Being woke means you group people by skin color, gender, ethnicity. You take away individuality and assign group characteristics and thoughts they are allowed to have.
A Vedantic Exploration of Mind as the Object of the Self
[This is part 2 of a 2 part series]
Projections of the mind due to superimposition
Just as while seeing a movie, we are all the time seeing the screen, even while seeing the world of objects, emotions, and thoughts, we are really seeing the Self. A person who is ignorant of the screen may consider the various images projected on it to be real and may become frightened on seeing a scene of fire. However, if our attention is on the screen, we will not be affected by any of the images seen on it as we know that they are not real. The purpose of practice of seer-seen discrimination is to shift our attention from the seen objects to the Seer, the Self. Since we do not know the nature of the self, we think that whatever we are intimately associated with is me. We can liken this to our dream state where we are able to make that distinction of seer – seen. We witness very vividly various images depicting our thoughts and emotions in various situations and the distinction is clear because it is another state – we remain unaffected.
Necessity of Seer-Seen Discrimination
When two entities are similar, discrimination becomes more difficult, for example, it is difficult to separate sago and white stones. Discrimination is also not possible when we do not know that there is a second entity. For example, if a person thinks that she or he is the distorted reflection in a mirror and suffers due to it, the only solution is proper discrimination between the actual person and the reflected image. Due to ignorance we think we are the body-mind and suffer. We are in fact the Seer of the body-mind, and the limitations of the body-mind cannot affect us if we properly discriminate between the Self, the Seer, and the body, the seen.
"Who Am I?"- Nature of the self
I, the Seer, cannot be the body or mind. The body is an object of the sense organs. Although, the thoughts are subtler than objects, they are seen (perceived) by me as my thoughts. Therefore, I cannot be the mind, which is made up of thoughts. Further, I exist in the state of deep sleep without mind (thoughts). Then, Who am I?
Sri Lakshmidhar Kavi in his short treatise of 28 sutras called Advaita Makaranda (the nectar of Upanishad mantras) refers to the nature of the self in the 8th and 9th verse:
I am not the body, nor the sense organs, nor the pranas, nor the mind and nor the intellect, because these are all objects of the my-thought or of the ‘this thought’.
I am the witness, all pervading and dear, and not the ego (ahamkara) ever, which has the calamitous associations with modifications, limitations and afflictions.
He further elaborates on the ahamkara and the self which is not within the scope of this article.
The scriptures declare that the Self is of the nature of existence-consciousness-bliss. Existence expresses as the thought "I am." Consciousness expresses as the thought "I know." Bliss (happiness) expresses as the thought "May I always be." The very fact that we want to live for ever shows that our nature is happiness and not sorrow.
As the Self, the Seer, is always distinct from the body and mind, which are seen, the idea "I am such and such a person" does not belong to the Self. Also, the body, mind, ego, etc., are inert and cannot say "I am such and such a person." The question arises, "Who is the embodied individual?" This empirical embodied individual is an illusion created by mutual superimposition of characteristics of the Self and ego (I-thought). (There is also mutual superimposition of characteristics of the ego and body, which makes us say, "I am the body.")
"Who Am I, The Individual?"
The scriptures state that in reality, I, the Self, am of the nature of absolute existence, consciousness, and bliss, the question remains, "Who am I if the embodied individual, who transacts with the world, does actions and enjoys the results of actions, is born and dies?" This empirical embodied individual is comprised of the many factors. Firstly, there is the Witness, the pure Consciousness-Existence, without which nothing can exist. However, the reflection of this Consciousness alone gives sentiency to the mind, and the mind can function only through a physical body.
Implications for mind management
Who I am, is beyond the mind: This is the way in which Patanjali introduces Yoga in the first four instructions of the Yoga Sutras. Paraphrasing, he says:
- Now, after all the preparation of life and practices, begins the study and practice of Yoga.
- Yoga is the nirrudah (mastery, control, regulation, transcendence, restraint) of the many levels of thought patterns in the field of mind.
- Then, with that achievement, one rests in the awareness of their true nature as Self or pure Consciousness.
- At other times, when not in this higher, truer state of awareness, one is falsely identified with those many levels of thought patterns contained in the mind field.
Being the witness/saksi : There is a single process that threads its way throughout the Yoga Sutras. That is to witness everything. Sakshi-bhava is the attitude of remaining as a witness or the ability to objectively look at the world, situations and problems. To witness everything involves systematically disentangling from the thought patterns, witnessing thoughts, cultivating remembrance or mindfulness, moving through the levels of awareness, and dealing with the gross, the subtle and the subtler.
Witnessing the thought process means to be able to observe the natural flow of the mind, while not being disturbed or distracted.
Witnessing thoughts does NOT mean a psychological suppression or repression of thoughts and emotions. This is a great quality by itself. Normally we are so conditioned with our likes & dislikes, that we either crave or are averse to situations. Mindfulness or cultivating a witnessing attitude is a universal human faculty that is recognised in all cultures of the world for its intrinsic and transformative qualities.
