by Darren Main
We began our exploration of yoga by looking at the concept of Atman. Atman is who each of us is, in Truth. Yet clinging to false ideas about one’s self or others bends and warps our perception of who we are. This allows us to experience the ego or false self.
When we come to the present moment, we have the choice of keeping things the way they are or changing them. Changing the mind in a way that leads to a more satisfying life is not a bad idea, but it is not the goal of yoga. In fact, if we stop there we have missed the whole point. Once this choice is presented to us, yoga would have us choose to let go—to wake up.
For example, in the present moment a woman could choose to leave her husband because her relationship with him is simply not working. Making this choice may well be a good thing. But if it only serves to shift her identity from married and unsatisfied to single and searching, not much has been accomplished. She has not reached the root of the problem. By practicing dhyana she could not only choose to modify the circumstances of her life, but also forgive the judgments held on the various levels of her mind and so find a greater degree of liberation. This would be a big step in the process of transcending her ego and ending her suffering.
The Mind
Brahman is all, and the Self is Brahman. This Self has four states of consciousness.
—Manukya Upanishad, 1:2
Before we can understand the practice of dhyana, we must first take a closer look at the mind. There are many models for describing the mind from eastern, western and psychological points of view. All of them have their merits, but all of them are necessarily limited. The mind is a vast inner realm with many nooks and crannies. To try to describe it in volumes of text would be impossible, so the few short pages that follow are only intended to point our minds in the direction of understanding. With that said, lets take a look at some of the basic components of the human mind.
As I have already stated, the mind is a vast territory with many facets. For simplicity, I usually divide the mind into four levels. There is not a well-defined line where one ends and the next begins, but to keep things simple we will speak of these layers of consciousness as distinct and separate areas.
The first is the conscious mind. This level is the part we are most familiar with. It is here that we have our conscious thoughts and basic cognitive processes. Usually thoughts in this area take the form of words, but can also include images and visualizations. The characteristic that most defines this level of consciousness is our awareness of it. Other levels of the mind are much less accessible to most of us, so we tend to be more familiar with the conscious mind. Consequently, the conscious mind is the part of the mind that we most identify with.
When we practice dhyana, this is the first area we encounter. Here, most of us find minds that chatter a lot. Depending on how active the conscious mind is, this can be a hard layer to move beyond. In many ways, this level of the mind is like the surface of the ocean. It is greatly influenced by the winds of our external life. Sometimes the conscious mind is very choppy and at other times it can be quite calm. Whatever the state of the conscious mind when we enter into dhyana, the goal is to bring our awareness deeper into the mind. If we are able to maintain the focus that was developed in the last limb, dharana, it is possible to sink below the conscious mind, even during the most turbulent storm.
The second level of the mind is the semi-conscious mind. This is the part that we visit in daydreams and during the REM stage of sleep. We are aware of this part of the mind, but only partially. Awareness of this level is usually foggy at best, and experience of it is easily forgotten. This is why it can be so hard to remember dreams after waking up.
If we are able to quiet the conscious mind, we will find that conscious awareness moves deeper, into the semi-conscious mind. It is here that we can easily get distracted in fantasy. When this happens, it is important to return to the focus point established in the last limb. It can be very tempting to want to engage in a fantasy, but doing so will keep us stuck at this level. Only by refocusing the mind can we move on to the third level.
The third level of mind is by far the largest. It is the unconscious mind, and most of us are completely unaware of what exists there. The terrain of this level looks much different than the others, and it can be very difficult to navigate. While the conscious mind was filled with very familiar, conscious thoughts, and the semi-conscious mind is filled with dream-like images, this deepest level of the mind is filled with archetypes.
Archetypes are symbols and images that are largely defined by our cultural and religious experiences. To a Hindu, these images may include a variety of gods and goddesses from that tradition. For people raised in the West, images such as those found on a tarot deck or in fairy tales may be more common. Some of these archetypes may be recognizable, and some may be very bizarre—even beyond description. That is why trying to understand these images can be so futile. These images may provide some insight in a psychotherapy session, but can be a major distraction during the practice of yoga.
If you are able to keep returning to your focus point, you can move still deeper into the mind and experience the true Self, because underneath these three basic levels of consciousness there is a fourth. For simplicity, I will refer to it as the Source. It is important to note that all minds originate from the same source point. This point has many names that come from many cultures. A simple Western name would be God. Eastern names would include the Tao and Brahman. Albert Einstein referred to this source as the Unified Field. Whatever one calls this Source, it is important to remember that it exists within every mind. For example, in the New Testament Jesus reminds his followers that “The kingdom of God is within.” [14]
This source point is the origin of all thought, and as we shall see in the next chapter, it is a formless thought of pure joy, bliss and love. This thought is present within you at this very moment and at every moment, though it is likely to be buried under layers of physical, emotional and psychological baggage. It is this source point that we are trying to realize when we practice yoga.
