Approaching death of the ego

Sometimes god gives our ego a new low. He redefines how much the ego should bend to humility. such an experience lightens the heart but leaves a memory and a mark.

I observe the same fear in people all around the world -- job related insecurity, old age and being single, divorced people who feel people with family are blessed, lonely people who resort to mindfulness and meditation. Happening all over the world. I attended a sangha meditation centre in Milwaukee and saw that a pediatrician was there, an old lawyer was there, a man who was about to get divorced was there, old women who are about to die were there, relative middle aged people who have gone through much sufferings were there.

Sometimes we don't understand why people dislike us -- but go deep inside them and it becomes clear the sufferings that they are going through and what it is which is making them hate us. when someone does something to you which you are not able to understand, it means there is something about you which you don't understand yourself. Why? because the same energy flows in them which is flowing in you. Everyone is behaving out of conditioning and therefore nobody is guilty. Yet nobody is innocent because they have a choice on how to use their energies. Wow -- such an awesome creation of God. He creates the world of opposites and gives a choice to souls.

Looking again at the back of the mind, there is nothing else other than the present moment all the time. memories is what makes the mind interfere. As UG Krishnamurthy says there is no way you can experience anything at all without the knowledge of it. The vicious cycle is such that Knowledge "enables" experiencer to experience and the experiences fortifies the knowledge. In the present moment there is no memory, no knowledge, no experience -- just beingness. Yet there is no word to describe the state. Buddha calls it emptyiness, Jesus called it the fullness of life. Yet they all describe the same thing.

Flying in an aeroplane

I was flying in air plane to a different city yesterday. Viewing the city from top from a few thousand feet, I got the mountain view perspective.

Each illuminated light below on earth represented a house or family. There were thousands and thousands of such lights. Some were stationary lights of houses and some were moving vehicles.

But the common thing was, each of those lights represented souls who are in pursuit. Some lights belong to corporations some belong to individual houses and people. Nevertheless all of them were in pursuit. Pursuit of more money, profits, better lifestyle, dealing with their own problems emotional, financial or intellectual. Trying to enjoy life meanwhile with various distractions like movies, drinks etc. Each one had their own attachments, and none of them were satisfied with whatever they had in the present moment.  They were all moving. Always on the move.

That's when I was aware that I too was one of those lights. Doing my own thing. Having my own attachments. I was one such light caught in my own pursuits.

I have decided to live a life free from all these things that make us human and earthlings. Every attachment is a pursuit.

Meditation map

Not sure if I'm doing it right, but this is my mind map in meditation, my awareness takes one of the routes in the green boxes depending on current requirement in life
Aum

Powered by Mindjet Connect. http://www.mindjet.com/products/connect/

Powerful Meditation

Last night there was a power cut at home & hence me and my wife went upstairs on the terrace for a walk. After some walk, she started listening to Music on her MP3 player while I sat cross legged on the terrace floor for a meditation.

- Took some 5 minutes for my mental and physical systems to cool down

- After that awareness was just in the present completely, the sound of the neighbourhood, the feel of the breeze, the honks of distant vehicles in the city, the sound of my own breath, walking sound of my wife, sound of the leaves, and there was no me, just perception. This might have continues for 10 minutes or so though I was not aware of the time.

- Then mind entered contemplation – to observe the observer of all the perceptions that were happening. This was when I observed the breath had come to standstill, i.e. the incoming and outgoing breath was neutralized to a very short in-out breath which almost became standstill. Was in this state for the next 5 minutes.

- The next moment I observe I was feeling my spine, I was feeling myself as in the observer, in the infinite super-conscious state. There was a mild light at the top of my head and also sound. Together there was a heaviness feeling in my head – as if all the activity was only in head and the body awareness was lost. I was just the head and spine – that how I felt. It was a beautiful state. Don’t know how long it lasted but i dont remember anything on the material plane during this state. No more sound of external world disturbed me or even came to my notice.

- Then my guru appeared in my meditation vision & he was cross-legged just like me. Then we spoke a few things which happened very fast. Next thing I remember is my wife calling me for dinner as power was back. I stayed in the same state for 5 mintes feeling completely refreshed, rejuvinated and full of energy.

Thanks to my guru for guiding me into such a wonderful meditation.

