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..:: Enlightenment
X / Meditation ::..
By
Alan Schneider
What is to be done about the world of
Newtonian physics in which we seem to be entrapped – the so-called 3D
Universe? The philosophy of Yoga calls this world the Mind
Trap, a reference to the role that our perception plays in its
creation. So, are we trapped in the Body, the Mind, or the World?
The answer is: all three, but it is only through mental
adjustment that anything can be done about it – the body and the
environment remain fixed in physicality, whatever their ultimate
spiritual nature may be. This essay describes the mental means needed
to effectively counteract the Yoga Mind Trap on all of its levels of
manifestation.
The body is the anchor of
physicality in perception: this happens through the combined action of
the physical senses, the mental perception of those senses, and the
sentient interpretation of that perception – its perceived
meaning to the ego, the personal focus of sentience present
in the human condition. The ego, in turn, is ultimately an
acculturated phenomenon – it has no real existence apart from the
cultural contexts in which it occurs. We are, above all, and after
all, social creatures whose self-perceptions occur in comparative
contexts – in this sense, we are all mobile difference engines,
constantly evaluating ourselves against each other. This is the
essential composition of the Mind Trap – an interactive
combination of neural sensory activity (as occurring in the central
nervous system), higher neurological events taking place in the brain,
and social sentience – with these elements all feeding back into each
other in an incredibly complex structure of psychophysical events that
“I” know as “me” at any given point in Newtonian time and space. If we
remain in this state of being, we are little more than rats on the
rat-wheel in the “laboratory” known as life, and this without regard to
how well we perform – the wheel is the wheel is the wheel, and the only
real alternative is to get off. Yoga and meditation are two
primary means of doing this.
The origins of these two
activities are lost in time, but they have certainly been in existence
for several thousand years in one form or another. In fact, to
simplify things here, Yoga, whether postural and physical or
contemplative and mental, is a form of the larger practice of
meditation. The conceptual underpinning of the various Yogas (the Yoga
historian Patanjali identified eight fundamental varieties) is geared in
all cases toward interrupting the closed feedback loops of cultural
conditioning to establish the possibility of non-interpretive perception
of the flow of experience. This flow is universally present in the
stream of collective consciousness originating with the Self
referred to so often in these essays.
A prior discussion of the
significance of life in general is probably in order at this time,
before we proceed to the specific techniques of release from the Mind
Trap afforded by meditation in its many forms. The Greek philosopher
Socrates once observed that “The unexamined life is not worth living!”,
yet this is precisely the kind of life that the vast majority of
human beings lead today – thoroughly embedded in their cultures of
origin with little or no awareness of any alternatives at all. The
meaning of this type of existence is exclusively culture dependent, and
necessarily transitory, passing away with the death of the body that
existed as little more than the individual unit of cultural
expression. Occasionally, certain individuals move away from this
functional sleep-walking existence and begin to awaken to the presence
of something beyond acculturation, but often implicitly realize the
extent to which they are caught in the Mind Trap in the process, and
retreat into the rationalization or denial of their condition – the
“vital lies” mentioned in Ibsen’s play The Wild Duck as the
motivating principles of life. While there is certainly more
“vitality” in this mode of existence, it still falls short of the
real mark of liberation from the Mind Trap, because it relies
on reactive thinking for its substance. What is required is the full
perceptual extrication from culture rendered attainable at the immediate
wish of the individual. This quality of experience is what
meditation affords to us when practiced faithfully and correctly – the
full freedom of consciousness provided by disciplined perception.
The question can, and should,
be asked whether this freedom is a denial of social responsibility, or
even a psychotic denial of external reality. I would counter
with another question: “What, after all, are we here for?” Is the
meaning of life found in the unthinking collection of financial and
social objects? Is it found in addiction? Is it found in senseless
suffering? Boredom? Apathy? At least in the experiment of meditation
we are making a conscious decision to explore within and look for the
answers to meaning where they are most likely to be found – the
mechanism of consciousness. If anything, this is an ultimately
responsible activity and an ultimately sane one as well – responsible
because Socrates was absolutely correct in his observation – we
must examine life to give it worth – and sane because inner peace
is the core of all sanity, and meditation reliably produces this
condition as the experience of spiritual bliss. The unadulterated
exposure to the Newtonian condition is toxic by its very nature, and
requires the appropriate application of an antidote – a
psychological countermeasure – to neutralize this toxicity. Meditation
is just such an antidote.
