The Beneficial and the Pleasant

People today suffer intensely from the fever of the senses and try the quack remedies of recreations, pleasures, vacations, picnics, banquets, dances, etc. only to find that the fever abates but returns after an interval – it does not subside. All the varieties in taste, colour, smell of the various food delicacies, when you consider fairly and squarely, are a mere drug to cure the illness of hunger. All the drinks that people have invented are but drugs to alleviate the illness of thirst. What you term luxury (bhoga) today, is a thing that drags people into excitement and insane pursuits. A fever will go away only when the hidden virus is rendered ineffective. So too, the virus or illness of your mind will die only when the rays of wisdom (Jnana) falls upon it. Discern and always try to prefer the beneficial (hitha) to the pleasant (priya), for the pleasant might lead you down the sliding path into the bottomless pit.

We know it from meditation, we sit down, close the eyes and take a mantra and get refreshed with meditation. 

If we practice every day, it is no more about taking a break, it is part of the day like cleaning teeth, we sit up and meditate for about a half an hour.

What does Swami tell us exactly with those words? 
Suffering the fever of the senses we think it is normal. Whatever we do with the remedies of pleasures, we will just find that the fever returns after an interval and it does not subside, but it doesn't feel like a fever rather like something refreshing. 

So Swami doesn't talk about a time out, he talks about a mental conditioning that turned into sickness and we have to look at it like a fever, but we should not forget that this seems for us normal and not sick, after a certain time we just go for the same pleasure or urge for vacation or dance again to get that break and to feel refreshed and if we do it with mediation, it takes care of it every morning that we start new again, but I guess that is not the same, meditation is the remedy for that sickness. 

People today suffer intensely from the fever of the senses and try the quack remedies of recreations, pleasures, vacations, picnics, banquets, dances, etc. only to find that the fever abates but returns after an interval – it does not subside. All the varieties in taste, colour, smell of the various food delicacies, when you consider fairly and squarely, are a mere drug to cure the illness of hunger. All the drinks that people have invented are but drugs to alleviate the illness of thirst. 

We had last week nice dinners and the last we had a cocktail instead of some other drinks and it tasted very good, the meal as well and it would not have come to my mind to see it as a mental sickness to enjoy the food. 

There is another information of Swami that luxury is a thing that drags people into excitement and insane pursuits. 

What he is telling us is that it is not healthy to do that and to go for it, as it is insane. 

What you term luxury (bhoga) today, is a thing that drags people into excitement and insane pursuits. A fever will go away only when the hidden virus is rendered ineffective. 

The fever of our normal every day life, the routine makes it always the same and all those things change that routine a bit and makes it more pleasant. 

But when we see it as a sickness it needs to be cured and here we talk about the illness of our mind and it will die only when the rays of wisdom and that is Jnana fall upon it and we should notice here that Swami doesn't talk about love only, but about wisdom. 

The rays of wisdom will fall upon it. 

We have to discern and we have to prefer the beneficial to the pleasant, we have to use discrimination and he doesn't once mentions the word 'love only' as also with love there is a difference between the pleasant and the beneficial. If it is body love the pleasant is without question not always beneficial. 

So too, the virus or illness of your mind will die only when the rays of wisdom (Jnana) falls upon it. Discern and always try to prefer the beneficial (hitha) to the pleasant (priya), for the pleasant might lead you down the sliding path into the bottomless pit.

The association to it was going down with Swami in the dream stage in the well, but it was not a pit and not a bottomless pit, when we reached the bottom there was only little life water left and it had been a deep well and we went up again together and on the way he dropped the body and it fell into dust and still we went up the well and on the top there was Krishna and his brother. 

And it has to do with the relationship we have with the divine, it is part of the family if there is Krishna and his brother and they were walking happily over a beautiful green meadow. 

It was in those days when he left the body, also the king and he was living at a place where gold and silver flows and the insight about personal staff. 

He said it also in a thought for the day that the first step is living in his vicinity and that was just being in his ashram, the personal staff is about a job assigned by him and the insight of Krishna and his brother was a family relationship and the king means we are all part of his kingdom. 

We have different roles to play and personal staff is different from just being in the vicinity. My ex went there and enjoyed the little kids to make him feel better, who is not able to enjoy the little kids, but he didn't care about his own daughter. 
Sathva, purity is the path, rajas, passion we have to transform, Tamas, perversion and dullness we have to give up it was perverted and that is why it said as the man coming in our dreams to awaken that we had to get a divorce. 
He doesn't understand it until today and he thinks he was such a lovely guy.  

He doesn't care about anybody but himself and in the ashram he was always present because there was nothing else to do and he was bored and when we went for a visit we had to pick him up, drive with him around and bring him back and since we left he was the pure opposite and that is how we get aware that he was just bored at that place and because he was bored he had nothing else to do and that is why he sat alway in front of the door. It was nothing else but socialization and he just took advantage of it that it was about love and all that, in reality he is not at all interested in love. 

The energy going down feels somehow like a bottomless pit and we need somehow to change it and get out of it. We have to see it in our own life to get a feeling for it, otherwise, we are not able to understand it.