Understanding our outer world, our inner world and how to direct them
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Today, I spoke three main points. The nature of the outer world, the nature of the inner world, and how to channel, how do you function effectively by understanding this nature. Nature of the outer world, I talked about how most pleasures, which catch our eye, they are like nectar in the beginning, but poison in the end.
Give the example of addictions. And many other pleasures, which are enlightened pleasures, which are uplifting, they are like poison in the beginning, nectar in the end, like learning writing. Expressing ourselves artistically through writing is enjoyable, but learning the nitty-gritty, the craft can be a pain.
Building the foundation of a house is not very fulfilling. The superstructure comes, that’s what is fulfilling. So, the culture around us is filled with showing us the nectar initially of worldly joys, and that can distract us.
Then we talked about the inner world, where there is the mind and the intelligence. So, basically, inside us, we often experience some kind of tug-of-war, and we are sometimes wise and sometimes otherwise. And that’s because we have these two faculties, the soul is the source of consciousness, and mind and intelligence are like resources.
So, the intelligence is associated with reason, the mind with emotion. Ideally, the intelligence should be in control of the mind, and then when it looks outwards, it sees the consequence of actions. And therefore, it perceives even when there is poison.
Our motivation will be determined by our vision. If you look at how heavy weights we have to lift, we will feel disheartened. If we look at what kind of physique we can develop by lifting those weights, we will feel enlivened.
So, if we look at the eventual nectar that will come in enlightened joys, we will want to perceive it. Look at the initial poison, we will want to give up. So, the intelligence is in control, we look at the eventual results, and that motivates us.
But for us presently, quite often, the mind is in control. And that’s how we become impulsive. And thus, we end up sabotaging ourselves.
So, when the mind is in control, we get carried away by the immediates. In that, I talked about three things. Weakness is where the mind occasionally overcomes the intelligence.
Wickedness is where the mind has completely controlled and dominated the intelligence. And virtuousness is where the intelligence has trained and harmonized the mind according to its plans. So, you want to go from wherever we are between wickedness and wickedness towards virtuousness.
And how do we do that? If there is an arm wrestling match between two people, if you want A to win, either A has to become stronger or B has to become weaker. So, spirituality can help us do both. Spiritual insight, spiritual philosophy helps us understand the nature of the outer and inner world and makes our intelligence strong.
And spiritual practices give us experience of higher joy. They take us beyond the initial poison to the nectar. So, meditation and other such practices can, when the child recognizes that writing is also pleasurable, then the child will be ready to learn writing.
Similarly, the mind experiences the joy coming from higher activities, then the mind’s impulsiveness weakens. And when the intelligence in the mind can work together constructively, then our focus can become very strong, we can get into a flow and with even a little time and attention, we can do a lot. And thus we can create a life that is filled with both achievement and fulfillment.
Thank you very much.