Vedanta Blog 2024
The first of the Four Practices (sādhana-catuṣṭaya) is discernment (viveka). What does it really mean? What does it do? How do I practice it? How does it help my spiritual life?
At its heart, adhikāri-vāda simply means that the spiritual benefit we derive is directly related to the capacity we have. We all have the ability to increase our capacity. What should we do to increase our spiritual fitness?
When the Principle of Competence fell into the hands of incompetent people, it took the form of “the condition for eligibility.” Who had access to knowledge and who did not have access—this became a highly contested issue. What was the corrective that Swami Vivekananda offered in the matter?
Unless we are fit to undertake spiritual study and practice, we won’t benefit from them. What does spiritual fitness mean? How is the Principle of Competence (adhikārī-vāda) connected with spiritual fitness?
Discernment helps us distinguish the right from the wrong, the good from the bad, the healthy from the unhealthy. When it is time to choose, we instinctively choose to attach ourselves to whatever makes us happy and detach from whatever makes us unhappy. Thus detachment is a natural follow-up to discernment. What does this mean to my life as a spiritual seeker?