food that aids spiritual living

Food that aids Spiritual Living

 

 

“Eat to live… Do not live to eat!” This wise saying seems to have its roots in our ancient scriptural texts. Recognizing that our body, mind and spirit are undeniably interconnected leads to the understanding that what we do to one aspect of our ‘being’ will impact the others. A logical next step is to treat the body, including its diet, in a way that will affect the way we think and support our spiritual growth. Food should not merely nourish the physical body, but also energize the human Spirit. Human thought cannot be united with the Spirit if the body is burdened with food that is inconsistent with such unity. This logical and clear truth becomes more and more obscured with the present day clamor for gross satiation.

Fasting and feasting have long since been associated with sacred festivals of all religions. It is becoming more and more evident to all that what we do or do not ‘eat’ impacts our spiritual well-being. Ancient sages and saints have long been known to fast as penance or to ‘cleanse’ their bodies, regarded as the temple of the spirit. Fasting has always held an important place for those who wish to fine tune the connection between the spiritual and the physical. After fasting, a person’s mind is more clear, they say, and the extra-sensory perception more keen when the digestive system is not drawing so heavily on the energy supply.

‘Feasting’ together on the other hand, nurtures the ties that humans need to feel connected and integrated socially. The gathering of a like-minded community, centered around a joyous sharing of food, brings people together in a way that few other things can!

What then should one eat? What is the effect different foods have on our thinking and behaviour? What are the foods that are spiritually elevating? Lord Krishna has elaborated on all these aspects of life in the Srimadbhagavad Gita. As He differentiates between Tamsik, Rajsik and Satvik foods, it becomes clearer that a spiritual aspirant must necessarily opt for a diet that elevates higher thinking.

Param Pujya Ma, in her elucidation of the Gita, Chapter 16/16 explains these Truths further:

1. One who eats too much does not achieve yoga.

2. One who eats too little also does not achieve yoga.

3. Nor does one who starves himself attain yoga.

4. The complete cessation of experiencing the material world does not ensure yoga. It is the attachment with the sense objects that has to be annihilated.

5. Eating in excess promotes disease and laziness; it increases attachment and the appetite of the taste buds.

6. Starving oneself will only bring about extreme weakness and the inability to concentrate or meditate.

7. To concentrate on eating or fasting is in fact sheer foolishness.

The Yogi does not concentrate on the food he partakes. He eats as much as is necessary to promote yoga. He eats within limits.

In Chapter 17/8, Param Pujya Ma elucidates thus:

The Lord first speaks of the sattvic diet.

Those foods which promote longevity, the strength of Truth, health, happiness and love, which are succulent, warmth giving, substantial and dear to the heart, are the foods which are favoured by the sattvic people.

We need to first understand the full connotation of the word aahaar or food:

Aahaar

1. That which we consume.

2. That which strengthens or reduces any of our qualities.

3. That which influences our qualities.

All these come within the scope of aahaar.

Aahaar serves to strengthen the intellect and also to veil it. The food of thought can initiate several negative forces and can also strengthen them. It can also annihilate several negative tendencies.

Every foodstuff comprises certain qualities that become our aahaar and strengthen us within. These qualities are both gross and subtle. So also, food can strengthen not only the gross body but also the subtle being.

1. Food is one kind of aahaar.

2. Circumstances are also a type of aahaar.

3. Knowledge and ignorance, too, are aahaar.

4. That which purifies and that which renders impure – all these are varied kinds of aahaar.

Every object is replete with qualities. Every object influences us. Every quality constitutes an aahaar for us. Every object strengthens or debilitates some qualities within us. Mental knots also increase on the basis of aahaar. Both positive and negative thoughts are foodstuffs of the mind.

Sattvic Aahaar

The diet of one who is predominantly sattvic:

1. Such a diet augments the attribute of sattva within that person.

2. Such a diet encourages the growth of virtue in the one who partakes of it.

The real aahaar of the one in whom the quality of sattva predominates is yagyashesh – or the residuum of his deeds performed in the spirit of devotional offering (As expanded on in Chp.3, shloka 13). What will be the mental intake of that sattvic individual? Such a one generally gives minimal attention to gross dietary intake.

