Rely on the Heart rather than the head!

Looking at the picture of an apple in picture book, the child learns about the apple. But a real apple alone will give the actual experience to the child. When the apple is cut and fed to the child, it will enjoy its taste! For considerable part of life, man looks at the picture books of the world and learns about many things. But he lacks the experiences. Here I remember the proverb, “an ounce of cow’s milk is far superior to barrels of donkey’s milk. Hence everyone on earth must experience actually what they learn through the books.

This is more vital in spiritual domain. Reading many books on meditations, one cannot meditate. He has to sit in a quiet corner of a room, on a plank around 4” high, sitting cross legged and concentrate on some syllable like “OM”. This is just a posture. Real problems arise only from here. When one tries to meditate, all thoughts rush in the mind at once, forcing him to leave the task. Yes, the mind will survive only in the past and future but not in the “Present”. Meditation is to bring the mind to the Present state! A fly will sit both on the sweets and offal but it won’t go near the fire. Meditation is like the ‘fireplace’ for the mind. How can you bring it there? In fact, meditation is ‘anathema’ to the mind.

Real meditation is going beyond the mind! You have to disembark the mind and thoughts from your conscious, once you pursue real meditation! Sri Ramana Maharishi of South India has clarified more on this. He says that the external world and all experiences one gather are mischievous manifestations of the illusory mind which can be termed as “Maya”, the great illusionist or magician. We have seen magicians effortlessly take a rabbit and many things from an empty hat. Children and even elders enjoy magic shows. It is a clever sleight of hand. Only another magician knows the trick and not the audience! The mind too is very clever magician who makes us to believe in the phenomenal world with the connivance of the senses. We perceive the world through the senses and sense organs. They aid the mind in projecting a nonexistent thing as real.

Now, the real question is what to take and which one to discard? All mental processes start from the head and they are to be ignored if one wants to pursue spirituality. He should consider what the ‘heart’ prompts him and not what the head dictates. There is always conflict between the head and heart. Head represents material sphere while heart represents spiritual Self. But, most of the people in the world deny due importance to the heart and follow what the head dictates. The mind is a mad monkey that too in an inebriated state. How can we rely on those flimsy instruments which let the individual down every time?

All the human virtues emanate only from the heart and not from the head. The head belongs to secular life and the heart is the core for spiritual life. Hence we must use our discrimination in selecting the correct choice in our life. The majority of people in the world relies on their head (mind) and led their life, devoting their entire energy in earning wealth and properties, gathering relationships and in this process they bind themselves inexorably to the mundane life. It is evident from our own experiences that the external world or persons can never give us everlasting happiness! The pleasures derived through the senses are feeble and fleeting like the lightening in the sky! Also, thunder accompanies every such lightening. Hence we cannot avoid the resultant grief altogether.

Life is a coin which contains the two faces. None can get one sided coin. When you accept ‘pleasure’, you invariably invite the ‘pain’ that accompanies!

Most of the married couple in the world can vouch this experience. Initially, marital life seems paradise! Within a few days, all differences comes to the fore vitiating the harmony enjoyed thus far. Hence, all experiences of the world are a mixture of pleasure and pain. Mothers knew it well. They undergo lot of pain and discomforts during delivery which is even life threatening. Once they see the face of the baby, all their pain vanishes in thrice. Hence never consider the human life as a means of enjoying the pleasures of the world. Every rose contains thorns!