I have already talked about meditation package. I will be posting many meditation routines over the next several weeks. You can pick the ones that you like and try it out. As mentioned before, meditation practices should reflect in your real life. There must be palpable change in how you live. If there is no change or effect then you ought to change your meditation routine. But, please give it a fair chance.

Are you ready?

Patanjali starts his book by saying, “Now, the discipline of yoga.” He presumes that you are ready before you indulge in Patanjali yoga sutra. Any one cannot express it any better. You ought to be ready for meditation before you go further into meditation. Your mind must be ready. “Why should I meditate” is not a question any more. You must have some basic concepts about meditation so that you can proceed with confidence. It will be good if you have practiced thought management exercises which include dropping and parking of thoughts They will help you get further and deeper in meditation.

Place of meditation

Any place for meditation is better that no place. It is always better to have a designated place for meditation. It is even better if the place is away from living room, bedroom, kitchen etc. The vibrations matter in meditation. However, I commonly practice meditation sitting in a chair when flying. It is a great time to spend time with you. It also gives the elevation (height) which was only possible at one time by going high up in the Himalayas in olden days. Gravity pulls downwards; Grace is a force that moves upwards.

It is also desirable to have a non-conducting surface to sit on.

Time

Any time for meditation is better than no time  It is desirable to do meditation at same time and at same place if at all possible. Soon it becomes possible that the time and place waits for you. Things fall into place easily when you arrive ath the place and at that particular place. Meditation becomes easier to happen.

The optimum time is dawn or dusk. Life in nature is transitioning and you can be part of the change. The nature around you is waking up at dawn; birds are chirping, sun is rising in the east and grass is feeling fresher. You become connected to your surrounding. This rising and changing energy becomes available to you.

Posture:

There are different positions for different meditations. A sufi will dance for meditation and a Zen monk will instruct you to look at a wall. However, I describe here a common energy saving posture that can be used for most meditations.

http://meditateinleicester.org/meditation-classes/

Sitting with feet close together, straight back and straight neck. You can take help of back support or support against a wall. Hands should be placed on each other with thumb joining together at the tip. I prefer to gently close the eyes; some like to keep it half open (just be able to see tip of the nose). Effect of gravity is least in this comfortable position when back and neck is straight. Have a comfortable cushion to sit on if possible so that you can be comfortable for an hour so and not be bothered by pressure changes to your nerves leading to numbness or tingling.

However, meditation can be done sitting on a chair especially if sitting with feet together is difficult or impractical. You can close your eyes and be away in office or airplane seat while you have some time for yourself.

Group:

Meditation in a group has a unique effect. It is as if many forces are trying to move upwards in one direction. Every one is practicing individually. Each person is alone. Yet, there is inter-connectedness between each person meditating together.

Not much is known about meditating together in a social network setting. I have a feeling that inter-connectedness can be developed between meditating persons situated in different locations. That is one reason, I say, “Let us meditate together.”

It is your journey

Meditation is an adventure. It is a journey to nowhere, yet you pass through many unknown and strange experiences. I always remember, invite and pray to God, entity or energy to be with me when I get into this journey. “Be with me and guide me” is what I say. You can do what suits you.

I would like you to read the disclaimer @ before you embark on any of the techniques described here. It is your decision to proceed.

Sankalp

Sankalp means “I resolve to” or I promise to. You determine for yourself what you are going to do and see that it is completed. It is a means to get things done (GTD). You say to yourself, “I will meditate today for half an hour.” Then you meditate for half an hour. Mind does not say, “it has been 25 minutes, let us stop today. I will do 35 minutes tomorrow.”

I invite you all to take a sankalp, “I will meditate every day at xxx time and xxx place for the month of December.” You can find an excuse to do so. December is a month of Gita Jayanti and we shall make December as Gita Jayanti month. December is also a month of Christmas. Energy of Jesus is available in December. What can be a better month.

What to expect

This is a difficult one. No one wants to raise your expectations too high.. Yet I would like to say to you, “Do not sell yourself too cheap and do not set your expectations too low.” Your time is valuable. You are going to carve out half an hour to one-hour daily of this valuable time. Stress relief and reduced tension is not enough value out of this time and should not be the ultimate goal. This would happen because if is a bye product of meditation. You will be more peaceful. That is a given. If it does not happen, change your meditation or go and do something else.

Let us strive to get much more out of the time spent. Many institutions have chronological courses that are like our colleges and schools. You do a primary level and then you go for an advanced level. I am not saying that they are wrong. However, this is against the grain and foundation of meditation. The effects of meditation are not linear. They can be totally unpredictable. I will leave it at that here.

Timing of these effects is also important. You may not have any effects during meditation. You may feel sudden peace energy shower on you while you are driving or just walking. The rays of sun are drenching your body, sand on the beach is touching your feet and wallah, there is this heavy energy showering your whole existence. You pause, close your eyes and thank some one out there (God), feel full of gratitude and move on. You are sleeping and suddenly have this dream that is a dream of your astral body. You are able to fly. You can control your flight and move around at a level above the ground. One day you (astral body) are able to get out of your physical body and look at yourself in surprise. This can go on through to multiple levels. This may not happen the first day you meditate….but then who knows.

All this has to reflect in real life. Meditation should and will bring success. It is not just for esoteric experiences.

Caution:

Make sure you do not think negative during or around your meditation times. You may be connected to unknown corners of this universe and what you think may materialize. It is great responsibility on your part to make sure that you take meditation very seriously. It is not a casual phenomenon. Just do not try to meditate if you are not ready. There are many other things you can do with your time.

Here is one set of three meditation routines that complement each other….

I will be posting this shortly so that you have time to get ready.

other….

I will be posting this shortly so that you have time to get ready.

A one-day storm in New York adds excitement to our travel plans

(An opportunity for thought management)

Are you ready for a crisis?  I am not.  I do not like them and do not want to face them.  However, crises do happen in our lives whether we like it or not. I see it as an opportunity rather than “why this happened to me.”

Many societies have created customs whereby a mini-crisis is created so that you and I could experience what it is like to be in a crisis.  Fasting for one day or 40 days is one such event.  This is common in many societies and cultures.  Long arduous journeys to pilgrimages have been another set of practices.  Even now there are people who will stand up, then lie down (prostrate) and progress slowly like that until they reach their destinations.

I am not sure they realize the purpose behind the whole mini-crisis creation.  They may just be doing it as a ritual.  The idea is to bring awareness to you.  A crisis enhances the focus of your attention and it is better to practice in a controlled situation rather than in an unexpected event.

I am coming to the point.  I am going to describe a real event that happened to me.  I will first describe the event as it took place and then go on to explain what was going on inside my mind as the whole event was taking shape.  You all may have similar or worse travel stories and must have handled it in your own way.

The story:

We had a trip planned to go to Costa Rica.  The flight was from Portland, Maine (PWM)  to Newark, NJ and then to San Hose in Costa Rica.  The departure time was 12:43 pm from PWM.  We packed the day before and planned to get early to Portland to meet a friend of ours who will then drop us at the airport.  The tour company advised us to take a copy of the passports that we did by scanning.

We spent some time with our friends in Portland who then dropped us at the airport (around 11 a.m).  I started looking for passports to complete our check in.  The continental agent offered to put us on an earlier flight, which had been delayed because of mechanical reasons.  We were so happy.  But, soon I realized that there were no passports with me.  I remembered that I placed the two passports on the scanner to scan for our records and did not collect them before leaving home.  We live 80 miles away from the airport and that is usually an hour and half each way.

The only chance we had to get to San Hose was if our original flight got delayed further.  What do we do?  My wife, Lekha, came up with a bright idea.  We first called our friend Kanti in Portland to bring our car back and then called another friend Cheryl in our hometown.  Cheryl has keys to our house and happened to be close by to our home.  Kanti came to the airport quite quickly and we headed back to our home.  As we were driving back Cheryl went to our house, picked up our passports from the scanner and started driving to Portland.  Of course she needed to fill her gas tank on the way.  We were both driving at a speed ….and kept in touch with our cell phones.  The timing of our meeting and place was determined as we came closer to each other.  There was no room for any error.  Finally we came to a place in Augusta, Maine, where we timed our arrival in a parking lot of super 8 motel with extreme accuracy.  We picked our passports, thanked Cheryl, and headed back to the airport.  We got to the airport at around 13:45 hoping against hope that the flight will still be there.  Kanti had other things to do but stayed along.  The continental agent was surprised to see us back and we were happy to learn that the flight was still in Portland.  You can imagine how relieved we would have been to learn that even the first flight was still in the airport.  We checked in for that flight and went through for the security check to get to the gate.

I needed my coffee and went to the Starbucks coffee shop at the airport while Lekha sat on a chair happy to see that we are still getting our flight to Cost Rica.  My cell phone rang as I was in line at Starbucks.  It was my wife calling from the gate.  I wondered what was going on.  She knew I just came for a coffee.  “May be, the plane is boarding,” I thought.  She said, “ All flights to New York are cancelled,” and asked me to come to the gate for making alternate arrangements.

We had another project now.  Lekha was on phone with the tour company while I was in line to make alternate booking.  There was no way to get to Newark to get our connection to San Hose.  The flight next day was all overbooked.  With help of my smart phone (iphone) and with great support from the continental gate agent, we finally came up with a plan.  A US Air flight will take us to Philadelphia, we shall stay in Philli overnight and then take 5:45 am flight to San Hose (reach there about noontime).  It was around 4pm by this time.  We checked our luggage with US Air and went to their gate to wait for another 4 hours.

We sat on a bench besides the US air gate wondering how to pass the time.  AUS air agent approached us and asked if we will like to go on an earlier flight.  We of course did not know about any earlier flight and enquired about when the earlier flight was going.  She said, “Now.”  We jumped on the offer and before we knew it, we were in the plane ready to fly to Philadelphia, relieved about not having to wait for a long time before the next scheduled flight.

We reached Philadelphia in an hour and a half.  Weather was miserable as expected.  The flights in and out of New York had been cancelled because of this one-day storm that centered over New York.  It was raining, was misty and was cold.  We were given the impression by the Continental airline that we will be provided hotel for the night.  All we had to do was find an agent and ask.  We found one agent.  There were 50+ stranded passengers around him and he obviously was overstretched and overwhelmed.  He advised all of us to do what needed to be done and submit the bills to continental.  But there were no guarantees and no assurances.  In other words, we were on our own.

So we booked a close by Marriott courtyard that had airport pick up service.  A hotel pick up bus showed up half hour later, but it was full.  The driver said, “I will be back in 20 minutes or so.”  We patiently waited another half hour.  The bus did show up and it was full already.  We found out next day that they had only one bus working that day.  The other bus was in a shop.

Anyway, about 15 of us by this time waiting for the shuttle bus decided it was time for us to pick up a taxi.  We lugged our luggage in the misty, rainy, wintry conditions to the taxi stand on the other side.  The cab driver helped put luggage in the trunk and we told him to take us to the Marriott courtyard.  We felt relieved again that at last we will be in the hotel soon.   That soon was not supposed to be.  We soon found ourselves on a highway going in a fast speed.  We asked the driver where he was going.  There was an argument and he gave us two choices putting the blame on us of course.  The first choice was to pay him 50 dollars and he will take us to the airport Marriott courtyard.  The second one was to go back to airport for a resolution.  We were so tired by this time, both mentally and physically.  We decided to go back to airport and he took us back there.  The resolution was that the same taxi driver would take us to the hotel.  He then for the first time put the meter down and took us to the hotel in approximately 5 minutes.  We paid him and got into the hotel registration line, which was long as expected.  Lekha got in the restaurant line while I got in the registration line.

Next day was another day.  Our flights were on time and we joined our group in Costa Rica in the afternoon.

We were in constant touch with our tour company, Collette Vacations.  They were very supportive, always knew our whereabouts and arranged our pickup from the San Hose airport in Costa Rica. They picked us up in private transport and drove us to our tour group.  We had lunch there and were very happy to meet the group people although we did not know any of them from before. They all greeted us with cheers and wanted to know the details of what we went through.  We had great time in Costa Rica although it did rain quite a bit.  We saw Macao birds and a rare find brown howler monkeys (photos)

The one-day storm in New York posed travel challenges while we had a one-day storm of our own.  Both the storms are over.  It is easy to recount the story, but how did it affect our minds as were going through is another story.

Thought management:

A crisis presents problems but also presents opportunities.

1. It is an opportunity to test our strengths and weaknesses.
2. It is great opportunity for experiencing i.e. feelings, pains, pleasures, the butterflies and the mixed ones.
3. Not only do we need to manage our own mind, we also have to manage people and situation around us.

We all need to have tools for managing our thoughts.   I have described many of these tools in ‘thought management’ book.  Everything was going smoothly until I noticed that the passports were missing.  I felt bad.  This is not good planning.  What is happening to my memory?   There would have been several possible approaches to this situation.  This is how I approached:

I soon realized that I needed to drop or park all these thoughts and focus on what needs to be done. I dropped the thoughts that had no ends, thoughts that were there just to disturb.  I parked the thoughts that had a time line i.e what will happen if I miss the flight.  I focused on thoughts that needed immediate attention.

Finally, as we were walking along the Tamarinda beach in Costa Rica, we saw this person who created his own little challenge (photo below).  He was walking on the beach (which has many fallen trees for hurdles) with a small ball on his head.

So you are ready mentally.  Mind is not going to be in your way and is usually encouraging you to go for it.  It is not just a curiosity.  It actually wants to experience the meditation; there is now a thirst.  Once the experience, however minor, happens, there starts a pull. A force appears that tends to pull you towards meditating.  This phenomenon is totally unique.  Your mind might resist before you try out meditation.  It might even warn you against even trying meditating.  Role of mind becomes negligent once the individual experiences even a minor explosion of meditation.  The experience will keep you bringing back.  There may be a gap when you do not meditate at all, but, I am sure, “you will be back.”

Physical Readiness:

The following verses from chapter 6 in Bhagavadgita outlines how important moderation in life is.

naty-asnatas tu yogo ‘sti
na caikantam anasnatah
na cati-svapna-silasya
jagrato naiva carjuna

16. Yoga is not possible for him who eats too much or for him who abstains too much from eating: It is not for him, O Arjuna, who sleeps too much or too little.

yuktahara-viharasya
yukta-cestasya karmasu
yukta-svapnavabodhasya
yogo bhavati duhkha-ha

17. For him who is moderate in eating and recreation, temperate in his actions, who is regulated in sleep and wakefulness, yoga becomes the destroyer of pain.

Let us go over the important aspects touched here:

1. Food intake
2. Sleep and lack of sleep
3. Entertainment (vihara)

Yukta

Krishna talks a language that applies to all time and all space.  There are no “dos” and there are no “don’ts.”  He knows that all dos and don’ts are relative.  I may need 6 hours of sleep while someone else needs 9 hours of sleep.  Both may be right amount of sleep for the concerned individual.  Krishna uses a Sanskrit word, “yukta.”  Yukta encompasses three English words in one, right quantity, right quality and right mindfulness.  Yukta ahar means right quantity of food, right quality of food and staying mindful in the process of eating.  It is important to understand and follow these basic principles which are not only important for meditative processes but also important in staying well as well.

Right amount of food intake (yukta ahar)

The number one epidemic in the USA and in many other parts of the developed world is obesity. Krishna says that right amount of food intake is important prerequisite for meditation and yoga.  Yoga and meditation is not compatible with successful meditation.  This was important in Krishna’s time 5000 years ago and is important now as well.  It is obvious that Krishna emphasizes the importance of wellbeing here in any yogic and meditative practices.

Right amount of Sleep

Krishna starts by telling Arjuna that yoga or meditation is not possible for those who sleep too much or are not sleeping enough.  The importance of sleep is being recognized lately in wellness researches. Most adults require 7 to 8 hours sleep. While it may seem like losing sleep isn’t such a big deal, sleep deprivation has a wide range of negative effects that go way beyond daytime drowsiness.

The effects of sleep deprivation and chronic lack of sleep

• Fatigue, lethargy, and lack of motivation
• Moodiness and irritability
• Reduced creativity and problem-solving skills
• Inability to cope with stress
• Reduced immunity; frequent colds and infections
• Concentration and memory problems
• Weight gain
• Impaired motor skills and increased risk of accidents
• Difficulty making decisions
• Increased risk of diabetes, heart disease, and other health problems

It is obvious that right amount of sleep is necessary to stay well and staying well is a requirement for happy meditating.  I have stated before and I state again, “I recommend meditation for success and not for sickness.”  Some will say that meditation will help you sleep better and this is true as well.  However, that should not be the primary reason to start meditation.  It is better to work on sleep and then start meditation to get ahead in life.  We will discuss techniques of meditation that may enhance your sleep and even bring awareness to the deepest parts of sleep as and when we come to discuss different techniques.  For now we need to pay attention to our sleep patterns and get the right amount of sleep for our body.  You might have already noticed tha sleeping too much is not helpful either.

Right amount of recreation and entertainment (viharasya)

We do more than just sleep and eat.  Krishna does not restrict us to a lifestyle.  He wants us to live in moderation.  Indulgence is not going to help.  A  Zen master tells group of students, “Zen is being in the present. Being aware, and not doing anything mechanically are the keys. When you eat, you just eat, when you read newspaper you just read news paper.”Next day the student sees that the master was eating while reading news paper and asked him “Master, I thought you said we should not eat while we read newspaper”
Master says, “No! I said, when you eat and read newspaper, you just eat and read newspaper”

Happy Meditating

Meditation at 11500 ft

Happy meditating

1. Mental
2. Physical
3. Surrounding/environmental

1. Mental readiness is important in 4 different ways

• Before Meditation: Meditation in some way implies death of mind as we know it.  Mind knows that it will lose its control on our whole being.  This is one reason mind is bound to put up a fight.  However, mind is smart and it will not let you or I know that it is putting up a fight.  Mind will do what it knows best.  It will raise questions.  It will bring good questions.  Why should I do meditation?  I do not need meditation.  Meditation is done by wacky people.  Here is a good one:  I and my wife Lekha signed up for a 3 day Zen meditation.  Some of our relatives joined us at the end of our meditation session for further tour of the area.  We described to them that we had just finished this wonderful yet tough 3 days of meditation.  My friend and relative who is a physician as well said, “You just wasted 3 days of your life.”  I have compiled some articles for reading about this issue which might give some answers to some of these questions.  A mental readiness and co-operation is essential to any meditation.  Your mind has to be convinced that you should meditate.  Otherwise, you will not continue it.  You will not experience anything during meditation if your mind does not co-operate.
• Now you are ready: This is where many teachers start.  Patanjali Yoga Sutra starts with a verse:

Atha Yoganushashanam

Now the discipline of Yoga//YS1:1//

Patanjali does not get into the logic of whether you should do yoga or not.  He is only talking to the group that has decided to proceed.  The admitting process is over.  No enrollment is going on.  No, it is time for the class to begin.  This is important.  You have to be totally into the class.  You are not here to check it out.  There is no one forcing you to be here.  You have to make that decision.  But, your total participation is necessary.  You can always exit but that should not be in your mind at this stage.

• During meditation:  Mind is the biggest issue during meditation.  Thoughts keep on coming.  All these may be good thoughts.  They may all be novel ideas.  How do you deal with them?  I have described exercises to help this very aspect in an article, “Thought Management.”  It will be a good idea to do those exercises prior to getting into the practices of meditation.
• After meditation: I took part in a teleconference about “Anger Management.”  There were several participants who raised one issue.  Anger does not arise while they are meditating, but it comes back when they are not meditating.  And, we all spend more time when we are not meditating.  This raises an important question about the effects of meditation.  Is meditation good for the time you are meditating or does it have effect on your non-meditating life as well.  As far as I am concerned, if the effect lasted only during the time of meditation, I would not recommend that kind of meditation for anyone.  Meditation effects should be lasting throughout the course of our life.  This is what we are meditating for.  A positive energy, a friendly vibration and a depth of unexplained force around you, should accompany you all the time.  An hour of meditation should last for several hours if not the whole week or two.  So, I would suggest looking for an expression of the meditation in your non-meditation times, in your social and private relationships and in your decision making world.

Meditation is for success because of the following 5 products in your meditating process. :

• i.      Streamlining of thoughts (A good working mind at your command and wishes)
• ii.      Increase in upset threshold
• iii.      Decrease in centering time; decrease in duration you stay upset
• iv.      Mindfulness is a component and end product of meditation.  More mindful means less mis-haps and less strain on trying to remember what happened
• v.      A better alignment with your surroundings, better interpersonal relations, a reduced time to make the right choices and right decisions.

Happy meditating

(More to follow)

Samskara, a Sanskrit word describes several concepts. These concepts are all related but convey different essence when used in different context. This is not very dissimilar to some common words in English. Water a plant carries a different meaning than drinking water to quench one’s thirst. In this book we will try to explore, understand and try to be innovative about the meaning we attribute and the methods of imparting samskara in modern times. Samskara of an individual has a general meaning of what one carries from one life to another; a journey from life to life. The last thought in your dying moments is the quintessence of your entire life up to then. The same impressions and experiences will become your potential for the next life. That will be your asset to carry into the next birth in a seed form. In the interval between births, though there is no body, there is a great chain of body-related experiences existing in seed form which can become active at any time upon acquisition of a body. We refer to these impressions and chain of bodily experiences as Samskara. One may call it conditioning or even a built-in program of your life, applicable in the future. A man knows how to drive a car. If the car is taken away from him he does not forget how to drive a car. His experience of driving a car stays with him in a seed form. The only thing lacking is the car. Once he gets a car his driving will come back to him.

Let us examine the banking system of today. You deposit money or take out money from a bank in the currency you deposit. You can some times borrow money and the other times lend money. You have to balance your check books, the credits and debits. Don’t forget the finance charges. The usual desire or requirement is to have a positive balance. The more you have in the bank the more value it has, the more you can do with it. The aim usually is to have as much as you can.

Now imagine that instead of having a brick and mortar building to deal with you have to deal with a virtual entity. Actually, it is not hard to comprehend a virtual banking since many people do actually deal with banks via the Internet. If you can stretch your imagination a little more you can imagine of having a virtual currency in a virtual bank. Why to carry dollar bills or a plastic? Even with virtual money in a virtual bank, you still have to deposit money, balance the checkbook and desire to have a big bank account.

Now, imagine that you have to deposit this virtual currency in kind rather than in currency (money) in a virtual bank it is getting close to the concept of samskara. The virtual bank is your bank. This is not accessible to any one other than you. The currency is your karma, be it a good karma, a bad karma, or an ugly karma. You do not have to deposit the karma. Deposit is out of your control. It is automatic. Once you do a karma it is deposited. Even if you intend to do a karma it is deposited. The desire of performing a karma is considered equivalent to doing the karma. The balancing also is automatic. Once you undo a karma it is removed. In this account a good karma does not cancel out a bad karma. All karma have to burn out. We will get into the details of karma later on since the samskara can not be understood independent of the concept of karma. They are closely related.

The main thing that has to be understood is that the goal of the samskara deposit is to get to a zero balance. The understanding of this principle is important. Buddha was walking along. Accidentally, his big toe hit a pebble and as expected the toe started bleeding. It of course was painful. Buddha’s response was that of utter relief. This was the last of his karma coming back. He thanked the pebble and continued walking. In your childhood you might have experienced sprain or trauma. Your mother might have said, a ‘graha’ has been cut. This is a similar situation as of Budha’s toe. The concept of karma deposit and then burning out has gone deep in our psyche. Sometimes these word are uttered without even understanding the details of the incident.

