The Main Human Mistakes and Sins

The seven deadly sins by Hieronymus Bosch

In the Judeo-Christian tradition in the Western world, there have been descriptions of things, which we consider undesirable in the character of human beings. Such characteristics indicate a spiritually diseased condition. The more spiritual power we have, the more we are able to conquer these anomalies.

Real progress on the path of healthy life means avoiding the negative and cultivating the positive aspects of life. Faith is more focused on the positive side; even though there is faith by which we are avoiding the negative aspects. For example: I believe this is good for me, therefore I accept it – I believe this is not good for me, therefore I reject it.

Nevertheless, there is a small difference between these two types of faith.

We know that whenever we are going through any type of crisis, it is very good, if we can come to a state of mind which brings us into an active engagement in a positive way. If we are obsessed by a negative experience and we do not have the power and knowledge to overcome it, then our belief that something is not good for us and that we should give it up, becomes the cause for further frustration. Only through positive faith and engagement can we overcome such difficulties.

So, let us consider here these so-called mortal sins and let us see, how we can overcome them.

Luxuria

This very prominent and dangerous influence is not even considered to be pathological in Western psychology.
Lust is something what we experience as part of our life. The whole material existence is being created by lust. There is nothing uncommon about it. What we are speaking about here, is uncontrolled and morbid lust. This lust creates many problems and is the reason for a lot of suffering. We can accuse our materialistic lifestyle as being guilty of causing all the problems we are facing. Such a lifestyle is the cause and at the same time the result of all the suffering. Materialistic lifestyle means promoting materialistic values. In this way we are sinking more and more deeply into the problem. In the case of lust, when people get too influenced by it, it turns into luxuria, immoral sexuality and adultery. We just have to look at what the advertisement and entertainment industry is doing through the media. Lust is being promoted in every product. A mind embedded with this impression becomes completely uncontrolled and sick and in this manner people become obsessed with degenerate sexuality. Rape, torture, pedophilia, sexual murder and other aberrations are the results of this ongoing contamination of the society.

An immense number of children in the world are being sexually abused, sometimes used for child pornography. Sexual abuse of minors is one of the horrible things which is a daily affair in this world.

Uncontrolled sex life has very drastic consequences. One of those consequences is AIDS. This disease is spreading throughout the world. And people, who do not know how to control their lust, are very much in danger. Not only are they in danger, but also all the other people with whom they get in contact for the purpose of enjoying sex. Even married people become sometimes so unrestricted, that they are going outside of the marriage to have sex with others. Besides the affection and trust of their partners, they are also risking their partner’s health. This is very irresponsible and can be considered as deliberate harming. This is how bad things are due to not being well guided and well trained. Therefore we have to behave properly and surrender to the curing principles of faith, which are being given to us by grace.

Western psychology has done a very bad job by failing to identify and promote a sane level of sexuality, as it is explained by different mystical traditions. Yong people, influenced by the modern lifestyle and education, consider this concept to be outdated. They want the “modern way” and we see the results of this.

Psychologists are not yet ready to recognize lust as our great enemy, nor do they have a proper approach to overcome it.

Therefore we want to show with these OIDA-therapy teachings that the problems of human beings have to be solved by positive understanding; by positive engagement and by saving our energies and directing them in the right way.

There are traditional healing methods, which help us to keep human beings on the right track and to protect them from descending into the pitfall of materialistic confusion. In regards to lust, there is a very effective way of controlling it. This is dedication to higher ideals of truth, presented by God and his messengers. It is not enough to say that we believe in some higher ideal. We have to enter into the service of the truth. Whether we are married or unmarried, there is for everyone, according to their circumstance of life, something to be done in service to the truth. One can serve God and the truth by taking care nicely of their wife or husband and children, according to the guidelines set by the spiritual process they are following. The motivation for the service to the family must be Divine. Otherwise we just become enamored with money. Lust has three sub-divisions: profit, adoration and distinction. To overcome this, we have to utilize the profit for maintaining ourselves, so that we can serve the higher purpose, as well as directly supporting the higher purpose. We should direct adoration towards God and the representatives of truth. In no way should we expect or desire adoration for ourselves. And distinction has to go to the distinct teachings of the truth which we are getting.

