[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
society may not have any meaning for the life spiritual. Thus,
there is a need for entering into a new type of life s
evaluations. You have to take a new birth, almost, when you
enter the spiritual path. You have to be reborn, as the great
masters often tell us. Unless we be reborn, there is no hope.
Here rebirth means a total transformation of the organism,
including the notions of the mind, the very way of thinking
itself, a reorientation of the structure of the psyche, for the
purpose of getting oneself tuned to the laws of the life
spiritual. This is the profound significance of this pithy
statement in this verse of the Bhagavadgita.
Yada viniyatam chittam atmany eva vatishthate;
Nihsprihah sarvakmebhyo yukta ity-uchyate tada.
The mind becomes freed from all the desires for objects
of sense, spontaneously, and as a matter of course, without
any special effort on one s part, just as, when one wakes up
from dream, there is a spontaneous withdrawal of the mind
from everything that it saw in dream. This is the positive
aspect of self-restraint which will bring the fruit of delight
and inner freedom from conflict and tension of every kind. As
a matter of fact, the test of success in yoga is the extent of the
freedom one feels in oneself internally, the strength one
experiences within, and the joy that manifests itself from
one s depths, without any special exertion to obtain things
from outside. Nothing might have happened from the
outside, but inwardly everything has changed. The joy that is
reflected in the face of a person and the positivity that
characterises the personality would be an indication of the
percentage of success that is achieved in the practice of yoga.
The retention of the mind in the nature of the Self or the
Atman, which is the main theme of discussion in the
87
Dhyanayoga section of the Bhagavadgita, is the essence of the
whole teaching, and it sums up the very essence and the
meaning of the aim of life of all mankind. The equilibrium
that preponderates in the relation between the mind and the
Self is the state of yoga, and this state has to be reached by
efforts which have to be put forth very slowly and gradually,
inch by inch, as it were, missing not even a single step in the
process of the movement of the ascent, for missing any step
would be a predecessor to a fall. The difficulty in this practice
is really the context of the lengthy teaching which is the
Bhagavadgita up to the eighteenth chapter; and in a way we
may say that the eighteen chapters are the eighteen steps in
the practice. Inasmuch as nothing can be more difficult than
this attempt on the part of the soul to unite itself with the
Divine Purpose of the universe, we are asked to go very
slowly and very cautiously:
Sanaih-sanair uparamed buddhya dhritigrihitaya;
Atmasamstham manah kritva na kinchid api chintayet.
Yato-yato nischarati manas chanchalam asthiram;
Tatas tato niyamyai tad atmanyeva vasam nayet.
This is the teaching of the actual practice. You must exert
your control over the mind without allowing it to feel that
any pressure is exerted. That is the technique of the
educational process in any field of life. The mind has to be
enabled to flower or blossom forth into a higher experience
spontaneously and automatically, without pressurising it
into any kind of pain or sorrow in the practice. The more you
are able to introduce the principle of satisfaction into the
practice, the more is the likelihood of an early achievement;
because any pain that is inflicted upon the mind may be a
causative factor of a recoil of the mind. Hence it is that while
there should be intense ardour for the purpose of the
practice, there should be no over-enthusiasm. That means to
say that we should not overestimate our powers. God is, no
doubt, at our back and he is the greatest help in this
endeavour of the soul for this Supreme Achievement, but the
way in which God works is a mystery by itself; and inasmuch
as this mystery cannot be grasped, one has to move only in
88
proportion to the extent of one s understanding of this
mystery, and when the mystery remains an object of one s
ignorance it may not be able to render conscious help.
Understanding and feeling blend together in the practice.
There is a gradual coming together of these two functions.
