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SAMADHI PADA

Introduction to the Path of Yoga

  • Now the discipline of yoga.
  • Yoga is the cessation of the mind.
  • Then the witness is established.
  • In the other states, there is identification with the modifications of the mind.

The Five Modifications of the Mind.

  • The modifications of the mind are five. They can be either a source of anguish or of non-anguish.
  • They are right knowledge, wrong knowledge, imagination, sleep, and memory.

Right and wrong knowledge

  • Right knowledge has three sources – direct cognition, inference, and the words of the awakened ones.
  • Wrong knowledge is a false conception that does not correspond to the thing as it is.
  • An image conjured up by words without any substance behind it is Vikalpa -imagination.
  • The modification of the mind which is based on the absence of any content in it is sleep.
  • Memory is the calling up of past experiences.

Constant inner practice

  • Their cessation is brought about by persistent inner effort and nonattachment.
  • Of these two – Abhyasa – the inner practice, is the effort of being firmly established in oneself.
  • It becomes firmly grounded by being continued for a long time, without interruption and with reverent devotion.

Practice and desirelessness

  • The first state of Vairagya, desirelessness – cessation from self-indulgence in the thirst for sensuous pleasures, with conscious effort.
  • The last state of Vairagya, desirelessness – cessation of all desiring by knowing the innermost nature of Purusha, the supreme self.

The meaning of Samadhi

  • Samprajnatasamadhi is the Samadhi that is accompanied by reasoning, reflection, bliss and a sense of pure being.
  • In Asamprajnata Samadhi there is a cessation of all mental activity, and the mind only retains unmanifested impressions.
  • Videhas and prakriti-layas attain asamprajnata Samadhi because they ceased to identify with their bodies in their previous life. They take rebirth because seeds of desire remained. 20. Others who attain Asamprajnata Samadhi attain it through faith, effort, recollection, concentration and discrimination.

Total effort or surrender

  • Success is nearest to those whose efforts are intense and sincere.
  • The chances of success vary according to the degree of effort.
  • Success is also attained by those who surrender to God.
  • God is the supreme ruler. He is an individual unit of divine consciousness. He is untouched by the afflictions of life, action and its result. 25. In God the seed is developed to its highest extent.

The master of masters

  • Being beyond the limits of time, he is the master of masters.
  • He is known as Aum.
  • Repeat and meditate on Aum. Repeating and meditating on Aum brings about the disappearance of all obstacles and an AWAKENING OF A NEW CONSCIOUSNESS.

The obstacles to meditation

  • Disease, Languor, Doubt, Carelessness, Laziness, Sensuality, Delusion, Impotency, and Instability Are the Obstacles That Distract the Mind.
  • Anguish, despair, tremors and irregular breathing are the symptoms of a distracted mind.
  • To remove these, meditate on one principle. Cultivating the right attitudes.
  • The mind becomes tranquil by cultivating attitudes of friendliness towards the happy, compassion towards the miserable, joy towards the virtuous and indifference towards the evil. 33. The mind also becomes tranquil by alternately expelling and retaining the breath.
  • When meditation produces extraordinary sense perceptions, the mind gains confidence, and this helps perseverance.
  • Also, meditate on the inner light which is serene and beyond all sorrow.
  • Also meditate on one who has attained desire lessness.

Dropping out of the wheel

  • Also, meditate on knowledge that comes during sleep.
  • Also, meditate on anything that appeals to you.
  • Thus, the yogi becomes the master of all, from the infinitesimal to the infinite.

Periphery and center

  • When the activity of the mind is under control, the mind becomes like pure crystal reflecting equally, without distortion, the perceiver, the perception and the perceived.
  • Savitarka Samadhi is the Samadhi in which the yogi is still unable to differentiate between real knowledge, knowledge based on words and knowledge based on reasoning or sense perceptions, which all remain in the mind in a mixed state.

The pure look

  • Nirvitarka Samadhi is attained when the memory is purified, and the mind can see the true nature of things without obstruction.
  • The explanations given for the Samadhis of Savitarkaand Nirvitarka also explain the higher states of Samadhi, but in these higher states of Savichara and Nirvichara Samadhis, the objects of meditation are more subtle.
  • The province of Samadhi that relates to these finer objects extends up to the formless stage of the subtle energies.

