Material Body

If we have a little common sense and a sincere desire to know things as they are, there are so many things we can learn just by studying things around us. For example, even by observing the difference between a living body and a dead body we can understand some of the basic underlying facts of reality. Amazingly this basic information remains unknown even to the leading so-called educational institutions on this planet. When Srila Prabhupada was preaching one time at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.) he inquired, "Where is the department at this university that teaches the difference between a living body and a dead body." Nobody could answer him because there is no such department.Why are we attracted to a living body and repulsed by a dead body? The chemical elements are the same. The difference is the presence or absence of the living spark, the atma, the spirit-soul. In the living body the spirit-soul is present, and in the dead body the spirit-soul is absent. So what is actually attractive and meaningful is the spirit-soul, not the material body. Yet in spite of this simple, easily understood point we invest practically our entire life's energy in catering to the demands of the material body, which is a mere covering of the actual self. And we practically complete ignore the needs of the eternal soul.Such a misspent life is utter foolishness. It leads to frustration and ultimately devastation at the time of death when everything is ripped away from us. The best thing is to mentally detach ourselves now by understanding and realizing, "I am not this body." Understanding means to grasp the philosophical concept, and realization means to fully imbibe that understanding in our every thought, word, and deed. In other words to always think, speak and act on the platform of being a spirit-soul, rather than a material body. How do we accomplish this? We have to engage ourselves fully on the spiritual platform by engaging everything in the service of God. This automatically elevates us to the spiritual platform without any necessity of the gymnastic system as practiced in hatha yoga or the system of mental speculation as practiced in jnana yoga. The platform of bhakti yoga (devotion to Lord Sri Krishna) immediately situates us on the transcendental platform. This can easily be realized by engaging all of senses in the service of the Lord. Through this simply purifying process we gradually awaken the dormant enlightened consciousness, the Krishna consciousness, which has been sleeping within us for countless lifetimes.

Uncertainity

There's nothing worse than uncertainty. We live in a world where there is growing tendency to make all absolutes taboo. Everything is relative. Many argue that there is no absolute standard for right and wrong, truth or untruth. They say that whatever you feel is right and true, is right and true for you, and whatever anybody feels is right and true is right and true for him. Sometimes they put a condition "as long as you don't hurt anybody." But the meaning of not hurting somebody is quite differently interpreted for example by someone who is against abortion as opposed to someone is in favor of abortion. Some people have no qualms about advocating kindness to animals while at the same time they eat them. The problem is that when my "truth" overlaps your "truth," and we have a very disturbing distressful situation on our hands. Thus fighting is going on between family members, between neighbors, between communities, and between nations. This is all coming because there is no universally accepted standard of right and wrong/ truth and untruth. If someone tries to impose their brand of relative truth upon others claiming it as absolute, this does not solve the problem. In the Kali Yuga, the age of quarrel and hypocrisy, this is a very common phenomenon. Whoever has the most clout economically or politically will put forward their "ism" and as an absolute and try to use their economic and/or political clout to get everyone else accept it as absolute. But this is artificial and therefore it can stand, it cannot remain. If we are going to have actually solidity and certainty we must hear directly from God, without any distortion, as to what is the Absolute Truth. Out of His sweet kindness the Lord personally appeared on this material plane of existence 5,000 and carefully and clearly revealed what is the Absolute Truth to His most beloved disciple, Arjuna. After hearing Krishna's or God's revelation of the most confidential knowledge, Arjuna said to Krishna: param brahma param dhama pavitram paramam bhavan purusam sasvatam divyam adi-devam ajam vibhum "You are the Supreme Personality of Godhead, the ultimate abode, the purest, the Absolute Truth. You are the eternal, transcendental, original person, the unborn, the greatest." Bhagavad-gita 10.12 If the human society can follow the wonderful example of Arjuna, then were will be perfect peace and happiness throughout the entire globe. No one has to change his or her religion because religion is actually one, to love God. It doesn't matter if you call Him Krishna, Christ, Allah, or Jehovah. If one can give up the sinful activities of meat eating, illicit sex life, intoxication, and gambling and absorb themselves in chanting the names of the Lord, they will quickly achieve the supreme happiness of pure love of God.

