THE MYSTIC: PART I - THE SEEKER (Part 1 - THE SEEKER)

by Arindam Bhattacharjee

  Acharya took Raghav to the Neelatal, an amazing crystal clear lake in Tapovan and asked him

  “Have you seen anything more beautiful in your life than this place?”

  Raghav replied,

  “Never! It’s so serene! I have travelled the world but never have I seen such beauty.”

  “There are many beautiful lakes like this in the Himalayas”

  “The color of the lake changes with the movement of sun from being green in the morning to crystal clear. The reflection of the mountains is just amazing and you can sit here for hours just absorbing the beauty. Do you want to take a dip?.”

  Raghav was alarmed,

  “Are you crazy? It’s freezing!”

  The Acharya smiled,

  “Do you see those small fishes in the water? Don't you think they feel the cold?”

  “Well they are created for the cold environment.”

  “Don't you think that cold is relative? Does it really exist?”

  Acharya looked at his shisyas as they removed their clothes and dived into the lake. Raghav said,

  “This is astounding – how do they do it?”

  Acharya replied, “You know everything is relative but one needs to get used to this fact. You don't try to put water on your head in this cold climate. If you do so your cerebral fluid might freeze and this will result in coma and death. This is called HACE and one must be careful in these altitudes.”

  Raghav replied, “So you are not going into this water.”

  “Well we will now go to another beautiful place. You see, there is the Gomukh glacier. It’s a famous tourist spot and so we won't go there. On the other side is Bhagirathi glacier and you have the Bharathi peaks I, II, III. Then there is Chitrangani glacier over there where we plan to go. It’s covered with ice. Let’s go there; it’s very calm and peaceful.”

  Acharya took Raghav through the moraines and boulder to reach the bergschrund of the glacier from where the Bhagirathi River originates. Raghav said,

  “This is just amazing. I cannot imagine that I would be in a place where the mighty Ganga River originates. I thought there will be ice around here.”

  Acharya replied,

  “Actually you are standing over ice right now. This is black because it is covered with the Himalayan gravel but you are standing on hard ice.”

  Acharya took a stone and hit it a few times to show the white surface of ice below the gravel. Raghav replied,

  “Well this is an overpowering moment.”

  Seeing the Acharya take off his clothes Raghav asked

  “So you plan to take a bath over here?”

  Acharya smiled, “Why not? The water is at a perfect zero.”

  He moved to the mouth of the glacier and took a few dips. He came out and sat on the top of the ice above the glacier. Raghav asked, “How you do this? Don't you feel cold?”

  Acharya answered,

  “Well you need to understand that if I generate heat within my body then I can counter the outside cold, I will not feel the cold. But this comes after years of training.”

  Raghav waited without a word as Acharya sat on ice with his eyes closed. For many minutes he just stared at him blankly, awed at the individual's ability to be simultaneously at peace with Nature and his own self. He wished he could gain that peace.

  After about half an hour they returned back to the cave where the shishyas had prepared breakfast for them. Acharya now announced, “I need to go to the plains today but I will return in the evening. Tomorrow you should join us for some light practices and then we will talk about the brain.”

  Raghav still acclimatizing to these altitudes sat down and noted the events of the day.

  8.5: The Brain-Culture

  Raghav went with the Acharya for a brisk morning jog but he did not take part in the martial arts practices. He felt the last ten years had weakened his bones and muscles. The Acharya indulged in harsh martial arts practices including hundreds of kyotos and animal forms which Raghav could not understand everything. Acharya then took Raghav for the meditation session and gave him few mantras to recite pronouncing the basic word “OM”. After this Acharya made all of them sit in front of him and said,

  “Aren't you feeling great to be alive and enjoying this view? Himalayas are the true temples in the world. This is the abode where all yogis come to meditate. The atmosphere speeds up the meditation process because the air is very thin and one can attain Samadhi much faster here than anywhere else in the plains.”

  Smiling Acharya continues, “The effect of being here is also enormous for the health. This is the reason why we have come here to perform Hatha Yoga and meditate here – at these altitudes. These conditions help us to quickly move forward and the positive impact of one’s health is simply great.”

  “Your red blood count increases and when you go back to the plains your capacity for holding oxygen gets increased. Also your blood becomes thicker and so you need to drink a lot of water. Your heart too becomes stronger and so will your bones and muscles. So much about body; now let’s move on to brain culture.” Raghav remembered what Dr Raman had told how. How is it that Acharya knows about everything that Raghav needs

  Acharya picked up the threads of the discussion.

  “You know the brain is that essential part that helps us understand the world that we see. Now in continuance from our first day of discussion we understood that once you free yourself from the clutches of time then there is no such thing as past, present and future.”

