The practice of discernment (viveka) is the simple practice of looking in order to figure out what’s what. We do it all the time, which is how we are able to take decisions in life. When we are able to distinguish right from wrong, or good from bad, most of us choose to do what is right or what is good. Another criterion we use is to do what is in our best interest, or what makes us happy and helps us avoid pain and suffering. It is obvious that we need to look and think in order to determine what makes sense and what doesn’t, what is right and what isn’t, what is worth pursuing and what isn’t ..read more

The Principle of Competence (adhikāri-vāda) plays a major role in the way spiritual training is given and received. We have seen how the principle matured during the Vedic period and, in recent centuries, was misused by some to impose arbitrary conditions of eligibility to determine who can be taught and given access to resources. Many of those conditions have become irrelevant today with the easy availability of books and the advent of the internet. It is virtually impossible now to meaningfully deny access to resources. But lack or denial of access is never really the only hurdle. Merely hav ..read more

Indra, the leader of the celestials, and Virocana, the leader of the demons, once approached Prajāpati. They were right away told to spend thirty-two years practicing the disciplines of a celibate student. Only after that did Prajāpati ask them the purpose of their visit. When they told him of their desire to know the Ātman, he gave them a preliminary teaching. The teaching satisfied Virocana. He felt that it was all he needed. He felt no need to explore and examine what was told because it seemed to confirm his own prior understanding, which was sadly superficial. Virocana thought of himself ..read more

“In the last post we saw what survives death and what doesn’t. Where does the surviving part of me go?” Most of us believe that we will go somewhere after death. No one knows where that “somewhere” is, although everyone will know exactly where it is after they die. If we are curious to know the answer now, when we are still living, we have to turn to a source we trust or have faith in. Religious texts of most traditions provide interesting narratives, call them “stories” if you like, regarding the passage after death—of who goes where and why. Here we’ll focus on the general consensus in Vedan ..read more

Among the mysteries in life, none is as intriguing as the mystery of death. No one really knows what happens after death. There are theories aplenty but none that can be objectively verified. Death is a door to exit, not to reenter. No one comes back to give a firsthand account of what happens after death. The matters related to death and afterlife (assuming there is one) belong to the field of eschatology. All ideas concerning death and beyond are interlinked with the ideas regarding the self and the purpose and goal of life. This is clear from the study of the Kaṭhopaniṣad. The discussion th ..read more

Mental impressions play an outsize role in our lives. They generate desires, they influence our decisions, and they determine our character. They exert a lot more control on us than we realize. It is helpful to know how they are formed, what they do, and what we can do to use them to our advantage. First, the basics. Work (karma) is not only what we do with the body (our usual activities) but also what we do with the mind (such as thinking). Every conscious activity done with the help of the body and the mind is karma. It usually produces some result (karmaphala, literally, “fruit of work”). P ..read more

The current population of the world is said to be a little over 8 billion. Compare that with the number of bacteria in every human body, which is estimated to be around 39 trillion. If the earth is a community of 8 billion human beings, within every one of us is a staggeringly larger community of around 39,000 billion bacteria. It is astonishing to think that billions of bacteria are born in my body, that is where they live their entire lives, that is where they multiply and where they eventually die. For a great many of these, my gut is their entire world. It is tempting to wonder if any of t ..read more

With a little bit of creative imagination, it is possible to see God as a child. If nothing is impossible for God, then God can be everywhere and in everyone. God can be immanent as well as transcendent. God can be both personal and impersonal. God can have form and also be beyond form. God can have qualities and also be beyond qualities. God can be whatever I hope God is, and so much more besides. God can be a child too, why not? Now why would my heart like to think of God as a child? Before adults get a chance to meddle in the lives of children and kill their spontaneity, the little ones do ..read more

Whichever way we understand the terms “good” and “bad,” it is helpful to keep in mind that it is people who are good or bad. It is people who make enemies, who fight, and who kill—and it is people who make friends, who love, and who enrich life. Religion doesn’t do anything. Religion is not a conscious living being like you and me. It is people who do things. That may be true, but what about people who claim that they are religious? Isn’t religion responsible for whatever such “religious” people do? This raises a set of thorny questions. Such as, what is meant by a religious person? Who amongs ..read more

When I was studying in high school, we read an essay in our Hindi textbook which spoke of death as an art and an opportunity. The lesson made a deep impression on me and it has stayed with me all these years. Oddly, even today I remember verbatim many of the statements in that essay. Death is often an unpleasant subject and hence skirted around by most people. Luckily for me, the essay created in my heart not a neurotic obsession but a healthy space to reflect on the reality of death. The basic premise of the essay was simple. Die everyone must, sooner or later. Death is the one certain thing ..read more