Get Freed from the Service to the Mind

Please accept our humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada and Srila Gurudeva. The recent mail from H.G Kalacakra Krishna das and H G Sudarshana devi dasi ,’Anger is Danger’ is a really an enlightening one. Anger is the reflection of unsettled mind and below is a nice story which teaches us about the nature of our disturbed and uncontrolled mind. Once Buddha was walking from one town to another town with a few of his followers. This was in the initial days. While they were travelling, they happened to pass a lake. They stopped there and Buddha told one of his disciples, "I am thirsty. Do get me some water from that lake there."

The disciple walked up to the lake. When he reached it, he noticed that right at that moment, a bullock cart started crossing through the lake. As a result, the water became very muddy, very turbid. The disciple thought, "How can I give this muddy water to the Buddha to drink!" So he came back and told Buddha, "The water in there is very muddy. I don't think it is fit to drink." After about half an hour, again Buddha asked the same disciple to go back to the lake and get him some water to drink. The disciple obediently went back to the lake. This time too he found that the lake was muddy. He returned and told the Buddha the same thing. After some time, the Buddha once again asked the same disciple to return to the lake. The disciple reached the lake to find it absolutely clean and clear with pure water in it. The mud had settled down and the water above it looked fit to be had. So he collected some water in a pot` and brought it to Buddha.

Buddha looked at the water, and then he looked up at the disciple and said,"See what you did to make the water clean? You let it be.... and the mud settled down on its own - and you got clear water. Your mind is also like that! When it is disturbed, just let it be. Give it a little time. It will settle down on its own. You don't have to put in any effort to calm it down. It will happen. It is effortless."

The above story reminds us of a beautiful verse from Srimad Bhagavatam 5.11.17:

bhraatrvyam enam tad adabhra-viryam
upeksayaadhyedhitam apramattah
guror hares caranopaasanaastro
jahi vyalikam svayam aatma-mosham

"This uncontrolled mind is the greatest enemy of the living entity. If one neglects it or gives it a chance, it will grow more and more powerful and will become victorious. Although it is not factual, it is very strong. It covers the constitutional position of the soul. O King, please try to conquer this mind by the weapon of service to the lotus feet of the spiritual master and of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Do this with great care."

Here in this purport Srila Prabhupada explains that the easiest weapon to conquer our mind is to neglect the unwanted orders of our mind. The mind is always telling us to do this or that but we should be smart enough not to blindly obey the orders of our mind, therefore we should be very expert in disobeying the mind's orders. Indeed the mind should be trained to obey the orders of the soul.

The below verse from Srimad Bhagvad Gita 6.34 also very nicely explains the position of our disturbed mind :-

cancalam hi manah krishna / pramaathi balavad drdham
tasyaaham nigraham manye / vaayor iva su-dushkaram

"For the mind is restless, turbulent, obstinate and very strong, O Krsna, and to subdue it is, it seems to me, more difficult than controlling the wind."

The mind is so strong and obstinate that it sometimes overcomes the intelligence, although mind is supposed to be subservient to the intelligence. For a man in the practical world who has to fight so many opposing elements, it is certainly very difficult to control the mind.

We should hammer ourselves constantly to engage our mind and ourselves in devotional activities instead of materialistic mundane activities. As stated in the story, the muddy water is the mundane materialistic thoughts coming in our mind and getting disturbed totally. And we ourselves don’t know how we behave when we are totally disturbed. We are not the person who we are actually suppose to be, we get changed totally. We act totally reverse to our normal behaviour, which in result gives only unhappiness/moroseness to our self. And the clear water here is stated as clear as our thinking, if we give our mind sometime to settle down and think positively, then it will lead us towards devotional activities which gives us extreme pleasure and satisfaction to our mind.

It is not that one should obey the orders of the mind. Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura used to say that to control the mind one should beat it with shoes many times just after awakening and again before going to sleep. In this way one can control the mind.

Another bona fide process is to abide strictly by the orders of the spiritual master and engage in the Lord's service. Then the mind will be automatically controlled. When one receives the seed of devotional service by the mercy of the guru and Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, one's real life begins. If one abides by the orders of the spiritual master, by the grace of Krishna he is freed from service to the mind.

The easiest way to control the mind, as suggested by Lord Caitanya, is chanting "Hare Krsna," the great mantra for deliverance, in all humility. The method prescribed is sa vai manah krsna-padaravindayoh: one must engage one's mind fully in Krishna in order to keep themselves away from other material engagements which will only agitate the mind. We pray at the lotus feet of Krsna and our beloved Guru Maharaj to keep us and our minds always engaged in Krishna Consciousness which is only our ultimate goal.

Thank you very much.
Yours in service of Srila Prabhupada and Srila Gurudev,
Sarva Mangala devi dasi
Abu Dhabi.

Chant,

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna

Krishna Krishna

Hare Hare

Hare Rama Hare Rama

Rama Rama

Hare Hare

and be happy.