Gita Inspires 3.42 Human Psychology and Self Identity - Rang de Basanti

­­­Namaste! Bhagavad Gita has inspirations to change our life. Do we know in human psychological personality, who is the boss? Why are human being’s superior to animals? And importantly, what is our self-identity? Sloka 42 from Chapter 2 summarizes this very wisdom. इन्द्रियाणि पराण्याहुरिन्द्रियेभ्य: परं मन: | मनसस्तु परा बुद्धिर्यो बुद्धे: परतस्तु स: || 2.42|| BG 3.42: The senses are superior to the gross body, and superior to the senses is the mind. Beyond the mind is the intellect, and even beyond the intellect is the soul. You must watch Rang de Basanti to understand the true meaning of this sloka. The movie portrays Aamir Khan and his four friends as cynical, carefree and totally wasted, BUT are inspired after their close friend dies when his fighter plane malfunctions and crashes. Their sense of ‘self-identity’ shifts, changing their very life! They become motivated by a higher goal, because of this incident. Leaving their hedonistic lifestyle, they become revolutionaries to take action. Suddenly, the attitude of eat-sleep-be-merry, don’t care for anyone other than oneself goes away. They are inspired by the idea of ‘get rid of corruption’ just like Mahatma Gandhi, who was inspired by an idea of ‘freedom for India’. Bhagavan Krishna tells us that there is a gradation to human personality and asks us to evaluate where our self-identity predominantly lies: sensual enjoyment driven life is at the lower end of the human spectrum. We are no different from animals in this aspect. Living the life of emotions, feelings is higher to sensual enjoyment. But that is not all. Living the life of ideas, rational thoughts, concepts – like Rang de Basanti depicts in the transformation the friends go through is higher than emotionally driven life. Gita real teaching starts where the movie stops. Beyond the intellect is the soul – Atma, and re-aligning our thoughts, emotions, to that is the best way of living life. Hari Om!