Vedanta Psychology - Suhotra Maharaja Archives

The body needs to eat, but if I don’t give you the right kind of food, you are notsatisfied. And it might not even be assimilated by the body even though it’sassimilable food.Devotee (6): The duration to sleep you need about 15 minutes for all the elementsto nourish the body…required for the mind…from the day.Maharaja: When you sleep?Devotee (6): Yes, …so much going on.Maharaja: So much going on, ok, yes. I think the whole concept of this sleep we’llget into very deeply in the future chapters.Devotee (3): When the body is engaged in some menial activity and the mind is notfully absorbed in that activity, and the way I see it, it can be focused on chanting theholy name, or the contemplation of the philosophy of the …aspect. But can it be saidthat one is superior to the other, that it’s better to be focused on the holy name thancome up with some…?Maharaja: So is it when we are doing some activity that fairly routine and you cando the activity efficiently but not necessarily be absorbed in it, the mind can think ofsomething else, is it better to be absorbed in developing contemplating service andother things?They are non-different. Because sankirtana means that it includes everything.Because the point is this, one is chanting, that’s one’s own position and existence,but then the idea is then there is going to be relationship with the Lord and others.So even in the chanting we see it goes through stages, the name, the form, thequalities, and pastimes. So once it gets to pastimes then you are talking aboutinteraction. Up to that point, then it’s some form of appreciation. The name that’s it’snon-different from Krsna, form Krsna’s form is very nice, qualities are even moreexpanded on that, but His pastimes are His interaction with the devotees, thatbecomes even more special. So now in that pastime, there has to be interaction. Sothere must be attraction, there must be to…activity, the attachment that’s there andeverything…Devotee (3): Could you expand on that…when you are chanting your japa…Maharaja: When you are chanting your japa to think of something else. Ok. In onesense yes, that’s better than contemplating something else. But in another sense it isservice to be absorbed in the name. So that absorption in the name that that itself isnatural. But we see in this, you are dealing in absorption in the name is generally youare dealing with attraction or attachment to Krsna. So even though they areabsorbed, there is still going to be active service. The devotees of Vrndavana arecompletely attached to Krsna and completely attracted, but because of that they aredoing activity. So because of their attachment they perform service. So because ofthe prayojana, then there is abhideya.