What your phone can teach you about your mind

Phone

The most ubiquitous of external devices What we anyway think of, use it to think of spiritual truths

Mind – many meanings

AttentionIntelligenceIntellectual person Non-material side

What is the mind?Gita’s tripartite model of the selfBody – Hardware Mind – SoftwareSoul – User

Distance for difference

The mind is inside us – and outside us too See from soul’s perspective, not body’s perspective

Default setting

Eg auto-correct goes incorrectLook at the mind before you look with the mind

Default setting

Change your browser’s home pageEg whatsapp message with link

Delusion

Improving hardware can’t treat corrupted software Physical progress can’t bring mental peace

Mind-brain

Mind – softwareBrain – CPUHeart – Soul – source of emotions

Origin: Who is the inner activator?

“The brain is a computer . . . But it is programmed by something that is outside itself.” - Wilder Penfield The Mystery of the Mind,

Starting point for emotions

External / physical stimulus Mental recollectionSpiritual inspiration

Brain & emotions

Every action has a physical componentEvery emotion has a neurological component

Brain & emotions

Every action has a physical componentEvery emotion has a neurological component

Chemical nirvana?

Pathologizing every human problem Eg. Cracked – Why Psychiatry is doing more harm than good by James Davies

The other extreme

Spiritual & material – complement, not replacement Eg Japa for fresh breathStructural

Mental problems

Don’t position medication for the mind & devotion as competitors Different minds have different needs

Painkiller – Antibiotic

Don’t campaign for or against the painkiller – focus on the curative medicine

Bhakti = Anti-virus program

Grants Higher wisdom&Higher happiness

Energy drainer apps

Energy draining thoughts, emotions, habits

Willpower – Finite

Don’t waste willpower on unnecessary battles

Gita 2.58

Don’t just battle over your choices – choose your battles

External adjustment: valuable starting point

Out of sight is out of mind provided the mind is out of it

Redefining freedom

Freedom comes not by having facility for unlimited choices, but by ability to make wise choices

Redefining freedom

Freedom for vs Freedom from

Redefining freedom

Freedom comes by respecting the right restrictions, not by rejecting all restrictions

Free love – self-contradiction

Love is the bond that frees us to bring out our best

Bhakti-yogaRe-condition yourself by:RepetitionPurification Revelation

Accept yourselfChange begins with acceptanceIf God had wanted us to be someone else, he would have made someone else

Repetition What we do, we tend to do – the law of inertia

PurificationMind like wall with graffiti?Scrub off?Repaint? Re-manifest

RevelationKrishna’s glories enlighten even the enlightened (10.09)

First things firstFocus on the war for devotion, not the battle against temptation

Spikes of desires What happens during the spikes doesn’t matter as much as what happens between them

Hope – fruit of faithSeek counsel from

Krishna, not the mind VSN: animish, nimish

The best youWhat we are is God’s gift to us; what we become is our gift to God

To know more

Questions www.thespiritualscientist.comDaily spiritual reflections:www.gitadaily.com