An Understanding of Self

By J.L. Dhar

Simple Ways To Harness The Power Within Practical, precise and full of real-life examples, this book is meant to be your intimate life-coach. In fact, this book is an invitation - an invitation to truly know and understand yourself. But it is not an invitation that somebody else has sent you. It has actually come from the deep yearning of your own soul. It is an invitation from you to yourself. Be invited and undertake the journey within.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wisdom Tree Publishers
• Release date: Jul 7, 2015
• ISBN: 9788183282604

Book preview

Cover

Comments on author’s previous book An Interview with Self:

I have gone through the book and I liked particularly your writing on ‘Practice Silence’.

— Dr. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam

Former President of India

I went through the book and found it very interesting!

— Nandan M. Nilekani

Chairman, Infosys

I agree with most points in the book.

— Prof. K. Satchidanandan

Former Secretary, Sahitya Akademi

The overall style of the book is simple and lucid. The book deserves to be read by all intelligent men. It is well got up and moderately priced.

— D. N. Kaul,

G. Police (Retd.)

(Koshur Samachar)

The book establishes that the writer is a very knowledgeable, experienced and devoted person. The book undoubtedly contains introspection and high-level thinking.

— Late H. D. Shourie

Director, Common Cause.

This book invites you to identify, understand and control the demons within and transcend those to help yourself embrace your own inner light. Be at peace with yourself!

— Hindustan Times

The readers are able to identify with the problems discussed in the book and the author succeeds in making one realise that one’s desires are not the be all and end all of existence, human relationships have to be nurtured, happiness is because of one’s attitude and not circumstances and true freedom is the freedom to be oneself. The language is simple and the expression direct.

— The Tribune

© J. L. Dhar, 2008

First published 2008

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission of the author and the publisher.

ISBN 978-81-8328-260-4

Published by

Wisdom Tree

4779/23 Ansari Road

Darya Ganj

New Delhi-110002

Ph.: 23247966/67/68

Published by Shobit Arya for Wisdom Tree; edited by Manju Gupta; designed by Kamal P. Jammual; typeset at Marks & Strokes, Delhi-110028 and printed at Print Perfect, New Delhi - 110064

Contents

Preface

1. Know Your True Self

2. Taming the Monkey-mind

3. Desires, Happiness and Spirituality

4. Mom, Dad, Cash and the Kids

5. Change the Direction to Change Life

6. The Power of Devotion

7. An Inner Journey to an Outer Destination

This work is dedicated to the memory of

Gurudev, Shri Swami Lakshman Joo Maharaj —

saint, scholar and exponent of Kashmir Shaivism.

It takes one story to…

inspire a song

create a bond

alter a path

mend a rift

reach a soul

transform a relationship

re-affirm a marriage

save a life.

One story can change the world!

You are what your deep, driving desire is.

As your desire is, so is your will.

As your will is, so is your deed.

As your deed is, so is your destiny.

— Brihadaranyaka Upanishad IV 4.5

Preface

Years ago, I found myself locked in a battle with myself, and that battle frequently resulted in restlessness, irritation and provocative behaviour, both at home and in the office, which perhaps made it very difficult for other people to be in my company. I had become an introvert. I was, therefore, unhappy with others and ill at ease with them. It led me to depression for I felt a strange sense of anxiety and fear of being rejected. Although I might have looked tough outwardly, my heart felt weak and wounded. I continued to build sharp picket fences around me so that no one would get close to me. I held the pain and the tribulations close to my heart.

But I was determined to prove myself. Indeed, I have had to struggle hard to find the right professional career and settle down in the area of my work-field. My initial days were difficult. I didn’t have much money, but then I didn’t need it all that much either. It was at the time that I seriously started working with myself, trying to introspect and understand why I felt, thought and acted the way I did. I read Osho a lot, including some other good material. I needed to ask myself a lot of questions. Indeed, to try and know myself, is what has really been my concern ever since I felt a yearning to look within myself for solutions and answers to the myriad problems that I have had to face, from time to time. Gradually, things started changing, healthy relationships started developing and areas of influence grew. In a way, my struggle, after reaching a certain stage in my professional career, has been more spiritual than mental for there can be limitations to the development of the mind beyond a point, but not to the development of the heart. Many times, being kind is more important and longer lasting than being right. It brings radiance and joy.

Around that time, I started conceptualising my ideas and experiences. My first self-help book, An Interview with Self — Simple Ways to Unravel the Power Within, thus took shape and was published by Wisdom Tree, a leading publishing house, in the year 2004. This book received good press reviews and has been immensely liked and appreciated by readers.