This virtual account of karma that we all carry from life to life is what Hindus have called Samskara. It is worth focusing a bit more here. How did we learn about the significance of Samskara? Why did we not focus on the body? Why did we spend thousands of years of our total energy on apparently virtual things?

Every time period has a contemporary approach. At the present time we use the rational approach to understand the real nature of material world. We want to know the details of all matter and also of living species. We examined the matter and reached to electrons protons and neutrons. Similarly, we examined the living cells and reached to the genes. To reach where we are in this direction it has taken thousands of years and a continuity of at least two thousand years.

Hindus had a different approach. The sanatana dharma provides the answers to the holistic relationship of an individual (vyakti), nature (shrishti), society (samashti) and God (parmashti). The relationship of soul (atma) and Ishwar (parmatma) has been the subject of our studies. The primary focus is on the immortality of soul and not on the transient body or the material world. This is clearly mentioned in Gita by Krishna who says:

Vaashaanshi Jirnani Yatha Vihay
Navani Grihnaati naroparani
Tatha sharirani vihaya jirna
nyanyani sanyati navani dehi (2..22)
As a person puts on new garments, giving up old ones,
Similarly the soul accepts material bodies, giving up the old and useless ones.

Another meaning of Samskara is the sacraments of human beings that takes place at various stages of life. We will discuss this in more detail in the third chapter of the book. There are sixteen samskaras (sacraments) that are typically recommended in the Hindu tradition. We will be recommending a minimum of four samskaras that are more prevalent now. The Namkaran samskar (ceremoney of naming of the child) is conducted when a child is born. The yagnopaveet (thread ceremony) samkara when the child grows up and is ready to go to school. Vivaaha samskara (marriage ceremony) is performed at the time of marriage. The antyeshti samskaras (Final rites) are performed at the time of death. In the example of our virtual bank with virtual currency, you can take these samskaras as initiation incentives contributed to you by the society to help you do dharmic karmas in your life.

Many regard Hinduism as being synonymous with working for enlightenment. The meditations, the tapas, the yogas the mantras; all leading to moksha. The path to enlightenment does not relieve you of the virtual bank of samskar. You are still bound by the law of karma and as Buddha will say:

Aeso Dhammo Sanatana
This is the law.

So the Hindus have also worked on what happens when you do not get enlightened. Enlightenment happens to only a few. Most of us belong to the category where we carry the baggage of current and past bodily experiences to the next life. It is only when the virtual accounts becomes zero that the virtual body becomes one with the divine. This simplistic model is presented in this manner only to develop an understanding about the significance of Samskara, Karma and the journey from life to life.

A certain race, a certain religion, a certain nation carries its own samskara, which gives it a certain character. That is what has happened to India. The trees of India, the soil of India have become charged with the energy liberated from the likes of Rama, Krishna, Budha, Mahavir, Nanak, and numerous such divine entities. This has created an energy field, a budhafield that is unique. The whole development of Teerthas and dhams is based on this concept of release of focused energy. If you can be on that wavelength you can feel it too. You can be a part of it as well.

What is the source of this knowledge? How did we acquire this knowledge and where did we loose it? What do we do to rediscover it? Each one of us can develop some understanding of samskara, karma, dharma and other Hindu concepts by reading about the scriptures. But a deeper appreciation requires one to explore, research, do sadhanas and tapasyas to rediscover and further enhance the knowledge about these. Before we get into the concept of samskara let us explore the scientific concepts and learn how the intelligentsia has given time, money and energy to get to the point they have come, the distances they have covered. We believe that for hundreds and thousands of years the Hindus poured their entire intellect and resources to discover these truths. When Buddha says Aeso dhammo sanatana (this is the law) he does not theorize, he does not think so and this is not his opinion. Similarly when Mahavir says “Dhammo mangalmukkitam” that is what he knows. It is backed up by his experience, work and the work of thousands who experienced before him.

It is important to realize that we in the east were not so much interested in philosophy. Philosophy is more of a mind game. A philosopher is more interested in the logic of mind and less in the Truth and realization. We do not like to think whether or not God exists. Our Rishis were not interested in proving God’s existence. Even if you do not believe in God, it is o.k. They were more interested in the search itself. We used the word Darshan which is often translated as philosophy. But, Darshan has a totally different meaning. Darshan is face to face. Darshan is realization. That is why many of our scriptures have statements by the people who had Darshan. Vivekananda wanted to know about God. He is passionate. He goes to Ramkrishna and asks him, “where is He.” RamKrishna laughs and then touches Vivekananda with his feet. Vivekananda goes in to a trans. He had the realization that could not have been expressed in words (the darshan). There was no debate and it was not necessary.

Budha was in the audience of over 10 thousand people. Budha never spoke a single word about Truth. If some one asked him the question what is truth he would keep quiet. This day he just sat silently. A flower in his hand. It was a lotus flower. He was just looking at the flower as if the ten thousand people did not exist. Moments passed and then hours started passing and people started becoming uneasy. Then suddenly, one disciple -Mahakashyap – amongst the gathering of ten thousand – started to laugh for no reason. Budha called him and handed over the lotus flower. He said to the audience, “What I could say to you in words, I have said to you. What I could not say in words, I am giving to Mahakashyap.” This is the Darshan, face to face, a deep realization that Mahakashyap had which prompted his laughter to manifest. This transfer of realization is difficult to be expressed in words. But, when a realized soul chooses to speak, he does not simply philosophize, it is not merely a mind game. He simply states the facts as he sees them.

Our Shashtras reflect word from people who had the realization. We never paid much attention to the pundits, the intellectuals and the so called philosophers. Yes, the intellectuals have written a lot of commentaries. There are several commentaries on the Bhagavadgita and likewise there are several on Brahmasutra or Pataanjali. But the original ones, be it Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, or Dhammapada or Shankarbhashya; they were all spoken and written by the realized ones, the ones who had the face to face darshans.

With this introduction we will try to get on with the rest of the book. It is imperative that we try to understand the law of Karma, it is also crucial that we understand what we mean by Dharma and know how to perform the important samskaras.

PARAMPARA

To understand our culture, (samskara, Dharma etc.) it is important to understand the concept of parampara. What can we learn from parampara? How a disconnect in parampara can be disastrous for a civilization?

Parampara is one reason why people in India like to remember a series of past generations of an individual. In many families the whole series of ancestry was and to some extent even today given great importance. Rameshwar comes from the family of Satishwar who was a saint and was son of a great saint Parmeshwar. Rameshwar has to have an element of saintliness because Satishwar was a saint and his forefathers were all saintly people. It is as if a flow, a continuum of Parmeshwara is flowing through Satishwara and Rameshwar. It is very important to grasp this point before we get any further with any kind of Samskara. As if the river Ganga originates from Gangotri…It flowswith all its white waters and its melodious music. And, the name changes to Alaknanda. It flows in a continuity. There is the same essence, the same melody, and the same purity. Just the name is different. Ganga flows to Haridwar, and then touches Varanasi. Other rivers and riverlets join in. But, the same Ganga flows with the essence in continuity. It has covered distance in space and time, it has changed in quality and quantity. But its reverence has remained the same.

Parmeshwar to Satishwara to Rameshwara, the flow of santliness has continued. Krishna has described it beautifully in Bhagwadgita:

Ewam paramparpraptmimam rajaryayo viduh
sa kalenneh mahatta yogo nashtah parantap (4..2)

This supreme science was received through the chain of succession and the saintly king understood in that way (the way of parampara). But in course of time the succession was broken, and therefore the science as it is appears to have been lost.

He is talking about a method of knowing and calls it knowing by parampara. Arjun is an intellectual. He has been through the education system of the time and was the best at the time. Krishna is not only dealing with the best educated person of the time but also with a brave heart of the time who also happens to be his sakha (friend). And to him he says that there is another method of learning that seems to have been lost. In the preceding shloka he has said that he told this yoga to Sun. Knowing that he is talking to Arjuna he says in this shloka that there is another method of learning. Learning by parampara. What is the meaning of parampara. In fact there is no word in English that can explain what is the meaning of parampara. Parampara is more like a continum or a flow as described above. It is not the same as tradition. It is not learning by reading the shastras, it is not part of learning as you grow; it is a flowing. This knowing by parampara is a flow.

The knowledge Krishna is talking about in Gita is of a different nature, a higher nature. There are other knowings by parampara. Purohits in our villages mostly learned by parampara. There was no school of purohits then. It just flowed through a system. For thousands of years people in India have poured their entire energy for the search of truth. You can visibly see the flow of Ganga. Ganga is not an ordinary river, its flow was not just melting of the glaciers, it is not a random phenomenon. It is an alchemy, it is science of a kind which we have not mastered yet. For a simple fact that Ganga water is always fresh no matter how many years it has been bottled in is one parameter you can see for yourself. There is another flow that permeates through India and that is the very essence of India. India is an eternal journey, a path of nectar, stretching from eternity to eternity. The Ramas, Krishna, the Budhas, the Mahavirs, Kabirs, Nanaks and many others have all contributed to this flow of nectar which forms the very essence of India. This is why we never wrote a history. Some of these events are beyond time and space. It is a continuum. And then there is the esoteric history, which is so very difficult to authenticate. For example it is not an accident that 22 out of the 24 Jaina Tirthankaras went to die on the same mountain the Samved Shikhar. The gap between the first tirthankara Adinath and the last one is thousands of years. But they all went to leave their bodies at the same peak. The namokar mantras developed by Mahavira may appear simple spoken words but they were developed with a specific goal and for a specific purpose. How can you really incorporate all this in a written history. That is why the emphasis of the flow, the learning by parampara, the learning by shruti. What happened to this flow? What happened to this learning by parampara. What has happened to the Samskaras, the samskaras as mentioned earlier represents this flow which is truly beyond time and space and also represents the sacrements which appear to be bound in time and space

In Krishna’s time part of this was lost, the part that Krishna has touched in Gita. In the present time It seems that most of it is lost. The flow seems to have been interrupted. Maithili Sharan Gupta raises the same point in Bharat Bharati when he says:

Ham kaun the kyaa ho gaye
Aur kyaa honge abhii?

This is a concern shared by most people. We have to remember and remind others that the destiny of India is the destiny of the whole humanity – because of the way we have refined human consciousness, and because of the lamps we have lit within the human being. No where else in the world has this been done. It has been over ten thousand years of ceaseless perseverance, of ceaseless yoga and incessant meditation. And for the sake of this we have lost everything else. But, even in the darkest nights of man, we have kept this lamp of human consciousness burning. No matter how dim the flame may have become, the lamp still burns. The lamp is burning.

Hindus knew a lot of things – it would be surprising if they did not having been on a religious quest for thousands of years. For over ten thousand years most of their most intelligent and wisest people have devoted their lives to the same end – the search of the ultimate, the search of truth. They were possessed with the only desire of knowing the truth hidden behind the existence, to see that which is invisible. They wanted to encounter that which is formless. It would be really amazing if such people did not know anything after having single mindedly dedicated all their intelligence and energy to the single quest, and that too for over ten thousand years. They developed the science of yoga, tantra, mantras, meditations. One book Vigyan Bhairva Tantra describes 112 techniques.

But, during the last 200 years certain very disturbing events happened. It is worth understanding and taking serious note of this. There have been hundreds of foreign invasions on India in the last several years, but no invader could ever attack the vital core. Some invaders looked for wealth, some occupied land, others captured palaces and forts. But, none could touch the core (interiority) of India – the attention of invaders was not drawn towards it. Then for the first time attacks were made on this vital core of India, on the interiority of India when the western civilization invaded India. The easiest way to attack it was to disconnect the country from its long history and to destroy the past. A gap was created between the people and their history. In this way people became uprooted and powerless. Suddenly the learning by parampara was interrupted. The flow was obstructed.

If western civilization were to be destroyed today, there would be no need to destroy its buildings, its cinemas or its theaters. If just the top ten universities were destroyed the whole western culture would disappear. The western civilization would slowly die and become lost. The real basis of all cultures is its sources of knowledge. The roots of a civilization are in its long chain of knowledge…it is in the knowing by parampara, it is in the flow of knowledge that passes from generation to generation without any conscious awareness about it. Let me give an example. Two brothers from a family in India were sent to a Convent school by their father. The family was a large family and the two brothers used to touch the feet of their father each morning. The father decided to visit the sons in their school and went there. The two brothers came to see their father and happily said hello to their father. The father simply asked the sons to pack up and go back to home. The sons were surprised and did not even know what had happened; what had gone wrong. The father remarked, Sons, “I sent you to this school to learn what is new, not to forget what you knew.” But, there are many fathers who will be proud when their son will say hello to them. What is in touching the feet? Very few know that it is not just a custom. It was a science of energy transfer. It developed as a science whereby father or a guru could transfer energy to the one touching the feet by touching on their head. This was part of the technology of shaktipat. On the other hand, It will be interesting to know how hand shaking developed in the west. It was a way to ascertain that the person coming to meet you is not hiding a weapon in his hand. The first method is a product of trust while the other one (hand shaking) is a product of distrust.

If the history of just two generations were taken away, a country would become cut off from all possibilities of further progress That is the difference between human beings and animals. Animals are not able to make progress because they do not have schools. They do not have any way to transfer knowledge from older generation to the new generation. At its birth an animal begins life right from where its father began, and its offspring will do the same. The human being through education, can help his child’s life begin from where he left off. So there is a continuity of knowledge. All human progress depends upon transfer of accumulated knowledge from generation to generation.

If you visit Mexico and see the ruins of Mayan civilization, you will be astounded. They rose to fame around 900 AD. Now there is not more than 3.5 million Mayans in the world. They do not know how their civilization lost the glory. They are known to be an intelligent race. They built several beautiful structures including pyramids. Their pyramids are present as far as in St. Louis, Missourie in the USA. The parampara is lost, there is a disconnect between their past and the people. They are now made to believe that they were primitive culture who used to make human sacrifices to rain god for every little trivia. They have ruins of this ball game that can only be hit using feet, elbows and waist. Again, they have been made to believe that the loosing team captain had to be sacrificed after the match. Not only did they loose the parampara of their own history, their history has been distorted to make them look inferior and primitive. In the Sacred cenotel (water pond) in Chichen-Itza a 16th century Christian Spanish Diego De Landa postulated that children were sacrificed in that well by Mayans. That is the truth now. Every one else has to prove otherwise. Several divers have been inside the well and none found remains of children. But, then there are theories of what might have happened and why there are no bones of children. No body asks why the certain priest thought that children were sacrificed.

Just imagine if for twenty years all adults decided not to teach anything to their children. It would not just be loss of twenty years worth of knowledge but all the knowledge collected over ten thousand years could be lost. And such a loss could not be made up for in the next twenty years. Several decades will take to make up the gap, because of the discontinuity created in the accumulation of the knowledge.

In this way, those two hundred years of British dominance in India created a great gap. Most of its links with the ancient knowledge and wisdom were broken, and it had to establish an identity with a totally new and alien civilization with which its older civilization had no relationship. Indians think that theirs is a very old civilization. However, they are mistaken, they are only two hundred years old. The British in some sense are now far older a community than Indians. The education imparted by Maculey system has controlled many of our minds. That which the West chose to give India is its knowledge. Whatever India knew before 200 years ago was lost in one stroke.

When the threads of a branch of knowledge are lost, people seem just like ignorant fools. If you go out now with tika on your forehead, and someone asks you why you are wearing it, you will feel ashamed because you have no good answer. So, applying a tika cheerfully is difficult these days. Of course a simpleton can do it. He has no fear of others. But he is doing it not because he knows its purpose but because he thinks it is the thing to do.

When the links of real knowledge are broken, the outward symbols of it become difficult to carry. Then a certain tragedy results. Those with intelligence keep away. And a traditional knowledge remains meaningful only as long as intelligent people are involved in it. It is interesting to see that whenever such a misfortune overwhelms a civilization, whenever it looses its connection with the past knowledge, the intellectuals drift away from it because they do not like to look foolish. And the ignorant masses try to preserve the symbols and follow the rituals. The symbols and rituals continue for some time and unless revived die a natural death. It often happens that a valuable heritage is preserved by ignorant and backward looking people and the people who claim to understand disappear at the first opportunity.

If India wants to restore the broken links with the past, people will have to look at every ritual and sacraments that is being performed by the so called ignorant and illiterate masses. What they are doing is not without any reason. Their outward symbols are linked with the past of thousands of years. Some day we will have to thank them for at least having saved the symbols of that knowledge- symbols on which research can be done. Only by doing the research in to these rituals, symbols and the likes can we revive and give new life to the deep understanding that grew over a period of several thousand years.

KARMA
The whole gist of life centers around karma. The virtual currency unit in the virtual bank of Samskara is karma. We have to develop the understanding of karma, nishkam karma, karma sanyas, and why one performs one or the other karma. A man is born with certain Samskaras; his past pushes him towards doing certain karmas and these karmas are then deposited in the virtual account. The process continues. What is the way out? How do you reach a zero balance? These are all the areas we will explore in this chapter.

The first thing that must be understood is that no one lives without doing a karma. Karma is not optional. Once born, you have to perfom karma. Krishna in Gita says

Na hi kaschit kshanmaapi jatu tisthtyakarmkrit
karyate hyawashah karma sarva prakritijjairgunaih (3..5)
There is no doubt that no human in any time period even for a moment can be without doing a karma; because the whole humanity is induced to perform karma by the gunas of prakriti.

A child is born. The first thing he or she does is to cry, the cry expands the lungs and then on it breathes and does its karma. Krishna is saying that life is synonymous with karma. As long as you live, you continue working (do karma). There is no way to escape. Humanity has freedom, but not as far as whether he or she can do karma or not. One can choose what karma to do but one can not choose not to do karma. Arjun has the choice to fight or not to fight but by not fighting he can not escape from karma.

As mentioned earlier one can choose what he wants to do. However, that is not totally true. Most of the vital work (karma) is not left to the individual. The body breathes. This breathing is not left to the choice. If it were left to human choice, the person might forget to breathe, or may just not want to breathe. Several such vital actions are not optional. The beating of the heart is not your choice. If you do yoga you may be able to control your breathing or heart but in doing so you have developed the integrity and the wisdom not to interfere in the nature’s process. Your Karma that is left unto you is really not that important for the universe. It may be very important for you but for the existence it is totally immaterial.

So the question arises. If you have to do karma and every time you perform a karma it is deposited in the Samskara virtual account, how can you ever achieve the zero balance that we talked about in our first chapter? Normally what we understand by karma or work is a response, a pratikarma. Pratikarma is a actually a pratikriya to a karma, response or a reaction to another action. You go home and your son is angry at your. You are the father and you reply to that action of anger by your reaction of anger. Both you and your son make a deposit in the virtual account of samskara. These two karmas had their origin from a reason, it was a response to some reason and there was an expected result. The son must have been angry because of something and he is showing anger to get a response. Most of our lives we live doing pratikarma.

A karma in strict sense is a different phenomenon. Karma is spontaneous. It is not a reaction or a response to another action (karma). When the son shows anger and no response arises inside you, then what comes out is karma. You irritate your baby son and he pushes your hand away. Instead of an anger, tremendous love arises inside you. You smile and hug that child and the child gives you a giggle. This is spontaneous. A young baby’s anger is authentic and so is its smile and the giggle. The identity of I has not developed. And the karma here has a different quality.

A man goes up to Gautam the Budha and spits at him. Budha wipes the spit with his shawl and asks the man if he had to say anything more. The man gets disturbed. This is not the response he was looking for. He had answers for why did he spit, he had answers if Budha’s disciples tried to restrain him. But, the man was puzzled. Budha clarified that he realized that the man was angry and did not have words to express and therefore he spit on Buddha. Buddha acknowledged that this problem of expression happened to him many times when he had difficulty expressing with words. The man further asked why Buddha did not get angry in response. Buddha was very clear. He said, “you are not my master.” Why should I react to what you do. I am not your slave. The next day the man came back again and this time he was crying and putting his head on Budha’s feet. Buddha again asked him if he had to say anything more. The man said I am asking for an apology and you are not saying anything. Budha said that again you have problem expressing with words and you are using tears to express. I acknowledge that and want to know if you have to express anything more. As far as apology is concerned anger did not arise in me yesterday and therefore there is no question of pardoning you. Karma in itself is spontaneous and comes out of a man who has akarma inside, he is silent inside. You throw a stone and no ripples arise. This karma of such a person does not get deposited in the account of the samskara similar to the no deposit of a baby’s giggle. Once you stop depositing karma all you have to wait for is the return of your deposited karma and the zero balance gets closer. This karma can be performed by Karma Sanyas and Nishkam karma yoga. We will come back to it a little later.

We should also understand a little about vikarma, a karma that should not be done. This is where it gets tricky and Krishna says that the gati of karma is mysterious. Let us examine why Krishna says that the gati or movements of karma is mysterious.

There was a war going on in Kargil between India and Pakistan. And the saying goes, “Everything is fair in war and love.” Pakistan had been refusing to take back the bodies of their soldiers because they were stuck with the statement that the Pakistan army was not fighting in the war. The lines between vikarma and karma start getting blurry in this situation. One has to be aware of not only what you see but also of what you do not see. There is this famous puzzle that clarifies the point a little further. A Brahmin is walking by. He sees a cow running. He keeps walking when he meets a butcher carrying his big knife. The butcher asks the Brahmin if he has seen a cow going by. That was his cow and she had run out of his butchery. She (the cow) is due to be killed, and he is going to kill the moment he finds her. The Brahmin is in trouble now. Lying is a vikarma and so is killing (specially of a cow). The Brahmin is in a bind. The butcher is telling the Brahmin that all he has to answer was yes or no. Did he or did he not see the cow. The Brahmin wants time to think. The question for him is not the cow but which vikarma to choose. The emphasis in the east is not so much on the karma or vikarma but more on the status of the subject behind the karma, the doer.

Talking about the doer, this is now time to address Karma Sanyas and Nishkam Karma. Again Bhagwadgita is the main source of all understanding of karma and hence I will quote here from Gita. But before the quote let us analyze why Gita became the source of understanding of karma yoga. Krishna has a situation, a unique situation. The Mahabharata is on. The forces are ready to fight and the warrior Arjuna does not want to fight. He suddenly is caught up with his intelligence and futility of war. What all is bad about war suddenly confronts him in the battlefield. Krishna is not teaching in the plains of Himalaya or in an Ashram to sadhus and sanyasis. The situation is intense and outcome to be is crucial. He had to explain all about karma yoga to get Arjuna to decide what was right for him to choose. Many a times Arjuna has asked Krishna to tell him what is right. He wanted Krishna to decide for him. Krishna never obliged him for that. He instead chose to clear all the doubts and questions that Arjuna had. Ultimately Arjuna decided on his own. Coming back to the quote from Gita:

Sanyasah Karmayogasch Nihshreyyaskarawobhau
Tayostu karmasanyasat karmyogo vishishyate. (5..2)
Karm sanyas and Nishkam karma yoga both are both good for liberation. But, of the two karmayoga is easier to follow and thus better.

It should be understood here that Krishna is talking to Arjun. He is a soldier. For Arjuna, who is a warrior, karma yoga is easier to follow than karma sanyas (some people call it renunciation-it does not reflect accurate meaning). The same may not be true for a painter or a poet. In fact, Arjuna actually is talking the language of Karma Sanyas. He says, “what is the use of the war, why should I kill all these people that I know?” But, Krishna actually could see through Arjuna. His personality was not that of a Karma Sanyasi, He had always been a Kshatriya. Arjuna was trained rigorously to become the best of all the warriors. He was a master archer. He had won Draupadi in a competition. A man of competition all his life is suddenly talking the language of karma sanyas.