It means our time and energy have to be completely spent for serving our family and others on their spiritual path. And in case that someone is not married, they can use all their time and energy for service to God and others. Spiritual communities are offering these types of opportunities for service. If we utilize all our energy in this way and put all our attention into this service, then we cannot go astray anymore. We simply do not have the interest in or the time for any type of deviation. We do not want to make trouble for anyone due to our actions. We do not want to hurt anyone by our uncontrolled behavior. Or looking at it from the positive perspective we want to do everything possible, to please others and God. Positive engagement and thinking will give us the power to resist all types of trials and do the best.

Gula

Gula means excessiveness, greediness, overdoing, and exaggeration. These are behavioral pathologies, addictions to substances and similar habits. Eating too much, working too much, being obsessed with sexual engagements to the point of becoming completely uncontrolled – all this is excessiveness. In Sanskrit it is called atyahara.

So let us see what can help cure us of this excessiveness.
Vedic tradition offers a very simple method: “Eat only what has been offered to God and eat only that much, that is necessary to keep the body and soul together.”

We have to work at least 8-10-12 hours. Besides that we have to be a good father, mother - whatever we are. We have to withstand all the different challenges of life. For this reason we have to give sufficient energy to the body. That is the reason why we are eating.

Some people eat so much that right after eating they want to lie down. “Now I have to do my digestion.” They just lie down for 3 hours. This is excessiveness and waste of time and health by inappropriate eating. You are supposed to eat to have energy for service.

If you eat things which are unhealthy, like meat, fish, eggs etc., then you are immediately accumulating negative reactions. Offering food to God, as it is described in the Vedic tradition, means that you can not offer whatever you want. There are certain restrictions. Food offered to the Lord must be ahimsa or non-violent. In other words, it cannot come from killing. This food will be blessed by the Lord. In this way we will get cured from excessiveness and we will make progress in our evolution of consciousness.

Greediness can be cured if we learn how to accept and use only those things which are in the service of the truth. We have to be engaged with something, whatever one likes to participate in. We should avoid exaggeration and do the things according to principles we are being given by our mystical tradition guides. We should fulfill our duties and we should not try to utilize our activities just for enhancing our own position. Being obsessed with our own position, with “I, Me and Mine” is also atyaharah. So even acting for the right purpose, we can still adopt an improper attitude. For getting recognition and taking some advantage, we are ready to do more than what we are able or supposed to. These are actually not positive things, even if it is for a good purpose. It is a big effort to obtain praise for oneself, and very often we are ready to push ourselves in front of everyone, or to belittle others.

We have to move toward full participation and acting on behalf of the common goal. That will cure us absolutely from all excessiveness, greediness and similar dysfunctional behavior.

Avaritia

We are speaking here about greed and the tendency of not letting things go. One is unwilling to give up or lose something. This, in Sanskrit, is called laulyam, strong greediness to hold onto things and not to lose them.

We want to be the centerpiece of everything, so that we can control everything and everyone. This becomes very much a symptom of the pathology of materialism, we could say. Materialism leads us to all kinds of obsessions, because we do not have any commitment to spiritual life.

These attitudes are all given by nature. We are born with them and they have more or less influence in our lives. But there is also an element of nurturing them and giving them space to extend their influence.

Once there was a lecture held by a Harvard scholar on the science of publicity. During that lecture held at MIT (Massachusetts Institute for Technology) he said the following:

“We need envy, we need greed, we need pride, we need vanity, we need jealousy, we need lust and we need all these things in order to make our economy grow. They are the impulses in our society for people to compete with each other, for people to become determined to have more than the others of all these things.”

Then someone in the audience said: “What you just said sounds to me like we are supposed to contaminate humanity. We have to make them sicker, unhappier, so that our economical goals can be fulfilled.”

Then the so called scholar answered: ”Well, it may sound so, but once we have achieved some economic development and have a very strong society, then we can try to teach other values to become less envious and to overcome other negativities in life.”

We can see the reason why our whole social system is working against us. Materialistic conceptions applied in society are destructive.

Modern psychologists are working for publicity campaigns. They use the latest technology to appeal to these instincts, to the impulses and to the weaknesses of the living beings. They have utilized all their sophistication and their intelligence simply to hinder the progress of the individual. In other words, they are promoting faithlessness.

They are promoting mundane progress at the cost of the soul.

This makes us think of Jesus Christ, when he said: “What is the value of winning the entire world, if you lose your eternal soul?”

This is something like selling your soul to the Devil.

The Devil is our mundane irresponsible enjoyment. Or in other words: What is understood spiritually to be a downfall is considered in materialism to be an instrument for entertainment.

