In June of 1936, Mr. B. C. Das, a physics lecturer complained to Bhagavan in the Hall about a “vicious circle” , namely, that meditation “is only possible with the control of the mind and control of the mind can only be accomplished by [meditation].” He added in frustration: “It is practically impossible to make the mind concentrated.”
Bhagavan in a very relaxed tone, responded:
Concentration is impossible so long as there are predispositions. By practice and dispassion (abhyasa vairagyabhyam), it is possible. Vairagya is the absence of diffused thoughts; abhyasa is concentration on a single thought. The one is the positive and the other the negative aspect of meditation.[1]
Over the decades, many who have come to Bhagavan have expressed the same frustration, confronted by minds besieged by restless thoughts charged with anxiety, self-doubt, or fear. In our digitally saturated age, overactive minds have become the norm. Yet Bhagavan prescribes a clear remedy: non-attachment—a quiet yet profound strength arising from relinquishing our infatuation with outcomes, possessions, identities, and expectations. Vairagya is not indifference or passivity, but clarity—the capacity to remain grounded even as the world churns.
How do we cultivate this non-attachment or vairagya? Bhagavan points to predispositions (samskaras), emphasizing that the source of our disturbance lies within us. Any effort to bring about improvement by railing against the world is pointless. Attempting to rectify external conditions without the inner work is futile. Vairagya takes place within. Bhagavan succinctly states, awareness is detachment.[2] Attachment rooted in non-awareness and the stupor of narcissistic delusion binds us to the notion of a separate self. Freedom lies in surrendering the ego to its source—the Self. Bhagavan explains:
Let us surrender first and await results, then we can discuss it further, if need be. Learn what surrender is. It is to merge in the source of the ego. The ego is surrendered to the Self. Everything is dear to us because of love of the Self. The Self is that to which we surrender our ego, [allowing] the Supreme Power, i.e., the Self, to do what it pleases.[3]
Surrender and Acceptance
Bhagavan’s vairagya (vi+raga=vigataraga, or non-attachment[4]) begins by loosening our insistence on how things should be and embracing things as they are. Surrender allows for a new harmony based not on ideal outer conditions but on inner alignment. We harmonize our desires with life’s inherent unpredictability. Bhagavan elaborates:
We give up this and that of ‘our’ possessions. If you give up ‘I’ and ‘Mine’ instead, all are given up at a stroke. The very seed of possession is lost. Thus, evil is nipped in the bud. But one’s vairagya must be very strong.[5]
As our enquiry deepens, detached awareness gradually reveals hidden layers of the heart, uncovering not just lightness and joy but grief and vexation as well. When we touch on what lies hidden beneath the mind’s surface chatter, we enter a new dimension of the inner work which includes layers of undigested laments and orphaned emotions stored in the body. Here we find that Bhagavan’s surrender is there to help us.
Surrender, Bhagavan reassures, is not passive resignation but an active trust in Divine wisdom beyond human comprehension. We stop reacting and start listening to the clues our immediate environment provides us with as though they were ordained of God. Lord Krishna advises Arjuna similarly:
Perform your duty with equanimity, abandoning all attachment to success or failure.[6]
In uncertain times, vairagya and non-attachment empower us to act fearlessly, engaging without becoming obsessed with outcomes. Non-attachment becomes a sacred discipline, fostering stillness amidst turmoil, wisdom amidst confusion, and freedom amidst impermanence.
If we find the thoroughgoing nature of life’s changeability challenging, we also begin to see how it can be freeing. We begin to recognise that nothing in the created order endures through time. We begin to relate to the phenomenal world in a more detached way. Non-attachment to created things allows us to walk in harmony with a world that no longer needs to be perfect for us to be at peace. Bhagavan reiterates:
Self-surrender leads to realisation just as enquiry does. Complete self-surrender means that you have no further thought of ‘I’. Then all your predispositions (samskaras) are washed away, and you are free. You should not continue as a separate entity at the end of either course.[7]
Surrender practice, however, can be daunting. Fully experiencing emotional intensity, especially during meditation, may feel unsettling. Yet, by courageously turning toward discomfort without avoidance or analysis, we allow things to be seen through the lens of Bhagavan’s enquiry. Here we naturally let go of the impulse to insulate through compulsive thought or conspicuous device use.
