In the previous episode, we discussed about the model of mind assumed by Patanjali while discussing various steps of Yoga. That model has the sense organs, sense processing or Indriya part of the mind, sense coordination or the Manas part of the mind, the individual identity or Ahankara, as well as the intellect or the Buddhi.
While the sense organs directly interface with the world, Buddhi provides the interface to the soul.
A few episodes ago, we also discussed stages of Yoga where the mind gets gradually withdrawn from a completely outward looking state to an almost restrained state. Let us briefly recall these stages.
When such a transition takes place, first the sense processing parts or the Indriyas withdraw, attaining the state of Pratyahara. Then the manas also gradually withdraws. While doing that, the mind goes through two stages, namely Savitarka Samadhi and Savichara Samadhi. The mind is still active in these two stages but restrained to a large extent.
In the next stages, the manas almost withdraws, leaving behind only the state of bliss. And finally, the mind reaches a stage where there is only self-awareness, and no other mental activity, not even experience of bliss. That is the Asmitanugata Samadhi.
In that stage, the Ahankara or the self-awareness part of the mind is still active. As we said, all this time, there was awareness of whatever was going on. That is why Patanjali calls these stages as Samprajnyata Samadhi.
What happens when the meditator goes beyond this stage?
That is the stage where most of activity of the mind stop. As a result, there would be no awareness. But it is not as if nothing is happening. Buddhi part of the mind is still active. It is this Buddhi that is in direct touch with the soul. Patanjali says that at that stage, the Buddhi acts like a mirror, reflecting back the soul to itself.
That means, at that stage the soul is cutoff from the external world, hitherto conveyed by rest of the mind. The soul sees its own image, reflected by the Buddhi, in the place of the world.
Once the soul sees itself in the mirror of Buddhi, it knows who it is. It would know that it is not the body/mind with which it had always identified itself. It becomes like the lost prince brought up by some robbers in a forest. As long as the prince thinks that he is the son of some robber, he behaves like one. But when someone tells him who he really is, he attains the stature of a real prince. He is no longer confused. He no longer behaves like a wayward robber. He returns to his kingdom. I am quoting from an Upanishadic simile.
So, the realized soul too can detach itself from the clutches of the body/mind.
Two things can happen as a result.
Either the soul disassociates itself from the body/mind never to get entrapped again. It would no longer like to drown itself in the worldly mire. It attains its pure, unalloyed, ever blissful state.
Or, in some rare cases, it may choose to continue its association with the body for the benefit of other trapped souls. It would like to guide them, so that they could wade through the ocean of the world. That is the case of great masters. They come back to worldly life, even after they attain realization. They do it for the sake of others.
But unfortunately, things are not always that simple.
The Buddhi of a worldly person is always contaminated by various past impressions. What happens if you stand in front of a dirty mirror and try to see yourself? You can’t see a clear picture. Similarly, the soul of such people sees only a blurred image of itself reflected back by an unclean Buddhi. It only gets partial realization about its true nature. So, it cannot get completely free from the entanglement of body/mind.
In such cases, the meditator remains in such a state for some time before he is pulled back once again into the world, while the mind traces back its steps.
From the state of complete unawareness, the meditator gradually slips back into awareness. First, he becomes aware of his own individual existence as body/mind/soul combination. Next the manas part of the mind starts working, followed by the Indriyas.
The senses start perceiving the world, and the meditator is finally back to where he left. He is once again a body/mind dominated person. He starts identifying himself with whatever his mind shows him.
Now there are some important questions.
Question 1. What is it that which pulls back the person from the ultimate, though momentary, state of realization, back to the worldly tangle? In other words, what is it that blemishes the Buddhi in such a way that the soul cannot see its own clear image?
Question 2. What is the use of getting into the final stage of Samadhi if one ultimately retraces back his steps?
Question 3. How do we know what happened in the final stage of Samadhi, since there was no awareness at all?
Let me try to explain the situation by means of a simple day-to-day analogy.
What happens when you switch on a computer which was OFF. You might have heard of the word ‘bootstrapping’. The computer bootstraps itself. It starts doing what its EPROM was programmed to do. EPROM is a small piece of memory which instructs the computer what it should do when it is switched on.
But this memory is unlike other memories of the computer. The instructions written in this memory are almost permanent unless erased explicitly. It can also be reprogrammed with a different set of instructions. That is why it is called EPROM – erasable, programmable, read only memory. It is some kind of permanent memory, unless it is willfully erased and reprogrammed. And this memory is essential to bring the computer back to life, or to boot, in common parlance.
As long as this EPROM is intact, the computer can regain itself after being shutdown momentarily. Similarly, our mind too has an EPROM which enables us to function in the world as a combination of body/mind/soul. As long as we would like to continue in this world as a ‘normal’ being, we need this EPROM to be functional and intact.
But as I said, this EPROM is reprogrammable. And it could get reprogrammed into all kinds of wrong things, which we normally call as a bug in computer jargon. On a positive note, it can be reprogrammed to eliminate any ‘bugs’ that could have crept in. And in the extreme case, it can be completely erased. Let us talk about that extreme case later.
Now what does this EPROM correspond to, in the context of mind?
As we said, these are some preset instructions that keep the soul associated with the body/mind and keep it active in the world. For a worldly person, these instructions are essential, to carry out worldly interactions. At the same time, for a person who would like to free from the worldly entanglement, these are unnecessary hindrances.
What are these preset instructions? We will see them in the next episode.
No comments:
Post a Comment