19870627 Bhagavad-gītā Ch.17

The following is a class given by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami on June 27^th, 1987 in Hartsville, South Carolina, USA. The class begins with a reading from Bhagavad-gītā, chapter 17.

Jayapatākā Swami: In the Bhagavad-gītā, which is a basic text, which is more than 5000 years old, most of the basic teachings regarding how to be happy while living in this world, and how to go back, return to one’s original full spiritual position, are described in a simple manner in the Bhagavad-gītā. So, in the Bhagavad-gītā, it explains that we are a combination of body, mind and living force. Modern world is very nice. The only complaint we would have is that the body is given so much importance, but the mind and the spiritual level is often neglected, which in the long run creates more problems. Even for the body. So, life means that the body mind and the living force, all these aspects of life should be brought into a proper harmony. The living force is actually who we are. That is the real self, as described in the Vedas by the word ātmā - meaning the self, or the soul, or living force. For instance, the body goes through various changes: small baby, little child, a youth, adult, old age. In all these different changes, the body also changes. But the consciousness has a continuous link one still remembers the childhood. One feels that one is the same person, although the body is changed. The mind may even change, but the living force doesn’t change. So, in the Bhagavad-gītā (2.13) it explains:

dehino ’smin yathā dehe
kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā
tathā dehāntara-prāptir
dhīras tatra na muhyati

That just as the body is changed so many times, but the living force remains the same. Similarly, even when the body perishes, the living force continues to exist and simply goes to one body, enters into a womb at conception, and begins a new life. From an embryo, child on... fresh start. So, the living force is also described. Just as the sun is situated in the solar system. From one place the sun is radiating it’s energy throughout the universe. In that way the living force is situated in the vicinity of the heart, and the through the blood stream, the consciousness is radiated throughout the entire body. And if we do a simple experiment, we can see whether that is true or not. We could just cut off the circulation to one of the extremities of our body, and if by cutting off the blood, if after sometime we lose the sense of feeling, that will indicate that this is infact true. Of course everyone has experienced that. I don’t even have to go through the exercise. If we cut off the blood, our hand will go to sleep. Our leg will go to sleep. We will lose the sense of feeling. That means intrinsically the hand doesn’t have any sense of feeling if it is not connected with the blood. Who is feeling? It’s not the hand that is feeling, it’s the living force that is feeling! The hand is like an instrument. Just as we have microscopes and telescopes and so many different instruments for seeing. So this body has instruments for seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting and feeling. But all of them are receiving information and passing that on, through the brain, directly to the living force. Actually, the brain later on categorizes what’s actually happening. But we feel it directly from the living force. So, this living force is actually who we are. We are the living force. Sometimes people say, “I have a soul.” But according to Vedic Indian ancient vision, we are souls and we have a body. We are living force and we have a body.  I live in Eastern India, in Bengal, and there is very customary, when someone is greeting another person, they say “Āpnāra śarīra kemana āche? - How is your body? Is your body healthy?'' They don’t say, “How are you?”, because you are the ātmā. You are the living force. The living force is always good. But the body is sometimes healthy and sometimes sick. So they say, “How is your body?” This is a customary greeting. In the Bhagavad-gītā, our founder Bhaktivedanta Swami explains something about the living force.

Purport:  Since every living entity is an individual soul, each is changing his body every moment, manifesting sometimes as a child, sometimes as a youth and sometimes as an old man. Yet the same spirit soul is there and does not undergo any change. This individual soul finally changes the body at death and transmigrates to another body; and since it is sure to have another body in the next birth – either material or spiritual – there was no cause for lamentation by Arjuna on account of death, neither for Bhīṣma nor for Droṇa, for whom he was so much concerned.

