Householder and Monk

We’ve been slowly rising out of a dark age spiritually. For some time, real spiritual progress was best achieved by withdrawing from the heaviness of the world. Thus, for hundreds of years, the most illustrious examples of enlightenment have often been monks and nuns. Many traditions have come to teach the renunciate path as the only way to enlightenment.

While this has been relatively true for a time, it is no longer true. As world consciousness rises, dharma is restored and householders can once again make decent progress. Some are becoming remarkable shining lights. Older history shows many past examples as well. The majority of ancient texts like the Rk Veda were written by householders.

A householder is one who is out in the world, with work, family, and so forth. A renunciate or recluse is one who withdraws to an ashram, monastery or cave. The vast majority of people are the first.

The renunciate path you can recognize by its Neti Neti (not this, not this) approach. It is a disconnecting from all expression, seeking only the depths of silent being. The reality of the person is denied. Some promote this as the only truth. But there is a different approach for the householder.

For them, it is in some ways the opposite. And this, and this. A householder is obliged to very much engage their person as an aspect of their expression. They add the full range of creation to their daily life.

In the back of the book Science of Being, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi describes the “Paths to God Realization.” In it, he specifies that the Intellectual path of discrimination is the path of the renunciate. Other paths, such as that of action & perception, devotion, and so forth are generally householder paths.

If a householder tries to follow a renunciate path, they will succeed at neither. Very simply because they will be in conflict. Their natural inclinations will fight their practice. But because of teaching influences, many householders drift in a kind of middle ground, with one foot in each.

They pursue long daily spiritual practice while trying to hold down work and a life. Or they focus on practices that are better for monks such as long retreats or a deep practice of inquiry.

I say this from experience. When I first read Maharishi’s reference above, I thought this meant I had to be a renunciate. I didn’t even know how.(laughs) When I began, long practice was more necessary for good progress. But millions of meditators have softened and smoothed the way.

We have to note that it’s not all black and white, as my error above indicated. Many people are inclined to a combination of paths. Royal or Raja Yoga itself, outlined in the Yoga Sutras, is a blend of Yogas.

Further, people’s personalities vary. More introverted people will have reclusive tendencies, even if they’re householders. And renunciates may benefit from some activity in the world. Many do good works, for example.

This also does not mean a householder should not take periods of retreat from the world for rest, healing and deepening. And some retired people may find retreat ideal. But only the renunciate should pursue this over all. The householder should not see withdrawing as an escape from worldly troubles or a means to enlightenment.

Also, this does not mean a householder will not go through the same stages as a renunciate. There will still be a detachment and witness phase. But for the householder, this is a stage whereas for the renunciate, it is the emphasis. And they will relate to the stages differently.

The apparently indistinct line between the 2 can confuse people and there are many promoting detachment as the goal. But what feels natural? There is so much richness beyond ego-surrender, it cannot be imagined. To deny that over confusion about our path is to miss the fullness of our being.
Davidya

The Rose List

I first became aware of Rose Rosetree through her interview on Buddha at the Gas Pump (Batgap). She’s all about subtle perception and healing and developing skills for same. Her tag-line is “Reading People Deeper and Healing with Energy Spirituality“

As I’m exploring models of awakening, I was fascinated by the idea that her “energetic literacy” allows a person to read if someone is enlightened or not. I know a small number of people who can see this and can help people past their last barriers. As this is a potent way to support others and opens the door to objective ways to study transpersonal development, the ability to learn it was intriguing. But evaluating such a unique vision is not a simple matter.

She sees the stages very similarly to how I do. But she determines the shift quite differently, through auras. By auras though, she don’t necessarily mean coloured light around the body but rather energetic signatures. Light is only one aspect of that.

She describes an enlightened person as having a “stabilized, habitual state of consciousness with certain characteristics that would be easy to identify for someone with Stage Three Energy Literacy.” She refers to “databanks” in each chakra and said they’d all be working well, are relatively balanced, and are free of “stuff” – her term for astral or emotional debris. The aura will also be permeated with the divine in some way and there will be a value of joy from that connection.

In other words, the personal crud is cleared and they are feeling the divine. A dry Self Realization would not make the cut.

She’s rather fearless about calling a spade a spade and tells it like she sees it. A few teachers she mentions as being enlightened but having messed up (including ones she’s studied with).  A few others she mentions as awake but not enlightened, even if they say otherwise. I’d agree there are some who have recognized the Self but not become it yet. I was such for many years. And there’s a difference between Self Realization and its mature state, sat chit ananda (absolute bliss consciousness).

