Transcending Desire

Going beyond the grasping of the ego

“That which is seemingly many; that which postulates separateness; that One is One alone. Even maya, the dream, emerges from unity. Do not be beguiled by this illusion of separateness, which gives rise to desire and attachment. For the reality is not this. When you open the eyes of the heart, all is experienced as love. Why? Because the nature of this creation is love. When you realise you too are the same love, then nothing can sway you into thinking that you are separate from love.” Sri Sathya Sai Baba – inner message

What is and what is not is irrelevant. It is who you are that is central to life. Move into a stage where you see life happening, but you have no investment in what happens. You are the One who sees not the One who does. – Satyavan

Sharing from pilgrims on the path

More insights from the study described in the May newsletter

Early on the journey to Self-realisation, we become more and more aware of the nature of their own desires, and realise that the goal of peace and happiness cannot come from obtaining the objects of the world, the attainment of desires only gives fleeting pleasure and that no matter how many objects are possessed, the desire for more objects continues:

Attachments to worldly possessions and sensual pleasures trapped me and prevented me from finding true freedom in life. The more I freed myself from ego, desires and expectations, the closer I came to happiness, joy, love and peace.” Sara Pavan- Puttaparthi

“I was fulfilling one desire, another was coming. I was a fool that was searching for the happiness where it is not. Sense pleasure only gave me a glimpse that there is happiness, and I learnt to cut off my desires and search happiness out in the proper place – within.” Lalita Ma

“The more we have the more we want. People always think that if they attain something, whether it’s more money, a better job, a good husband, then they will be happy. But it never works like that. Happiness and peace are not found in acquisition, but rather in renunciation of our attachment. We have been hypnotized to believe that the key to life lies in attainment of material possessions, professional success, external achievement, and status and sensual pleasures. We have been deluded, deceived and blinded by the power of Maya, cosmic illusion.”- Swami Chidanand

Sadhvi Bhagavati, a woman swami from Parmeth Niketan in Rishikesh was originally from a traditional upper-class American family, with an apparent destiny to become a paediatric neuropsychologist. She returned to America deeply impressed by the happiness she had gained from her spiritual connection during a trip to India. She subsequently conducted her own unofficial happiness survey and questioned many American associates who had attained the peak of their various professions. Without exception, the response to the question “Are you happy?” was “I’ll be happy when … ”. They all saw happiness as something that would come in the future, perhaps when the new house was completed, or a son graduated and found a good job. It was this realisation of the limited value of worldly objects that inspired her to return to India for a simple life of service, and to eventually take vows as a swami. She has remained there fulfilling these vows for the last thirty years:

“I knew I had found something I was not even looking for. I knew I had been handed a gift more precious than all the diamonds in the world. I knew it was not a gift to refuse. I said, 'I will not leave, I am happier here, more at peace here, more full of joy and meaning here than I ever even imagined was possible.’”

Nani Ma a young English woman who went to India in the 1970s as a teenager and who now runs her own ashram as a swami, shares her early experiences on the yogic path:

“I realized the futility of everything: dances, parties and boys. I found no satisfaction in it. I was looking like everybody else for answers where they weren’t any. I could never get enough because I was never satisfied. Even if I got some happiness, the next day it wasn’t there anymore. There was a gradual growth of lack of interest in the world. I’d experienced the pain of the world, but it never occurred to me that one could get out of the pain … or that there was any answer anywhere else. It was just that, ‘no, I have to get a better boyfriend and more money’. But I started to realize deeply more and more each time that there wasn’t any answer there. There wasn’t any joy there, and the joy that was coming from spiritual study and from meditation and from clarity inside, that joy was incomparable. Nothing, none of the happinesses could compare with the happiness that’s coming just from the pure life.”

On the path we all learn to identify the need to transcend desire and attachment, and the reactivity and bad habits which tend to follow in their wake. There is a need to exercise restraint over the baser instincts by overcoming greed, lust and anger. Often this takes a lot of practice!

During our periods in the Himalayas, Swami Anand, living a life of renunciation in his simple cave abode in the high mountains, is determined to teach all who visit him, how desire and attachment lead to mental dis-ease and unhappiness, and how inner happiness and peace arise when desire is understood and controlled.

“One journey is external and one is within. The more we take a path or journey external, the more we become unhappy and disturbed. And the more we take the journey from external to internal, then happiness will start revealing itself.” -Swami Anand

The Last Desire

In 2000 Phil and I were inspired to undertake a mystical pilgrimage to a special cave above Badrinath, the Gufa Narayan Cave. I was certain if I too reached this cave I would become enlightened, as had the twelve sadhakas described in the book ‘Nara Naranayana Gufa.’ At that time the desire to realise God, was the driving force in my life.

After much preparation and a laborious search for a guide and porters in Badrinath we set off. Unfortunately, the guide did not know the way, and relying on obstruse directions from shepherds we found our selves close to the top of Urvashi Mountain, at nearly 20,000 ft, and no way to proceed without mountaineering equipment, with Phil having almost died from altitude sickness and myself suffering the most violent headaches I had ever encountered. After much arguing between the guide and the porters (in Hindi) we descended, and the porters fled. The guide told us to wait for three days in a cave above Badrinath and he would come back with new porters and assured us he now felt confident of the route.

We set up camp in a small damp cave and waited. On the third night we emerged to a golden dazzling light over lighting the whole area. In the centre of this almost blinding light, Babaji appeared. He turned and began to instruct me. He asked me to give up attachment to seven things. He said, “You must give up attachment, to husband, children, home, work, clothes, and body.” As he went through these all, I was mentally ticking them off as no problem. Finally, he said I must give up attachment to realising God Itself!