This second book, which is in your hands, has taken shape and form as a sequel to my previous book. Dictionary meaning of sequel is ‘to continue the story of an earlier one’. This is a book that needs to be written; this is a story that needs to be told and re-told, time and again. Our preparation can be helped by not only getting to know the story, but also by re-visiting it and familiarising ourselves with it, by soaking in the story so as to be ready for its meanings to be revealed to us slowly, to be imbibed and assimilated with our divine self.

Thus this second book has emerged from my continued deep-felt urge to try and understand how and why most of us continue to be prone to low self-worth, fear, anger, envy, jealousy, vanity, ego, selfishness, mistrust, deceit, obsession with money, sex and sexuality, desperate hankering after material goods and services and so on and so forth, and have, therefore, almost lost the path to a peaceful living. This writing has, in a way, been an important part of my own learning for it gave me a chance to hold and ponder upon every experience I had close to me, hoping to assimilate its meaning.

An Understanding of Self is a slim and racy book. It offers some very easy, practical ideas and thoughts in the form and style of crispy one-liners on how to gain the ability to understand and manage one’s turbulent mind and thus be at peace with one’s self. It should turn out to be as good and engaging a book as the previous one, for it has been prepared in a gravy blended with deep feelings, emotions and true-to-life situations laced with tales, stories, anecdotes and parables that make its reading a treat. In a way, the contents are truly baked in time and space — a clear guide to help the reader achieve the most — physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.

We all want happiness, peace and release from suffering. We often think that the enlightened ones are somehow special, different from us, with a state of mind that is unattainable by an ordinary person. But the fact of the story is that each one of us can attain wisdom, happiness and enlightenment by cultivating the correct motivation — a sincere aspiration to be of help and benefit to all sentient beings. To ‘enlighten’ means, ‘to provide knowledge or spiritual insight; to illuminate what was previously dark or obscure’. Osho has said that there is no such thing as darkness; it is only the absence of light. Once the light engulfs you, there is no place for darkeness anymore.

Each person’s experiences and process of spiritual and transpersonal aspects of enlightenment are, of course, unique. No two experiences are ever the same, yet some self-help/inspirational texts and stories, such as those included in this volume and in the previous book, might inspire the reader, give him clues to finding one’s own true self through spiritual awakening.

We are all, at our own time and space, writing the story of our individual lives. We want to know what is it about. We demand something deeper or richer or more substantive. We want to know where we are headed — not to spoil our own end by ruining the surprise, but to ensure that when the end comes, it won’t be shallow or miserable. We would have done something. We would not have squandered away our time here. This book is about that urge; that need in each one of us to overcome our so-called helplessness and reach our goals. Perhaps, therefore, it is time to re-write the life-story!

It would seem to be an easy thing, really — the reading of a book. You pick up a book, open it, fix your gaze on it, and begin reading. Well may be so, may be not! In reality, though there is a mystical bond between the writer, the book and the reader, the author may actually be trying to figure out his own life on the page; not the reader’s. As the Irish poet W.B. Yeats once told an admirer of his work:

If what I say resonates in you, it’s merely because we are both branches on the same tree.

So is my wish with this book.

The book is so organised that you can start reading from any where you like or pause whenever you want to. You can start any time. You don’t have to keep your work aside to read it. And you can be as much or as little involved with it as you want.

I was motivated not only by a yearning to find greater fulfilment in my own life, but by a strong belief that if I worked with myself to add value to the manner and style of leading my life by changing my fossilised mind-set, I could perhaps also make a definite contribution towards making positive changes in persons in my immediate family, at office and elsewhere.

In this book we will journey together. Ours will be a collaboratic search for meaning. Through experience we can become a lens that can give us the opportunity to see what is truly good and holy in our lives. This is a book about our inner resources which we all have but are not aware of or make use of it in full measure. It is about tapping into one’s potential for becoming more healed better human beings. This wonderful opportunity, however, is neglected by our persistent tendency to look at the experience rather than through it.

Take this as an invitation to truly know yourself. It is not an invitation from me. I am privileged only to be one of the invitees but, in a way, entrusted with the duty to distribute the invitation cards. The invitation actually has to come from the deep yearning of your own soul. Therefore, it is an invitation from you to yourself.

I would frankly like to state that in my own journey within, which is perhaps limitless and, hence, continuous I have been inspired by many authors and writers, whose writings have undoubtedly influenced and shaped me and my thoughts. So I have no hesitation in admitting that they have in a great way, directly or indirectly, contributed to my book. Therefore, in all humility, I can say that this book is as much their’s as mine.

A book bears the author’s name but represents a team effort. I wish to thank Shobit Arya, Publisher, Wisdom Tree for his invaluable guidance in shaping and publishing this second book of mine; the editorial staff and various others at Wisdom Tree who, in their own way, were of help. Finally, my readers, who, because of their interest in my first self-help book, inspired me to write a sequel — to continue the story. It can be anybody’s story which, perhaps, needs to be told and re-told; written and re-written, till it makes a mark, becomes a guide to self-awareness and growth.