Sitting in the fire of inner difficulty helps us see that the murky regions of the heart are not inhabited by enemies to be overcome. Rather, the heart’s residual afflictions—whether ancestral, collective, or born of early life wounding—are resolved simply by being felt and known. We do not need to like what enquiry practice presents us with but rather only see it and allow it to pass through. Bhagavan affirms the usefulness of enquiry:
An examination of the ephemeral nature of external phenomena leads to vairagya. Hence enquiry is the first and foremost step to be taken. When vichara continues automatically, it results in a contempt for wealth, fame, ease, and pleasure. The ‘I’ thought becomes clearer for inspection. The source of ‘I’ is the Heart—the final goal.[8]
Acceptance transforms the internal landscape. What seemed oppressive becomes liberating, our honesty deepens, and we no longer hide from ourselves.
Japanese philosophy beautifully articulates this concept through wabi-sabi, celebrating imperfection, impermanence, and incompleteness as essential to aesthetic beauty. Cracks in pottery, faded ink on paper, and weathered wood symbolize life’s inherent deficiencies, reflecting inner struggles. Not all flaws in a piece of art need be edited or improved. Instead, they may serve as signs of character, evidence of time, testaments to a life fully lived, and representations of the essence of earthly existence, which is ever fraught with constraints, not least of all, loss, sickness, decline in old age and death.
Most of the time, life’s vexations appear as inherent, whereas they are only the signature of our long-standing resistance. Bhagavan’s surrender comes to our aid, not that it fundamentally reorders creation, but that it radically alters our relationship to it. Bhagavan exhorts:
Leave it to Him. Surrender unreservedly. One of two things must be done. Either surrender because you admit your inability and require a Higher Power to help you, or investigate the cause of misery, go into the source, and merge into the Self. Either way you will be free from misery. God never forsakes one who has surrendered. (Mamekam saranam vraja).[9]
The courage of surrender brings radical honesty, accepting internal discrepancies as part of a divine pattern. The 14th-century Dominican monk, Meister Eckhart beautifully guides us:
To get at the core of God at His greatest, we must first get to the core of ourselves at our least.
Accepting the histories of our imperfect hearts is faith. This is Bhagavan’s surrender. It is laying our imperfections at the feet of God. By contrast, insisting on preferred circumstances separates us from God and Self, divides heaven from earth, and banishes us to the outer regions of a made-up realm. Instead, we learn to exclude nothing.
Surrendering is among the highest forms of moral freedom, delivering us from the endless task of perfectionism and the compulsion to curate our life by always smoothing its edges and polishing its surfaces.
In shedding pretences and trusting that mistakes are preferable to stagnation, we recall a line from Søren Kierkegaard, to dare is to lose one’s footing for a moment; not to dare is to lose one’s whole life.
But what is the dare Bhagavan is calling us to?
It is probing the realms of the heart that were previously avoided, neglected or hidden away.
The Way Out
The way out is through, goes a saying. We need not fix our imperfections but simply remain present to them. In so doing, we reflect the kindness Bhagavan showed his devotees in the Hall. The spiritual path involves entering discomfort consciously to redeem it and be redeemed by it. The poet Rilke encapsulates this beautifully:
Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our help.
The spirit of non-attachment is coming to see that there is nothing so quietly tormenting as the subtle tension of our resistances. The act of wanting things to be other than they are creates friction and separates us from ourselves and from others. An internal world shot through with restlessness is a drain on our vital energies and keeps us firmly rooted in ignorance.
Bhagavan versified our longing in a prayer to Arunachala:
Let me, Thy prey, surrender unto Thee and be consumed, and so have peace, Oh Arunachala! [10]
Acceptance means not pushing against things. When we resist conditions day in and day out, God’s hands are tied, unable to work on our behalf.
Non-attachment helps us train the heart to remain open to what we are called to and simultaneously, to what is beyond our control. Muruganar says it eloquently:
Forsake me not, my friend Detachment, ever let me call you mine, for you destroy the densest darkness, the darkness of desires, kindling the flame of knowledge.[11]
The Mother Bird
We recall the simile of the mother bird who prays fervently that her eggs would hatch bringing forth healthy babies. She doesn’t stop there. She tends her eggs around the clock, turning them at regular intervals to be sure the warmth of her soft belly permeates every part of each egg. Nearby another mother bird decides to pray and practice surrender with even greater intensity, so much so, that she imagines she does not need to turn her eggs or even sit on them. The latter’s eggs never hatch. Why? Wasn’t she sufficiently surrendered?