While in the initial stages the understanding may
predominate over the feelings, and the feeling may be at the
background, so that one may be under the impression that
the heart is not cooperating with the understanding, by
assiduous steadfastness in this practice, one would be able to
bring the two together until they do not remain two faculties
but one focussed force of intuitive cognition. In fact intuition
is nothing but the coming together of understanding and
feeling. In normal human perception they stand apart. The
head and the heart do not go together always; but they
become one when the third eye opens, as they say, and the
physical eyes are no more necessary for the vision of
perfection. For this achievement the practice has to be very
gradual in the sense that one has to observe the extent of
reality present in the different stages of one s ascent; and the
most important thing to remember in the practice is to be
honest to the particular stage in which one is stationed at any
given moment of time. One should not wrongly imagine that
one is in a higher state than the one in which one is really.
The mind can stretch itself into an imaginary condition of a
false achievement and one can be mistaken in this concept.
There are several sincere seekers who are prone to the
mistake of thinking that they are liberated souls: the only
duty they have is to save the world, and they have already
saved themselves, and entered the Infinite. While they can be
thoroughly mistaken in this feeling they may be cocksure
that they are right. So, this is a difficulty into which one may
fall as if into a quagmire in the middle of the practice; and no
one can be of help here as the understanding has failed. It is
the failing of one s understanding that makes one feel that
one is in such an elevated position. The rationality gets
stifled and it becomes torpid instead of getting transparent,
and this is due to the interference of old Samskaras , or
89
buried impressions, frustrated desires, etc. The frustrated
feelings need not necessarily be those of this present life.
There are feelings and feelings, impressions after
impressions, piled up like thick layers of clouds in the sub-
conscious and the unconscious levels of the mind which
retard the progress of the soul towards its aim. It needs no
mention that we have passed through various lives. This is
not the only life we are living, and whatever we are today is a
fraction of the total of which we are made, the larger part of
which lies hidden as a potential power in the unconscious
layer of our personality, acting, of course, like a spring which
pushes forward certain impressions and impulses into the
surface of consciousness and compels the conscious level to
commit the error of thinking that it is totally free in the
conduct of its ideas and thoughts through the daily
vicissitudes of life. If we take into consideration the presence
of this motive force behind our conscious activities, what we
call the unconscious level, one would very much doubt if [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl ocenkijessi.opx.pl
society may not have any meaning for the life spiritual. Thus,
there is a need for entering into a new type of life s
evaluations. You have to take a new birth, almost, when you
enter the spiritual path. You have to be reborn, as the great
masters often tell us. Unless we be reborn, there is no hope.
Here rebirth means a total transformation of the organism,
including the notions of the mind, the very way of thinking
itself, a reorientation of the structure of the psyche, for the
purpose of getting oneself tuned to the laws of the life
spiritual. This is the profound significance of this pithy
statement in this verse of the Bhagavadgita.
Yada viniyatam chittam atmany eva vatishthate;
Nihsprihah sarvakmebhyo yukta ity-uchyate tada.
The mind becomes freed from all the desires for objects
of sense, spontaneously, and as a matter of course, without
any special effort on one s part, just as, when one wakes up
from dream, there is a spontaneous withdrawal of the mind
from everything that it saw in dream. This is the positive
aspect of self-restraint which will bring the fruit of delight
and inner freedom from conflict and tension of every kind. As
a matter of fact, the test of success in yoga is the extent of the
freedom one feels in oneself internally, the strength one
experiences within, and the joy that manifests itself from
one s depths, without any special exertion to obtain things
from outside. Nothing might have happened from the
outside, but inwardly everything has changed. The joy that is
reflected in the face of a person and the positivity that
characterises the personality would be an indication of the
percentage of success that is achieved in the practice of yoga.
The retention of the mind in the nature of the Self or the
Atman, which is the main theme of discussion in the
87
Dhyanayoga section of the Bhagavadgita, is the essence of the
whole teaching, and it sums up the very essence and the
meaning of the aim of life of all mankind. The equilibrium
that preponderates in the relation between the mind and the
Self is the state of yoga, and this state has to be reached by
efforts which have to be put forth very slowly and gradually,
inch by inch, as it were, missing not even a single step in the
process of the movement of the ascent, for missing any step
would be a predecessor to a fall. The difficulty in this practice
is really the context of the lengthy teaching which is the
Bhagavadgita up to the eighteenth chapter; and in a way we
may say that the eighteen chapters are the eighteen steps in
the practice. Inasmuch as nothing can be more difficult than
this attempt on the part of the soul to unite itself with the
Divine Purpose of the universe, we are asked to go very
slowly and very cautiously:
Sanaih-sanair uparamed buddhya dhritigrihitaya;
Atmasamstham manah kritva na kinchid api chintayet.