1. Such people are not fettered by the enjoyment of physical tastes.

2. Their attention is drawn towards something other than physical tastes or gross food.

3. Such people desire to transcend the body-self.

4. They seek to return the body to the Lord, believing that it was His in the first place.

5. They desire to live only in order to pursue spiritual practice.

6. They desire longevity only in order to perform yagya.

7. With perfect control, they partake of that food which nourishes the body, enabling them to remain alive to attain the attributes of the Supreme with the objective of union with the Supreme Lord.

The Lord has categorised that foodstuff as sattvic, which increases one’s longevity. He has proclaimed sattvic food to be one that grants health and freedom from disease.

The mental intake of such a one is also sattvic.

1. Such a one does not partake of the ‘food’ of evil conduct.

2. He does not partake of food that pollutes the mind-stuff.

3. He does not take food that will increase mental knots and complexes.

4. He does not partake of a diet that increases ignorance.

5. He does not wish to be influenced by any circumstance or situation because he does not want the ‘intake’ of external influences to taint his intellect.

6. He seeks to remain healthy at the levels of both mind and intellect.

First understand what is disease:

1. Impurity of the mind-stuff is a mental disease.

2. Ignorance is a disease of the intellect.

3. Mental knots constitute a disease of the very core of man – his Self.

4. Desire too, is a disease.

5. Actually, attachment too, is a disease.

One who possesses a sattvic tendency:

a) does not partake of a diet that enhances any of the above;

b) does not ingest a diet of hypocrisy and arrogance;

c) does not eat a diet of pride of name and fame.

He seeks out a diet of knowledge that will eliminate ignorance and augment patience, strength and enthusiasm.

He imbibes the food of such knowledge which:

a) apprises him of his duty;

b) makes him compassionate;

c) helps him eliminate sorrow;

d) teaches forgiveness;

e) augments love and happiness;

f) increases the degree of Truth and fortitude in his life.

The diet of the divine qualities is yagyashesh – the residuum of actions performed as yagya. The diet of the individual who abides in sattva is also yagyashesh. Yagya has to be performed personally. Thus this diet too, has to be prepared personally.

1. The joy derived from loving is yagyashesh.

2. Yagyashesh is the consequence of acts of forgiveness, compassion, mercy etc.

3. Yagyashesh is the residue of joy derived from alleviating the pain of another.

4. The residuum of tender affection such as a parent has for the child, is yagyashesh.

5. Yagyashesh is the fruit of selflessness.

Only the one who prepares this diet of yagyashesh himself can partake of it.

Having attained such a purified diet of yagyashesh, the individual:

a) attains equanimity;

b) becomes devoid of all enmity;

c) becomes devoid of desire;

d) becomes eternally satiated;

e) becomes indifferent towards his own body, mind and intellect unit;

f) becomes free of meum and attachment;

g) becomes inwardly silent.

All thought processes, both negative and positive, cease.

It is said that sattvic people ‘cook their own food.’ That means

1. If you forgive you will get sattvic nourishment.

2. Your sincerity towards others helps to ‘cook’ the diet of yagyashesh.

3. If you serve others, then your food of yagyashesh is prepared.

4. If you perform your duty, your diet of yagyashesh is ready.

Dharma

Yagya and a life of duty constitute dharma. But remember, that which is the residual result of such practice is yagyashesh.

1. One’s capacity of forbearance increases only with the practice of endurance.

2. Love is the outcome of the practice of loving.

3. Happiness increases only when one gives happiness.

Such ‘sattvik’ or ‘enlightening’ foods are a source of delight for the one who abides in sattva. Juicy and energy and warmth giving:

a) Love is such a food.

b) The result of the practice of love yields such fruit.

c) That residuum which remains when one loves, is juicy, and warmth and energy giving.

Such food is indeed substantial and long lasting.

That which is long lasting yet does not become stale, that food lies within. Such stable and unchanging foodstuff must be:

a) vivek or the faculty that discerns;

b) yagyashesh – the outcome of yagya;

c) the proof of a life lived in the spirit of yagya;

d) dharma itself.

Adherence to dharma is the yagyashesh, the food that is ever fresh, that increases man’s happiness and love. Those who can mould their lives in the cast of yagya do not bother about what physical food they ingest.