Meditation is a way of being, not a technique

 

Found this beautiful Article on the Internet

It is the non-clinging, and therefore the clear perceiving, and the willingness to act appropriately within whatever circumstances are arising that constitute this way of being that we are calling meditation.

It is not the content of your experience that is important. What is important is our ability to be aware of that content, and even more, of the factors that drive its unfolding and the ways in which those factors either liberate us or imprison us moment by moment and year in, year out.

~Jon Kabat Zinn

Read Full Article here

Video on Meditation

 

My uncle gives me this nice video on how to meditate. It has computer animated illustration of the same. Nice one. Had seen this sometime back during my visit to Ayurvedagram.

 

 

Related post: Visit to Ayurvedagram

I am the boss of my Mind !

 

Loved this chapter so much from Gurudeva that i wanted to post it here.

The Cause of Joy and Sorrow

Somewhere the idea was born that man should live in states of happiness and joy all of the time. But, in the first place, happiness and joy depend upon unhappiness and sorrow, even to be recognized or appreciated. If man would only know that whatever emotion transpires within him foreshadows its opposite. Secondly, suffering is a greater intensity, a higher vibration, than happiness. You do not learn much from your happiness's; you learn from the states of suffering, which awaken the higher consciousness of your soul. But suffering has no value for its own sake.

You learn more from the states of suffering than happiness

When the mind recognizes it is suffering over something or other, it is time to practice meditation, to see into the causes, to expand your consciousness a little bit more so that you will grasp the workings of life and its karmic laws. Then you will attain to a greater intensity than either joy or suffering has to offer. You will view the wheel of life, of cause and effect, objectively. And you will not so quickly identify yourself with the lower emotions or the objects of your own mind's creation.

Then there are the people who, like a fish caught by a fisherman, grasp onto the hook, who step on the spiritual path, but spend their time flip-flopping in the water, tugging at the line, swimming first one way then the other, never really approaching the surface. Why? They live in their ego, that's all. Their consciousness is limited. The ego is just a trifle dumb. Have you observed an egotistical person? He is just a little dumb, isn't he--not aware of the layers and layers of wisdom within him.

It is the wise man who recognizes the importance of controlling the forces of his mind. His life is a struggle to make his philosophy real, to gain control of the cycles of experience which have tied him to the wheel of karma. You don't escape the chain of cause and effect by just sitting with your eyes closed, trying to keep awake, trying to meditate. The genuine practice of yoga involves meeting new challenges each day, having new realizations each day, becoming the boss of your mind, not allowing it to flop around at the end of the line. This type of diligent concentration will definitely change you from the inside out.

The genuine practice of yoga involves meeting new challenges each day, having new realizations each day, becoming the boss of your mind, not allowing it to flop around at the end of the line.

You will begin to realize, more and more, that you are the creator of your life and every aspect of it.

But your incarnation on this planet is not complete until you have exhausted the wheel of karma, and it will not exhaust itself unless you gain control of it. The wheel of karma, of cause and effect, the world of form, is apparent only when you look at it. You only attain the natural state of your radiant inner being when you step off the wheel of karma. It is not natural for man to live bound to the lower states of mind, ignorant of the fact that God dwells within. But the hearing and understanding of this truth is only the first glimmer of the dawn, a preliminary awakening. The rest, the final realization, is up to you. It is up to you and you alone to penetrate the veil of illusion and realize the Self, the Absolute, beyond desire, beyond the experiences of the mind. It is up to you to realize God.

Aum Namasivaya

The need to Start Meditating

 

My guru says:

Desperate states of mind are disturbing many people these days. They are caught in emotional turmoil and entanglement, scarcely knowing how to get themselves out of it, or even fully realizing what state they are in. This condition, which often deteriorates as the years go by until nervous difficulties and mental illnesses set in, can be alleviated by the simple practice of meditation. Those who are content to live in a mesh of mental conflict, which is not only conscious but subconscious, will never get around to meditation, or even the preliminary step: concentration. But a person who is wise enough to struggle with his own mind to try to gain the mastery of his mind will learn the vital practice of meditation. Just a few moments each morning or evening enables him to cut the entangled conditions that creep into the conscious mind during the day. The consistent practice of meditation allows him to live in higher states of consciousness with increasing awareness and perception as the years go by.

