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Our Dualistic Tendency Causes Maaya, Which Hinders Us From Seeing Ishvara’s True Nature

इच्छाद्वेषसमुत्थेन द्वन्द्वमोहेन भारत |
सर्वभूतानि सम्मोहं सर्गे यान्ति परन्तप || 7.27||

ichchhā-dveṣha-samutthena dvandva-mohena bhārata
sarva-bhūtāni sammohaṁ sarge yānti parantapa||7.27||

Shloka Translation
BG – Ch. 7- Ver. 27:

The dualities of desire and repulsion originate from illusion, O descendant of Bharat. All living entities in the material realm are deceived by these, O conqueror of enemies.

Explanation

All of these dualities, such as happiness and distress, pleasure and pain, summer and winter, night and day, and so on, exist in pairs. These duality are intricately bound to life’s experiences. Birth and death, on the other hand, are the most deluding dualities in life. Between the two extremes of birth and death sits the arena of one’s life. Death is unavoidable from the minute a living entity is born, and it is followed by another birth.

Our rational mind believes that material pleasures will bring us happiness and fulfilment. As a result, while we seek the pleasurable experiences, we despise the painful ones in material consciousness. Despite the fact that attraction and aversion are not fundamental characteristics of these dualities, they originate as a result of our ignorance.
Our intelligence is unaware that materially gratifying conditions will merely serve to heighten our sense of materialism. As a result, we believe that pain is harmful to us. Adversity, on the other hand, has the power to erase that material illusion from our minds and elevate our soul. Our misconceptions are the result of our ignorance. These dualities are inseparable components of God’s creation, and a spiritually raised person rises above likes and dislikes, attraction and aversion, and so on.

Verse & what we can learn

We are born into this duality or dualistic thinking from the minute we are born. Because we are constrained to think in terms of likes and dislikes, we will never be able to think in an integrated, holistic manner. We chase after a certain object because we adore it and can’t imagine life without it. We’ve finally gotten it. However, once this occurs, we begin to dislike the one thing we couldn’t live without. Ultimately, all of these pursuits end in disappointment.
As a result, how do we let go of our preferences and begin to think holistically? The solution is karma yoga. We reduce likes and dislikes to a large extent by consistently executing activities in service of a higher ideal. Every sense organ has a preference for or aversion to certain objects. That is an indisputable fact. It is up to us, though, whether or not we feed these likes and dislikes. Breaking free from the grasp of the sense organs prepares us to pierce the maaya barrier.

To acquire knowledge and to implement that knowledge in life one needs to be mentally and physically active and healthy and for that daily meditation is a great tool.

There are various types of meditation like Buddhist meditation, heartfulness meditation, mindfulness meditation, meditation for stress, and each meditation benefits are countless. There are also numerous meditation techniques for beginners which help in practicing daily meditation so go ahead and start your journey towards a peaceful and balanced life.

In the Next verse, Shri Krishna tells Arjuna how we can overcome the dualities.

Let’s learn to live with “The Gita” via Meditation Affinity…