Bhakti

                                                              

Benares - The faith of the people here makes even a non-believer like me believe!

My friend recently updated his Facebook page with the above photo of a man praying in Benares, with the tag line, “Benares - The faith of the people here makes even a non-believer like me believe”.

This friend of mine, is a very keen observer of life around him. Mostly quite in his disposition, with good tastes but clear mind. But his tag line was quite an invitation for me to put down my thoughts on faith nay bhakti, and that is the reason for this blog.

Faith can move mountains. Well, and this old man’s faith or bhakti made my friend a believer…even if it means only for some time.

That reminded me of a story that I heard. This story was in the context of sangeeta upanyasam (story telling through songs) of Narada Bhakti Sutra by one of the renowned exponents from south India.

First the story.

Rasa Khan was a Muslim (emphasis) diamond merchant living in Mathura in the 16^th century. He found out that most the Seth (rich merchants) in the town go to upanysam or storytelling. He thought it would be a good idea to pitch his sales while all the Seths are congregated in one place.

As it would have been, the story was of Govinda, the local lad, the revered Lord Krishna. As the story telling was going on, Rasa khan approached a Seth with one of his special diamond jewellery and showed it to him. The Seth engrossed in the story telling, shooed him away. Rasa khan tried again with another Seth, only to be shooed away again. He approached many more such Seths, in the hope that one of them will pay attention to him and he could connect and make a sale. But alas, he could not even get attention of anyone of them.

Resigned at this fate, as he was ruminating, he caught the story teller use the word diamond jewellery. Human mind is such that, the word or object on top of one’s mind is always heard or seen. Rasa Khan, caught the part, where the story teller describes in detail how Lord Krishna’s adorned with diamond jewels, his flowing curly hair, his mystifying music from flute and his personality was so alluring to the people in Mathura.

Not knowing that Govinda, the boy, was someone, who had lived in Mathura millenniums back, he was in awe with emotion on got goose pimples when heard about this Govinda. He was for some moments transfixed at the description of this lad and remained rooted to his ground. He was wonderstruck. Within minutes, he realised he had to see Govinda. He wanted to see this person immediately. Lost in this moment of calling, he dropped all his jewels and ran into the town asking the people of Mathura, where he could possibly see this Govinda. People, took him to be mad and booed at him. Most people thought, he was making fun (because he was a Muslim) of them, while others were afraid of this man’s sudden interest in Govinda.

One gentleman, though, directed Rasa Khan to seek Govinda in Brindavan. Rasa Khan ran to Brindavan and on reaching asked the people where he could see Govinda. They directed Rasa Khan to Srinathji temple, where the lord is seen as Goverdhana giridhari.

People were in queue to enter the temple, and Rasa Khan joined the queue. When his turn came, the guards objected his entry, as he was not a Hindu. But Rasa Khan was madly in bhakti. He kept mumbling the word Govinda and stayed near the temple for ten days. Finally, the guards, unable to goad him away, complained to the temple in-charge about him. The temple was looked after by the Vallabhacharya clan. When the present Acharya heard this, he said “Oh, Govinda, I have been your lifelong devotee, but never have I reached such a state of bhakti. Why does the lord not make me mad like Rasa Khan?” He addressed the guards, “you don’t know the power of bhakti, and this power does not have any religion, caste, background, and status as its source. It is the source itself.” So saying, he immediately rushed to the temple and took Rasa Khan inside the temple for the lord’s darshan. When Rasa Khan saw the Lord’s Idol, he attained enlightenment. His initial pursuit was to see a live person, whom he knew as Govinda, when he saw the idol in all its splendour, he felt his bhakti for the Lord Govinda, through this idol. And on that very moment composed his first bhajan standing in front of the Lord Srinathji. From there on, he composed and sang many bhajans and remained a lifelong bhakt.

Rasa Khan’s story is about one type of bhakti that humans attain by just listening to the stories of great people who have lived this land. His story is about a person, so far away from Govinda and its history, but attaining enlightenment due to an association for only few moments, of Govinda’s story during the upanyas.

The power of the Lord is from the strength of the bhakt’s bhakti. Bhakti is one of the ways to attain enlightenment. The stronger the bhakti, the closer is the human soul to the Supreme.

Bhakti, is but buried in every human being. Occasions like the story telling, satsang provide opportunity for this bhakti to flower. The flowering of this bhakti brings unending joy and bliss. In Rasa Khan’s case, other than the bliss that he achieved, due to the strength of his bhakti, he also left a legacy of beautiful songs for us to hear.

