Wise Words
Laws Of Memory : Part 17 : Law Of Balance
Tarun Pradhaan
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# Laws of Memory Part 17 Welcome to Pure Experiences, and this is a series on Laws of Memory. Today, we are going to discuss the Law of Balance. ## 14 - Law of Balance This means everything in this existence seeks an equilibrium. Everything, with time, spontaneously equalizes. Whenever there is an excess of something, it creates an imbalance, and a change happens, which reduces that excess. Things move in a direction such that the energy is balanced out, so that nothing is too much and nothing is too less. The direction of the change is always such that it minimizes imbalance. You can have a sub-law of Law of Balance, which is the law of entropy. It says that the energy in a system tends to distribute equally. The Law of Balance explains not only entropy, it explains many other physical laws, but the Law of Balance is applicable to not only physical, it is applicable to the body and psychological events also. Entropy is a specific case where this law is seen as equalizing force. For example, if you keep a clay pot outside, it will stay like that for a few days, a few months. The rain, the sunshine, or the snow, the vegetation, grass, they all contribute towards its destruction. The clay pot tends to become clay. Its particles tend to scatter around. So in science, we say entropy increases. The form tends to become formless. A complex system tries to simplify, breaks down. From a human point of view, it is destruction, but from the point of view of the memory, it is simply trying to balance. When you create a clay pot, you actually create an imbalance of probabilities, of energy, of distribution of patterns in the memory. Now, somewhere in the memory, there are more regular patterns. Something gets concentrated somewhere, while around it is randomly moving patterns. So, the law of probability says that out of all the positions a particle in the pot can occupy, the probability of it being in a pot is very tiny. Imagine there are 1 million locations in a room, and some particles are restricted to one or two locations only, that is inside the pot. Now, that creates imbalance in the memory. Since the memory is in motion, impermanence is the law, the particles, they try to occupy other positions in the room. Out of a million, it is more probable for a particle to be somewhere in the room, move around, rather than being constraint to one position, which is the clay pot. So ultimately, impermanence appears, motion happens, and the particles in the clay pot try to distribute in the room. That is what we see as entropy. From a human perspective, everything breaks down. It is impossible for the clay particles scattered in the room to automatically construct a clay pot. It is impossible. Only when some energy is supplied, so that imbalance happens, probability distribution is imbalanced, only then something appears which is meaningful. It takes energy. We say it consumed power. Creation consumes power or energy, but the opposite is spontaneous. It won't take too much energy for the clay pot to again become dust in the room. And you can see this law of entropy everywhere in nature. It explains many more laws like law of potential. If water is at a higher potential or a higher level, there are more locations for it to occupy, and it goes to lower level. Somehow finds a way. It takes structure, energy, and power to keep it at a higher level. Otherwise, it tends to go down and balance itself. So in physics, we say that in a system, the system tries to come into a state of least energy. This is a consequence of Law of Balance. The creation also creates imbalance. On a flat surface of sand, if you create a sandcastle, pile up some sand, you will see that there is a pit, small pit. This is a case of imbalance. And given enough time, the sandcastle will fall down, and the pit will be filled up, and it will again become a flat surface. This is a direct consequence of probability. Same way, electrical charges, if they are concentrated in same, one place, they try to flow to somewhere else where there is less charge. And the same is true for everything. Even if we don't see it, the Law of Balance is acting somewhere. Since everything is impermanent, the balance never becomes static. It is always a dynamic balance. Or we call it a state of equilibrium. It is not that everything will become dead and motionless because of Law of Balance. No, it becomes a dance of harmony, equilibrium. Yes, from the human perspective, it can be destruction, leveling up, something boring, but without this law, nothing will move and nothing will be steady also. The Law of Balance provides an illusion of stability, steadiness. So, there can be more examples of balance. You already know examples related to physical world. You can see the Law of Balance in the body. If the body works, walks, runs, it loses energy, water, nutrients, and then it must be fed those things. It feels tired. It is painful, hungry. That is a condition of imbalance. When you eat, you rest, it is balance. But if you rest too much, the body becomes restless, uneasy. It needs something to do. Sickness of the body is seen as imbalance inside the body, whether it is about hormones, blood, nutrition, whatever. And it is also imbalance with respect to the environment. If there is such a such an imbalance, the body gets infected by other microbes, other life forms, too much heat, too much cold. These are all imbalances that cause sickness in the body. So, the human body, and not only human body, bodies of every creature, they seek a balance, a balance with the environment and a balance in the inner environment. If you feed the body something which disturbs the harmony, it falls sick. So anyway, the law of entropy consumes it because a body is an imbalance in the