Question:

Can raaga/ dvesha happen at the sub conscious level?  Are there seeds of attachment buried deep inside me which will pop someday?

Answer:

Yes, Raaga/Dvesha happen at a subconscious level predominantly. It is because we live our lives unaware of how our minds work and affect our emotions. Thus these seeds keep sprouting every now and then.

When we grow in the knowledge of the Self, we become more and more aware. When we start understanding the Self more and more, the identification with the mind and body breaks away and we become more and more conscious. When we become more conscious we stop having so many raagas and dveshas and in turn stop creating agami karmas. So don’t stop until you reach there.

Question:

If we take a similar experience for other examples of raaga and dwesha, example- a person gives up coffee or tea with great effort n will. He will erase out the coffee from his raaga list he wrote down for the Ashtavakra homework. He is very happy. If he has a similar dream years later where he is sipping coffee, does it mean he still has a raaga for it? In real, he doesn’t even think of it or crave for it. Just in his dream, his sense of taste got active. Does it mean, he still has raaga for it?

Answer:

He may have the raaga or may not have the raaga, the dream does not tell one for sure. A dream is not always yours. It can have nothing to do with you for e.g. You can dream of tea if you sleep in a hotel room where a tea-seller negotiated deals for hours a day ago. The atmosphere affects the mind too.

Question:

I always loved art since my childhood. Never involved much in the outer world. I was a introvert who sat in a corner sketching n painting. I loved making art so much that one day I chewed a eraser thinking it was a grape and did not even know the taste as I was so involved in the art. Even now, sometimes when I’m painting, I forget about my lunch n all other chores. If it is my raaga, does it fall in the category- situation? And I cannot come out this raaga. Is art my enemy? It takes away my family time n everything else when I get into it. I can’t balance.. I get lost.

Answer:

Art is a thing of beauty. It is not just external but also brings out your internal beauty. That is one way of being 100% in the present moment. You are blessed to have such a gift. The only thing that you need to learn is probably not get carried away in it so much. When you get carried away, you are again losing the ‘being in 100% present’ factor. You are crossing the line unawares!

It is a simple matter of disciplining yourself. So do some time management. Maybe you can set aside a couple of hours to be able to do your art. One beautiful thing that you can take from your art is your being in the present moment. Now bring that into your daily routine where you are doing your family chores, your job or even your grocery shopping. Are you 100% in the present moment?

Very few people are fortunate enough to have this kind of an experience with eyes open. The only skill you have to learn is

1. Time management and
2. Bringing the same ‘ekagrata’ or one-pointedness into other activities.

Keep working on it, I am sure you will get there.