Spiritual master "Guru"

It is not possible to enjoy this material world because it is a place of suffering. No matter what we may do to try to counteract the suffering conditions, we will continue to be hounded by so many varieties of suffering conditions. The solution for one problem creates another problem. The solution for that problem then creates another problem. In this way we can never come to an end of the sufferings of this material existence.

However there is a way to become completely free from all varieties of suffering conditions. What is that method? We simply have to wake up. We have to come out of the dreamlike state of material existence. This material body is really not me after all. It is simply a covering of the eternal all-blissful, all-knowing self.

So what is the method of waking up? We need to come into contact with a person who is already awakened. This is described in the Caitanya Caritamrita as follows:

brahmanda bhramite kona bhagyavan jiva
guru-krsna-prasade paya bhakti-lata-bija

"According to their karma, all living entities are wandering throughout the entire universe. Some of them are being elevated to the upper planetary systems, and some are going down into the lower planetary systems. Out of many millions of wandering living entities, one who is very fortunate gets an opportunity to associate with a bona fide spiritual master by the grace of Krishna. By the mercy of both Krishna and the spiritual master, such a person receives the seed of the creeper of devotional service."
---Caitanya Caritamrita, Madhya 19.151

So how does one become fortunate to associate with a bona fide spiritual master?

Krishna is very eager to bestow His mercy upon all living beings. As soon as someone desires the Lord's mercy He gives that living being the opportunity to meet a bona fide spiritual master. Such a sincere person is helped from within by Krishna and from without by the spiritual master. Both the Lord and the spiritual master are prepared to give all help to the living being who desires to become free from material bondage and thus easily bring about a total solution to all the problems of material existence.

Material world full of miseries

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This material world is described in the Bhagavad-gita as duhkhalayam, a place of misery. By living here we get daily first hand experience of the reality of this description. In spite of the fact that no one wants to get sick, get old, or die, everyone is forced to endure these miseries. Plus there are innumerable other miseries caused by the mind, other living beings, and nature.

So what can be done about all this suffering? In the Bhagavad-gita Lord Krishna declares that we have to be tolerant of the dualities of material existence.

matra-sparsas tu kaunteya
sitosna-sukha-duhkha-dah
agamapayino 'nityas
tams titiksasva bharata

"O son of Kunti, the nonpermanent appearance of happiness and distress, and their disappearance in due course, are like the appearance and disappearance of winter and summer seasons. They arise from sense perception, O scion of Bharata, and one must learn to tolerate them without being disturbed."
Bhagavad-gita 2.14

Even the body of a fully self-realized soul gets sick, gets old, and dies. Even such a soul has to face so many impediments caused by nature and other living beings. Therefore we must patiently endure so many difficult circumstances while we engage ourselves in serving the Lord's mission. These difficulties are a golden opportunity for us to endear ourselves to the Lord because the more we are willing to take trouble in executing the purpose of the Lord, the more we become recognized by the Lord. Difficulties are therefore welcomed by those who are learned in the transcendental science.

Am I this Body??