The thought of no-thought

  • These Samadhis that result from meditation on an object are Samadhis with seeds, and do not give freedom from the cycle of rebirth.
  • On attaining the utmost purity of the Nirvichara stage of Samadhi, there is a dawning of the spiritual light.
  • In Nirvichara Samadhi, the consciousness is filled with truth.

The fall of the idiots

  • In the state of Nirvichara Samadhi, an object is experienced in its full perspective, because in this state knowledge is gained directly, without the use of the senses.
  • The perception gained in Nirvichara Samadhi transcends all normal perceptions both in extent and intensity.
  • When this controlling of all other controls is transcended, the seedless Samadhi is attained, and with it, freedom from life and death.
SADHANA PADA

The seeds of misery

  • Kriya yoga is a practical, preliminary yoga, and is composed of austerity, self-study and surrender to God.
  • The practice of kriya yoga reduces misery and leads towards Samadhi.
  • Miseries are caused by: lack of awareness, egoism, attractions, repulsions, clinging to life and fear of death.
  • Whether they are in the states of dormancy, attenuation, alteration or expansion, it is through lack of awareness that the other causes of misery can operate.

Sleep, identification, duality

  • Lack of awareness is taking the transient for the eternal, the impure for the pure, the painful as pleasurable and the non-self for the self. 6. Egoism is the identification of the seer with the seen.
  • Attraction, and through it, attachment, is towards anything that brings pleasure.
  • Repulsion is from anything that causes pain.

Prati-prasav: the primal of the ancients

  • Flowing through life is the fear of death, the clinging to life, and it is dominant in all, even the learned.
  • The sources of the five afflictions can be abolished by resolving them back to their origin.
  • The outward expressions of the five afflictions disappear through meditation.

Awareness: the fire that burns the past

  • Whether fulfilled in the present or the future, karmic experiences have their roots in the five afflictions.
  • If the roots remain, karma is fulfilled in rebirth through class, span of life, and types of experiences.
  • Virtue brings pleasure: vice brings pain.

The seer is not seen

  • The discriminating person realizes that everything leads to misery because of change, anxiety, experience, and the conflicts that arise between the three attributes and the five modifications of the mind.
  • Future misery is to be avoided.
  • The link between the seer and the scene that creates misery is to be broken.

The bridegroom is waiting for you

  • The scene, which is composed of the elements and the sense organs is of the nature of stability, action, and inertia, and is for the purpose of providing experience and thus liberation to the seer. 19. The three gunas – stability, action, and inertia – have four stages: the defined, the undefined, the indicated, and the unmanifest.
  • The seer, although pure consciousness, sees through the distortions of the mind.
  • The scene exists for the seer alone.
  • Although the scene is dead to him who has attained liberation, it is alive to others because it is common to all.
  • The seer and the seen come together so that the real nature of each may be realized.
  • The cause of this union is ignorance.

Awareness, not knowledge

  • The disassociation of the seer and the seen which is brought about by the dispersion of ignorance is the remedy that brings liberation. 26. The unwavering practice of discrimination between what is real and what is unreal brings about the dispersion of ignorance.
  • The highest stage of enlightenment is reached in seven steps.

The eight limbs of yoga

  • By practicing the different steps of yoga for the destruction of impurity, there arises spiritual illumination which develops into awareness of reality.
  • The eight steps of yoga are: self-restraint, fixed observance, posture, breath regulation, abstraction, concentration, contemplation, and trance.

Death and discipline

  • Self-restraint, the first step of yoga, is comprised of the following five vows: nonviolence, truthfulness, authenticity, mystery in daily activities (brahmacharya), and non-possessiveness. 31. These five vows, which constitute the great vow, extend to all the seven stages of enlightenment regardless of class, place, time, or circumstance. 32. Purity, contentment, austerity, self-study, and surrender to God are the laws to be observed.
  • When the mind is disturbed by wrong thoughts, ponder on the opposites.
  • It is necessary to ponder the opposites because wrong thoughts, emotions, and actions, such as violence, result in ignorance and intense misery whether they be performed, caused, or approved through greed, anger, or delusion in mild, medium, or intense degrees.

