"My complete safety in every moment lies in claiming my eternal innocence."

                                                                 

                                                                - Nouk Sanchez  (from Facebook)

my eternal innocence is the true 'me'....it is lost for most beneath the 'i am the body' belief...hence effort has to be made to retrieve it...most of us are not aware of this until pointed out by a master who is always established himself in Self abidance.

Mohanakrishnan Annavangote

1 hr · Like

      A profound pointer from the life of saint Paakkaanaar highlighting 'Values'.

Paaakkanaar and his wife made ten bamboo baskets daily and sold them but took money for only one basket , the rest nine they gave away free of cost...all the nine who got them free asked him one question.."Paakkanaar, why are you not accepting money for your hard work..? he used to reply " those nine ones are the most valuable and i am keen on retaining their value with me while giving them away for free."

Mohanakrishnan Annavangote

MIND CONTROL (Part -5 )

for the attention of all my BLOG readers...


MIND CONTROL (Part - 5)  is under edit and will be posted very shortly in this BLOG.


Mohanakrishnan Annavangote

SELF AWARENESS AT THE HELM OF AFFAIRS  -  a reflection

                     ‘’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’

Those ones established in firm Self abidance only perform selfless service to Society, as ordained by the Self.

Mind ceases to exist in silence. Silence is the door to Faith. Faith is surrender to the Self. Faith merges with the Self. All faiths, all symbols of sectarian thoughts, all colors end up finally in their one and only goal, the Self, they merge and become one with the Self. Self is the Goal of all births. Self is God, formless and nameless, compassion, grace, peace, joy and bliss supreme.

Mind gives man billions of fragments of one single identity and one gets caught in its swirling currents  unable to collect oneself into one single identity. The power of concentration becomes very week, indulgence in pleasure becomes uncontrollable, ignorance reigns and one is lost in the cauldron of thoughts

.

One has an original, ‘one’s own’, powerful true single identity which can shine only in the absence of the mind. So establishing oneself  in silence is absolutely necessary. How does one tackle the Mind, the ever powerful current  of incessantly running thoughts which weakens one’s  attention, takes away the power to concentrate on one single subject and hides the vision of  one’s true identity ?

   

A ‘Direct Path’ exists to the Self for those in conflict and for those serious seekers of truth who look for Freedom from Bondage. To tackle the Mind the question now is  ‘ Who wants to tackle the Mind?’ The answer will naturally be, ‘I’ want’ it. Hence it is essential that one’s ‘I’ and it’s source have to be searched in ones inwardness and retrieved.

This is a choiceless matter for one until one knows the truth about one’s ‘I’. Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi  puts it simply as ‘ In the absence of Yoga viyoga happens and in the absence of viyoga Yoga happens to one’. Hence one is left with no other alternative as Yoga has to happen in one’s life sooner or later.

The creator creates existence and sustains it until it’s dissolution when the purpose is fully served.

An Avatar is a spontaneous birth of the creator in human form in perfect self abidance born as a shepherd to take care and guide his herds. All Avatars hitherto born on earth are personifications of Compassion, Grace did selfless service to human society as guides.

Life does not blossom to its intended extend for one who has not understood his prime duty as that of realising his own true Identity. His or Her duties to family and society will  naturally follow as second and third ones.

Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi is an Avatar born to guide the human society as a whole and remove the ignorance of the above prime duty which naturally removes all doubts and fears from life for man.

‘Self Enquiry’ as advocated by Sri Bhagavan is a Secular subject  fit for all to pursue easily due to  the simple  directions that are  projected  very clearly and understandably irrespective all existing divisive factors in the world that divide human society into fractions.

In the year 1999 the Govt. Of India released postal stamp of Sri Ramana Maharshi and held an international  Seminar on ‘SELF ENQUIRY’ in Bangalore guided by Sri A.R.Natarajan, president  of the RAMANA MAHARSHI CENTRE for LEARNING, BANGALORE.

