There was this boy in the school who was a “probable” in the school’s cricket team. One of his friends from the locality asked him – a fast bowler- as to who are the ones who bowl really fast in his class/school.
Ram and Lakshman, he said promptly, but added more seriously after reflection, that when he was “angry” he also bowled as fast!! This went on my mind when I asked myself the question as to what made me “want to write and write well”. And the answer came almost immediately; when I was in a blasphemous mood!
This led me to the thought process of finding out whether there is any co-relation between the two, and a vague conclusion emerged. Both the “anger” of the boy, and my “blasphemous mood” represented “prarabda” and the effort to overcome this was “free-will”.
“Not bad” was my reaction to this emerging thought process, and I could hardly miss the point that the trigger to this was the cogitation over the “Geetha Sloka” which was the theme of my last piece in the blog. For some strange reason this sloka had been constantly on my mind from the time I read it; and even now, after weeks of mulling over and putting those thoughts to pen in the blog, there is still this constant feeling of “not-being-fully-satisfied” kind of emotions filling up my thoughts.
As I was mulling over, a kind of “samadhanam” struck me. Why not go deeper into this in a kind of Q&A to get to more easily understood meanings for these terms by leading me to that satisfactory phrase of modernists – the root cause- of my agitated mind? Again my reaction was: “not a bad idea”.
It was then that I decided to go ahead, with the intent of blogging them later, and quite unmindful of whether others will be in a similar frame of mind to read it (Blasphemous mood in as much as I am second guessing others responses?). Here I go regardless:
Q: What is the cause for “agitation of mind”?
A; It’s the desire for peace/happiness.
Q. How does “desire” spring forth in our minds?
A. When you “relate” to something, there is “attachment”. This attachment then turns into “desires”.
Q. If this is so simple why does the mind remain agitated ever chasing that elusive “peace & Happiness”. ?
A. Most of our “desire” and “attachment” have connection with our physical body (and confined to the realm of the gross material world). Since neither the physical body, nor the Gross manifest World are permanent, as one life-cycle is not adequate to fulfill our never ending desires, we take repeated births to experience the outcomes, as a kind of cause-effect paradigm. Non-fulfillment of desires within the current life cycle it-self is the main cause for uneasy minds.
Q. What is this cause-effect paradigm called?
A. This birth-death-rebirth cycle, is beginning-less. To put it differently and in more easily understandable terms, it starts with “creation” which is Maya subservient. This seemingly ends with “prarlayam” but only just. It restarts all over again based on “memory” with another cycle of “creation, sustenance, samharam”.
Like the famous riddle “chicken or egg which came first” this phenomenon’s beginning is not determine-able. So it is beginning-less for the believers. Hence “prarabda”-- meaning that something which has no beginning and has begun -- is the term given to this perpetual cause-effect paradigm. (Note: See Vichu Sutras –Label in blog)
To sum up therefore, Attachment/Desire is the cause, and “janma”, is the effect. Together this cause-effect paradigm is known as “prarabda”, a beginning-less and already begun bondage as it were.
And our effort(s) to overcome/ free ourselves from this bondage is “Free-Will”.
So far so good; but to continue
Q. When this Desire/Janma cycle of “Prarabda” under the influence of “maya- the illusion” gobbles up every such free-will effort into its realm like a black hole, how does one escape this treacherous “pull”?
A. The manifest world is “secular”, and impermanent. So the key is to constantly remind ourselves to remember this, and tell ourselves that that we should try not to relate with it. Once we understand this, avoiding temptations of attachment and desire, is the next step. To be able to practice this and to finally escape this pull, is to attain “mukthi” (“be free”).
Q. How does one do this to get “mukhthi”?
A. By understanding that the so called “Free Will” is not adequately strong enough to resist these temptations, and to allow it to be subsumed into Gods Will. So the key is to get rid of all traces of “ego” and in all humility surrender unto Him to guide your free will towards “release” from this pull/bondage. There is a better and more apt word for this “God’s Will/ Guidance; it is called Grace.
Q. Arguably there is no difference between one’s free will & His Will in that ultimate stage where “you, he, I” do not have any separate existence. And regardless of whether it’s a Ravan, a Duryodhan, or a Vibheeshan or a Yudhister, every action/every will is His and therefore where is this dichotomy between our free-will and a separate His will?
A. There is absolutely no gainsaying the fact that this is the ultimate truth/reality. But this is only for one who has realized that the whole cycle of Prarabda is just a drama/reality show for His amusement. Indeed, only after abandonment of all that is secular one is able to get to that transcendental stage. The piece “Thyagena ekay amruta twama nasuh” from Upanishads is a “pramaanam” (testimony/evidence) to this. .
And by the way it is only in the Upanishads, where there is this elaborate discourse about the “oneness with God” kind of profound truisms and comes at the very end of “vedas” and thus go by the name “vedaanta” (meaning the final portion of Veda). Vedas are about karma and acquisition of knowledge.
And the most interesting point is that this “abandonment” is not a conscious act; There is this prayer to Lord Rudra; “like the cucumber fruit when is ripe, it just separates itself from the stem, O’ Lord I pray for my release”……..Similarly when you are ripe, you are delivered, and the secular is abandoned. It is at that stage whens you get “mukthi” or you are delivered, the dichotomy perishes.
Till then for all the rest it is prarabda driven perpetual cycle albeit with the crucially important rider that one has the free-will to exercise through His grace, and be rid of this bondage.
The following (a) text from scriptures, and (b) a more profound meaning of “liberation”, would amplify/bring in more depth to these observations:
(a) “All affairs cease once prarabda wanes/decays. So long as “P” remains, no amount of cogitation/ meditation will help one rid of his affairs”. (the samskrit word used is Vyavahaaram which translates to Affairs of current life cycle): From Panchadasi.
(b) “Out of free-will one chooses to be in “bondage”, Release from this bondage is “mukthi”- Liberation- (Definition of “mukthi” from different sources: Dictionary, Gita etc).
“The more you know the less you understand” is a Chinese saying. While I am not able to be completely awed with this great adage, if the term “know” used here pertains to “storehouse of information” this adage acquires depth. And this implied meaning renders itself aptly to sum up the paradigm of cause and effect.
To be in tune with the subject of this essay, knowledge in this context would be “prarabda”. Free-will is our exercise to transcend to a liberated understanding & experiencing stage in “mukthi”.
It is one thing to know and quite another to understand and get “mukthi” in an environment where (a) individual greed drives success in the market, (b) Gods Will is replaced by the free-will of the rich and powerful, (c) there is ubiquitous pain/hunger, sufferings (d) there is erosion of self-respect, (e) information is mistaken for knowledge, (f) sophists/devils advocates take over from seers / angels etc. such truisms will only invite derision and ridicule. To try and relate these to our vyavaharams to find succor to agitated minds would require further meditation and His immense Grace.
If I attempt it here (a) it would stretch this essay to more boring levels, and (b) it would very likely border on blasphemy. Remember my regret that only “blasphemous mood” seems to provide me the trigger to start any essay? I would want to overcome that “prarabda” with my “free-will” for a change, and not do this at least now.
The desire to blog a second part to this as a sequel does not however go away as I feel that all my quests to find a meaning to my existence will be a waste if I am unable to relate these truisms to my day-to-day affairs and have a hope for redemption. That could however wait and I will end this piece with an anecdotal piece of humor. :
Q from a rich friend: I have a 4 bed bungalow, a Chauffeur driven car, my doting parents and wife and children. What do you have?
A (Mine) : I have “prarabdam”………
Ekalavya alias Vichu
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