some forgetfulness. So for example, somebody is an alcoholic and they are trying to recover from alcoholism.

If their desire to recover from alcoholism is very strong, then what happens is that when they pass by a bar, the remembrance that they will be given is, that remembrance will rise from their heart, how much embarrassment you got in your life, how much health problems you had, and that remembrance will come and the intoxication, the high alcohol, then forget. And then the knowledge of what to do at that time, I have to get away from this bar as quickly as possible, I don't want to go inside, drive away from here. On the other hand, if the desire to drink is very strong, and they entertain the desire, then what will happen is, the remembrance of the pleasure of drinking Urkha, and the forgetfulness of all the problems associated with drinking Urkha, knowledge will be, okay, how can I go and drink without even coming to know about it, that's what will happen.

So it's not that when Krishna says, I give knowledge in the name of forgetfulness, that does not mean he is doing it arbitrarily. That all three are based on the principle of reciprocity, which is the desire that we are collecting. So when we say in the practise of Bhakti we get higher place, what does that mean? That one thing is that, the remembrance of the higher pleasure becomes so prominent, and the remembrance of the lower pleasure becomes almost insoluble.

And that's how that particular condition does not happen anymore. So it is not that Krishna is specifically causing that thought to arise in us. It is almost like, there is based on the impressions in our mind, in our mind there are many different impressions.

And among those impressions, if you say, consider that the mind is like a high security building, big, the central security window, security computer. So there are cameras from all the doors, exits, everything, there are all windows over there. Some window becomes big, some window becomes small.

So which window becomes big, which window becomes small, that ideally should be depending on, okay, who is this dangerous person coming over. Based on that, if you look at it. But I think the windows are already installed.

So like that for us, there are a set of options inside us. And which one we maximise, that is definitely maximised. So when we desire something, I click on a particular window and that zooms out.

So my desire is like clicking. That window zooming out is Maktah Smriti Gyan. That window will be large is the Smriti.

The other windows, water mirrors won't do this. That is, that window gets minimised. That is a permanent.

So that's how this whole thing works. Questioner- What desire a person has is dependent, is that independent of Krishna's choice? Is our desire independent of Krishna's choice? Once you start going in the cycle, it can become quite complicated. But the essential principle is we always have free will.

The free will is within a range. So that range is determined by our past karma. And that past karma works under Krishna.

What do I mean by that? Say somebody is an alcoholic. I just can't stop. I just can't not drink.

Okay, then you are, I can't not drink. But maybe you can choose whether you stop with one drink or two drinks or three drinks or go to ten drinks. Nobody will say I don't have any free will at all.

Maybe there somebody is an alcoholic. I have no free will whether I would drink beer or whisky. That is from the range of free will.

So then we always have free will depending on each of the functions. But based on the desire that we dwell on, the desire that we develop, so in terms of what pops up when or what is present when, that is not in our control. But when something pops up, do we zoom in on it? Do we pay attention to it? Or do we try to minimise it? So the exact interaction between what is the range of free will and what is the extent of free will here, that is a whole different subject.

I have a whole seminar on how free is our free will. So that depends. There is always some room for the free will and that can increase or decrease.

But there is some room. So within that room, if we choose a healthier option, that is what will become easier for us eventually. Devaputraji, you said that our past choices do not force us but push us towards the next step.

Yes, we are products of our past but we are not prisoners of our past. Yes, please sir. Firstly, thank you very much for the class.

You mentioned Arjuna had two conclusions. One, not morality, which I understand whether he can kill his elders, relatives. But you also said he had a concern on meaning.

So I cannot understand that meaning. Meaning is he will enter over, he will feel the wrong knowing of you. So what is the conclusion he had on meaning? No, I didn't say that Arjuna had two conclusions.

I was saying that Arjuna's question about what is the right thing to do, the right thing to do, determining it, can be seen from a moral perspective or it can be seen from the perspective of meaning. Say for example, I will give a contemporary example. Somebody has an urgent project deadline in office, they are meeting in the morning.

And the child has got into some trouble, so I call it a duty. Now, is it a moral question? Both are duties. Being a parent is a duty.

You are working in a company, the company is paying the responsibility, there is also a duty. So it is not so much a moral question. You could say it is a moral question but there is also a dimension of meaning.

What is more important for me? So the question, the dilemma for Arjuna could be seen from the perspective of morality, it can also be seen from the perspective of meaning. That is, which is more important for me? Being a Kshatriya and fighting over the war? Because that is what my calling is, that is what my job is. That is why I have been given, I have been given the role of a king.

Or what is more meaningful for me? I am a member of a dynasty, I have to protect the dynasty. So we focused on analysing Arjuna s dilemma from the perspective of meaning. If you want to go to morality, then you go to the dimension of what Duryodhana had done, what the Pandavas had done.

Krishna himself does not go into the moral dimension so much. So Krishna uses ethics, the ethical dilemma as a starting point for a philosophical approach. So Krishna says, in one sense, the question of what is right has to be answered by going deeper to what is real.