Jayapātāka Swami: Any man who has perfect knowledge of the constitution of the individual soul, and nature, and the Supersoul, both material and spiritual is called a dhīra or a most sober man. Such a man is never deluded by the change of bodies. So we see that although the living force is in everybody, yet we see every individual is different. This is for two reasons. One is that every living force is different. It is an individual person. Another reason is because every individual person has their own fortune, their own destiny, and their own karmic history. They have their own desires, and because of all these various influences, they have developed a particular body. They have achieved a certain body. In this way they are living. Now there are various things which can affect our consciousness. Normally, our consciousness is not in a pure state. It’s coloured. Just as someone may be wearing yellow sunglasses, or they might be red glass or might even be blue. If you look through a yellow glass, everything looks yellow. If you look through red, everything will look red. If you look through a blue glass, things will look tinted blue. It’s very natural. So, similarly although the living force is one, different people will see different things because they have already different outlook based upon the type of association they have made in this world. So the Bhagavad-gītā explains that there are basically three types of consciousness. Goodness, passion and ignorance. And goodness is like yellow, passion is like red, ignorance is like blue. So, just like the primary colours if, you mix yellow, red and blue, you can get unlimited combinations of colour. Similarly, by different percentages of passion, ignorance, or goodness, you get different kinds of outlooks, personalities, people and so on. So if a person wants wisdom, if a person wants happiness, if a person wants peace of mind, then the mode of goodness helps with that. If a person is in the mode of passion, then it produces greed and anxiety. Passion gives some immediate happiness but subsequently gives suffering. And the mode of ignorance produces insanity, and laziness, and various types of irrationality and destructive tendency. So, food is also affected. If a person eats food which is in the mode of goodness, this is very healthy. If a person eats food that’s in the mode of passion, then that has a different effect. And if one eats food that is in the mode of ignorance, then that can produce even disease and illness. So, in this category vegetables, fruits, milk, grains, things which are juicy, which are fresh, which are these are foods in the mode of goodness.

(Bg.17.8):  Foods dear to those in the mode of goodness increase the duration of life, purify one's existence and give strength, health, happiness and satisfaction. Such foods are juicy, fatty, wholesome, and pleasing to the heart.

(Bg.17.9):  Foods that are too bitter, too sour, salty, hot, pungent, dry and burning are dear to those in the mode of passion. Such foods cause distress, misery, and disease.

(Bg.17.10):  Food prepared more than three hours before being eaten, food that is tasteless, decomposed and putrid, and food consisting of remnants and untouchable things is dear to those in the mode of darkness.

Jayapatākā Swami: It’s like if something is decomposed, rotten, scorn off, that can even cause typhoid or food poisoning. If something is too hot, too spicy, it’s very extreme in some way, that can cause other types of mild indigestion, discomfort. Basically, the foods mentioned here in the mode of goodness, those are the foods that we recommend people to regularly eat. Those food fall in the lacto-vegetarian category. Now in addition to simply eating those foods, it is also recommended that one can learn how to prepare the foods as a type of yogic meditation. Basically, to bring our consciousness up to the level of the living force, we require to bring the consciousness in touch with some spiritual contact. Just like we are chanting mantras. Mantra is a vibration which can deliver or liberate the mind and consciousness, which can uplift it to the spiritual platform. Mind is generally on a lower platform, but gradually the consciousness can be uplifted to be aware of the self and the supreme self. That is called yoga, or to come in contact with the Supreme Absolute Truth. So just as that is possible through this type of meditation, it is possible through discussion and knowledge.

