Once there were two monks—a Guru and a śishya—who lived in seclusion in a forest. One day, the disciple visited a nearby village and came back and reported that he saw the villagers fight among themselves. As he was not used to the ways of the world, he was perplexed as to why they were fighting. On hearing this, the master snatched the śishya’s kamaṇḍalu and said, “This is mine.” The śishya replied happily, “Yes, Guruji, please take it. It is yours.” The Guru smiled at the innocence of the disciple and said, “Dear child, if you do not have a possessive attitude (my‑ness), it is impossible to explain to you the cause of conflict. There is no way you will even understand why fighting happens in the world. This ‘my-ness’ is the cause of all sorrows and conflicts.”

The chief cause for sorrow (vishāda) is this ‘my-ness’. Anything we hold on to as ‘mine’ is saṃsāra; it will bind us. Gross possessions such as house, wealth, family, and subtle possessions such as name and fame are the chains we bind ourselves with. A person reads about the death of many in the obituary column of the newspaper yet remains unaffected. The same person is deeply affected when something befalls his near and dear ones. Thus, our pain is not objective; it is subjective. Only when it is related to us in some way, it becomes a problem. Mine-ness is the seed of sorrow. The deeper the ‘my-ness’, the greater the sorrow.

What is the way out of this maze we have built within ourselves?

~ An excerpt from Srimad Bhagavad Gita | Elixir of Eternal Wisdom by Sri Nochur Acharya

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