8. Freedom For / From the Senses

What does Kṛṣṇa say in the Bhagavad-gītā? Again He says, “Are you going to do this analysis or take advantage of the analysis of Revealed truth?” So, we try to come under the influence of the Revealed truth. We say, “Oh, in Bhagavad-gītā Kṛṣṇa says, ‘Above the objects of the senses are the senses’; they are higher, refined, they are superior. ‘But above the senses is the mind.’ Okay, the mind is higher than the senses, and it is the seat of sense experience.” Then He says, “Finer than the mind is intelligence.” Then we say, “Okay, now I understand, intelligence—the discriminating factor because the mind has no discriminating ability.” So, we are told, you need to infuse the intelligence with dharma-buddhi, back to Sādhu, Śāstra, Guru, Vaiṣṇava. Finer than intelligence, He is saying, is what? “That is the beginning of the ātma plane.” So that is where the self is located.

So if you are viewing the self from the outside in and seeing yourself in terms of gender, nationality, age, all of these things, you are not having a proper glimpse of yourself, and who you are, and what is your potential. How can you proceed?

So you have people thinking the most important aspect of their lives is their sexuality; that is who they are, and they need to express their sexuality, and then they will be free, they will be liberated, they will live a life of freedom and happiness by identifying with a particular aspect of sexuality. I mean I am not making this up. So they think, “That is freedom, freedom to express yourself”, that, “I profess this type of sexual preference, now I am a liberated soul, and I want to be viewed exclusively in terms of my sexuality.” So then we have to consider: what is freedom? What is liberation?

Well, Guru Mahārāj, as usual, put it in the proper terms, “Freedom for the senses, or freedom from the senses?” Most people would think, “No, it means freedom for the senses, to do what you want.” So should we say that someone, who is under the influence, in the language of the scripture, vācho vegaṁ manasa, the belly, tongue, and genitals, they are engaged in self-expression? Thatis a liberated position? Really? That the tongue wants to eat this, so I allow the tongue to drag me in a direction, that is freedom? “I’m expressing who I am.”

I remember when I was a teenager, and I’d become a vegetarian, and a friend of mine—we were having this discussion back and forth—and he’s like, “Oh, why are you doing this?” And at the time for me it was an intuitive thing, it wasn’t based upon a lot of analytical thought, it was just an intuitive compulsion. But he was starting to feel defensive about eating meat, so he once said to me, “When I eat a steak, it is an expression of my love for the cow.” We were in a band, and the lead guitarist turned to him and said, “That’s total bullshit.” Like, “Do you expect us to believe that?” Even he, who was not a vegetarian, thought it was an absurd denial. He said, “It is an expression of my love for the cow”; I go, “You should be careful who you love, or those whom you love should be careful in dealing with you.”