Let us first take up the issue of karma sanyas. The truth of karma sanyas is based on the realization of the fact that the usual mundane karma ultimately leads to no where. The person can see that by building a house, getting married, having children and gathering belongings has taken him nowhere towards the realization of his self (Atma) and the parmatma. You keep coming back and getting entangled in the same rut and at the end, you carry the garbage of bodily experience, the samskara, only to return back to start all over again. This realization drives you towards the Sanyas from these routine mundane Karma. It is a result of certain kind of awakening. The awakening is similar to drawing a line in water. No mark is left in the water. The line is obliterated the moment the hand that draws the line moves forward. In reality whatever we do is nothing more than drawing line in the water as far as existence is concerned. All our actions in the past, in this life and previous lives, have not taken us anywhere. It is the awareness that actions do not take you anywhere that leads to the sanyas from karma. It appears that the person has renunciated, it appears that the person has stopped working. But in fact the actions have dropped from such a person. Even this person eats, drinks and walks. The difference is in the quality and the status of the subject behind. He is the awakened one. He does not engage in the same kind of karma. We do karma for ourselves where as the awakened one engages in any karma for others out of compassion. Mahavir lives on, not because he has any clinging to life, but because the universe wants him to live. He in fact used to put conditions to his living and the whole existence used to meet those requirements. He worked even on the animals to get them further in the search of truth. There are sayings that animals used to come to him in his teachings. This is a result of compassion, the karma flowing out of his being for the benefit of the existence.

I recently went to a museum where several people came to visit. Amongst them were many children, children of the age of 4 and 5 years old. Adults were all listening to the guide and reading the writings on the plates. They appeared to be trying to appreciate the art and beauty of the paintings. They all looked interested. Watching the young ones was fun for me. They were running around. Sometimes just picking up pebbles and putting them back. At times they will go over the benches and other time under the benches. Energy was flowing out of them. There were no plans, no blue prints. They did not question whether there was value for money or whether or not the trip was enjoyable. They did not bother about the weather forecast or how they will be going back. If you analyze their karma, there is nothing to analyze. They are children. But there is much to learn. We are children for the existence. We stand on a piece of land and claim it is ours. We are willing to die for it. The existence looks at us and laughs. If it could talk in our language, it would say to us, “Many others have made the same claim many times before.” This realization by an individual is what makes the possibility of karma sanyas, the individual decides not to engage in the same karmas again.

Now, if every one realized that it is not worth staking claim on a piece of land and followed the path of sanyas (renunciation) then how would the world run. The balance will be maintained as long as there is no counterclaims. But it is easy to disturb the balance. A situation like in the past when Mahabharata happened or now when the India Pakistan disagree on Kashmir is more of a practical question in real life. Renunciation is not the answer. Krishna knew that it is not worth staking claims on a piece of land but he also had to balance the counterclaim of the Kauravas. Arjun actually was trying to do the renunciation. He did not have the realization but was choosing to leave the battlefield. This is where Krishna interjects the notion and details of Nishkam Karma Yoga.

Nishkam karma does not focus on Karma, it focuses on the aspect of the anticipated result. Karma Sanyas wants you to understand the futility of doing any karma. It wants you to be aware of the dream like status of any karma. It is often useful when you face a situation that looks critical to you. It is quite upsetting and you do not know how to handle it. You can look back and find a similar situation in your life in the past. Those are just like dreams and all that is left is memory.

Nishkam karma requires you to forget about the result. The expectation of results and desires are inter twined. You develop a desire, you go for an appropriate action and you get a result. Nishkam karma says that you stay in the middle, no desire, no results. Just the karma.

Krishna in Gita goes on to make the point about the results of a karma. He says:

Karmanyewadhikaraste ma faleshu kadachana
Ma karmaphalheturbhurma te sangostwakarmani (2..47)
You have a right to perform the karma but not to the fruits of action. You have no control over the fruits of action. You should not be desirous of the result and you should not be interested in not doing your karma.

This sutra is the key to nishkam karma. You have the right to do the karma but not to the result. This does not mean that there is no result. And this also does not mean that there is no path to get results. Karma is the only way to get any result.

I do the work, the karma. Work flows from me. The result comes from the whole, the samasti. There may be divine hands in the production of the result. You may have heard quite often that a certain person is lucky. He made less effort in the work but got results much more than expected. The luck factor actually is that unseen hand that either compounds the results to make you lucky or reduces the results to make you unlucky.

The importance in Nishakam Karma is on the trust. The trust on the existence or to the Parmatma. When the trust is total all the results are provided by the unknown. This has to be understood. When the shradha is total, the trust is absolute it is the Parmatma’s responsibility now to give the results, the results happen. This is sometimes referred to as you do karma in samarpan to the Parmatma. You become the flute through which the Parmatma is playing the tune.

Even if you do not believe in Parmatma, if you do not have your focus on the result all you have is your karma and the total energy goes to the karma. The result has to happen better and total as well. It is interesting that people who have too many desires are the ones who do the least karma. And then it is not a surprise to know that these are the people, the people full of desire that end up getting the fewest results. And these are the people you will find complaining against God. They are never happy

Most desire and result oriented karma are done to achieve happiness, but in the end the happiness seems to be eluded all the time. Happiness in desire/result oriented karma is always in the future. The present is unhappy. The happiness is in the future. The truth is that you will always be in the present and future will always be in the mind. Once you start being happy in the present the future has to bring more happiness. You do not depend on something else to come and give you happiness. How many times you have been on vacation. The dream was to go to the perfect vacation. Hawaii was the dream. Now you are in Hawaii. You go to check in and find that the hotel does not have the room that you wanted. Suddenly you are miserable. You raise hell. You make your point, make phone calls and before you know it is not only you who is unhappy but your family, the travel agent and the hotel employees; every one involved is unhappy. No, it is not the room or the meals or the manners that is the cause of unhappiness in this instance. It is as if you are looking for the unhappiness and the room is an excuse waiting to be the cause. The dream vacation has come but you have the habit and momentum of remaining unhappy. Nishkam karma is based on this realization, that the expectation of results of a karma is the cause of unhappiness. Does it mean that there should be no planning. Planning and expectation of results are two different things. Planning, budgeting or forecasting is different than the painful desire and expectations that drive your being and literally inhibit you from giving your full energy to the work.

Another interesting thing follows as a shadow of Nishkam karma. Once there is no interest for a result there is no frustration. When there is no interest in the result no work is small and no result is too small. Not an indifference, but a steady state of happiness in whatever the result is. A deep acceptance arises inside. The acceptance of whatever may happen in result is so fulfilling that the individual gets to the steady state of happiness; some call it anand and others call it bliss. Have you wondered about the fact that all misery arises from not accepting the isness. The wife is trying to change the husband and the husband is trying to change the wife. They both have done research about each other before marriage, every thing has been figured out. Happiness is bound to happen. Then the marriage takes place. The next thing you know is that change has to happen. You can experiment it any day or every day. Decide that today you will accept everything as it comes. This does not mean that you do not take appropriate action. Let us take the worst case scenario. Your house is on fire. If you do not accept it to the extent that you go mad you cannot take any action. Take a deep breath and then accept the fact that the house is on fire. In medical terms it is said that you may fall into denial phase specially if you hear a bad news typically “you have cancer.” However, once you accept the fact that the house is on fire, after you have taken a deep breath, you can try to get the support services available to deal with the fire. It is quite obvious in this instance that the appropriate action is to accept and then respond. But, in smaller situations at home, the ones with your son , the ones with your daughter, you fail to realize that taking a deep breath is the trick for happiness.

Nishkam karma yoga is the preferable one not only for Arjuna but also for most of the people of today. The reason in both is the same. Arjun was an extrovert and today’s world is mostly extrovert. Sanyas of karma is not natural to an extrovert personality. An extrovert is interested in the karma, he does not see the futility of karma easily. It may be easier for him to see that the results can be more than he can ask for and that his productivity may increase if he does not waste his energy in influencing or manipulating the results. If you go back to the Upanishadic times, the equations were different. A king in those times will go to a poor Brahmin and touch his feet for his blessings. The introvert was on the top and the extrovert respected the quality of his interiority. Situation is totally different today. Even the Swami today is known by his association with a politician. The extrovert is at the top now. The sadhus are valued because of the ministers company they keep but not vice versa.

Another reason why this Nishkam karma yoga is of more value in today’s world is that this gives an alternate theory to the age of competition and productivity, frustratrations and burn outs. James Moore has written a book entitled The Death of Competition.. In this truly epochal work of business strategy, Moore boldly demonstrates that for many vibrant companies the future is now; that today’s great enterprises no longer compete for product superiority or even industry dominance. He thinks that what matters now, and from now on is total system leadership. Beyond the death of competition lies the advent of something new and better. But what is it? Moore envisions a future characterized by organized chaos. Now, time is not very far when the writers will soon be seeing the benefits of Nishkam karm yoga. Organized chaos is very close to unpredictable results. Focus on the karma not on the result. The question of competition does not arise.

Competition has its good points and its limitations. It seems that there has to be several tiers of systems and understanding suited for different level of existence. Arjun was the one who could be a candidate for Nishkam karma yoga. His excellence would flourish under these circumstances. Bhim may be a different story. For him a challenge by Duryodhana may produce a better result. Remember, Krishna, Buddha or Ram cannot be produced by the method of training or competition. They are unique flowers. Patanjali and Einstein also are in similar boat. Competition can produce average, the superior is out of the reach of competition. People like Tiger Woods (the champion golfer) have noted this point too. He feels and teaches others to think to produce their own best rather than compete with others. Why be limited by the limitations of others. Excel with yourself. This in many terms is similar to doing karma according to your swadharma.

Let us next examine the root question. Why one is bound to do karma. And, what pushes you or me to engage into one karma or the other? This is dealt with by Krishna in Gita in the following sutra:

Satwam Rajastam Eeti gunah prakritisambhavah
Nibandhanti mahabaho dehe dehinamavyayam (14..5)
Satvaguna, rajoguna and tamoguna which are part of prakriti bind the body to the soul.

And all karma are a result of these three modes. This is very subtle to understand. That is perhaps one reason why this comes up in detail towards the end of Gita. What is visible is karma and its results. You can comprehend Rama fighting with Ravan but what gunas are working behind the scenes is not that obvious. For understanding purposes you can look at anger. You know a man whether he is angry by looking at him. His posture is different, he is screaming, his eyes are raging, he is screaming. But, it is difficult to see anger itself. If you could look inside the person, anger can be seen surrounding the preson. It is an energy that has its own roots. Awareness and witnessing is the art of getting to know this energy. Once one becomes aware of the gunas (modes) of prakriti (nature) behind the karma, then it becomes possible to transcend the modes and go to what is termed gunateet (beyond the modes). Then whatever karma flows out of you (in this state of gunateet) is similar to Nishkam karma and there is no question of deposit in the virtual account.

Prakriti pushes a person to do different karmas by a combination of the three gunas. Satva guna is purer than the other gunas and it frees from all sinful actions. Those situated in this mode develop knowledge and become conditioned by the sense of happiness. The mode of rajogun is born of unlimited desires and longings. Because of this, one is bound to material, fruitive action (sakam karma). The tamoguna relates to the inertia. The results of this mode are madness, indolence and sleep. The mode of satvaguna conditions one to happiness, rajoguna to fruits of action, and tamoguna to madness.

All the gunas are important. A guna is neutral meaning that in itself neither they are bad or good. For example a stone is lying on the surface. It is not moving; it is in a state of Tamoguna. You pick up the stone and throw it. A movement is created by the energy imparted to the stone by you. This is the property of rajoguna. While the stone is traveling in the influence of the imparted energy, tamoguna is working to bring it down to the state of inaction. Rajoguna is movement. The thing that drives us to go to meetings, do a yatra and write books are all the properties of Rajoguna. The tamoguna is essential as well because this is what brings us to rest. What is paramount is the balance. The balance is in part the property of the Satwaguna. Satwaguna alone sometimes is not so effective. Budha’s teachings for example were from the properties of Satwaguna. For these teachings to become propogated the energy of Rajoguna is needed. And, that happened when a king like Ashoka got influenced. He used the methods of a king (Rajoguna) to propagate Budhism as is known today. All in all none of the three gunas are in itself good or bad; they have their own utility and their own importance.

All these three gunas are represented in different proportions in different individuals. We have just made a preliminary introduction to the topic of gunas here mainly to impress on the fact that there is prakriti behind any karma that a person does. One who becomes aware of this property of prakriti also understands the basics of the Nishkam Karma.

DHARMA
We have covered samskara, and how karma affects the samskara and how samskara influences karma. Through all this lies the thread of Dharma. Dharma is the thread which goes through the karma, samskara to give it the shape of the mala or a garland. You can also perceive it as the center of a circle. At the periphery is the samskara, the karma and the series of births and deaths. The center which has never moved is the Dharma.

A man should do karma according to his swadharma. A doctor’s swadharma is to heal and he has the means to heal or hurt. The medicines that he uses to heal can also be used to kill. His dharma does not allow him to kill a person using the overdose of a medicine. A soldier’s dharma is to kill the enemy. If he starts healing the enemy and the doctor starts killing then the swadharma is being violated. This is a very simplistic model but conveys most of the meaning of the word.

Dharma, in the broader sense, on the other had is a little more difficult to comprehend mainly because of the break in Parampara that we talked about earlier. We have the words but the words have lost the meaning. Let’s try to put some clues together.

There have been several ways that Dharma has been expressed in the east. Satyamev Jayate is one such bold statement and it has been the hallmark of India’s identity. It is part of the Ashoka pillar (stambh) and simply means that truth is eternally victorious. We stand on the side of and fight for this truth and believe in the fact that when you stand for the truth, along side you stand all the forces that protect it. It is worth exploring this and understanding it better by drawing upon our ancient history which we are so proud of. We have not fought wars for borders and boundaries but for the re-establishments and protection of this truth. Mahabharata was not fought for any personal or national interest, it was fought for values, call it dharma. Dharma is not the same as religion. Dharma is not an institution. A student’s dharma is to study, a soldier’s dharma is to protect and so on. In some ways it is your true nature, your inner self, and your conscience. There are two beautiful expressions of dharma, Sat Chit Anand and Satyam Shivam Sundaram and there is one statement of this dharma, Satyamev Jayate. These three words of wisdom (mantras) belong to the universal spiritual consciousnes and not to any organized religion..

We are what we think we are
All that we are arises with our thoughts
With our thoughts we make the world
(Dhammapada)

In the east we realized and believed that the most powerful thing in the world is thoughts. The source of these thoughts is also important. A Hitler or a Stalin use the power of thought in a different manner than a Buddha, Nanak or Mahavir. Thoughts bring about certain concepts some of which are contemprary and some are eternal.

There are some concepts and words which have a composite meaning. They mean a lot of things simultaneously. If the word gets out of use for a long time then the meaning gets lost too. People do not see a practical utility of the word. The world runs perfectly without the concept or the use of the word. It can always be given a contemporary but wrong meaning. And, that may be the final blow. Dharma is one such word which was in common use for several centuries. There were division of people on the lines of dharma; one the dharmic (one who follows the dharma), and the othr were adharmic (one who rejects the dharma).

The word Dharma has been in use from ancient times. Budha used to say “Aeso Dhammo Sanatano. The largest collection of Budha’s sutras is called Dhammapada. Mahavir says:

Dhammo mangalmukkitum, Ahimsa Sanjamo Tavo
Deva vi tam namasanti, jass dhammo saya mano

Dharma comprising of Ahimsa (nonviolence), Tapa (austerity) and Sanjam (discipline) is the ultimate well-being. The one who is constantly engaged in the above mentioned Dharma is respected even by the gods.

It is of utmost importance that we understand the meaning of Dharma, the context it was and should be used. These are the bricks and mortars of our whole Indianness. There are differences in different thoughts and sects in India, but all agree on Dharma. We can argue if there is God or not, whether murthi puja is right or wrong but we do not differ on the concept of Aeso dhammo sanatana.

Let me use a contemporary example. What do you understand with the word ‘Basic Human Rights.’ Every one seems to understand it. Newspapers keep reporting of violation of basic human rights in China, India, Africa and where not. Really, what do you know about this concept. What are human rights? Did you know that the basic human rights consists of 29 articles as declared by General Assembly in 1948? The first article says, “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights…” Whoever says that this is true. We all know that all human beings are not born free but that is not the point, the point is the word has composite meaning, and is in common use.

On the other hand Dharma is again a word used universally in the past and has composite meaning. Gita starts with the shloka:

Dharmakchetre kurukchetre….
And one of the boldest statement of Krishna in Gita says:

Yada yada hi dharmasya glanirbhavati bharata
Abhiyunarth madartheyam sambhavami yuge yuge (4..7)
Whenever there is decline of Dharma, and the rise of Adharma, I embody myself for the upholding of the Dharma.

We had wars for the upholding of Dharma. Dharma was placed on a higher pedestel compared to human life. Life happens again, but what is its use if the Dharma is not upheld. It is a very interesting logic and the people who talk about so called basic human rights may not like it.

So what does Dharma mean. As I implied earlier Dharma means many things. It means the ultimate law, the logos. By ultimate law is meant that which keeps the whole universe together. Invisible it is, intangible it is – but it is a certainty. Otherwise, the universe will fall apart. Such a vast, infinite universe, running so smoothly, so harmoniously, is enough proof that there must be an inter-current that connects everything. We are not islands; the smallest grass is connected to the greatest star. There is a relationship. Destroy the smallest grass leaf on your farm and you have touched something of immense value to the existence itself.

In existence there is no hierarchy, there is nothing small and nothing great. The greatest star and the smallest grass leaf exist as equals; hence the other meaning of the word Dharma. It also means Justice, the equality, the non hierarchic existence. Dharma knows no classes.

The third meaning is righteousness, virtue. Existence is very virtuous. Even if you find something which you cannot call virtue, it must be because of your misunderstanding. The existence is absolutely virtuous. Whatever happens in the universe is always right. The wrong never happens. It may appear wrong to you because you have certain idea of what right is, but when you look without any prejudice, nothing is wrong, all is right. Birth is right, death is right. Beauty is right and the ugliness is right.

Dharma also means and has been used as God. It also means discipline-different dimensions of the word. One who wants to attain truth will have to discipline himself in many ways. The word discipline means the capacity to learn, the availability to learn. The word comes from disciple. Disciple means one who is ready to drop his old prejudices and is willing to learn.

Dharma also means the ultimate truth. When mind disappears, when the ego disappears, then what remains is the ultimate truth. Something certainly remains but it cannot be called something or anything, Buddha calls it nothing. Nothing is easy to misunderstand and therefore it is better expressed as no-thing, it is not a thing. The ultimate law is not a thing. It is not an object that you can observe or perceive. It is your interiority, it is subjectivity. This is another meaning of Dharma, the interiority, the subjectivity, the truth. Truth is subjectivity. The difference between fact and the truth is that fact is an objective thing where as truth is subjective. In medicine the students are taught the difference between symptoms and signs. Symptoms are what patients report, he has a pain, he describes the pain. Pain is subjective and there are big dilemmas as how to assess pain and compare it from one patient to another. Signs are objective. Patient is tender at one spot on touching, the area is swollen. The swelling is obvious but the to the observer but not the pain. Pain is a common experience, but pain threshold varies from one person to another. It cannot be shared, or transferred and is difficult to express and it definitely is not a theory or a hypothesis. When it happens it is real. Truth is a different matter but there are some qualitative similarities. Truth is never a theory or a hypothesis. It is always an experience, your experience. Hence my truth cannot be your truth. You have to find your own truth. Truth is unshareable, untransferable, incommunicable and often inexpressible.

Sakam Karma
Before we get in to the details of individual samskaaras, let us explore some basic facts about karma, the karma that we do in our daily lives, the sakam karma. In the earlier part of the book we explored among other things the subject of Nishkam karma. Here we will try to take up the sakam karma that we did not bring up earlier. Sakam karma simply means that you do a karma with the result in mind.

In fact the whole concept of Samskara is based on the debits and credits of sakam karma. Nishkam Karma is what we all ought to be doing, but most of us live in the world of Sakam Karma. If all of us were to do Nishkam Karma there is always a zero balance and there would be no need to open the virtual account of Samskara. Normally, at the time of death the body dies and all the desires, chain of bodily experiences and impressions of mind take the form of a seed which carries on as samskara. This is the driving force for finding another body and once the body is found in form of a new birth, the seed start sprouting. The past Samskaras start acting out. You also start accumulating new Samskaras. You start from where you left off in your past life. This is your journey from life to life.

But, in the real world most of us do care about the result. By default we can not decide not to do karma. Every one who is living has to do karma. Also, every Karma produces a result. But, the result is not in our control. In this case it is easy to comprehend the Nishkam Karma in theory. If the results are not in your control, leave the results in the hand of the Parmatma. But, the Hindus went into the basics of how Sakam Karma influences the Samskara, how the results can be influenced by Sakam Puja and so on.

Before we look at the basics of Sakam Karma, let us examine the incidents of Mahabharata. Kaurav and Pandav are fighting. Duryodhana has a stronger army. Bhisma Pitamah, Dronacharya, Karna and many such well trained warriors are on his side. It is impossible to defeat one of them. How can any one defeat all of them. Arjuna and all were trained by Dronacharya and Bhisma Pitamaha who were on the Kaurava side. They were fighting for an outcome of winning the war.

On the other side, Arjuna was well trained. He spent years practising and sharpening his skills. He spent one year doing tapasya to please Shiva to gain more powers. Krishna himself was his sarathi (charroteer). Hanuman was on his pataka (flag pole of the charriot). Arjuna with all his excellent training goes numb in the beginning of the Mahabharata. He with does not want to fight. He is ready but not quite ready. He starts talking the language of Karma Sanyas. Krishna interjects. Arjuna has achieved every thing possible by his sakam karma. He has gone through rigorous training. He has done his Tapasya for power, he has got the support of devtas . Now what is left. Krishna now gives him the ultimate sutra of Nishkam karma. To excel he not only needs the readiness by training and the divine hand but also a full one hundred percent and more of his fighting skills. This is only possible if Arjuna can take his mind off the possible results. There was no calculable possibility of Pandavas winning to start with. If he just went by equations, he would not have been able to fight fully because there was no predictable victory for the Pandavas. Krishna has been Arjuna’s sakha (friend) long before Gita happened. He could have told Arjuna about nishkam karma before, while Arjuna was in training. No, that was not the time. Arjuna had to have the training. He had to go through the rigors of life. Once he was ready to take off, the ultimate formula was given.

In the real world and in real life, life does not start with Nishkam karma. That is a possibility. That is the best. It is important to understand this issue. When one is full of desires inside and always is looking for results, it is not appropriate of talking about Nishkam Karma. It is appropriate to know and understand the Sakam Karma as it is and then work towards Nishkam Karma.

So how does sakam karma work. What are the basics of Sakam Karma and how can you possibly influence or affect the results. For this undrstanding let’s look at the shloka that is the cornerstone of Nishkam karma again:

Karmanyewadhikaraste ma faleshu kadachana (2..47)
You have the right to the karma but not to the result.

This shloka does not say that you do not get a result when you do a karma. You do karma and you get result. That is why this shloka is not only the key to Nishkam karma but also fundamental to the Sakam karma. There is an unknown factor between the karma and the result. The same karma does not produce the same result a second time even for the same person. For a different person the result of the same karma can be totally different. If you change the time and space for the same karma results can be dramatically different. This means that the results of any karma is unpredictable and there is no reproducibility.