This source point can be thought of as like the light bulb in a movie projector. It shines a continuous beam of light out through the lens of the mind. This light, if it were not filtered through a piece of film, would be one uninterrupted expression of bliss and joy. But because most of us hold many judgments in our minds, these judgments act like film that bends the light and creates the motion picture of our individual and collective lives.
Learning to neutralize these judgments or samskaras is what starts to clean up the mind, dissolve the illusion of Maya and make us more loving and blissful people.
Samskaras, The Seeds of Karma
When all mental distractions disappear and the mind becomes one-pointed, it enters the state called samadhi.
—The Yoga Sutras 3:11
If the mind were completely empty, the Source would shine through it without obstruction. That one thought of love, peace and joy would then be manifested on the stage of Maya. Life in this illusion would be a perfect expression of unconditional love.
Of course, the mind is not empty and our experience of Maya can be anything but loving at times. This is because most of us hold vast numbers of samskaras.
Traditionally, samskaras are seeds of karma planted within the subtle body, particularly in the nadis and chakras; however, I prefer to think of them within the context of Western psychology. A samskara is a judgment or a psychological attachment developed by the ego. It is then filed away in one of the three levels of consciousness and held in place until it is brought to conscious awareness and neutralized.
Our perception is constructed of two basic things—positive judgments and negative judgments. We have already compared the illusion of Maya to a computer simulated virtual reality. While it may appear very real, it is only a bunch of ones and zeros strung together to create a false view of ourselves and others. This may seem impossible, but if you think about it, everything you encounter is largely the product of
your own preconceptions.
All day long we live in duality. We constantly affirm that, “This is good and that is bad.” We call one thing pleasurable and another painful. We label and file and compartmentalize everything we see. Our behavior is directed largely to finding people who will bolster our judgments so that we can maintain them, and making enemies of those who challenge them. All this does nothing more than keep us from examining our perception of the world.
Holy wars are a perfect example of this. Rather than experience the Atman in all beings, people on both sides of the battlefield find their self-definition in what they are not. They seek out people who will bolster this evaluation, and so they create an enemy to define themselves and then they create allies to help them lock their perceptions into place.
It is easy to pick on the turmoil in the Middle East because it seems so absurd, but in principle we do the same thing all day long in our own lives. We have a perception, and we seek enemies and allies to help us maintain that illusion. It is all about protecting our apparent need for duality.
A samskara is like a bad investment. If you were to take all of your savings and invest it in a stock which was doing really poorly and which continued to decrease in value, that would be a very unwise move. Yet that is exactly what we do with our spiritual wealth when we hold onto a judgment. We make investments that drain us of life and ensure that we are tired all the time. Learning to withdraw these judgments is like reinvesting your spiritual wealth in the present moment.
It is tempting to think that samskaras are based on negative judgments alone, but this is not the case. There are really only two kinds of judgments—positive and negative. Both are samskaras, and both need to be neutralized in order to realize our True nature. For instance, many of us hold a samskara that says marriage is good and another one that says divorce is bad. Both bend and twist the light of our true nature out of shape. Both bolster the idea of a false identity, and both need to be forgiven if peace is to be found. As long as we hold the judgment that divorce is bad we will harbor negative thoughts about people—perhaps even about ourselves—who are divorced. Rather than see Atman, you may see less than their perfect nature.
By the same token, if you judge marriage to be a good thing, you are creating a standard which Atman now has to live up to. In effect, you are saying that you would be more perfect than you already are if you were to get married. Of course, trying to improve on the perfect requires that we first ignore or deny perfection.
This is true of all judgments. They are created to block the flow of love through the mind. Each judgment, big or small, positive or negative, is a step away from the knowledge of the True Self. Conversely, the relinquishment of those judgments is a step closer to Self-realization.
Not all samskaras are created equal. The ego cherishes some more than others, and thus it can sometimes take years of conscious awareness before we are actually able to let them go. Other samskaras are not that big a deal and can be transcended by simply bringing awareness to them. The trauma of stubbing your toe is probably going to be easier to deal with than the trauma of being sexually abused, but the goal is always to let them go, no matter how much we feel we need to hold on them.
I met a Trappist monk on one of my stays at a Christian monastery. Most of the monks there were in silence and had little contact with visitors. But because Brother Jacob worked in the bookshop at the monastery, he was able to speak a bit more freely with outsiders. I asked him what had made him decide to let go of the world and make what many people would think an extreme choice by becoming a monk. He shared with me a touching story that has sat with me for many years.
