doing good to the world

[Guest guest]

namaste.

 

When we were children, we heard our elders always imploring us

to do good to the world. We follow the same pattern now and say

to our children to do good to the world. But I wonder if that is

a correct way of saying at all.

 

Can we do good to the world? My answer to that is no. No permanent

good can be done to the world. If it can be done, the world would

not be this world. If a person is hungry, we can buy some food to

the person and satisfy the person's hunger. But the hunger of the

person returns in a few hours and he will be hungry again. Every

step we take in being good to the world can give only a temporary

solution. So, where is the cure for this ever-recurring fever of

pleasure and pain and the pairs of opposites the world goes

through? Further, is there a world *out* there at all for some

good to be done? Again, my answer is no. Then what does this

"do good to the world" mean?

 

As I see it, it means "be a good person", so that our outlook of

the world changes, so that we see the world as a much more equanimous

set-up, so that the equanimous set-up is an ever-lasting set-up.

The world of feelings, emotions all around is what we have set up,

and if we are good, we see it as a good place.

 

Further, if we are of the outlook "I am doing good to the world",

we are on the wrong track. The reforming or doing good to the

world is the reforming of you, i.e. being a good person and not

reforming the world. It is you that is to be reformed, not the

world.

 

What does it mean by being "good"? The answer is there in BhagavadgItA

chapter 18 and in VivekachuDAmaNi: attend to the nityakarmAs and

niyata karmAs with an approach of tyAga, with complete detachment to

the results and to the fruits of the results; even while doing these

nityakarmAs, the sense of "I" of the ego is not to be there.

 

Regards

Gummuluru Murthy

------

[Guest guest]

Gummuluru Murthy wrote:

>

> Gummuluru Murthy <gmurthy

>

>

> Can we do good to the world? My answer to that is no. No permanent

> good can be done to the world. If it can be done, the world would

> not be this world. If a person is hungry, we can buy some food to

> the person and satisfy the person's hunger. But the hunger of the

> person returns in a few hours and he will be hungry again. Every

> step we take in being good to the world can give only a temporary

> solution. So, where is the cure for this ever-recurring fever of

> pleasure and pain and the pairs of opposites the world goes

> through? Further, is there a world *out* there at all for some

> good to be done? Again, my answer is no.

>

>[...]

>

> Further, if we are of the outlook "I am doing good to the world",

> we are on the wrong track. The reforming or doing good to the

> world is the reforming of you, i.e. being a good person and not

> reforming the world. It is you that is to be reformed, not the

> world.

>

> What does it mean by being "good"? The answer is there in BhagavadgItA

> chapter 18 and in VivekachuDAmaNi: attend to the nityakarmAs and

> niyata karmAs with an approach of tyAga, with complete detachment to

> the results and to the fruits of the results; even while doing these

> nityakarmAs, the sense of "I" of the ego is not to be there.

>

 

excellent observations.

 

this world is a perfect school. whatever transpires

is in fact vital to its unfoldment, which is itself

a spiritual process. however, whether one "does"

good to others or not, even itself isn't interfering

with karma, because such actions themselves are still

part of the script. and the point you make is accurate

that the good deeds only serve to purify the [albeit

theoretical] karta.

 

on a further turn of the spiral of insight, is that

there is really no-one, per se, who is suffering.

once when Yogananda visited Ramana, he asked him

how to go about teaching and healing the suffering

masses. Ramana replied: "who is suffering? what is

suffering?" upon awakening, the former jiva sees

that in fact he has been awake in the Heart all along,

and that suffering never had a subject to register its

malaise upon. this is how and why Self-inquiry can be

so potent a sadhana. it all boils down to erasing the

alleged ego. adopting the reality of choiceless

awareness is the result. in fact, we are and have

ever been operating on the auto-pilot of choiceless

awareness, since the idea of a real, separative doer

is always purely an illusion.

 

namaste