Hi James,
I’m 22 years old and I discovered Vedanta one year ago through your disciple Andre Vas. I realized the ordinary awareness which I am by attending his excellent Gita course. Subsequently, I fell in love with knowledge and started getting more and more into your blog, the satsang section of ShiningWorld.com. Recently I also bought your Non-dual relationships video with Sundari, and I plan to buy the Panchadasi soon too, as I do a systematic daily study of Vedanta – Isvara blessed me with sufficient time to do so.
James: Good for you! Sundari wrote an excellent book, The Yoga of Relationships. If you donate 15 euros to ShiningWorld and send your address to me I will send you a paperback copy. I think you will benefit from it because it gets into the whole relationships issue in detail, particularly the love issue, which doesn’t get much attention in this email. Sex and loneliness are definitely related to love, which is the nature of the Self. There is definitely a difference between love and sex.
I really appreciate your straightforward approach to Vedanta and especially your modern, casual way of speaking, which makes satsang very relatable. I consider myself really lucky to have stumbled across the absolute knowledge at this young age and have teachers like you and Andre available.
James: God is great, Mike. You are lucky, considering how most young people are chasing experiences, not knowledge.
So much for general info about the jiva, I want to keep it as brief as possible as I strongly value your time. My question is concerning relationships, which I felt you’d be the best fit to ask you about this.
The jiva Mike feels that now is the right time to date girls. When looking at the underlying motivation, my intellect’s evaluation is that it’s not a binding vasana, as I could just as well not do it. As a student at university very busy with exams right now, I would do this in the study break during a time when I would have a lot of free time anyway – enough for the doer to incorporate study of Vedanta and go out with someone.
The main motivation would be to find a relationship where we could lend each other limited emotional support and perhaps travel together from time to time, as I just moved out from my parents. The jiva still feels kind of lonely sometimes, and clearly there’s a hormonal/sexual motivation, which arises perhaps on a weekly basis. I don’t have experience with long-term romantic relationships; my few experiences up to now with girls have been rather short-term sexually charged adventures, mostly when I didn’t know Vedanta.
James: Well, the point is to keep it non-binding, which isn’t all that easy when sex and loneliness are tangled up. If any relationship is going to work, it needs to be done as karma yoga otherwise you will lose sight of your goal, moksa. Contacting objects is naturally permitted in the first stage of karma yoga, as standing up to the desire required in the second stage is out of your reach at present.
Once you get the zero-sum aspect of relationships it is easy to take the needy feelings with a grain of salt. Of course you need to be honest with women about your ultimate goal, which will limit the field unless you date someone who just wants to hook up, no strings attached. But this doesn’t solve the loneliness problem, of course. You need to always keep in mind that everything in life is zero-sum, which is a curse from the worldly point of view and a blessing from the spiritual point of view. Having said that and considering your age and circumstances you need to throw that needy horny dog a bone now and then or your mind will get pretty uncomfortable.
Also, I don’t expect fullness from a relationship, as I know any experiential fullness would be just a pale reflection of my own ananda. But seeing the current circumstances, it intuitively seems like the right thing to do to act out this desire, being determined to act it out – if I would do it – in a dharmic way for her and me, and having this free time on my hand. After all, self realization also confers freedom to do or not to do, right?
James: Yes, but you need to make sure you aren’t using Vedanta to delude yourself. The fact is you are determined to do it anyway. So it’s better to just say that these vasanas are actually compelling you.
On the other side, I know my mind still needs some polishing to get the experiential benefits of knowledge, and I certainly wouldn’t want the dating/subsequent relationship to get into the way of this journey.
James: You’re pretty mature for 25. Good idea. Nothing is more important than looking after your spiritual needs. Even if you do get sidetracked, you will come back to Vedanta in the fulness of time, but why take a chance? The smart thing is to see any and all relationships through the karma yoga filter. It’s a win-win. You enjoyably take care of the vasana business and mature at the same time.
So the question would be: could it just be my svadharma right now as a young man to actively go out, approach and date girls dharmically to find a loving relationship? Or should I just surrender this part of my life to Isvara, to let him present the right girl into my life if and when it’s in the jiva’s best interest?
This is the only issue where I lack clarity and the intellect just can’t come to a definite conclusion, wiggling between “do it!” and don’t do it. It kind of stifles the jiva. Perhaps Isvara in the form of James can help me. Please also consider my ego’s still quite rajasic bias in what I wrote. Thank you so much!
James: Yes, to question 1. Now to question 2. Isvara is the unknown factor in every situation. You should always surrender everything to Isvara if you want Isvara’s help. Pray for a girl that appreciates a spiritual partner and see what Isvara sends, keeping in mind that Isvara is both dharma and adharma, meaning It is not above tricking you. So stay alert and allow what happens to teach you dispassion and discrimination. You will probably have to work through any number of women to get the right one, so don’t jump the gun and grab the first one that shows interest. Be cool. Patience pays off in spades.
Mike: Thank you for your answer! I especially appreciate your honesty and the fact that you’ve reassured me that satisfying this desire is OK at my age, as long as I do it in a karma yoga attitude, surrendering the results to the field. Indeed it seems like all the insecurity whether I should go about acting in the field to satisfy this need or not delayed my journey up to now.
Concerning the other things, like money and power, experience already taught me of its emptiness and the zero-sum aspect you’ve mentioned.
Almost the same thing goes for long-term romantic relationships, intellectually and from the experience of others I clearly know it’s zero-sum as well.
James: You’re a smart guy if you learn from observing others. Most people are too self-obsessed to see that we are all the same fool. Yes, you have to mess up once or twice but this love/relationship issue brings jivas down to their knees like none other. People in their seventies and eighties still look for love.
But it feels like I do need to go out and experience this at least once in my life, because every time I try to apply nididhyasana to this desire, it just feels like Isvara istelling me: “Hey man, on an absolute level you are full and complete here and now. But Felix is young, this is the thing appropriate to do for you now, according to your upbringing and your culture.” Plus, I’ve already made the experience how quiet and peaceful the mind can get in an instant, once it realizes how the whole value it attached to a certain object/situation in reality is only its own projection.
James: Controlling the mind with the knowledge “I am ever-full existence shining as consciousness” is jnana yoga. It’s fast and efficient. If you were at that level you wouldn’t be writing me about insecurity issues. But your circumstances require karma yoga because the confluence of the loneliness and the sex vasana has already convinced you that you need to act. Karma yoga takes care of insecurities and sets the stage for jnana yoga
Will keep in mind the honesty aspect and the karma yoga attitude you’ve mentioned while dating women, and also continue studying the scriptures, which is clearly number one in my life anyway. Having experienced the liberating effect of Self-Knowledge in all fields of life and knowing this is the path for me is simply the greatest gift for the jiva.
James: It’s hard to be honest when vasanas are driving your actions. Karma yoga is only karma yoga if you are committed to moksa. Once you are committed to Vedanta, life becomes joyful because the seeking stops and every situation is an entertaining experiment…no big deal.
Otherwise I’ll be happy to support your work in every way I can in the future, too.
James: Cool. Looking after teachers and the teaching is one of the most important karma yoga daily rituals.
You can post this on your blog if you think others could benefit from it!
I will post it. It’s an important issue. I enjoyed writing it. It will benefit others.
Love,
James