Are your eyes seeing, or are you seeing through your eyes? Are you ears hearing, or are you hearing through your ears? Is your skin feeling, or are you feeling through your skin? What is that body and who are you? By careful thoughtful analysis we can understand that this body is changing at every minute while I, the passenger within the body, remain the same. I was a little baby. I become a young boy, then a young man. Now I am middle aged and soon to be an old man. But all along through these many changes of body the "I" remains the same. Therefore it is not at all difficult to conclude that the self and the body are different from each other. They are not one and the same. Even though with careful thoughtful analysis our spiritual existence beyond the body is quite obvious, still we have developed a society based on economic development and sense gratification that constantly reinforces the false conception of "I am this body." Why do we as a society do this? Because it sells. The general mass of people will consistently spend their money based on the principle of what gratifies their material senses. Therefore advertising plays off of this tendency. The companies that can most successfully exploit the lower pull towards bodily consciousness become the most successful. This creates a downward cycle, a whirlpool that constantly sucks the modern day society into deeper and darker ignorance. Is there a light at the end of the tunnel? Yes. That light is the Bhagavad-gita. Therefore the Bhagavad-gita should be very widely distributed in every language of the world and should be required reading in every educational program. In the meantime at least we can become educated and free from the suffering position of bodily consciousness. And we can do the highest welfare work of sharing this liberating knowledge of the non-material nature of the self with as many people as possible.

Self Realisation

The self-realized life is the ultimate lifestyle because it elevates the practitioner out of the realm of temporality, ignorance, and misery into the dimension of eternity, knowledge, and bliss. In this material world everyone is striving for this. However, due to a poor fund of knowledge they are striving for it in the wrong way. It is generally felt that money, power, and prestige can purchase happiness, but the anxiety-ridden lives of those who have attained money, power, and prestige proves that this is not where happiness is found. Sometimes those who have wealth, influence and fame may temporarily think they have attained happiness by these things, but sooner or later it becomes obvious that they have not. Sadly this is usually too late for them to be able to get free from their entanglement in the material energy to devote their energy fully to the self-realization process. Therefore it behooves one to solidly embark on the self-realization pathway as early as possible. In ancient times even the young boy, Prahlada, became a great self-realized soul. In fact he is celebrated even today as one of the twelve great Mahajanas, the most highly realized personalities of history. So how does one begin the self-realization process? The first thing you have to realize is that you are not your body. As long as we think that the self and the body are the same we can never become self realized. This illusory state of mind is called bodily consciousness. The devotee of self-realization must be firmly fixed in understanding, "I am not my body." The body is constantly changing. At every moment the old blood corpuscles are dying and new blood corpuscles are taking their place. Just as the water in the river is constantly changing, the cells that make up our bodies are constantly changing. What today is a water molecule of Mississippi River water was yesterday Ohio River water. Next week it will be Gulf of Mexico water. So what actually is the Mississippi River? It's a place that attracts the water molecules to flow through it. Similarly you are actually the atma, an eternal spiritual being, who attracts the molecules that constitute your physical body to conglomerate around you for a certain period of time until they flow somewhere else. Just as the water molecules in the Mississippi River constantly change, the cells that make up your body are constantly changing. To enter the supreme self-realization lifestyle you must completely discard the conception that you are male or female, black or white, old or young, Russian or American, etc. However, simply negating your physical existence is not sufficient. Mere negation is impractical. It does not give you any platform on which you can function. Therefore you must positively assert your spiritual identity. There are some philosophers who assert that the self is simply false. But if this is the case, who is asserting that the self is false? If they (according to their philosophy) do not exist, how can they assert that the self is false? They cannot do so. Therefore this absurd philosophy cancels itself out and cannot be accepted as valid. It is confirmed by Lord Sri Krishna in the Bhagavad-gita that we are not this body: dehino 'smin yatha dehe kaumaram yauvanam jara tatha dehantara-praptir dhiras tatra na muhyati "As the embodied soul continuously passes, in this body, from boyhood to youth to old age, the soul similarly passes into another body at death. A sober person is not bewildered by such a change." Bhagavad-gita 2.13 We can remember experiences we had when we were small children even though the cells that constitute or make up the material body have all changed. Therefore it is obvious that I and my body are two, not one. At the time when someone dies we lament that they have passed away, but yet their body is lying there in the funeral home. It is obvious from our intuitive understanding at such moments that the self and the body and not the same. But yet every day we get up and look into the mirror foolishly wondering, "How do I look today?" We constantly identify the body as the self. This is our present state of illusion. By hearing the words of God from the authorized scriptures such as the Bhagavad-gita, and by hearing the words of self-realized souls who are situated perfectly in spiritual consciousness without any tinge of bodily consciousness, we can understand that we are not these bodies. And then if we can fully implement the instructions we receive from the Lord and from the spiritual masters, we will fully realize that we are not these through the complete awakening of our original consciousness as eternal spiritual beings.