     

Mohanakrishnan Annavangote

Ramana Maharshi Centre, Guruvayur

Camp: Bangalore

MIND CONTROL (Part -4)

                                                        

Bhagavan Sree Ramana Maharshi

                                               

                               (Dedicated to the Lotus Feet of Bhagavan Sree Ramana Maharshi)

                                                               MIND CONTROL    (Part-4)

  

Mind is a collection of thoughts. In the absence of thoughts Mind does not exist. The gross body needs to have feelings, otherwise called thoughts, and Prana to acquire sufficient knowledge during the span of his existence that will lead to the purpose or goal of his birth. Thoughts, collectively called Mind, and Prana the life force are two branches of the same power source known as the Self. A thought is consciousness and Prana is the dynamic force that controls the motor activities of the gross body. A thought is a feeling one experiences. A thought of food is a feeling one gets when hungry. One needs only just enough food, clothes and shelter to live until the purpose of his creation is served. But when these needs exceed the prescribed limits they become desire. Desire in one leads to greed and conflict which in turn influences one’s intellect in it’s discriminating capacity.

The question here is why the basic needs of a human being exceed the limits prescribed. Like in a software application the needs here are suggested by default settings but it is also open to customization as per one’s wishes for which the customer alone will be responsible for the indiscriminate projections and their after effects. In human life the needs exceed the limits due to the existence of the ignorance factor in one’s base constitution. Due to this ignorance the senses start seeking more and more pleasure over and above the limits and the resulting thoughts in the form of desire intoxicate the intellect also and the discriminating machinery’s functions become erratic due to the spanner thrown into it.

Who has the power to control the senses? Only knowledge has. Knowledge does not rise due to the malfunctioning of the intellect. Who can repair the damages? Only a Guru, Guide can help in this respect. And one’s experiences in life also. But experience may not be there always. The Guru is the embodiment of knowledge, a channel of Grace from the supreme power, the creator or. And a Guru is also an Avatar, the SELF personified in human form.  Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi is one such Avatar born in the contemporary world to guide masses who keep adopting new evolutionary living styles according to the need of the time. Man is committed to himself first, to family friends and society next.

Coming back to the ignorance factor in Man’s constitution let us try to have an in depth picture of his Being. The Gross body is made up of the five natural elements born from the cause, Maya or the Primeval Ignorance. Maya possesses three qualities such as sathwam, rajas and thamas which are inherent in all the five natural elements space, air, fire, water and earth.

From RAJAS are born the GROSS BODY’S five organs of perception, five organs of action, and the five Pranas which together form the life force.

From SATHWA are born the SUBTLE BODY consisting of  MIND, INTELLECT,MEMORY OR CHIT AND EGO.

The THAMAS or ignorance called the CAUSAL BODY is the cause for the birth of the above two bodies as the presence of Ignorance rekindles the flame of Knowledge in the cycle of creation, sustenance and dissolution of Existence for the Creator or Purusha to become one with the resulting Supreme Blissful state and attain his primordial single identity or Swaroopa devoid of any attributes where the Creator forgets his own role in the Blissful state and it becomes necessary to make him aware of his will power as ignorance of it prevails. Knowledge is made to rise here to begin creation again and maintain the aforesaid cycle. So much as a brief explanation for the existence of the primeval Ignorance.

Knowledge having served its purpose and finding no attributes dissolves into itself. Since Knowledge or prakruthy is indestructible it dissolves into itself and lies in dormant state in the primordial Purusha. Purusha shines alone. Knowledge and Ignorance cease to exist. Iswara merges with the Supreme Bliss and Nothing prevails. Ignorance rises.

Athman or Purusha or Brahman having merged into his real state BLISS, the result of union of prakruthy with Purusha and in the absence of knowledge and ignorance, remains as Purusha alone in BLISS, known in sanskrit as the state of ‘kaivalyam’, and forgets himself. This state is known as Dissolution where Nothing exists except the Supreme BLISS, Purusha’s original nature. This  leads the primeval ignorance to be the cause for the birth of knowledge lying dormant in Purusha to wake up Purusha and to make manifest Maya or Prakruthi for reunion with the Purusha resulting in the creation of Bliss for the Purusha to attain his own Oneness, or Kaivalyam, in the form of BLISS. The cycle goes on and off.

