3.FROM KANCANA TO KAMINI:-

Kamini:-

In the previous slokam(2) a true seeker is advised to give up all covetousness for wealth of the world, and here he is advised to give up lusty passions for women. From the days of the Upanisad to our own times, we find in all masters this constant warning against wealth(kancana) and woman (kamini). But no insult is meant to either; this is a statement of a scientific truth. All intelligent living  creatures have these two irresistible urges, 'to possess more' (wealth) and to 'enjoy' (woman).

The Reality:-

Here Sankaracharya gives us a line of thinking, which can be  an efficient antidote to the fanciful price, that the body gives to the object of senses. The soft inviting bosom of your beloved , if sentimentally analysed and mentally seen in its realty, will reveal itself to be composed of only abhorrent flesh and fat , packed  in a scaly skin! If these component parts are brought  before  your mental vision, spiritually the mind shall immediately retreat from the disgusting ugliness of it all. Through the practice of this 'pratipaksa  bhavana , we can re-educate our mind, not to runaway with its imagined picture of happiness, in the perishable softness of the filth filled body.

 

 

To rise above the instincts:-

Swami Sankara, thus with the very opening stanzas of Bhaja Govindam, cures the student, of his two most powerful fascinations--his thirst for wealth and his instinctive hunger for flesh. When these two are eliminated from a personality, it will have no more fuel to jerk it out on to the outer fields of its enchantments. To rise above them is an achievement in itself, and for this repeated practice is unavoidable.