They may say in atheistic ethics: “Do not overdo it”. Do not go to the last consequence of your lust, greed etcetera, but they’re drawing upon a line which is not defined, which doesn’t really exist.

So what does this mean? The world is ruled by a criminal mentality and crime and suffering are the results of it. Sometimes, like in the case of the scholar from Harvard University, materialists admit this fact.

The way to be cured of avarice is to understand that everything is controlled by the Supreme Controller. You should not think: “Oh, why do others have something, which I want to have.” You should accept whatever you have to do and whatever is given to you. Never think that your work is the reason for having something. There are higher reasons for having and losing things. Just like a man has to accept that he has to maintain his family; a woman has to accept that she has to care for the children and make the household beautiful. In the same way we have to accept all things the way they are coming to us. This is the way to be cured of avaritia. Charity is also one very effective method of curing our conditioned character. Charity means that we give care and attention to others and that we are willing to not think of ourselves while performing such acts..

In this way we can solve the problems caused by preoccupation with ourselves.

It is a very important point. But there are different levels of charity. The most important is that we do the charity under the guidance of somebody who is spiritually advanced.

Otherwise we could easily create more problems for others and the environment with our good intentions.

Acedia

Acedia or laziness means that I have no faith. I do not see any value in what is to be done. This is a symptom of a diseased condition. Should we not naturally be inclined to make ourselves useful to others, especially, to all those, who have done so much for us – like for example our parents, teachers, farmers etc.?

The problem is that we only want to enjoy. We want others to work for us. We cannot understand what our natural position is. We feel that we are the rightful enjoyer, that the world owes something to us, and that other people are lucky if they can do something for us. Thus we always want to relax. If somebody challenges or threatens our attitude, we immediately react with anger.

We are not convinced that our qualifications have been given to us by God for a very good purpose. We do not have faith in the most essential aspect of life, which is that I am constitutionally a servant and that there is nobody better to be served than God or those who are serving the truth. Due to the lack of this understanding, the material nature is pushing us to serve our own senses and those people, with whom we come in contact with by providence, and who oblige us to serve them against our will. Thus we become more and more frustrated. The tax-department, the military, our wife, husband or children and our entire surroundings, do not care. They are obliging us to serve them. Otherwise they will punish us. In this way, if we cannot act in a positive way for a higher purpose, we have to experience what it means to serve the circumstances of life by obligation and force. And if we can not handle this, then we are in great danger. We are on the verge of developing unsocial or criminal behavior.

Laziness comes from ignorance. We are not able to see the mystical background of life. We think everything in life is by chance. This is because of a lack of faith.

Some people are so lazy that they want their wives to work for them. Or they let their children and family stay at home without food, while they hang around in bars only talking nonsense. Laziness is like a curse. Nobody will like you, except those who may see a material interest fulfilled by you.

To overcome laziness, OIDA-therapy proposes spiritual rejuvenation. We have to learn about the wonders of the world and the miracles of life. We have to hear stories about those who have sacrificed themselves joyfully for the welfare of others. We have to go to the root of all problems to find out, when and where did we lose faith and enthusiasm. The study material provided by OIDA-therapy will hopefully help us to regain strong faith again.

If you want to go deeper into a particular mystical tradition, which you feel strongly attracted to, then you have to follow the recommendations of the teachers you have trust in.

Faith will be given to those who pray for it: to those who admit that nobody should cause suffering to others; to those who are reasonable and are ready to share their energies, give donations for good causes or do voluntary work to improve the situation of suffering souls in this world. A general teaching of the OIDA-therapy is that you have to be ready to give to others, whatever you are hoping and aspiring for in your life.

Ira

Ira means to become angry, furious and aggressive. In Sanskrit it is called krodhah.

You see others like: “They are my enemies. I want to get rid of them.” You get enraged.

You want to damage them. You want to do something to them. This is very dangerous, because in that mood you are actually doing wrong things to yourself and to others.

According to the Bhagavad Gita, anger is frustrated lust.

People in the mood of lust are inviting all the negative things. It is narcissistic, when people are angry with life, angry with the world, and even angry with God. They say: “I don’t think He exists”, or: “Oh, I am complaining about God, He should be criticized for all the bad things He has allowed to happen.” Like that. This is very dangerous.

On the other hand, how can we counteract this statement? What is there to replace it with?