So, it is also there are some activities which are described as sacrifices, or activities which are performed with a purpose of uplifting the consciousness. So, when food is prepared as a meditation as a type of an offering, or as sacrifice, then that food becomes sanctified, and those who eat it, their consciousness is also uplifted. And they can feel something different from that type of food as compared to other ordinary food. So, the person that is preparing the food in a loving attitude to offer it to Kṛṣṇa. In this type of very pure attitude, then that vibration also enters into the food, and those who partake of the food, they will get more benefit than meets the eye. Say somebody’s cooking when they’re very angry, somehow that will go into the food, and those who eat it may even get some effects from that. This is very subtle and not so easy to ascertain, but actually it has an effect like that. So how we mould our life, what type of association we place ourselves into, this is very important. If we learn from the Bhagavad-gītā how to see what aspects of the world are good, what are passionate, what are ignorant. If we chose to associate with those activities which are more good that will uplift us. Those things that are passionate tend to keep up on the same level and those things in the mode of ignorance tend to degrade us. So in this way, according to how a person leads his life, this creates the environment or the consciousness of what the future life would be. Now in this way there is the transmigration of the soul. Now recently in modern parapsychology, there have been various experiments performed using regression through hypnotism, using the children who have a recollection of their previous lives, and there are literally thousands of case histories. There was one five-year-old child who kept telling the father that in a previous life she was living in another village. Actually this was a child born in Bengal, India. But some scientists from Virginia, United States, they went to research this. And this child, she kept telling the father that “I used to live in Bhatpara, and I was married there but I died at a young age. But I have my husband, my children and everything there." So, the father’s thinking why my little baby is is saying all these things. Finally out of curiosity he agreed to take his daughter to the other village. She immediately walked right up to a particular house. She tried to enter into the house by a particular entrance, but that entrance has been blocked off. Then she went around the house and she went into another entrance. Later they found that the entrance she tried to go into previously, was the main entrance for that house. But some years before, two three years before, they had closed it off and were using another entrance. When she came in, immediately when she saw her husband, it is a custom in India that the wife feels a little shy before the husband. So she immediately started to… even though she was a five year old girl, she started to just emotionally display certain sentiments like, “Oh! Here is my husband. This is his name. This is bill… whatever the names were. Started to identify the grandfather. So the father was totally amazed, “How this is possible??” So that's why he talked to some scientists, and finally from Virginia they came, some parapsychologist experts, to study, and they came to the conclusion that there is no other explanation except for the transmigration of the soul which is popularly known as reincarnation. That after this body is finished, we continue to live. We simply go on and take new birth. So in this way, it's basically a certain number of souls in the human form of life, and then from animal species other souls are coming up, gradually, through a type of evolution or transmigration. Normally human beings are also supposed to get liberation and go out of the cycle of transmigration or reincarnation, and go back to our original spiritual position outside of this material world. Because now human beings are neglecting this science of self-realization, they are not achieving liberation in sufficient numbers, so we are getting a kind of accumulation of human beings known as the population explosion. This could easily be corrected if more people would participate in self-realization and achieving liberation from the material world.

So 501 years ago, in 1486, Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu appeared in Navadvīpa Māyāpur, about 108 kilometres north of Calcutta, and he established that this age we are in, the 20th century, this is called basically the age of Kali. It's a Vedic period of time which started 5000 years ago and will continue for many thousands of years. It's known as the Iron Age. Before, it was known as the Bronze Age, before that Silver, before that the Golden Age. So we are now in the Iron Age. So for this Iron Age, he taught, for achieving self-realization the most practical method of elevating the consciousness is by chanting mantras, or specific vibrations, which are meant for uplifting the consciousness. Now previously these mantras had always been chanted in India. That's not something new because since time immemorial great yogīs and sages have been chanting mantras. The difference is that, Lord Caitanya, he taught that if a group of people chant together, this will have more effect. And in that group chanting you can have people of all different ages, of all different creeds, of all different backgrounds, and they can all come together and in a co-operative way, they can all chant clapping their hands and playing some instruments, and even dancing. And in this way, it's a type of active meditation. The consciousness remaining fixed in chanting or singing and hearing the mantra, the people's consciousness can be elevated very quickly. Now there is a great culture behind this.