In the old hall in Sree Ramanasramam where Bhagavan daily attends his court a devotee expressed disappointment in his not being able to study the volumes of Scriptures that proclaim means for realizing one’s Self and regretted that his life is being wasted not knowing the Self. Sree Bhagavan replied to him in Tamil the words “CHUMMA IRU” meaning “JUST BE”. He further said “realize your Self first in Silence then one will naturally know what one needs to read. What is the point in spending a life time reading vast volumes of the Scriptures and still knot know one’s  Self?”

Self Enquiry is ‘The Direct Path’, rather a bypass to the destination, the Self. It suits the contemporary living styles of Man and as evolution brings in changes and transcendence of Mind to higher planes of knowledge it also invokes graceful methods as a means to achieve the end. Hence  Avatar of Guru, or a Guide in some form, even it may be an Experience coming to guide, takes place on earth to lead the society. Sree Bhagavan is such an Avatar, the Supreme Self personified in human form.

In Self Enquiry methods Sree Bhagavan stresses on the means to Mind Control. Mind is a collection of thoughts. Thoughts lead to action further resulting in their multiplications. The current of thought flow keeps moving. Thoughts are the result of latent tendencies lying dormant as seeds in one’s being and get accumulated over births. The seed comes to fruition at the appropriate time in this birth or later depending upon one’s actions or karma. Karma is three fold such as sanchitham, prarabdham and Agamikam meaning the ones carried over from previous births, the carried forward ones and the current ones together form prarabdham and the ones which are about to happen is termed as agamikam. The triple Karma form the total play of thoughts which affect one throughout his life. Once the Mind is destroyed by dissolving it in one’s Self the triple karma also disappears. No Mind no karma. An intelligent person will be able to chart out his future in the absence of Mind and triple karma by the proper conduct of his dharma and future karma and reach his goal, the Self.

Sree Bhagavan directs one who faces difficulties with the Mind to investigate into the identity of the person for whom these experiences happen. The investigation inward will reveal the nature of the experiencing person as ‘I’.  It is necessary to hold on dearly to this ‘I’ thought or the feeling of ‘I’ as all thoughts are occurring to this ‘I’ and this ‘I’ is the core around which all thoughts revolve. Like in a whirlpool the core ‘I’ is drawn into its vortex leading all the way towards the Self where it  merges. The ‘I’ feeling being a continuum from it’s source it does not disappear altogether and remains as a perennial flow. But thoughts having no attributes to hold on, as they rise spontaneously from seeds, disappear or drown into the ‘I’ thought. That is why attention has to be focused one pointedly on this ‘I’ thought , one’s identity . If one identifies with  thought by ignorance of one’s true identity the ’I’ thought, it leads further to multiplication of thoughts and actions and becomes continuous and one remains always with thoughts.  Practice with devotion helps one to abide firmly as one’s own ‘I’ vibration. In the absence of thoughts silence and peace prevail. If one listens with a keen ear one can even hear an accompanying humming sound as if created by a dynamo while in abidance as the ‘I’. The ‘I’ is only the tip of an iceberg and much experience lie hidden underneath to be tapped by persistent Self Enquiry.

 Creation is nature or knowledge and it has a purpose to serve. Hence Man has naturally feelings or thoughts necessary for sustenance till attainment of knowledge of the creator. Normally when hungry the thought of food arises in one and it disappears when food is consumed. The thought arises only when hungry again because it is natural and normal. These necessary feelings or thoughts are only a group of skeleton thoughts which don’t accumulate and hinder knowledge.

Mind Control steps in where Desire makes an entry. A desire is different from a normal thought. It can result in multiplication of pleasure, action, fear, panic etc. and play havoc with the functions of Intellect. Desire rises due to the crossing of limits prescribed for sustenance and acquisition of knowledge which is the purpose. Ignorance of limits is due to the absence of knowledge of them. Like in a software application which has default settings for limits in various aspects life too has default settings prescribed. The software application gives freedom to choose by providing customize options to suit one’s desires sometimes resulting in unachievable higher outputs by overlooking the default settings for limits.     

                                          

Likewise in life also limits are prescribed by default settings for optimum results and if due to one’s greed and desire one crosses the limits set naturally the result is chaos and confusion. Sree Bhagavan points out here how to overcome desire and lead a normal life for it’s fulfillment and removes the devotee’s ignorance by giving knowledge of one’s true identity and also of one’s mistaken identity and shows where the exit from ignorance lies in one’s life.