Narada Bhakti Sutra’s is a compilation of stories on how through bhakti, one achieves enlightenment.  This compilation is quite extraordinary in itself. It start with “Athatho bhaktim vyaakhyaasyamah” which means “now hereafter, we will explain bhakti”. This means, there is something before. What is it?

(inspired by Smt. Visaka Hari, exponent of sangeeta upanysam and Amit Khanna, a friend)

Laughing Causes and brooding Effect

Most people underestimate the power of knowing the "cause", while the "effect" seems to get all the affection. Most of our communication pattern reflects this trend. We seem to be in high with effect and little or no attention to the cause. Whether it our analysis, solutions, communication, interactions, we seem to focus more on effect.

Nature by definition is a cosmic drama between cause and effect. The cause is the origin while the effect is the outcome of the "manifested cause".

Science has always studied nature as a cause-effect relation. From Newton’s law, Faraday's principle or Einstein's special theory of relativity, everything is an explanation of cause-effect theory told in many ways.

The Sun, is the primary source of energy for our solar system and its rays that reach the earth, is its extension or manifestation. The sun's rays thus assume a different form to reach the earth. Now, one could quickly jump into the incorrect conclusion that the Sun's effect is in fact, heat.

But No. The heat is only when the rays reaches an object. 

Sun    ------> sun's rays     -----> heat

Cause -----> manifestation-----> effect.

Love   ------> kiss              ------> pleasure

Thus when sun's rays falls on the water it evaporates, while on a skin, it tans or burns the skin.  The love can manifest into a kiss and leave pleasure as an effect or a blush on the cheek of a sweet girl.

So clearly, how we understand, the cause, the manifestations and its effect will greatly help us in running our daily life. 

The science behind the cause-manifestation-effect is simple and is common sense.

Where there is a cause, there will be manifestations. And when you have manifestations, there will be an effect.

How strong the manifestation will decide the effect. 

So the effect is just an outcome that one cannot control. It’s the cause that controls through manifestations, the impact or effect. Once the Sun's rays is released, what the effect is, is not controlled by the Sun. It just is.

For us the biggest and the most profound impact of this understanding of relationship, is in answering the question "What is my purpose in this life"?

What my purpose is, will decide my destination. The purpose is the cause, the destination is the effect. Where I am destined to reach, I have no control. What I do control is the purpose that I have identified. So how big a purpose, or what purpose that I choose is more important than where I want to reach. 

So how will my purpose manifest itself? 

Sun    ------> sun's rays     -----> heat

Cause -----> manifestation-----> effect.

Love   ------> kiss              ------> pleasure

Purpose---->            ?       ------> destination

The answer is - by my "consistent actions". The manifestations and its quality reflects the purpose. The purpose of Sun is to bestow life on earth, while for the match stick, it is just to start a fire. 

My actions will manifest my purpose. So if my purpose is to achieve stardom as a movie star, then I should be acting in movies. But stardom is an effect and I won’t be able to control it. So my purpose cannot be to achieve stardom, but my purpose should be something else. You have to spend more time deliberating and deciding what your purpose is and forget about the effect or destination. This is one of the biggest fallacies of human kind. We spend enough time discussing the effect or the destination or the pleasure but little or none in seeking our purpose.

Knowledge helps in not only bridging our understanding but also showing us the vast available opportunities We need knowledge to decide whether our purpose is right for us. However, if we are not capable to grasp knowledge ourselves, we may seek teachers, mentors or a master. The right knowledge leads to the selection of the right purpose most suited to a person.

No Purpose   ----> your actions------> any destination - unsatisfactory result

Your Purpose----> your actions------> your destination - satisfactory result.

Don't waste your actions by not choosing a purpose in life. In other words, all your actions should lead to the purpose of your choice. Eating, sleeping, working, walking partying, playing, any action should be dedicated to "your purpose". Once, your actions are for the purpose of your choice, you don't need to worry about the destination. It will be but naturally, your destination. Your choice of actions should be manifestation of your purpose.

In the end, let me leave a thought. If there is cause, is this Universe its effect? Or if this Universe is the cause, what is the effect? 

What if I tell you, the Supreme Creator (who or whatever it is) is the cause, and we are but just its manifestations? 

Think, think, and think on your purpose. Seek to unravel the mystery of your purpose. Your purpose, till you realize your life's purpose, is to explore opportunities.

Life is an opportunity! 

Child's play

It has been my experience that anytime I smile at a kid, the kid smiles back, involuntarily and very genuine. But the better part of this "smiley" conversation between me and the kid, is the inedible mark of happiness that it leaves behind to stay with me

I have had similar experiences for now over 3 decades and it has never failed. I have always felt light and happy after seeing a kid smile. 