For instance, you have heard the drum being played. Now in playing these drums, it's not an ordinary drum. Of course originally these drums are made out of clay, called mṛdanga. Mṛt means clay. But because when shipping from India to the West, the clay usually breaks. You see in modern technology we have now fibre glass. Unbreakable. But the shape is very similar. Even when a person plays the drum, there’s a meditation they do. Each sound has got another meditation that the person who plays the drum will think. thi tha tha, thi tha tha, thi tha tha tha thi tha tha thi tha - like that, each one has a sound. So even the drum is a kind of meditation, and there is certain mantras or sounds that one meditates on while playing the drum. Of course, that doesn't really matter for people that don't play the drum. But this demonstrates that within the culture, there is a very vast tradition going. It’s not just ordinary playing of instruments. It is actually ceremonial playing. Although when young people are playing, or even old people, when they play, after some time they feel a lot of spiritual energy. Sometimes it's just a very joyful expression. But actually it's a very serious business. It's a very serious meditation. It's very joyful. It's something that can be serious, something that can be important, but same time it can be very pleasant. In this way you can have your cake and eat it too. You can be performing self-realization and at the same time it's very joyful to perform. Why should self-realization have to be unpleasant or boring? Why can't it be interesting and very joyfully performed.

So Lord Caitanya, he taught this basic process and he was having hundreds and thousands of people even gathered together, chanting these names of Kṛṣṇa, these different mantras. So at that time there was Mughal rule in many parts of India. That means from Turkey different Mughal hordes had conquered Northern India, Eastern India, and they were ruling. So by faith these rulers are basically Mohammedan. Just like Ayatollah Khamenei, sometimes they tend to be very rigid in their beliefs. Sometimes they are not very yielding and accepting different other cultures. In fact this is kind of a trait, especially in those times. But somehow Lord Caitanya was able to even impress the Mohammedan rulers. That what he was teaching was something basically very pure and very good. One time he was chanting just about 4 miles from the capital city of the emperor Hussain Shah. While he was chanting, literally thousands and thousands of people started to gather to join along with this big group-chanting, so much so that it was becoming a very big fair. Literally thousands and thousands of people were all gathering and chanting. So some of the non-Muslim or Hindu ministers in the government, they became very worried that if the emperor, the Mughal emperor Hussain Shah knows about Caitanya Mahāprabhu's chanting, maybe he will take some reprisal. Maybe he will think it's against his sectarian religious view or something. Who knows what might happen? So they said one representative to go and tell Lord Caitanya to stop his chanting because of the danger that might be there being so close to the emperor's capital. So that representative went to see Lord Caitanya. But Lord Caitanya was so involved in the chanting from morning till night. He was chanting and chanting, and with the chanting one can use the whole body in meditation. He was dancing or playing instrument. But he was totally occupied in it from morning till night. So, the person was waiting, waiting, when he gets a chance to speak. Just like midday, they may take a break. Chanting goes on, he may go take a quick shower or bath in a pond, take his lunch and again go out to chant. There wasn’t a moment where he could get time to speak to him. Like this he was waiting for two days, and more and more people were coming. It was just like huge, nonstop day and night they were going on. So finally, he started to talk to some of the other principal chanters that were there right next to the Mughal emperor's capital city. It's just 4-5 kilometres away, 3-4 kilometres away. Anything could happen. Better you go further away from here. So then they started getting worried and then chanting, some people hesitating. So finally Lord Caitanya could see that the enthusiasm was getting a little bit weakened. So suddenly he stopped all the chanting and he adressed everyone. "You think that I don't know where we are? You think that I don't know that we are right next to the palace of the emperor Hussain Shah? Nothing can stop the saṅkīrtana movement or this process of chanting. This is going to spread because this is the most effective means of liberating the consciousness. So you don't have to worry, just go ahead chanting. In this way you will be able to advance very quickly." So everyone felt again enlivened and they went on chanting, and that representative from the minister failed and went back.

In the meantime naturally the news reached the emperor that Lord Caitanya was chanting and thousands of people were joining him. So, he asked one of his ministers “What do you think about this Lord Caitanya?”

So again that minister thought that I better cover it up. He said that “Caitanya is just a mendicant. He is just some type of hermit moving around. He is not important. Not much following, no money, nothing”.

Then the Hussain Shah said, “No, I don't agree. I have a different opinion.”

They said, “Well Lord! Tell us your opinion”.