environment. It is a creation. It is a structure, very complicated structure, held up against the law of probability. So, destruction of the body, death, old age, is also Law of Balance. This will be surprising for many people. What about birth? Is it creating imbalance? And the answer is no, it is creating some kind of dynamic balance. So, for any creature, if there is a abundance of resourcesfood, shelter, protectionit causes an imbalance in the environment. And new births happen. The creature reproduces more in in response to that signal. And more individuals of that kind, they consume the resources, and balance happens again. But if there is scarcity, less reproduction happens, less births happen, and there is again balance of resources. What happens if there are no resources, but the organism keeps reproducing? And the answer is very clear. It causes total destruction. If it is a human organism, it causes complete collapse of the society, civilization, and culture. So, birth also causes some kind of balance, and death also causes balance. Otherwise, these processes, these events will not exist. There are more processes in the body, like too much pleasure becomes boring, and then it becomes painful. There are mechanisms in the body to ensure that nothing goes out of balance. If the body grows beyond a specific size, it becomes heavy and slow, cannot defend from predators. That kind of body cannot run fast, cannot fight quickly. So, they are the first to be to be eaten by faster and more violent animals. So, they optimize. They reach a perfect balance. Too fast and too energetic creature will consume more energy, more food, and will quickly run out of resources. So, that also places upper limit. So, there is a dynamic balance in nature, in the ecosystem. If something goes wrong in the ecosystem, everything gets affected. It is a very delicate and dynamic balance. I think many people know about these things nowadays. Humans, due to their ignorance, and probably they have more agency to create imbalance, they tend to destroy things quickly. They pollute, they hunt overhunt, or they overproduce, and they reproduce too much. They do all kinds of unnecessary things, keep causing imbalance. But they cannot break the Law of Balance. Sometimes the balance is restored in a very inconvenient way, which we don't like. So, let us move to something which is mental, whatever we call mental or psychological. Because anyway, everything is mental. So, in the mind, we see the Law of Balance. Rise of emotion is caused by imbalance. A perfectly balanced mind will not give rise to too many emotions or too many thoughts. Something happens, something needs to be done, now emotions, desires, and thoughts arise in the mind, and their direction is to balance out everything. If there is a fight, immediately anger or fear arises. It causes actions to minimize that anger and fear. If the situation is not balanced, these emotions, thoughts, they keep arising, almost violently. It is inconvenient. We say it is a mental sickness because something is out of balance. If no action is taken, the imbalance keeps rising. And some kind of breakdown or destruction happens in the mental structure that causes mental disorders, mental sickness. And most of the mental sickness is imbalance in emotion. Either there is zero emotion, lack of it, or there is excess emotion, and that person acts like a mad person. Same way, too much thought is a result of some kind of imbalance. You are unable to take a decision, keep thinking. You have incomplete knowledge, incomplete information, you don't know what to do, keep thinking. It is a new situation, you never handled it, you keep thinking about it. So, it is an imbalance. The mental imbalance eventually causes some kind of imbalance in the body, because the energy seeks an outlet. The uncompensated, imbalanced energy in the mind tries to flow through body, and causes bodily sickness, illness, some kind. For example, too much thinking can cause headache. This is probably everybody's experience. But there are very subtle changes in the body that happen due to imbalance in the mind. This is well known to those who practice holistic medicine, healing, etc. Body is not different from mind. And you can guess that the imbalance in the mind will show up in the world, outside the body: bad relationships, disorganized house or office, ugly work style, there is no beauty in whatever they do or say, and so on. That is that shows some kind of imbalance somewhere. So, it is a dance. The body is not seeking a state of rest. The mind does not want to remain dead. The body-mind machine is seeking some kind of balance. If you know this law, you can utilize this law to find the imbalance and then restore the balance. So, there is a spiritual angle to the balance also. If there is too much ignorance, the causal body disintegratestoo much entropy. Ignorance shows that there is a lot of entropy. Everything is disorganized, illogical, and out of place, unharmonious. So, that kind of causal body will go down the ladder of evolution instead of rising up. Somebody who is pushing too hard in spirituality, doing some kind of impossible practices to progress, yes, there is some imbalance there, and it will cause some extraordinary, supernatural kind of manifestations. Many people experience this. So, spiritual progress is an act of balance. You cannot hurry it, and you cannot delay it. So, the golden rule everywhere, whether it is spiritual or material or everything in between, is: excess must be avoided. Too much of anything is always bad, and too little of anything is also bad. You need a balance. So, too little water in atmosphere will cause deserts. Too much water will cause swamp. Too much heat from the sun will not enable life here, and too little will cause ice ages, right, everything will freeze. Just the right