Actually, hers is not surrender at all. Unwilling to listen for the subtle prompting of God—the still small voice within—she is invested in an idea about herself as one totally surrendered. Like many of us, she harbours an unconscious fear that listening to God within would compel her to listen to the haunting cries of the defilements. Like many of us, she avoids God to avoid herself. Like many of us, she has lived her whole life at a distance from her own heart. Outward acts of surrender and devotion do not help her discern the soft whispers of the Divine prompting her to tend her eggs like the first mother bird. She tricks herself into believing that her intense surrender exempts her from action. But true surrender does not mean inaction.
Here we are reminded how Lord Krishna said to Arjuna on the battlefield that there is no such thing as inaction. Every choice is an action. As for the choice not to act, the second mother bird pays a heavy price for it. True surrender means doing all in one’s power, then leaving the rest to God.
Acceptance
Non-resistance, non-reactivity, and non-longing form the core of acceptance practice, but all are seen in the light of doing what is being called for in the moment. Acceptance allows for harmony beneath life’s surface turbulence. When resistance ends, harmony naturally arises, bringing transformation. When we stop resisting the moment, the moment stops resisting us. Acceptance is not the end of effort, but the beginning of freedom. When we give up everything, God has no choice but to come to our aid.
This is illustrated in The Mahabharata through Draupadi’s ordeal. We recall the scene where Duryodhana, the leader of the Kauravas, drags Draupadi to the assembly hall and attempts to humiliate her.
When a gentleman from Ambala asked Bhagavan about a rational explanation for Draupadi’s vastra (sari) becoming unending, Bhagavan responded:
Spiritual matters cannot be fitted into rational explanations. Spirituality is transcendent. The miracle [comes only] after Draupadi had surrendered herself. The secret lies in surrender.[12]
Here we recall Lord Krishna rubbing dust from the feet of the surrendered person on his head. True surrender is sanctity of the highest order.
Self-Acceptance
Non-surrender is often born of a deficit in self-acceptance. Ultimately, freedom begins not with external changes but with internal acceptance. There is no judgment, no ledger of right and wrong—only the silent radiance of Being. The ceaseless project of self-improvement is rooted in a misunderstanding, namely, the belief that the ego is fundamentally flawed whereas, in fact, there is no ego, Bhagavan tells us. Thus, mistakes—previously seen as failures—do not belong to anyone. In recovering them, we can then let them go. They then become gateways to a hidden innocence residing further down.
Conclusion
True courage begins by embracing life and sitting with uncertainty, sorrow, or loneliness without trying to fix or flee anything. Beneath every struggle lies God’s grace, illuminating our inherent purity untouched by karmic afflictions. Courage arises when we give up the fight, trusting that even what is difficult has something to teach us. Surrender and self-acceptance are indispensable components of Bhagavan’s enquiry. They offer a profound path to freedom, inviting us to embrace conditions just as they are. What remains is simplicity and the shining truth that we were never unworthy to begin with. Through enquiry, we begin to overcome non-acceptance, allowing us to discover what is not broken, namely, the Ground of Being—the Self—whole, complete, luminous, and aware. —
Footnotes and References
[1] Talks, §287, 27 November 1936.
[2] Guru Vachaka Kovai, Prof. K. Swaminathan, §243.
[3] Talks, §201, 14th June 1936.
[4] Talks, §566, 26th October 1938.
[5] Talks, §28, 4th February 1935.
[6] The line continues, Such equanimity is called Yoga or union with the Supreme. Bhagavan Gita, Chap. 2.47-2.53.
[7] Talks, §31, 4th February 1935.
[8] Talks, §27, 4th February 1935.
[9] “Only surrender to Me”, Talks, §363, 20th February 1937.
[10] Aksaramanamalai, v. 28.
[11] Guru Vachaka Kovai, Prof. K. Swaminathan, §239.
[12] Talks, §101, 19th November, 1935.