Yato-yato nischarati manas chanchalam asthiram;
Tatas tato niyamyai tad atmanyeva vasam nayet.
This is the teaching of the actual practice. You must exert
your control over the mind without allowing it to feel that
any pressure is exerted. That is the technique of the
educational process in any field of life. The mind has to be
enabled to flower or blossom forth into a higher experience
spontaneously and automatically, without pressurising it
into any kind of pain or sorrow in the practice. The more you
are able to introduce the principle of satisfaction into the
practice, the more is the likelihood of an early achievement;
because any pain that is inflicted upon the mind may be a
causative factor of a recoil of the mind. Hence it is that while
there should be intense ardour for the purpose of the
practice, there should be no over-enthusiasm. That means to
say that we should not overestimate our powers. God is, no
doubt, at our back and he is the greatest help in this
endeavour of the soul for this Supreme Achievement, but the
way in which God works is a mystery by itself; and inasmuch
as this mystery cannot be grasped, one has to move only in
88
proportion to the extent of one s understanding of this
mystery, and when the mystery remains an object of one s
ignorance it may not be able to render conscious help.
Understanding and feeling blend together in the practice.
There is a gradual coming together of these two functions.
While in the initial stages the understanding may
predominate over the feelings, and the feeling may be at the
background, so that one may be under the impression that
the heart is not cooperating with the understanding, by
assiduous steadfastness in this practice, one would be able to
bring the two together until they do not remain two faculties
but one focussed force of intuitive cognition. In fact intuition
is nothing but the coming together of understanding and
feeling. In normal human perception they stand apart. The
head and the heart do not go together always; but they
become one when the third eye opens, as they say, and the
physical eyes are no more necessary for the vision of
perfection. For this achievement the practice has to be very
gradual in the sense that one has to observe the extent of
reality present in the different stages of one s ascent; and the
most important thing to remember in the practice is to be
honest to the particular stage in which one is stationed at any
given moment of time. One should not wrongly imagine that
one is in a higher state than the one in which one is really.
The mind can stretch itself into an imaginary condition of a
false achievement and one can be mistaken in this concept.
There are several sincere seekers who are prone to the
mistake of thinking that they are liberated souls: the only
duty they have is to save the world, and they have already
saved themselves, and entered the Infinite. While they can be
thoroughly mistaken in this feeling they may be cocksure
that they are right. So, this is a difficulty into which one may
fall as if into a quagmire in the middle of the practice; and no
one can be of help here as the understanding has failed. It is
the failing of one s understanding that makes one feel that
one is in such an elevated position. The rationality gets
stifled and it becomes torpid instead of getting transparent,
and this is due to the interference of old Samskaras , or
89
buried impressions, frustrated desires, etc. The frustrated
feelings need not necessarily be those of this present life.
There are feelings and feelings, impressions after
impressions, piled up like thick layers of clouds in the sub-
conscious and the unconscious levels of the mind which
retard the progress of the soul towards its aim. It needs no
mention that we have passed through various lives. This is
not the only life we are living, and whatever we are today is a
fraction of the total of which we are made, the larger part of
which lies hidden as a potential power in the unconscious
layer of our personality, acting, of course, like a spring which
pushes forward certain impressions and impulses into the
surface of consciousness and compels the conscious level to
commit the error of thinking that it is totally free in the
conduct of its ideas and thoughts through the daily
vicissitudes of life. If we take into consideration the presence
of this motive force behind our conscious activities, what we
call the unconscious level, one would very much doubt if [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]