How does meditation function
to achieve this healing result? First, by establishing a voluntary
disconnect from the three agencies of physicality noted in the previous
paragraphs – the body, senses, and ego. This is quite different from
the involuntary disconnect of psychoses, or the involuntary confusion
and turbulence of neuroses. It is also fundamentally different from
the addictions and habituations seen in many cultures around the world,
all of which subject the individual to dependencies on external events
and conditions for their practice – usually more or less costly and
dangerous ones. Meditation costs nothing but the time spent in its
practice, and generates progressive healing and wellness as its
consequence, not any form of external dependency. The only possible
negative to this procedure is that it can be abused by practicing it
excessively to the detriment of positive cultural involvement – a
balance of time spent in various different constructive cultural
activities (e.g. working, resting, socializing, exercise, relaxation,
worship, etc.) may be necessary to prevent the onset of “mediholism” in
some cases. The Buddha even said on one occasion that the
addiction to Enlightenment was the final one to be overcome,
and advocated the practice of the humble simplicity of the Buddhist
lifestyle – “chop wood, carry water” – as the goals that would resolve
this final obstacle to full spiritual freedom.
Although there are many
different approaches to meditation, they all involve some form of
mild-to-heavy trance induction through some initially external activity
– Yoga postures, spiritual contemplation, walking, chanting, singing,
prayer, rhythmic breathing, gazing into a light source or at a suitable
object, listening to a pleasant repetitive tone – all done to the point
where the body, senses, and ego begin to relax their hold on
consciousness, enabling the above noted trance state to ensue. This
state is characterized by a defocusing of ego awareness – the normally
acutely observant ego is displaced through sensory relaxation by the
more diffuse observations of the underlying native consciousness
of the observer. This may be a more or less subconscious or even
previously unconscious state of being for the observer, but it is
the more comfortable, natural state of observation in any case. The
accompanying condition of this diffuse observation of events (both
external and internal) is the highly beneficial state of detachment from
the acculturated associations to sense objects of various kinds –
sexual, material, monetary, chemical, impulsive, compulsive, and so
on. This detachment is the essence of spiritual freedom from sense
objects, and conversely represents the possibility of attachment
to spiritual Truth in its legitimate forms existing beyond
cultural interpretation, ultimately culminating with the experience of
the Self.
Bearing in mind the
“Addiction to Enlightenment” warning mentioned in a preceding paragraph,
and the implied need to maintain the Balance of Consciousness which has
been mentioned as a theme of this essay series, how much meditation
is too much? This is a complex and tricky question to
answer. Gurus in India routinely spend their lives in meditative
trance of varying degrees of involvement, reflected in different levels
of Samadhi (divine union) – sivakalpa, the lightest level, and
one that passes quickly, essentially only offering a brief “taste” of
the spiritual Self; nirvakalpa, a deeper, lasting experience of
the Self that persists after the attendant trance has abated, with life
altering implications; and sahaja, a fully involved state of
union with the Self that may or may not be accompanied by further
participation in society. In comparison, here in the
hyper-materialistic West, our entire culture is geared toward the
concretization of what is considered in many sectors of Indian society
as Maya – the sensory illusion masking spiritual Truth.
The West makes little or no room for any practice that does not generate
material results, particularly monetary ones. The wandering spiritual
esthetic would quickly be apprehended and institutionalized “for his own
good” in our Western culture! Thus, the spiritual Path is a damn
tough road to travel in this part of the world where there is no real
cultural support for the activity. And the fact that Western
materialism is currently spreading like a spiritual plague around the
world only serves to render what was always a challenging quest all the
more so today.
So, the first consideration
of how much is too much regards what the cultural expectations are that
the individual is subject to. Unless one is independently wealthy in
the West (or the East), one must spend at least some time working
for a living to sustain the bare necessities of existence – basic food,
essential clothing, and rudimentary shelter – and any kind of meditation
schedule must be worked into this routine. At the other end of the
spiritual continuum, yes, there are still many ashrams existing in India
that will accept new devotees, but their number is steadily diminishing,
and entry expectations are becoming concomitantly more stringent.