For me this was completely unthinkable.

Did not the scriptures tell us that the desire for God was essential to succeed on the spiritual path? Surely if I gave up this impulse, this desire, I would just fall back into a materialistic life and stagnate? I lay awake the whole night, still with a pounding headache, going over and over such arguments.
The guide did not return, and later we slowly made our way back to Badrinath, and I retired to our room, crying and crying, because I hadn’t reached God and now it did not seem likely. A Swami who lived in a nearby kutir came to find out what all the crying as about. Helpless, all Phil could say was “She is just crying for God”. At this time, this was just not a desire I could even begin to consider giving up!

It is not until now, many years later that I realise that Babaji did not ask me to relinquish all desires at once! Rather it is a progressive process. The ultimate desire is always to merge with the One. It has to be given up in the end because it is still a product of the mind. True freedom means freedom from all desire including that one.

When the mind is holding us by a thread, and that thread is the desire for liberation, it will keep us from that which we seek. Therefore, this last thread will have to be cut.

What is the knife that can cut it? It is the Buddhi, which can recognise this desire as still being a barrier. So, it is important that all of us on the spiritual journey develop a keen sense of discrimination. We need to leave aside that which is temporary and only seek that which is permanent.

In the end the seeking has to be let go of in the true act of surrender to the One that we truly are. When we lose all seeking, we remain as the One. May we all have the courage and discrimination to find true freedom through the gradual relinquishment of all desire. – Savitri

To enter the dream and accept it as the only Truth, is maya. To enter the dream and see it for what it us is realisation. To be the dreamer and the dream yet not be attached to any of those roles is true awakening - Satyavan

Bhagavad Gita

Shiva burns Kama

This classical Indian story invokes many images and brings forth many lessons.

The story goes that Sati (Shiva’s wife) was so insulted that her father Daksha had not invited her husband Shiva to a yajna (sacrificial fire ritual) that Daksha was celebrating, that Sati invoked her inner fire and turned herself to ash. At first Shiva was enraged and went on a path of destruction.

After some time Shiva’s anger cooled and he became completely dispassionate. He retreated to Mount Kailash and went into deep meditation on the snowy slopes. Shiva is the one who dissolves creation, just as Brahma creates, and Vishnu preserves. Shiva’s withdrawing imbalanced the universe and the devas (demigods) were worried about the fate of creation. Indra (the ruler of devas, hatched a plan. He approached Himavan (the ruler of the Himalayas to ask his daughter Parvati to go to Shiva and entice him back to his role, as well as offer to be Shiva’s consort. Parvati was totally willing, as she felt in her heart that Shiva was the one for her.

Parvati made her way to Mount Kailash and, seeing Shiva sitting, immobile and absorbed, began to dance. Her dance was the dance of the spheres, full of wonder and enticement. However, Shive was unmoved, totally and utterly in deep union with the unmanifest Brahman – pure consciousness. Try as she might Parvati could not arouse Shiva.

Indra was mortified but, being full of plots, hatched a cunning addition to the scene. He sent Kamadeva (the deity of desire or lust) to Kailash with instructions to entice Shiva out of His deep contemplation. Kama duly set off for Kailash over the mountain trails. Arriving at the scene, finding Parvati in despair, he whispered in her ear, “Don’t worry. I will make Shiva desire you. Dance your most beguiling dance and I will let my arrow fly.”

Parvati began dancing. It was the dance of the yearning of all creation for the love of Shiva. It was the dance of all creation in its majesty and beauty. Kama then fired an arrow of desire straight into the heart of Shiva. The ripple of desire that crossed Shiva’s heart awoke Him from the trance. Seeing Parvati desire arose spontaneously from His cosmic heart. He was enamoured of Parvati. However, in that instant the buddhi, the wisdom voice, told Shiva that he had been tricked. Anger quickly rose up and, with a searing flame that emerged from Shiva’s third eye, He burnt Kama to ashes. Shiva then took those ashes and made drew three stripes across His forehead.

Shiva then turned to Parvati. He was taken by her purity of intention, her persistence that she was to be his partner and her deep love for the ascetic Lord. He realised that His withdrawal had significant consequences for creation and Shiva consented to be her husband. Thus was the universe saved.

This story, whilst interesting in itself, is symbolic of the process of transcending desire. We go through life encountering many challenges. Events in life can fuel our anger. So it was with Shiva. He lost his wife and was enraged. But, because Shiva was wise and realised that his anger was powerfully destructive, He mastered it and withdrew. At times we also wish to withdraw from this world, to enfold ourselves in silence. But life has a way of intervening as the delight of the world draws us back in. Parvati was sent to remind Shiva of His duty, and to balance His immersion in pure awareness with the actions required within creation.

The tool for this process was Kamadeva – desire. We cannot escape desire, but we do not need to be bound by it. Shiva destroyed Kamadeva and burnt him to ash (the end result of the reduction of matter), but He also accepted Parvati as his consort. He wore the ash on His forehead as a sign of transcending desire, but performed His duty by bonding with Parvati.

Desire can be transcended, but that does not mean it is completely destroyed – it plays its part in the maintenance of creation, the dance of life.

The Heart of Wisdom

“The Heart of wisdom is the seeing true of all that has no substance other than that which has been conjured out of desire. For desire arises when there is a dual outlook. But when the eye becomes singular, all else falls away into the illusion that it always was. See true, with wisdom’s eye oh beloved ones, and the Heart will enfold all – the joy and the sorrow, the dark and the light, the despair and the ecstasy, as the play of the One among the many.”

Sri Sathya Sai Baba – inner message