Sree Bhagavan shows a devotee how practice or sadhana of Self Enquiry is to be initiated. As and when one retrieves one’s true identity the false identity that ‘I am the Body’ drops off.  “Like searching for a valuable thing lost in a deep well one should in silence controlling speech and watching the breath dive deep down into one’s inwardness and look for one’s lost true identity by asking the question to oneself ‘Who am I?”

Mind and Breath are two branches of the same power source. When breath is controlled by watching it the Mind also gets controlled and vice versa. Sree Bhagavan calls watching the breath  “prathyaveshana pranayama” meaning simply watching the inhalation retention and exhalation of breath without any particular measure as prescribe in hardcore Pranayama pracrices. The result in that as well as in Self Enquiry is one and the same. All roads lead to Rome. In the silence that follows the true identity shines forth as the ‘I’. The first experience of ‘I’ is a distant vision of the Self. The source of ‘I’ has to be investigated further when one is established firmly in one’s ‘I’ by asking oneself the question “Whence am I?” meaning what is the source from which the ‘I’ thought rises.

The source of the ‘I’ thought is dealt with in the next forthcoming Part -5 of ‘MIND CONTROL’.

                                                                                                         

author                                                                                                                      

Mohanakrishnan Annavangote

                                                                                                                 ( Continued in Part -5 )

FOOD SHELTER CLOTH and MIND CONTROL

MIND CONTROL

                                                                 

Dedicated to Bhagavan Sri Ramana Mahrshi

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Food Shelter Cloth and Mind Control..........What is Mind? And Whose Mind?

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Have you ever felt the swelling up of compassion within you when you observe the whole world around you? Surely ‘No’ will be the answer by most. You were too busy and in want of something or the other always. Do you remember when, last, the words ‘Love You’ were uttered by you to a fellow being? And why? And what the incantations of those words can conjure in the beings of the addressee and the addressor? Those words were a thought expressed outwardly to the addressee for one’s benefit of a favor, help, gift, or for love reciprocated, by the addressor. Those words, like any other words which lead to future snow balls of activities, for instance, create naturally a goodwill in the beings of both persons in the form of love, love which is nothing but compassion (grace) bestowing itself upon them thereby leading to his/her well being. How?

Well, the thought works out in these lines if the words have come out naturally from one’s heart. But the same words pronounced intentionally with an ulterior motive will kill them prematurely as it can be due to a desire for possession. And desire is repetitive reproductive and accumulates perennially which is one of the supply sources to the active, ever moving thought bank which removes the edge to the one pointed concentration by the intellect into knowledge.

Mind, the thought bank, rises from the Heart. Mind is consciousness; a thought is consciousness in a living being. A living being is the combination of matter (jada) and prana (the life force). Space,air,fire,water and earth, the five natural elements are born from the three qualities(gunas) of Maya viz. sathwam, rajas and thamas and these three qualities are inherent in all the five elements. Sathwam is Pure or Super consciousness, Rajas is activity and Tamas is ignorance. These three qualities of the consciousness arose from the divine play (Maya).Maya covers the beginning and existence. Maya is the First Word ‘AUM’ or ‘OM’. The Word was the first.

“In the beginning [before all time] was the Word (Christ), and the Word was with God, and the Word was God Himself. John 1: 1”

 The ‘Tamas’ quality of all these five elements when undergoes the natural process of interaction and mixing in a variety of permutations and combinations evolve into the five Gross elements. From the total Rajas aspect of all these five natural elements the Five Pranas (life force) evolve. And from the total five Sathwic (Sathwam) aspects of the five natural elements is evolved the Inner instruments viz. Mind, Intellect, Ego and Memory.

Mind is of the nature of indecision and doubt, decision is the nature of Intellect, Ego is the notion of ‘I am the doer’ and Memory is ‘Chitham’ (of the nature of consciousness).

The Grossified or Gross body possess the five sensory organs or organs of perception viz. Ear, Eyes, Nose, Tongue and Skin for hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting and touching and the five organs of action viz. Speech,Hands,Legs, Anus and the Genitals. Thus the grossified Gross body is born.