In Chapter 17/9, Param Pujya Ma elucidates:

The Lord says, “Listen! I shall now elaborate on the rajsic diet.” Rajsic and tamsic people are replete with demonic attributes. Therefore let us first discuss the demonic diet.

Bitter, sour, salty, excessively hot, pungent, dry and caustic foods which give rise to sorrow, suffering and disease are the foods which are dear to the rajsic being.

The gross diet of people of varied lands is diverse.

1. It differs in accordance with the climate.

2. It differs in accordance with the varied resources.

3. It differs according to the digestive capacities of different people.

4. It differs in accordance with the individual’s bodily requirements.

Generally this gross diet has very little effect on a person’s disposition to sorrow, remorse etc. So obviously the diet that the Lord is referring to is of a different nature.

Every man can produce his own (subtle) food. The intake of a demonic being comprises pride, arrogance etc.

Now let us consider the food that augments anger, greed and desire.

1. What kind of intake will enhance conceit and delusion?

2. What is the diet which promotes deceit, treason, arrogance and wickedness?

3. Which is the food that increases one’s tendency to lose one’s temper, to be jealous and to malign others?

4. What will be the diet that enhances hard-heartedness and indifference?

Param Pujya Ma further explains:

A man ‘cooks’ his own food – this means that what he offers to another:

a) he partakes of that same ‘diet’ in a subtle manner;

b) his intellect absorbs that same quality.

Just as:

1. Any tyranny you perpetrate on account of your self esteem, will in fact nourish your pride; your negative qualities will flourish on account of your tyrannical nature.

2. Any atrocities you commit on account of your innate wickedness will yield an inevitable result – the strengthening of your own wickedness.

The energy that spurs the rajsic being into action comprises of:

a) Greed and desire;

b) Pride, hypocrisy and arrogance;

c) Selfishness and the desire for self-aggrandisement.

1. Those who are replete with these tendencies, use the other merely for selfish gain.

2. They do not reflect on the trauma the other suffers in the bargain.

3. They are given to temper and attachment to desire.

4. They are pretenders and full of extremely sinful qualities.

5. They are full of malevolent and contemptuous attributes.

6. They are full of arrogant and hypocritical traits.

A pungent diet of the Rajsic

1. Their diet is extremely pungent and bitter.

2. Their diet is disagreeable – one can say it consists of harsh speech.

3. They are critical and prone to speaking and hearing unpleasant and bitter words.

4. They are ungrateful. They attack the very people who helped them and then they forsake their benefactors.

5. They hurl all kinds of accusations on the very person who has helped to establish them.

6. They have varied worldly interests.

7. They are full of criticism.

When they treat others in this manner, on the subtle level they receive the same food in return from others. As a result, their tyrannical qualities are strengthened.

It is clear that whatever one cooks and serves the other, one eats the same food oneself. If one prepares a diet of sorrow for another, one strengthens one’s attribute of generating sorrow. Just as the remnant of the sattvic diet and its consequent action is the fragrance of the Supreme Self, so also, the diet of the tamsic being and the despicable deeds it generates, results in a putrid and foul smelling residue.

Sour Food

Such people savour sour food, that is, food that sours another’s mind. Rajsic tendencies are strengthened by such food that sours others.

Such people:

a) are hard hearted and hence ‘sour’;

b) are deceitful, shameless, tyrannical, hard and merciless – thus they can be described as ‘sour’;

c) are ill tempered themselves and also provoke anger in others. Thus their own tendency towards anger is nurtured.

A salty diet

Such people cook excessively salty food.

1. They sprinkle salt on another’s wounds.

2. They speak harsh words that cause sorrow to others.

3. They speak a language that causes injury to others.

4. They cause distress to whosoever comes in their path.

5. They take advantage of the poor and torture them further in their penury – rubbing salt on their wounds of poverty.

6. They desert those who are enmeshed in difficulties.

7. They turn away from their duty and hurt their parents.

8. The son deprives his parents of their son – such are the wounds they inflict.

9. The child denounces his parents – sprinkling salt on their wounds.

Excessively hot food

Such people are used to eating extremely ‘hot food’. Anger too, is hot. It has the power to burn.

a) It consumes the other.

b) It burns the intellect.

c) It destroys all the virtuous and good qualities.

The speech and the actions of such people verily burn the other, reducing happy homes to ashes.