What really exists, what really matters. So this what is right is a question of ethics, it is a question of morality. This is a question of ethics, what is real, that is a question of philosophy.

So almost the same way, one follows the nature of reality. So I am not talking about all that, I am just talking about the point is, I didn t focus on the moral aspect of it, because that was not the focus of Krishna anymore. And Guruji, just to add, when anybody is trying to find the meaning, that would depend on what is the identity one is associating with, as you said.

So if the identity one is associating with is just of a Kshatriya, then you would associate that meaning. But if the identity is also of Pandit Maharaj Krishna and therefore, more than me being important, what is meaningful to me, it is also important what would please Krishna in this situation. Is that the right understanding? So because when you said that Arjuna has to find meaning, and when you said that what is it that is good for me, so that can also go to the extent of self-obsession or self-centric, what is good for me, or selfish perspective.

But then it can be generalised by saying that what is good for me, we interpret or assess based on who we think we are, which is where your point of functional identity versus fundamental identity comes. So therefore, even this point of what is good for me can be again seen at multiple levels. A person who is only engrossed in the functional identity or in bodily platform would think that this is good for me or this is what I am supposed to do, versus if somebody is also conscious of the fundamental identity, then one would also see what part God would want me to play.

So both can be attributed to this point which you said of what is good for me. So what is meaningful for me, I am not really getting into what is good for me, but I am talking about what is right and what is meaningful. So now if somebody's highest value in life is pleasure, then that is meaningful for you.

Then just look for what is pleasure for me. Say if I have got five gulab jamuns, and my highest value is pleasure, and there are five people coming, and I eat all the five gulab jamuns before they reach here. Or if my value is relationship, I would have a good relationship with them.

Then I enjoy something, I want others also to enjoy it. I may share it with others. So it's not a lack of meaning, it's just that if our value, where is it coming from, that will determine our decisions.

So if I am thinking of myself as a solitary enjoyer, if I think that I am part of the community, and if I share it with others, then you can become a good person. Ultimately, our consciousness expands. So when somebody is a narcissist, or somebody is selfish, the consciousness shrunk on them only.

The consciousness can expand to family, it can expand to community, ultimately it can expand to include Krishna. So meaningful to me is not necessarily selfish. It depends on the consciousness.

Exactly. So, Masao, thank you for that wonderful session. So my question is mainly around mind.

You talked about three things, you mentioned about that. You can become a slave and then stagnate. You can try to make it your slave to suffocate you.

And the third option, which is, I just want us to make it as your friend. But how do we actually go about doing it in a practical message? See, the mind has many impressions in it. Now, specific words may be different.

I'll use a particular set of words. In the mind, there are instincts. And there are impulses.

The impulses are associated generally with the anarthas. Anger, greed, lust. The impulses are often anti-intelligent.

That means when we act impulsively, we act against our intelligence. So these are the anarthas. Now, the instincts are associated with our bhakti or our varna.

So instincts are more like programmed intelligence. Programmed intelligence means some people have a musical instinct. Some people have a language instinct.

Some people have a drawing instinct. Some people have a home decoration instinct. In modern language, you would have a different type of intelligence about them.

This image there in people. So with respect to our impulses, they need to be regulated. They need to be covered.

But the instincts need to be facilitated. They need to be generated. They need to be… Now, doubting, nobody outside this one knows about it.

So in doubt, what is a dove? What is the tail of a dove? What is the meaning of a dove? They need to be challenged. So you see, in the Bhagavad Gita, when Krishna is speaking in the third chapter, he talks about two distinct and almost opposite things. First, he says, what will repression accomplish? He says, you are a warrior.

You are a protector. He says, if you go fight this war, in future, when you hear the Kauravas are performing war, I prostitute these people. You won't be able to live with yourself.

Your natural instinct is to be a protector. So be a protector. So in that sense, when we say we become a friend with them, that doesn't mean we always listen to them or they listen to us.

No, we share interests. Okay, today we go here. Tomorrow, we go to the place where you like.

Tomorrow, we go to the place where I like. There is negotiation. So in that negotiation, our instincts, both of them are in the mind.

So instincts, they need to be accommodated. They need to be facilitated. They need to be developed.

The whole purpose of an ashram at one level is to develop those instincts, what the instincts they originally have from previous lives, to give them facility to develop them so that they can continue to society. So that they can get satisfaction. But if you see, in 334, there is one so-called spiritual teacher for whom the essence of the Bhagavad Gita is developing consciously.

What can repression accomplish? And for him, it means eat whatever you want, be sexually intimate with whoever you want. Just do whatever you want. You know, if you consider just after this, the whole section, 336 to 43, where Arjuna is asking, there is something inside me which makes me act self-destructive.

What is it? What can you do about it? Now Krishna must have said, I already told you what to do. Keep the nigger or keep the rishis. Just do whatever it tells you to do it.

Krishna doesn't say that. There is something different over there. That is Karnesha, Krodhesha.