Understanding is control

Mind Map on Mind control

Thanks to Amit for pointing out this new software on Mind mapping and brainstorming. And I decide to use it to generate a mind map to control the mind itself ! Uploading version 1, will update it as and when i discover new methods from my gurudev.

click to enlarge

Related Posts : Experiencing Now with Nature , The Eternal Now state 

The Donkey and the Carrot

The title describes the way we live life daily in the conscious mind. We get an experience, feel it for a while and wait for the next. We believe the next emotion / experience experienced will be the highest in our life. No matter how many emotions we experience, the next set of those emotional experiences will be the high point of our entire life, and we are sure of it! That is the conscious mind.

This way the conscious mind carries us minute after minute, hour after hour, day after day, year after year, life after life. Novelty is its nature and ramification is its result. We can always find in the conscious mind some distraction to please us, to intrigue us, to dominate our awareness of other states of consciousness. And we don't have to look very hard to find it.

When we are in the conscious mind, we are like a donkey with a carrot in front of our nose. We are always walking to try to get that carrot. We are never satisfied, and we are never happy. The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.

While in the conscious mind -- We see people, we reason and relate our own condition with theirs, we feel sad when we find them to be in a better state "relatively". "Relative agony" is the key word which we follow unknowingly in our conscious mind. No matter how fortunate we have been, we feel unlucky when we discover that we find someone who is "relatively" more fortunate than ourselves, we feel ourselves as unlucky when we discover that we find a friend marry someone who is "relatively" well off or if we never got one, we say "they are so lucky -- wish i had that kind of luck too", no matter how much we earn we feel unlucky when we learn about "relatively" better hikes to a friend in a neighboring company. When we live in the conscious mind, we only surmise. We make guesses. We are never quite sure if we are right. That is the conscious mind, the part of you which you dare to think is real. It leads us on and on and on, life after life after life after life after life after life after life.




The mystic's goal is to control awareness while he is in the conscious mind -- to know where he is in consciousness. When he finds he is aware in the conscious mind, and the five senses have become his ruler, he then controls his awareness within the conscious mind itself. There are many way he does this -- breath control, enquiry, remembering and pondering on a chosen ishta devata (diety) etc.

A beautiful method below from my guru about how to control mind on the conscious plane.

There is a Saivite hermit, the venerable Markanduswami, living in a humble mud hut in Sri Lanka. He is very old, and was for many years a disciple of Jnanaguru Yogaswami. In fact, his every utterance is a quote from his guru. One afternoon at his hut he described Yogaswami's approach to dealing with thought during meditation. He said, "Yogaswami said, 'Realize Self by self. You want to read this book, that book and all these books. The Book of Infinite Knowledge is here (pointing to his chest). You'd better open your own book.' The prescription he gave me to open that book is this: 'When you are in meditation, you watch the mind. Here and there the mind is hopping. One, two, three,...a hundred. In a few seconds the mind goes to a hundred places. Let him be. You also watch very carefully. Here and there this mind is running. Don't forget Self for a second. Let him go anywhere, but if he goes to a hundred places, you must follow him to a hundred places. You must not miss even a single one. Follow him and note, He is going here. Now he is going there.' You must not miss even a single one. That is the prescription Satguru Yogaswami gave me to open this inner book. He said, 'Watch very attentively and learn to pick up things coming from within. Those messages are very valuable. You can't value them. Realize Self by self and open this inner book. Why don't you open your own book? Why don't you make use of it? Why don't you open your own book? What an easy path I am prescribing for you!' "

Dhyana Samarambhanam (Beginning to meditate)

A very dear friend of mine mailed me as follows -- "I am scared of meditating, I dont want to feel miserable, as u can recall I was feeling so, to the point that even wanted my life to end, Secondly I dont think I am fully matured or prepared to see good times and bad times as mere experience and not react to them."

This friend of mine had tried to do regular meditation and after some practice her sensitivity levels had increased and she started experiencing highly emotional states. According to traditional Hindu philosophy this is something that happens naturally to both a beginning and an advanced meditator.