amount, balanced. Same way, you cannot work too much, and you cannot sleep too much. Body needs balance. You cannot eat too much, but you cannot eat too little. Just the right amount. You cannot eat a balanced diet of one thing only, one nutrition only. No, you need all the nutrition, all kinds, variety of food. In the mind also, if there is zero anger, that person, that body-mind creature will not be able to defend, will be defeated, will be killed by more aggressive members. But if there is too much anger, that person will be hated, disliked, and will get killed by somebody who does not like that kind of violencepeacekeeping forces. So, just the right amount. Same way, just the right amount of fear keeps you alive. Too much, you won't be able to live properly. Too little, you will take more risk, and then always danger. Too much love, and you will take illogical decisions. Probably you will spend all your money, you will go mad for it. Too little love, and your life becomes boring, colorless, monotonous. Too much happiness, everybody knows now, the law of polarity and law of cycles and so on, probably you already guessed, is not good. You need some suffering to make the life spicy. Same way, too much spiritual practice causes problem. Too many blind beliefs: problems. "I don't believe anything at all": big problem. So, balanced thinking, balanced practice, equilibrium. Remember, spiritual progress is also equilibrium. Whatever is progressing does not want to go down, does not want to regress, but also does not want to hurry up the progress. There is no hurry in the nature. Everything happens at the right time. Too many desires will make you mad, crazy. No desire will make you depressed, boring. So, if you are fortunate to know the Law of Balance, you can optimize your life at all the planes of existence. This law is manifested in all the levels. All layers of memory show this law. So, I've given you many examples, and you must have understood it now. ## Rising Above Balance So as we said, it is possible to rise above the uncontrolled way of balancing, imbalancing, or entropy. You need to detect the imbalance. How will you detect imbalance if you are asleep on the wheel? You can see that most of the population is asleep, which means they are not aware. If somebody is aware, he or she can detect imbalance immediately. There are indicators of imbalance everywhere: red lights, green lights, all kinds of lights. You need to be aware, you need to be sensitive, and you will see the imbalance immediately, and then you can take some action to balance it. Some people are very sensitive, especially the spiritual people, because they have a high amount of awareness. These people, they withdraw from the society because they find too much imbalance in the society, too much. If they cannot do anything about it, they leave it. So awareness comes through knowledge, self-realization. Otherwise, you will keep thinking that this body-mind is me, and that kind of ignorance keeps it in imbalance. That equilibrium never arises without awareness, and awareness never comes without self-realization. And as soon as there is some kind of spiritual balance, a knowing, we call it equanimity, also called samadhi, which means a balanced state. That's all it means: a balanced mind. "Sam" in Sanskrit means balanced, equal. Although many people will interpret the word "samadhi" in different ways, probably there are already 100 definitions of this word, so I avoid this word. But equanimity is probably less corrupted, as it says "equal", balanced. So, the mind enters a balanced state. This is indicated by peace and bliss. The indicators of balance within you are peace and bliss, equanimity. And the indicators of imbalance are tension, suffering, violence, madness, everything failing, everything breaking, dissatisfaction, and lack of harmony and love, plus bodily sickness and general degradation of the society, which you can see around you. Society is mostly degraded. There is mostly suffering. Yes, there are few people that are happy. They are happy with an imbalance. If there is complete imbalance around you, entropy says that that person who is happy will not stay happy for long. For example, a king robs everybody, kills every enemy, captures every woman in a kingdom, in a domain. That king is a happy king, obviously, but he has created imbalance. Now, there will be mutiny or there will be riot, and these people will become so angry, obviously, they will kill that king. It is a short-lived happiness. Nobody will call it happiness; it is madness. But there are many things like this if you read history. Still, there are people like this who are in position of power. They create imbalance and call it achievement or happiness. That is the worst kind of stupidity. Intelligence says harmony, equanimity, balance, not imbalance. Some people earn a lot of money, call it happiness. They have simply created imbalance. Now, they gather an army of jealous, poor, unhappy people around them. They need two or three bodyguards to walk on the street. They need to keep keep checking their profits and bank balances. If they cannot keep up, they're fired from the company, whatever, corporation. People have created all kinds of really mentally retarded kind of imbalances, and they call it happiness. A king who captures the kingdom, but builds road, encourages farming, gives out money, gold occasionally, promotes art, science, philosophy, and spirituality, opens hospitals and universities, and brings prosperity in the kingdom, becomes a successful king. Yes, he will collect taxes, yes. He will punish people who are against his power. He will be violent. He will defend the kingdom using warfare and weapons, and so on. But there will be a balance, dynamic balance. He is keeping the peasant class, the lower class, happy and entertained. They get everything they