  “Memory, which is part of the brain, creates the time for us that we perceive and then it externalizes time so that we can understand it. Without memory time would not make any sense to us.”

  “But we will discuss about this later. Once your mind is free then you will realize that the universe is comprised of spaces that can be mapped according to many dimensions. The untrained mind can only understand three dimensions but a free mind can jump through spaces. The future that you understand is just another space in the multi-dimensional universe.”

  Acharya pauses for a glass of water which the shishya has provided

  “Remember I have told you about the meaning of truth, cultural understanding of truth, about the path to achieve the truth, the difference between sapeksha satya and brahma satya, but I have not told you the way to free oneself from the clutches of time. For this I am going to explain the connection of time to the human brain.” Raghav stops breathing to get another bust of knowledge from Acharya.

  “When memory creates for us time, it is our conscious part that understands this time. The subconscious is that part of the brain where forgotten feelings, thoughts and experiences are stored. It contains thoughts, feelings and images of the past events. This memory stored in this part of the brain is very difficult to access; it is responsible for the ego. As Freud had explained, the subconscious brain always keeps on imparting pressure on the conscious. It is the ego that destroys the individual.”

  “As I had explained before, when you come to the mountains the first things these peaks do to you is to break your ego. You realize that you are nothing in front of these massive mountains and Mother Nature. The destruction of ego is essential as otherwise the ego is like a snake that will destroy the individual. Now only someone with a strong will-power can access what is stored in the subconscious. Then there is another part of the brain that is super-conscious.”

  “This I will discuss later. The subconscious brain does not understand time but is spread into spaces. These spaces refer to the spaces of the universe. So when one is able to look into the subconscious or the higher self he can sometimes glimpse the future. But even for this one needs to train the mind first about which we will talk later; it will enable you to access the subconscious.”

  “Future is nothing but a space in the vast universe and once you realize the truth about this, you can see the future. A sixth sense is what an untrained mind realizes but a trained mind has this in control.”

  Acharya paused and d
rank some water.. He looked at Raghav and asked,

  “I hope you understand what I am saying.”

  Raghav replied, “I think so.”

  “The brain has different cycles which many scientists have confirmed. It goes through different stages of alpha, beta, theta cycles which I will explain when I will talk about mind. Also when you sleep you must have also heard of terms like rapid eye movement to explain the state of your brain.”

  “We will discuss these when I explain tomorrow how the mind imposes on brain and thus on the body. But you must understand that there was this culture of brain training prevalent in this country way before Westerners built their first theories.”

  “You must have heard of Taxaxila, Nalanda and Vikramshila universities. They were proud to have been host to the most advanced brains of their times. Many subjects were covered apart from philosophies like mathematics, physics, astronomy and the like. You must have heard of Acharya Vishnugupta, Aryabhatta, Bhaskaracharya among the many scholars.”

  “It even played host to scholars from all over the world. It is also said that when Khilji attacked Nalanda University, his hordes burnt down a 14 storey library; the burning took many weeks. These universities were veritable mines of knowledge. Here many esoteric rituals were cultivated – it was not only about reading of scriptures for brain-culture. These were research centres for Tantra and related mantras and the book Prajnaparamita is a treatise written by a monk of one of these universitie is considered to be the most advanced book on philosophy ever written.”

  Acharya looks at Raghav and asks,

  “So have you heard of this book.”

  “I don’t think so” replied Raghav

  “The summary of that book is associated with the four words ‘Ohm Mani Padma Hum’ which in sum total explains the truth of human existence and if you understand this you will understand mind. Then you had the Vedas which many don’t know the source, but are great scriptures but on which Buddha was silent.” Raghav smiles.

  The Acharya continued

  “It is said that one has a very unusual understanding of truth in the face of death. The whole past flashes in front of the person in seconds. That is the reason why death has a symbolic understanding in different religions in the country. For instance among the Jains is the ritual of Santhara. You must also have heard of the story of Chandragupta Maurya performing Santhara, a Jain custom of suicide by fasting unto death.”

  “The principle behind this vow is that a person exits from his body with complete peace of mind, calmness, and patience, without any fear at all. It not only prevents the influx of new karmas but also purges the old karmas which is attached to the soul. Jains acknowledge that the suffering is endured while starving but rationalize it by stating that it allows for a better understanding of the inherently painful and flawed nature of earthly existence. Through this process they say one can realize the actual truth. Then we have the Buddhist way of undergoing the process of Kapala Moksha.”

  Acharya paused and went into some deep thoughts. After few minutes he continues..

  “Then you must have read or heard about Tibetan Book of the Dead where they describe the phases a human mind goes through before death. Imagine the state of mind of the researchers who wrote about that book. Kapala Moksha, is about the relationship of the one with the universe, but to understand this we need to know about mind first. About this I will talk tomorrow.”

