Question:

Ektaji, what is the scenery and what does it mean ‘not to get lost’ in the scenery? Who is the seer?

Answer:

Scenery: Everything around you is the scenery. The people, situations and things around you are all scenery

Seer: You are the seer. The one who is seeing everything happening is the ‘seer’.

The seer experiences the scenery through the senses. These senses love to indulge in the scenery and the seer becomes a slave of the senses and gets stuck in the scenery outside.

The seer gets lost in:

• • what he sees
  • what he touches
  • what he smells
  • what he tastes
  • what he hears

Let’s take an example of what it means ‘to get lost’ in the scenery. For e.g. you see a person. Immediately, you are attracted to the person. You want to be with the person. This is a raaga. This raaga slowly develops into lust that in turn develops into possessiveness. That finally leads to obsession. This is the drama that develops from getting lost in the sense of sight. Similarly, you can hear somebody’s words and get lost into a drama created in your mind from the raaga or dvesha related to his words. The mind gets lost in the world of 5 senses called the scenery!

This is what is meant by the seer getting lost in the scenery outside. This creates bondage!

When the seer becomes strong through knowledge and Abhyasa, he has a say over his senses and is no more a slave to his senses. His senses listen to him and he can choose to use his senses when he wants and stop when he wants. He becomes stronger than any temptation of food, sex, beauty, music, etc. this strength is the real Freedom!

The withdrawal from the scenery back to the seer is the only way to freedom!