Caustic food

Those who are predominantly rajsic, partake of such food.

1. Harshness is their diet.

2. Their interaction is therefore full of negative energy.

3. Their intellect is sharp but reserved only for selfish purposes.

4. Their astute intellect is used merely for the downfall of the other.

5. Their sharpness becomes like an arrow for the other.

6. The sharpness of this attribute causes great sorrow.

7. The speech of such people is also sharp and pierces the other.

8. The deeds of such a one are fierce; they are deeds that destroy others.

Such are the ways of the avaricious, who are full of desire. Such is the effect of the rajsic diet. Food cooked by the rajsic further strengthens the rajsic qualities in them.

Dry food

Dry and insipid beings are rajsic in nature.

1. They are not concerned whether the other lives or dies.

2. They are not concerned when another is in agony before their very eyes.

3. Immersed in arrogant pride, they bow low only for their selfish gain.

4. When their selfish purpose is accomplished, they dry up, they look away – they have no further interest.

5. The blood of their parents runs in their veins but they cannot spare it even for their own kith and kin.

6. No relationship matters to them no matter howsoever close it may be. They recognise relations only for their selfish needs.

7. They do not even know the term ‘duty’.

Such people can only spread sorrow.

Burning hot food

The diet of the rajsic being is burning hot.

1. It inflames the minds of others.

2. Filled with hatred and inspired by jealousy such people aim only at reducing the other to ashes.

3. They cause extreme agony to others.

4. Their language is sharply critical and full of sarcasm.

5. These highly critical people denounce others and heap insult and calumny upon them.

6. They are eternal enemies of other people and cause constant friction.

1. The use of a quality is its nourishment.

2. The use of a quality causes it to increase.

3. The use of a quality augments that quality.

4. The use of a quality is its sustenance.

The fire of the attribute of rajas leaves the individual ever unsatisfied. The fire of desire causes perpetual dissatisfaction. Such individuals scorch others with the flame of their desire and thus perpetuate their own cravings and discontent.

The Lord says that it is this diet which is naturally dear to the one who is predominantly rajsic. Such people, who are ever given to desires, cravings and worldly indulgences, give nothing but sorrow and pain to all. They perpetually bring on new mental illnesses, because they are constantly attacking others.

Now the Lord speaks of the tamsic diet.

In Chapter 17/10 it is clarified,

Half-cooked, parched, putrid, stale, polluted and impure – such is the diet that is dear to those who are predominantly tamsic.

First consider the natural traits of a tamsic being:

a) Pride of the body and moha.

b) Ignorance and sheer blindness.

c) Bound by sloth.

d) Afflicted by laziness and sleep.

e) Inaction.

f) The tendency to embrace imaginary principles.

g) Oblivious to duty.

A tamsic diet

1. Such people eat stale food cooked by others.

2. They partake of uncooked food.

3. They eat food that is decaying.

4. They eat food that should have been eaten much earlier.

5. They partake of food that has lost its essence.

6. They eat half-cooked food.

7. They eat food that is tainted.

8. They partake of food that is of no use to anyone.

9. They eat that food which is polluted and causes disease.

10. They eat food that augments ignorance.

Tamsic knowledge

1. Their knowledge is based on delusion.

2. Their knowledge is based on meaningless books.

3. Their knowledge is devoid of thought and consideration.

4. Such knowledge comprises of thoughts stolen from another and lacks personal experience. Therefore this knowledge is never complete.

5. Their statements are full of half-cooked knowledge.

6. They try to sell half-baked thoughts and ideas.

7. They try to preach their half-baked ideas to others, but since their ideas are stale, they often do not relate to present day problems. Thus the ignorant tamsic being is also as half-cooked as his thoughts!

‘Parched’ food, devoid of sap

Such people partake of food that is devoid of sap.

1. The lives of such people are meaningless.

2. These demonic people live only for themselves.

3. They shirk their duty.

4. They are lazy.

5. They make every excuse to abandon their duty.

6. They make others’ lives meaningless and insipid as well.

7. They are dead for another. Yet they are always indulging in inimical activities where others are concerned.

8. They do not grasp the true meaning of the principles of dharma due to their innate slothfulness. Hence they attribute wrong meanings to the principles of dharma, and translating them to suit their own purposes, they render them meaningless and lifeless.