want. He is not doing excess of kingness. Plus, he is also enjoying the rule. So, we see very few people like this who are completely balanced in all manners, in all the dimensions of life. It is almost impossible to find such a person. If you take a look at animals, you will find almost all of them have a perfect balance within themselves, within their community if they are social animals, and with nature. They are balanced. There is occasional violence, there is occasional conflict, few minutes, then rest of the time it is peace, bliss, very less disease. They do not even grow old, and they complete their lives in a perfect way. You will see the perfection of the nature if you observe wildlife: birds, fish, other animals. This balance will not be seen in domestic animals, pets. They fall sick, they die. They die in accidents, motor accidents, and they are killed by human for eating, and so on. These animals are raised as a farming practice. They do not live a life. They are farmed, they are grown for food. So, you will never find a balance there. And people who eat that kind of food, the imbalance gets transferred there. They also become like that: sick and stupid. So human beings, due to their unnatural lifestyle, have caused imbalance. A spiritual person realizes this and starts to create balance in their lives. So a spiritual person, a seeker, will seek balance, equanimity or samadhi, peace, bliss. A spiritual master canthis is importantif he pleases, can produce balance in others. Can balance the entire universe if they want, but they don't. Because imbalance is seen as a natural event. We don't go ahead knowingly and start making everything equal, because we know the Law of Balance is operating. We don't need to do much. At the right time, balance will rise. So a master is never in a hurry. The master does not want to enlighten everybody in the universe, although they want to, but they don't want to do it in one day. Some can do it in one day, but they know it is some kind of imbalance. We need ignorant people. We need these non-spiritual crowd to balance as something in the universe. So probably the masters know more than I can describe here. Their actions can seem almost mysterious, magical sometimes. Whenever you perceive imbalance, you need to act in a balanced way. Already the memory patterns are going to create equalization, equilibrium. So before it becomes violent and inconvenient, you do it yourself. Your all actions must be balance. And that simply means that do not do anything in excess. If it happens naturally, you can be sure that it is balanced. It will be balanced. If you need to do something which is not present in nature, yes, do the minimum. So, minimalism is the key. Minimalism does not mean reduction to zero. No, it does not mean that you destroy everything, keep nothing. No, it means perfect balance. Not more than needed, not less than needed. This is minimalism. If you minimize even more, you will see that there is some tension, there is some imbalance, and you will need to restore it. If it goes above a limit, you will see, yes, imbalance, you reduce it. So minimalism does not simply mean go on reducing, no. You need to increase something which was not there. That is also minimalism. So, this is a big subject, minimalism in itself, but it is the art of living so that nothing goes in excess, but happens exactly according to the need. And there is a law which I always keep telling people whenever they ask what to do. It is very amazing that humans don't know what to do. They know how to mess up everything without anybody telling them, but they don't know what to do when things go wrong. So, the formula is: do that which is necessary. It is related to minimalism, and also related to Law of Balance. If you do only the necessary, it will create a balance. If you keep doing unnecessary, yes, causes imbalance, and the restoration is sometimes undesired. We don't want that kind of restoration. So from the beginning, you need to check where is imbalance, start reducing. If it is too much, start increasing if it is too less. Balanced action. And there is an extension to this rule of necessity: after finishing that which is necessary, do that which is joyful, which brings pleasure and happiness. Because minimalism sometimes looks boring, monotonous, grayscale. You can add color. Always add the color in such a way that there is harmony, and there is joy, pleasure, happiness, and everybody enjoys it. It should not be imbalanced. You cannot enjoy by making lots of people unhappy. That already shows imbalance. You must have done something unnecessary. This is not minimalism. It is an art, and it must be learned. Other creatures are doing it naturally. Mother Nature ensures balance in case of other animals, other creatures. But humans have a freedom, which is very good, which is a power. We have free will, we have power to act even if it is not necessary, but we are learning to master this power. We are learning to cause a balance when we have excess ability to do something. Human beings are still learning it. So how to speed up the learning? Learn the laws of the memory. With this knowledge, you will be able to do whatever you want, and still keep everything in balance. You will be able to create infinitely, still maintaining a balance. You will be able to destroy, still escaping the consequences. That is what every magician or tantrik or master wants. So, the key is knowledge of these laws, and rising above these laws not by breaking it, but by utilizing these laws in your favor. So we'll continue our discussion on laws of memory. Thank you for listening to Pure Experiences. --- This article is a formatted transcript of a video in the series of videos on my YouTube channel **Pure Experiences**. Laws of Memory Video Series: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWKBCXU2oaNU