And this is where, Hindus made the breakthrough. Not every one can surrender to parmatma and do the Nishkam karma. That is ideal but not in everyone’s grasp. So, there are techniques developed which may influence the results. The danger of these techniques is two fold. The techniques (may have been lupta today) can be misused for a bad outcome by a mischievous mind. The technique is a technique. Ravana can use mantra and tapasya to get the same powers that anyone else can. When he gets those powers to influence results and outcome, he uses it the way he wants to. It is like the atomic weapon falling in to the wrong hands.

The other risk is that if mantras, and tapasya can get the desired result, it can give a false sense of security. Why bother making an effort to do the karma? It can lead a whole generation to become lazy. A complacency can arise. People can become dependent on these techniques. This can lead to many fake Swamis and Sadhus claiming to produce magical results for an individual. The important point to realize is that these techniques do not replace the need to do your Swadharma. A karma has to be done. If you have to pass an examination, you have to prepare. A mantra or a puja can help but can not replace the books.

Many technologies were developed on these lines. We seem to have lost the keys and in some instances the locks themselves. The significance of astrology, mantras, murti, mandir (temple), tirtha (places of pilgrimages) have all been debased or lost over hundreds of years. There are many keys in life which can open doors of treasures, even today, but unfortunately we neither know anything about these treasures nor about the locks which may be opened. And, if we do not know either about the treasures or the locks, then what is left in our hands cannot even be called a key. It can only be a key if it opens a lock.

The key has left a sort of lingering fragrance in the unconscious mind of man. The impressions are hiding in our unconscious (part of samskara that we carry along) and therefore there is a possibility of bringing it to the surface. Effort is required in this direction. A renewed interest in these techniques is essential. That is the only way we can reinvent the hidden mysteries of these techniques. The knowledge we obtain by reinventing will be the building blocks of future developments.

These techniques form important steps during the performing of different essential Sacraments. In most sacraments, astrology is used to find out the most auspicious time for the event. Devtas are invoked to participate and bless during the event. Some of the Sacraments are performed in temples or in certain teerthas. Therefore, some understanding of these techniques is essential before we get into the vidhis (how to) of the Samskaras.

Astrology – A Science of Cosmic Oneness
Astrology is perhaps the most ancient subject and also in a way the most ignored. It is the most ancient because astrology has been in existence as far back as we have been able to investigate the history of mankind. Astrological inscriptions have been found on bone remnants from the Sumerian civilization which existed twenty-five thousand years before Jesus. Bone remnants have been discovered with astrological inscriptions and with an outline of the moon’s orbit in the sky.

But in India this science is even older. In the Rigveda reference is made to a certain constellation of the stars which could only have occurred several (ninety-five) thousand years ago. Because of this, Lokmanya Tilak concluded that the Vedas must certainly be even more ancient: the constellation of the stars as the Vedas describe it could only have occurred at a certain moment ninety-five thousand years ago; so that particular vedic reference must be at least ninety-five thousand years old.

That particular vedic reference could not have been added at a later period. Other, younger generations would not have been able to work out a constellation that existed many years before. But now we have scientific methods which we can use to discover where the stars were at a particular moment in the distant past.

The deepest laws of astrology were first discovered in India. In fact it was only because of astrology that mathematics was born. To make astrological calculations, first mathematics was needed. The digits used in arithmetic were invented in India — the numbers one to ten, which exist in all the world’s languages, are basically Indian in origin. And throughout the world the decimal system has been accepted: the decimal system was born in India, and it slowly spread throughout the entire world. The numerals one to nine, prevalent in all the world’s languages, came into existence only because of the influence of Indian astrology.

Astrology basically believes that your birth and future are affected by the planetary positions. It believes that you are not an island unto yourself. You are part of the whole. Your being affects the entire universe and the universe affects you. It is necessary that we understand some basic matters regarding the concept of astrology. First, it is necessary to know that, from a scientific point of view, the whole solar family is born out of the sun. The moon, Mars, Jupiter, and the rest of the planets, including this Earth, are all organic parts of the sun. Slowly, life on Earth came into being — from plants to man. Man is an organic part of the Earth; the Earth is an organic part of the sun. It is like a mother who has a daughter, who in turn also has a daughter, and in all three of them the same blood flows. Their bodies are made up of similar cells. The scientists use a word “empathy” meaning shared sensitivity. Those things that are born from the same source have a sort of shared inner experience.

Out of the sun the Earth is born, and out of the Earth our bodies are born, and far away, the sun is our great grandparent. Whatsoever happens on the sun creates a vibration in every cell of our bodies. It must be that way because our cells are all born out of the sun. The sun appears to be a great distance away but it is not so far. In every element of our blood and in every particle of our bones live the atoms of the sun. We are part of the sun, so it is no wonder that our lives are influenced by the sun. There is a sort of intimate relationship between the sun and ourselves. If we understand this relationship rightly, we can enter into the dimension of astrology.

There are various types of astrology practiced all around the world today. As far as its application in the performing of essential samskaras such as marriage is concerned, it is used in at least two parts. The matching of horoscope of the bride and groom helps compare the qualitative aspects of the two. What is not obvious by meeting the persons involved or by their family history may be very obvious to an astrologer regarding the possible behavior patterns and the future of the pair. A good astrologer can see if the two are compatible now and will stay compatible in the future. How applicable it is today is not the subject of discussion here and we will not address that part. The other application is to find an auspicious time (when the planetary positions are favorable) most suitable for the event.

Mantra – the science of sound
Mantra is another technique to affect the results of your karma and they are in themselves not good or bad. They can, however, be misused if the person behind has otherwise intentions. Remember that a mantra is a secret technique to achieve more power. A mantra is not in itself spiritual. Some mantras can indeed lead you to be spiritual. Om can bring you closer to the anhad nad, hu can work on certain centres to awaken your chakras. A spiritual person uses mantra for different purposes than a non spiritual. Many of the rituals and sacramnts (samskaras) that we are going to describe use mantras to invoke certain kind of gods.

The mind can become powerful if you focus its energy. It is just like the sun’s rays falling to the ground. If you focus those waves, those rays, through a lens, fire can be created. Those rays were falling all spread out but now they have been narrowed down through the lens. They have become one-pointed, concentrated; now fire is possible.

The mind is energy, in fact, the same energy that comes through the sun, the same subtle rays. Ask the physicists. They say the mind has a voltage of electricity, that it is electrical.

If you can focus the mind through a lens, the mantra is a lens, and you go on repeating Ram, Ram, Ram, or Om, Om, Om, just one word — if you go repeating and repeating and repeating it, and the mind’s whole energy is centered in that one word — it becomes a lens. Now all the rays are passing through that lens. Narrowed to one point it becomes powerful, you can do miracles. Just by thinking you can do miracles.

Mantras can aslo be used in puja to achieve a wanted result. This often is called a Sakam puja. Often a mantra chanted at a certain time in a certain place has a compounding effect. For example, there are many sadhaks who do durga path at the time of Navratri in Kamakhya. This has been going on for centuries. The whole atmosphere is charged in Kamakhya at that time.

Sometimes it is difficult to understand how mantras can produce results. The same people who question such techniques use other techniques to get results. In the west there is always the talk of positive thinking and how you can get ahead by thinking positve. There are courses in the USA where it is taught that if you want to become the chief, start thinking and behaving like a chief and that will take you there.

Vincent Peele has written a book on positive imaging. This is one step ahead of positive thinking. Positive imaging is like dreaming. Construct your dream and fill it with the desired result. A patient is going to have a surgery. He starts dreaming that he is having surgery. His surgeon is doing the surgery and the surgeon is doing great. There are no complications. Bleeding is minimal. The patient is now recovering and the recovery has been wonderful. Now, this person is trying to influence his outcome and also the behavior of not only the surgeon but the whole operating team. And, Vincent Peele is convinced that positive imaging works in getting close to the desired result.

Hindus went a step further. The science of sound. Most mantra sounds do not have any meaning. If there was a meaning, perhaps it will loose its effects. There are provisions of how to do mantra jaap and when and where to do them to obtain a given result.

Mantras can also be used to do Nishkam puja. Then the sound is used to transgress mind. The vibrations of the sound goes to every cell of the body. The mantra is internalized by making it a continuous phenomenon. Now you do not have to chant Om,Om from outside. Your whole existence is echoing with the sound. In such a state mind is bypassed. It simply is dropped. There is no desire to achieve any thing. If there is no result or goal in mind the mind is no more needed.

Mantras as mentioned above can be used to achieve powers. And then it can be used to show your powers. People who are doing miracles using powers of mantras are magicians, not spiritual. They are even anti-spiritual because they are spreading magic by misusing the powers they have achieved in the name of religion, which is very dangerous.

So if you are a man of mantra miracles you can say to a tree, “Die,” and the tree will die; you can say to a man, “Be healthy,” and the disease will disappear, or, “Be unhealthy,” and the disease will enter — many things you can do. You can become somebody, and people will recognize you as a man of power but never a man of God.

Mantras have a neutral status, they were not developed only to affect the result of a given karma. Mantras are and can be used in spiritual journey to get to a point from where the jump can happen. The whole technique of mantra and its japa in an appropriate place can create an atmosphere where the jnana can happen.

However, in the performing of samskaras mantras are used to invoke differnet gods and piters and also to bless the participants. Mantras are essential parts of all samskaras.

Mandirs – the laboratories of the past.
Hindus did a lot of experimentation. Mandir was the laboratory at one time where people could go in and experiment with meditation, with mantra chanting and so on. Different mandirs were sites of different experiments and experiences. A shiva temple has a different discipline than that of the Dakshineswari temple in Calcutta. A Jaina temple has different locations (often on mountains-away from water) than a Vishwanath temple which is on the banks of Ganga. Some people claim that the Vishwnath temple we see is not the real Vishwanath temple. The real temple is kept hidden from the access of a commoner. As if it exists in a different dimension that is accessible only in certain states of meditative mind. The real Gangotri similarly is said to be accessible only by the travel of your astral body. The physical body cannot reach the real souce of Ganga.

Before we learn more about temples let us explore where science is heading today and what lies in store for future of Science. Man of today knows a lot about matter. He has amassed a lot of power, specially a destructive power. Unless a man knows himself all his knowledge lacks authenticity. In the hands of an ignorant man nothing can be creative, but even ignorance can become a creative tool in the hands of a knowledgeable one. If a man can understand himself, can master himself, only then will his other achievements have real merit. Unless this happens he is simply digging his own grave.

That’s what we are doing. We are digging our own graves. Previous civilizations were destroyed by external attack; ours is threatened by a great internal danger. If the civilization of the twentieth century is annihilated, it will be by suicide. This is what we will have to call it, if there is anyone left to call it anything. It is possible this final war may never be written into human history. It will take place outside history’s ken, because it will destroy all of humanity. Those who came before us made history, we are preparing to unmake it.

We are in control of infinite material power, but we know nothing of the depths of the human heart, we know nothing of the poison and the nectar that lies hidden there, side by side. We know the atomic structure of matter but nothing of the atomic structure of the soul. And this is our great misfortune. We have achieved power, but no peace, no enlightenment.

There is great power in the hands of the unenlightened, of the unawakened. But these are the people who should not be allowed to possess power; if it is misused, power can wreak great evil. Our whole search has been for power. And this is man’s mistake. He is in danger from his own achievements, from his own successes. The world’s great thinkers and scientists should be made aware of the pitfalls of this preoccupation with the question of power. It is just this sort of blind, thoughtless investigation that has brought us to the brink of the present crisis. The aim should be peace, not power. And if the aim becomes peace, then the focus will be on the mystery of man himself, not into the secrets of nature. There has been much research and exploration into unconscious matter, but the time has come when we must concentrate on man himself, on his mind.

The science of the future will include the science of consciousness, and will not be limited to the science of matter. This change musts occur before it is too late. Those scientists who are committed to the investigation of the inanimate are orthodox men, with minds bound by tradition and convention. Men of awareness must come forth to alter the direction of scientific research. Science must strive for knowledge of man himself. In their efforts to master the material world modern scientists have attained results unprecedented in human history; there is no reason they cannot be equally successful in achieving the same insight into man. Man can be known. He can be mastered; he can be transformed. I see no reason to be discouraged. We can come to know ourselves, and on this knowledge we can build a totally new consciousness.

This has been the science that Hindus worked on. Places were developed which could be used as center of peace. You could pass by a temple and feel the energy of peace. Peace and calmness dawns on you. It was easy for a person to go into meditation inside a temple. There was a time when the Mandirs were alive and the keys were known to fit the locks, one knew how to use the temple. All the mantras have no literal meaning but they have a pragmatic value and we used to make our children absorb them at a very early age. They would learn the use of the temple without ever even being aware of what they had learnt. They would learn the art of entering the temple, how to sit there and how to make use of the sacred precincts. Whenever there was an emergency or any difficulties, people would run to the temple and then return home having regained a sense of balance and tranquillity. Each morning they would go to the temple, where else. But all of these were not taught to them – they incorporated it at a very early stage in childhood.

At the entrance of the temple we find big bells or gongs. You enter the temple and ring the bell. The sound of the bell is close to the sound of Om. Moreover, if you are chanting a mantra and your mind is wandering, a bang on the bell wakes you up, centers you on the mantra. You enter the temple. You are going up the steps and your mind is in the marketplace, you enter the temple and before you enter you ring the bell. It brings your total being to the temple. The sound of the bell along with your centering and that of other beings creates an atmosphere which sets out the waves of peace and tranquillity. And this going on years after years, Concentration of the energy, what more can you ask for.

The dome of the temple is a mini sky. If you chant a mantra in the open sky, your mantra may escape easily away from you. The dome of the temple creates reverberations of the mantra. The effect is compounded. Several other people chanting mantras there. A place for experimenting. A place for going deeper inside yourself.

Temples have small doors specially for the main center. Did the people who designed temples did not know about cleanliness. How can you keep the area aerated. They knew and developed other methods. They worked on alchemy. These are the same people who have performed the ultimate alchemy by getting Ganga to flow. Ganga water is no ordinary water. Similarly they found that the mantras have a cleansing effect. That is how these temples stayed clean for thousands of years. They kept the center of the temple with small doors to preserve the energy which has been focused there from different experiments.

One of them is the prana pratistha. The statues in side temples are not just pieces of rocks. With special mantras there have been invocation and institution of life energy in them. The light in a temple comes from ghee lamps. The quality of light and its effects on the eyes coming from a kerosene oil, perhaps more economical, is not the same as that emanating from a ghee lamp. Try doing a tratak dhyan on a kerosene lamp and then on a ghee lamp. The soothing effects of the ghee lamp is obvious. Similarly, a sandal paste on the forehead (near the third eye) has not only a cooling effect but also a balmy effect. All these things were not just accidents. They have been the work of many people over a period of time to get to the mature stage of usage.

Many of the samskaras (sacraments) are performed in Mandirs. Sometimes, a mother or a father makes a vow of visiting a temple if certain desired result is obtained. Our whole life at one time centered around temples. If you are happy you go to the temple. If you are sad you do the same. It is our duty to find out the details of how we can re-energize and rediscover the mysteries and science of the temples. Why do we have 12 jyotirlingas. Why Ujjain is the tantric city. There are many such issues which we have to focus on. Research is needed in this area and it is a challenge for us to take upon this task.

Murti Pooja – The bridge between the manifest and the unmanifest
Murti pooja is one example where our knowledge base has eroded, and that led to attacks on the whole concept from inside and outside. We have the key, we have the technology but we do not have the locks or we do not know how to use the key. And, then what is expected happens. The so called intellectuals who can criticize any thing they do not understand started going against the system. The people who continued with Murti pooja (and thank goodness they did) did not have the intellectual logic to defend it. On the other hand people like Kabir, who never need a murti pooja, said:

Pathar pooje Hari Mile
To Main pooju pahar
If God can be achieved by worshipping a piece of rock
Then I will worship a mountain

Kabir is right from where he is speaking. Once you have reached, and you choose to speak the language of the enlightened one, there will be a problem. Kabir does not need a murti. Budha does not need a murti. But, they have already reached. When Budha got there, he stayed maun for several days. He did not find anything new. What he found has already been there. He could have said, “There is nothing to find.” But, he talked for forty years. He kept giving techniques, techniques like Vipassana and others. Krishnamurthy, instead started saying that you do not need to do anything. Now, that is true for him. And nobody has reached without doing anything. Even in Krishnamurthy’s case the whole theosophy school was behind him to get where he got.

The attacks from outside are easier if there are doubts inside. People who literally worship a Rock (Kaba) started criticizing statues. They were obsessed with statues so much that they took upon themselves to destroy the statue system. Now, that is totally absurd. Without understanding the whole system, they decided that they should destroy the statues. But, when you are guided by blind faith, you do not need brain anyway. Similarly, people who carry a cross around their neck and kill draculas using the cross, have intellectual nerve to try to criticize one of the most scientifically developed technique in the world. All because, we started having doubts.

Everyone is not a Kabir or a Krishnamurthy. They need techniques to get there. Meditation, Tantra, Mantra are techniques that can be used by different strata of people.Different people have different personalities and different aptitude. One method is not suitable for all. And, that is one reason why so many different techniques have been developed. They all do not get to the same place. The ultimate may be the same but there are many techniques which are meant to have certain manzil, certain destination.

We call this Sakam Pooja. Like Sakam karma, there is Sakam pooja and there is Nishkam pooja as well. The murti puja has been used for both the sakam puja and also to get further to the enlightenment. As we mentioned above, Mandir is a laboratory, murti is the energy source. Pran pratistha is the technique that brings the life energy to the murti. Differents mantras invoke different energy fields (devta) in to a particular murti. The dispersion of the energy is limited by the small doors as entry and exit. The dome shape of the top helps reverberate the chanting of mantra and purifies the space, mind and body of the temple and individuals. The ghee lamp, the fixed times of aarti and puja all that is part of a science and not a false fixed belief.

Many examples have been used in this book to try to convey our meanings. They are simplistic models and should be taken as such. The whole basis of idol worship or murti pooja is the relationship between the mind and the cosmic mind. What is needed is a just a bridge between the two. The murti is an attempt to create that bridge. Only something that is manifest, like the form of a murti, can become the bridge – because for most of us it is not possible to establish a direct link with the formless.

For example, we can say that telephone is not needed for communication because a telepathy would be better. There are no wires, no telephone bills and no need to carry a cellualr solid interface. In theory it is great, in practice, for now it is not possible.

No matter how much one may talk about the formless and the unmanifest, it is mere talk, and does not really convey anything to you. Whatever experience your mind has are all experiences of form and shape. You have no experience of the formless and the words cannot create any resonance in you about that which you have no experience of. You will go on talking about the formless and continue living with the form. So, if you want to establish a relationship with the formless, you will have to establish a relationship with the formless, you will have to create something which on one side has a form and on the other is formless. That is the secret of the murti, the idol.

Let me explain this another way. A mother has her son in the war front, away from her, say in the USA. She has a grand child too who she is very close to but has not seen him for many years. The son goes back home to visit his mother. She asks him about the grand son. The son describes how the grand son has grown up and is 5’7” already and is very handsome. What does the mother ask for. You guessed it right, a photo. She looks at the photo and starts crying. The photo is the manifest, in a sense it ia an idol, a murti. She sees the photo and the photo has disappeared. The grand son has appeared. It is real, the tears are the proof. Not only the grand son has disappeared but in some sense the grand mother has also disappeared. Only the emotions appear. The manifest is gone, the unmanifest has descended

Put differently, worship is the art of making the murti disappear. It is the art of slowly dropping the manifest and entering into the unmanifest. When you go to the temple you see only the murti, because you are not able to see the worship itself. If you see Meera in a temple, you see Meera and the murti of Bhagwan Shree Krishna, but for Meera both the murti and Meera are dissolved in the bhakti, the worship has happened.

Not only we developed the science of putting murti in temples but we also developed the science of disposable murtis. The murti is made for several samkaras and in several annual pujas like Saraswati or Durga puja. The worship goes for hours or days. Once the worship is over the murti is dissolved in water. It is gone. The murti was used just as a bridge, in the worship the murti disappears so does the worshipper. The murti has done its purpose and is ready for visarjan. Ganesh is invoked in gobar How significant is gobar. It is not even a stone. The question is not what the manifest is, wheter it is gold or gobar is not the question. The question is whether it acts as a bridge for you or not. Does it bring the tear of joy in your eyes the same way that a photo of grandchild brings to the grand mother’s eyes.

Cosmos, Consciousness and the science of souls
All the concepts of Samskara is based on the fact that we have a life with the physical body and the impressions and experiences that we have go with us in a seed form when we die. This is what we call our samskara. The question obviously arises as to what happens to us when we die. Our physical body obviously dies and is cremated on our death. The soul (Atma) lives on. Where is the Atma after death? What are its movements? What happens to those who get enlightened? All these questions arise and the Hindu mind has tried to answer these questions by a very systematic and scientific mind. Before we get into our Hindu thinking let us examine how the physicist of today are coming close to where the ancient Hindus have worked on.

One thing is very clear from the findings of science today is that our senses are not sensitive to majority of the reality around us. There is very strong argument that the universe in our immediate vicinity is far more complex than we can imagine. One has only to compare the amount of man’s knowledge obtained by his unaided senses with the enormous increase provided by the development of such devices as telescopes, microscopes, radio receivers and X-ray machines, to realize how very limited we are. Telescopes, microscopes and similar “magnifying” techniques form a continuous and open-ended chain of development. The urge to see farther and smaller has always existed, and is fundamental to the extent of being instinctive. No matter how powerful an instrument is built, there will always be some object of interest which is barely visible, and so an awareness of things still beyond its range and an incentive to improve it. On the other hand, such developments as radio communication and X-ray examination required the positive discovery of radio waves and X-rays before they could even be contemplated. Only then could the requisite technology be developed so that they could be used to gain further knowledge. One would expect any “extra” dimensions to come into this category, and there could well be other equally fundamental “unknowns.”

Until an initiating discovery is made, it is extremely difficult to conceive of their existence, speculate on their characteristics or imagine the consequences. The dimension that the ancient Indians worked upon was the possibility of parallel universes. They have been described as Mrityalok, Pitrilok, Devaloka and Brahmaloka. These are the descriptions of the different lokas which have some sort of dimensions. The physics applicable to one Loka probably is different from another one. This area has to be revisited from a modern scientific approach.

Science is almost getting there from a different approach. In our ancient scriptures including Gita it is said that Brahma’s one day and one night is equal to thousands of years of our existence. This is not very dissimilar to the theory of relativity of Einstein. Isaac Newton thought that time was like an arrow. Once fired, it could never return. Einstein, however, thought that time was more like a river, which meandered and speeded up or slowed down near galaxies and stars. The new wrinkle on all of this is that scientists today believe that the river of time may have whirlpools, or have forks.

Einstein has been looking for the “Theory of Everything”. For over half a century scientist have been puzzled over why the basic forces of the cosmos – gravity, electromagnetism, and the strong and weak nuclear forces – require markedly different mathematical descriptions. But, if we see these forces as vibrations in a higher dimensional space, their field equations fit together like pieces of jigsaw puzzle, perfectly snug, in an elegant, astonishingly simple form. This is what Michio Kaku writes in his book, “Hyperspace.”

