spirituality Archives - Hope With Anirban

Reading the Bhagavad Gita: Changing My Life

The author reads the Bhagavad Gita daily and admits that it’s changing his life. Despite not being a Hindu, he follows the Gita for wisdom.

I’ve been reading the Bhagavad Gita lately and I think it is an amazing book that suits my temperament.

The Bhagavad Gita: Waking Up Early

And I think it is slowly changing my life.

I’m waking up early and following a routine.

I think it is important to follow a spiritual practice daily.

Be it reading spiritual texts or meditating or lighting incense sticks or something else.

But it’s necessary for the peace of mind of the individual.

My Mother’s Example

My mother has taught me to bow down to God.

She has a Masters of Science degree and she still prays to God every day.

And I think just because you’re educated formally doesn’t mean you stop praying and become an atheist.

It means you become a more serious practitioner of spirituality.

If there’s anything that education should do to you is to open your eyes to what you don’t know.

And that humility, if your education’s good, should make you a more spiritual person.

The Caste System

Mornings are for waking up. And I read the Bhagavad Gita which gives me immense joy.

Of course there are parts about the caste system.

But I just ignore it.

Because of course it’s such an old text and there will be misinterpretations which lead to parts like the caste system.

I’m Not A Hindu

I’m not a Hindu. I’m an Adivasi. I’m born in a religion called Sari dharam which means “Truth religion” in Santhali. Sari means “Truth”.

But I love reading Bhagavad Gita.

I choose to read the Bhagavad Gita because it has a lot of wisdom.

Not because I don’t like my religion.

Conclusion

Today I woke up and I thought,”Mornings are for waking up. Just wake up and start typing.”

And so I did.

And I think the Bhagavad Gita has a great part to play in this.

Thank you for reading this line! It means a lot.

I came home after a long time

The author writes about his arrival at Howrah, his hometown, and how he plans to stay there for a few days before returning to Bangalore.

Yesterday I came home to Howrah from Bangalore after a long time via flight.

And I feel bliss after eating the homemade food that my mother and father cook at home.

I think it’s important to visit home and balance work and family.

I don’t have the work part figured out just yet but I’m on my way to secure job interviews.

But I’ve figured out my family part.

My parents and my siblings are there. And they mean a lot to me.

There isn’t much story here. But I was a bit anxious throughout the journey and I was observing the people around me.

I had my fruit juice(Maiza) bottle with me which I was occasionally sipping throughout my journey.

I’ll be staying in Howrah for the next 7 days. And I have plans other than voting.

I didn’t just come here to vote. But I came to accomplish some important tasks which I’ll write about in the future(So stay tuned).

To see my parents’ faces when I came home gave me immense joy.

And I drank a glass of lassi after I entered home.

And I have to tell you I had the best sleep last night in a long time.

So yeah I came home and I’ll return soon after a few days.

Thanks for reading this line! It means a lot.

Read This If You Feel Hopeless About Life

The author writes about his experiences with spirituality to persuade readers to have hope about life.

When I was 16 I started meditating daily.

I read books on spirituality and religion.

I even watched YouTube videos of spiritual gurus who talked about God, the nature of reality, truth, etc.

But I didn’t understand most of it.

But what little I understood was that there is something beyond what we see in life.

All the money, fame, success, pride, etc. is only temporary.

What’s more permanent can be found through spirituality.

So I started meditating.

Although I messed up big time trying to meditate without guidance, I think what it taught me was more than any course or book could teach me.

That teaching is that normal life is not as bad as we think.

I learnt from meditating wrongly that meditation isn’t necessary to attain nirvana or moksh.

What’s necessary is self-honesty and good behavior towards others.

If you can be honest about your intentions and behave well to others in a way that is just, I think that’s a good start.

So as you might know I had to go through a few episodes of psychosis as I wrote about it in my other mental health blog posts, that’s a topic for another blog post.

What I want to tell you through this blog post is that there is hope.

Mundane life isn’t all that there is. There is a truth beyond life that can set you free.

It can make you realize the divinity that lies within you and all other beings.

I like to ask myself this question,” What is God?”

We might think we know what God is- a supreme godhead, or an impersonal power or absolute infinity or nothingness.

But I just like to think that I don’t know what God is.

This lets me think beyond the preconceived ideas of other people about God.

So yeah there is hope.

I’m not asking you to believe in God. But I’m asking you to ask yourself what’s beyond all this.

Thanks for reading this line! It means a lot.

What are my thoughts on the concept of living a very long life?

I think being satisfied is more important than the age you are at.

I think the question of living a short or long life comes up because when we grow older we become weak and various diseases affect our health.

In short, it’s not pleasurable to live a long old life.

So if I write “Life should be lived now to the fullest rather than waiting for a day in the future when we would have ‘enough’ money for retirement”, I would do injustice to the fact that irrespective of whether you live now or later, the most important thing is to be content and be satisfied with what you already have.

So if you are young and trying to enjoy life now, but you still want more, more of everything, then you’re not living life.

And if you are old and have enough money for your retirement, but you hate every moment of your life and have a lot of regrets because you lost your youth and good health, then you’re also not living life.

The truth is you can enjoy your life at every moment of your life if you are content and happy with what you have.

Believing in a higher power may help to have such a tranquil mindset.

So be grateful for what you have. Be content and satisfied with what you already have.

Thanks for reading this line. It means a lot!

You’re not special

I had read a book called “The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck” by Mark Manson.

There the author writes about how entitlement or thinking that we’re special is the cause of our problems.

It is a deeply healing book and opened my eyes to the real meaning of the Bhagavad Gita.

