Essays on the Gita - Track 601

Comment: Is it difficult to become impervious to physical suffering? About death, I know and now I have quite an indifferent attitude, but about physical suffering still I get very upset at times. My mother in law has been suffering since the last six-seven years So how does one overcome that?

You know, physical suffering is certainly the most pressing pain. Other pains are easier to come out as you rightly said by psychological treatment of our own consciousness. But physical pain is the most difficult thing and this will take time. We have to give time to overcoming this pain, and the more we are able to allow the higher force to penetrate into the body, our own body, but that is a very difficult task. First of all the body has to be kept in contact with the Divine more and more to allow the atmosphere to remain as peaceful as possible. That’s the first condition.

Although the life full of hustle and bustle and noise all around, we actually live in a marketplace all the time psychologically, therefore to allow the consciousness to remain as peaceful as possible, like here now for example. The peace of the Divine is quite great in this room, and to be in such a condition for a long time until the body itself begins to feel the presence, not only psychologically but the body itself, the vibrations in the body, the vibrations of peace and calm and silence and so on. The more this happens, the greater is the peace penetrating into us.

First the peace is the easier thing to have normally. Our first experiences of Divine are more or less those of peace and silence. But as you move forward, a positive gladness arises, and in every condition that gladness is sustained, more and more, there is an inner cheerfulness, under every circumstance that cheer remains, and then, there is a positive delight even, in every circumstance. If I am insulted I do not feel offended, I feel delighted; if I fail, I do not feel depressed, I feel delighted. Not that I welcome insult, not that I welcome failure, but my condition is such that I derive from it the real rasa and my consciousness perceives that something else has been worked out through this experiences.

  Mother once said, "Humiliation is the sure gate of glory." Normally, humiliation is something which people try to avoid, and they don't like it, but Mother said that if you really want real glory, not that you invite humiliation, but if it occurs, then it can open up in your life a gate of glory. So if you realise this not only intellectually but in your state of presence of the Divine, because when Divine is present all around, it is always the invasion of Satchidananda around you.

Now, the more you live in this condition the more you remain free from suffering, even if it is suffering of somebody else, and the more you can help the suffering individual to receive a similar peace and delight. In fact this is the best way of helping others. Normally we console people by words, by remaining together and so on. It is also all right, but that is not the effective method. The effective method is if we can carry within ourselves that vibration of peace and delight, and then even if you are with somebody for a short time, you can impart it more easily and that gives a great strength to the suffering individual. So the more we live in a state of peace and delight, the more we carry with us, the more we are able to help the others.

Question: When a person who takes the humiliation I tend to feel very sad for that person also, maybe if I am the object of humiliation but the person who is inflicted it I feel very sad.

Answer: That is good. That is a great sympathy which is good. As I said, it is not that we invite sorrow, it is not that we invite defeat, it is not that we invite humiliation, but if it happens because of circumstances and by the various situations in which one is placed, then these very things open up a gate, which otherwise would not opened at all. There is a secret meaning, as Mother said: "it is only in the night that the greatest secrets are revealed". That is a scheme in the world. So those people who feel, "Oh, my Lord, I am in darkness and I am in the night..." But then the whisper of God comes more readily when you are in the night! It doesn’t mean that during the day it does not come, but the scheme of the world is such that some of the most important things, some of the best things can occur when there is defeat, when there is insult, when there is humiliation, when there is a 'night'. The scheme of the world is such because you are going into the night it means that you have dared to enter into that very field where God has to manifest fully. So somebody should go to that plane, and you have dared, so naturally the Divine is closest and gives the best help at that time.

Question: But in ignorance, as you said or in the night or in defeat, in ignorance we aggravate the situation in a defeated circumstance?

Answer: You do. That is why we do not know how to take a defeat.

Question: But then that does not help you or elevate you in fact you are further degraded...

Answer:...because we take it wrongly, that is why. Just as success also leads to degradation if we become extremely proud in success, which is the wrong way of taking success. The whole point is that all experiences have to be taken in the right manner. You have to see the message involved.

Question: But for that the basic ignorance has to be tackled...

Answer: Not the basic ignorance. Ignorance is not something like one uniform piece, it is a kind of a gradation in the ignorance. If one is totally ignorant you are becoming insensitive, so there is no problem. In a total ignorance there is only insensitivity, so nothing happens, whether you succeed or fail, there is no difference. Even the experience of success or failure, even awareness of it means that your ignorance has slightly diminished. Now,  if you diminish it  further then you are able to deal with it properly. In fact actually if you see retrospectively all your failures, if you really measure it, you will find that all the failures were 'really' the doors to success, in retrospective if you rightly examine your life truly.