Why are we suffering

Why are we suffering in the cycle of birth and death? This is the most important question to ask and the most important question to get answered. If you think that you not suffering wait a few a minutes, a few hours or days and carefully consider again if you are actually completely free from suffering. Suffering is constantly coming and going in this material world. It's always either fading in or fading out. It never fades completely out. When it fades in, depending on its degree, we are uncomfortable, unhappy or devastated. When it fades out to varying degrees we feel good or better because it's not as bad as it was before. But the suffering is still there. We are always being hounded by at least one of the three types of material miseries. These miseries are, 1) miseries caused by the mind and body, 2) miseries caused by other living beings, and 3) miseries caused by natural disasters such as earthquakes and tsunamis. We like to imagine that the suffering is completely gone when it fades out, but the fact is that it is always there to one degree or another. Even if it is faded out, today or tomorrow it will surely fade back in again. The underlying dread of when the next fade in will occur is in itself a tangible suffering of the mind. Why do we suffer? Our suffering is due to false identification with the temporary body. We are not these bodies. We are eternal spirit souls fully blissful in nature. The body, on the other hand, is bound for suffering under the influence of the laws of material nature. So as soon as we foolishly think, "I am this body," we cast ourselves into a suffering situation that is incompatible with our actual nature and identity. When the eternal, all-knowing, and all-blissful living being casts himself into temporality, ignorance, and misery the resultant situation is bound to be intolerably dissatisfying. How does this false identification with matter take place? The spirit-soul originally exists with Krishna or God in a pure loving relationship in the spiritual world. But if he misuses his free will and becomes envious of the Lord wanting to compete with Him for supremacy, he is allowed entrance into this material world where he can aggressively compete with so many other imitation "gods" who share the same envious mentality. Such an awkward, untoward living condition is for convincing the soul to regain his original position of loving service to the Supreme Lord in the Spiritual Sky. Once we understand why we are suffering we can then undertake the proper remedial measures for reviving our dormant enlightened consciousness. This process of becoming enlightened is the sum and substance of our course. To come to the spiritual platform we need the mercy and guidance of someone who is already liberated. A drowning man cannot help a drowning man. It takes a man who is not drowning to rescue a man who is drowning. The person who is not drowning in this material existence is known as a bona fide spiritual master. By taking shelter of such a liberated soul we can quickly and easily regain our original, eternal, all-knowing, all-blissful nature. Therefore there is nothing more important than to find out such a qualified teacher. How will we find him? The good news is that the Lord within your heart knows your innermost yearnings perfectly well. When He sees that you are eager to become enlightened by a bona fide spiritual master, He will bring you into contact with one, so that the light of spiritual knowledge within your heart can become flipped on and you will for first time in millions of lifetimes see things as they actually are. Of course there is a qualification for such enlightenment. One must approach the spiritual master in complete humility, inquire from him submissively, and render service unto him. It's not that you can approach him as equal and argue with him. You must submit to his authority as a realized soul. If you will seriously adopt this prescribed method, what amazing revelations you will receive from him! By his mercy you will be awakened to your eternal spiritual identity as a servant of God and derive unlimited pleasure by serving God and by chanting and hearing the Lord's glories as much as possible 24 hours a day. You won't care a fig for ordinary entertainments such as cinemas, restaurants, sports, card games, or chess. You will be swimming in an unlimited ocean of nectar simply by fully absorbing yourself in Krishna Consciousness or God Consciousness.