At first, I wondered if she was reading sattva development rather than atman. But her comments suggest more. “Permeated with the divine in some way” suggests a deep perception. Earlier, I had the impression that there was a standard underlying energetic process in enlightenment. The chakras are awakened and we connect with source in the crown. Advanced stages unfold during a decent. Some teachers and kundalini traditions follow this model. However, others experience the stages during the rise and there are kundalini traditions that support that as well. And so on. She has apparently recognized this variety in the results.

The List
The result of her reads is her Enlightenment Life List, people she’s rated as Enlightened by the above criteria. Unexpectedly, it includes some famous people like Obama, the Clintons, and George Clooney. Shades of Men in Black! (laughs) From comments, it would seem that being in the larger public eye can raise someones consciousness. (a group consciousness effect?) But I’ve never explored that. In most cases I’ve seen, people who are enlightened know they are. I have met a few who were unsure. But once verified, their progress accelerated.

Rose indicates that when she started expanding the edge of energetic literacy into enlightenment, she didn’t meet the standard herself. Also, as she’s more heart driven, there is less conceptual precision. Plus it’s kind of an organic unfolding like this blog, rather than a presentation of a fully formed teaching. But as Rick Archer (Batgap) said to me, “she’s a sweetheart, making her much-needed contribution.“

Of course, making pronouncements about others is tricky territory. David Hawkins, of Power vs Force fame, is notorious for having rated many famous teachers, all of whom he rated as lower than himself, save Jesus. His ratings are considered infallible by himself & adherents. (he’s a no on Rose’s list) There are also some guru rating sites that are essentially trash-em lists.

Rose’s approach doesn’t fall into these traps but is instead a simple is or isn’t (yet). She says it’s about clarity rather than judgment. And offering examples for students to read. But a few issues still come to mind. For example, it’s not the person who is enlightened. It is the Self that wakes up to itself, through an apparent person. Making a list of names points to the person. But addressing that requires only a caveat. She talks about some of this here.

It’s useful to note here that she differentiates Householder and Renunciate enlightenment. A renunciate is Neti Neti (not this, not this) oriented whereas a householder still very much engages their person as an aspect of their expression. If this difference isn’t clear and a householder tries to play a middle ground, they succeed at neither. I’ll write more on this later.

Secondly, her process is by perception which can be fallible. The perception is also reading the effects of awakening not the awakening itself. She does however mention a few exceptions who appear to meet criteria but have issues that overshadow that development. She also notes it’s her read and opinion. No absolutes stated. That’s a good sign.

Clearly, it depends on the skill and experience of the reader. As I don’t have these skills, I’m keeping an open mind to get a better sense of what this is. I’ve bought her book Aura Reading Through All Your Senses but have just started it. She’s since recommended more recent books to me, like Read People Deeper. Thus, this article is more a work in progress than a review.

Here’s a good article on how her outlook evolved. She also talks about what she sees as the 10 most significant things about enlightenment there.

Meanwhile
Meanwhile, I commented on her blog a few times. One she quite liked and moved forward to a more recent post, then offered to read me for her list.

I found the exercise interesting as it looks to the question from a different angle than usual and confirms a couple of subjective impressions.

As prior posts mention, I’ve stayed pretty low key about who I am here, for various reasons. And awakening really isn’t about a person anyway. So it was a consideration if this was even appropriate. But now I sit at #180 on her list. (laughs)

I’ll do some more reading & exploring before I have better handle on the techniques she teaches. She certainly has a unique vision and some excellent insights. If her processes are as effective as she suggests, they could be quite useful in a number of ways.

Meanwhile, we’ve exchanged blogroll links. 
Davidya

Emotions and Energy

When I read about Non-Violent Communication (NVC) in the past, I saw it as a way to help resolve conflict between groups. I hadn’t seen it as a healing tool, especially not for self-talk. But it’s actually excellent for getting clear in communication in general, including with yourself. What are the facts and feelings, what is the judgement and blame? And how can we meet needs and come to satisfaction? (I review the steps here)

Another key point is that if you try to “figure out” what will make you happy with logic (left brain), you’ll likely miss the target. This is because our emotional needs are emotionally driven. We have to use feelings to identify the unmet needs. You CAN get satisfaction, in spite of what Mick Jagger sang.  