The Subtle body consists of the ungrossified or unchanged five natural elements which evolve into the five sense organs, the five organs of action, the Five Pranas (life force), the Mind and the Intellect all put together into seventeen parts.

The Causal body is in the form of Ignorance, which can’t be explained and the cause or need for the other two gross and subtle bodies. It is beginning less and not modified.

With these three bodies awareness and life begins. The three states of awareness are ‘Waking’, ‘Dreaming’, and ‘Deep Sleep’  which occupy one’s lifetime through out.

The three qualities, the five natural elements, the three bodies and the process of the convergence of all these together to create a living being can be further elucidated but for a living being the priority is to gain knowledge of ‘Mind’ as mind is the only basis for the intellect which actually ‘thinks’ ‘decides’ or discriminates.

And here the ‘Mind’ is born. Why a thought? If thought is ‘Consciousness’ why is it different from the Source, the Super consciousness called The Heart? The Answer to this common question is that “The Super consciousness is the Heart, the Primal universal being, the Source from which all arose, God himself whose fantasies create, sustain and destroy or dissolve his creations back to the source”.

 

Here comes the secret. Every piece of creation is a part of god himself. All of these hold themselves as one entity, the God. Hence know that you too are a part of God. You can see God in his entirety deep inside you if you know how to look inside. Man is nothing but a Microcosm of the Macrocosm.

One needs a firm conviction by way of experience to know this truth.

As life begins for man the seed of an identity crisis also starts growing due to ignorance of the three qualities that form the texture of his individuality. The only direction the individual always seeks is towards happiness which having not reigned properly with knowledge gradually results in Desire and possessiveness. The eight resulting tendencies of Desire such as passion, wanting, cruelty, competition etc give rise to accumulative actions which after their fruition leave these latent tendencies in seed forms which will lie dormant for fruition again in time. All these activities create an uncontrollable and perennial thought flow. Also a false identity, Ego, rises between the Mind and the Heart, the Source or the True individual concealing it from the Intellect or Knowledge. The Ego then proclaims itself as the individual and remains until it is destroyed by the knowledge of its falsehood.

The thamas aspect in the gross body combined with continuous thought activity in the subtle body removes the edge of the intellect making it short sighted and a weak faculty in its discriminatory role in distinguishing the eternal from the ephemeral thus forcing it all the time to remain unceasingly on the shallow waters above the deep thought currents. As the true identity of the individual is not sorted out the Mind continues reigning supreme and churns out withering words that are hollow and powerless and sows anarchy in the individual being.

The search for freedom from mind, peace and meaning starts here in ones life and one looks for help hopelessly for the intervention of the unknown. But this situation need not rise in one’s life and can be arrested prematurely if one gains knowledge of his true identity. For a true seeker the Heart or God enters in one’s life in the guise of a Guide or Guru or Teacher.

As at least the existence of the unknown is accepted by an ignorant one his faith in the unknown also leads him to the answer for his sufferings. It is said that the Guru comes half the way to meet his true seeker out of compassion.

 

Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi is an avatar in human form born to guide the seeker of contemporary times. In the passage of time and according to the changes in living styles of man God or Heart appears in some form to guide humanity as can be clearly seen from the history of world nations. Sri Bhagavan advocates practice of ‘Self Enquiry’ to modern man to retrieve his lost identity. His teachings are condensed in the three words “Who Am I?” He deals with Mind exclusively for people suffering from its excessive ways. It is necessary to discover the nature of mind in very simple process to get rid of it as it stands in the way of Self Discovery.

For this it’s essential that one turns his or her attention inward one pointedly. One needs to concentrate one’s attention into one’s inwardness and dive deep and search. But then one lacks concentration and finds distracted by thoughts at every step inward. One is stuck here for one has no means to stop the fast moving train of thoughts though one wishes.

The Scriptural declarations of all faith try their best to guide man but then a 9 to 5 man has no time to learn or listen to the vast volumes of their intrinsic knowledge. Time has brought need for changes to suit the man or woman of today with little time to spare in their life.