He said “Well, I am an emperor. I have so many kings under me. My kingdom goes this far. You get the whole thing. But what is keeping this empire together? Why do my generals work? Why do my governors work? Why do all you ministers work? None of you would work if I didn't enumerate you. If I didn't pay you. If you didn't get any money, no one of you would work. I don't even think that my wife would stay if I could not provide her economic needs. But I have noticed that this Caitanya, this Lord Caitanya, thousands of people are joining him and they are not getting any pay. Even some of my own ministers.” (One of his ministers had joined Caitanya Mahāprabhu, Rūpa.) “Even he has left the service and joined Caitanya Mahāprabhu. So my opinion is he has got the power of Allah. He is not different from Allah or Khudā. He must be directly either God or connected with a power of God. Otherwise, how he can have this power to make people happy and satisfied without giving them any material remuneration. No one can do that unless he is spiritual.” The emperor has given his opinion. So in this way Caitanya Mahāprabhu, he was able to impress people all over. Whether they were a Mohammadi, whether they were Hindu, Buddhist or Jain or whatever they were, Sikh.

So, this message was brought in 1965 here to the Western world by Bhaktivedanta Swami. He came to Australia. How many times? 6 times! At the age of 70 he left India, and he travelled around the world about 14 times to different continents. He went to Russia. He went to Africa. He came here to Australia 6 times, from the age of 70 to 82, training the people in the modern world the same principles of Caitanya Mahāprabhu. So many people know that when they see the devotees chanting in the street. Because that was practiced some 500 years ago, so still on occasion, just like this Saturday there will be a procession on Ratha-yātrā and the devotees will be chanting in procession. But apart from the public chanting, one may also chant in their own home. It's not that everyone has to. Some people may be shy to chant in public. We have a temple also. Several temples. Just like we have here some regular meetings, once in a month I heard. So people can chant together, or they may chant in their home. The idea is that certain techniques are there of chanting, of meditation, of cooking, of  simple living and high thinking, natural living, which can all bring to help the spiritual consciousness up in an individual. This is basically a process where each individual can become liberated, no matter what age they are, no matter what creed they are, no matter what background they have. The basic techniques I have described like chanting, the actual process of how to do it. In some meetings like this, we show how to chant on meditational beads. The idea behind that there are two basic categories of meditation. One is where one totally shuts off the senses. Tries to gradually stop the mind and just meditate focusing the consciousness between the eyes. Meditate on spiritual cakras or spiritual centres in the body. This one form of meditation that requires to be very peaceful, by breathing exercises, through various techniques, to bring the consciousness to a very controlled situation. Now that takes a long practice and people have to be very patient to do that type of technique. Basically inactive kind of people. People that can sit still for a long time without falling asleep. It's not so suitable for the people of the West. Even to learn the sitting postures is quite difficult. Some people were not able to perform many of the āsanas which are conducive for this form of meditation. So many people identify that as yoga. But that is one of the yogas. There are several yogas.

