Courage To Experiment – In Gita Verse 17.9 Foods that are too bitter, too sour, salty, hot, pungent, dry and burning are dear to those in the mode of passion. Such foods cause distress, misery and disease.

Krishna is saying that people who enjoy bitter, too sour, hot, pungent, dry and burning tastes will be living their life of passions. He is saying how food affects our biochemistry.

Patanjali has explained the relationship between body and food.

In that sense Patanjali is logical, rational, mathematical, scientific. He does not ask for any faith. He asks only courage to experiment, courage to move, courage to take a jump into the unknown. He does not say, “Believe, and then you will experience.” He says, “Experience, and then you will believe.”

And he has made a structure on how to proceed step by step. His path is not haphazard; it is not like a labyrinth, it is like a super-highway. Everything is clear and the shortest possible route. But you have to follow it in every detail; otherwise you will move out of the path and in the wilderness.

That’s why I say he is logical, and you will see how he is logical. He starts from the body because you are rooted in the body. He starts and works with your breathing because your breathing is your life. First he works on the body; then he works on the prana – the second layer of existence – your breathing; then he starts working on thoughts.

There are many methods which start directly with the thought. They are not so logical and scientific because the man you are working with is rooted in the body. He is a soma, a body. A scientific approach must start with the body. Your body must be changed first. When your body changes, then your breathing can be changed. When your breathing changes, then your thoughts can be changed. And when your thoughts change, then you can be changed.

You may not have observed that you are a close-knit system of many layers. If you are running, then your breathing changes because more oxygen is needed. When you are running your breathing changes, and when your breathing changes your thoughts immediately change.

In Tibet they say if you are angry, then just run. Have two or three rounds of your house, and then come back and see where your anger has gone – because if you run fast, your breathing changes; if your breathing changes, your thought pattern cannot remain the same, it has to change.

There is no need to run. You can simply take five deep breaths – exhale, inhale – and see where your anger has gone. It is difficult to change anger directly. It is easier to change the body, then the breathing, then the anger. This is a scientific process. That is why I say that Patanjali is scientific.

Nobody has been so scientific. If you go to Buddha he will say “Drop anger.” Patanjali will never say. He will say if you have anger, that means you have a breathing pattern which helps anger, and unless that breathing pattern is changed you cannot drop anger. You may struggle, but that is not going to help – or, it may take a very long time. Unnecessary. So he will watch your breathing pattern, the breathing rhythm, and if you have a certain breathing rhythm, that means you have a certain body posture for it.

The grossest is the body and the subtlest is the mind. Don’t start from the subtle because it will be more difficult. It is vague; you cannot grasp it. Start with the body. That’s why Patanjali starts with body postures.

You may not have observed, because we are so unalert in life, that whenever you have a certain mood in the mind you have a certain body posture associated with it. If you are angry, can you sit relaxed? Impossible. If you are angry your body posture will change; if you are attentive then your body posture will change; if you are sleepy your body posture will change.

If you are completely silent you will sit Buddha-like, you will walk Buddha-like. If you walk Buddha- like, you will feel a certain silence merging within your heart. A certain silent bridge is being created by your Buddhalike walk. Just sit under a tree like a Buddha. Just sit, just the body. Suddenly you will see that your breathing is changing. It is more relaxed; it is more harmonious. When the breathing is harmonious and relaxed, you will feel the mind is less tense. Thoughts are less there, less clouds, more space, more sky. You will feel a silence in and out, flowing.

Hence, I say Patanjali is scientific. If you want to change your body posture, Patanjali will say change your food habits, because every food habit creates subtle body postures. If you are a meat eater you cannot sit Buddha-like. If you are non-vegetarian your posture will be different, if you are vegetarian your posture will be different – because the body is built by your food. It is not an accident. Whatsoever you are putting in the body, the body will reflect it.

So vegetarianism for Patanjali is not a moralist cult, it is a scientific method. When you eat meat you are not only taking food, you are allowing a certain animal from which the meat has come to enter in you. The meat was part of a particular body; the meat was part of a particular instinct pattern. The meat was the animal just a few hours before, and that meat carries all the impressions of the animal, all the habits of the animal. When you are eating meat your many attitudes will be affected by it.

And if you are sensitive you can become aware that whenever you eat certain things, certain changes immediately come. You can take alcohol and then you are not the same. Immediately a new personality has come in. Alcohol cannot create a personality, but it changes your body pattern. The body chemistry has changed. With the change of the body chemistry, the mind has to change its pattern and when the mind changes patterns a new personality has come in.

Patanjali is scientific because he takes note of everything – the food, the posture, the way you sleep, the way you get up in the morning, when you get up in the morning, when you go to sleep. He takes note of everything so that your body becomes a situation for something higher.

Patanjali won’t say that it is good to be loving. He will help you to create the situation in which love can flower. This is why I say he is scientific. If you follow him step by step, you will see many flowerings in you which were inconceivable before, unimaginable. You could not have even dreamed about them. If you change your food, if you change your body postures, if you change your sleeping patterns, if you change ordinary habits, you will see a new person arising in you. And then there are different changes possible. After one change another change becomes possible. Step by step, more possibilities open. That is why I say he is logical. He is not a logical philosopher, he is a logical, practical man.

Krishna is concerned with you and the transformation. And you cannot change things just by thinking about change. You have to create the situation. Otherwise, all over the world, love has been taught, but love exists nowhere because the situation doesn’t exist. How can you be loving if you are a meat eater? If you are eating meat, the violence is there. And with such a deep violence how can you be loving? Your love will be just false. Or, it may be just a form of hate.

This is the situation of the whole human phenomenon, the whole humanity – just pious in thoughts; in deeds, man remains the animal. And this will be always so unless we don’t cling to thoughts but create situations in which thoughts change.

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