Life is a mirror

  • When the yogi is firmly established in non-violence, there is an abandonment of enmity by those who are in his presence.
  • When the yogi is firmly established in truthfulness, he attains the fruit of action without acting.
  • When the yogi is firmly established in honesty, inner riches present themselves.
  • When the yogi is firmly established in sexual continence, vigor is gained.
  • When a yogi is firmly established in non-possessiveness, there arises knowledge of the ‘how’ and ‘wherefore’ of existence.

The shadow of religion

  • When purity is attained there arises in the yogi wisdom for his own body and a disinclination to come in physical contact with others.
  • From mental purity, there arises cheerfulness, power of concentration, control of the senses, and a fitness for self-realization.
  • Contentment brings supreme happiness, purity, and power.
  • Austerities destroy impurities, and with the ensuing perfection in the body and sense organs, physical and mental powers awaken.
  • Union with the divine happens through self-study.
  • Total illumination can be accomplished by surrendering to God.

Death to the limited

  • The posture should be steady and comfortable.
  • Posture is mastered by relaxation of effort and meditation on the unlimited.
  • When posture is mastered, there is a cessation of the disturbances caused by qualities.
  • The next step after the perfection of posture is breath control, which is accomplished through holding the breath on inhalation and exhalation or stopping the breath suddenly.
  • The duration and frequency of the controlled breaths are conditioned by time and place and become more prolonged and subtle In.
  • There is a fourth sphere of breath control, which is internal, and it goes beyond the other three.

Returning to the source

  • Then comes the dispersion of the cover that hides the light.
  • And then the mind becomes fit for concentration.
  • The fifth constituent of yoga, pratyahara – returning to the source – is the restoration of the mind’s ability to control the senses by renouncing the distractions of outside objects. 55. Then comes the complete mastery over all the senses.
Mantras

The word “mantra” is shaped by linking two words from the Sanskrit language- “man,” to think consciously, to ponder over, to meditate and to witness, and “tra” to transform, to liberate, to release.

Mantra merely means to do something new with the old patterns of our thoughts, with careful consideration, towards the ultimate liberation.


Chanting or singing mantras repetitively with musical instruments is an ancient process of meditation, through which people throughout time have tried to open the gateway towards freedom, love, compassion, and oneness with the entire universe, in their consciousness.


Mantras are a powerful way to transform the mind. However, the chanter must have firsthand an understanding of the mantra they sing or chant. If we pay close attention to the word mantra explained above, it becomes evident that it is not the mantra and its meaning that liberates. It is the understanding behind the mantra which charges the mantra with spiritual energy. Thus, the mantra must be linked to the chanter’s direct experience for it to work as a tool of healing.

There is a possibility even today while singing these mantras with love and understanding; one may realize oneness within and without.

WAHE GURU

WAHE = Wonder, Reverence, Astonish
GU = Intertia, Matter, Ignorance, Darkness, Transience
RU = Light, Wisdom. The light, the wisdom, which has transformed my ignorance, inertia, Darkness is WAHE, Wonder. My soul now filled with love, wonder, and reverence, vibrates with this light, every moment. My soul meets this light now in everything around me. This light leads my soul, from darkness to light.

JAI MA

JAI = Praise
MA = The divine energy, the life-impulse (mother) within all.
May the divine, the life-impulse, within every heart, bless all. All my praise to this life impulse. She is the mother (Ma) of all.

HARI BOL HARI BOL

HARI = the one who dispels
BOL = Say, or Utter
Oh! My mind!
Say, or speak of his name who dispels all your worries, pains, and miseries.

OM SARVE SHAAM SVASTIR BHAVATU

SARVE SHAAM SHAANTIR BHAVATU |
SARVES HAAM PURNNAM BHAVATU |
SARVE SHAAM MANGGALAM BHAVATU |
OM SHAANTIH SHAANTIH SHAANTIH ||
May there be Well-Being in All.
May there be Peace in All.
May there be Fulfilment in All.
May there be Auspiciousness in All.

Om Peace, Peace, Peace

BUDDHAM SARANAM GACCHAMI
DHAMMAM SARANAM GACCHAMI
SANGHAM SARANAM GACCHAMI
May I seek the Buddha for refuge.
May I seek the Dhamma for refuge.
May I Seek the Sangha for refuge.