The Vedas provide us with very practical advice. They state: If you want to be angry with somebody, then be angry with yourself. You are the one who is silly and who has made many mistakes. If you really want to chastise someone, then chastise yourself. Do not go around making others unhappy by accusing them or anything like that. This has no sense. Even if you are right in some cases, do not try to criticize others. Someone can be corrected only if they want to be corrected. And they will only accept advice from those to whom they feel connected by faith and trust. Either way around, if we are in the situation to be corrected, or to correct someone, to understand the impact of faith is very important.

Faith is the basis for our recovery. We have to understand that it is also the basis for the recovery of others. In this way we should not disturb the faith of others and we should only have faith in those, who are representing our inner conviction. They know how to speak out about what is in our hearts and their actions are the source of our confidence and faith. When you have faith in someone who is representing your higher ideals, than you are also ready and motivated to overcome your shortcomings and negativities and reach your higher ideals in that way.

You are not ready to tolerate negativity within you, because it doesn’t belong there. You don’t want to have it there. You understand that this is an aberration of consciousness.

“I don’t want to have that. I want to be in the positive field, because I want to please my Lord. I want to please those, whom God has sent into my life. I’m thankful to my father and mother. I’m thankful to have a brother or a sister. I’m thankful to my wife. I’m thankful to my children. I’m so thankful to my teachers. And I am thankful to my disciples.” In that attitude a person can overcome what is called pathology in its various forms. Furthermore, we need intense enthusiasm, intense determination, intense patience, intense strict following of principles, intense association with spiritually advanced people, intense rejection of association with sensual people who follow an egoistic lifestyle. Behaving this way is practical and it will help us improve our lives.

According to the saintly Prahlada Maharaja, it is a demoniac mentality that looks upon others as enemies and threats. Everybody belongs to the Lord and is under His control. If you are the servant of the truth and the servant of all, then you don’t have any enemies. The only enemy you have is your false ego and the mistakes you have made in the past.

Otherwise there is no one in the world who really even bothers to be your enemy. They don’t have any interest in becoming your enemy. Once our spiritual master, Swami B.R. Sridhar, said to us: ”You think, that you are so important and that someone has decided that you are his enemy? You are in a grand illusion. Everybody is just thinking about himself and how to improve, and arrange his things. No one wants to make you his enemy or meditates upon you as an enemy. He’s not capable. He is so captivated by his narcissism.”

So we have to beware of this trap of thinking in terms of enemies (They are my enemies, I am their enemy) and at the same time we have to develop a positive attitude of appreciation, help and love.

But there are all kinds of justifications which can come across our way. A criminal and envious mentality is very dangerous. When I was a hippy I traveled around the world to try to find an answer to the riddles of life. One day somebody invited me to sleep in a commune. I didn’t know anything about them so I went there. As we were sitting together, the people were coming in and they were sitting around the fire and one was saying, “Oh, do you know what I did today? I stole a television from the supermarket.”
“Wow”, they said: “How did you do that?” He said: “I just went in with a workers uniform; I just picked up the set and took it out the main door”. Then another came and said: “I stole a camera today. I went into the store and I said I needed to get one and look at it. Then I just left the store, when there was the opportunity.”

I was sitting there while one after the other presented their stories. Then I realized that I had just come into a community of thieves. They were all telling stories about how they were stealing and how they enjoyed it. They were rejoicing in it and they considered it a “victory”.

They took something away from capitalism, and said: “Yeah, all these big shopping malls. They are all owned by some big demons so we have liberated some items today.” I was sitting there dumbstruck. Luckily, the next morning I grabbed my bag and ran away from that place. This is the type of place where sooner or later everybody ends up in jail. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. Ali Baba and the 40 thieves, something like that. But they had a justification for their stealing and their anger. They would not feel guilty that they were stealing. On the contrary, they were proud of it.

On account of bad association one can become like this and who knows then what’s going to happen? But we should always be aware of how we are choosing our association. If we are honest with ourselves and we pray and worship purity, there is nothing which can take us away from the proper path.

Invidia

Invidia is envy, jealousy or grudge.

It is amazing, that Western psychiatrics do not consider it as an illness.

There is only a consideration in the Freudian based psychoanalysis, that envy is a kind of insecurity, which leads us into patterns of wrong behaviour. In Vedic understanding, the desire (iccha), leads us to envy (irsya). We want to be the dominator and the owner of everything. Out of this attitude many problems of life develop.

