Evolution of humanity is not a race in which one entity must defeat the others. Theosophy looks upon life on earth as a great drama: "All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players," said Shakespeare; and that is also the Theosophical view. Evolution is a drama in which every actor plays his own part, however trivial it be. Human beings differ from one another and each in his own place has to play his part. Life-evolution is team-work; it is a co-operative and not a competitive venture. The play begins and ultimately ends for all actors—that is the cycle of evolution; some enter upon the stage first, some leave it last; but the success of the whole venture depends on the merits of each.
The purpose underlying human evolution gives us a new point of view. It shows us the reason, the logic and the truth, why selfishness ends in disaster, why competition defeats its own purpose. With the perception of this real aim in human evolution we recognize that Culture of Concentration should not lead to individual and personal success so that we may establish our superiority over others, but it gives us the power to understand and evaluate everything correctly, so that our behaviour and conduct is as true and as gracious as that of Nature herself. The really cultured person is he who seeks the bonds that bind him not only to his own caste or class, to his own set or circle, but who seeks the links which unite him harmoniously, as a human soul, to all beings in the vast cosmos. The culture we need for enjoying as well as understanding life arises from that spiritual attitude of the human mind. We are ignorant and unhappy in the mind—primarily and fundamentally. Diseases of the body and agonies of the heart, pain and anguish of every type and description, are of the mind and in the mind. And what we need is the culturing of the mind.
When we look at the minds of people, starting with our own mind, we find that human beings generally suffer from two main defects: there is the wandering nature of the mind, and there is the peculiar weakness of the mind which habitually runs to small, petty things, and moves round and round in restricted circles.
Everyone complains about the wandering mind: the businessman, the society woman, the student, all recognize this mental trait and also admit that their success or failure in life is very much bound up with their concentration. The mind of everyone jumps from object to object. Why is this? What is the remedy?
Then too when people look at themselves and analyse their own habits and actions, they find that they fall much below their ideals. They wish and aspire to become better, but they seem, somehow or other, unable to get out of the narrow grooves of life. They fail to rise to the heights which they see with their own minds, and their minds remain stuck to earth, though they see the beauty and the glory of the stars. What is the remedy?
Our first task in studying the subject of the Culture of Concentration is to understand the nature of the mind which wanders from object to object, but which also wanders round and round definite grooves, which are often narrow, and mostly restricted.
When we begin to trace the wanderings of the mind, we find out that the mind follows the course dictated by the senses. Our eyes see or our ears hear something, and immediately the mind goes in the direction of or runs away from that something. So there are three factors: there is the mind, there are the senses, and there is something else—our attraction to or aversion for the objects of sense. We see something which we like, and our mind immediately thinks about that thing and feels pleasure; we see someone we do not like, and our mind runs away so as not to contact that person. All the time the mind makes contact through the senses with the objects of sense because of our likes and dislikes.
The difficulty is not with the senses, for we have evolved them for our own growth and progress; nor is the difficulty with the many objects and people around us; it is not the fault of a thing or a person that we like him or it, or dislike him or it. The difficulty is in our likes and dislikes, called in Sanskrit raga-dvesha. They are, so to speak, the very life-essence or vitality of the senses and organs. The force of desire sways the senses, and for their own satisfaction our desires draw upon and drag our mind. The mind contrives to fulfil the desires which are aroused by contact with the objects of sense. Therefore the Gita teaches:
Those enjoyments which arise through the contact of the senses with external objects are wombs of pain, since they have a beginning and an end; O Son of Kunti, the wise man delighteth not in these. (V, 22)
What then shall we do? Torture the senses as Hatha-Yogis do? Run away from the world and its many objects so that the senses may not contact them? These methods are useless and perverse. Let us learn to make the right use of the senses, not torture them. Let us also use and evaluate correctly the things of the world. For both these purposes we need the use of our mind. By mind and mind alone can we train and use the senses; again, by mind and mind alone can we ascertain the true values of all things. The attack must be on the likes and dislikes, on raga-dvesha, on our desires. In the Culture of Concentration, our attractions and aversions play an important part, one of the most important of which is presenting the mind with an object or a subject for concentration. There are many so-called concentrated minds in our civilization, but concentrated on what object or subject? What are such minds thinking of all the time? Of money, of fame, of acquiring this or obtaining that? This is most dangerous. For, when the mind has become absorbed in sense-objects, when it is following the dictates of the desires, it becomes so involved in those objects and those desires that it loses the guidance of the Soul, it weakens the very voice of conscience.
