The Path to Meditation
Mind is a flow of thoughts. In deep sleep, we experience blankness. We don’t have any awareness of our body, not even the feeling “I am” in deep sleep. Blissful in complete ignorance of one’s existence. The awareness of the world, our body, and our mind manifests when we are awake.
As a dreamer, we are totally unaware of our higher nature – the waker. The dream world is a projection of our own inner world. The entire dream world appears in our awareness. It is entirely true so long as the dreaming continues. The dreamer is dead the moment we switch role to the waker. In other words, we left the body of the dreamer and identified now with the body of the waker. And now we see the waking world of gross objects. The dreaming world had subtle objects. What happens when we get sucked into deep sleep? There is no world to experience in deep sleep. There is no object available in the sleeping world. When an object appears in one’s awareness, the mind gets activated. The mind identifies with the dreamer in the dreaming world, and with the waker in the waking world. A flow of thoughts towards the objects appear. This quality of flow can greatly impact one’s ability to focus and one’s happiness.
Attachment is the special worthiness given to an object because of experience of pleasure in the past archived as impressions in the memory. Aversion is the special unworthiness given towards an object because of experience of pain in the past archived as impressions in the memory. Now, when the thoughts flow, they flow because of the dualities of attachment and aversion. Multiple objects bring multiple streams of thoughts. The degree of attachment or aversion towards the object can greatly influence the wellbeing of the mind.
The state of the mind can be classified into 5 states:
- Scattered
- Dull
- Partially attentive – sometimes gathering, sometimes wandering.
- Attentive – smooth flow of similar types of thought. Symptoms include deep and slow breathing, feeling of calmness, more self-awareness.
- No-mind – state of awareness of no-thoughts. This is unlike deep sleep. In this state, the mind dissolves into Awareness.
No practical work in either of the waking world or the dream world is possible in the first two states of the mind. Meditation is possible only after we are able to cross the chasm of third state.
Now, since a thought is nothing but an object in one’s awareness. Meditation has two components:
- Calming the mind
- Transcending the mind
Tens of thousands of thoughts flow in the mind everyday – some are fully manifested in our awareness, some are partially manifested, some remain unmanifested.
When an object appears in our awareness, our attachments and aversions, which are nothing but impressions of the past experience with the object, flow towards or opposite the object. Stronger the attachment, greater the intensity of the flow of thoughts. Stronger the aversion, the flow of thoughts towards the absence of the object, which is another form of attachment. What causes attachments and aversions then?One’s inherent tendencies manifest as attachments and aversions towards objects. There is no world of objects in deep sleep. One is just a bag of inherent yet malleable tendencies to ready to be manifested, thanks to the faculty of the mind. The key therefore is to let these tendencies manifest with non-attachment. But how?
One cannot beat the river of thoughts into submission. One has to harness this flow to one’s own advantage. The mind is capable to learn and love new objects. We harness the mind’s power of attachment and aversion to associate attachment with Self (the nature of Satchitananda, Existence-Consciousness-Bliss) and aversion towards current pleasures and pains of the self.
The idea then is to deliberate thoughts towards an object of meditation (Self) by cultivating love towards the object. This strengthens the flow of thoughts in the mind. The more one thinks about the object, the continuous the flow of thoughts towards the object. With continued practice, one is established in a sustained continuous flow of thoughts towards the object to the exclusion of other types of thoughts. Mind attains one-pointedness.
Since Self is the subject Itself, the objects of meditations therefore are pointers to the Self. One such pointer is a mantra.
Mananat-trayate iti Mantra. That by which the mind, mananat, is protected, trayate, is, iti, mantra. What does the mantra protect us from? The consequence of the uncontrolled flow of thoughts.. If the mind is agitated, one is restless. An agitated mind is dangerous because it gives us an impression that if I do this or don’t do that, I will not be satisfied. A distracted mind, an agitated mind is of practically no good use. An agitated mind is easily predisposed to the mercy of emotional upheaval.
A mantra introduces a flow of thoughts towards the mantra. The energy of the restless thoughts is channelised towards this mantra. Increased attachment to the mantra starts to drop away other thoughts from flowing. Syncing breath with mantra further induces calmness.
Mantra Japa, is a training technique to introduce one-pointedness by repeating the mantra a number of times to the point of exclusive of all other thoughts. Since love for the object of meditation is important, a mechanical repetition would not yield optimum results. To yoke the mind to the mantra, it must love the mantra. When they ask to meditate upon the mantra what they mean is to learn about the mantra, know it, and become it! Mananat-trayate iti Mantra.