In labouring with and giving birth to this project, I would like to acknowledge the following:

To begin with, I would like to thank God for granting me with the insight to distinguish between good and bad, my brother¬in-law Prof. R.N. Kaul for going through the manuscript with a toothcomb; my wife, Krishna, the only woman in my life who has been a source of support, inspiration and strength; my son Raman and his wife Vandana; my daughter Dolly and her husband Vikram and, of course, my grandchildren Prathana and Soham, Didon and Pranav, for being there making life worth living and loving.

May God bless you all!

J.L.DHAR

1

Know Your True Self

To start with, may I ask you a personal question? Do you love yourself? Assuming your answer will be in the positive, can I rephrase the question— Are you happy with what you are, how you are or where you are in life right now?

Based on my interaction with a wide cross-section of society, I have come to the conclusion that your response would be in the negative. I can then take you to the next logical question — But then, why not? In that case, how can you fall in love with yourself?

Now, this might make you wonder how a person who doesn’t find his life fulfilling, can be in love with it! That is the paradox! This is because you don’t know yourself. You may know yourself when you look at yourself in the mirror — outwardly you may see your face, but close observation will tell you that what you are looking at is not your face, but your mind. Are you able to look at yourself with respect? Does your facial expression reflect peace and contentment? Do you like the self that you see?

Don’t be fooled by the face you wear, for most of us wear a mask— a thousand masks, perhaps. Masks that we are afraid to take off as none of them presents our real self. Pretence has become second nature to us. On the surface we may seem smooth, but the surface is our mask, our ever-concealing mask. Beneath it dwells the real you and me — in utter confusion, in fear, in rage, in envy, in malice, in ego, in aloneness, in hopelessness and what not. We idly chatter in a polished tone when making superficial talk and say things that mean nothing. And nothing of what is everything — of what is crying inside us. We are consciously hiding everything as we dare not speak about it. We are afraid lest others think less of us, that others laugh at us, for deep down we know we are nothing, we are empty, we are a hoax and our worry is that others might see it and reject us.

Actually, within our hearts, we all feel the call to be simple, to be conscious, to be present, to be real. Yet throughout the day the world urges us to be at war with ourselves and with each other — be resentful about the past, be anxious about the future, be hungry for what we don’t have, be impatient to reach somewhere to gain recognition, be dissatisfied with work, job, salary or whatever, be unhappy about the situation at home! Indeed, our lives and our minds are filled with useless thoughts.

We never stop to think about the traits that are bad like jealousy, revenge, deceit, egoism — all that is negative. Indeed, our life exists between two polarities — being and doing — what we are and how we behave. We may be a pure being but what matters is how we act or behave. If we observe our life, we will see that most of our behaviour is not authentic. It is full of hypocrisy. When talking to our friends, relatives, or even strangers, we hide our true feelings and thoughts. We express what will be socially acceptable and not create problems. We hide more than what we reveal. This way, everyone leads a fake life.

Such a situation may lead us to serious illnesses borne out of mood swings, hyperactivity, anxiety, failure, irritability, lack of concentration, insomnia, indigestion, worry about the future, fatigue, etc. We do not want anybody to know about it. We panic at the very thought of our ugly interior; at the fear of being exposed. That is why we frantically create a mask to hide behind it — a nonchalant, sophisticated façade to shield our self from the glance that knows.

But there always is a piercing glance that is constantly watching us. Whose glance is that? It is our very own glance! After all, how can anyone run away from one’s own self, from one’s own peep, from one’s own stare? In fact, it is the only thing that can liberate us from our false self, from our own self-built prison walls, from barriers that we so painstakingly erect. It is the only thing that will assure us of what we can’t assure ourselves — that our worth is something else — more important, more valuable, more precious. That alone can release us from our shadow world of panic and uncertainty, from our lonely prison.

If such an awareness were to descend on us, we would be able to see our true self, think and say what we need to sincerely think and say for survival. We shall then dislike the superficial game; the superficial and phoney game. We would really like to be just what we are — real, genuine and spontaneous.

A still mind sees what the present contains. A busy mind sees what is not here. Therefore, let us learn to be present in the present — to look at the person who is here as he is, without any illusion, any superficiality.

If it were possible to summarise all mystical teachings in a simple sentence, the following saying would be apt: ‘Make your state of mind more important than what you are doing.’ What we think in our mind is the source of what really counts in life. Happiness and misery, success and failure, effectiveness and uselessness, competence and ineptitude, courage and fear, strength and weakness cannot be blamed on circumstances or other people. Rather, the condition of our mind is the main causative factor of all our problems.

Nothing is interesting if we are not