It is very clearly said in the Bhagavad Gita 10.8 (aham sarvasya prabhavo mattah sarvam pravartate iti matva bhajante man budha bhava samanvitah): “I am the source of all spiritual and material worlds. Everything emanates from Me. The wise who perfectly know this engage in My devotional service and worship Me with all their heart.”

Wise people know perfectly that God is the origin of everything. Only they experience peace. They can understand what peace is, because they accept that they are not the controller, the enjoyer nor the proprietor of the things in this world. How does envy manifest? There are desires which we have, but which we cannot satisfy. If we see someone else getting the things we want or reaching achievements which we desire . then we become very nasty and angry. Out of envy we are ready to tell lies, to become brutal and do any other inappropriate action. In this way, envy is a very strong influence and it does not come alone. Influenced by envy, we will totally deviate from a healthy and progressive path of life.

Then we will become old and grumpy. Nobody likes an angry old man or woman. They live in solitude. They live alone, because they are just angry about life. They cannot be full of love. They don’t understand their own mistakes. They are always thinking: “I’m good and you are bad. I know what is right, you do not know.”

Whenever they start talking they complain about everything. Sometimes old people fall into this trap. But it is much worse when young people completely adopt this mentality.

There is a nice saying in South America: ”You start becoming old when you stop learning new things.” This means, if we are unable to change anymore, if we do not try to recognize our weakness and correct it, then we immediately become old and angry. We become the type of a person, whom everybody tries to escape from.

We can see that envy and all the other weaknesses lead us into a diseased condition.

To eliminate problems or to prevent even bigger problems, we have to change our life very radically. In other words, we have to uproot the causes of our degradation. OIDA-therapy offers a systematic study of the problems of life and provides proposals for the changes that need to be effectuated.

Superbia

Superbia is pride or vanity. This is pathologically identified as narcissism. In Sanskrit this is called dambhah.

Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita (dambho darpo ’bhimanas ca krodhah parusyam eva ca): Arrogance and pride, harsh treatment of others, intimidation of others, these are the nastiest elements of daily life. People influenced by these elements feel superior to others and want them to submit to their desires. We can even see this in the family, where people are supposed to love each other; sometimes they get on each others nerves, exploit each other or extract whatever they want to get from the other person. So, as you can see, this is very complicated. Vanity, pride, harsh treatment and all these kinds of things are symptomatic of the world of illusion and ignorance.

These are called demoniac qualities in the Bhagavad Gita. There is a potential divine being - that is you, and there is a potential demon and that is also you. Deva or Asura. Are you going to live like a devotee of the truth (Deva) or are you going to live like a demon (Asura)? This is the daily question and struggle in our lives.

If you have faith that you should be a light being, a servant of the truth, obviously you have to shun all the things which the asuras or demoniac people are worshiping. Asuras do not want to have any divine qualities.

There is an ancient Vedic story about Prahlada Maharaja. He was sent to the school of the Asuras. In this school he was talking about the truth and was getting the other children to understand higher values. The teachers became furious. They said:”Tthis is a place for hypocrisy and politics. You are ruining this school by pronouncing values of divinity! Stop this immediately!” Prahlada refused that order. So, they took him back to his father, Hiranyakasipu, and they said: “We are very sorry. We have a school for demons, but this boy is incurably dedicated to divinity. We hate this and we are not going to allow it. You, dear Hiranyakasipu, are very powerful. Do with this boy whatever you like, but we can not take responsibility. He is turning our entire school into a school of devotees to the truth! We even caught him singing the Holy Names of God with the other students.

What do you expect us to do? Take this son and do with him whatever you like.” So Prahlada was expelled from school of Asuras.

The remedy for vanity is to understand that we should be beautiful, strong, determined and expert for the service to God and the truth and not for our own sense gratification.

The Lord is very kind and He has given a lot of beauty to each person. Not necessarily physical beauty, but the beauty of the soul, which can be very loving. There are of course people, who are not only bereft of the bodily beauty, but their character looks even worse. And there are people who are very beautiful, but who do not have a good looking character. In order to become a beautiful person, we have to follow the most beautiful person. We have to give up the concept of external beauty and look for internal values. For that we have to keep good association. This is a very essential point. Only good association can take us up. Bad association drags us down. So we should not be proud, but we should look for those, whom we can be proud of. If we are proud of ourselves, that’s not beneficial. But if we are proud of those who are helping us to get out of illusion, that is good.

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