Krsna Kathamrita

“Experience is the best teacher – and a fool learns in no other way.” The implication of this well-known saying is twofold: Firstly, wise people learn from others, without having to undergo the experiences themselves. Secondly, experience is the euphemistic label people place on their follies and mistakes. While the saying has its validity, it neglects a third possibility: a person may not learn even after experience. That is the extent of the folly to which we are reduced by the mind. By its insidious influence, it wipes out the basis of our learning: our memory of our experiences. While outlining the eight-stage trajectory to tragedy, the Bhagavad-gita (02.62–63) explains how what begins with contemplation ends in self-destruction. Relevant for our discussion is the sixth stage, the eradication of memory (02.63: smriti-bhrama), which leads to the destruction of intelligence and the final descent to self-defeating behavior. By its insidious influence, the mind wipes out the ...

If an asteroid comes within the gravity pull of a planet, it is dragged down to that planet. Similarly, during our life-journey, the gravity pull of sense objects – their promise of pleasure – can pull us towards them, away from what we intended to do. The Bhagavad-gita (02.62) warns us that contemplation on sense objects can drag us towards self-destruction. Unlike the largely fixed gravity pull of celestial objects, the gravity pull of sense objects varies according to individual conditionings and conditions. If we are conditioned to indulging in a particular sense object, then its gravity pull on us will be much more than that on others. And if we are in a vulnerable emotional condition such as boredom or anxiety or distress, the sense object’s promise of quick relief will allure us more than at other times. Another consequential difference between the two gravity pulls is that the gravity pull of sense objects depends not just on physical proximity but also on mental prox...