To succeed in becoming free, we need to look within. As long as the mind is focused on the external world, we will subject to its effects. This means that we will feel the duality of life, we will be swayed by it and come under its control. Thus we will vacillate between being hot or cold, happy or sad.
A practical example is of feeling hungry. When we're absorbed in eating lots of food, the result is that we will enjoy the feeling of fullness or satiation after a good meal. However, with time we will feel hungry again. The more we eat, the hungrier we will feel in time, as we become used to eating that quantity. Hunger will absorb our minds and the search will food will be paramount to us.
Curiously and perhaps paradoxically, if we fast or abstain from eating for an extended period of time, we find that hunger subsides. The initial craving for food dissipates and the urge to eat goes away. Anyone who has fasted for long enough will know this experience. Then after one or two days, one no longer feels the demands of hunger and when eating again, much less food is required to feel satiated. The stomach shrinks but also the mind and tongue become pacified and acclimatized to less food. We become less under the control of the external objects, in this case food.
This is a practical example of how the mind and senses can be pacified and tranquility can be achieved, not by surrendering to the external objects of the senses but by going within. Similarly, the wise who pursue enlightenment realize that it lies not outside ourselves but within. And by mastering the mind, withdrawing it from excessive focus on the external world, for example via the recommended process of yoga and meditation, real peace of mind is obtained.
By focusing on the externals to satisfy the mind, we are simply pouring fuel on the fire of our mind's desires, which are primarily survival based. Thus the desires are not satiated but rather intensified over time and the mind becomes more and more controlled by the externals.
Enlightenment or liberation can however be achieved by going within. As the twentieth century psychologist Carl Jung said, "He who looks outside dreams; he who looks inside awakes." He is simply repeating, based upon his own realization and introspection, what has been taught in the ancient yoga texts all along.
By focusing the mind within, instead of externally, the mind is more easily pacified and tranquility is attained. And it is this state of peacefulness that is required as a platform from which ultimate enlightenment can be achieved. First the mind and senses must be pacified and their dictates subdued before any attempt at self-realization and the transcendent can be attained.
This is because the self that is to be realized is not in the mind or the brain, but in the heart. The higher self is said to be situated within the heart, according to the ancient wisdom texts. As long as the mind is accepted as master because its voice is louder, we will not be able to hear the whisper of the higher self in the heart.
It is the mind which creates the ego identification with the body. And as long as we identify with the body and ego, we will be affected by whatever is thrown at the ego and body. If we receive praise, we will feel inflated by it. If insult is hurled at us, we will feel deflated by it.
However, once the real self in the heart is attained, and we realize this as our true identity beyond the body and mind, then real tranquility is achieved and no amount of praise or insult will affect us. Humility will be a primary symptom, as we realize the equality of all sentient beings as well as the supremacy of the higher power which animates all life, that one consciousness of which we all are but a small fragment.
Therefore, the ancient wisdom texts recommend the yoga and meditation practice to facilitate going beyond the mind, subduing it and going within to hear the voice of the heart. Modern depth psychology in its own way recommends the same thing, as seen in the writings of Carl Jung and others. This is because it is a natural and intuitive process which applies to all humanity for all time, and simply gets discovered and expressed in unique ways according to the time and place in history.
Once we have stilled the mind and linked up with the higher self in the heart, we are in essence already in a state called samadhi by the ancient Sanskrit texts. This is the liberated state, where one is liberated from the dictates of the mind and the addictions to the external objects of sense gratification. In this state, the heart and mind are in coherence and one is in a state of wholeness, which is the goal of life and the platform for transcendence, where our greatest potential can be expressed.
Bhagavad Gita ch6:7
जितात्मन: प्रशान्तस्य परमात्मा समाहित: ।
शीतोष्णसुखदु:खेषु तथा मानापमानयो: ॥ ७ ॥
jitātmanaḥ praśāntasya
paramātmā samāhitaḥ
śītoṣṇa-sukha-duḥkheṣu
tathā mānāpamānayoḥ
SYNONYMS
jita-ātmanaḥ—of one who has conquered his mind; praśāntasya—of one who has attained tranquility by such control over the mind; paramātmā—the Supersoul; samāhitaḥ—approached completely; śīta—cold; uṣṇa—heat; sukha—in happiness; duḥkheṣu—in distress; tathā—also; māna—honor; apamānayoḥ—in dishonor.
TRANSLATION
For one who has conquered the mind, the Supersoul is already reached, for he has attained tranquility. To such a man happiness and distress, heat and cold, honor and dishonor are all the same.
PURPORT
Actually, every living entity is intended to abide by the dictation of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, who is seated in everyone's heart as Paramātmā. When the mind is misled by the external illusory energy, one becomes entangled in material activities. Therefore, as soon as one's mind is controlled through one of the yoga systems, one is to be considered as having already reached the destination. One has to abide by superior dictation. When one's mind is fixed on the superior nature, he has no other alternative but to follow the dictation of the Supreme. The mind must admit some superior dictation and follow it. The effect of controlling the mind is that one automatically follows the dictation of the Paramātmā or Supersoul. Because this transcendental position is at once achieved by one who is in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, the devotee of the Lord is unaffected by the dualities of material existence, namely distress and happiness, cold and heat, etc. This state is practical samādhi, or absorption in the Supreme.
Reference: Bhagavad Gita As It Is, translation and commentary by Swami A C Bhaktivedanta, original Macmillan 1972 edition.
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