Progress from desiring mind to the desire-less soul.
Four basic
emotions can be termed as: Fear (भय). Anger (क्रोध), courage (धैर्य), Peace (शांती).
Normally we
observe that anybody acquires fear and Anger in life naturally. You don't need
any training / guidance to be equipped with these emotions. To have the virtues
of Courage and Peace, normally, one has to do deliberate efforts. There are
very few individuals who have the virtues of Courage and/or peace in-born.
Why?
In order to
know the answer we have to turn to the process of evolution as explained by S.
V. (also refer to EARLIER ARTICLES ON EVOLUTION click here for the first article)
We shall see
the views expressed by Swami Vijnananand when he guided the young seekers of
Manashakti in 1990 on the desired direction of the research needed to find
the truth behind the process of evolution. The book in Marathi “आपण असे का वागतो” (Why we behave like this?) gives
his message. Here are some excerpts from chapter four of this book.
We have fear and anger engraved.
Why did fear
and anger are engraved in human mind? How are they related to evolution?
Basically, why should we have a desire to have this body (to take birth, to come to the stage of
being)?
In the
course of evolution, we came to this stage (human body) after wearing a variety
of bodies (starting from amoeba to chimpanzee and several past human
incarnations) in the past. We progressed to the human body by the route of
evolution.
Sex is the
original emotion. But fear and anger are also parts of human nature. Unless
they were having a contribution in the evolution, fear and anger would have
never come trekking along with the living being. They survived only because
they were basically needed. Even rage is a tool of evolution.
How is rage
related for the survival of the fittest? The one who was mighty, survived.
Nature itself has the rule - might is right. Then to be powerful than others,
rage is required. We started to get revolutionized
because of fear, to overcome the instinct of fear.
What is evolution?
The
transformation which took place in the living organisms is the evolution.
Darwin has stated that the meeting with Nature is proved by fight. The minute
scripts or the portions of evolution should be understood well. They should be
studied in deep.
Desire
leads to Efforts.
Efforts in turn lead to Victory or Defeat – this is the way the chain of
development takes shape. So-called evolution is depending on desire.
In that
chain, we used fear and anger as protective armors in the beginning. But they
become harmful later as other feelings and shades of nature got mixed in.
How anger
got associated with evolution.
The
perspective in evolution being ‘survival of the fittest’, human beings had to
struggle for living. This meant that they had to fight. In fear and anger, in
both the places a fight - latent and evident- was the only difference...
There is
basically a paradox (in life). It is there in laughter and tears, in fear and
anger, in functionary and sensory organs, and in the inborn nature and in the
one born out of experience… Though all of these are getting integrated, still,
if you try to find the root of all this, you will have to go only to the process
of evolution.
If you try
to explore to the minutest then it can be seen that as your forms of mind went
on playing with matter in the course of evolution, you went on taking one
incarnation after another – you will also find the root of that manifestation
of your nature, hidden somewhere in evolution. If that would be found in
evolution, then the question that you will have in mind is, - has that been
proved so far? We shall try to establish that link.
As you are
all the time surrounded by some emotion, you are doing some or the other action
using motion at every moment – you either utilize it in the right manner or the
wrong one. If utilized properly, then it gives good results, at least in the
material form. We call that as progress. When it has an ill effect we call that
as downfall. But do the effects of this motion linger on in our personality,
our body, our mind? You will have a question whether such a process really
exists in reality. Then yes, there is indeed such a process.
It has not
only happened in the present stage of the evolution but you have accumulated
various experiences in your entire journey of evolution. Utilizing these
experiences cumulatively, you were born. It is a truth that your nature was
carved out of this. At the same time to prove this truth, you have to prove one
more truth -- that, such a process exists in your life, it is in your anatomy,
and we will have to arrive at it again.
This way the
thread which leads us to evolution will be woven correctly, joining the
contemporary with the past history.
Emotions acquired later in journey of evolution.
The advanced
emotions of Courage and Peace were acquired much later in the process of
evolution. The primitive brain is the reptile brain. As the brain developed its structure, it later
acquired a limbic brain with a variety of advanced emotions. The brain also
developed in to a thinking brain to take decision from available options in a
given situation. The Neo-Cortex, which is relatively the most recent
development in the brain evolution, has the capacity of apperception (the
capacity to think on your own thoughts in terms of its merit).
In the
journey of evolution, the emotion also evolved. The emotions of Courage and
Peace are the relatively recent advancements. And that is why they are not
engraved in our mind in the deepest manner as the original emotions of Fear and
Anger are deep rooted. The same cycle of
brain development follows in the human life starting from one-cell conception
prenatal stage to the fully grown brain by the stage of youth.
If at the
moment of death if the mind is perfectly at peace, then it may travel to the
destination of Bliss. If it is not at peace and is rest-less surrounded by some
or the other desires, then logically it ought to opt for rebirth to fulfill the
left-over desires.
Comments:
The process of Epigenetics says that the behaviour at any moment in the life is the cumulative
effect of nature and nurture. The process starts at the stage of conception but
even the period of pre-conception can't be ruled out. Swami Vijnananand states
that the process started from the moment life started on the earth when mind
got associated with matter.
The desire
to associate of course is the property of mind.
The progress
from ‘fear’ to ‘no-fear’ (peace) stage is the progress from desiring mind to
the desire-less soul. And acquiring that state of mind should be the objective
of the human life. To the extent the life purpose is elevated, this objective
can be achieved.
The
intellect is the vital tool behind the purpose for the decisions taken at each
moment. Let us see the working of intellect in more details later.
Vijay R.
Joshi.
