ARANI SERIES
Spark 52
Saturday, April 13, 2019
RETIRED LIFE – GUIDANCE FROM GEETĀ
With warm best wishes to all on the auspicious day of Shri Rāma Navami, we present this Spark 52.
Geetā is never tired of guiding us; we should not be tired either, just because we retired from work!
Geetā supplies valuable guidance to us till our last breath, as long as we have the capacity to think, reflect and receive. Retired life, therefore, is as much a good time to study the holy text as any other period of life. Not going to the same workplace, where we had gone for 30 to 40 years, really speaking, is a mere superficial change. The inner psychological life is no different after the so-called retirement. Here are 10 pointers to possible applications of Geetā to life after the age of 60 years, which is the typical age group of retired people.
The topic is surely akin to the traditional concept of vānaprastha, the third among the four stations of life as envisaged by Sanātana Dharma. [The other three are, as everyone knows, brahmacharya, grihastha, and sannyāsa.] Let me state that vānaprastha today has little to do with going to a forest; it is major changes in lifestyle and important shifts in outlooks or priorities that bring about the third stage, no matter where you live.
Let’s begin with simple things and slowly move towards deeper, philosophical pieces. The first five below are relatively simple and the last five are relatively subtle.
1. Take right food
One mistake most of us would have done during the fast-paced life before retirement is surely eating carelessly. Geetā is insightful in advising us to take ‘saattvik food,’ which will ensure better health, physically and mentally. We must reduce, if not completely stop, spicy food, stimulants like coffee and tea and so on. Geetā says1 our food should promote, “long life, balanced outlooks, inner strength, true health, contentment and loving disposition”! We must find out such healthy food that take us in the direction of these pointers.
2. Speak in truthful and pleasing ways
Pressures of life, stress everywhere and varieties of temptations and provocations would have made us speak irresponsibly on many occasions. We would have hurt our own near and dear ones in the process. We would have gossiped at the work place against those colleagues or higher ups, whom we would not have liked. All this would have caused a lot of damage to our own mental well-being. Geetā, which is everybody’s scripture, exhorts2 us, “Let your speech be not-agitating, true, pleasing and beneficial.”
3. Invest time and energy in health
Calling daily exercise a sacrifice (yajna) that is honoured in the Vedas, Shri Krishna praises the value of ‘yoga’ in boosting our holistic well-being.Yoga, as we know, is āsanas, prānāyamas and much more. Eight stages (or limbs) are described in Patanjali’s astha-anga-yoga). Worldly life generally pollutes our psychological condition and injects many kinds of toxins into our physiological system, which is much acknowledged by modern medical science. Shri Krishna talks3 of a ‘thorough cleansing’ (kshapita-kalmashāh 4.30), that compares well with the popular ‘detoxification’ of modern times. We must do, in retired life, what we could not attend to in the busy life of working and earning.
4. Sleep adequately
Not going to any form of excess, we must give to our body adequate rest, which is one of the privileges of retired life. This hurried world, called mad at times, leaves us sleep-starved in general. We must find out the optimum number of hours of sleep that our body actually needs, and give that to our precious instrument. Geetā talks4 of ‘optimum duration of sleep and of staying awake’ and warns us against either excess or deprivation.
5. Train your senses
Spirituality never asks us not to enjoy life. All it does is to urge us not to get enslaved by the pleasures that sense objects bring to us. In retired life too, we must enjoy life but the key word is “moderation”. It is but natural that various sense objects like delicious food, dance and music attract our senses. Geetā asks5 us not to come under their sway. The verse (shloka) in the context, in fact, generalizes the situation to both attractions andrepulsions (rāga and dvesha). When the external world either tempts us or provokes us, we must exercise restraint and maintain our balance.
6. Do not waste energy on thoughts of what you got
A major cause of depression as we get older is the repetitive thought of “how we received less” in various contexts. In terms of material rewards and positions or in terms of love and respect, our mind may brood over “what we got” and that is sure to sap us of our energy. “karma-yoga6”, the celebrated teaching of Geetā, basically asks us to focus on giving our best and not waste energy on receiving the most. It is never too late to make this shift in focus. Let us do it as we embark on our retired life.
7. Let the water not enter the boat
A million gallons of water can be around a boat but the vessel is safe as long as the water does not enter it. Likewise a lot of things can go wrong around us but, if we keep them in their right places, and not let them enter our inner chambers of thought and feeling, we can remain objective. We can then take the right action. Geetā says exactly this7, “Keep out those things that belong outside!”
8. Take the support of Om
Without mincing words, Geetā praises the great sound of Om8. Reciting Om, we can gather our mental energies, which were otherwise getting dissipated in countless ways. During the evening of our life, and, what is more, at the time of departing from this world, nothing is more helpful than anchoring our thoughts in God, best represented by Om. As we study Vedānta, our understanding of Om gets deeper and the practice of reciting the mystic sound is bound to get far more beneficial.
9 Trust God in all respects
Geetā, let us not forget, is a religious text. The word ‘religion’ means re-connecting with God. In the verse in the middle of the entire text, before which there are nine chapters and after which again there are nine, Shri Krishna sums up his advice9 to all humanity, “Fix your mind in Me; be devoted to Me; worship Me; Salute me; you will thereby attain divine heights!” We must do this, and our retired life, if not before, is ideal for turning Godward.
10. Rise above both the mind and the body
The Geetā addresses our mind educates it for spiritual literacy. Anybody who studies a bit of spirituality begins to understand how our mind is a greater power than our physical body. Spiritual education goes on to show there is something called the “spirit” that is way higher than the mind also! This “spirit” is often referred to as the “soul” (ātmā).
Weapons cannot cut this SOUL,
Fire cannot burn this SOUL,
Water cannot make it wet,
And wind cannot dry it up!
We can, by valid implication, add a line –
Retirement cannot weaken this soul!
Every time we feel dejected, if we do, looking at the body that is getting weaker and facing other challenges that retirement entails, we ought to reflect on this revelation of the Geetā. “I am the soul; I am as fresh as ever,” would be the upshot of these teachings.
*
Notes:
1 āyuh-sattva-bala- ārogya-.. Chapter 17, verse 8
2 anudvega-karam vākyam satyam… 17.15
3 ..yoga-yajnāh tathā apare – 4.28
4 ..yukta-svapna-avabodhasya.. 6.17
5 ..na vasham-āgacchet 3.34
6 ..karmani eva .. mā phaleshu 2.47
7 sparshān kritvā bahir-bāhyān 5.27
8 om-iti …vyāharan .. 8.13
9 manmanā bhava.. 9.34
10 nainam chindanti shashtrāni.. 2.23