I’m not an authority on spiritual texts, so I’ll only share my opinion.

I felt there’s a relationship between Mark Manson’s book and The Gita.

Maybe Mark Manson didn’t read the Gita. But I feel that way for some unknown reason.

For example from Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 2 verse 47 as little as I understand, it tells us to do work but be detached from the results.

I feel that Mark Manson also wants to say this through his work.

Why am I saying this? Why am I writing about Mark Manson’s book, The Bhagavad Gita and concepts of entitlement?

Because I feel it reduces our suffering.

It releases us from the idea that we must do something great. That somehow we’re special.

Sometimes it’s wiser to be humble and down-to-earth.

No life is ordinary.

Where I’m right now, I will meet my psychiatrist and psychologist in a few days and I feel like I should be treated in a special way.

Will that happen?

Nope, not going to happen.

I am getting a lot better. I have healed a lot from my mental health issues like bipolar disorder, psychosis, social anxiety, etc.

But my situation isn’t and never was special.

I’m glad you read this line. Thanks a lot!

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Met Sri M in Kolkata many years ago

A few years ago, I met Sri M who is a spiritual teacher, social reformer, educationist, author and global speaker.

Here’s a brief introduction of Sri M-

https://satsang-foundation.org/the-founder-sri-m/

He came to our city for his book release. The book’s name is “Shunya” which in English means Zero or Nothing or No-thing.

We went to the auditorium and we watched discussions and classical Hindustani music show I guess.

Then there was a Q/A round.

I promptly went ahead and asked my question.

But I thought the question was dumb.

I was about to ask “How to find God?”

But I couldn’t ask that question.

Because I thought it was not my duty to find God.

I have more important duties like taking care of my parents and getting higher education.

So I asked the question, “Sir, when I read the book I felt unconditional love. Is the book about unconditional love?”

Now this was an even more stupid question.

But Sri M said,”Maybe you feel that way because you yourself have unconditional love in you.”(there may be a slight difference from the actual words but it doesn’t change the meaning)

Now this is something.

Then we took Sir M’s signature on our copies of “Shunya” and Sri M blessed my mother and me. And he, we and everyone else left the auditorium.

This was something unreal of an experience.

I still can’t believe that all this happened that day.

Well it’s something to meet realized beings.

When I met Sri M, I had met a lady in a train who claimed to have seen God.

And she has helped me and advised me since on life’s problems and spiritual realizations and we’re still connected.

She asked me what I felt when I met Sri M.

I said that I didn’t know because I think I am not so spiritually advanced.

As I write this, I realize that I need to be more mindful during my spiritual meetings.

And it is one of my dreams to visit Sri M’s ashram at least some time in the future.

I’m happy that you’re reading this line. Thanks a lot!

No Hell No Heaven – An Original Poem

There’s no hell or heaven
Outside yourself
In the afterlife
Nor in other people’s mentalities.

Hell is when don’t understand the reality
Heaven is when you seek to see what they see
Hell is ignore-ance
Heaven is acceptance and empathy.

People fight outside my house
But they’re not other than me
They are just like my mother, my father, my friends
I choose to not ignore and feel their place of pain.

Pain is real, pain is there
People don’t go to hell
We, You, I am already in hell
Trying to make it heaven piece by piece, brick by brick.

Next time when you pray to your God, say
“I don’t want heaven nor hell.
I just want to see the truth, your face
No matter how ugly or beautiful you might be.”

-Anirban Saren

Dear friend, does God exist?

Dear friend,

God exists.

God is not some entity or idea.

God is inside you.

God is inside your friends and enemies.

God is inside a stranger.

God is empathy.

God is sympathy.

God is the truth.

God is your friend.

God is.

God is when you hold on to nothing anymore.

God is when you let go of your expectations.

God is when you love yourself.

God is when you accept yourself as you are.

God is when you remember to even once chant his name before giving up. And he shows his miracle.

God is when you prioritise your well being before “success”.

God is your best friend.

God is there.

God is there with you always.

God exists. Believe.

-Your friend

A Story of Finding One’s Self-Worth

The story of the shepherd in “The Alchemist” reveals that true treasure lies within us. Embracing our inner strengths can lead to success and fulfillment despite life’s challenges.

Let me tell you a story.

The story is from the book “The Alchemist” by Paulo Coelho . (So spoiler alert!!!)

Story Time

Briefly the story goes like this –

Once upon a time there was a shepherd in Spain who got a dream in his sleep. The dream was about a treasure.

So he sold all his sheep and went to Egypt to find the treasure.

He faced many challenges. He lost all his money, worked in a shop at a remote place, then became wealthy somehow, etc.

Forgive me if I forgot some things or write the wrong facts in the story.

Then he reached the place(in Egypt) where he was supposed to find the treasure after many years.

And he found nothing there. NO treasure was found.

But he met a person who told him that there’s a treasure in Spain and he described the place.

Then it hit the boy(shepherd) that the place that the person described was the same place where he had the dream of the treasure all those years ago.

Then I guess the shepherd found the treasure.

Your Self-Worth

I guess what I want to tell you through this story is-
You already have everything it takes to be successful and happy.

The treasure is inside you even if you think it’s outside you.

I am in my 3rd semester of MBA Data Science at Amity University Online and I am worried.

I am worried if I will get a good job after getting the degree.

And these are normal worries.

However I realize that like the Alchemist’s story, everything is inside me.

Like the shepherd(boy) I can go after my dreams, I can fulfill my dreams while facing all the challenges and obstacles.

And I need to remember that the real treasure is inside.

And prioritize my own mental health and self-worth.

Conclusion

Thank you for reading this blog post.

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