Recently, I took an NVC-based workshop. It included some of the science behind our emotional state. For example, the Vagus nerve running in front of the spinal column has 3 channels.

The Dorsal, closest to the spine, drives our Freeze response. It mutes our response time and brings emotional states like shame, sadness, overwhelm, and confusion. We also go there when we’re badly injured. External symptoms include loss of muscle tone in the upper back and difficulty meeting people’s eyes (it’s not just psychological). Broadly, we tend to feel numb and disconnected from the body.

The second channel is our Fight/Flight alarm channel. That can express as anger, frustration, and so forth. Blood rushes to the limbs and away from the prefrontal cortex (higher mind) and digestive system. We become faster but stupider. Chronically, this activation we experience as anxiety.

You can divide the “Feelings when your needs are not satisfied” from the Feelings & Needs Inventories (pdf) into these 2 channels.

The third or Vental channel is operating when we feel safety and are socially engaged. Our brain hemispheres are more balanced [and nostril breathing] and we’re face focused. Much easier to meet needs in this mode.

If you’re familiar with the 3 gunas, these easily align. Tamas (inertia), Rajas (fire), and Sattva (evenness). When this pattern shows up, you know you’re looking at fundamentals.

On a constant basis, our amygdala inside the brain checks if we’re safe and OK. If not, we shift into the first or second channels. The amygdala is what holds the emotional charge in memory. It requires a single exposure. It has no time stamp and thus creates an eternal ever-present past. And emotional charge. This is our implicit and largely unconscious memory.

Behind the amygdala is the Hypocampus. It retains explicit memory after multiple exposures that is factual & timestamped. It tracks them for 3 years until they migrate to the cortex as long-term memory.

Together, the 2 bring us both the facts and emotions associated with various memories. However, during trauma, the hypocampus goes off-line, leaving only the timeless charge. If we’re able to name the feeling state though, the memory becomes explicit & conscious. At first it can be a little muddled but it gets clear with practice and clearing the backlog.

We also explored the evolving understanding of the brain hemispheres. If we carry a lot of unresolved trauma, our right brain can become like a “jungle.” Thus, we favour the left and control, detail, and judgment or blame. It’s a way to resist pain and feel safer. If we become disassociated, the right hemisphere goes quiet.

From an energetic standpoint, we’re talking about the lower 3 chakras. Safety, emotions, and lower mind.

Parents who are stressed and action-driven are typically left-brain dominant. The left brain sees others as tools & objects. (objectification) They’ll see their child as a collection of tasks for them. Such parents will expect specific careers, good grades, status and accomplishment. The child will often feel unseen and unknown, not received. Many teenagers thus balk and rebel at apparently pointless expectations and unmet needs. If the parent is barely functional, we learn to stay small and disassociative in dorsal mode. The worst of course is when parents visit their traumas on their children.

It’s also useful to note that children don’t even have the left brain orientation engage until ~2 years old. It doesn’t fully develop until around 6 so parental feedback is taken in as fact, including any shaming control measures. We may learn it’s safest to be invisible by functioning from the dorsal. Self-shaming becomes automatic.

Other kids stay more in fight/flight and thus lash out at others, perhaps becoming the bully. They find it easier to be in hate than shame. Adults can be the same way.

With such examples, we have to relearn natural relating techniques. Hence the role of NVC. If we ask others for empathy when we’re not feeling alive and in the body, there is no one there to accept it. We’re energetically closed. We have trouble receiving and will find it easier to  give than receive. Often, we’re habitually trying to be invisible while asking to be seen so our needs don’t get met. We have to be awake and alive within to receive.

On the flip side, if we know we’re supported, it’s difficult to stay in shame or anger. Make sure that the people you hang out with can receive you, where self-expression is safe. You want 2-way relationships and you may need to learn to invite them. If you’re invisible (closed lower centres) you will be felt as unavailable by others.

When we’re relating and are not received (tuned out, subject change, talked over), how do we respond? Acceptance? Others may sometimes need a nudge. Do we repeat ourselves? Or do we ask for acknowledgement? If it still doesn’t work, there isn’t really a relationship taking place. It’s more like 2 toddlers who play near each other but have not learned to relate yet. They are together but separate.

The Energy Side
The techniques the workshop used to help heal skirted the edge of going into the mud of emotions. I would consider this the hard way. NVC is very useful for identifying emotional states. We can use them as signals for things to resolve. We want to allow feelings to arise and complete (resolve the charge). But we don’t want to wade into them – it’s a subtle but huge difference. Wading into the feelings amplifies them and can make them more real. For our shadow, it’s wading into the mud.