“When I was four,” he began, “my mother died, leaving me in the care of my father. My father was not a bad man, but he had a drinking problem and a lot of the time I felt like I was left alone after my mom died. Life was not easy and I became a very bitter and angry young child. My adolescent years were marked with even more challenges. I was arrested several times and eventually wound up in a juvenile detention center. By anyone’s predictions I was not headed toward a very bright future. But I met a Catholic nun named Sister Maggie who was a volunteer at the center. She took a liking to me and always took time to visit with me. She sort of reminded me of my mother, so I liked her right away too. I thought, in the beginning, that she was just going to push her religion on me, but she never did. The only thing she did that was different from almost everyone else I had met, was that she refused to see me as damaged goods. There was something very healing about that.”
“Over the year and a half I was there,” he continued, “we became good friends, and I eventually asked her to tell me about what nuns do. I think I even asked her if she missed sex. She told me a little about her beliefs, but focused on what she called her contemplative practices such as ‘centering prayer.’ This was strangely interesting to me, so I asked her if she would teach me. She excitedly agreed and taught me a very simple meditation technique. It was so simple that I thought it was a waste of time, but she assured me that it was very effective. I practiced each morning and afternoon as she instructed. Some days were harder than others, but I managed to stick with it. I was astounded at how deep the practice took me. Although it scared me at first, her support and encouragement made it seem okay. It brought me face to face with so much that had been buried in my unconscious. I would often encounter resentment toward my father for not being more fully there for me. I also found that I had a lot of anger at God for taking my mother from me.
“It took me several years of encountering this resentment during my contemplative practice before I was able to forgive. Surprisingly, I wasn’t forgiving my father or God; I was simply choosing peace over the things I had held onto for so long. I had always believed that forgiveness was pardoning bad behavior, but through this practice I have realized that it is really nothing more than letting go of the things that I had been holding onto.
“Once I let go of some of my bitterness and anger, I started to feel peace for the first time since I was a child on my mother’s lap. Sadly, Sister Maggie died of breast cancer a few years ago. I am so grateful that she taught me the most important tool a person can have in life—meditation. Shortly after Sister Maggie passed on, I decided that I wanted to devote my life to opening my mind through these contemplative practices, so I joined the Order. Some people think I am making a great sacrifice by being a monk, but from what I have seen, a life devoid of deep spiritual exploration is a much bigger sacrifice.”
It amazes me that he had never studied yoga. Everything he spoke about was what I had learned to do through my yoga practice. Although he was practicing a Christian form of meditation, the principles were very much the same. By focusing the mind inward and bringing his conscious awareness deeper and deeper into the mind, Brother Jacob was able to let go of many samskaras. As urban mystics, we have the opportunity to do the same thing.
Not all our samskaras will be easy to let go and many take years of practice. But it all starts with bringing attention to them. Through dhyana we learn how to look at attachments in the mind and move beyond them. To do this we must enter into witness consciousness.
Witness Consciousness and the Practice of Meditation
Select a clean spot, neither too high nor too low, and seat yourself firmly on a cloth, a deerskin, and kusha grass. Then, once seated, strive to still your thoughts. Make your mind one-pointed in meditation and your heart will be purified.—The Bhagavad Gita 6:11-13
The practice of dhyana can take many forms, but it almost always starts with the concentration developed in the last limb, dharana. That is only the beginning. Dhyana moves beyond just focusing the mind—it is a disengaging of the ego. It’s like shifting a runaway car into neutral. The ego can still rev the engines, but it has become completely benign and will eventually calm down.
There are many techniques for the practice of dhyana. Sometimes a mantra is chanted; at other times the focus is on the breath, or the attention is focu
sed on the sensations of the body. When we practice dhyana in the context of hatha yoga we use the body and the breath a lot, but these are by no means the only ways. Whatever technique is used, the underlying practice is one of entering into what is often referred to as the witness consciousness. It is here that the power of the mind is taken back, and we begin to rise above the drama of the ego. This is where we transcend the ego and allow ourselves to be lifted to higher ground.
During one of my meditation workshops I was speaking about the importance of becoming a witness to whatever comes up. After the first meditation, one of the women in the group shared that she had a hard time letting go of an election controversy. This was when Al Gore and George W. Bush were in the midst of the infamous Florida recount to see who would be the next president. It had permeated the news and it was all anyone seemed to be talking about. She was upset by the prospect that Al Gore could win the national election and yet lose because of counting problems in one state. Even as she spoke about it I could see the tension in her face and hear a slight trembling in her voice.