Chapter 2: Sānkhya Yoga – Yoga of Contemplation on Self / Verse 70

Ordinary people have only a well-like mind, whereas the Knower’s mind is like the ocean. The seeker has to nurture his mind so well that it resembles the vast, deep sea, into which incessantly pour in a number of rivers from different directions in varying widths and depths. He must learn to interact with the world, remaining all the while unperturbed by whatever transpires and whatever impact it brings about, like the sea unmoved by the rivers’ inflow of varying intensities.

Krishna’s illustration, when closely reflected upon, makes the mind grow greater and greater spiritual dimensions.

No river is the least different from the sea, in content. Both are water. Vapour rising from the sea, spreads and hovers in the sky. Moved by winds, it goes up and gets cooled, to shed as rain, which falling on mountain tops forms rivulets, and flows, finding its course. With tributaries, it becomes huge, gushing into the sea.

Due to its vastness and depth, the sea assimilates all the inflow, to remain unmoved, infusing its salinity to the inflow, and being one with it.

Like the sea, the Knower also assimilates all interactional impacts, enhancing his vastness, depth and assimilativeness. Truly, no object from outside ever enters one’s mind. It is always one’s own response and reaction that one has to assimilate, like the sea does its rivers. Mind forms object imprints every time, and it can assimilate them also. Where is any problem then?

It is sheer ignorance, delusion, that causes interactional agitations and tensions. Knowledge of oneness, same-ness, will dissolve all conflicts and confrontations. Be like the sea, vast and deep, and remain unruffled!

To desire anything is redundant. Any kind of joy, satisfaction, is a creation of the mind. Knowing so, develop your joy spiritually, and be like the sea in your interactional life. Such a one, the Sthitadhee, is the model human for all times!