Emotions are the subjective experience of energy states. In energy healing you resolve the underlying energy blockage or resistance and thus resolve the resulting emotional effects (not to mention the karma). Thus energy healing is deeper and more effective than the drama.

When you learn energy healing, the first thing you learn is how to ground and not take on the energy you’re trying to resolve. Becoming more energy-aware allows us to resolve the root dynamics. While we still may experience a wave of emotion, we don’t have to wade into the trauma, just let it go. Watch it go by.

This process is also much simpler. For example, for a particularly big one, the teacher ended up engaging over a dozen other people as support plus engaging some role-playing. I can see the way this allowed the individual to feel safe and release, but the complexity and skill required to do such healing is much higher.

The exercises also made reference to being in the “resonant witness.” There was no inquiry or other techniques to make this more conscious and not everyone is aware enough of their own awareness for this to be valid. But being in an observer state makes watching the emotions go by much easier.

It’s also worth noting that if we learn to work with our internal energy environment, we can meet the majority of our emotional needs internally. They are simple energy states that can be adjusted with attention. I talked about this back on Feeling is Believing.

There is perhaps a ways to go from being deep in shame to being energy-aware and in a witness state. But having the support of others and some simple techniques can really help.

For a good introduction to energy healing, I’d suggest the Dreamhealer books, especially #2. His workshops are an excellent practical experience but are mostly in Canada.

From there, you can learn to feel and read energy and to ground and protect yourself. There are quite a few modalities around. Many such healers have studied several and integrated various features. But the key is simplicity. Energy is simple. It’s moving or not, it’s smooth, harsh, or sluggish (the gunas again), and so forth.

Most importantly, we can learn to heal ourselves.
Davidya

Your Elusive Creative Genius

This is a clip from a few years back but I’ve frequently sent the link to writers and other creatives and it came up again today. I thought it was time to share it here. I originally mentioned it back at the time, when it was not available on Youtube and thus for posting here.

In this TED talk, “”Eat, Pray, Love” Author Elizabeth Gilbert muses on the impossible things we expect from artists and geniuses – and shares the radical idea that, instead of the rare person “being” a genius, all of us “have” a genius. It’s a funny, personal and surprisingly moving talk.” She explores the origin of the word genius and of course, the muse.

Creativity and genius really aren’t personal traits. They’re more gifts, a reflection of a given openness that allows the innate intelligence and creativity of the universe to move through our specific form of it. This indirectly relates to our evolutionary progress I discussed back in What is Consciousness? Simply because openness is a key quality for transpersonal development.
Davidya

Walking

“We’re all just walking each other home.“
- Ram Das (servant of God), aka Dr. Richard Alpert, author, Be Here Now (1971)

Now in his ’80′s and in spite of a serious stroke, he’s still teaching. His latest work Be Love Now “follows the track of his own heart awakening“. He described himself not as a guru which is the way [embodies it] but as a teacher who points the way. That quote is a nice pointing.
Davidya

States of Consciousness redux

aka 7 States of Consciousness, aka Stages of Human Development

Periodically on this blog, I write a reference article for background info on key subjects. I can then link back to it for followup by readers, rather than re-explaining key points in detail. The article I’ve linked to the most has also been one of the top 10 hits here for years. That is States of Consciousness.

Since writing that article, my own experience and understanding has deepened. I’ve even gotten a graduate degree in the subject. (laughs) I’ve added several addendum’s to the old article but  a rewrite is overdue.

Fundamentally, the evolution of higher states of consciousness or enlightenment is a continuation of the development we experienced growing up. Rather than stalling at personal self-actualization (Maslow), we continue through a natural series of steps into cosmic (boundless) Self (Atman), through the depths of its development, and on into what is known as Brahman.

In the early 70′s when I first began reading about consciousness, there was no Internet, just a mixture of speculative books and ancient oddly translated texts. Bucke’s old book Cosmic Consciousness was key for many but it tossed experiences and awakening together in a basket. The west had no framework or map, not even a language. Many used different definitions for fundamental terms like consciousness or cosmic. As science has lacked the eastern tools for a systematic study of awareness, it’s been relegated to an effect of brain function.

A small book I read then was Anthony Campbell’s Seven States of Consciousness. It was based on Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s teaching which was in turn based on ancient Vedic experience. It was the first I saw to offer a framework for experiences and the nature of the process of enlightenment.