There is another yoga which was taught to Arjuna who was a warrior, he was a politician, he was a general, he was a prince, he was a very cultural person, he was a great religious man but he was an active man. He was artistic, he could play music, he could dance, he could do so many things. So, when he was proposed that he should perform some yoga, that he should go to the forest and meditate, he said, “It's totally against my nature to sit in one place indefinitely. My mind will become restless after a short time. It is easier to control a hurricane than to control my mind and sit in one place indefinitely. Isn't there another form of meditation?” So then another type of meditation was given. Meditation using the body. Using the senses. But focusing all the senses on particular spiritual objects. For instance playing the drum, that uses the sense of touch. Chanting using the sense of speech. Hearing uses the sense of hearing. That's why we sing ‘Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa’ and we listen, the two senses used to focus the mind. Then if you also play an instrument, and if you dance, the three activities further focused. And if you are alone, it’s not practical. Some people sing alone, but usually people feel shy to sing alone. When you are in a group it's easier. So there's also these meditational beads. The beads use the sense of touch in the meditation. Also it helps to keep track. If you count how many you are chanting, that also helps to keep the mind determined to chant properly for a particular period of time. And also we can use incense or flowers, like these flowers. These flowers were presented to me very beautifully. A Garland. Now this is prepared in loving attitude, and these are natural. These are offered to Kṛṣṇa. So the incense, the smell of that can also bring the mind into better concentration. Uplifted from a… just like if you walk into a stinky bathroom or something, your mind just gets pulled down. It’s a horrible place. And if you can smell beautiful flowers, and waterfalls, natural beauty, the mind is exhilarated by that atmosphere. I mean every place has got a certain vibration. So if you take an incense, and you offer that according to the Kṛṣṇa conscious system, that very aroma from the incense can give one exhilaration, a type of aid in concentration. In our temples we also have pictures, as well as images or deities, which also can be used to focus the eyesight. In this way all the senses can be engaged in meditation. Not only chanting meditation but even cooking. Cooking can be done as a meditation. Or some work can be done as a meditation. Just like some people, they do sewing. Some people make a garland, they may do that as a meditation. There is no limit to how many activities. The techniques can be applied to various activities which are not causing any harm to others. So this gives a little idea about some of the basic teachings and history of this Kṛṣṇa conscious movement, some of the basic philosophies. I may miss many have missed many important points so many doubts may come up in the discussion, and since very shortly we are going to have the vegetarian feast and other programs (I heard videos and other things), I think this time would be appropriate to allow you to express any questions or doubts or things you would like to know about before we proceed on. That will be a better use of the time now. If you have any questions, I could address those questions. I want to thank the opportunity for listening so patiently and for coming here to this program. I certainly find that the people here are very receptive very open minded, intelligent, I am very glad to be here with you this evening.

*a question on remembering previous birth*

Jayapatākā Swami: Well normally we forget, because at the time of birth there are various things that happen which cause us to forget. One thing is when we sleep, we forget some of the details of the previous day. If we try to remember what happened a year ago, many of the details escape us if it is very monumental thing that happened, then we can remember. When we take birth, we sleep basically for 9 months when we are in the womb, or most of those months. When we take birth, it’s an excruciating pain, child birth. And in that pain we go in a state of shock, which also helps us to forget. Then when we are born, we have new senses. We have a new body. And with the new body, we don't know how to use the body yet. Then we forget the previous body. Usually some small children they can remember, but by the time they get 4-5 years old, they forget everything. There's a whole new ocean of information, whole new conditioning has already begun. Generally we forget in all these traumas of child birth and being in the womb for so many months. We generally forget. But also by regression, by hypnotism, these impressions are still in our subconscious, and many people have been taken back by hypnotism. Say someone was 25, “Now you’re 23, you’re 20, you’re 18 years…”, they take them back. Then they say, “Now you are in the womb of your mother, now in your previous life.” When they say, “You are in the womb of your mother”, they automatically go like this, they curl up. So sometimes they have to tell them, “When I tell you something, don't move your body.” Otherwise when we say womb of the mother, they like immediately go into a very… even like violent… just go into that pose how we were located in the womb of the mother. That's not good for grown up people to do that. So that hypnotist has to take precaution that they don't do that. There are some techniques for that I don't know. Then he takes them into their previous life. They can remember. So we may consciously forget, because consciously we are aware of this body, of this life, and because of all those traumas, there are some exceptions. Why the exceptions are there? Whether it's because of a caesarean birth it's because of there wasn't so much trauma of being born the normal way, or whether it's because of some karma, some unknown circumstance. This I can't say but the percentage of people that remembers are very few but some do have some recollection when they are small. But these are the basic reasons why normally we don't. That's also good in one sense. Because we get a fresh start. So many things happened. If we had to remember all those lives, it becomes too much. All the pain and all the suffering, and desires, and unfulfillment. It's very difficult. Actually we are given a fresh start. Say a person wants to achieve something. So they are given a chance to achieve their unfulfilled desires without having to remember so many unnecessary things in the previous lives.

