Chapter 2 and 3

Here we continue our summaries of Bhai Sewa Singh Ji's book, Pantha Prem Na Janaiye. I combined the chapters two and three as chapter two was quite short.

The mind has come with the fixed number of breaths after which it will separate from this body. This human lifeform is the only lifeform from which we can achieve mukhi and escape the cycle of reincarnation. We have been told the rules of the game and have all been sent with the chance to succeed in this lifetime. Yet many will not follow the rules of the game and have to be reincarnated again and again, going through cycles of suffering. 

Maya is split into formless and formed states. The physical version of maya is everything in the world and our body. The formless state of maya is thoughts. One form of thoughts is tamoguni thoughts, these are “kaam, krodh, lob, moh, hankar” (lust, anger, greed, attachment, pride). These are called the Panj Chor (5 thieves) in Gurbani because they trick us. When we spend our time in thoughts we are using up our precious breaths. Remember we only have a limited number of breaths in this world. We are tricked into wasting away our breaths by these thoughts because Waheguru has tasked Kaal to keep us distracted as part of the game. The Panj Chor steal Amrit. As we discussed in the last post, amrit is a food of the mind given to us when we enter the fourth state of the mind/10^th gate/Sunn/Sehaj Ghar, our home and is physically tasted as a sweet taste by people in this state. Without it our mind is starving and suffering. One of my favorite translations from this chapter was “We work as slaves (of Kaal) and we carry the loads of this world upon our heads (we think, we work for ourselves and don’t take anything to the home of the mind at night.” (SGG Ji Ang 166). Oh how we think that we carry so much burden on our heads of maya, when actually we won’t take anything with us when we die. Whose load is this to carry? It belongs to the Creator who created it. Bhai Sahib reminds us that the suffering mind is often desperate, it begs and cries for help, but it remains attached to the things that lead to its suffering. In Gurbani there is an analogy of a monkey who puts its hand into a narrow-mouthed pot to get food out and its hand gets stuck, leading it to scream for help. It could simply just undo its fist of food and release its hand, but it refuses to let go of the food and gets caught by the hunter who set the trap. Similarly, Bhai Sahib explains that we are the monkey, greedy for maya, and not willing to let go of the Panj Chor, and therefore we get trapped by Kaal and lose the game. We must be willing to let go of this all in order to win the game.   

At night, the body and mind disconnect and the mind goes to its home in Sunn. Gurmukhs, people who follow Hukam, can then meet other Gurmukhs at this time in congregation. Most of us manmukhs either enter dreams, or we otherwise just aren’t able to meet others during this time. (It isn’t mentioned in this chapter but a sleep state is a practice state for death. We read kirtan sohila before we go to sleep just as we read it at a funeral. Here we disconnect from our bodies.)

The mind connects to the body by air, pavan. This entire game of life is based in the breath because remember we have a limited number of breaths. By controlling our breath, we are going to be able to help to control the mind, which has gone wild and out of control over all its incarnations. To make progress, first the mind must sit in the body. Most of us let our mind just wander freely. It is out attached to worldly things like making money, our jobs, even “good thoughts” but thoughts, nonetheless. The mind must learn to be IN the body and connect to its breath in order to learn to become thoughtless and go to Sunn (this is the method of dying while still alive which is mentioned in Gurbani). The way of doing this is by joining sangat, and then learning the way to chant Gurmantr (chanting of a mantr, example in other languages people sing Allah and Ram Ram and we sing Waheguru mantr as a method of remembrance). Bhai Sahib reminds us that the mind constantly tries to find a way to escape and will trick us, in advanced states the Yogis and others have been tricked by getting magical powers which made them use thoughts and once again put them into maya. Finally, those who have won the game and are completely merged into God are able to separate out their body and mind in a different way, like Baba Deep Singh Ji was able to continue to fight while holding their head separated from the rest of their body.   

This chapter has some very important practical points, each part of every chapter has lines from Gurbani to show that this knowledge is all based on the Guru Granth Sahib Ji. This chapter brought up a few things for me on reflection. Firstly that part about being in the body being necessary. I think we often think about the states of Baba Deep Singh and the martyrs in our history, because their minds had been in Sunn and transcended the connection to the physical tortures and I always thought this sort of meant you needed to ignore the body to succeed. Yet the start is that our mind escapes constantly and that we need to simply just get it into the body and the breath in the first place. My first work on breath probably came at the time I started to do sas gras simran in 2016, yet I think I never really understood how much my mind was outside of my body until this last year. The start of connecting to my body, and understanding how much it was storing was a shock to me and I have taken that step by step with breath as a main action. I think it is important to recognize how hard it can actually be to be in the body. This is probably why so many people use mindfulness, yoga, tai chi, etc. because these are breath methods to get us grounded back into our body. We have our own way of doing this in Sikhi. 

I think the other piece that really stood out to me was that the method of dying while still alive is this way of being in congregation, japping naam, and working on getting to Sunn. It is about letting go of our attachment to the 5 chor, and our thoughts and everything we have and are in this world. I feel like so many times we as Sikhs these days, our youth and maybe even other generations have a different idea of bravery and death. It is easy to just say we are willing to sacrifice our lives, if you have no value on your life or the precious breaths you have and the purpose you are wasting away. That isn’t bravery. To give up the mind, to give up your ego, and let go of all these identities you have intrenched into yourself is the harder thing to do. The words sant-sapahi are attached to each other for a reason. It amazes me how people are willing to go to great lengths for the Sikh community, or for themselves but still are unwilling to work on the mind when that was the whole purpose of our life here according to Guru Ji. The game is to be played with the mind itself. It really is the hardest battle you will ever have to fight, yet some people are just unwilling to even give it a chance. The other unfortunate part is a lot of us didn’t even remember this was the game, we didn’t take out the time to read our Gurbani to learn about the game, we didn’t look past the rote reading of Japji sahib to delve into what it is telling us about how the world was created, and how to live my life today, how we didn’t invest into learning from our Guru. The whole concept of Sikhi is to learn from our Guru, so we have to learn beyond just the superficial of being a good person, and into the depths of how we actually can truly live to our fullest. If you want to be like Bhai Taru Singh then sing shabads like them, then read Gurbani with passion, and love. Ask in your Ardas to be taken on this path, to get Naam, and to meet those in sangat/congregation who will travel with you “Koi Ave Santo, Har Ka Jan Santo, Mere Preetam Jan Santo, Mohi Marag Dhiklave.”