What is Detachment ?

When some person, thing or object of our desire stays in our mind even after it is not in front to us or has vanished away from our sight, it is called attachment. If we permit this desire to stay longer on our mental plain, it creates feeling of happiness, sadness, bitterness, envy, hatred, pride, greed etc which is attachment. We crave for taking revenge from our ‘enemies’. They are people whom we have labeled as our ill wishers in our thoughts because they are not meeting with the criteria of goodness we have stored in our psychic.

Lot of people talk of being detached or feeling detached. But what does it mean? Does it mean stopping interaction with our near and dear ones? Does it mean quarantining oneself from our loved ones? Does it mean avoiding celebrations or functions of the family? Does is mean stopping to enjoy life? Does it mean maintaining a physical and mental distance from the world to maintain a close relationship with God? Does it mean stop enjoying. NO. NO. NO. This is not detachment.

Ancient Holy Scriptures state that in the pursuit of God, if we neglect our worldly duties then God burns down our sins occurring due to this neglect and takes us in HIS fold thereby freeing us from the cycle of birth and death. Many of us do not understand the crux of this and start to give up worldly duties, still enjoying our luxuries etc and seek our freedom without following the other part of the teaching. We do not genuinely take up the search of God. This is not detachment.

When we have taken human body, we automatically have to perform many worldly duties depending upon our position in the family, society and the world. God does not want us to run away from them to find him. Shirking from family responsibilities, even if you are old and yet capable, is not detachment. Real detachment comes when we do all our duties but with the feeling that whatever would be the outcome – good or bad – we will remain calm and stable. We offer both – the credit as well as the fruit of performing our duty to the God. This way we get free from Karma bondage because now karma is God’s and not ours. When we act this way, automatically it so happens that our conscience does not permit us to do anything wrong or undesirable or harmful for the society.

Controlling faculties of mind and making choice is in our hand but the result is not. The outcome is our destiny. We get only if we deserve. There are so many factors which determine what we deserve - some of them we will not understand, only God can.

When we look at ourselves as DOER, take responsibility of our actions on self than we have to carry the burden of our own individual karma life after life and bear the good as well as bad outcomes of the same. Detachment is means to get rid of this excess baggage for it is wise to travel light coz the journey is long. We have to understand that nothing belongs to us.

If we go deeper, the society we live in carries the burden of its collective karma which it has to endure in next life time and so on. That is why wise men say that we should check our company. For company we keep affects our mental makeup and vice versa.

This world has been called the play of God’s Maya (illusion). What we see, hear, feel, smell or taste with our five senses is not all that this world is comprised of. Universe encircles many phenomenons which are beyond comprehension of our five senses. A spiritual person has to first learn to discriminate between real and unreal. Choosing to stay with the real and detaching oneself from unreal. Only God is real, rest is unreal. We do our karma and then wait for its result/ outcome/ affect. If it is not as per our expectations we start to find fault and get into blame game. This is not detachment.

I am not talking to you, keeping away from you and not meeting you. This does not mean I am detached from you. I would be detached from you, if you’re being out there in this world or anywhere does not affect me in any way. I should not have any kind of love or hate feelings for you. I should feel comfortable as well as neutral in your company. If your being in the same room as me invokes feeling of excitement or jealousy or ill will or hatred, it is attachment. We are attached when we feel like or dislike for some person, place, object or event.

We are supposed to do our karma as per dharma based on stations of duty of our life disinterestedly, just like a witness. The outcome of our karma should not bother us. Prescribed dharma is what we find in religious scriptures as well as in our own inner consciousness depending upon the level of development of our soul in this lifetime. If we act this way and offer what we did along with its outcome – whether to our liking or not – to God, we are said to be detached and free from any karma bondage. Our karma burden in lighter. This is said to be the first step.

In the next step, if we continuously stay detached from our karma and remain connected with the God/Universe, feeling calm and peaceful amidst ups and downs of our life, staying unruffled, we will be able to break through this unreal cycle of birth and death (where we stay entangled life after life) and find the real - attain Nirvana – will become masters of Self and need not be born again.

Vandana Ritik
New Delhi