ANGER MANAGEMENT - PART II

Consequences

Verse 2.63

krodhād bhavati sammohaḥ

sammohāt smrti-vibhramaḥ

smrti-bhraḿśād buddhi-nāśo

buddhi-nāśāt pranaśyati

Translation

From anger arises delusion, and from delusion, bewilderment of memory. When memory is bewildered, intelligence is lost, and when intelligence is lost, one falls down again into the material pool.

This is also a four step process as illustrated below:

1.      When anger takes over the better side of us, we are in total delusion.

2.      We feel disoriented, completely confused and unsure as to what is going through our minds.

3.      We lose our capacity to use our intelligence diligently and end up doing things we shouldn’t do.

4.      This results in our final fall down to a point of no recovery.

Solution

Each of us might have our own way of controlling anger like going for a walk, reading a book, listening to music or just remaining silent.  Each of these techniques might be working very well for us. But do they work all the time? That is something known only to the individual exercising those techniques.

Although these options may work at times, they are not foolproof. This is because we are trying to exercise the techniques after anger has taken over our intelligence, basically to suppress the emotion rather than stopping it from arising in the first place. The reason that these options are not faultless is because we try to fight our senses singlehandedly.

We pretty much underestimate the power of our senses. Krishna says that the senses are so strong and impetuous that they forcibly carry away the mind even of a man of discrimination who is endeavoring to control them – verse 2.60. And that even one roaming sense is enough to sway our intelligence – verse 2.67.

Our senses are responsible for our incessant flow of desires and we have to remain undisturbed, just as an ocean, which is ever still even when the rivers flow into it.

In fact, Arjuna asks this very same question to Krishna,

‘Why do we still commit sinful acts as if engaged by force?’

Krishna answers that the root cause of this problem is lust or desire alone, which when unsatisfied, turns into anger. This is stated beautifully in the following verse:

Verse 3.37

kāma esa krodha esa

rajo-guna-samudbhavaḥ

mahāśano mahā-pāpmā

viddhy enam iha vairinam

Translation

It is lust only, Arjuna, which is born of contact with the material modes of passion and later transformed into wrath, and which is the all-devouring, sinful enemy of this world.

Lust is our eternal enemy that can never be satisfied. Our senses are responsible for our incessant flow of desires. This being the cause of wrath, we have to understand where lust actually resides within this human body and then how to curb it. 

Verse 3.40 of the Bhagavad Gita explains that the residential quarters of lust are our senses, mind and intelligence.

Now that we have identified our true enemy, we have to look at ways to conquer this very powerful enemy in the form of lust, and the good news is that we don’t have to do it all alone.

Verse 6.35

asamsayam maha-baho
mano durnigraham calam
abhyasena tu kaunteya
vairagyena ca grhyate

Translation

O mighty-armed son of Kunti, it is undoubtedly very difficult to curb the restless mind, but it is possible by constant practice and by detachment.

Krishna advises us to do that by-

Ø  Regulating our senses by engaging them in the service of the Lord. Or at least withdraw our senses when they should not be used – remember the example of the tortoise we spoke about in the introduction? Withdrawing our senses can be very difficult, given our mind does the job of all our senses singlehandedly - at times by imagining and concocting things. Therefore,

Ø  We must endeavour to steady our minds by deliberate spiritual intelligence – Verse 3.43 - evaḿ buddhehparaḿ buddhvā saḿstabhyātmānam ātmanā.

Thus knowing oneself to be transcendental to material senses, mind and intelligence, one should control the lower self by the higher self and thus--by spiritual strength, conquer this insatiable enemy known as lust.

Ø  Spiritual strength is the only way to conquer this eternal enemy. Therefore it is absolutely essential that each and every one of us look at ways to develop this strength which lies dormant within us.

And unless we curb lust, it is next to impossible to conquer anger which is simply a manifestation of unsatisfied desires.

In the posts to come, we will talk about how we can develop our spiritual strength by developing a higher taste.