Bhagavad Gita Verse 1.1

Greed – In Gita Verse 1.1 Dhṛtarāṣṭra said: O Sañjaya, after my sons and sons of Pāṇḍu assembled in the place of pilgrimage at Kurukṣetra, desiring to fight, what did they do?

By asking this question Dhṛtarāṣṭras reveals his eagerness. Foremost if we understand our eagerness we can see that we are eager when we feel scarcity, lack, fear etc. In that moment we are in a hurry to grab any opportunity that comes in front of us out of out greed and from here our downfall begins.

Nothing happens overnight. Existence is very compassionate. Irrespective of our greed he gives us many hints not to fall prey to our greed. But we are so much consumed with greed we overlook the subtle hints and don’t pay any attention to them. And these subtle hints we call obstacles. We become more restless when any obstacle comes in the path of our greed.

Greed is a bottomless pit like a quagmire which exhausts the person in an endless effort to satisfy the wants without satiation.

Just to understand the nature of greed is enough. You need not do anything else to get rid of it; the very understanding will clarify the whole mess.

Man is full or complete if he is in tune with the universe; if he is not in tune with the universe then he is empty, utterly empty. And out of that emptiness comes greed. Greed desires possession or accumulation: by money, by property, by furniture, by friends, by lovers – anything, because one cannot live as emptiness. It is horrifying, it is a ghost life. If you are empty and there is nothing inside you, it is impossible to live.

To have the feeling that you have much inside you, there are only two ways: either you get in tune with the universe…. Then you are filled with the whole, with all the flowers and with all the stars. They are within you just as they are outside you. That is real fulfillment. But if you don’t do that, and millions of people are not doing that, then the easiest way is to fill it with any material things.

Greed simply means you are feeling a deep emptiness and you want to fill it with anything possible; it doesn’t matter what it is. And once you understand it, then you have nothing to do with greed. You have something to do with your coming into communion with the whole, so the inner emptiness disappears. And with it, all greed disappears. That does not mean that you start living naked; that simply means you do not live just to accumulate things. Whenever you need something you can have it.

Greed is not a desire at all. So you need not do anything about greed. You have to understand the emptiness that you are trying to fill, and ask the question, “Why am I empty? The whole existence is so full, why am I empty? Perhaps I have lost track; I am no longer moving in the same direction, I am no longer existential. That is the cause of my emptiness.

So be existential.

Let go, and move closer to existence in silence and peace, in meditation.

And one day you will see you are so full – overfull, overflowing – of joy, of blissfulness, of benediction. You have so much of it that you can give it to the whole world and yet it will not be exhausted.

That day, for the first time you will not feel any greed – for money, for food, for things, for anything. You will live naturally, and whatever is needed you will find it. And you will live, not with a constant greed that cannot be fulfilled, a wound that cannot be healed.

Tags: Greed