Secrets of the Body
Acharya Prashant: This body is made of finite mortal, earthly elements. What happens to this body, and where this body comes from is no secret at all. This body comes from other bodies, and all the bodies arise from the soil just as all pots arise from the soil. And who does not know what fate each of these pots meet? The soil carries no specific form. When it takes the form of a pot, then it assumes a particular name and individuality. But that name and individuality are just play things for a little while. Sooner than later, the pot again meets the same earth, and the pot and the earth become indistinguishable.
This is the peaceful, silent realization. Remember, the futility of this body; remember, how misplaced is your belief in anything valuable that can emerge from body identification.
Please understand, what is it that we say?
I, who am the body, will achieve this. I as the body, will reach there. I, who am the body, will amass wealth.
Whatsoever we want to do, we want to do as the body, whereas the body is just earth, waiting to meet the earth. It is not even waiting to meet the earth; it is already just earth — soil.
Time, as an intermediary, time as an illusion, has deceived us. We think we walk on the earth, no. There is just the earth. There is just the earth. It’s not as if you are walking on the earth. It’s not as if you have stepped on the soil. There is just the soil — soil on soil. Remember Baba Bulleh Shah? There is just soil on soil —“Maati Kudam Karendi Yaar.”
And that is the reason why I say, you see, that the Upanishads are the source of all spirituality irrespective of place, time or a particular branch of religion. Upanishads are the very core of religion — religion without any name, not any particular religion. Upanishads are the heart of religiousness itself. Now, from this heart, a lot of streams can emerge, and those streams will have names. Irrespective of what the name of the religious stream is; at its heart, sit the Upanishads — irrespective of where that stream was flowing.
That stream could have been that of the Ganga — in the alluvial plains of India; that stream could have been the Yellow River in China; that stream could have been the Danube; or that stream could even have been a desert river in the sands of Arabia — At its heart, lie the Upanishads. Therefore, if one has not studied the Upanishads, it will be very difficult to understand religion at all, any religion.
Equally, if one resonates with the Upanishads, one will be able to appreciate all religions; any and every religion, because all the streams, all the religious streams, whenever they flew and wherever they came from, they all have the same heart. The outer characteristics are different, the heart is the same, you know? Your hand definitely looks very different from your leg, and your eyes surely do not look the same as your ears, yet they are powered by the same heart. Are they not? Same is the case with all religious extensions.
That which we call as religions are not really religions; they are religious streams. They could be called as extensions of the one unified body of religion itself. So, religion is a body. One particular religion, you can call as its arm, one you can call as its nose, I mean, depends on your mood. Whatsoever is the stream, the power is coming from the Upanishads; or you could say that the power is mostly neatly expressed in the Upanishads. Therefore, the Upanishads are a must if you are a genuine seeker of the truth.
So, that’s what the body is all about. And all our life we have been just been glorifying the body itself, right? “I am your friend,” the moment I say that, what has actually been put on a pedestal? The body. I am a body, you are a body, now, friendship is a side affair; the central thing is that I have considered you and me as a body. I’m your wife or I’m your husband, what’s the foremost and central assertion here? You are a body, I am a body; whatever we have done, we have just done as bodies.
Even to God when we have prayed, we have prayed as bodies. “Oh my God, I have just come to your temple or to your church or to your mosque.” You have come to a mosque, a truth doesn’t move, what has come to some place? Obviously, the limited body. The seventy kilograms that you call as your yourself; this is me, this seventy kg is me, and I have come to the temple. This body is not you, and yet whatever you have done, you have done as the body. If you can just take away this much.
Remember, remember, remember, the Upanishads are not saying — forget your past and enjoy the present; the Upanishads are emphasizing again and again, “Don’t forget, don’t ever forget what you have been doing all your life. All your life you have been making the central mistake, and the central mistake is to think that life belongs to the body. The central mistake is to think that the body lives.”
Tell me, tell me, tell me, “I mean, he’s your friend, right? Had he had no consciousness, how valuable would he be to you?” Why, why? The body is the same. You are attracted to a woman, let’s say. If her consciousness distorts, how valuable does she remain to you? I mean, I’m not even talking of an absence of consciousness; I’m talking of just distorted consciousness. Does she remain valuable to you? And yet we behave as if the body is the real thing.
Had the body been the real thing, then you would have continued to preserve the body even after death; and today you have scientific, medical means to preserve the body for really long time. I mean, those means were there even in the days of the mummies, and today those means are far more advanced, you can preserve the body, would you do that?
Your best friend passes away, would you preserve the body? Why not? The friend is the body, you are the body, the friend is the body, and the body can be preserved, why don’t you preserve the body? “But that appears so stupid.” If that appears so stupid, then “krato smara krtam smara”—remember, this is what you have done to your friend all his life, all your life.
You have looked at him just as the body. Have you bothered to really know his real name? His real name is consciousness. His real name is the little self, the ego. I call it — the atript chetna—that’s what our one shared common name is, the real name. We all are unfulfilled consciousness.
Are you getting it?
But is that how we look at each other? No. We look at each other as bodies. And that is even more tempting if the other body is alluring, belongs to the other gender, or is alluring in some other way.
The body is of, let’s say, your little kid. Then it becomes even more difficult to look at your kid as, actually, consciousness in motion. You care for his body; do you care so much for his consciousness? Really not. The kid comes to you, the kid is hungry, and that will disturb you. Right? But what if the kid is really hungry from within, do you even detect that?
The kid returns from the playground; it’s evening time; there’s a scratch on his leg, and you will be alerted—“Oh, what is it? Where did you get it from? Let me clean the wound. Let me put some aid on it.” What if there is a mark on his consciousness, on his mind? Are you worried even a little bit?
There’s a little scratch on the body, and an alarm is raised; and so much on the mind, nobody bothers. That’s what must be remembered, that’s what we have done throughout, and that’s what we are not to do any further.
Are you getting it?
The past is a great resource; it is not to be wasted away or thrown away or forgotten. If you do not really decode your past, you are bound to repeat your past.
Are you getting it?
If you have not been able to unravel your past, then you will simply relive your past. So, for that, all the propaganda, coming from the neo-spiritual circles that say that, Past is something to be just kept aside, and you have to move on; and life is in the present, so what will you do with the past? No. Go back, return to the past again and again.
Why must you return to the past again and again? Because your fundamental tendencies have not changed. So, when you are returning to the past, you are actually looking at yourself as you are right now.
Are you getting it?
You cannot look at yourself as you are right now because in this moment, there is no space, no allowance for that. So how will you know who you are? You are someone who hasn’t really changed. Very few people really manage to transcend their old self. So, who are you? You are much the same as you were two years back, right? So, how do you know yourself? Just look at what you did two years back. That’s exactly what is happening in your life right now. Worse still, that is also what is waiting to happen tomorrow.
Unless you attend to the past, learn clearly from it, your past will just rename itself as your future. Actually, there is no future; it’s just the past returning to you in another name. And that’s the punishment you get for not learning from the past, for not remembering the past.
Therefore, the Upanishad is saying,
Om krato smara krtam smara krato smara krtam smara
and do that again and again. See how the cycle is operating within you. See how you are much the same as you were at the age of five. See how only the external stuff has changed. See how the inner tendencies have just not evolved or sublimated.
Are you getting it?