Thus, a good rule here to be applied anywhere is the personal
comfort measure – what are your expectations for your life, and how much
adjustment are you willing to make for spiritual growth? How far out
of your comfort zone are you willing to travel in spiritual
exploration? What kind of personal sacrifices are you willing to make
to live a spiritual lifestyle? These are all fundamental questions
that should be deeply pondered before instituting a meditation regimen,
and they are very personal in nature. If ones material life
will be severely disrupted by spiritual practice, then ones level of
commitment must be very determined indeed.
Mine was such a commitment –
I wanted more than anything else, including preserving life
itself, to know the Truth – not merely the spiritual Truth, but the
absolute and final Truth of Consciousness, and I
eventually found that Truth through meditation. I practiced this
technique in several styles at every available opportunity for many
years and lived a very constrained existence while doing so – my regimen
was relatively very heavy, a reflection of my level of commitment.
Your level may not be so involved, and probably will not be
initially, as you experiment with what works in your life. I generally
suggest beginning with an interval of no more than fifteen minutes of
slow, rhythmic breathing in a quite space, preferably with closed
eyes. That’s it, no more until you have a sense of where you want to
take the activity, and this sense will evolve of its own volition
without any intention or prodding on your part. Just let it be.
Many people take up the
practice of postural Yoga as their form of meditation, probably a good
idea, since the physical exertion of the postures tends to enhance both
physical health and personal psychological grounding – I practiced Yoga
myself as my initial introduction to meditation for many years, and
still observe many of the tenets of the Yoga spiritual lifestyle – the
Yamas and Niyamas. Bluntly, the postures become significantly more
difficult to attain with the advance of age, and I am a young man no
longer! My current preferred form of meditation is Buddhist breath
meditation, which can be performed by almost anyone, almost anywhere,
and has the added advantage of humble simplicity – one simply finds a
quiet, secure space, closes the eyes, and begins slow, deep, regular
breathing until relaxed trance is attained, and then allows oneself to
pass back out of trance into normal awareness naturally after a short
interval. This is well suited to the Buddhist simplistic observation
“Chop wood, carry water”, in fact even these rudimentary activities can
become meditations unto themselves, in reflection of the ultimate
Buddhist intention in living – constant peace and communion with Self.
As progress manifests in
meditation, as evidenced in longer intervals, deeper levels of trance,
more profound and significant spiritual experiences (in and out
trance), and the attainment of more lasting levels inner peace, ones
life and lifestyle preferences tend to pass into spiritual transition.
This is probably desirable, with the caveat that the impact on ones
material existence should still always be monitored responsibly. None
should sacrifice any portion of hearth and home without the absolute
certainty that this is called for and appropriate along the spiritual
path! The spiritual lifestyle exists in inherent conflict with the
material lifestyle, and this can be personally disastrous for the
individual who does not conscientiously maintain an appropriate balance
between the two. Yes, we should follow our Hearts, just so long as we
do not lose our heads in the process! Such is the spiritual
price of this Newtonian material existence...
The maintenance of this
material/spiritual Balance is fraught with moral and mental
challenges. The Buddha was clearly correct in his observation that
desire is the root of all suffering, as was the Christ in his comment
that “Easier it is for a camel to pass through the Eye of the Needle
than for one of wealth to enter the Kingdom of Heaven!” Material
opulence inevitably blinds us to higher consciousness and moral
imperatives, hence the ageless wisdom of the Sages admonishing self
control and simple living. The very unfortunate reality of material
acquisition is that it is an enormous waste of the only thing
that we really have in this life – our time – if it is not offset
by moral conscience and higher consciousness. The great
bulk of humanity is functionally addicted to material acquisition –
whether they are any good at it or not – and the really good object and
resource collectors tend to be willing to do anything to keep
what they have and acquire more – the human consequences are often of
little or no importance to them. Let us learn to live in peace and
wisdom, lest we perish in opulent ignorance.
- With Love, Alan -
(Copyright 2010, by Alan Schneider)
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