So there is a part of us which needs to be regulated. So basically, how do we make a friend? Negotiate with the mind. That those of what pops up from inside, that is constructed.

If you facilitate that, then what happens? You don't feel suffocated. Yes, some things, I am saying no to the mind. But some things, often we have chemistry.

There are natural interests. These are natural relations. We are good at it.

Then the mind won't feel suffocated. That's how we make a friend. I have a question.

Suppose, it's a very general question. Suppose a person lives in a normal life. All of a sudden, he is thrown into a jail for no reason.

And the problem is that, here I am trying to find the meaning of life, where he has no pleasure. But the problem is, every fourth day, he is allowed to visit his people, just to talk to them. But he has already come back.

So how can we find meaning in life when there is no pleasure? Okay. See, there are situations. That's why, if somebody is living a life that is in the pursuit of pleasure alone.

Means? That is, pleasure is too unstable as a basis for meaning in our life. Because sometimes in our life, when we go through phases, there is absolutely no pleasure. But then, the meaning will come to something else.

After I come out, I will do this, I will do that. Or, while I am there, I can learn this thing, I can develop this skill. Sometimes, there are facilities for people to learn and develop some vocational skills out.

So, suppose, we may be thwarted in finding meaning in one or two or three areas. But it's not that we cannot find meaning anywhere. So, suppose somebody falls terminally sick, and they have big plans, they are young and healthy, and they are hospitalised.

Now, we can't go to job, we can't do anything, we can't go out, we can't exercise. Many sources of meaning will be crossed. But then somebody will say, okay, how do we spread meaning? Sometimes, people who are sick, they become so bitter and they are complaining and blaming everyone.

And they are sick, and they make their care givers sick of them. At one level, their sickness is okay, you understand that. They don't want to take everyone's responsibility.

At that place, a certain attitude could mean, okay, how can I find meaning? You know, I will be polite and kind. They think I can't take care of them. Let me try to have a positive responsibility.

We can't be happy about what has happened to us. That's terrible for you. But we can act in a way that we don't overstep the unhappiness in this culture.

So, sometimes we have to find, okay, what can I do to create a meaning? There is this book written by Victor Frankl. He wrote a book about, he was a Jewish psychologist who was interested in the Holocaust. Holocaust, see, there are many, many terrible things in history.

But, you know, this Holocaust is the only time when mass murders have been there. But the Holocaust is the only time in recorded history where industrial efficiency was brought to mass murder. So horrendous.

So, he said that even then, he observed that their being was basically just some broth, some soup with a few vegetables within it. And he found that when people were serving those, some people would go out of the vegetables to do what was nourishing them, otherwise it was just liquid. So some people would serve, they would take the vegetable out for themselves, keep it separately, and they would just take other vegetables for themselves and serve just the liquid to others.

Some people, they would go out of their way and keep vegetables for others and keep just the liquid for themselves. Others would mix it all together. Just try to give liquid, liquid, liquid.

So in that situation, there is always a prison. Any woman that gets inside the gas chamber and killed, you always have some scope to make a difference. So there is always freedom.

So in that small act of gentleness, of kindness, somebody can find meaning. So, it is not easy. What happens is, to some extent, to be able to find meaning, we have to shift towards a certain level of curiosity.

Curiosity, you see, what happens is when there is resentment, why did this happen to me? That's a valid question to ask, but that's not a helpful question to ask. So curiosity is, okay, now that I am in this situation, what can I do? So, what door is open for me in this situation? Raghupat himself in this song says, आच्छे किच्चु कागे कबे एही अनुमान है। नहीं केन वाली बेना एही वस्ता है। Raghupat has gone all the way to America and he didn't know any room there. Krishna, you must have some purpose for me.

Why did you bring me here? So let me try this. Let me try this. So we can always find some room for me.

Okay, one last question we'll have very briefly. Hi, Ganesh Babuji. You mentioned about dharma and you mentioned about my dharma.

So what is the difference? I mean, dharma and my dharma. My dharma, see, if Arjuna asks about my dharma, then it would have become a very specific discussion about whether he should fight or not. It was, Gita goes about universal questions.

So Arjuna questions universal and that's why the deliberation of Gita also becomes universal. So if you see, some people say that Krishna just told Arjuna the Gita to get him to fight the war. But if Krishna, that's what Krishna wanted.

Krishna didn't have to speak any philosophy. Krishna just reminded Arjuna about the disrobing of Draupadi. Do you remember how Draupadi was crying at that time? Do you remember how helpless you felt at that time? Do you remember how much you wanted to punish the people who had caused you and Draupadi such pain? Now is your opportunity, destroy them.

Even an ordinary person, if their family is dishonoured, they'll get angry. Arjuna is a trained warrior. So Krishna will just focus on that level.

It's remarkable in the entire Bhagavad Gita, there is not a single mention of Draupadi's disrobing. So Krishna did not just want to give Arjuna circumstantial reasons for fighting. Krishna wanted to give Arjuna universal principles for life.

And that's how the Gita becomes so relevant for all of us.