​The Katha Upanishad uses the metaphor of a city with eleven gates to describe the physical body. Seven of those eleven gates are our eyes, ears, nostrils, and mouth—in a word, our senses. We could not function easily in this world without our senses, and so they are useful and necessary gifts. We run into trouble, however, when we allow the senses to control our lives.
 
As Eknath Easwaran notes in The Essence of the Upanishads, when we live through the senses our vital energy—our prana—is constantly directed outward until it is depleted. We are then vulnerable to depression, as we cut ourselves off from the world in an effort to replenish our prana. Thus we set up an alternating cycle of frantic grasping at the outside world and dark isolation. Moreover, a life lived exclusively through the senses leads us to identify ourselves as strictly physical beings, and to judge both our own value and the value of others in terms of such things as physical appearance and material possessions. When those things go, as they inevitably do, we have nothing to fall back on, and so we live our lives in a constant state of fear and insecurity. We exhaust ourselves in the impossible task trying to create a safe, perfect, changeless physical environment for ourselves, and react to anything or anyone disturbing that environment as a threat. Living our lives with that attitude affects both our own inner peace and the peace of our world.
 
So how do we use and enjoy the senses in a healthy, reasonable way? Another metaphor from both the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita is useful here. The body, these scriptures tell us, is like a chariot and the senses the horses. Without some kind of control, the horses will pull the chariot in any direction they choose to go. The controlling mechanism is the mind. The lower mind serves as the reins, but those alone are not enough. We also need a charioteer pulling on the reins, and that charioteer is the higher, discriminating mind. And we need to remember in whose service the chariot exists. The Lord of the chariot is the Self. Easwaran tells us that the way we cultivate the discrimination we need to keep the senses in check is through meditation. When we meditate we close off the senses for a time and watch the mind at work. We gradually develop and strengthen our powers of discrimination. And we remind ourselves that we are more than body, more than senses, more than mind. Given those tools and that awareness, the charioteer can direct the horses in whatever direction the moment requires. 

​On Thursday we will celebrate Krishna Janmashtami--Krishna's birthday-- in Hindu tradition. One of the most striking things about Krishna is the various ways in which he is depicted. He is both the mischievous, playful child and the wise charioteer who guides Arjuna in his spiritual journey, the flute-playing beloved of the gopis and the fierce demon-slayer, human avatar and Supreme Being. What are we to make of these apparent contradictions? One way we might see Krishna is as the embodiment and affirmation of the wholeness of the human condition.
 
We are often tempted to view our lives dualistically. We believe that in order to become spiritually enlightened we need to repress our human nature and renounce the pleasures of life. Our image of holiness is the solemn-faced saint with the halo on her head. Krishna shows us that, while we inhabit this human body, we can evolve spiritually and still be fully human. We can sing and dance, laugh and play while we also study, pray, give, love, and serve. Our spiritual leaders reinforce this idea. From Pope Francis and the Dalai Lama to our own gurus, all show us how to smile, to crack a joke, to—in the words of Dorothy Day—practice "the duty of delight."
 
In the book Karma Sannyasa, Swami Satsangi writes, “To adore life is the greatest sadhana.” Krishna shows us how to live our lives fully, to embrace all life has to offer, while always keeping our eye on our ultimate purpose—to remember who we truly are and to act in this world as  instruments of the Lord of Love.