Mind control (Sama): Mind control is very hard to attain. The mind can cause bondage, but it can also confer liberation. It is an amalgam of the passionate (rajasika) and ignorant (Tamasika) attitudes. It is easily polluted. It relishes in hiding the real nature of things and casting on them the forms and values that it desires. So the activities of the mind have to be regulated.
The mind has two characteristics. First, it runs helplessly after the senses. Whichever sense the mind follows, it is inviting disaster. When a pot of water becomes empty, we need not infer that it has leaked away through ten holes; one hole is enough to empty it. So too, even if one sense is not under control, one will be thrown into bondage. Therefore, every sense has to be mastered.
Second, the potency of the mind can be promoted by good practices like meditation, repetition of the name, devotional singing, and worship (dhyana, japa, Bhajans,and Puja). With the strength and skill thus reinforced, the mind can help the world or harm it. So, the mental power gained by such spiritual practice has to be turned away from wrong paths and controlled by mind control. The senses have to be directed by the principle of intelligence (buddhi). They must be released from the hold that the mind has on them. Then, spiritual progress can be attained.
The mind (manas) is but a bundle of thoughts, a complex of wants and wishes. As soon as a thought, desire, or wish raises its head from the mind, the intellect (buddhi) must probe its value and validity —is it good or bad, will it help or hinder, where will it lead or end. If the mind does not submit to this probe, it will land itself on the path of ruin. If it does and obeys the intelligence, it can move along the right path.
People have three chief instruments for uplifting themselves: intelligence, mind, and senses. When the mind gets enslaved by the senses, one gets entangled and bound. The same mind, when it is regulated by the intellect, can make one aware of one’s reality, the Atma. This is why the mind is reputed to cause either bondage or liberation.
Body and sense control (Dama): Now for the second of the six virtues. Control of the body and senses can be achieved only by spiritual exercise (sadhana) and not by any other means. One has to avoid spending precious time in useless pursuits. One has to be ever vigilant. One
has to engage the senses of perception and of action and the body in congenial but noble tasks to keep them busy.
There should be no chance for sloth (Tamas) to creep in. And, every act must promote the good of others. While confining oneself to activities that reflect one’s natural duties (Svadharma), it is possible to sublimate them into spiritual practices for the body and the senses.
Withdrawal from sensory objects (Uparati): The third virtue is withdrawal from sensory objects. This implies a state of mind that is above and beyond all dualities that agitate and affect common people, such as joy and grief, liking and disliking, good and bad, praise and blame. But these universal experiences can be overcome or negated by means of spiritual exercises or intellectual inquiry. People can escape from these opposites and dualities and attain balance and stability. Withdrawal from sensory objects can be achieved while engaged in day-to-day living by avoiding entanglement with and bondage to differences and distinctions.
One should free oneself from identification with castes like priest (brahmin), protector (Kshatriya), businessman (Vaishya), and labourer (shudra); or with family clans; or with conditions like boyhood, youth, adult, and old age; or with genders like masculine and feminine. When one succeeds in discarding these and is firmly established in the Atmic Reality alone, one has really achieved withdrawal from sensory objects.
Do not look at the world with a worldly eye. Look upon it with the eye of Atma, as the projection of the Supreme Self (Paramatma). That can make one cross the horizon of dualities into the region of the One. The One is experienced as many, because of the forms and names people have imposed on it. That is the result of the mind playing its game. Withdrawal from sensory objects (Uparati) promotes inner exploration (Nivritti), not outer inquiry and activity (Pravritti). Along inner exploration lies the path of intellectual inquiry (Jnana); along outer exploration lies the path of karma.
The sacred activities like rituals and sacrifices that are laid down in the Vedas cannot confer liberation (moksha) from bondage to birth and death. They help only to cleanse the consciousness. It is said that they raise people to heaven, but heaven is also only a bond. It does not promise eternal freedom.
The freedom that makes one aware of the truth, of one’s own truth, can be gained only through listening to the Guru (shravana), ruminating over what has been listened to (manana), and meditating on its validity and significance (nidi-dhyasana). Only those who have detached their minds from desire can benefit from the Guru. Others cannot profit from guidance. Those who expect and look forward to the fruits of their actions can engage in them until their consciousness is cleansed. After that, their actions are of no value. So, one must be ever conscious of the Atma as pervading and penetrating everything, so that attraction and repulsion, the duality complex, have no effect.
Forbearance (titiksha): The fourth virtue, the attitude of forbearance, refuses to be affected or pained when afflicted with sorrow, loss, and the ingratitude and wickedness of others. In fact, one is happy and calm, for one knows that these are the results of one’s own actions now recoiling on one, and one views those who caused the misery as friends and well-wishers. One does not retaliate or wish them ill. One bears all blows patiently and gladly.
The natural reactions of people, whoever they may be, when someone injures them is to injure in return; when someone causes harm, to do harm; and when someone insults them, to insult back by some means or other. But this is the characteristic of the worldly path (Pravritti) —the path of objective involvement. Those who seek the inner path of sublimation and purification (Nivritti) have to avoid such reaction.
Unshakable faith (Shraddha). The fifth among the virtues to be cultivated is unshakable, unwavering faith —faith in the sacred scriptures (Shastras) and the moral codes they contain, as well as in the Atma and the Guru. Faith is the sign of Shraddha. The scriptures are designed to ensure the peace and prosperity of the world and the spiritual perfection of mankind. They have before them this great aim; they show the way to its realisation. So, one must place faith
in such holy scriptures, gurus (preceptors), and elders. Gurus are indeed worth worshiping, for they show us the path of ultimate fulfillment (the sreyomarga). The gurus, on their part, must instruct people only in ‘the knowledge of the one Atma that is immanent in all beings
(sarva jivaatmaikya Jnana)’. The one who has unwavering faith will achieve this wisdom. The gurus themselves must have full faith in it and live according to that faith without the slightest deviation.
Equanimity (Sama-Dhana): Equanimity is the sixth virtue. One has to be irrefutably convinced that what the scriptures (Shastras) make known and what the Guru teaches are one and the same. One’s intellect must rest upon and draw inspiration from the Atma, at all times and under all circumstances. The aspirant for spiritual progress must be attached only to the unchanging universal Consciousness. All actions should have the joy of God as their goal. One must place implicit faith in the scriptural dictum: All living beings are facets and fractions of God. To confirm this faith and strengthen it, one must look upon all beings as equal. The above sixth virtue is the treasure of spiritual struggle (sadhana sampath).
In summary, the third qualification consists of the six virtues: mind control, body-sense control, withdrawal from sensory objects, forbearance, unwavering faith, and equanimity. (Sutra Vahini, pp. 8-12)