Mind - the creeper

Mind - the creeper

Sri Muralidharaswamiji

The mind is like a tiny creeper within our hearts. Just as a creeper needs some hold, onto which it entwines itself, the mind too needs an object to hold on to. Though a creeper has no eyes, it surprisingly reaches a nearby staff or tree and entwines it by itself. Similarly, the mind reaches out from our hearts through the senses, and clings on to various objects of the senses. For instance, the mind slowly peeps out through the ears and clings on to a melodious tune or song, reaches out through the eyes to catch hold of a beautiful sight and so on. Though these objects are inert by themselves, the mind projects them as possessed of life and leads us away from the truth. So, this needs to be curbed.

The Vedantins suggest that this creeper called mind must be uprooted totally at the very place of its origin, so that there is no scope for it to grow and reach the objects of the senses that lead us astray. On the other hand, the Bhaktas say � �Give the mind Lord Krishna as its hold, so that it entwines itself around Him and finds pleasure in its own place of origin, thereby having no need to escape through the senses. The mind that entwines around Lord Krishna will eventually get transformed into the Lord Himself, leaving no trace of the mind-creeper!� This approach differentiates the path of Bhakti from the path of Vedanta.


...Shared by Sri K. Janakiraman, Chennai
from his conversations with Sri Swamiji.