  The Acharya looking content with today’s description continued, “The vibrations of these mountains have stored all this knowledge in this serene environment. All truth is relative and there are many schools of philosophy and cultural practices in this country for trying to realize the ultimate truth.”

  “Now I will tell you what happens when one frees himself from the clutches of time and has control over his subconscious and the super conscious. So if you ask me whether I can see the events in the future then I can tell you – yes I can.”

  One Shishya asked.

  “So can you tell me whether some events will occur in the future? Droughts or bad times”

  Acharya replied

  “I definitely can tell what event will occur when, but I refrain from doing this as it will destroy the motive to be on this path.”

  Acharya looked back at Raghav and continued,

  “I can see the country will undergo great pain and suffering in the future; there will be plenty of killings. I can also see many deaths but I will not warn them as this is part of the cycle of life and death.”

  Then he stared deep into Raghav's eyes again and the gaze made him tremble as if he was pointing to something concerned with Raghav, “I also see someone trying to get out of the suffering that he has caused.”

  Raghav was surprised at Acharya's change of tone and did not understand what he meant and was he pointing to the machine.

  The younger inquisitive asked,

  “Can’t you see any time tracking device or calendar that can specify the time of that phase? We can make a living out of your abilities and become millionaires!”

  The Acharya jovially responded,

  “Ha ha ha! Good business idea! We can give it a try but let me explain to you why it won't be feasible. This is another amazing part about mind. When you are in the future, your mind will reject any information about the time because the mind cannot understand it. When you are jumping spaces you cannot keep track of time.”

  “Your mind does not have shape of its own and there is no way it can see any shadow in the future. You cannot predict time even at looking yourself. Though you can predict few future events of the nearby present, but some things of distant future are difficult to comprehend.”

  Looking at Raghav growing the suspicion in his mind about the machine he continues, “I see a super human has evolved in the future but he is not one with God. I can predict that there would be raids and murders. Does this satisfy you? You come up with a business plan about this and then we will go about doing it!”

  Raghav knew that Acharya was just trying to play games with the sishyas’ mind to capture his imagination in the same way as he used to do with people in his company. The sishya continued,

  “Why don’t you warn them about this occurrence?”

  “It would be wrong from our side to share such information. These powers are bestowed to us by God and seeing the future is one of the benefits; but trying to change the effects will be very wrong. I can certainly guide you but the path has to be traversed by you. It’s not an easy task.”

  “And also do you really want to go and talk to those people on television about these things, people who cannot even get out of their beds in the morning to do even basic yoga? And also, don't you enjoy being here in the midst of the serene mountains? Why do you want to destroy that for greed?”

  The disciple nodded his head.

  The Acharya continued.

  “But in the end I would like to tell you about the teachings of Buddha that holds true in each moment of our lives. The teaching is about following the middle path, the righteous path. He endured all types of sufferings that no other human being could possibly have endured to tell the people that, one must follow the middle path in life.”

  “He put forward the eightfold path for the cessation of suffering. All who followed this eightfold path would lead a long, healthy and vigorous life. This is the real truth of existence and universe. So we would now chant some mantras before we starting meditation. You should all chant with me. I will explain you the meaning of these chants later.”

  Buddhaṃ saraṇaṃ gacchāmi.

  Dhammaṃ saraṇaṃ gacchāmi.

  Saṅghaṃ saraṇaṃ gacchāmi.

  8.6: The Mind-Culture

  Raghav was feeling energetic after staying in Tapovan just for a few days now. He would wake up early morning to see them practice and perform absolutely impossible rituals but today Acharya was going to speak about mind and he waited patiently for Acharya to finish his practice and meditation to start speakin
g on the topic of mind.

  Acharya continued,

  “Acharya Nagarjuna is a very important link in understanding the mind and was the first person who introduced the theory of relativity in his philosophy of Mulyamadmika charika. The concept of shunyata goes to his credit which many say the apt understanding of what Buddha had said almost after 400 years after his death. Later after another 400 years Bodhidharma brought this theory of shunyata into the practical field to become the first immortal.”

  “This concept contends that we are not perceiving the actual truth in this world. Whatever you are watching in this world is a drama. All the political parties taking up a role is a drama. You listening to me, this too is a drama.” Raghav smiles again

  “To justify this, you are not able to see the outside the visible spectrum. You are blind to many spectrums which today many scientific instruments have been able to perceive them which explains one does not see the entire reality. You are blind to ultraviolet rays, radio radar waves etc. For example many satellites launched today can do multi-spectral imagery.”

  “Same is the case with the sound. You cannot listen to a major spectrum of sound and given these concepts, these things are difficult to explain. For example, if you are sitting in space how does one define gravity to you? So what you are watching is the sapeksha satya and not brahma satya.”