Hyperspace is the theory of higher dimensions. It states that dimensions exist which are beyond length, width, height, and time. In higher dimensions, there is “enough room” in which to describe all of the interactions found in nature (electricity, magnetism, gravity, and the nuclear forces). This means that in hyperspace (especially in its latest form, as superstring theory), one may eventually be able to unify all the known laws of physics into an equation perhaps no more than one-inch long. This may complete Einstein’s age-old dream of finding the “theory of everything,” which may describe everything from black holes, the big bang, galaxies, down to the lilies of the field.

Because this theory is a theory of everything, it may eventually answer questions that have puzzled scientists for thousands of years, such as, What happened before Creation? Can you go backwards in time? Can you visit the stars? Einstein’s theory of general relativity allows for both the possibility of time travel and wormholes. However, we would need an incredible amount of energy to open up holes in space and time. The Planck energy, for example, is 100 billion billion times the energy typically found in a hydrogen bomb. To understand the vast energies involved, scientists like to categorize civilizations in space into 3 types. A Type I civilization has harnessed truly planetary power. They control the weather; they mine the oceans; they control earthquakes; they get energy from the center of the earth. A Type II civilization has exhausted the energy of their planet. They get energy directly from the solar furnace called the sun. They “mine” the sun. A Type III civilization has exhausted the power of a single star. They harness the power of a galaxy. By contrast, we are a Type 0 civilization! Perhaps a Type I or II civilization will have the power to manipulate space and time at will.

Where are these higher dimensions? These higher dimensions are all around us. Imagine carp swimming in shallow pond, just below the lily pads. They spend their entire lives swimming in 2 dimensions, not realizing that just above their universe lies the 3rd dimension. Every point in their two dimensional universe is in contact with the 3rd dimension, yet they cannot conceive of the direction called “up” or “down”.

Similarly, many scientists believe that we live in 10 dimensions. The other 6 dimensions are invisible to us, just like the 3rd dimension was invisible to the fish. Scientists believe that at the beginning of time, the universe was 10 dimensional, but it was unstable. The universe (like a soap bubble) split in half, splitting into a 6 and a 4 dimensional bubble. The 6 dimensional universe collapsed, thereby inflating the 4 dimensional bubble, which became the big bang. Thus, our universe is expanding as at the expense of the 6 dimensional universe, which collapsed. Therefore, the 6 dimensional universe, although it is all around us, is too small for us to enter. Can ghosts or people live in these higher dimensions? At the turn of the century, many theologians thought that ghosts lived in these higher dimensions, since they would have power beyond our imagination. In fact, all these feats are possible if a person actually did live in these higher dimensions. Unfortunately, as we now suspect, the energy necessary to access or enter these higher dimensions is the Planck energy, which is far beyond anything that we can master without present-day machines.

Has there been a Type III civilization before our current times. If you read ancient Indian scriptures it makes you wonder if they were able to have control over the natural forces. They have talked about their concept of the “Theory of Everything” as well. The problem has been in the language. It is always difficult to understand a language and literature of a higher civilization by a lower civilization. If we are the Type 0 civilization and the shastras were written by Type III civilaization, problems are bound to arise. How can we then understand that the earth will grab the wheels of Karna’s charriot at the crucial moment of his fight with Arjuna. We have no control on the planets, how could anybody then have these powers?

We feel that the difficulty the scientists today are having in explaining the theory of everything may be because they have limited themselves to the four physical forces – gravity, electromagnetism, and the strong and weak nuclear forces. It may be easier to find a theory of everything if Consciousness was included in the equation. Every matter and a being has in it some level of consciousness. A human being is more conscious than a plant. A stone is mostly unconscious, thereby meaning it has minimum consciousness. The range of consciousness is from unconscious to subconscious to conscious and the from superconscious to cosmic consciousness.

We mentioned the theory of 10 dimensions and the big bang as described in earlier paragraphs. Is there something beyond all the dimensions, which has no dimensions? Our scriptures talk about this dimensionless eternal existence – the unmanifest. This can also be called Cosmic Consciousness and Hindus call it Parmatma. When the atma (individual consciousness) merges with the cosmic consciousness one achieves enlightenment in mystic terms.

What then is the physics of this space. The equations of this cosmic consciousness has not been worked out by the physicists of today but there is an equation described in Ishavashyopanishad about it:

Aum purnamadah purnamidam
Purnat purnamaduchyate
Purnasya purnamadaya
purnameva vashisyate

Aum
That is the whole
This is the Whole
From wholeness emerges wholeness
Wholeness coming from wholeness
Wholeness still remains.

The purna or the Whole is not the same as infinity, but if you use it as a mathetmatical symbol the above sutra means that

Infinity + Infinity = Infinity and
Infinity – Infinity = Infinity

From the unmanifest comes out the manifest and at the end of the cycle (night of Brahma) every manifest thing dissolves into the unmanifest. There has been other expressions of this unmanifest. The sound of this domain is the sound of silence. That which remains is Aum. This is also called the anhat nad (unstruck sound) by some and the sound of one hand clappings by others. The light in this domain is the light of thousand sun shining at the same time and is the light without any source. When Arjuna had the opportunity to see Krishna’s Virat roop, this was a glimpse of this unmanifest’s expressible possibility. No wonder Arjuna’s heart poured out and he sang:

Twamadidevah purushah puranas
twamasya vishwasys param nidhanam
Vettasi vedyam cha param cha dhama
twaya tatam vishwamanant roopam (11..38)
Thou art the primal Deva, the Ancient Purusha, Thou art the Supreme Refuge of this Universe, Thou art the Knower, and the one thing to be known; Thou art the Supreme Goal. By Thee is the Universe pervaded, O boundless Form.

Some call it shunya (Zero, vacuum or nothing) and the others call it purna (Whole, Everything or infinity). The science today has come close to these observations. The empty, vacuum and fullness can be expressions of the same thing. According to our current understanding of physics, every region of space is awash with different kinds of fields composed of waves of varying lengths. Each wave always has at least some energy. When physicists calculate the minimum amount of energy a wave can possess, they find that every cubic centimeter of empty space contains more energy than the total energy of all the matter in the known universe! Space is not empty. It is full, a plenum as opposed to a vacuum, and is the ground for the existence of everything, including ourselves. The universe is not separate from this cosmic sea of energy, it is a ripple on its surface, a comparatively small “pattern of excitation” in the midst of an unimaginably vast ocean. “This excitation pattern is relatively autonomous and gives rise to approximately recurrent, stable and separable projections into a three-dimensional explicate order of manifestation,” states Bohm. In other words, despite its apparent materiality and enormous size, the universe does not exist in and of itself, but is the stepchild of something far vaster and more ineffable. More than that, it is not even a major production of this vaster something, but is only a passing shadow, a mere hiccup in the greater scheme of things.

From this Cosmic consciousness comes out the whole creation of different dimensional universe. Different parallel universe as described from Brahmaloka to Mrityaloka (where we live). Every loka in the parallel universe is bound by the laws of time (relativity) or call it spacetime, but the Cosmic Consciousness lies beyond this spacetime equation. Big bang or no big bang, the cosmic consciousness remains unaffected. This is described by Krishna in Gita:

Aabrahmabhuvanaallokah punaraavartinorjuna
Maamupetya tu kaunteya punarjanma na vidyate (8..16)
All the Lokas (parallel universes), O Arjuna, including the Brahmaloka are subject to the return, but, after attaining me, O son of Kunti, there is no rebirth.

In Mrityaloka we exist in form and shape and this is the three dimensions space that we are familiar with. If you add time as dimension then it becomes a four dimensionsal space. Then there is the Pitriloka and Devaloka where the souls after death reside. Mantras are techniques to invoke them and bring them closer to us to take part in any sacraments that we do. They are invoked for the purpose of blessings and their help in ones life.

The big question of time travel has been dealt with by a different approach. Normally travel for us means travel in distance. A machine like a car, a train or an aeroplane automatically comes to mind. And, that is why there is so much appeal to H.G. Wells time machine, even though it is a fiction. Physicist still dream of a machine and a warp speed. Einstein proclaimed that a travel faster than speed of light is not possible and we have got stuck with that. Now that theory is being challenged but still it is difficult to imagine for a machine traveling even at the speed of light.

Hindus worked on the seven chakras, vortices of energy distributed throughout out the body, the lowest chakra being the Muladhar and the highest being the Sahashrar. Each chakra is also connected and associated with seven different bodies. We will discuss the first four bodies at this place merely to explain the theory of travel in time and space. The physical body that we all know about is the first body and its corresponding chakra is the Muladhar chakra. We all know the limitations of our physical body. Its sense have a limited range of light and sound perceptions and also has the effect of gravity which is measurable in G units. The size of the physical body is also limited by its physical structures and dimensions.

The second body is called the etheric body and usually is the same size as the first body. The second body is like collection of vapors. The etheric body lives for 12 days after the death of the physical body and then withers away. The etheric body can increase in size and also shrink. When a man is afraid the second body shrinks in size and when one is happy it expands. In meditation one sometimes experiences that the body has expanded and filled the whole room or even the whole atmosphere. These are the expressions of the second body that are being perceived by the conscious mind. Sometimes the dreams of the second body can also be seen and remembered. The second body can leave the physical body and travel around as well. If you have dreamt of traveling in air, it probably is the dream of the second body. The travel is not limited by the speed of light, but it is only possible in the current time. The etheric body does not travel in past or future. There is a very interesting story in Sunderkand of Ramayana.

Hanuman is on his way to Lanka. The devatas send Surasa to test if Hanuman is brave enough to go to Lanka and if is he the right coice for the job of finding Seeta. Surasa comes and says to Hanuman that she is hungry and opens her mouth. Hanuman increases his size to twice the size of her open mouth. This goes on until there is no more space. Then Hanuman becomes miniature and goes in her mouth and comes out from her nostrils and then asks for her permission to proceed ahead. The problem here is of language. This whole phenomenon is of the etheric body and nothing to do with the physical body.

The third body is the astral body. This is just the collection of vibrations. But it has a kind of a shape. It has its boundaries. This body has the freedom to travel in the past but not to the future. There are some seekers stuck in this state of third body. The experience is subtle but very enjoyable. They can visualize your past very clearly. I have encountered one Tantric who used to love me. He will call us on telephone and tell us what we have been doing. He was well respected but his future predictions never came true. This is the body that we talked earlier that can travel to the real Gangotri and see the source.

The fourth body is called the mental body. The fourth body can travel into the past and the future. In an acute emergency, sometimes even an ordinary person can have glimpses of the future. If Jean Dixon (fortune teller) could predict the assassiantion of John F. Kennedy, this is from the glimpses of this fourth body. It is usually mentioned that Balmiki rishi wrote the Ramayana before Rama was born and it so happened that Rama lived his life exactly as writeen by Balmiki. Now, it is possible that that Balmiki could go out in the future with this mental body and see the whole story of Rama as it was going to happen. This is speculative but not worth discarding at the first glance. After all, Aadi Shankaaracharya story of transferring his soul into the body of a king who had died is a story that is around the 500 A.D. His body was kept alive for several days until he came back to his body. The technology was available not so long ago until the linkage (parampara) started fragmenting.

Yes, time travel is possible. But probably an awareness of a different body and its travel in a wave form is more of possibility than inventing a physical time machine. It is not always the distance or a wormhole that you have to pass through, it is a perhaps a transcendence to a different space or even a different dimension. If you want to travel with the physical body then you require Planck energy, but, if you have to travel through astral body, the physics of vibrations will be different. Yes, it is difficult to communicate with the Piters and the Devtas as we are. But, there is a possibility that mantras and other similar techniques can be of help. These concepts have to be explored further. To change to from a type 0 civilization to type I or II will only happen if type of civilization we have to have new discoveries or re-discoveries of some sort.

In all samskaras (sacraments) we invite the Piters and Devatas to come and join us in the event. The good souls usually do not come on their own. They have to be invited. There are many different kind of good souls. Each with different personalities and properties. Indra has different characterstics than Ganesha. The Hindus have devised this technology and they chant different mantras to invoke different gods for different purposes. In most sacraments Ganesha is invoked in the beginning and then others. Similarly, out in that space is your ancestors, which can also be invoked and invited so that they can cast their blessings to you.

Krishna instructs and encourages this technique in Gita in chapter 3:

Devanbhavyatanena te deva bhavyantu vah
Parasparam bhavyantah shreyah paramwapsyath (3..11)
Cherish the devas with this, and may those Devas cherish you: thus cherishing one another, ye shall gain the highest good.

In all the Samskars (sacraments) we chant mantras to invite these benvolent souls to help us in our jouney from Life to Life. Now, with all these basic understandings, we will get into the samskaras proper in the next chapter.

SAMSKARAS – THE SACRAMENTS
Every culture consecrates the milestones of life with ritual and festivity. In India these rites of passage, called Samskaras, are celebrated in the home and in the temple, marking our spiritual journey on the earth. Hindus celebrate life’s crucial junctures by holy sacraments, or rites of passage, called samskaras, which impress the subconscious mind, inspire family and community sharing and invoke the Gods’ blessings.

For the Hindu, life is a sacred journey in which each milestone, marking major biological and emotional stages, is consecrated through sacred ceremony. Family and friends draw near, lending support, advice and encouragement. Through Vedic rites and mantras, family members or priests invoke the Gods for blessings and protection during important turning points, praying for the individual’s spiritual and social development. There are many sacraments, from the rite of conception to the funeral ceremony. Each one, properly observed, empowers spiritual life and preserves Hindu culture, as the soul consciously accepts each succeeding discovery and duty in the order of God’s creation. There are 16 popular samsakara and these include the rites of conception, the three-month blessing, hair-parting, birth, name-giving, head-shaving, first feeding, ear-piercing, first learning, puberty, marriage, elders’ vows and last rites. The Naamkaran, Graduation, Vivaha and the Antyeshti Samskaras are popular and of greater relevance and therefore we will limit our discussion to these in this book.

Common Procedures
The place of yagya should be neat, clean and pure. It should be pure in ground, air and its vicinity. This should be free from any kind of disturbance. It is important to realize that cleanliness alone is not enough. There is emphasis on purity and absence of disturbances. These relate to what effects impurity may have on these processes. The purification and the clearance of disturbances can also be helped with chanting of certain kind of Mantras.

A Yagyashala or a yagyamandap is made with specific measurements. This is place where the sacrament is performed. It should be cleaned with brush every day and decorated appropriately. It is obligatory that everyone prays to the divine through the performance of yagya for the well-being of all. For this purpose of Homa (Oblations) are offered. The dimensions of the yagyakunda usually depends upon how many Oblations are going to be offered.

Small pieces of certain specific wood are cut into for the purpose of wood fuel. These are then placed in to the middle of the yagyakunda after making sure that they are clean and not infested with worms. There are four kinds of articles for the Homa which include articles with fragrance (kasturi or musk, keshar or Rotileria tinctora etc.), of strength (ghee, milk, fruit etc.), of sweetness (sugar, honey date etc.) and of herbs (somalata, paan etc.). Then a prasaad is prepared for offering.

All these are common to most Samskaras. Now we will take up individual sacraments or rites of passages and discuss the basis of our thoughts with some details of the process as well.

Namkaran Samskar
When a child is born there is need of an identity and that is the reason a name is given to him. It is the beginning of a journey, a journey of life. As everyone is aware of an identity is helpful. Even when you go on a journey in an airplane, you need to have an identity check. A name is useful. Not only you need an identity check, your luggage also needs to have a tag. Once that particular journey is over and you have collected your luggage the identity of luggage is not needed. The luggage is with you and there is no need for a tag any more. Similarly, with the end of ones’ life which is end of a visible journey, the identification looses its meaning until you start your next journey of life again. You and you samskaras go with you at the time of death. You do not have a physical body with a physical address at that time.

When a child is born he comes without a center of his own. For nine months in the mother’s womb he functions with the mother’s center as his center; he is not separate. Then he is born. Then it is utilitarian to think of oneself as having a separate center; otherwise life will become very difficult, almost impossible.

Man has no center separate from the center of the whole. There is only one center in existence; the ancients used to call it Tao, Dharma, God. Those words have become old now; you can call it Truth. There is only one center of existence. There are not many centers, otherwise the universe would not be really a universe, it would become a multi-verse. It is a unity, hence it is called the “universe”; it has only one center.

But this is to be meditated upon a little. That one center is my center, your center, everybody’s center. That one center does not mean that you are center-less, that one center simply means that you don’t have a separate center. Let us say it in different words. You can make many concentric circles on one center, many circles. You can throw a pebble in a silent lake: one center arises from the fall of the pebble and then many concentric circles arise and they go on spreading to the farthest shore — millions of concentric circles, but they all have one center.

Each can claim this center as his own. And in a way it is his center, but it is not only his. The ego arises with the claim, “The center is mine, separate. It is not your center, it is my center; it is me.” The idea of a separate center is the root of the ego.

To survive, and to struggle for survival in the fight of life, everybody needs a certain idea of who they are. And nobody has any idea. In fact nobody can ever have any idea, because at the deepest core you are a mystery. You can’t have any idea of it. At the deepest core you are not individual, you are universal.

For example, you have a name. That is a fiction. You came without a name, you did not bring a name with you, the name was given to you. Then by constant repetition you start becoming identified with it. You know your name is Rama or Rahim or Krishna. It goes so deep that if you fall asleep with several other people and somebody comes and calls, “Rama, where are you?” nobody will hear except Rama. Rama will say, “Who has come to disturb my sleep?” Even in sleep he knows his name; it has reached to the unconscious, it has seeped through and through. But it is a fiction.

But when I say it is a fiction I don’t mean it is unnecessary. It is necessary fiction, it is useful; otherwise how are you going to address people? If you want to write a letter to somebody, to whom are you going to write?

A small child once wrote a letter to God. His mother was ill and his father had died and they had no money, so he asked God for fifty rupees. When the letter reached the post office they were at a loss — what to do with it? Where to send it? It was simply addressed to God. So they opened it. They felt very sorry for the little boy and they decided to collect some money and send it to him. They collected some money — he had asked for fifty rupees but they could collect only forty. The next letter came, again addressed to God, and the boy had written, “Dear Sir, please next time when you send the money, send it directly to me, don’t send it through the post office. They have taken their commission — ten rupees!”

It will be difficult if nobody has a name. Although nobody has a name in reality, still, it is a beautiful fiction, helpful. Names are needed for others to call you, ‘I’ is needed for you to call yourself, but it is just a fiction. If you go deep into yourself you will find the name has disappeared, the idea of ‘I’ has disappeared; there is left only a pure am-ness, is-ness, existence, being.

And that being is not separate, it is not yours and mine; that being is the being of all. Rocks, rivers, mountains, trees, all are included. It is all-inclusive, it excludes nothing. The whole past, the whole future, this immense universe, everything is included in it. The deeper you go into yourself, the more and more you will find that persons don’t exist, that individuals don’t exist. Then what exists is a pure universalness. On the circumference we have names, egos, identities. When we jump from the circumference towards the center, all those identities disappear. The ego is just a useful fiction. Use it, but don’t be deceived by it.

The namakarana occurs in the temple or home, eleven to forty-one days after birth. The baby’s name, astrologically chosen, is whispered in the right ear by the father, marking the formal entry into Hinduism.

Graduation Samskara
Graduations are important landmarks in one’s life. You acquire knowledge and knowledge is power. Your future depends upon how you apply this knowledge and not only does your future depends upon this applied knowledge, but the future of whole humanity depends on you. You may not feel that you are so important, but you do not really know that you are not. What does a seed know how big a plant it is going to grow up to. You contribute to the society you live in, wheter this is going to be a positive contribution or a negative one depends on you.

By bringing in the Graduation Samskara in your life, the family and the society wants to assure that you get the best of the devas, piters, the society, family and friends on your side. As soon as a graduate reaches the site of samkara, hymns in the prayer to God should be recited collectively and every one should extend a hearty welcome to the graduate. Then he should move to the Vedi of the yagya and occupy his seat. The graduate shuld offer ghee in the yagya. There shuld be prayer after the purna-aahuti and then the teacher (Acarya) gives advice to the graduate. It is important that the graduate understands his moral rights and a code of conduct that is suitable for his family, friends and society. At the same time he should also be made aware of possibilities of his personal growth and his history.

Satyam vada | Dharmam^ cara | Swaadhyaayaan maa pramadah. | Satyaanna pramaaditavyam | Dharmaanna pramaditavyam | Kus’alaanna pramaditavyam | Bhutyai na pramaditavyam | devapitr.kaaryaabhyaam^ na pramaditavyam | Maatr.devo bhava | Pitr.devo bhava | Aacaaryadevo bhava yaanyanvadyaani karmaan.i taani sevitavyaani no itaraan.i | yaani asmaakam^ sucaritaani taani tvayopaasyaani no itaraan.i |

Always speak the truth. Act according to Dharma. Never be lazy to follow the dictates of dharma, Truth and welfare of all; Never neglect the acquisition of prosperity, yagya havan (Deva-Karya) and respect to your parents making them always happy so that they feel proud of you; love and respect your mother father and Guru.

Graduate, you are embarking upon the field of activities of life. You have a great responsibility towards your family, society, nation and the entire humanity. We wish every success for success in whatever field you move. After these, the teacher, parents, re;latives and friends should bless the graduate by showering flowers and chanting:

Vivaaha samskar:
Whether or not you believe in marriages being made in heaven, marriage in every culture and civilization is the most celebrated event in ones life. Hindu culture celebrates marriage as a Samskara – sacrament, a right of passage when two individuals start their journey into the Grihasthashram – the life of a householder. It is the beginning of a divine union of two individuals. Vedic ceremonies facilitate this union to begin the enriching experience of a householder,s life. Through these ceremonies we seek the blessings of Almighty God and our ancesters as well as the best wishes of friends and relatives for the physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual well-being of the individual.

Of all the Hindu sacraments, Vivaha or marriage is considered to be the most central one. Hinduism rightly emphasizes the importance of the life of the householder. The sacrament of marriage impresses upon a person that earthly life is not to be despised ; rather it should be consciously accepted and elevated to the level of spiritual experience.

The underlying Vedic philosophy in a Hindu marriage is that the multiplicity of creation becomes possible when purush unites with prakriti. The conceptual vedic metaphor therefore of a man-woman unity is Ardhnarishwara – half Shiva and half Parvati in one image. Ceremonies performed at a wedding reflect this highest ideal of ardhnarishwara.

The core of a Hindu marriage lays emphasis on the two essential values, harmony and growth.

Harmony, beginning with one’s inner self and encompassing the entire creation, remains at the heart of all the ceremonies performed in a Hindu marriage. It is believed that true peace for any individual is only possible when harmony prevails around as well as within.

Growth in a householder life is considered an opportunity for two individuals committed to merge their individual “I” consciousness (Ahankar) and evolve their “We” consciousness (Vayamkar). Vedic rituals and ceremonies invoke divine will for the growth of the couple.

Ganesh Pujan

Gauri putro ganadhyaksho vighnaharta vinayakah
Vaivahik vidhawam mangalam viddhatunah

Any auspicious event like a marriage always begins with the prayers and offerings to lord Ganesha. Ganesha represents the cosmic intelligence and wisdom. He is the Lord of all new beginnings – the provider of wisdom. His name is invoked at the commencement of all undertakings and is inscribed at the beginning of all literary works and invitations. Ganesh is the keeper of the threshold, the remover of obstacles, master of the mind and son of Lord Shiva and Goddess Parvati.

Jayamala

The bride and bridegroom exchange garlands made of fragrant flowers, pledging to love and respect each other. The fragrance of th flowers signifies the fragrance that will envelope the couple throughout their lives.