Basically, the 7 States are:
1) Sleep state – dreamless, mind & ego asleep.
2) Dream state – REM sleep, mind is active, body asleep.
3) Waking state – typical ‘reality’, typically only the physical world is seen as real.

4) Transcendental Consciousness (TC) or samadhi: a state of restful alertness where the mind is awake but quiet, silent but alert. It’s completion is CC below when it becomes full-time.

5) Cosmic Consciousness (CC), awakening or Self Realization: with enough experience of TC, it becomes infused in our life and becomes full-time, beneath waking, dreaming and sleeping states. We wake up to ourselves as cosmic, or more precisely, the cosmic wakes up to itself through us. This shift is permanent though it may take a little time to be clear. We are a witness or observer to an apparently illusory world. Only the inner wakefulness is real. It’s completion is sat chit ananda, absolute bliss consciousness.

6) God Consciousness (GC), Celestial or Divine Con.: the refinement of perception and the awakening heart and fine feelings from lived CC reveals the mechanics and process of creation. In some ways, this is more a process or series of stages than a single state. The inner remains real and the outer world becomes seen as a Lila or divine play. It’s completion is God Realization post Unity where we choose to unite with or remain close to God. Refinement continues through all stages and can take hundreds of years to complete. Thus in the current age we do what we can.

A lot of GC development is skimmed over by western minds. For some, you can barely recognize a GC phase, just CC and UC. But without this development, the fullness of enlightenment will not unfold and later stages will stall. Soma is the mechanism, discussed here. It’s also worth noting that soma and bliss awaken laws of nature that have long been dormant. Personally, that brings us the experience of being fully supported by the world. More broadly, it changes the rules of life over time. Golden ages are very different from what we’ve been experiencing because new laws are awake.

7) Unity Consciousness (UC) or Oneness: where the intellect recognizes the outer experience of the world and the celestial plus the inner experience of silence are of the same thing. The inner and outer world are found to be one and the same reality and their separation ends. Through a series of recognitions, all layers of experience, memory, all space and time, and even the experiencer itself are united in one wholeness. It’s completion is in Brahman.

Beyond Unity, there are no longer stages of consciousness. We transcend consciousness, existence, and Atman into Brahman. I’ll explore that more in a later article.

It should be noted that development of Atman carries forward from prior lives. We pick up where we left off. Thus some seem to move more quickly or slowly than others. Similarly the development of sattva (purity or clarity) also carries forward. This is most related to the refinement of GC. With sattva well-developed, you see people who may not be awake but have amazing perceptions. With Atman well-developed but less sattva, you see clear awakening but a denial of the divine and a drier unfoldment. The ideal is of course a well-balanced development.

A Reexamination
Over time and study, it soon becomes apparent there are flaws in this 7 states map. For example, the first 3 are more states of the physiology whereas the last 3 are more stages of development. The first, waking, dreaming and sleep, continue in all stages of development. The later three are stages that are progressively superseded. (although there is much overlap) TC in the middle evolves. At first TC is experienced as a new and transitory 4th state of consciousness. There has been scientific research to validate this experience. However, as it becomes permanent, it becomes experienced as the foundation underlying all states and stages of development. It is no longer a state but rather the permanent, ever-deepening foundation.

Even though the TM organization went on to give Sanskrit names to the 7 states, if you search the Vedas, you will not find a description of the 7 states this way. You do however find them described in the Vedas much as in the prior paragraph. Three states of body-mind and several stages of the development of enlightenment. Two different things.

Maharishi stopped talking about higher states entirely after the early 1980′s. I believe he originally was attempting to bring Vedic ideas of higher stages to the western model of states of consciousness. But there was a huge gap between the western idea of consciousness as a side-effect of brain function and the Vedic experience that consciousness is the source of all physical reality, including the brain.

Dr. “Skip” Alexander, a psychology professor at MUM (where students practice TM) some 20 years ago published several articles, such as in the book Higher Stages of Human Development (1990, out of print), that suggested an alignment of the higher stages with models of human development from psychology. This includes Piaget’s Cognitive states, Kohlberg’s Moral Reasoning, and Loevinger’s Ego stages. Higher stages would simply extend these models. Unfortunately, Dr. Alexander died and though this alignment is still taught, it has not been developed nor has it updated the old 7 states model.