*question about the mind*

Jayapatākā Swami: Well naturally the mind is very flickering. So when a person starts to chant, the mind tends to wander and go different places. So that's why when you are chanting in a group, usually the chanting is so intense, maybe the volume and the chanting… being in the group of people the tendency for the mind to wander is little less than when you are chanting alone. Although the mind is pretty good in wandering in any circumstance, it's little easier to concentrate when there's many people chanting together, and there's instruments, and there is dancing. It's usually easier to concentrate. That's one of the benefits of the group chanting. But whether one is chanting in a group or individually, if the mind goes off, we can just bring the mind back again. As soon as the intelligence is able to perceive that the mind has gone off, again it brings the mind back to listening to the chanting. So as that's going, maybe in one hour we can bring the mind back every ten seconds and may go off every ten seconds, but gradually we develop a habit where we can chant for a period of time with only meditating on that vibration, maybe for a period of one minute, or two minutes. And gradually that will increase where a person can chant for even half hour. But the mind is so treacherous, so difficult to control. Say someone's chanting, then they realize that, “For some period of time I have chanted without thinking of anything else.” Then the mind is thinking about the fact that you’ve chanted without thinking of anything else. That's another thought, chanting and thinking about chanting. (laughter) Then you feel proud. Then your mind already took you somewhere else. (laughter) It's kind of like the mind, you have to treat it like you capture a little deer or some animal from jungle. You’ve got to actually tame it. If you totally leave the mind unleashed, it will run off. So, you have to give it a long leash. If it runs off, you bring it back again. Normally we don't try to control our mind. People identify that what they think is themselves. But actually, what we think is kind of the conglomerate of the conditioning in the society, and the experiences we have been in, not only from this life but from previous lives as well. So by practicing self-realization one gradually starts to realize that the mind is also a type of very subtle machine. The intelligence, or that which can see the mind and can direct the mind, the reasoning power. Like the mind may suddenly think, “Oh this is something good, this is something bad.” Immediately the intelligence can overwrite that. For instance, someone gets angry because someone insults a person. So, the mind may suddenly say it will be good to take vengeance against that person. But the intelligence says no that's not good, because the person who insulted me is not worth taking any retaliation. Better to tolerate. So the mind may come up with different thoughts, but the intelligence has to reason whether that's a good thought or not. And ultimately accept or reject and direct the mind's direction. So by practicing the chanting gradually, one's intelligence becomes stronger and one can start to direct the mind. Even though the mind comes up with different thoughts, one actually comes to a much higher position in one's outlook so that the mind no longer can cause one simply to be happy or distressed, just by thoughts. But one start to try to control the mind, and direct the mind in a positive way. To do that, we practice controlling the mind by having to think or hear the chanting. And then, we can only do that for a certain period of time before our patience or attention is no longer is able to be kept. So therefore there are other types of activities one can also do as a type of meditation, like cooking. Cooking can also be done as a type of meditation. There are unlimited types of work that could be done as a meditation. It is a question of purpose, and intent, and knowing the technique. You can use different activities as forms of meditation also, as active meditation. In this way gradually the mind becomes peaceful because you keep engaging it in transcendental activity, and the intelligence can control the mind by engaging in positive activities.

The mind is like a machine. It's like a library of different experiences and likes and dislikes that we have built up over lifetimes where this living force is actually the witness. The living force is the witness which is seeing everything go on, and normally what happens is the senses, our senses, are engaged in serving sense objects. Object of the tongue is tasting, eating something. Object of seeing, object of hearing. So the senses, they are engaged in serving the dull matter of sense objects. The mind thinks of different ways, so the senses can better serve the sense objects. The intelligence further coordinates the activities, and the living force is kind of dragged along. So there's a picture in the Bhagavad-gītā of five horses, a chariot with five horses, pulling with their strings and a driver. So the 5 horses are the senses, the string is the mind and the driver is the intelligence. And the rider in the back seat is the living force. He is witnessing everything. He is the actual person that's thinking, willing, feeling everything that's going on. Now spiritual life is just the opposite the living force is meditating on the absolute truth and on the Supreme Personality of Godhead on the supreme reality and engaging in different types of meditation, sacrifice so on. So, the living force is focused upward and the living force brings the intelligence under its control. The intelligence controls the mind and the mind starts to control the senses.