Be in a State
of Sahaja Samadhi
From Divine Life Society Publication “The Process of
Yoga” by Swami Krishnananda
Most of our experiences are
emotional. We feel exhilarated on the possession of objects and depressed at
the loss of them. Yoga psychology deals effectively with these two aspects of
human experience – emotion and pure psychological observations of objects
through - vairagya and abhyasa.
Vairagya
is the emotional detachment of the personality from objects. Raga and dvesha, affection and the opposite
of it, are inseparable from our emotional relationship with objects. When we
are possessed of emotion, we lose control over ourselves and also lose control
over the principles of ethics, morality, and understanding.
The spiritual path is a path
of hardship, in the sense that, it is one of discipline(self-control), because
it is a voluntary submission of oneself to the demands of the soul, which
aspires to be absolutely independent, rather than the desires of the mind,
which is always connected with the objects of sense.
Samsara
is a mental phenomenon, not a physical connection. Birth and death are
experiences of the mind, not of the body; therefore, the liberation that is
achieved is also a mental phenomenon, not a physical phenomenon. The body is
not connected with your pleasures and pains. It is the mind that enjoys and
suffers, so what the mind does is more important.
The first method that you can
adopt when the mind thinks of an object of pleasure is to think of the
opposite. Pratipakshabhavana is the method
of substitution, of replacing one emotion with another emotion, the vicious one
with the virtuous one, the lower with the higher. Raga
ceases by the thought of masters like Hanuman and Bhishma, and dvesha ceases by thinking of
masters like Buddha.
The other method which you can
adopt is to think of the consequences of the control of the senses. Behind the
individual subject there is the universal subject, which pulsates through every
mental activity of the individual subject. The wave on the
surface of the ocean may be regarded as an individual subject, but behind it
and at the bottom of it is the universal subject which is the ocean. Control of
the senses is nothing but making the wave subside into the ocean.
Do not try to run
after the objects of the world and try to please people in the world. So do not
be under the impression that when you are virakta or when you practise vairagya,
self-discipline – when you detach yourself from objects of pleasure – you are
going to be a loser. You are going to be an immense gainer by spiritual
practice.
The third method is
the entire sublimation by direct meditation, which is abhyasa.. The
sublimation of all emotions and mental activities of every kind is the direct
practice of yoga. While the first stage is the control of emotions, the second
stage is an attempt at the cessation of every mental activity, even the direct
impersonal perception of things. You will not even be conscious of the
existence of objects, let alone be attached or averse to them. Abhyasa,
which is meditation on reality, is the outcome of vairagya.
The practice of yoga
is meditation. In meditation, the mind fixes upon a given concept or an object,
by which it is automatically abstracted by way of pratyahara from
objects of sense. Pratyahara, dharana and dhyana go
together as a concentrated focus of mental activity. Meditation is not merely
thinking. You contemplate the whole world through that object. A flag
represents the nationality to which we belong, though the flag itself is not
nationality. Likewise, the image or the symbol that you use in meditation is
not a selected isolated object but a representation of the entire cosmos.
Savitarka,
nirvitarka, savichara, nirvichara, sananda, sasmita,
etc., are called samadhis, or stages of meditation by which the mind
ascends into the higher ladders of objectivity from a single given concept or a
form or an image to a wider expression of it, until you reach the whole cosmos
of the five elements and their subtle background in the form of the tanmatras,
and go still higher into the mahatattva; and finally, Isvaratattva
itself becomes the object of your meditation.
The object of your
meditation is to rise from the world of phenomena to the world of noumena or
reality. Cut short all unnecessary activities. Your daily program should
consist only of those items which are absolutely essential for the maintenance
of your life socially and spiritually. By awakening ourselves into the
realities of a higher life, we tread the path of spirituality and become
blessed even in this very life.
In conclusion, may I
request you all to contemplate a little more profoundly than you have been
doing, up to this time? Be a disciplined person, be a good person, be a
spiritual person, be an aspirant of the Reality rather than the phenomena which
pass before the eyes. Have the yogic experience of eternity and infinity
blending together and be in a state of sahaja samadhi, seeing the
Truth everywhere, Reality everywhere. This is spirituality. This is yoga. God
bless you.
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