It is of primary importance therefore to ascertain the why and the wherefore of our likes and dislikes. Why do we want money? Why fame? Why this, that or the other? Moreover, the mind does not become really concentrated when it goes in the direction of the objects rather than in the direction of ideas. It becomes enslaved. People always think of objects; very few consider ideas. If the purpose of life is to learn, to gain experience, then we must take into account the learner, the soul who is gathering experience. All great teachers of the Science of the Soul have emphasized this fact. When our mind is thinking of the worldly objects dependent upon the senses, running after those objects and thus misusing the senses, pain, suffering and sorrow surely result. But when the mind turns away from the objects and goes towards ideas, ultimately it learns how to use the senses correctly, and then health of body and of mind results. But often people, turning away from objects to ideas, go to the wrong type of ideas or to false or half-true ideas, and then also pain and suffering result.
In the Culture of Concentration we have to select such ideas as would (1) enlighten and strengthen the mind; (2) enable that mind to purify and elevate the desires; and (3) train the senses so that they fulfil their real purpose of becoming fit and worthy channels for the soul-force to flow. This is the threefold task each human being has to perform if our evolution is to be brought to a successful end.
There are three truths containing important ideas that will enable us to fulfil this threefold purpose.
"The soul of man is immortal." That is the first great idea on which the mind must dwell. It is the soul that is immortal, not the body and the senses, not the mind, not the wealth and fame that we hanker after. If the soul in us is immortal, our function is to learn to know how this is true and how to live accordingly. From the dawn of evolution, the spiritual part in us is immortal; that which is gained through evolution is the understanding of that immortality, the realization that the soul is immortal and has power over all mortal things. As our mind dwells on these concepts, it lets go of the desires and the senses. They fall away from the mind, and that mind becomes enlightened. The desires become aspirations, and the senses are not merely stations for receiving impressions or messages from the outside universe, but become channels for radiating forth the light of the soul, the magnetism of the soul, that soul-power which uplifts, energizes and inspires people. Turn to the second truth.
"The principle which gives life dwells in us and without us, is undying and eternally beneficent." In this we learn that that which is in us and that which is in great Nature outside of us are one and the same. God within and God outside, Self within and Self outside, are of the same essence and substance. This is important to recognize, for it gives us the true idea of prayer. What is there in great Nature that is not in every human being? The strength and power of Nature is in man, and man's conquest over Nature is a clear proof of it. On the moral side, the compassion of Nature, the adaptability of Nature, the sensitiveness of Nature—all are possessed by every man and woman. The other great idea in this truth is that this principle of life within us and without us is beneficent. By our ignorance or by our perversity and selfishness we human beings produce evil. Wickedness is the result of the mental corruption of human beings. It is the human mind that spoils the beauty of Nature, the beneficence and graciousness of Nature. So let our minds dwell on that principle of life which unites us to all men and to the whole of Nature, and which principle is eternally beneficent, ever and always just, righteous, beautiful and gracious, provided we co-operate with it, work in harmony with its laws. When this truth is recognized by the mind, it is not difficult to grasp the meaning and significance of the third truth.
"Each man is his own absolute lawgiver." Meditation on the first two truths convinces us that neither the God of religions nor the heredity of mechanistic science made us what we are, but our own thinking in the past makes or mars us in every part of our constitution. Our past ideation made our present perceptions, created our present character, brought to birth our present body with its brain and senses. It is no use blaming God or Nature, no use finding fault with racial or family heredity, no use holding our friends and foes responsible for what is happening to us. Meditation on this truth takes away any depression, for it reveals that in the present, now and here, we ourselves can re-form our character, reshape our body, by using our mind to see differently, to understand correctly, to evaluate the world and its people more truly. Each man is his own absolute lawgiver, in every department of life.
These three truths give us the right basis for commencing the education of the soul. Culture of Concentration, like any other culture, requires a basis or foundation. To recognize himself as the maker of his own destiny, to perceive that within him is that power which manifests strength and grandeur in Nature outside, to feel in the heart the force of the soul which is immortal—all this enables us to change ourselves now and here. Let us endeavour to make of our earthly life a heavenly song.
Take care not to casually discuss matters that are of great importance to you with people who are not important to you. Your affairs will become drained of preciousness. You undercut your own purposes when you do this. This is especially dangerous when you are in the early stage of an undertaking.
Other people feast like vultures on our ideas. They take it upon themselves to blithely interpret, judge, and twist what matters most to you, and your heart sinks. Let your ideas and plans incubate before you parade them in front of the naysayers and trivializers.
Most people only know how to respond to an idea by pouncing on its shortfalls rather than identifying its potential merits. Practice self-containment so that your enthusiasm won't be frittered away.
—Epictetus