So what did this experience tell me. Well that is what i share with you in this blog

Kids are pure in their action, with no memory to jog or experience to repeat and act. My grandmother used to tell me "kids are but manifestation of God". I never understood this statement when I was a kid, but begin to understand the import now. What she meant was that God reflects innocence and being happy without leaving a trace of control or power.  A blooming flower is innocent and beautiful. A lion cub is cudly, cute and full of energy.

A kid brings a similar feelings amongst us. They are innocent and remain happy despite the surroundings. So, am I saying that being happy is the normal state that children are born with? I guess so. It is but natural for nature to show its true unadulterated form immediately on the birth of new one. It is true not just for humans but for all beings on the earth.

So, if you are not happy, you are not in the normal state. And in the state of being happy, you are God.

Brahmavid Brahmaiva bhavati! (One who knows the Brahman becomes the Brahman)

Reply to Tunku, Sunday TOI, India Mumbai

Hey Tunku,                                                                                                           11-01-2015 10:53:55

I am taking the liberty of addressing you by your first name because I sense a bit of closeness with you. I follow you in twitter and have been reading your articles in the “The Daily beast”. On a friendlier side, I have a very similar pepper-salt combination over my head. I also love your hairstyle which reminds me of the Shahanshah, where Amitabh plays a hero.

Some caveat. I am not scholarly, reasearchly Standfordish kind of guy. So I don’t compare well with your English and flamboyance. However, I have seen life and death at close quarters and lived my life, true to my feelings. Yes, that is what prompted me to address this reply directly to you.

It was the headline in Sunday Times, India that jolted me out of my senses today morning.  The headline “Why Paris is even more shocking than Peshawar”. This headline was under the column “Deep focus”.

You say –“the mowing of school children was blood curdling, but random. At Charlie Hebdo, the dead were chosen by name, and chosen expressly because they were a symbol of freedom".

Schoolchildren for no fault of them were murdered for revenge, as a lesson to their parents, who happen to be doing their own profession, whatever that be. These terrorist did not kill these fathers/mothers but their kids, innocent, unknowing, full of life. Yes life, before this horrendous act.

And you have the cheek to say, that the Charlie Hebdo “as an assault on the moral senses”, it had arguably an even greater impact than mowing down of schoolchildren. Tumku, you should be either out of your mind or indulging in nepotism. I am sure, it’s not the former, because of your pedigree and scholarly work, but surely it is nothing but nepotism at its worst. Kids are but an expression of life. Yes they are expression of life. Its only when you are alive, that you get the freedom of speech. These kids had not even earned their freedom from their parents, and lost their lives before even reaching the stage of enjoying freedom of speech.

How can this dastardly act of murdering school kids be not an assault on moral senses? How can this not have a greater impact? Why random people when murdered senselessly do not have impact while selected few becomes a problem to be solved? The truth is, it is only now, that journalists like you realise that terrorist have entered the homes of people and normal life is hit.

And in the end you suggest to the “West”, and I quote – “But fears of such a backlash need not be an alibi for paralysis, and the longer it takes for the west to find ways to combat the Islamist cancer in its cities, the harder it will be for the vast majority if law- abiding Muslims who live in the west to distance themselves from the poison of rabid few”.

Do you know that these terrorists have been terrorizing Indians for last 30 years and every time there is move by the “East” to tackle this head on, loads of Western socialist, journalist and random evangelist  heaped pressure on the Government to see this as a “minority issue” rather than as a terrorist issue. After 30 years of such hobnobbing, we the normal office going professionals, don’t know when and where these terrorists will strike again. Moreover, if the “moderates” from majority take this issue for public debate, they are beaten down to pulp by random journalist as “Sanghi”, Hindu nationalist and such other names.

My point is clear – killing by terrorist of any human whatever his profession is, wherever he is, is blood curdling and assault on moral senses. Charlie Hebdo need not take the position of having greater impact.  Journalist will have to become part of the normal life and not give themselves elevated positions. Join us in the fight along with normal people as equals. Good day.

Universe of Life - Brain pickings

The Separators

One of my friend called me and casually chatting and during the chat asked what I was doing for the upcoming new-year eve night. I said, nothing. He then said that he had noticed that I don’t wish birthdays, wedding anniversaries also. And in a very searching tone, asked why do not I show importance to these events in life and so on so forth?

I did not have any valid reason to explain away that difficult question. This blog is an after-thought of that question. It neither answers nor is expected to answer that question. But it did leave me with a larger revelation that I think, has changed me.