‘Mind Control’ is an important aspect in the practice of ‘Self Enquiry’, the need of the present for a secular nation or world. It leads one into the discovery of one’s own lost original identity, the lack of knowledge of its existence being the sole reason for man’s miserable, purposeless and joyless existence as equal to that of a clone.

Total Awareness is expected of an individual which only can give fullness to life. Where we stand now is in the tracks of an athletics field, each one with his or her own track, with many hurdles placed in between the start and the finish. Each hurdle here is a stage of awareness. Why Awareness at all in man’s busy day? Because the Intellect says, “don’t stand there like a donkey in the centre of the road during the busiest traffic hour”. It further says “It’s because you are not aware you have to cross the road in an instance. Your mind is bogged down with confusion created by thoughts. Get rid of them, you can think straight and see into the distance and the gaps between vehicles.” 

The processes or methods of ‘self enquiry’ are very simple and can be practiced by anybody irrespective of cast creed and society, by king or footmen without differentiations.

Mind Control is dealt in detail in the articles posted in the

BLOG:http://www.blackandwhiteholes.blogspot.com

“Principles and Practice of Yoga”

by Mohanakrishnan Annavangote

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Blog  http://www.blackandwhiteholes.blogspot.com

“THE DIRECT PATH” of  BHAGAVAN SRI RAMANA MAHARSHI

to the goal of Life in the science of Yoga.

~~~~~~~~

Like every human attempt to acquire more and more knowledge to attain meaning and goal of life gets updated and redesigned in the passage of time in the realms of science and philosophy of life, the most important chapter “Yoga” has also to its credit the most researched and latest method naturally perfected for practice to suit and fit into the living styles of the contemporary human society by a sage, visionary, seer, an avatar of god himself known as Bhagavan sri Ramana Maharshi of Thiruvannamai of south India. The Enquiry methods lead one into the inner layers of human consciousness fearlessly and joyfully at every stage of the practice thus lifting him into higher and still higher planes of experience and knowledge as to the constitution of one’s own real identity during the transition of the false identity towards the Heart and releases one into freedom from all bondages when the term death ceases to exist foerever.

The practice of Self Enquiry does not insist on endless practice of vigorous physical exercises etc and will go on inwardly 24x7 in wake sleep dream states once instituted, in any comfortable posture in work or in leisure. In the  wake of Self Enquiry the Prana also gets streamlined in the body naturally making the body mind combine a perfect instrument without much fuss on some of the old and traditional cumbersome postures. Ofcourse practice of Pranayama also helps the respiratory tracts and in the stopping of the mind but temporarily. To quote sri Bhagavan here “Prana and Mind are two branches of the same Force, when Prana is controlled the Mind becomes quesicant  and when the Mind is controlled the Prana becomes controlled.”But once pranayama is stopped the mind resurfaces. Hence he suggested pranayama only as an aid to control mind. The essence is to control the mind mainly by knowing it’s nature.

Self Enquiry has been declared by the Govt. of India also as an HRD concept and as most desirable and easily practicable scientific method of Yoga for the members of any human society of the world irrespective of color, cast, creed, religion and income standards. It has a world wide following of sincere seekers because of it’s universal appeal.

A visit to the Blog http://www.blackandwhiteholes.blogspot.com from its first posting onwards will give any one a fair idea and layout of the subject.

However, be that as it may, the following paragraphs will give one an insight into the birth of YOGA and it’s subsequent transition in the passage of time until the updated version given above on the essence of Yoga known as “SELF ENQUIRY - A DIRECT PATH” as advocated by Bhagavan sri Ramana Maharashi.

An invocatory verse from the Prasnopanishad (an ancient scripture) runs as follows:

“All this (in this world), as also all that in heaven are under the control of Prana. Protect us just as a mother does her sons, and ordain for us splendour and intelligence”.

Prana, is known as the life force, the vital energy, that propels all creations to their destinations as ordained by the supreme.  Without prana life cannot sustain. Therefore it is absolutely essential to make sure that this pranic energy balance in human body is maintained throughout at its maximum efficiency level for taking the individual to his or her goal of life. What is the Goal of life? The answer to this question is not known clearly to a large number of living human beings due to the existence of a hurdle at the mental level called the ‘veil of ignorance’. This is due to the wrong conviction that one is the gross body made up of flesh, an identity crisis; every individual has to face and sort out. Because it is his or her passport to the heaven or goal of life.

