How can we practically do abhyasa for focusing the mind?
Answer Podcast
Transcript
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self-conception. Can you tell us one, two, three things by which we can do abhyas while chanting, while trying to control the mind? Yes, the word abhyasa in the vernacular language often means study.
In Sanskrit, abhyasa means practice. So, the way to do abhyasa, way to do practice is simply practice, first of all. But just like if somebody is trying to say practice archery.
Now, they can’t practice archery or that. It’s not that practicing archery means simply shooting arrows wherever they go. Practicing archery means actually shooting arrows with the intention of hitting the target.
If a person just closes their eyes and shoots arrows wherever, anywhere, that is not really archery practice. Archery practice means each time an archer is practicing, they are trying to hit the target. So, similarly, when we are talking about practicing for focusing the mind, the practice always has to be purposeful.
Like the archery practice is purposeful with the purpose of trying to hit the target. Similarly, our devotional practices or our overall practice of discipline of the mind, that has to be purposeful. So, being purposeful means that we focus on striving to go closer to Krishna and in going closer to Krishna, we keep that in mind that I am not just doing this as a ritual.
I have a purpose over here. My purpose is to move closer to Krishna, to attain Krishna, to express my devotion to Krishna, to do some constructive service for Krishna. When we have that attitude, when we have that disposition, then actually, we will find ourselves growing in our spiritual life.
We will find that the practice becomes more and more fruitful. So, if you have the practice as purposeful, then it will become fruitful. Whatever the purpose that we have, that we will eventually attain as a fruit.
So, that’s keeping the purpose in mind is very important while we are doing Abhyasa. And second thing is while we are doing Abhyasa, it’s good to be aware of what is the path or what is it that connects us easily with Krishna and what is it that connects us, causes a lot of difficulty in connecting with Krishna. That means that if we find that if there are certain activities, say, some of us may like Kirtan, some of us may like philosophy, some of us may like Diti Darshan, whatever it is.
So, we find out what is it that connects us easily with Krishna and we do that more and more. So, that is the process by which we can easily connect with him. So, Abhyasa in this case will be Susukham, will be joyful because that is something which is within what our Svabhava likes.
So, if you consider circle of things that we like to do and circle of Krishna Bhakti, if we can find out some things in the intersection of the two, then we will be able to move forward steadily in our service to Krishna, in our Abhyasa in his service because that is something which we will naturally continue towards. Thank you.