Practical Psychology and Life Journey -1-

By Sri NV Raghuram
Conference at NIMHANS
September / 2008

*Paper abstract*
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*In case of all the species in the creation, other than human being, their activities are all pre programmed the life is a simple journey ‘from womb to tomb’ and they never think about why do they have to live. But for a human being life is a very complex process.*
*Various spiritual and religious leaders tried to give some answers or the others which may be convincing for some people and for some others the question is always a puzzle as to why do we live or what is the purpose of life. Some said the living is in accordance with divine grace or purpose of life is to seek the pleasure of ‘Allah’ or to maintain a moral life etc. *
*Sanatana dharma which is often known as Hindu philosophy, whose essence is given in Bhagavad-Gita, gives a four fold path called Purushartha, where in dharma forms an important step. Arjuna’s problem though appears to be about war it is not just so and there is fundamentally a spiritual dimension to it which is connected with the purpose of life and living. *
*Krishna by his explanations slowly steers Arjuna into understanding life and its purpose from this spiritual dimension, thus removes the psychological barrier, there is no need for giving Arjuna a simple ‘moral code of conduct’ which is explaining that this is good and this is evil!*
*Arjuna is a fundamentally a person who practiced goodness all his life. But surprisingly he has the suffering in the battle field as against the wicked king Duryodhana who never did any right thing through out his life and here also he is happily standing there to fight war, where as Arjuna developed the confusion. Sri Krishna raises his perception to higher dimension of life and takes him to the purpose of life. *
*Krishna manages this with such profound logic and takes away his confusion and through Gita teachings shows a higher purpose and dimension to the life. *
*Good and bad, right and wrong, success and failure, birth and death, and etc are all in the region of normal transactions in life like the day and night. There is a higher realm of transaction available for us where we go beyond the pair of opposites. That is a state which is fee from all tensions confusions. When we go beyond these pairs of opposites final point is where even the birth and death do not disturb us. That state which is not affected by happiness or sorrow is the state of inner peace and harmony. *
*Modern psychology is trying to make a sick person to come to normal level. According to Gita if we can motivate a normal man into higher dimension of life then there wall be a chance for him to go beyond so that the chances of falling in to the trap of mental sickness can be totally eliminated! This is the practical psychology according to the Gita. This state which is beyond the pairs of opposite is given several names like gunateeta which is beyond three gunas namely sattva, rajas and tamas, purushottama which is beyond prakruti and purusha, and as Naishkarma siddhi in the language karma. *
*According to Gita we can not have one and leave other as they are pairs of opposite like in a magnet we can not have only south pole or north pole or in the nature only day or only night. We can rise above the influence of the pairs of opposite. Those who are beyond pairs of opposite can handle the disturbances more efficiently. Recommendations of Krishna is to consciously practice good in the manifest world and deep inside go beyond both pairs of opposites. This is the spiritual journey and yogic psychology.*

- to be continued...