I also explored a related model as an evolution of perspectives. The first 3 stages both map major childhood phases and adult stages if development is less or challenges more.

We can now understand that we should be looking at TC through UC as a process that occurs, underlying our daily experience of waking and sleeping. The stages have a significant impact on our perspective of the world and what is true for us.

Understanding the basics of the development of consciousness is very useful for a number of reasons. For one, understanding our own life and unfoldment certainly makes the whole process easier. I recently explored the issue of Conceptual Barriers. We can also get the jist of where we’re going and verify the experience when it unfolds. And it helps greatly in understanding the perspective described in the spiritual and religious texts of old as well as talks by current teachers.

It’s very easy to fall into conceptual arguments about which teaching or perspective  is right or wrong in a cornucopia of offerings. We should avoid attempts to judge the development of a given person and rather focus on the stage they are speaking to or of at the time.

This understanding of stages has been lost from some traditions. It’s clear the Buddha, for example, spoke to various stages but Buddhism today largely does not recognize anything but awakening. Similarly, many today suggest the inner oneness of CC is advaita (non-duality). Because the outer world may seem illusory, it is discounted. But as long as the illusion is separate, this is dwaita, duality. Advaita describes Unity which is totally inclusive and so much more than CC.

This kind of muddling certainly doesn’t help our understanding. Some teachers even mix stages  together. Further, if you don’t recognize the underlying process, it’s easy to mix experiences or side-effects with being. This is especially true when it’s new when you’re still separating the wheat from the chaff and trying to catch up conceptually. You even see somewhat comical ideas described as requirements, much as a cat may consider being bumped by the fridge door part of being fed.

It’s also important to differentiate between experience and being. We can have wonderful experiences of higher stages. But this is like being King for the day. This is not the same as being the King. There is a big difference between tasting it and living it, between experience and being. Missing this point, you may fall into the trap of trying to recreate an experience that is inherently transitory. You end up chasing the memory of an experience rather than living it. I’ve seen people deny awakening, they’re so fixed on recapturing an old experience they think is “it”.

Finally, the idea of this description is not to serve as a concept to debate or a philosophical position. It is designed to be a map to guide you. Hold it lightly. Even if a fortune teller gives you an accurate reading of your future, how it plays out is never what you expect. Such is the nature of the path home. If we are to continue forward, at each stage we must let something go of what we once held true. But what replaces it is always better than we possibly could have dreamed.

We have a profound gift in having a human form. This is the opportunity to reach profound levels of development and return “home”.
Davidya

On Choosing a Mantra

On the American Veda article, someone mentioned the Kriya Yoga Conference next March where the author Philip Goldberg will be speaking. I noticed both CSA sites linked from the conference page have basic effortless meditation instructions on their site.

On Rev. O’Brian’s site, she suggests using the mantra Om. As the primordial sound (pranava), it is a well known mantra. However, it is a mantra only suited for renunciates. If you use such a mantra, you’ll notice your possessions and relationships tend to fall away. I would not recommend this for most people. Shankaracharya Swami Brahmanand Saraswati (Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s guru) went so far as to call it poison to happiness, more so for women.

On the R.E. Davis site, they suggest choosing a pleasant English word. Again, I would use caution here. The mantra takes you very deep within and becomes quite powerful. A random word may have unpredictable effects. (more to understand Mantras)

One traditional Indian way of choosing is to use the name of your favoured form of God.* This is sometimes a family tradition but can also be seen in a jyotish astrology chart. In her Answers Part 1, Mother Meera suggests “Whichever mantra [Divine name] comes to you easily and spontaneously is the one you should do. It should give a strong feeling and be like music flowing from the heart.” If you’re not comfortable with the God thing, simply use a bija (seed) mantra of known suitable good effects.

Ideally, one learns meditation from a teacher. They know how to choose mantras and can guide you into the effortless experience. Often, it is the habit to try. When subtle effort creeps into the practice, it stops bringing benefits and we tend to then drop it. It’s good to have a clear experience of effortlessness periodically early in the practice.

Deepak Chopra’s meditation apparently chooses mantras based on your moon’s position at birth. He also taught a technique to the entire audience at a presentation I was at. Transcendental Meditation teachers are similarly trained to give suitable bija mantras. I’ve been happily using TM for decades and it’s certainly the most thoroughly researched. Because meditation is so fundamental to our well-being, the range of benefits is huge.