Kanyadan

In Vedic law, kanyadan is considered to be the highest form of a pious duty performed by the bride’s parents or the maternal uncle. The concept behind kanyadaan is that the bride is a form of the Goddess Laxmi and the groom is the Lord Narayana. The parents are facilitating the union of Goddess Laxmi with Lord Narayana.

Sumuhurtam

The selection of an auspicious day and time – which is determined on the basis of the most propitious configuration of the cosmos for a marriage – signifies that each one of us is an integral part of the entire cosmos, and an integral cosmic law governs us all. Hence auspicious time of marriage is believed to enhance in the life of the newly wed couple.

Mandap

The place of marriage ceremony (mandap), is considered sacred in a Hindu marriage. The mandap represents the entire world where nine poles represent the nine planets. The guardians of the eight quarters of the world that are represented in the nuptial canopy are:

Indra – God of the celestials (East pole)
Agni - Fire God (South east pole)
Yama - God judge of human actions (South pole)
Nivriti – God of death (South west pole)
Varuna – God of water (West pole)
Vayu – God of wind (North west pole)
Kubera – God of the riches (North pole)
Isana – God Shiva (North east pole)

The center pole or Stambha signifies marriage. Vedic ceremonies are performed within the mandap, a symbol of the universe, where the newlyweds are blessed by all the guardians of the world.

Agni

Agne vratapate vratam carisyami
Tatte pravravimi tacchakeyam
Tenaradhyasamidamahamantrat
satyamupaimi svaha

Agni, the ceremonial fire, symbolizes the aspects of purity and sacrifice in life. Vedic ceremonies are traditionally performed near this small fire, which serves as a witness. Fire is believed to have a priestly role and a threefold composition – his nature being the anthropocosmic that is divine, human and earthly at the same time. Agni is Aadhidaivik, aadhyatmic and aadhibhautic. It signifies purification with qualities of heat and light.

Paanigrahan
Paanigrahan literally means accepting the hands. When the groom takes the right hand of the bride in his right hand, he takes her as his wife. The following mantra is recited by the groom while he accepts her hands.

• my beloved! I pledge to look after you throughout life even when you are old

• Apart from looking after you through the whole life, I pledge to perform all the duties appropriate for the head of the family.

• I consider you to be a gift of the lord. I shall look after you faithfully. Live with me happily for the whole life of a hundred years or more along with our entire family.

• You are my better half. We shall obey the commands of God and He shall provide us with a blissful abode.

• Let all the elements f nature, whether fire, the sun, or the earth, as well as the warriors and scholars of the realm help in promoting and protecting our family

• We shall strive for the happiness and prosperity of the family. We shall mutually appreciate the beauty of our inner emotions. I promise not to hide anything from you nor shall I enjoy anything stealthily.

Mangalashtaka
These verses are specially written in a traditional form for the couple, are recited by the priest, as well as the family members of both bride and groom. These verses are often composed by family members and invoke Lord Ganesha, Istdevta (personal deity, Kuldevta (family deity) and ancesters, so that all of them may come and bless the couple.

Saptapadi
Saptapadi – sevenfold vows taken by the bride and bridegroom – one of the most ancient aspects of a Hindu marriage. It is an essential and crucial part of the ceremony that validates a marriage. This sacrament is performed before the homa fire in a wedding hall or temple and is occasioned by elaborate celebration. The Grihya Sutras pronounce, “One step for strength, two steps for vitality, three steps for prosperity, four steps for happiness, five steps for cattle, six steps for seasons, seven steps for friendship. These are the seven mantras that the bride and groom take together around the ceremonial fire.

1. Sharing: We promise to share the duties and welfare of the family. We will respect each other. We will take care of each other’s well being, both material and spiritual.

2. Family Dharma: We will share each other’s joys and sorrows with courage and strength. Together, we will protect and provide for our family.

3. Harmonious Life: We take an oath of trust and loyalty to each other. We believe this will ensure prosperity, joy of life, and longevity. Our great standards of morality will allow us to raise children with noble character.

4. Growth: We will develop a love for beauty, art, literature and will fill each other’s life with the fragrance for human values: love compassion, understanding, sacrifice, and service.

5. Restatement: Let us reconfirm our four vows of purity, love, family, duties, harmony and growth.

6. Spiritual Development: and Social Obligations: We will conduct our lives according to the principles of Dharma. We will perform all acts of righteousness. We will continue the great traditions of our Dharma and pass on these Eternal values to our children. We will ensure the continuation of our great Hindu heritage for the benefit of all humanity.

7. Eternal Bond: Now with these seven steps, we are related as husband and wife and our bond is eternal. Let our love and friendship become eternal. We have accepted each other in the presence of God, our ancestors, our parents, our relatives and friends; we will abide by our Vedic scriptures.

Let us assure each other of our unflinching love. Let our thoughts, decisions and actions be one and in unison. Let us be kind, loving, considerate, good and open hearted to each other. Let us share our material and spiritual wealth. Let us become as complimentary to each other as thought and speech are to each other.

Antyesthi Samskara
Before we get on with the last rites, let us look into how death is looked upon by the Hindus. It should be realized that Death is the only certainty in life. Most people are afraid of death. Hindus tried to understand the mystery of death and have done a lot of work towards this end. After all this is the end of the journey of life. But another journey is about to start. If there is strong desire to fulfill unfulfilled desires, the soul will take another birth, the Samskara being the driving force. If one has gone beyond desires then the soul is freed at this time and is not bound by the laws of Karma. The person has achieved a zero balance and has no driving force to bring him back. Such a person has achieved what is called as Moksha, Nirvana or Enlightenment.

Thus, the journey after death can be two fold, one is the path of return and the other is path of no return. This makes the whole journey of life all the more interesting. In a way, the whole journey of life is a preparation to which type of death do you want to achieve. Most people do not want to discuss Death. You decide whether or not you go on to the journey from life to life or from life to eternity.

What then is the art of dying? How can you influence the outcome after death? These are questions that Hindus have tried to answer. One described technique about the art of dying is to develop your consciousness to the level that you could go into the death with a total awareness. This has to be understood well. Most of us become unconscious before the death comes. The death comes in sleep or in coma. You are never able to face the death as it is. Meditation is one technique which develops the awareness and the courage to face the death without becoming unconscious. There are techniques in Tibet whereby a beating drum keeps a person awake as far as possible to help them dye with awareness. Every one knows that Socrates was poisoned. What was interesting about his death was the fact he was up and walking after he drunk his poison. His disciples were worried. They requested Socrates to lie down and take it easy. Socrates told them that he did not want to miss the opportunity. He wanted to be awake and aware as far as possible. He kept describing his feelings until his speech gave up. So being aware is one key to the art of dying.

The other part is what Krishna has touched in Gita as follows:

Antkaale ca maameva smaranmuktvaa kalevaram
Yah. prayaati sa madbhaavam^ yaati naastyatra sam^s’ayah. (8..5)
yam^ yam^ vaapi smaranbhaavam^ tyajatyante kalevaram
tam^ tamevaiti kaunteya sadaa tadbhaavabhaavitah. (8..6)
And he who at the time of death, meditating on Me alone, goes forth, leaving the body attains My Being; there is no daoubt about this.
Remembering whatever object, at the time of end, he leaves the body, that alone is reached by him, O son of Kunti, (because) of his constant thought of that subject.

Again Krishna describes these two paths. It is clear that you have to be awake to be able to meditate on Krishna or have any meaningful that may affect your life when you start your journey again. One thing worth focusing on is the emphasis that is on the what bhava (thoughts or wishes) a person has at the time of death.

Many people believe that whatever they do in their life does not matter as long as they remember Rama or Krishna at the time of their death. They seem not to understand the shloka very well. Krishna has emphasized the point that the bhava (thoughts and wishes) at the end of life is important but this is mostly the bhava that the person has had all his life. A person has been having thoughts to kill his wife all his life will most likely have the same thought at the end of his life. A person that has been praying all his life to Rama or Guru Nanak will most likely have thoughts corresponding to that.

Another Concept we use for this last moment of life is the concept of qŸæ ((Path or recitations), a Gita path or a Ramayan path. Path is not the same as reading or studying a book. You keep reading the verses aloud. It is not important to understand the meaning of the verses. A certain state of existence of the persons is needed, there is a certain trust, shraddha that goes along with this path (qŸæ)). The whole scenario produces an atmosphere and a milieu where the departing soul can find solace and find it easier to have the right kind of thoughts or bhava that we described.

After working on the art of dying Hindus tried to understand what happens immediately after the death of a being. The first thing that most of the souls comes across is the utter shock and disbelief. It does not want to believe that the body is dead. The Etheric body is still around for approximately 12 days. So, naturally, there is emphasis on the fact that through rituals and the Antyesti rites, the message is conveyed to the soul that this journey of life is over and the soul should head for his next journey. The body is cremated, the fire is offered by near and dear. The burning of the body gives a clue to the soul and it starts believing about the death of the body. The mantras of the Antyesti Samskaras have messages to the soul about what it should be doing and how to go about further on. The whole prakriya (the process) takes 11-13 days.

Since a Hindu consecrates his entire life through the performance of various sacraments at suitable stages, at his death, his survivors consecrate the event by death rites for his future good and spiritual felicity. Though performed after a man’s death, this sacrament is no less important, because for a Hindu, the value of the next world is higher than that of the present.

It is customary to drop Ganga-water and Tulasi leaves into the mouth of the dying person. The body is carried on a bier by the nearest relatives and friends of the deceased. It is then either cremated or buried according to the custom of the community. If cremated, the ashes and the bones are later on collected and immersed in the sacred waters of the nearest river. If buried, a mound is raised over the remains as a mark of remembrance Shraddha or offering to the dead also forms an important item of the last rites. It is performed on the eleventh or the thirteenth day after death and consists of Homa, Pindapradhana (obsequial offering of rice balls) and feeding the Brahmanas.

• Choices
• We are what we think.
• All that we are arises with our thoughts.
• With our thoughts we make the world.
• Speak or act with an impure mind
• And trouble will follow you
• As the wheel follows the ox that draws the cart.
• We are what we think.
• All that we are arises with our thoughts.
• With our thoughts we make the world.
• Speak or act with a pure mind
• And happiness will follow you
• As your shadow, unshakable.

  Dhammapada

  Thoughts and Meditation have a very intimate relationship. Budha goes on to say that “you are what you think you are.” This is the first relationship between Thoughts and Meditation. The mind first has to be satisfied and become motivated towards meditation. What motivates one person may not do anything to another person. Gautam siddhartha was going about his life in a fine way. His life was a life full of luxury until he encountered someone who had died. This was a motivating factor for him. He left the luxury in search of the truth. All the books and talks about meditation or search of truth are simply meant to satisfy our minds so that the jump can be taken.

  Mind has to be satisfied that it is okay to do meditation. There is a saying that there ate about 1 to 1.5 million Indians in the USA but 10 to 15 million practice yoga and meditation. Once yoga and meditation were out of the institution of religion, many people started the practice. Now they do not have to belong to an institution. Most of the work on meditation and yoga have been done by the Hindus, but then hinduism was not an institution. It was called Sanatan and Sanatan, which means etenal, can never be an institution.

  This is important to realize. The mind must be ready and satisfied before an individual starts on any path. You can see it in our daily life. You want to buy a home or go to a movie. You do your home work and research the pros and cones of the work you are going to do. Sometimes there is also a social pressure. If every one else in your surrounding has seen ‘Monsoon Wedding,” you do not want to be left out. I recently went to a convention where we alll ahd to dress formal in Tuxedos and boe tie. The feeling was so great. Then I go to play golf. Can you imagine me or any one turning out in Tuxedo on the golf course. Theoretically there is no problem. You can always take off the tuxedo and make your shot and then walk to the next ball in style. But, no you or me will not do that because we will be branded insane.

  As mditation and yoga becomes more accepted by the society, it will become easier to start meditating for many people. More people will talk about it and then it becomes easier to start. Golf was a game of older people until Tiger Woods started winning championships. Now you can see several teen players on the course. Logic is needed to satisfy our minds to start meditation and yoga and that is what me and many others are doing. It is not good enough for me to hear that I write well, I want to see you all take the jump and realize what I have had the opportunity to realize. A critical mass of people that are talking about and doing medtation is also helpful.

  We discussed here how the thoughts matter before starting meditation. Mind needs to co-operate with an individual before he starts his journey of meditation. One needs to be convinced. Thoughts are necessary before, but they play a totally different role during medtation. The same thoughts that helped you get into meditation start becoming an obstacle.

  Thoughts and Meditation II
  (Questions have to drop)Your worst enemy cannot harm you
  As much as your own thoughts,
  unguarded. But once mastered,
  No one can help you as much,
  Not even your father or your mother.

  Dhammapada

  Let us explore what keeps us away from yoga and meditation. We always have reasons to stay away from ourselves. We find time to gossip, we find time to read newspapers, we find time to go to movies and we find time to visit our friends. But, when it comes to time for meditation, we love to procrastinate. Let us examine some common reasons (excuses) that we give to ourselves for not getting started with meditation:

  I am still young.

  I got a letter from a 17 year old girl in response to my meditation article “Meditation package,” that appeared in Times of India spirituality section recently. It was a long letter. Here is some excerpts from that letter:

  “I think it wud b of great help 2 me if i discuss sumthing abt this…This is goin 2 b a very long mail…but hope u don mind…

  Meditation has alz been sumthin of great interest 2 me…earlier it was just…Curiosity n more i’ve tried 2 find out what it exactly is…I’ve found myself more tangled than ever…n now…it has becum more of a necessity…i’ll explain 2 u how…”

  How many 17 year old (or even 70 year old) think of meditation as necessity. Meditation is not a necessity by any measures for most of us mainly because we do not see any value in meditation at that age. But more importantly, meditation is seen as opposite of having fun. Meditation is seen against life and what we normally do at the age of 17. We want to go shopping, we want to meet friends, go dancing and be entertained. It is perceived that meditation means sitting quietly doing nothing and more over it also means having a different persona.

  I see it differently. That is the age when there is so much energy in life. Meditation helps channelize that energy. It makes experiencing so much more fun. There is no point, in my view, starting meditation whne I am 80 year old and most of life energy is on decline. I can say that because I started meditation practices when I was young and my friends know how much I have enjoyed my life throughout my so many years until now. Meditation has bee complementary to every thing that I have undertaken so far, whether ti is in playing ping pong, tennis or golf or whether it has been in going to a pub or in a disco dancing. Meditation is not against life; meditation makes lifmore meaningful in every aspect. And, there lays my reasoning for starting meditation as early as you and I can

  I do not need it

  This is another good one. Some people do not do anything in life that they do not need or they do not benefit from. They evaluate everything in a business atmosphere. I need to have a house. I need a wife to have children. I need to earn money to be rich. I am not stressed and as far as I know meditation is good for people who are stressed. Why do I need meditation?

  This person perhaps should not delve into meditation until a need is perceived. There is however a catch here. Does this person really know what his needs are? Is he in touch with his core? His life is so much out on the periphery that he does not want to see inside him.

  This person is in denial in medical terms. He has to discover one day that every one has an inherent need for peace and prosperity. Real peace and prosperity can only happen when one gets centered and centering can only be achieved through the path of meditation.

  I am not going to get enlightened in this life

  I would not have thought of it myself until I met one of my friends recently. He went to a 10 day session on vipassana and had a great time. He was in touch with deeper cores of his existence. He finished his course and is calmer than he used to be. This was great experience for him. He loves Buddha and has all the right ingredients for getting further in his experience. His brain came up with a perfect line. I do not have a chance in this life to get my enlightenment. This is very clear to him. And may be it is true as well. Who knows? But this may not be true as well. He is a great planner and a very successful man. He now wants to plan for his next life. Please do not laugh. He is serious and means what he says. I cannot disagreew ith him much, because I know that we all can plan for our lives to come. That is what theory o f karma is all about. If you understand karma yoga well, you will also understand that it is all about planning your personal future. What karma you do in what state of mind determines what will happen to you in future.

  I would rather keep working on meditation myself if I was him. I am sure one of these days he will turn around and look differently on this matter because I believe in the pulling force of meditative experience. That force is with him now and will stay with him for a long time.

  This needs to be understood sincerely. The experience of meditation, however trivial it may have been, has a pulling force. Let the force be with you and this force will do the rest of the work.

  The questions have to drop

  The mind comes up with several explanations and excuses. It is not in my religion. I am looking for the right Guru or the right technique. There are answers to all the questions. But that is not the point. The main point is that questions have to drop. That is when the jump happens. The jump does not happen because all the questions have been answered. It happens because now there are no questions.

  Thoughts and Meditation III
  (Journey from Thoughts to no-thought)Atha Yoganushashanam
  Now the discipline of Yoga

  Patanjali Yogasutra

  We discussed how thoughts are powerful and how thoughts frame our lives. What we do and what we become is influenced by our thoughts. Yet, meditation is a journey from thoughts to no-thought. This is so fascinating. Meditation and yoga take us to a state of thoughtlessness.

  Patanjali’s yogasutra starts with the shloka that assumes that the discipline of yoga is in place. The preparation is over. The subject has already analysed the options and is ready to start the journey to yoga. He is ready to go on the path of dissolving the thoughts.

  Right thinking is needed to start the journey. The mind has to be satisfied with the concept that it is okay to go on this journey. This is not easy. Mind has the power. Thoughts shape our lives. Why should this mind who is currently our master let us start a journey where it is bound to loose its control? This is so subtle yet so true. Mind is the master for most of us. Why should it commit a suicide? We saw in our last two columns how mind is important and also what reasons mind comes up with not to start the journey of yoga. The questions that mind tries to bring up for not starting the journey are many. Every time an answer is given, the mind brings up another question. That is mind. That is the property of thoughts. Mind has to keep minding. Thoughts have to keep coming. That is our natural status. Arjuna has put it so aptly in Gita:

  cancalam hi manah krsna
  pramathi balavad drdham
  tasyaham nigraham manye
  vayor iva su-duskaram

  Mind is so frikkle
  Mind wanders all the time
  Mind is so powerful
  How do I get rid of mind?
  How do I control the wind?
  (Both are so difficult to control) (6:34)

  This is so true about our mind and our thoughts. Krishna does not disagree on this point with Arjuna. But he knows the way and shares it with Arjuna as well. Buddha knows the way as well and so do many others. Eventually questions drop, and then come the readiness and the discipline that Patanjali is talking about. Such a person is truly ready to go on the path of yoga.

  There is in fact no need to control and there is no need to focus or concentrate. This needs to be understood at the outset. Meditation is not concentration and is not focussing the mind on one idea. Focussing and concentration are sometimes useful in life, but that is not meditation. That is a chllange as well, because mind by default will not stay in one place. It is an impossiblity to bring mind to one idea and keep it there. It is like saying that water can be given a shape without a container. The property of mind is minding. It is a continuum. Hence, all effort to concentrate is bound to fail.

  So, how do we deal with mind and thoughts during meditation? This is one of the most important considerations for us to understand. It does not matter what meditation technique one is going to practice, thoughts have to be dealt with. Mind has to be dealt with in any practice of meditation. Buddha has said:

  “Everything arises and passes away.”
  When you see this, you are above sorrow.

  Dhammapada

  This is the way. Let the thourghts come and let it go. There is no need to get attached to the thoughts. Let it just transit the mind. Just become a witness. I share my story of being in Rishikesh recently. I was sitting on a rock in front of Parmarth Niketan Ashram in the middle of Ganga with my eyes closed and witnessing myself (meditating). The Ganga water was flowing around the rock. The wind was blowing nicely. The thoughts were going through my mind as well.The rock did not complain why I was sitting on it. The water did not care which rock was being bypassed. The wind did not ask me to get out of the way. But, it is so tempting to get attached to the thoughts going through our mind. Just let it pass. Mind is clever. Once it sees that it is being ignored, it brings thoughts that you would like to get attached to. They are the good thoughts. So, we have to be careful about our noble and great thoughts during meditation as well. In fact we have to be more careful about them compared to the bad ones. All kind of thoughts have to be treated equally.

  By and by the state of thoghtlessness arises. It is such a wonderful place to be. Now you can see the water flowing from a distance. You do not have to get wet to experience the flow. You can sit on the bank of the river and watch the flow. Thoughts are flowing in a very similar fashion. You can now witness the flow of the thoughts from the banks of the river of thoughts. The thoughts are there and you are here. A gap arises. This gap gradually widens and more doors to mysteries and divine start opening up. The positive enrgy of meditation starts sprouting. Gita starts making real sense in this situation. The words of Krishna acquire different meaning now.

  Thoughts are still powerful. Thoughts do not loose power; they become more powerful. Mind of such a person is sharper than the mind of a non-meditative person. Ek Buddhi of Krishna and nischal-tattva of Shankaracharya makes sense at this stage. How does such a person walk and how does such a person talk is what we will address in our next column. And then we will enter the specific techniques. I invite all of you to start the journey of yoga and meditation now. Please accept my offer and feel free to commuicate to me if I can be of any help in our journey from thoughts to no-thought.

  Thoughts and Meditation IV
  (Along the way)The questions have dropped. The action has started. I am now ready to meditate. The mind has agreed to go through the process. The journey has started. The enthusiasm is here and I am excited to start the new journey. Although there are no more questions, there are a lot of unknowns in the process. This has to be understood.

  Our old ways:

  We are on our way to start meditation, but we do carry our old habits and our old measuring tools. I do a certain puja and expect a certain result. This is called sakam puja and things are black and white here. There are people who stop puja if they do not get the results. And you must have heard people trashing the whole puja system because they did not get what they wanted. We meditate and expect certain results. We meditate and expect stress relief. When it does not happen, then we get more stressed. This is our usual old habit and ways.

  We start expecting certain outcomes and this then becomes a hindrance. My suggestion is to be aware of this process. Once this process is overcome, results start to happen. There is as if a testing period in this process. The existence is testing if you are serious about meditation or not. There is no one actually sitting there and performing a test. But, this is usual and that is why I am saying that there does as if exists a built in system to weed out the serious ones from the ones who just dabble in.

  The mind also plays a game. The mind gives the impression that it has agreed to meditate. But, the mind is waiting for the first opportunity to prove to the self that it is all hocus pocus. It already knows that meditation is a waste of time and is ready to quit the first chance it gets to do so.

  Open system versus closed system:

  Now you have passed the first test. The existence has tested you and you seem to be the serious one. You were one of the thousands who think about meditating who actually is has tried to meditate. You now are one of the thousands who have started but one who has proved to the existence that you are going to continue. What is the next step?

  What should you expect to get in turn? What are your measuring tools? How do you know if you reached somewhere? There are two kinds of systems in place. It does not matter who you learn meditation from. There are two general systems. One I call an open system and the other I call a closed system.

  Closed system: You sit down and start vipassana. You watch your breathing and are in vipassana for one hour a day for ten days. What should you expect to get by the tenth day. The teacher gives you self measuring tools. You can get to the sixth level by 7th day. If you do, you are doing vipassana successfully. Similarly, if you do kunalini jagaran techniques and if you get a sweaty palm or some such event, it means that your 9th chakra is active. I am using examples here that do not exist simply to make a point. I know that there is no sweaty palm as a measure and there is no 9th chakra inside of 7 chakra system. The point is that you look for landmarks and that defines your success in a particular system.

  Open system: This is a system I feel more attuned to. You enter meditation with an open mind and open expectations. Open expectations is simply no expectations. There is no blue print and there is no road map. You simply do not know what to expect. Any experience even no experience is welcome. Three of us were meditating in an open field one day. Although we were three each of us was individuals as far as the experience was concerned. I was going in a circle. Suddenly I was off balance. I fell on the ground. But the fall was so controlled and balanced that it would not have been possible without some extraordinary help. I ended up on the ground. For the first time ever, I experienced shunya. What a positive experience that was!

