6.2 Meditation

4. As the mind becomes attached to God in Yog, it naturally becomes detached from the world. So an easy criterion of evaluating the state of one's mind is to check whether it has become free from all material desires. A person will be considered detached from the world when one no longer craves for sense objects nor is inclined to perform any actions for attaining them. Such a person ceases to look for opportunities to create circumstances to enjoy sensual pleasures, eventually extinguishes all thoughts of enjoying sense objects, and also dissolves the memories of previous enjoyments.

The mind now no longer gushes into self-centered activities at the urge of the senses. When we achieve this level of mastery over the mind, we will be considered elevated in Yog.

5. We are responsible for our own elevation or debasement. Nobody can traverse the path of God-realization for us. Saints and Gurus show us the way, but we have to travel it ourselves. There is a saying in Hindi: ek peḍa do pakṣhī baiṭhe, ek guru ek chelā, apanī karanī guru utare, apanī karanī chelā[v.01] "There are two birds sitting on a tree—one Guru and one disciple. The Guru will descend by his own works, and the disciple will also only be able to climb down by his own karmas."

We have had innumerable lifetimes before this one, and God-realized Saints were always present on Earth. At any period of time, if the world is devoid of such Saints, then the souls of that period cannot become God-realized. How then can they fulfill the purpose of human life, which is God-realization? Thus, God ensures that God-realized Saints are always present in every era, to guide the sincere seekers and inspire humanity. So, in infinite past lifetimes, many times we must have met God-realized Saints and yet we did not become God-realized. This means that the problem was not lack of proper guidance, but either our reticence in accepting it or working according to it. Thus, we must first accept responsibility for our present level of spirituality, or lack thereof. Only then will we gain the confidence that if we have brought ourselves to our present state, we can also elevate ourselves by our efforts.

When we suffer reversals on the path of spiritual growth, we tend to complain that others have caused havoc to us, and they are our enemies. However, our biggest enemy is our own mind. It is the saboteur that thwarts our aspirations for perfection. Shree Krishna states that, on the one hand, as the greatest benefactor of the soul, the mind has the potential of giving us the most benefit; on the other hand, as our greatest adversary, it also has the potential for causing the maximum harm. A controlled mind can accomplish many beneficial endeavors, whereas an uncontrolled mind can degrade the consciousness with most ignoble thoughts.

In order to be able to use it as a friend, it is important to understand the mind's nature. Our mind operates at four levels:

Mind: When it creates thoughts, we call it mana, or the mind.

Intellect: When it analyses and decides, we call it buddhi, or intellect.

Chitta: When it gets attached to an object or person, we call it chitta.

Ego: When it identifies with the bodily identifications and becomes proud of things like wealth, status, beauty, and learning, we call it ahankār, or ego.

These are not four separate entities. They are simply four levels of functioning of the one mind. Hence, we may refer to them all together as the mind, or as the mind-intellect, or as the mind-intellect-ego, or as the mind-intellect-chitta-ego. They all refer to the same thing.

The use of the word ego here is different from its connotation in Freudian psychology. Sigmund Freud (1856 – 1939), an Austrian neurologist, proposed the first theory of psychology regarding how the mind works. According to him, the ego is the "real self" that bridges the gap between our untamed desires (Id) and the value system that is learnt during childhood (Superego).

Various scriptures describe the mind in one of these four ways for the purpose of explaining the concepts presented there. They are all referring to the same internal apparatus within us, which is together called antaḥ karaṇ, or the mind. For example:

The Pañchadaśhī refers to all four together as the mind, and states that it is the cause of material bondage.

In the Bhagavad Gita, Shree Krishna repeatedly talks of the mind and the intellect as being two things, and emphasizes the need to surrender both to God.

The Yog Darśhan, while analyzing the different elements of nature, talks of three entities: mind, intellect, and ego.

Shankaracharya, while explaining the apparatus available to the soul, classifies the mind into four—mind, intellect, chitta and ego.

So when Shree Krishna says that we must use the mind to elevate the self, he means we must use the higher mind to elevate the lower mind. In other words, we must use the intellect to control the mind. How this can be done has been explained in detail in old verse

6. We dissipate a large portion of our thought power and energy in combating people whom we perceive as enemies and potentially harmful to us. The Vedic scriptures say the biggest enemies—lust, anger, greed, envy, illusion, etc.—reside in our own mind. These internal enemies are even more pernicious than the outer ones. The external demons may injure us for some time, but the demons sitting within our own mind have the ability to make us live in constant wretchedness. We all know people who had everything favorable in the world, but lived miserable lives because their own mind tormented them incessantly through depression, hatred, tension, anxiety, and stress.

The Vedic philosophy lays great emphasis on the ramification of thoughts. Illness is not only caused by viruses and bacteria, but also by the negativities we harbor in the mind. If someone accidentally throws a stone at you, it may hurt for a few minutes, but by the next day, you will probably have forgotten about it. However, if someone says something unpleasant, it may continue to agitate your mind for years. This is the immense power of the thoughts. In the Buddhist scripture, the Dhammapada , the Buddha also expresses this truth vividly:

"I have been insulted! I have been hurt! I have been beaten! I have been robbed! Misery does not cease in those who harbor such thoughts.

When we nourish hatred in our mind, our negative thoughts do more damage to us than the object of our hatred. It has been very sagaciously stated: "Resentment is like drinking poison and hoping that the other person dies." The problem is that most people do not even realize that their own uncontrolled mind is causing them so much harm. Hence, Jagadguru Shree Kripaluji Maharaj advises:

"Dear spiritual aspirant, look on your uncontrolled mind as your enemy. Do not come under its sway."

However, the same mind has the potential of becoming our best friend, if we bring it under control of the intellect, through spiritual practice. The more powerful an entity is, the greater is the danger of its misuse, and also the greater is the scope for its utilization. Since the mind is such a powerful machine fitted into our bodies, it can work as a two-edged sword. Thus, those who slide to demoniac levels do so because of their own mind while those who attain sublime heights also do so because of their purified minds. Accordingly, Franklin D. Roosevelt, former President of America, expressed this very nicely: "Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds." In this verse, Shree Krishna enlightens Arjun about the potential harm and benefits our mind can bestow upon us. In the following three verses, Shree Krishna describes the symptoms of one who is yog-aru?ha (advanced in Yog).