Time, as it stands, is very difficult for people to understand. Einstein himself struggled to explain what time is and what it meant for physics and common man. Probability, space, money, weather, clock, life itself and even geography is impacted due to time. So what am I saying…Let me try with a story first. Flashback!

This story is more than 5000 years old. The great yogi Narada Muni explains to Emperor Kansa, why it is difficult to identify the 8^th child (since it was supposed to be the child that will ultimately kill the Emperor). How does he do it? He draws 8 dots in a circle and asks Kansa to count 8 starting from each of the dots. Kansa finds out (and so we all will, if we do the same count) that any of the dot could be the 8^th. He then decides to kill all 8 children. 

Three simple things can be understood from this story and it is a revelation.

First – time goes round and in cycle (not surprisingly, the universe/space is also going round and round)

Second – Since time goes round and round, there is no beginning or end.

Third – Since there is no beginning or end and time goes in circle, there is no past or future but only present (past and future becomes meaningless in a circle)

So what? How does this gyan answer the question asked by my friend?

In our lives, birthdays, anniversaries, new-year etc etc are all “separators” of our lifetime. We use these “separators” to categories your life into phases, just like you compartmentalise a big file with “separators”. Our lives are defined by these separators, birth, age, health, death and so on. We start defining ourselves from the separators point, losing in essence, ourselves. The question that I asked myself, will I give importance to the papers between the separators or the separators are important?

So what again? Can’t we party for these separators? Sure, we can, if one does like to. Celebrate every such “separator” that you create and enjoy its presence. But can I neglect the papers, aka time, between my separators? Certainly not. But then, we don’t wish birthdays every day? Do we?

But then, as I was ruminating on this fact, it dawned, that aren’t we- you, me and people like us, in the larger scheme of the time in universe, ourselves “separators”?

I want my life to be a celebration itself, because it is, but just a separator!

Corporate Bhakti

Corporate Bhakti – Something to break the monotony of reading and sending New year greetings.

There is no equivalent word for Bhakti in English, the language that I write this blog. But it is not the meaning of Bhakti that I want to share but experience of Bhakti that I want to share. I have experienced this state and/or realisation over a period of two decades. It has been my conscious effort to understand this state of Bhakti as against other feelings like trust, faith, dedication and righteousness that truly gives me the satisfaction today!

And yes, once I understood that Bhakti is a different feeling (feeling is still not an apt word for it), I was keen to understand how, why and for what purpose can I work in that state of Bhakti, in the corporate world.

One caution – language or semantics may cloud your understanding and you may like to caution your mind from falling in that trap.

Only principle – Each individual is a universe. Bhakti is not comparable within two different human beings.

And now….

Over the years I realised that I went into a state of at Bhakti, I felt courage within me, a feeling of faith (trust, but not on any specific object/person) spread across my being. I realised that there is a presence of an “unknown” (I acknowledged that unknown) and I could feel connection and oneness within and with all.

So I wrote down somewhere-

Bhakti = Courage + faith + unknown + connection.

But then why did I need courage? Why did have faith? Why did I realise that there is an unknown? And why did I feel this connection. But the most surprising part of this was, that I felt all these feelings simultaneously; this state of being in Bhakti.

My answers are my realisations.

I needed courage as my energy source. From the energy source, I got my courage. Something like circular reference in an excel sheet. lol

I was faithful in a persistent manner about myself. Without faith in self, I was not be able to act, go through the processes, rituals of life that I felt were meaningless. A very important outcome of faith in self was not only did I act, but I did make the “right” (in my worldview) choice (on hindsight) as against choices that were merely pleasant.

Life is an unknown, from the moment I was born and till I die, there will be unknown. Yes, there will be unknown, I said to myself off and on, reiterating this point. But being conscious of the unknown without arguing in my mind, I was letting my natural state of happiness to surface more often.

And when I was in the state of oozing energy, smoothly going through the daily activities, blissfully enjoying, I felt connected. Deep observation into this state, I realised that my “split personality” feeling was gone; disappeared; vanished. I was One. And when this One happened, I automatically felt oneness with nature, surroundings and with all. Quite dramatically, I felt completely at ease with all, without feeling the need to judge the obvious differences in my surroundings, fellow humans and their differing actions.

So when I looked at my corporate life, I realised that I was not courageous, my faith in self vacillated, I felt troubled to acknowledge the unknown and didn’t feel connected.

Now with my realisation of Bhakti, and more often being in a state of Bhakti, it has become my preferred mode of operations.

As an outcome of this, I now feel very energetic and I am able to more often make the right choices. Subconsciously I am at ease and feeling light and I feel the creative power guiding me when faced with challenges. The oneness has driven judgement out for most of the time, helping me with opportunities to learn.

Thanks.