Hansaji Talking on ‘Brahmacharya’

“This topic is something which is very much misunderstood. Usually Brahmacharya is taken to mean celibacy, not getting married, to become a Brahmachari (as the word comes from there). All our saints and sages were householders. Brahmacharis were more of a sect, which was for the training of our mind. And they were living for a purpose, and so that marriage would not be a distraction for them, they had a different path.

There are various paths for self-development and naturally, one was this, of remaining alone, work on yourself alone and very often, do a good amount of Sadhanas (practices). Earlier, many people used to do this, but then, society was getting affected, families were getting affected and the country was going in a different direction where the philosophy of work was not given importance. Self-evolution and self-development was given importance separately, when it was clear that through work too you can develop yourself.

Now this part, that you can reach the highest through work, was brought out in the Bhagwad Gita. Here was another path – do your work and through work, you will get everything, name, fame, money, position, self-development, God realization, everything would come through work. Work is worship, it is a treatment, it is your own Sadhana. Work works wonders and once you start working, the family, the society, nation, humanity would be taken care of. With just being separately alone as a Brahmachari, these things were not feasible, unless the Brahmachari had something else to do for the society.

So Brahman is the highest reality, i.e. consciousness. Universal consciousness, your own consciousness…so being with your own consciousness, keeping it in mind and doing the work is mentioned. In whatever work you do, your mind should be tuned with the highest reality. This consciousness can be called as the soul, Atma, Chaitanyata, etc. But awareness of this comes only when a person is in a level-headed Sattvik state.

Now here comes the expression of natural love. Every person is born with two basic characteristic. Every child is an embodiment of love. Love is visible in care. The mother starts caring for the child. So when you say that you love somebody, you show that love by caring. If you really love a flower, you should give some water to the roots of the plant. Then you would be caring for the flower, otherwise you would just pluck the flower and enjoy the sight till it is fresh and once it gets bad, you will throw it out. Love is not this, it is caring. So we understand this care through the mother.

The second aspect of every human is charity. We want to help. If somebody is suffering, naturally we would like to do something about it. We don’t have to teach that. If a child is given a doll, and its hand is broken, how much she cares and is affected if the doll is not in the right state.

So these are natural, instinctive feelings. But in human life, we have to understand the purpose behind it. We have to see that we don’t get lost into it. If a mother loves and cares for a child to such an extent that she wouldn’t allow her child to step down, she would carry her in her arms all the time, the child would not learn to walk and run. So what must she do, bring detachment along with it, allow it to grow, take the child to school when the child doesn’t want to go and is crying.

So if you really care for someone, then you should make sure that that person becomes self-reliant and is not dependent on you. So automatically you are trying to detach yourself, see things objectively. Attachment is a very strong Klesha, something which is going to create problems. So understand the difference between love, possession and me and mine to care and detachment. So keeping this point in mind we have to move ahead in life.

All our sensory organs are supposed to be used with a purpose, including the sex organs because they are organs of action. If you remember the purpose in mind while eating food, you will not overeat or eat wrong food. You are eating to get nutrition and to survive. It is your duty to eat regularly so that you remain healthy, happy, full of vigour and enthusiasm.

You are listening to beautiful music but the purpose is relaxation and feeling in tune with higher reality. So automatically your selection of music would be different. Gandhiji used to always sing one song written by Narsiha Mehta which said that every person who is a good human being, any other woman except his wife, is his mother. So when we see other women as a mother, respect and a sense of care automatically comes and not sexual demands.

With your own wife, you have your responsibilities and duty. If you want a child, sexual activity is required, otherwise even that is not required according to us. What is required is care. There was a survey conducted where men and women were separately asked about sex and why there was so much violence in the world. The ladies mostly said that “We don’t enjoy intercourse so much. We enjoy oneness, togetherness, coziness and care. We want that from our husband, not anything else.” This was quite a strong statement given by a majority of the ladies. If the husband can come and sit close to you and openly talk and share, it is more important, not sexual activities.

So the purpose of sexual activity is to have a baby. So we should not get into wrong thinking. Nowadays, young people, after reading about these things in books, etc. feel that “If you love me, you should be doing these sexual activities.” This is absolutely wrong. I remember one couple where it is expected that of you perform sexual activities on the first night of your wedding then the marriage is consummated. But the boy refused as he didn’t know the girl at all, so first let us know each other, care for and live for each other and then the sexual activity may come on the way if we want a baby. But the girl was very upset with it and took a divorce. It is the clarity of thinking, that you cannot behave like an animal doing sexual activity with anybody and everybody.

So what I’m trying to say is that our thinking has to be superior, above the human body and its pleasures. Keep the purpose in mind and things would be very different. So understand this topic in that fashion and I think we would be going in the right direction.”

– Smt. Hansaji J. Yogendra

Satsang is an open meeting held every Sunday from 9:30 to 10:30 am at The Yoga Institute, Santacruz East, Mumbai. It involves an interesting presentation to the public, made by the students of the Teacher Training Course. Each week, a new presentation of a Yogic concept is made in a simple way through skits and decoration for the general public, followed by a short speech from our Gurus, Dr. Jayadeva and Smt. Hansaji Yogendra.