The science of yoga leads one step by step into unfolding of this mystery with absolute clarity as can be seen from the instructions for practice of yoga. This science is born out of research by men of wisdom and as per their experience way back 8000 years in India and practiced and developed as a perfect method for uniting the mind soul and body with the supreme, the ultimate reality. Acharya Patanjali, from 200BCE, researched on the various aspects of Yoga and compiled them into one of his famous creations which became known as the Yoga Sutras. According to him the impurity of mind is removed through Yoga, of the speech by Grammar and of the body by Ayurveda.

Normally the practice of a Yoga session starts with salutations to this renowned sage among sages for invoking his grace to the student. Yoga streamlines the body and prepares it for higher purposes. A healthy body maintains the pranic levels at its optimum as prana is the controlling force for the body. An analysis here will show that the prana exists in a human body at six positions and controls the motor force in their respective allotted areas. These pranic outposts in the body are called ‘chakras’ that is, wheels. One can imagine an ever circling wheel of this vital force at its respective post in the body. These six points are known in Sanskrit language as Mooladhara, Swadhishtana, Manipooraka, Anahatha, Vishudhi and Ajna. Ajna chakra exists at the point between the two eyebrows. Of course there is a seventh point also and this is the final resting place for prana in a body which is called the Sahasrara or the thousand petals where the prana emerges as its highest potent form and merges with the universal prana or the heart and makes it possible for the individual or the mind or the soul, as it may be called, to unite with the source of the universal identity, the reality, the god or the truth.

A Yoga practice session has five levels of practice normally to be very strictly followed, to achieve the desired results. They are in the order of practice, Loosening exercises, kriyas, yogasanas, pranayama and bandhas and mudras. The loosening and stretching exercises are meant to prepare the body muscles for the yogic postures which in turn tune the body and mind perfectly to tap the potent energy lying dormant in the heart cavity of an individual. The cleansing techniques “kriyas” clean the body from the intestines onwards and help in purifying the subtle nerves that run through the body. Pranayama is controlling of breath systematically so as to bring in deep concentration and awareness of the mind and along with the “Mudras” and “Bandhas” The mind dives deep inward towards the self and merges there and thus get united with the creator. The lost identity of the individual is redeemed thus and one becomes part of the universal existence, conscience, bliss which is devoid of misery of the day today mundane ways of human life. Here the “Bandhas” and “Mudras” are neuro-muscular locks and gestures used while doing postures and pranayama.The breathing undergoes a controlled and regulated process which in turn accelerates the upward journey of the prana through the subtle centres for merger at the final centre with the divine will, or the creator or the heart as it can be termed.

There are various methods adopted in the way meditation is performed by individuals. In a nutshell it can be described as a means for the inward journey the mind has to necessarily do for an individual. The journey is in search of the source or birth place of the individual who exists in the form of awareness. Meditation in the beginning helps in sorting out one’s original identity that has got entangled with the body idea. Once the body idea is disposed of as a product of ignorance one’s real identity becomes ‘awareness’ devoid of the body. But it is difficult to get used to this truth in the beginning having been identifying with the body all the time in the absence of experience. Therefore it becomes necessary for the individual to place his identity properly, and then enquire into the source of this identity or rather as to where from the identity originates as it is in the form of awareness. Naturally the trail leads to its source like a stream to its source in a mountain. Since the knowledge acquired normally with the five senses is very limited one has to know to make use of his subtle senses which only can provide in-depth information as to the purpose and goal of life.

Meditation is a three fold process known as hearing, reflection and contemplation. Of course there are very crude methods also adopted in olden days based on superstitions and lack of proper guidance which are irrelevant here. In short hearing is listening to the wise, reflection and contemplation is grasping the subject in its proper meaning and reality. This leads to experience on the subject. It may be mentioned here that a healthy mind in a healthy body can accelerate the inward journey. For example, can you meditate with a stuffy and running nose without feeling uncomfortable to the core? Yoga gives the answer naturally here.

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