What Is Vairagya

The mind gallops towards the world of passion.

- Gurudev

Whether you keep quiet, close you eyes or open your eyes or do anything it runs towards the sense of sight, smell, taste, touch or sound. This craving for any of these experiences in the mind can stop you from being in the present moment.

And vairagya is retrieving your senses back from these cravings and thirst for objects. This is a basic requirement for meditation. Whenever you want to meditate, your mind should be dispassionate. Without dispassion, your meditation is no good. It is useless. It cannot provide you the rest you are longing for.

There are two types of arguments even in this. “The sage (referring to Maharishi Patanjali) has said, you should not have desires. Now you should not say, ‘I do not want any desire’ because that becomes another desire. Some people are on a trip to destroy their desires.

That mind which gallops is an obstruction. Any expectation in meditation is an obstruction. One should not crave for any sense object or of any celestial heavenly places that they may have heard. All these ideas are obstructions.

Your desire for pleasure or happiness makes you unhappy. Examine, whenever you are unhappy or miserable, behind that is your wanting to be happy. Craving for happiness brings misery. When you do not crave for happiness, you are liberated and when you do not even care for liberation, you attain love. This is param vairagya.

Happiness is just a mere idea in the mind.