It’s worth noting that in past controversies, it has been suggested that TM mantras were names of God so the practice (and any other eastern based meditation) was secretly religious praying to Hindu deities. However, most everything of import in Hindu culture is associated with one form of God or another. It’s a way of expressing gratitude, of making one’s entire life an act of devotion. But unless you formally use a name of God or have the intention to use it in this way, it’s not a form of prayer. In practices like TM, you avoid associating the mantra with any meaning as that can hold it in the surface levels of mind. Thus, associations with gods are irrelevant to the practice. It’s only if you choose an approach like Mother Meera’s, where you combine prayer and meditation, that such associations arise.

Rev. O’Brian suggests having the attention in the third eye area. Others may suggest the attention on the heart, especially if using a Divine name. Both the CSA sites suggest saying the mantra with the breath. If it’s more comfortable, you can drop all these details and simply allow the mantra to come and go as it will. Just favour it when you notice you’ve drifted off into thoughts. This will take you deeper within. And the attention will move naturally to where things are unfolding or purifying. Keep it simple if you want to go to simplest states of awareness.

In any case, choose a meditation that is effortless. Avoid the poor understanding of the Yoga Sutras that suggests meditation requires concentration and pushing out thoughts. Even science has demonstrated that has totally different effects. Concentration may increase focus skills but does that bring you home? Meditation should prepare you for the effortless allowing that unfolds enlightenment, not the effort that affirms the control of the ego.

Above all, enjoy!
Davidya

*India is largely monotheistic (one God) but sees God as showing up in many forms. In the personal or heart-based approach, all is seen as being done.

The Samadhis of Patanjali

Awhile back, I wrote an article on the samadhis listed in the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali*. At the time, I explored definitions from several translations. The result however was less than clear. Let’s try again. First, we’ll explore samadhi.

Samadhi or Transcendental Consciousness (TC) is that silence we experience in meditation where the breath pauses, the mind goes silent and we experience profound peace. If it’s a longer samadhi, we may notice the breath stopped and the lungs vibrating. The brain goes very quiet.  A wave of soma (sweetness) may be tasted in the throat. The skin can take on a kind of glow (ojas).

Samadhi is unqualified silence. This is why the experience cannot be easily described. Some associate ecstasy with samadhi. Ecstasy or bliss is initially experienced entering and leaving samadhi as the liveliness is like the “edge” or event horizon. That enlivenment is more than easily described as Rumi and many others illustrate.

(note that these sorts of experience are more common on retreats when you have a chance to get the body very well rested. They may be occurring briefly in regular meditation but are not noticed by a foggy mind.)

The experience of bliss during samadhi is a later stage when silence and activity can be supported at the same time. Earlier on, the subtlest noticing or liveliness pops one out. Eventually, the silence and bliss are carried forward into all of our daily life.

Patanjali names 8 degrees of samadhi. He first defines it as the “end of meditation”.
Notice how he describes most of this in pairs.

(Sa is with, A or Ni is without)
The first samadhi he names is Samprajnata samadhi (v1.17 )= with an object of attention. The sutra describes going from gross to subtle to bliss to “amness”. (via meditation)

Asamprajnata samadhi (without an object) is the result of repeated experience but still impressions remain.

Then in more detail:
Savitarka samadhi (v1.42): vitarka is fine directed thought. The mind is moving from sound to idea to object. This is the first stage of absorption.

Nirvitarka samadhi (v1.43) is the not version. The object remains but not the associations. The memory is cleared. The second stage of absorption.

Savichara samadhi (v1.44): vichara = flow of attention to Self. Not caught in an object/thought, the attention is inner directed. There is just a subtle object of attention, like the mantra or intention.

Nirvichara samadhi only the subtle object remains, without meaning or reflection.
The next verse tells us subtle objects extend into the formless.

The verse sequence that follows is useful to note – in brief:
1.47: restful alertness, luminosity of self
1.48: filled with truth, the intellect that knows only truth
1.49: direct knowledge, without senses
1.50: the impression of the above prevents new impressions
This illustrates how potent samadhi is.

Then we come to Nirbijah samadhi (v1.51), literally without seed. This is the pure silence one. This burns the latent impressions and liberates one from rebirth. We could say the individual goes completely off-line during.

Note that these are all descriptions of temporary states reached during meditation, one of the 8 limbs of Yoga he defines in v2.29 and following. V2.27 mentions 7 stages. This is not a reference to the 8 limbs to reach samadhi but rather the 7 samadhis listed above.

