Connect To The Core 3

CONNECT TO THE CORE
By:
Satyendra Nath Dwivedi
“Let noble thoughts come to us from all sides.”

[Rig-Veda I-89-i]
Part 3
Pleasure seems to lie in the satisfaction of the natural impulse, and the good
requires the taming of the forces of nature. The good does not seem to be
pleasant. Morality implies a wrestling with the lower tendency, the pursuit of
which appears pleasant. When man struggles to free himself from his natural
entanglements, life becomes intense with strife. Suffering is the condition of
progress. Struggle is the law of existence and sacrifice the principle of evolution.
The more the struggle and the sacrifice, the greater are the joy and the freedom.
“Both ‘Shreya’ and ‘Preya’ approach man; the ‘Dhira’ (wise man) examining the
two (well), discriminate between them. The wise man verily prefers ‘Shreya’ to
‘Preya’; but the foolish man chooses ‘Preya’ through love of gain and
attachment.” [Katha Upanishad 1.2.2]
According to the principle of ‘Karma’ there is nothing uncertain or capricious in

the moral world. We reap what we sow. The good seed brings a harvest of good,
the evil of evil.
Man can have the highest freedom only when he becomes one with God.
Becoming one with God is the attainment of the highest freedom. The more we
live in the presence of God, the more we assert the rights of spirit, the more free
we are; the more we lose our grip on the whole we belong, the more selfish we
are, the more is our bondage to ‘Karma’.
There is no doctrine that is as valuable in life and conduct as the ‘Karma theory’.
Whatever happens to us in this life we have to submit in meek resignation, for it
is the result of our past doings. Yet the future is in our power, and we can work
with hope and confidence. Karma inspires hope for the future and resignation to
the past. It makes men feel that the things of the world, its fortunes and failures,
do not touch the dignity of the Soul. Virtue alone is good, not rank, not riches, not
race or nationality. Nothing but goodness is good.
Life’s problems are not to be avoided; they have to be faced. It is not escapism
that is taught in the Upanishads, but acceptance, the coming of grips with life,
meeting the challenge of life with the challenge of philosophy, with the strength of
spirituality. The greatest strength comes from the knowledge of the Atman, our
Divine nature, says the Kena Upanishad [2.4]:
“Strength comes from (the knowledge of) Atman.”

The Upanishads tell man that he is not finite; that he is not limited, truncated
thing he considers himself to be. He seems to be limited because he is viewed,
or he views himself through the limitations of the body and the senses. In his
essential nature, however, he is Pure Being, Pure Consciousness, and Pure
Bliss – “Sat-Chit-Ananda”.
Man is his own greatest mystery. He does not understand the vast veiled
universe into which he has been cast for the reason that he does not understand
himself. Least of all does he understand his noblest and most mysterious faculty,
the ability to ‘transcend himself’ in the act of perception.
Pleasure and pain are incidental to physical existence; the animals function only
on that plane, but man has the capacity and privilege to transcend it and achieve
intellectual knowledge, moral elevation, aesthetic delight and spiritual perfection.
“No books, no scriptures, no science can ever imagine the glory of the Self that
appears as man, the most glorious God that ever was, the only God that ever
existed.”
- Swami Vivekananda
“The ‘Dhira’ (wise man) relinquishes both joy and sorrow when he realizes,
through meditation on the inner Self, that ancient effulgent One, hard to be seen,
profound, hidden in experience, established in the cavity of the heart, and
residing within the body.” [Katha Upanishad 1.2.12]
When the Indian sages realized the Absolute and the unconditioned in the unity
of Brahman and Atman, they felt the need for an adequate symbol to
communicate so incommunicable a truth. In their search, they came across the
symbol ‘Om’, which as the Taittiriya Upanishad [1.8] informs us, had already
established its usefulness for the communication of particular moods and ideas.
“The Atman, smaller than the atom and greater than the cosmos, is (ever)
present in the heart of this creature. One who is free from (the thralldom of)
desire realizes the glory of the Atman through purity and transparency of the
senses and the mind, and (thereby becomes) free from grief.” [Katha Upanishad
1.2.20]
The Upanishads say that the Atman cannot be attained through a mere study of
them.
“This Atman cannot be obtained by study of the scriptures, nor by sharp intellect,
nor by much hearing; by him is It attained whom It chooses – to him this Atman
reveals Its own (true) form.” [Katha Upanishad 1.2.23]
Life is a journey to fulfillment. The attainment of fulfillment, however, will depend

upon the path that man takes. The path of profit and pleasure, earthly or
heavenly, the way of ‘Preyas’ can never lead to true fulfillment, though involving
much action and capable of yielding gross refined sensate satisfaction, it is
repetitive but not creative; it tends only to increase of tension, sorrow and fear.
The path of knowledge and illumination, the way of ‘Shreyas’ on the other hand,
offers the supreme opportunity to man. Guided by discrimination and
detachment, life forges ahead in this path to achieve fulfillment and character.
The Kath Upanishad gives beautiful chariot imagery:
“Know the Atman as the master within the chariot, and the body, verily as the
chariot; know the buddhi (intelligence) as the charioteer, and the manas
(insipient mind), verily as reins; the sense-organs, they say, are the horses, and
the roads for them are the sense-objects. The wise call Him (the Atman) the
enjoyer of the experience (when He is) united with the body, senses, and mind.”
[Kathopanishad 1.3.3; 4]
“He who is possessed of right understanding with the manas always disciplined,
his senses become controlled like the good (controlled) horses of a charioteer.
He who is possessed of right understanding, with manas held and ever pure,
reaches that goal whence there is no birth (return to worldliness) again.”
[Kathopanishad 1.3.6; 8]
Life’s journey, to be successful, needs the contribution of all constituents
of the personality: the body, the senses, the manas, the buddhi, and the
Self. The most important thing is to ensure that the initiative and control
pass from the senses to the buddhi through the manas. This cannot
happen unless the buddhi and the manas are trained and disciplined into
their true forms. The true form of manas is its pure state when it is aligned
with buddhi, and ceases to be a mere appendage of the senses; then alone
it can stand the stress and strain in its unique situation, namely, between
the two powerful and initially opposite forces of the senses and the buddhi.
When the buddhi dominates the journey, life rises to the steady ethical levels,
tastes true freedom and delight, and achieves fulfillment in universality through
spiritual illumination.
“He who has ‘vijnana’, buddhi, or Reason, for his charioteer and a (disciplined)
manas as the reins – he verily attains the end of the journey, that supreme state
of Vishnu.” [Kathopanishad 1.3.9]
[To be continued]
Satyendra Nath Dwivedi

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CONNECT TO THE CORE

Satyendra Nath Dwivedi

“Let noble thoughts come to us from all sides.”

According to the principle of ‘Karma’ there is nothing uncertain or capricious in

“Strength comes from (the knowledge of) Atman.”

Life is a journey to fulfillment. The attainment of fulfillment, however, will depend

The Kath Upanishad gives beautiful chariot imagery:

Satyendra Nath Dwivedi

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