How can we train the mind to correct its bad ways?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

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So, how can we train the mind practically? Chanting seems to be more like a workout which has to get done. And how can we learn to more identify the mind or deal with the mind better? See, when a war is happening, at that time, if the defending army knows the kind of weapons that the opposing army uses, knows the kind of strategies the opposing army uses for attacking, then the defending army is better prepared to deal with it.
And all this is the function of the intelligence. There is a spy who goes inside and they find out the weapons and the strategy that is planned. And then the defending army can defend better.
So, like that, it’s not that the mind troubles us in unlimited ways. We could say specifically they can be unlimited, but there are broad patterns. So, for some of us, the mind may worry too much.
For some, I may desire something too much. The mind may become very judgmental about someone. The mind may become very depressed about things going wrong.
If we look at our mind, we can find out maybe three, four standard ways in which the mind troubles us. And then if we find that, we can prepare our own responses to the mind. That means that if I start worrying about something, the mind starts showing a horror mode, at that time, I may not remember the philosophy that I heard in the class.
But that is the time when I need to remember it. So, what I can do is, this is a particular situation, I have financial insecurities, or I have some relational insecurity, whatever it is. Just if something is repeatedly troubling me, then it is worth it to invest some time to deal with it.
That means I just write down my fears, this may happen, this may happen, this may happen. Now, quite often, writing down our fears itself shows many of the fears to be insubstantial. Sometimes, you know, we feel very worried about someone.
And then we want to talk with someone, we want to tell them the problem. And we tell them the problem, that seems so trivial, you know. It’s not such a big problem.
But then now we have told them, I have a problem. Then what we do is, when we are speaking, we realize it’s a small problem. But how can I tell it’s a small problem to others? So then I exaggerate the problem.
That’s how we try to do it, try to save face at that time. But if we just verbalize our problem, write it down, when we have a journal or something, write it down, that itself deflates, that itself decreases the temperature of the mind. The mind is becoming feverish.
Just writing down, we say, this is not likely to happen. At one level, anything can happen in life. But we can’t lead our life worrying and fearing anything and everything that can happen.
Some things are possibility. Actually, almost everything can be a possibility. But some things are probabilities.
Now, if I am driving in a car which has a defective brake, then an accident is not just a possibility, it’s a probability. Probability means something which is very likely to happen. If I start worrying about possibilities, I will not be able to do anything.
If I’m sitting in this room, the roof can collapse. That’s also a possibility. We don’t have to worry about it.
Once we start verbalizing what the mind is worried about, that itself helps us to differentiate. This is a possibility. This is a probability.
Possibility, I don’t have to worry about. So many of our fears are exposed as insubstantial when we write them down. Just get it out.
And once we have got it down, the mind feels, I’ve got a vent now. And then it is in trouble of so much. Then afterwards, when we have calmed down, we go back and look at what are the fears of the mind.
And then use our intelligence to address them. And okay, if this happens, then I can do this, this, this. If this happens, I can do this, this, this.
And then using our intelligence, we write down our own plan of how to address that fear. And then whenever next time the fear attacks, you know, we can go back. Just read that.
Okay, this happens, I can do this, this. When this happens, I can do this, this, this. And each time when we refer to it, we can keep refining it.
So this becomes like our customized weapon for dealing with the mind. And while talking about how to deal with the mind, it’s not just practical steps. We can write philosophical insights also.
So, you know, what we have heard from scriptures, what we have from classes, can write down those points also. Okay, this is a big problem. Let me not be, let me not get into anxiety.
Let me get into intensity. We focus on what can I do in this situation. So we basically, I call this as, you know, journaling is the way we make our intelligence the counselor of our mind.
The mind first vents out. So imagine, sometimes we have a senior devotee or senior friend who may go for counseling. So if we envision ourselves as there are two chairs.
Once I sit on this chair of the counseling, then I sit on the chair of a counselor. So first I vent out whatever is my problem. Speak it out.
That’s the counseling speaking. Then after the mind is calmed down because of having vented, then I go back and look at it. And counsel oneself.
So actually, you know, if we could just do this, create this difference of subject and object in ourselves, there’s one thing which we all are expert at doing. There’s nothing that we give as freely as advice. You know, the same worry, which is paralyzing me right now.
If somebody else came with that same worry, I would give a very good class of why you should not be worried. So it’s not that we don’t know how to deal with it. But it’s just that the mind doesn’t allow us to apply it at that time.
So if we can create that distance, OK, this is the mind. This is the intelligence. So let the mind vent itself out.
And then I direct my tendency to give advice to myself. That means I become the intelligence and give advice to the mind. And write this down.
So next time, whenever the mind starts troubling, then we can go and refer to that. And similarly, now this is actually intellectual. This is not necessarily transformational.
The mind still has the habit to worry, but I know how to deal with it. But when we practice bhakti, connect with Krishna, the mind becomes purified of the tendency to worry. So worry is actually a function of tamo guna, the mode of ignorance.
But by practicing bhakti, our consciousness rises from the lower modes to the higher modes, towards sattva guna and above. So by the practice of bhakti, the tendency to worry itself will decrease. So through our intelligence, through intellectual analysis, when the mind worries, we have some tools to deal with it.
But the practice of bhakti, it actually decreases the tendency of the mind to worry itself. And so when we’re chanting and we find chanting to be a burden, it’s a task to be done. So what we could do is we can prepare something similar.
Why am I chanting? Now why is chanting important for me? So write down some points. And then if we are chanting and we feel that it’s such a big burden, these are the reasons why I’m doing this. So in every activity, there is a price and there is a prize.
Now P-R-I-C-E prize and P-R-I-Z-E prize. So what I have to pay and what I’m going to get. So usually, if we feel that what I have to pay is more than what I have to get, what I’ll get, I feel why am I doing it.
But if I remember, okay, I’m going to get all this by this, then this prize is worth it. So like that, when we are chanting at that time, what the result is, we often don’t remember. I had to put in so much effort.
That seems to be a big burden. But if you have it written down, you know, why is chanting important for me? Why am I doing this? Then that intelligence shifts, intelligence corrects the distortion that the mind has created in the perception. So actually, the prize from chanting is far, far greater than the prize.
But at the moment, the prize is almost invisible and the prize seems too much. So if we have our intelligence, if we have written down our own reasons, why am I doing this activity? Then that perception distortion that has happened, that can be corrected. And then we can get the intellectual impetus to practice bhakti.
That is, so basically, using our intelligence to counsel the mind, that is one way in which we can correct the mind’s undesirable tendencies. Does it address your question? Just to add on, Prabhupada.