Naturally many people give up meditation at this point of time and continue living in the world of the mind. It is the "Shakti" power - of meditation which gives these kind of surprises to the meditator. The latent karma which the individual has to experience at some point of time in future is brought to the "now" in meditation. As a result experiences become intense and many people give up not knowing that sooner or later this karma has to be experienced whether in this or future births.

Unanticipated Consequences

There are surprises, many of them, for the beginning meditator, as well as for those who are advanced -- unexpected consequences that are often more than either bargained for, because on the road to enlightenment every part of one's nature has to be faced and reconciled. This can be difficult if the experiences of life have been unseemly, or relatively easy if the experiences have been mostly comfortable. What is it that meditation arouses to be dealt with? It is the reactions to life's happenings, recorded in the subconscious mind, both the memory of each experience and the emotion connected to it. Buried away, normally, waiting to burst forth in the next birth or the one to follow it, these vasanas, or deep-seated impressions, often come forward at the most unexpected moments after serious meditation is begun. It is the shakti power of meditation that releases them. There can be no repressed secrets, no memories too woeful to confront for the serious meditator. These experiences can be scary if one is "in denial" about certain embarrassing or disturbing happenings.

When this upheaval occurs for you, and it will, combat the paper dragon with the deep, inner knowing that the energy of the body has its source in God, the light of the mind that makes thought pictures recognizable also has its source in God, and nothing can or has happened that is not of one's own creation in a past life or in this. Thus armed with Vedic wisdom, we are invincible to the emotions connected with the memory of formerly locked-away experiences. When they come rolling out, patiently write down the emotional impressions of hurt feelings and injustices of years gone by and burn the paper. Seeing the fire consume the exposed vasanas, the garbage of yesterday, is in itself a great release.

The beginning meditator may be shocked and shrink from even continuing the practice of meditation, as his inner mind plays back unhappy thoughts that impose themselves upon his shanti. Many stop meditating altogether at this point and turn instead to the distractions of modern life for solace.

But true meditation happens because of soul evolution. We evolve into meditative practices from bhakti, the yoga of devotion. The transition is earned through past good karmas, not chosen as an intellectual or recreational pastime. As the transition of external worship to internal worship is made, the devotee has to face all bad karmas cheerfully and honestly in order to resolve them and move forward.

Meditation - Courtesy -> Times of India

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Visit to Ayurvedagram

Yesterday our whole team from office had been to Ayurvedagram (www.ayurvedagram.com). It was a wonderful experience. I learnt about very effective Pranayama, more about Meditation, and to eliminate back-pain, eye strain, and spondilytis through yoga. these diseases are common in IT folks who work for long hours even though thankfully im not having any of it (so far) .....

Amongst Pranayama, these were particularly effective to relax the mind

• Pranayama from Hatha Yoga (Surya Bhedan, Bhasrika, Ujjayi, Shitali, Sitkari, Bhramari, Murchha & Plavini Pranayama)
• Nadi Shuddhi Pranayama or Anuloma - Viloma (Alternate nostril breathing)
  
• Suryan Bhedan Pranayama (Right Nostril Breathing)
• Kapalbhati pranayam - Breathing forcefully

There were some more that were taught whose names i dont remember, but it goes like this - While inhaling forcefully both the hands go up, while exhaling both the hands come down near the shoulders (like Karate\Jujitsu practice).

http://www.yogapoint.com/info/pranayama.htm
http://www.healthandyoga.com/html/pran/pran_type.html

Other things i learnt

• Pranayama is a pre-requisite to meditation and will give good results - this i personally experienced yesterday
  
• Yoga exercises and self-contemplation are meant the keep the body in a relaxed state even while working
• Specific Bija Mantras stimulate one of the chakras starrting from Muladhara chakra to Sahasrara
• When in the thoughtless state in meditation, breath slows down and cosmic energy enters the body through the Brahma Randra opening in the top of the head.
• While the energy goes through all the 72000 nadis, it purifies each and a slight pain is felt during this purification
• On continuing meditation the pain disappears, the more we meditate, the more cosmic energy enters
• Breath slows down to almost to the point of no breathing, metabolism slows down, everything slows down.
• The cosmic energy is 3 times more if meditation is practiced in the centroid of the pyramid (1/3 above the base of the pyramid).
• The final goal of yogic exercises, pranayama and meditation is not just relaxing the mind and body but to attain Self realization and see God in everyone we interact.