  Now, this experience is not possible in a closed system. I am not looking for a certain kind of experience to happen. Any experience is welcome. The same experience may never happen in an open system. But unique and new experiences can happen each time you enter meditative experience. There is tendency of expecting the same experience again and again in the closed system, but the possibilities are endless in an open system. Yet, it is harder to start an open system. Many people feel lost in an open system. They are used to landmarks and end points. It is a business world. You want to know what you shall get for what you invest. Closed systems are attractive but have limitations. Open systems are not so attractive in the beginning, but are a lot more fun when started.

  This is an important part of practice of meditation and is meant especially for people who are practicing some meditative technique. In the next article we will talk more about what to expect in the course of a meditative journey. We will talk about minor explosions, detours and what happens if you stop the journey at some time in the course. I want to thank all the readers who are willing to read and then think one day about starting the journey. We will soon return to our Gita columns.

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  Thoughts and Meditation V
  (Along the way)I am now convinced that I start and continue the process of meditation. I am done with expectations and am ready to accept any thing that comes or goes. What happens next? Is everything wonderful after that? Do I just slip into meditation without any hindrance? Am I going to know everything? Will I walk on water? Will my third eye start functioning or will my chakras be vibrating? There are a lot of new questions that prop up. Questions about stepping into meditation have gone but new questions have propped up.

  Do I have all the answers? Obviously not, but let me try to address some of them. Meditation experiences are unique to individuals and they do not have direct relationship to time. Someone has been meditating for 20 years and may stay at the same place compared to someone who started yesterday. There is no linear relationship because there are a lot of variables. How sincere you are is important but not the only factor. Past lives come into play as well. What techniques you are practicing is right for you or not is another factor. Gautam Siddhartha appears to have been enlightened in one life. But that is what we can see. We do not see how many lives he might have struggled to have come to that point.

  The second point to understand is that miraculous powers are not the goals of meditation. The powers of grace move against gravity. The gravity is lower at higher altitudes and therefore it does become easier to meditate in the caves of Himalaya. But that does not mean that all our effort goes into meditating for levitation. That is one of the reasons I like the open systems of meditation so much. You do not have a mid point or end point. You just meditate and experience what comes your way.

  Minor explosions:

  I learned about this term from Osho. The experiences that I talked about above are fleeting. They come and go. In between we are our usual self. Do not take me wrong. There is change in me as a person and that change should reflect in my behavior and my life. If there is no qualitative change, then I am not meditating. I may be sitting there for one hour and that may be ok. But it ought to show in my life outside. That is the ultimate measuring tool.

  The experiences that we get in during meditation may not last long. Let me qualify this term. You go into meditation. Suddenly you experience this blue light coming out of your forehead; this is coming out of your third eye position. The light is so soothing. This light expands and fills your whole body. It keeps expanding and fills your whole surrounding. You do not remember how long this light has been with you. You come out of your meditation and you are back to where you started. The blue light is gone. The tranquility you experienced is still with you to an extent, but the depth of this tranquility starts to slowly wane. The core has changed but the deep peace is not here with you all the time. You just had a minor explosion.

  There is a difference between minor explosion and Samaadhi. In Samaadhi you are in that abode all the time. You are the peace. You are the tranquility. Any one else coming close to you can feel this deep peace around you. And this is like that all the time. I am not trying to see that such a person sees blue light surrounding him all the time, but he does carry the experience of deep peace with him all the time.

  These minor explosion one of which I just describes have a tremendous pulling force. They keep bringing you back to meditation time and time. There is no such experience as these that you can get by any other means. The quality of your life starts changing and you find that your centering time has shortened. It is quite an experience and worth going for just for the experience. What you get as a byproduct is a bonus. These byproducts may be some miraculous powers or whatever. But they will remain to be by products.

  Centering Time:

  Let me talk to you a little about centering time. We all think that there is something from outside that upsets our being. The world is out to get me. I need to stay calm, but the world does not let me stay that way. Meditative world thinks differently. It basically believes that if there is a problem, it is you. You live on a baseline of disturbance and all you need to tip is an excuse. And then I come to baseline once I have blown off my steam. But, my baseline itself is on a disturbance level.

  Let me explain this. I come home from work. It had been a busy day. My wife sees me and keeps watering the plants. She does not say hi or hello. She does not acknowledge my arrival. I am now feeling ignored. I go and change and come back down. I try to talk to her but it is not working. Anyway, the ice breaks and she talks. I knew it. There was no point asking you to bring anything. You would not bring it any way. She had asked me to bring a dozen of soda box, which I had forgotten. And before I know it I am shouting at the top of my voice. I am talking all about how tired I am and there is a major situation that comes out of this simple situation. We are supposed to love each other. But this is not the end. She stops talking to me for one week. My whole body is shaking. All the cells of my body are feeling the juice of anger. I am not aware that this juice is poison to my body and to my being. This continues for a whole week and subsides if I am lucky and another episode does not make it worse.

  Centering time for one event in this case is one week. Other events may make the crisis worse and we may be in a continued strained relationship for the whole of our life. That may become a new baseline for our relationship. And this is not that uncommon.

  What does meditation do to this scenario? By default meditation changes the base line. The threshold to show anger or disrespect goes up. The baseline is more peaceful. And most important of all, the centering time is diminished if not obliterated. I am still upset by my wife ignoring me. But I understand the pathway. I understand that if I disturb my being, it is me who is suffering. It is not only me but also the other person who is suffering in the process. In fact these questions also stop arising. It simply does not happen. The contrary logic is that I am justifying me not bringing the box of Soda. No, that is just an excuse. I am not upset because it is not worth getting upset. I will try to remember in future, is a different set of factors and I should. That is separate to me from being upset about it.

  This is important. We must see the separate nature of these two events. I forgot to get Soda is one event. I am upset is another event. Unless the separateness is clear it is hard to reduce centering time. Meditation takes us there where the separateness is so obvious that we do not have to think.

Buddha said, “You are what you think.” This has been quoted ever since he said these words all around the world. However, this is an incomplete statement. There is a second part of this statement that Buddha worked all his life to give to us. The complete statement should be like this, “You are what you think, but you are not your thoughts.” There is a distinction between thoughts and you.
We all play with thoughts and I believe that everyone who works with thoughts should:

1. Have the ability to drop thoughts – Tyag of thoughts

2. Have the ability and generosity of donating thoughts – Dan of thoughts

3. Have the courage and courtesy of accepting thoughts – Grahan of thoughts

The exercises described here will give tools which will help develop these qualities over time.

Furthermore, meditation is a journey from thoughts to no-thoughts. There are no thoughts, no waves and no mind-noises. There is just pure existence. Yet, when realized people like Buddha or Krishna have to communicate, they also have to use the same mind and thoughts that we do. But, they use mind and thoughts as and when they need to rather than be bombarded by thoughts even when they do not want it.

The exercises and details mentioned below may have different meaning for the person who reads it depending on his level of individual and spiritual existence. The quality of energy imparted to a thought varies from individual to individual depending upon their state of being.

One of the most difficult aspects of any meditation technique is managing thoughts. Thoughts keep coming. That is the reason I have developed these exercises for thought management. Once you get to know how to do thought management, it becomes easier to go into any meditative technique. Besides, these also help in sharpening the mind, developing control of mind and help in brainstorming on a particular topic without any interference from mind noise. These exercises help you to get to the point where you experience that gap between you and the thoughts that traverse your mind.

Thought Management: Knowing your Thoughts

Meditation and thoughts are interrelated. Most of us, as we are, are identified closely to our mind. Mind is the source of our thoughts. Our discussion of thought management here also applies to mind management. I feel that managing our thoughts also manages our minds.

1. Mind is always working
2. What are you thinking? What channels you are tuned to?
3. Consuming thoughts
4. Addictive thoughts
5. Urgency of thought output

1. Mind is always working
Just imagine that you had to work 24 hours a day; seven days a week, 365 days a year. There is no rest. There is no vacation. There is no sleep. It is not possible. You and I will go crazy. The body will revolt.

Yet, in case of our mind that is exactly what is happening. Osho has suggested that we call mind Minding. It is at work all the time. Thoughts keep transiting the mind all the time. They take the form of dreams when we sleep. There is no rest. There is no sleep for the mind. Yet, we do not always go insane. And it is no wonder that some of us do go astray.

I was invited by a friend of mine. Both I and my wife were at his house for chit-chat and dinner. He is a gastroenterologist and his wife is a psychiatrist. We got into a discussion of mind among many other things. My friend said, “my mind is always busy. Even when I am looking calm and composed my mind is working at full speed. I am always looking into all the ramifications of any of my decisions. I am constantly living in fear that something is going to happen to me. I have always had to work for anything I have achieved. Luck does not seem to come to me.” This is a family that is successful as we know what success should be. He has a wonderful family and he is a wonderful person himself. Does this sound familiar? Does your mind work overtime? The thoughts may be different. But, do you keep thinking all the time.

This is not a new problem. It is not just a problem of our times. Arjuna raises this question 5000 years ago to Krishna in Gita:

Chnchalam hi manah Krishna, pramathi balawaadriham
Tasyaham nigraham manye, vayorivasudushkaram

Hey Krishna, the mind is very unsteady, turbulent, tenacious and powerful; I consider it as difficult to control as controlling the wind. //6:34//

2. What are you thinking? What channels you are tuned to?

We believe that thoughts that transit our minds are our thoughts. Many of us truly believe in this theory. However, if you are an Indian, you may have one way of thinking. If you happen to be same Indian brought up in USA, you may have a different way of thinking. Arranged marriage may be okay if you live in India but it is a no-no if you live in the USA. Having a girl friend was unthinkable when I grew up in Patna in the 70s. I was in Delhi recently and many young boys and girls openly talked abut boyfriend and girl friend last month.

These are what we call our thoughts. These thoughts appear to be different depending upon when, where and what surrounding you live in.

The point I am trying to make is that the relationship between thoughts and ‘I” is not as close as we think they are.You must have watched television at home.. There are hundreds of channels. You can tune into news channel i. CNN watch democratic campaign 2008 debates between Senator Hilary Clinton and Senator Barrak Obama. You could as well go to sports channel or if you subscribe to Asian channels, watch Z-TV for an Indian movie. Even if I subscribe to 100 channels, do I watch all of them all the time?

The reason I am bringing TV channels into discussion here should be obvious by now. Our mind is like a TV station. We may not realize it. It is worth taking a deeper look into our minds. We had a medical association meeting in Bar Harbor. I and my wife Lekha visited Brian and his wife for an afternoon tea. We were again discussing about our thought process. Brian’s wife left the group to go to her room. It was not clear what the reason was for her to leave. Brian mentioned that he could think in two different ways. She might have something important for which she had to go. This give reassurance to Brian’s mind and he can stay cool and undisturbed. The other reason could be that she did not like our company and she left to avoid us. This thought process could be disturbing to Brian’s mind. The idea is to explain any event such that the mind stays undisturbed. I am not saying that this is correct or right approach. The point here is that there could be different channels of thinking. What Brian thinks depends upon which channel he is tuned into at that moment in time.

What channel we turn to depends upon what kind of person we are. What kind of person we are depends upon what kind of person we train ourselves to become. A true change of a transformational nature in my thinking only happens from meditation. We will get to at a later date. We ought to find out what channels we tune into most of the time. Let us focus on two kind of channels. First group of channels is negative channels and second group of channels is positive channels. Does your kind allows more negative thoughts to come in your mind or does it not.

3. Consuming thoughts
Some thoughts appear to stay with us and almost consume most of our time in a day. Sometimes they last for weeks and months.. They do not give a break. They keep going in circles. You go to work and your boss says something derogatory. How dare he? What does he think of himself? I have to do something about it. These thoughts can consume the whole individual existence. The sleep is disturbed. Nothing else matters. Does it sound familiar? Some one dear to you dies. The same thing happens. How do you deal with consuming thoughts? These are hard ones to deal with. The exercises below help you deal with these consuming thoughts effectively. The situation does not go away, but you can get a break and get a life while these consuming thoughts go in the background.

4. Addictive thoughts

Addictive thoughts are a little different compared to consuming thoughts. They are not there all the time. There may be an undercurrent but it is subtle and only appreciated when the first portion of exercise goes deep. They are not there all the time but when they come, watch out. The come so strong that you are not able to control them. You want to smoke a cigarette. It is a benign thought. You smoke one and it is over. You want to smoke another cigarette. Again you smoke and it is gone. You want to quit smoking. There is no problem. The thought of no smoking comes and you make a promise. It is all fine. Then the thought of smoking comes and your no-smoke-promise goes to sleep. It is interesting that conflicting thoughts can stay side by side in addictive thoughts. The same is true with alcohol addition or pornographic addictions. You keep addictive thoughts and wish to get rid of the addiction side by side. These are the hardest thoughts to recognize and deal with.. Yet, with practice it is possible to get there.

5. Urgency of thought output

You can find out what channels you tune into. This is possible by watching your thoughts. You can tell if you tune in to negative channels majority of times or do you tune into some positive channels at certain times. You also have to pay attention to what kind of processing goes on when you watch these channels. Once the processing is done, what is the mode of out put of your thoughts? Do you suffer from urgency of thoughts output. I am a urologist. I see many patients who have urinary urgency. This is common problem in women. When they have to go they have to go. Crossing legs may help, but, not for long. Some may leak while trying to hold. It is also common in men with enlargement of prostate.

It is hard to believe that this can be a problem with thoughts. I do this simple exercise to see how common this problem is. It is always difficult urgency of thought output for you. It happens without warning or recognition. So, it always helps to watch others. You can see in any party. All you ought to do is observe. Try to separate yourself for a little time from the discussions and just watch. Conversation is going on. Mr. A is saying something. Mr. B tries to respond. Mr. C can’t wait. He has to make his point. He intervenes not even knowing or acknowledging that Mr. B had already started. Mr. C gets interrupted because Mr. B had urgency of thought output. He could not hold.

Thought Management: Managing your Thoughts

1. Control of Mind – Dropping of thoughts
2. Multiplicity of thoughts
3. Caution
4. Explanations of Exercises for Thought Management

1. Control of Mind – Dropping of thoughts
This exercise should be done after one or two weeks of doing exercise 1. After that it becomes a combination of exercise 1 and this exercise. The idea is to drop any thought that comes through. No discrimination is needed. All thoughts that traverse the mind need to be dropped. Once you start the bad thoughts good ones start coming. They need to be dropped too. Good, bad and ugly; all thoughts need to be dropped.

I was describing this technique to a psychiatrist friend of mine. She was quite interested and even fascinated by the concept. The question she had is what happens if the thoughts reappear after dropping it. Some thoughts will re appear and keep reappearing. There is no problem with that. You have to keep dropping and keep dropping as many times as it keeps reappearing. You have to remember that the exercise is just to practice how to drop thoughts. It is not a judgment on your capabilities. The thought’s reappearance should not be taken as a defeat. No one is winning and no one is loosing in this exercise. The idea is to reverse the control. The fact that you can drop any thought at will takes you one step closer to getting control over your thoughts.

Some thoughts are easier to drop than others. Consuming thoughts are lot harder to drop. They are very tenacious. You almost have to separate them from yourself before they can be dropped. Once you practice this exercise for a while you can see the deeper thoughts that have stayed attached for quite a while and tend to stay there. The practice needs to continue. Indiscriminate dropping of all thoughts is the key. That is why I emphasized the point of not using this exercise in real life. This exercise is meant for only the session of half to one hour a day.

However, once you have learned to drop the thoughts, it can be applied to real life as and when needed. Here is an example. I drink a lot of coffee. I decide to cut my coffee intake. I like my morning coffee that I get from Dunkin donut which is on my way to work. I sit in the car and decide that I will not have coffee today. As I get closer to the coffee place, the thought comes that I could have it today and start not having coffee from tomorrow. I drop this thought. The thought keeps getting stronger as I come closer to the coffee place. The dropping of thoughts is also getting stronger. I am getting more powerful as well. The coffee shop passes by and I have gone past without having coffee and without having had to fight inside. The alternate approach which is common is to fight it. I want to fight my desire of having a coffee. The harder I fight the stronger the desire that I want to drink coffee gets back to me. The tension shows on my face. In the earlier example of dropping of thoughts, there is no element of stress or tension. Dropping of thoughts is not a fight.

2. Multiplicity of thoughts

We all know that our mind is active all the time. There is noise in there. Chatter is going on all the time. Is there only one thought at a time or are there multiple thoughts traversing the mind at any given time? I get up in the morning. I want to have tea. I also have to brush my teeth. Do I wake up my wife? My daughter and her daughter are home. I would love to play with my grand-daughter. Also, I have to write my article for the magazine. What about my golf? I must get my tee time. All these thoughts and more are in co-existence with me at one time. I do want to remind you that this are just exercises. We are talking about half-hour meditative exercises. All exercises help you to deal with real life situations. The applications are automated. Once you have the tools of dealing with thoughts, you will apply the tools in real life. Practice makes it a real possibility. The steps are:

1. Understand: Understand the underlying principles of the exercises

2. Exercise: Do the exercises as directed in half-hour blocks.

3. Apply: Application in real life follows. In the beginning you may have to make an effort; later it becomes effortless. It becomes a way of life for you.

4. Practice: Keep practicing 1, 2 and 3. We will discuss more about this later.

3. Caution
There are two things that might happen to you or anyone doing these exercise and you have to recognize them and be prepared to handle the fallouts from these:

A. There is going to be a change in your behavior, a change in how you deal with and process thought waves. You are going to be less predictable once that happens. This might affect relationship with close ones. Your spouse might find your behavior strange. Your wife comes home late and you are not disturbed. In the past you might have thrown tantrums if that happened. Now you know better. You will simply find out what happened. There might be a good reason for her to have been late. Your wife may have a pleasant surprise. Situation may take a turn. There may be occasions when someone may want to see you upset. Why are you not upset? Certain equilibrium has been reached between you and your surroundings. Change disturbs that equilibrium. A new equilibrium needs to be established. Sometimes it may become a problem. You are doing these exercises to bring peace to yourself and your surroundings. The contrary may happen. This is not what you may have planned for. I want you to know this beforehand so that you can prepare yourself for what may come in your life. A new balance may need to be re-established in certain relationships. You can handle it better if you understand that it might happen.

B. As mentioned above a change happens inside you by practice of meditative exercises. This change affects your outlook to life. Suddenly the world changes. You used to get up at 8 am in the morning. Now you get up at 5:30 am and are ready to do your yoga or meditative exercises before you go to work. It feels so good. You are full of positive energy. Now you want the whole world to behave this way. You want your son and daughter to also get up at the same time and get going the same way as you do. This impulse has to be recognized. You may want to share this newfound exercise with every one around you, but you need to resist enforcing on others you newfound love. You also need to avoid judging people according to your new standards. You have helped yourself by doing these exercises. It is good to share, but it is also good to resist imposing yourself on others. A balance has to be reached.

4. Explanations of Exercises for Thought Management

Processing of thoughts with positive energy
Thoughts or events that lead to generation of thoughts are generally neutral. We provide them energy (negative or positive) to go further. It is also important to remember that positive things generally happen around positive people. It is not that negative things do not happen to such people. The incidence of negative phenomenon around such people is less.

Example
Let us take a simple example. You are playing golf and you hit a ball. The ball slices and disappears in the woods. You are frustrated. How could this happened to you? You throw your clubs and start swearing. You take a drop and hit the next ball. This one goes astray as well. You have lost your center. You are still in an upset mode. You are not back to your happy point. The same event could be processed in a positive fashion. The ball has gone to the woods. How do I recover from it? I should get my next shot right. A good friend of mine, Brian Jumper, plays good golf. I asked him for some tips and he said, “It is all mental.” He knows it is not all mental but what he is trying to tell is that mind plays a great role in the game of golf.

Realization
It is important to realize that the processing of thoughts should be performed without letting the thought getting attached to you. You need to pick up any random thought that comes to your mind and process it. Processing requires energy from you. Prior to processing, it was just a thought. It is like a wild beautiful flower in a jungle. It just exists. Once a man comes near the flower, a new poetry arises. Making of a poem however natural, requires energy. Another man may want to dig the flower plant and destroy nature in the process. And yet another man may smoke his cigarette and throw carelessly in the wild forest which might start a wild fire. That wild fire may cause destruction and also cost money and lives in the process.

What is the point?
The point I am trying to make here is the kind of energy you provide in the processing the thoughts is important. Positive energy is what you need to use in processing theses thoughts in these exercises. Since these exercises are meditative exercises, there may be inadvertent materialization of your thought processes. Therefore it is important that you do not provide negative energy to any thoughts during these exercises. Otherwise, you might cause the wild fire effect in some form or the other. Also, since you will be working on certain thought intensely for approximately 5-10 minutes, you might also affect or pollute the universal thought pool if you impart lots of negative energy to that particular thought.

Positive Thinking
Most people understand what positive thinking is. They all want to bring this to their lives, but are not able to do it when they want to. The reason is that they are not used to doing so. Exercise one is meant to help you know what kind of thoughts you currently have and how you currently process your thoughts. This is how you have been doing it all your life. Any change takes time and practice. These half-hour exercises are going to provide you a platform for positive thinking. If you practice half-hour for several months, you walk around with positive energy and that is what you will have whenever any thought or event happens around you. Even negative thoughts can be practiced in a positive fashion. There is no thought or event that does not have a positive side to it.

Positive Imaging
One of my patients introduced me to this process. The patient had recently been diagnosed with prostate cancer. He had done his home work and wanted me to do his surgery. How can he control the outcome of his surgery by me? The patient gave me a book on positive imaging by Reverend Vincent Peele. It takes us beyond the world of thinking and places in the realm of imaging. The patient would imagine that he is on the operating table and I am doing his surgery. The surgery atmosphere is wonderful. The anesthesia is going well. The nurses are doing their job efficiently. The surgeon is doing his job. There is very little bleeding, if any. All this goes on to the end of surgery and he recovers well. Is this dreaming or is this positive imaging to the details? His outcome was excellent. There have been excellent outcomes in other patients too, who did not do positive imaging about their surgery. But, this does bring the dimension of a possibility in our lives. If you can image your thoughts you should try this technique during these exercises.

Positive state of existence
The goal of these exercises is to get to this state of living. By doing exercise one, you have already determined what kind of thoughts flow naturally through your head. Many of the successful people or high efficiency people have natural positive state when it comes to the area they excel in. If you are one of these successful people you may want to work on areas where you tend to have negative thoughts. You may be very successful in making money. People follow you as a leader in financial field. You may be on the cover of all the financial magazines. Yet, you may be very lonely inside. Positive energy helps you become a complete person. You have found your happy point. There still may be a problem with your spouse. You may not be talking to your son. But, it is ok. Once the negativity is out, you will be fulfilled as you are. Fulfillment on the outside just follows. Life outside is a reflection of state of existence inside. Once everything is at peace inside, you become peaceful outside. Thought management is not really enough to bring about these changes. Meditation works much better. Meditation also helps generate energy which then can be conserved in the form of positive energy state. Positive thinking then comes naturally to you.
It is worth taking a note from Krishna, from Bhagavad-Gita, who talks about attributes of such a person (who are able take part in nishkam karma):

nehabhikrama-naso ‘sti
pratyavayo na vidyate
svalpam apy asya dharmasya
trayate mahato bhayat

In this, there is no waste of the unfinished attempt, nor is there production of contrary results. Even very little of this Dharma protects from great fear. ||2:40||
1. No effort of nishkam karma is wasted
2. There are no obstacles (pratyavaya) in the path of nishkam karma and
3. Nishkama karma protects one from the greatest fear

The Supermind
By and by this exercise will prepare you for ultimate brainstorming power. Once you are able to do the exercise as above for few weeks, you will need to expand your horizons. Be open to input from the outside universe while processing the thought that you have randomly picked up. As if you have stopped your input and as if you have stopped processing from your side. You and your thought (picked up randomly) and nothing else. You with your thought are just waiting for some miracle to happen. And suddenly it does happen. You are now dipping into what Aurobindo has called the ‘Supermind’. You are one with this Supermind. Now you are able to process the thoughts at a different level. You are not alone. The input is coming from all around. You may need to develop a meditative mind to get there, but it is possible. Meditation then will start to have a greater meaning in your life at that point. We will stay here with thought management for the time being.

