Recently, Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon and owner of The Washington Post, wrote an op-ed in a newspaper suggesting that newspapers should stop taking sides in political campaigns, because the president’s endorsement “creates a perception of bias”. The Indic philosophical tradition upholds neutrality as key, whether in extraordinary reportage or progress on the spiritual path. Spiritualists and journalists must remove bias, prejudice, and political endorsement to arrive at the purest form of truth, which can be uncomfortable and challenging. One of the benefits of spirituality is that it allows the individual to become neutral, saving them from being swayed by fixed points of view.
Academic distance and neutrality have prevailed in various Indic scriptures. In the Ashtavakra Gita, for example, Ashtavakra states:
“I do not long for the dissolution of the universe.
I have no interest in its sustainability either.
(17.7)
In Yog Vasisht, Ram emphasizes neutrality towards life and death by stating,
“I don’t live long,
and I will not die soon.”
Bhagwad Gita 6:9 explains Krishna postulating,
“The yogi sees everything – the happy, the friend, the enemy, the righteous, and the sinner – with an impartial intellect. not biased between the righteous and the sinner, it is considered different between people.
Just as maya, the imaginary power of Brahman, creates the illusion that the world is real, and one of the ways to free it from the stranglehold is to develop the awareness of the witness, in the same way, to remain unaffected by the polarization of opinion, the individual must cultivate balance. with neutrality towards all ideologies, especially during elections. This applies not only to the spiritually inclined but also to journalists and media organizations, because it is their dharma to report facts impartially, just like Arjun’s dharma as a warrior to fight in Mahabharat.
The Indic spiritual ideal is Sthitaprajna, a person of stable wisdom, without bias or prejudice. In the Bhagwad Gita, chapter two, Arjun asks Krishna who Sthitaprajna is and how he sits and walks. Krishna explains that Sthitaprajna is unaffected by externalities. It has nothing to do with everything, meeting good and bad in balance, they do not like and do not retreat. Attachment to things, people, thoughts, understandings, and ideologies are deterrents to becoming Sthitaprajna. Therefore, to be equal, one must not have any political ideas or ideologies – left, right, or center – because he is an observer, observing and maintaining a studied distance, as if enjoying a Bollywood film unfolding on celluloid.
The Gita says that just as the wind carries the boat on the water, so too, that which is associated with the mind removes discrimination. Krisn explains that it looks wise with equanimity to all, whether brahmins endowed with learning and culture, cows, elephants, dogs and pariahs, too.
The Indian school of thought provides a contextual framework for detachment, dispassion, and even-handedness that guides the state of mind beyond the duality of likes and dislikes. The definition of yog, one of the six systems of Indic philosophy, according to Patanjali’s Yog Sutras, is ‘Yoga chitta vritti nirodh’, the cessation of the vrittis of the mind. When the mind is calm, the yogi is free from the modifications of the mind born of likes and dislikes.
Sant Kabir embodies the essence of detachment in doha:
“Kabira teri jhopri gal katiyan to paas.
Jo karenge so bharenge tu kyon bhayo udaas”
(“Oh Kabir! Your hut is near the butcher’s bay.
Why are you like this? For his actions, he will only pay.”)
A spiritually mature individual transcends all worldly pleasures and identifications, because he does not conform to schools of thought or indulge in art, food, music, or technology, and practices loving detachment even when surrounded by a loving family. They are post-culture, post-cuisine, post-art and post-music, founded on Self.
