Our mind naturally gets attracted towards materialistic pleasures, but it takes a lot of effort to meditate.
Two realms face us. The first is the world that we see and perceive. The other is the spiritual world, the world of the divine. We have practical experience of the first. It may not have given us much; instead of happiness, it has mostly caused us sorrow. But it is there, present in front of us. As for the spiritual world, we hear great things about it. Saints inform us that there is an unfathomable ocean of pleasure there, but we have not yet seen, felt, or perceived it.
The mind is naturally attracted to the world and its glitter because it is present, here and now.
Its pleasures may be illusory, but we can see it. It is the nature of the mind to believe what is evident than to have faith in something unseen. As the idiom goes, ‘a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush’. We have been cheated so often that we have little faith in promises, especially when someone promises vast riches.
Second, the mind is quickly drawn to the material world because the mind is of the same material as Maya.
The mind is made from Maya, and it is natural for the mind to gravitate toward the world. We will use the concept of physics to explain this. There is a force called gravity that attracts everything toward it. So, the fabled apple fell on Isaac Newton’s head instead of floating up, which led to discovering the theory of gravity. If an object tries to escape Earth’s gravity, it must use an amazing deal of speed and energy like a space rocket. They call this escape velocity. The escape velocity for Earth is 11.18 kilometers per second.
To escape the deadly grip of Maya, we need to put in considerable effort.
Granted, this is not easy, but what other choice do we have? The condition of a typical seeker is, he is disheartened quickly. Out of laziness, we lapse into our bad old habits, meandering in the same old worldly obsessions, and this has caused our ruin thus far. Divine pursuits will not give immediate results, but the long-term rewards are fantastic, whereas worldly pursuits may provide instant gratification, but the long-term consequences are ruinous.
A well-known study conducted at Stanford University in the 1960s explores the benefits of delaying gratification. They placed children in a room with one piece of tasty candy on a plate, with an instruction: you can eat the candy now, or you can wait 15 minutes and get two candies. The researchers found that those children who preferred to wait had better indices in practically everything - better health, scores, and behaviour.
This is even more relevant in the divine field because the spiritual world is all about delayed gratification. Do the hard work now and enjoy the fruits of your labour, not just in this life but forever.
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