Patanjali comes back to samadhi in v4.29 with Dharmamegha samadhi. “Continuous discriminative awareness”, undisturbed samadhi. Samadhi carries forward into activity so we live silence and activity together. Ultimately, the result is Self Realization, Cosmic Consciousness or awakening.** I explore the layers of the witness experience here.

I hope this makes some aspects of this wonderful text and the way meditation leads to awakening a little more clear.
Davidya

*I recommend the Thomas Egenes translation. He properly shows the Devanagari (Sanskrit), the transliteration, the word for word translation and English result. The translation is not littered with false ideas of hard concentration, limbs as rungs, and so forth. He’s the author of the dominant western texts for learning Sanskrit.

**Note that some consider the witness or observer experience of silent, continuous awakeness during activity and deep sleep to be the hallmark of Cosmic Consciousness. While it is an aspect, this can occur while one is still identified with the ego and is thus not yet an actual full awakening. One teacher described this as “soul awakening”. See the ‘layers’ link above for more detail of this process.

American Veda

Recently, I’ve been reading a book that’s a fascinating review of the migration of Vedanta and Yoga to the west. The book by Philip Goldberg is called American Veda: From Emerson and the Beatles to Yoga and Meditation. How Indian Spirituality Changed the West.

His range and depth of coverage are impressive and there is many little known details of the influences behind well-known teachers. Did you know Gandhi was strongly influenced by Emerson? And Emerson by Vedanta? As a fellow traveler of this journey, it’s wonderful to see the larger perspective and gain insights on the journey many of us traveled together. While some effects are obvious, like Yoga studios and meditation teachers, the influences are far more subtle and far-reaching than you might realize.

For example, Christian church’s taught us that the priest was our intermediary with God. Vedanta brought us ideas of self development, personal evolution, and direct access to source/divinity. These ideas moved into the mainstream, including in fundamentalist churches. He covers the Transcendentalists (like Emerson), New Thought, Yogananda, the Beatles with Maharishi, and so on. And I’m still only about half way through.

I’ve also been impressed by his balanced and objective coverage of some of the controversies and issues that many spiritual teachers and organizations have gone through. If you were part of the boomers that “discovered” eastern spirituality or wish to understand the period, it’s a great read.
Davidya

Update:
American Veda website

Philip Giving a talk on the subject (46 min):

On Sanskrit

In another forum, I wrote the following and thought it worth sharing here. It’s edited for context.

Sanskrit is a language that represents the sound of nature creating. Shiksha (a book on Sanskrit pronunciation) tells us Prakriti has 63 letters (sounds) and Sanskrit 64*. In that sense, sound is more important than meaning. In fact, the meaning is designed to be conferred to the listener by direct experience. More on this shortly.

Like all languages, Sanskrit is representative. Most languages are derived from prior languages and strongly influenced by ego-based awareness. Sanskrit, in its pure form, is derived from Shiva, from the divine. You might enjoy this article by Vyaas Houston, comparing English and Sanskrit.

I’ve heard it observed that modern languages are derived from a small group of proto-languages that arose around the world, fully formed, at around the same time. The Yugas book suggests this was due to group consciousness descending, necessitating verbal language. Writing followed. (see the Yugas link for more)

As we are that which contains creation, we can observe this process at work: sound/vibration giving rise to form and all experience. To be able to observe this requires the developed ability to stay in deep settled awareness at the source of thought with awake “inner” senses. When Sanskrit is heard at that level, the vibration gives rise to the form and we share the experience “encoded” in the verses. See Name and Form for more.

I understand Hebrew has some but less of that. Some Native languages probably do as well. English has little.

Veda, strictly speaking, is Shruti, sound. Veda is derived from Smriti, memory or impressions in Brahman. These have a visual quality like lucite slabs, vaguely like the memory in HAL in the movie 2001. These impressions are the map and foundation of all creations, not just our own.

I’ve heard it said that local languages reflect the local laws of nature. Google is apparently trying to catalog them, as described here.  (The Squamish nation is N of here.)
Davidya

* It can be noted that the Shiva Sutras & Vyakaran describe 42 letters and the alphabet is often taught with around 48 or 50 letters. Basically, it depends on what you include. There are only 36 unique Phonemes used. The Varna Samamnaya describes the full 64, including the plutos (3 count extra-long vowels) and ayogavahas (like the anusvara (the dot in Aum (om) that adds the m) and visarga (ha suffix)).