In the previous episode, we had witnessed Bhagawan Krishna making yet another big declaration as He’s in the process of explaining how to see all living beings equally. Bhagawan says that when all of us perform various kinds of spiritual offerings, irrespective of who does what, all of them reach Bhagawan Krishna only. Hence, as He receives all these offerings, Bhagawan never differentiates between who does what. He accepts all the offerings from all people equally without any differentiation. Moreover, Bhagawan also explains that He is someone who always keeps thinking about the welfare of all living beings equally at all times – Just like a mother or a father would not differentiate between their two children at home,Bhagawan being the divine father treats all His children (Bhaktas) equally.
This is what we call in Sanskrit as “Souhardham”, which means, “Always thinking good for others at all times”. We should make a strong introspection here – Is this characteristic relevant in today’s scenario? Even within our family, do we see everyone with an attitude of “welfare”? In many families, the sad reality today is that, even parents and children, brothers and sisters fight amongst each other in the name of “property” and “money”, isn’t it? Why is this happening? It is because of “jealousy” that we’ve developed over time. The moment we see someone having a better lifestyle than us, we immediately start thinking thus, “Oh wow! Till yesterday this fellow was a popper and today look at how lavish his lifestyle has become! He is very lucky to get a job that gives him enormous money, whereas, I’m not that lucky enough to earn more than what I am earning today!” This is the typical jealousy that all of us have today. Thus, even within the close family and friends’ circle, if we’ve to go and meet elders to secure their blessings on any festival eve, do people really bless us with their hearts? Many times, the answer is “No”! The moment someone sees us better than themselves, they immediately start feeling jealous, rather than feeling happy for us, don’t they? This is where all of us in society go wrong! The moment we start seeing people with jealousy, this paves the way for further arguments, fights and breaking up of our own families!
This is exactly what Duryodhana did too, didn’t he? The moment he started feeling jealous about Yudishtra’s growth in stature as a righteous king, he was unable to digest it and the resultant of this jealousy is where all of them are standing against each other at Kurukshetra, ready to fight a war! Now we can see here as to how jealousy ultimately leads to a disastrous war, which would ultimately lead to a mass destruction. This is why Bhagawan includes this point during the concluding part of this “Sanyaasa Yoga” (Fifth Adhyaaya). If we are able to view each other as equals, automatically the jealousy aspect would go down, which in turn would result in a peaceful way of living. Of course, in today’s context none of us are going to wage a war against each other as Duryodhana and Co. did, but this jealousy leads to the unfortunate breakdown of the entire family system in our society, isn’t it? Just because one of our brothers or sisters are doing well in their lives, does it mean that we will feel jealous of them? Rather, if we’re also interested in achieving a similar lifestyle, we should work and put efforts accordingly to secure one. There is no use of feeling jealous about somebody else’s growth, which will only ultimately hamper our own growth and peace of mind.
Hence, Bhagawan Krishna’s point of contention is very clear – Irrespective of various differences that we might have amongst each other, we should be able to see the “Atman” inside all of us, and thereby we should accept everyone equally. This is the point that I too wanted to highlight once again, keeping the present-day context in mind as part of this episode. Hence for today, let us understand this point clearly and we shall wait till the next episode to continue this discussion further! Stay tuned! 🙂
The Indian Dharma 