Thought Theme Undercurrent
This is an application of this exercise in regular life. In real life you can make one thought theme an undercurrent. You may have several parallel undercurrents running without any conflict with each other. Once you are able to pick up and stay with one thought without distraction; you will enjoy life on a different plane.

Example:
Let me give a simple example. I am a physician. One undercurrent thought theme in my professional life is ‘quality patient care.’ I was in office yesterday (Thursday) seeing patients. It was a busy day as usual. There was a patient, diagnosed with prostate cancer, who had come to see me. Let us call him John Doe. He is scheduled for surgery for removal of prostate coming Monday in 4 days’ time. He wants to get it done and be over with. The patient has a high grade cancer. The CT scan and liver ultrasound suggest that there may be minute metastasis in the liver. It is not clear. Rather, it is inconclusive. I do not have the images. The chances that there is liver metastatis are low. I try to contact the radiologist, who reported, to get more insight into his thinking. The radiologist is out till coming Monday. I talk to the patient and his family. They want to get it over with. Pressure is there. I go with the flow. The patient signs off on the consent-form and all is set. He leaves the office happy that surgery will be performed on coming Monday. All the paperwork is done. Everyone concerned is informed. I start seeing other patients and dealing with their issues. “The Quality Patient Care” undercurrent is still there. A thought comes about John Doe. The x-ray images are on my computer and I can talk to another radiologist and discuss his case. I can see images too, but I do not have much experience about liver mets or lesions. So, I pick up the phone and call the radiologist at another center where I work. We have a five minute discussion. The radiologist understands the situation and gives his feelings about the liver lesions. We feel that we should postpone the surgery and do some follow up images and have a better report of his status before proceeding further. This is what we go ahead with. I explain it to the patient and he is ok with that line of thinking.

Probably other physicians in this situation would have acted in a similar fashion without having the knowledge of undercurrent thought theme. They all have this undercurrent instilled in them while being trained as a responsible Urologist. The exercise mentioned above brings these undercurrents to a conscious level. Some undercurrents already exist in your life. You may want to get rid of some of these undercurrent thought themes once you become aware of them. And now that you have learned how to drop and add undercurrents, you can find it easier to get rid of some of these undercurrent themes.

Non-Attachment
By now you have picked up a thought, processed it as far as you can and have dropped it. You did not allow any of these thoughts to be attached to you. They were there just for the exercise. You thought about the game of golf intensely. Yet, the game was never there. You shot from the tee and perhaps made a birdie. But, the birdie was not real. There was no attachment. This is the basis of non attachment. Can this same principle be applied to real life? Is there no attachment in real life? We are born non-attached. We with help of our parents and the environment learn to attach. Every attachment disappears with our death. Exercise 3 lets you practice picking up a thought and processing it intensely for a few minutes. Remember to drop it completely as well. Then and then only will you get a glimpse of non-attachment. Whether you would like to taste this or not is up to you but do not be in a hurry to come to a conclusion about this intriguing topic.

5. Exercises:

1. Exercise 1. Knowing yourself
2. Exercise 2: Dropping All Thoughts
3. Exercise 3: Processing of thoughts

Meditative Exercise for Thought Management

Space and time:
You need to set aside at least half an hour for this exercise. You can find your own timing. It is always better to keep same space and time for any meditative exercise. I call it a meditative exercise because this exercise makes meditation easier. However, any time and any space are better than not doing this exercise. I use flight time for this exercise as well. You can do it on a break in office too. One place I find most useful for any meditative exercise is temples or churches. The vibrations are more conducive to help you get to deeper levels of any meditative exercise in these situations.

Posture:
Sitting position is preferable. Straight back and neck alignment has minimal gravity effect. A back support may be desirable. Sitting on a non conducting surface is energy preservation. Eyes closed and one palm over the other palm is also keeping the energy from going out. The same posture in future can be used for meditation. If sitting on the ground is not practical, a chair will do. This exercise can also be practiced lying down just before going to sleep. Again a quiet surrounding is preferable.

Important
It is important to remember that the exercises are just exercises. This is not a way to live life. Once practiced, life may change. But these exercises are meant for the period of exercises only. It is not a ‘should be’ proposition.

Exercises:
There are three exercises described below. There are some common elements, i.e where, when and how to prepare for the exercises.

The first exercise is for knowing your mind and thoughts that transit through your mind. This should be practiced first alone for few weeks before attempting the next step or next exercise

The second part of the exercise is about dropping of all and any thoughts. This again should be practiced for a month or so before going on to the next set of exercises.

The third part is about processing of thoughts and it emphasizes on processing with positive energy. Again all processed thoughts ought to be dropped as learned from exercise two. Now on all three can be practiced together. The first exercise later becomes a monitoring process to see if there is any fundamental change happening from practice of exercise 2 and 3.

Exercise 1. Knowing yourself

Goals

• Knowing yourself
We are what we think. It is important to know ourselves before we can think of having a change. Thoughts are flowing like waves. What thoughts are going to flow through my head is important to know. We all talk about positive thoughts. No body needs to tell me that. Yet, every one is telling every one else the same thing, “Have positive thoughts.” When the crunch happens, negative thoughts flow in uninterrupted and positive thoughts stay outside. How do we change this flow? The first exercise deals with this aspect, knowing yourself.

• Control of flow of thoughts
Now that we have learned about what kind of thoughts flow through our heads, can we change the flow? Is it possible to manipulate the thoughts? Can we control the flow of thoughts? We believe that it is possible. It is possible to change the flow. As we are thoughts control our existence. Thoughts (Mind) is the master. It is possible to change the control. It is possible to become the master of thoughts. Practice is the key

• Have a break from thoughts
We have not known thoughtlessness. We have not known an existence without mind. We keep on thinking when we are awake. We dream when we are asleep. Mind keeps on minding. It is possible to get to no-mind. It is possible to be without thoughts. This step will be discussed in future. Here we will mention the exercises for the first two components.

A brief
This exercise is meant for knowing what kind of traffic goes through our mind. This exercise is very individual. Honest is the best policy here. Just watch what kind of thoughts your mind allows. You may be a gateway for negative thoughts. You may be a positive person. No explanation or judgment is needed. A pure screening of who you are is the purpose. Awareness of thoughts is important. Thoughts often flow like waves, uninterrupted and abundant. Eyes closed and in meditative pose, watch the thoughts travel your mind.

Attempt this exercise for at least half an hour each day in the first week that you practice it. You have to make sure that you do not to get attached to any thought. Also, don’t stop or interrupt any thought. Let them run through your mind. The mind has a tendency to get attached to some kind of thought – good or bad, try to remain neutral through this exercise. If you find yourself getting attached to any one thought, start afresh. The mind may get bored and you’ll be tempted to abandon the exercise, but stay with it. Set the time as half an hour and persist with getting to know your mind.

The steps:
Sit straight upright with spine and neck aligned as mentioned above. Eyes should be closed or half open looking at the tip of the nostril. I find it easier to close the eyes completely. Now, just watch the thoughts that travel through your mind. Try not to get attached to any of the thoughts. Also, try not to interrupt or stop any of the thoughts. Many good thoughts may start to flow. Again, just because these are good thoughts, there is no need to get attached to them. Mind does not like this ignoring and tries to allure you into getting attached to some kind of thought material. Just try to continue to maintain the neutrality towards any and all kind of thoughts.

At times you will get attached to some of the thoughts. Once you realize it, you need to start again as fresh as ever. You behave as if no interruption has happened. Mind can now start getting bored. You need to be careful. It also starts telling you that you have done enough for today. Let us try doing more tomorrow. You ought to treat all these as traffic on the road. Let it all just transit. You set your time before you start and complete the project, come what may. Half hour is the minimum time I would suggest. If you are doing it on a flight in a plane, you can extend it to the time of the flight or make it an hour. After certain time, it is not boring at all.

I would do this exercise and this exercise alone for at least a week. After that it will be easier to move on to the next exercise. Try to resist going on to second phase before completing a week. You need to practice this for a week to become proficient in knowing your mind fully before moving forward.

Exercise 2: Dropping All Thoughts

The next step is Mind Control and is based on the principle of Tyag as described in Gita by Krishna. This technique is going to be a hallmark of all future techniques. So, it needs to be practiced as much as possible in your life.

The steps
Again, Sit straight upright with spine and neck aligned as mentioned above. Eyes should be closed or half open looking at the tip of the nostril. I find it easier to close the eyes completely. Now, just watch the thoughts that travel through your mind. The idea is to drop any and all thoughts that come through. You don’t have to be discriminating in this – any and all thoughts should be dropped. Some thoughts may reappear repeatedly. You need to drop them as many times as they appear. Just the fact that you can drop any thought at will gets you one step closer to controlling your mind. Indiscriminate dropping of thoughts is vital. This exercise is also meant as a half hour to one hour session at the most. This is not an exercise to be practiced in real day to day life. It is only to be practiced at the time of exercise slot. Application in real life is a byproduct. It just happens.

Exercise 3: Processing of thoughts
The 3rd step of this meditation technique and probably the most advanced – it takes perseverance and persistence. This exercise is going to give us the tool to identify and deal with one thought at a time. This exercise is not about prioritization. It is not giving advice about which thoughts to choose. It is about choice-less choice.
Goals: Processing of Thoughts
1. Directing mind to a particular thought (brain storming)
2. Processing thoughts
3. Generating Positive Energy
a. Positive Thinking
b. Positive Imaging
c. State of Positivity
4. Getting familiar with the Supermind
5. Having an undercurrent of thought themes
6. Understanding the basics of non-attachment

The steps:

Step 1: Pick up a thought
Thoughts are traversing as usual in your mind. The idea is to pick up a random thought and then stay with it for five to ten minutes. The important part is the randomness of choice. You just pick up any thought that comes to mind. Then start dropping all other thoughts. Just play with the one thought you have chosen.

Step 2: Non-Attachment
It is important to understand the fact that you are just picking up the thought randomly and providing energy to the thought for processing purposes. You are not allowing the thought to get attached to you. You will go through all the ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’, but you are going to maintain a distance between the ‘you’ (self) and the thoughts.

Step 3: Process the thought with positive energy
This exercise is about processing any thought. You need to be able to process all kinds of thoughts, good or bad, right or wrong. Once you are able to process the thoughts that you randomly pick up, it becomes easier to process a thought of your choice. So random thoughts have to be picked up and processed with positive energy for 5 to 10 minutes.

Step 4: Dropping of the Thought
At the end of this period the processed thought has to be dropped. The drop should be complete. It is as if the processing never happened. If it tries to come back, it has to be dropped again and again. This thought is not picked up again during this half-hour block and preferably never again in future exercises. Also, it is important that th thought is not allowed to attach to you. The next random thought is then picked up, processed and dropped. There should not be more than 5-10 thoughts that are picked up and processed in the half-hour block. Also important is the fact that no thought is processed for more than 10 minutes. If you are keeping a thought for over 10 minutes, it may mean that you are getting close to getting attached to that thought.

Before I get into the trip itself, let me explain certain aspects of meditation as I understand it.  Meditation is not something you or me do once a week or once a day.  It should be part of our life.  It ought to be an undercurrent that persists all the time.  Every one of us has been through the experience of an examination.  What happens one month before an exam?  We think of exam all the time.  Some students even take medicines to keep them awake.  I remember going to chai ki dukan in Patna in the middle of the night with a bunch of friends.

A conscious effort is needed in the beginning to make meditation the undercurrent of life.  Later, it becomes part of life.  We all know the pull of gravity.  We also know about the attractions and pull of sex energy.  There is similarly a strong pull of meditation energy.  It becomes obvious once there is some meditative experience.

It is always helpful to make one method as your core meditation technique.  I have picked up vipassana as a core technique for my life. I do not hesitate from trying any other technique.  A mantra jaap or kirtan dhyan or any other method will do.  I also found doing meditation in mandirs and tirth places quite an experience.  It is not difficult to find a corner in a temple where you can just sit down and slip into meditation.  People around usually do not bother.

I have been so far talking about meditation as if there is something for one to do.  In fact meditation is not a doing.  It is a happening.  It is more akin to sleep.  We create a surrounding where sleep comes and surrounds us.  Similarly, we create a situation where meditation happens to us.

We took a car ride to Rishikesh and reached there around 10 a.m. in the morning.  It was not difficult to find Parmarth Niketan where we were heading to.  We were 15 persons in total in two cars.  The view was so majestic.

The hills of Himalayas all around.

The Ganga flowing wonderfully.

We got our rooms in the ashram.  After getting fresh we met Bhagvati who is personal assistant to Muniji.  Muniji had to go to Delhi that day.  We all decided to take a bath in Ganga and went to the ghat.  The water was pleasant but cold.  There was a definite current.  After a short gap, there were rocks.  Water continued to flow around these rocks (see photograph).

We were all having good time.  We all started walking towards the set of rocks and a little beyond.  I found one of the rocks quite comforting and sat on it with my back staright and palms facing up one on the other hand.  I was ready for meditation to happen.  I sat there for over 90 minutes and I wish I could share my complete experience.

Let me talk to you about meditation itself.  I was sitting on one of the rocks.  There were other rocks there.  I did not hear them arguing about why I was sitting on one rock and not on the other.  There was gentle breeze going on.  The wind did not complain that I was in the way.  Sometimes the wind blew a little hard.  I had to balance my position at times to adjust to the speed of the wind.  If the wind turned into a storm, I would have moved out of the position.  This would be a normal practice.  The water was flowing around the stone.  They did not care if I was sitting in the middle.

The stone, the wind and the water appear to have sum-bhava to my presence.  Sum-bhava is very similar to what happens in vipassan as the end result.  It is a property of heart and not of the mind as many people want us to believe.  The stone or water have sum-bhava but with a big difference.  The level of consciousness is very low.  We are more conscious than the stones or the trees.  We can get to this sum-bhava by bringing our level of consciousness to their level.  We can get drunk or drugged and then claim to have sum-bhava.  Krishna is not talking about getting to that level.

Krishna is talking of bringing our level of consciousness higher.  Vipassana is a good technique to get there.  We have to learn how to deal with thoughts if we were to succeed in getting there.  Thoughts will keep coming.  It is like the wind blowing in the open.  Sometimes it will be gentle.  The other times it will be fierce.  We have to deal with thoughts in a similar way.  Let it just pass around you or through you.  There is no need to hang on to them.  They will transit through if you do not get attached to them.  If you do get attached to them for a moment, be prepared to drop them.  If the thought is really fierce, then you will need to be prepared to act on it similar to what you do with storm.  You do not sit in the open if there is a storm.  Similarly if you are meditating and some one tells you that there is a fire in the house, you will act on it rather than let it pass.

It will be difficult to understand Gita without meditating.  So far we have worked on trying to understand Gita without talking much about meditation.  It is time we get into the practices of meditation along with our journey of Gita.

“The behaviors of Jerry, Kramer, George and Elaine, the failed communication, and the everyday embassassment represent “nothingness” but a peculiar everyday life. These “nothingnesses” happen to all of us, but when it is put on TV, people will laugh at these. Besides, the author appreciates the fact that Seinfeld is a New York story but it is filmed in Los Angeles. Seinfeld takes those little nothings and combines them to create something realistic.”

Meditation is no Seinfeld, but this concept of nothing in Seinfeld can help in understanding what meditation is all about.  We need to understand that meditation just happens.  It is not even a process.  The techniques or processes are important, but they really are not techniques for meditation.  The techniques or processes take us to the point where meditation can happen.  It is not something that we can grasp, hold or catch and then bring it on us.

Meditation is more like sleep that it is like putting decoration lights.  All we can do for sleep to come is lie down in bed and switch off the lights.  We can prepare the surrounding which becomes conducive to sleep, but can’t force sleep to come.  Most of us are not very familiar with sleep because by the time sleep comes and surrounds our being, we are not aware of it coming.  We wake up refreshed and may remember some dreams, but by and large sleep happens in our unconscious state.  Meditation on the other hand is getting to the level of sleep and deeper with our intact awareness.  A big difference between sleep and meditation is that there is that of awareness.  There are meditative techniques whereby wakeful sleep is possible; but then it becomes a meditation.

Process and the product

It is important to understand this simple distinction between meditation techniques and meditation itself.   The techniques bring us to the point where meditation can happen.  The processes are important and are helpful in bringing us to a point where meditation can dawn upon us.  But, meditation cannot be forced upon me or you.  It is always spontaneous.

The commonest mistake for a person starting meditation is that he has a goal.  He or she wants to get enlightened on the first attempt for meditation.  If that does not happen in a short duration, we conclude that meditation is not for us.  This is my life story as well.  I started meditation in the late sixties.  I attended a meditation camp in Mt. Abu and spent seven days of intensive meditation sessions.  I had planned to get there by the end and it did not happen.  Was I frustrated or was I not?  You can guess that for yourself.

I now realize it better.  I understand the difference between process and product.  In our world where we live process and products have a relationship.  You eat and you get fat.  How the food affects your size also depends on how your body metabolizes the food you eat.  The input and output can be predicted to a large extent.  You market a product and there is a good chance you will be able to sell it.  This ordinary mathematics does not apply to the world of meditation.  You can do all the preparations; yet there is no guarantee that meditation will come.  It is generally said that meditation will happen for sure if you are ready for it, yet it is not possible to create that readiness by force.

The state of nothingness

However, there is another realization when meditation happens.  Nothing really happened.  All that happens is getting to know the reality of whom I am or who you are.  We live as if we do not know ourselves.  We are running away from ourselves.  We are always strangers to ourselves and more so loneliness bites us.  It is not that difficult to find out this simple truth.  Just observe someone when he or she is sitting alone.  They make efforts to make themselves busy.  They would like to go from shop to shop or flip pages of the same magazine three times over.  They may want to start a conversation with the person sitting next to them and what not.  There is nothing wrong with all this.

Meditation brings us home.  We start liking our own company.  There is no emptiness.  It is important to understand this.  Meditation is not a negative phenomenon.  It is not just absence of disturbances.  It is not just absence of thoughts.  This nothingness (shunya) is a very positive state of being.  That is why some people have used the word ‘whole’ for the same state of being.  Whole signifies everything as against nothing.  There is peace, calm and vastness all at one time.  Have you taken a walk in the morning besides a lake and looked at the freshness of the calm, vast peaceful lake?  There is no sign of negativity in the state of meditation.  It is a very positive state.  The whole body as if is full of peaceful vibrations.  Peaceful vibration sounds like a contradictory statement, but that is perhaps one of the closest descriptive words for this state.

The powerhouse of nothingness

This state of being brings clarity of thoughts to our existence.  Krishna calls it ek-buddhi.  Shankarachary calls it nishchaltattva and we call it clarity or decisiveness.  There is no actions (karma) happening at the center in the meditative state of nothingness, yet this is the source of all activity center.  This is the activity center.  No karma (akarma) happens here, but all karma start from here.  Nothing happens yet this is the source of everything.  This again is the reason some shadhaks (seekers) call it nothing and others call it everything (Whole).

This is just a realization that happens in meditation.  The truth has just been discovered. It has always been happening that way.  The ways are not limited to people who are in meditation.  It is true for all of us.  We normally do not know this fact of life.  The difference between us and those who live a meditative life is that of awareness.  They know it and we do not.

That is no small difference.  They are aware.  They can also see life events more clearly.  The decision making becomes easier for them because of the clarity of thoughts.  They live a happier life style.

Health and nothingness

We as we are live in our own world.  Some events are stressful and others are pleasant to us.  We let our being get affected with trivial things.  Disturbance is a pattern of our lives.  Sometimes disturbances are replaced with happy moments and we feel as if peace has arrived.  We go to a party and dance with music.  The dancing and the music has taken us away from normal disturbances and we are so happy.  We have not known the real positive peace.  We have not experienced the force of peace that is present in the nothingness of meditative state (sthitapragya).  All these disturbances affect our physical body.  We sometimes smoke and sometimes fight.  Stress induced illnesses start affecting our body.  We find solace sometimes in medicines and sometimes in alcohol.

It is not all that bad as I have painted the picture above.  It is not very far from the either.  Finding the state of nothingness brings a different dimension to our lives.  The positive peace travels with us to the music and the dance floor.  It does not only influence the individual me or you but also spread and surrounds the person next door.  The peace is infectious.  This positivity of nothingness travels with you like an aura.  How can such a person not be spiritually, mentally and physically in a healthy state?

Journey to nowhere:

I said above that positivity of nothingness travels with us like an aura.  The question arises as to whether meditation is also a journey and if it is where are we journeying to.

Let us first examine our usual journeys that we have taken so far.  We travel in different dimensions.  There is a journey in time.  We are born and we grow into childhood, adolescence and youth.  Every stage of life has its own beauty and has its own problems.  When I fall in love we feel that love is so unique to me.  But, at that age many others have fallen in love, are falling in love today and will keep falling in love in future.  Sometimes we get sick and then get better.  The time continues and our journey through time also continues.  We also travel in space.  I come from a village and spent a good part of my childhood in my village Balbandh.  I recently visited that same village in January 2004.  Not much has changed.  I could feel that kuch kuch (something, something) in my heart when I was there.  It was as if my childhood had come alive.  I also met some of my old time friends and we had a ball.  It only lasted for few hours because I had to continue my journey onwards.

It is usually said that time and space is related.  In fact time and space to some cannot be separated.  In my case time, space and I are also closely tied up.  There is so much travel and so many journeys that I as KB has taken and has yet to take. Yet, when I close my eyes and take the journey to my core, I see no journey at all.  There has been no travel of my core to anywhere either in time or in space.  It is still so static.  There is so much stillness there.  There has never been any movement of my center.  It is as still as the eye of a storm or the center of a tornado.

The journey of the outside stays outside.  What then is the journey to the inside?  It is the direction.  We ought to start looking inside.  There are techniques for meditation.  There are volumes of words written about meditation.  Gautam Siddharth left his palace and family for this journey of the inside.  When he found it, he also found that the journey is actually a journey to nowhere.  This journey to nowhere starts with a journey to somewhere and once the nowhere is found, a journey to everywhere starts again.  Once Buddha found that his journey to nowhere has come home, he started his journey to everywhere again.  He walked for 40 years telling others how to start the process for nothing and the journey to nowhere.  Many others have found this nothingness and have traveled to nowhere since then and before then.  Krishna is explaing that to Arjun as well.  Let us all be with Arjun and find more about this.

Second-hand knowledge of the self gathered from books or gurus can never emancipate a man until its truth is rightly investigated and applied; only direct realization will do that. Realize yourself, turning the mind inward. – Tripura Rahasya, 18: 89