9. Tamsic beings are not devoid of activity. In fact they perform deeds which are opposed to duty.

10. Full of ignorance, these are people who have lost their way and vitiate even the natural path towards the Supreme.

11. Those who follow these tamsic beings are also likely to lose their path.

12. Those who follow these tamsic beings are devoid of scriptural decree.

13. These tamsic beings sink themselves and ruin the lives of others as well.

14. When they find it difficult to earn through just principles and through their own efforts, they begin to rob others.

15. They even kill anyone who dares to oppose them.

16. They thus rob the happiness of innumerable homes.

17. If they gain any knowledge, they use it to destroy themselves.

18. They use such knowledge to render their children orphans.

19. They use such knowledge to widow their wives and advise others too, to renounce their hearth and home.

20. They set out to preach divinity but ruin their homes in the bargain.

21. They set out to preach about love but desert those who love them.

22. They renounce their duty yet set out to salvage the world.

This is the consequence of the attribute of tamas.

a) It renders knowledge lifeless.

b) It desolates a home buzzing with life.

c) It renders a life full of love, dry and devoid of beauty.

d) It spreads the foul smell of negativity.

Thus such tamsic food can be defined as ‘foul smelling’.

Foul smelling food

1. It is the life of yagya that yields a fragrance.

2. When only sorrow is meted out to others, a foul smell ensues.

3. A mind that is filled with ignorance, desire and craving can only emit a foul smell.

4. Such a mind, impelled by ignorance born of an unfavourable destiny, gives off this offensive smell.

5. Every word that leaves the lips reeks of a foul smell and consequently strengthens and nourishes such malodorous attitudes.

6. An untruthful speech, an untruthful life, serves to augment the deceitful and fraudulent tendencies that inhere in us when others become the victims of our untruthful behaviour.

Stale food

1. Such food is partaken of by one who lives in the past. Such a one revels in the happenings of yesterday.

2. Once offended, such a one is ever nourished by the subsequent inimical tendencies that collect within.

3. Once an enemy, such a one’s remaining life becomes an unmitigated attack on his supposed foe.

4. Such a one can never forget past events and happenings.

1. One who is tamsic in nature is ever blinded by the knots of his mind.

2. These mental knots consist of stale thoughts centred on past events.

3. One who cannot forget past antagonism eats only stale food.

4. He is ever dissatisfied himself and frustrates others as well. In fact, such a one becomes evil and wicked.

5. Oblivious to prevalent culture and tradition, such a one recounts stale knowledge and principles. He makes it impossible to translate knowledge based on Truth into practice.

Polluted or pre-tasted food

One who is predominantly tamsic, partakes of food that has been previously been tasted by another.

1. Such a person steals another’s words and puts his own name upon them.

2. He steals another’s wealth and makes it his own.

3. He steals another’s knowledge and passes it off as his own.

4. He steals another’s credits and establishes his own rights upon them.

People who thus exist on another’s ‘diet’, feed the world on that stolen diet as well. They feed upon others’ leftovers and falsify others. They distort every thought process and project even the truth as false.

Such people project another’s experience as their own experience to the world. They habitually stamp their own name upon another’s dreams or plans. The present day politician, the so-called saintly personages as well as the ordinary, worldly man – all partake of this polluted diet of another’s leftovers.

If one has something original to say, it is different – otherwise, why be proud of presenting ideas which are merely another’s leftovers? At least be prepared to tell the truth that this idea was stolen from someone else. Knowledge of the Truth inspires humility. Then how can one be so proud?

Every human being should know this fact. Only then will gratitude, truth and love increase.

The attribute of tamas is impure

1. It is the attribute of tamas that tries to prove false principles to be true.

2. Denial of duty is born of this attribute.

3. It is this attribute that pollutes whatever is pure.

a) One whose mind cooks ingratitude;

b) one whose so-called justice is full of injustice, whose intellect ‘prepares’ such injustice;

c) one whose dharma is to act wickedly;

d) one who is impelled by darkness;

e) one who is inspired by ignorance;

f) one whose truth is sheer delusion;

cooks only untruth in the vessel of his body. How can such a one ever be pure who partakes of impure food continually? He cooks impurity within and serves the same impure victuals to those who come before him. Thus his own impurity is nourished and strengthened.

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