We are never too far away from relapse Gita 02.60

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
thank you we are always just a day or an hour or even a moment away from relapse when we try to develop ourselves spiritually when we try to overcome our materialistic conditionings when we try to get over the problems that so when we endeavor to give up some undesirable habit we may meet with some success may find ourselves able to resist certain things and sometimes such resistance can breed over confidence that based on our capacity to resist certain conditionings we may start thinking that we have become free from that indulgence so may feel that now that indulgence that conditioning is a thing of the past we may have some encounters with temptations and we may resist those temptations and that will increase our confidence now confidence is good overconfidence isn’t and confidence means that we recognize that if we follow the proper process if we take the necessary precautions if we engage in the essential purificatory practices then we will be able to overcome we will be able to stay protected from our conditionings however overconfidence means we simply think that now nothing is going to affect me whatever happens I am protected I have become immune to this actually even when we take some vaccine to immunize ourselves from an epidemic even the immunizing effect does not always last forever it may last for some time and if the epidemic is continuing then we may need to take the immunizing medicine immunizer again and again periodically so it is not that our health is protecting us it is our health complemented with the immunizing agent that is protecting us so similarly when we are trying to battle against temptation and when we are resisting it at that time we can’t just overcome things by our own it is actually through the practice of bhakti that we are able to resist, we are able to overcome Krishna talks about this in the Bhagavad Gita 2.59 and 60 he cautions about the relentlessness of the attacks of temptation and the vulnerability of even the wise to temptation in 2.60 he says that that endeavor it these people are discerning they have strong discriminating capacity they know what is right what is wrong what is sensual what is spiritual but still senses are so turbulent so strong so wild that they carry us away that they drive us into illusion and then in the next he states that when we fix the mind on Krishna when we fix the mind on Krishna that is when we become purified that is when our endeavors for self restraint for self mastering gain success so it is not our determination but it is our devotion that brings purification yes determination matters but determination is not all that matters our determination alone doesn’t bring purification determination when directed towards devotion when directed through devotion when directed in devotion that means we use our determination to practice devotion and that is what brings purification that is what maintains purification but when we instinctively think that it is by our own efforts that we are pure that it is we who are purifying ourselves it is we who are doing what it it is by our own determination that we are staying pure and that now we have gone beyond temptation now to think that we have gone beyond temptation is actually to know that we have gone into temptation to think that we have gone beyond temptation is to know that we have gone into temptation so when we keep this in mind that a relapse that we can have a relapse at any time today I might be very pure but tomorrow some impure your temptation may overpower me I might see something externally and that might overpower me so I need to be extremely careful to the extent we have this caution and this caution is not fearfulness it is not that we are paranoid thinking that any moment we fall to temptation this caution is more in terms of Krishna fullness we can say that we stay absorbed in Krishna so caution should impel not fearfulness but faithfulness Krishna fullness that means we recognize that there is danger but we also recognize that there is protection available provided we take the protection to the extent we take the protection to the extent that we seriously engage ourselves and absorb ourselves in devotional activities to that extent we will be protected but we can never become complacent it’s very difficult for us to say that just because I have given up a particular indulgence today and I have been free from it for the last one week, one month or even one year that means that I am now become free one of the principles of guiding recovering alcoholics is that you know they are never entirely free from alcohol and they take life one day at a time that thank you god for keeping me safe yesterday and please guide me please keep me safe today please guide me so that I can stay sober today so if we think that the battle will go on lifelong that may burden us but if we see that the whole of life is just a sequence of one day after another after another and we just take life one day at a time then we will not feel so overwhelmed rather we will confidently take shelter of Krishna stay determinately devoted and thus stay purified and protected