Buddha not only rediscovered Vipassana meditation, one of India ‘s most ancient meditative practices but also recommended that meditation must be an essential part of life as a continuous process. Vipassana which means ‘observing in a special way’ is also synonymous with being conscious or aware, observing and paying attention.
This brings a peaceful state of mind, which allows the deeper aspects of meditation and samadhi to unfold, revealing that which is beyond the mind.
Personal experience: At a personal level, it took a lot of unlearning to think of myself as not the mind because my profession and my identity came from the working of my mind primarily. The recognition that I am more than my body-mind-sense complex is liberating. I continue to be amused and blessed (contradictory as it is) at how the mind works and why shouldn’t it? It is the nature of the mind to think. The practice of sakshi bhava has brought a lot of equanimity in my life as one is able to view events of the mind and not get carried away which contributes to functioning more effectively. In my work with street children which is very intense, what has worked for me is knowing that:
However gratifying the work, it still is a role, Observing situations objectively and responding proactively to do the best in the given situation and gracious acceptance of the results.
At a deeper level, I am blessed with the scriptural teaching about satyam and mithya and that I am Consciousness awareness and continue to prepare the mind to absorb this.
In conclusion:
Excessive identification with the mind has caused us to confuse thinking with identity and hence being. The problems of the mind cannot be resolved from the standpoint of the mind. The ability of viveka or discrimination is required to establish the distinction between seer and seen/subject object – I am not the body-mind sense complex. The principle of seer seen discrimination with respect to the self and the mind is one of the key steps to understanding the true nature of the self. Yoga sutras mention the practice of witnessing to objectively look at the world and its situations which brings about peace and reveals what is beyond.
-Mrinalini Rao
[Mrinalini Rao is a clinical psychologist & she is currently involved with developmental work for street children in India]
A Vedantic Exploration of Mind as the Object of the Self
[This is part 1 of a 2 part series]
In this information technology age, knowledge is at a premium and a greater emphasis is on occupations where the use of the mind is at its highest. People seek to define themselves by their thought processes – I am a complex person..I am sad when I think about my past…I am intelligent .. I have a poor memory…I am stupid and take time to understand things…I am so troubled my thoughts…wish they would stop…My mind is full of continuous chatter … I am sad..
As long as I am my mind, I am those cravings, those needs, wants, attachments, aversions, and apart from them, there is no ‘I’ except as a mere possibility or an unfulfilled potential. Excessive identification with the mind causes thought to become compulsive. The incessant mental chatter prevents people from finding that realm of inner stillness that is inseparable from Being. It also creates a false mind-made self .
The philosopher Descartes believed that he had found the most fundamental truth when he made his famous statement, “ I think, therefore I am.” He had in fact given expression to the most basic error: to equate thinking with being and identity with thinking.
Most of us think compulsively and therefore live in a state of apparent separateness and fragmentation of the mind. Identification with the mind creates an opaque screen of concepts, labels, words, judgments, images and definition that blocks all true relationship. It comes between you and yourself, you and another person. It is this screen of thought that creates the illusion of separateness, the illusion that there is you and a totally separate other. Because we are so unconsciously identified with it, we don’t even realise that the mind is using us and we are not using it. It ‘s almost as if you were possessed without knowing it and so you take the possessing entity to be yourself.
Many people seeking to know the self think that there is a great deal to be learnt about the working of the mind before they are anywhere near spiritual enlightenment. Studying the mind ‘s complexities certainly helps in mind management but doing so won’t take you beyond the mind.
Some of the features of having or deriving a strong sense of self due to identification with the mind are as follows:
-People feel very stressed and are so busy getting to the future that the present is a means to getting there.
-The past takes up a great deal of attention – with frequent talks about it, positively or negatively in the form of talking about past achievements or failures, adventures, experiences or stories or terrible things done to the self or the terrible things done to others.
-People are plagued with ‘what if’ thoughts that show the identification with the mind which projects itself into an imaginary future situation and creates fear.
-Most times, the thought processes create guilt, pride, resentment, anger, regret or self-pity.
-The mind says that you need time – to sort out, do, achieve, acquire, become or understand something because ‘you are not good enough’.
-The manifestation of defining the self as the mind is a deep sense of finitude – every pursuit is an act of rebellion against the sense of limitation that the individual feels.
According to Vedanta, self knowledge can be understood by an adhikari – a prepared student, one of his foremost qualities being viveka or the ability of discrimination. One of the things to be discriminated is what the self is and what the self is not.
Identification with the mind only strengthens a sense of self that is a substitute for your true self rooted in Being. The individual recognises that ‘I am not my hand, I am not my leg’. He says "my hands, my legs, my body, my brain." He also says "my intelligence." Though we also say "my mind,", we identify so much with the mind. This is very significant. Although it is your mind, it is one of the instruments within one of the parts of you. Just as the leg is a part of you, and the hand and the brain - similarly, the mind is a part of you just as the limbs are different, as your body is different from you. Between the "I" and the mind, there is so much attachment and mine-ness that anything happening to the mind is happening to us. Even if we make this paradigm shift, of ‘I am not the mind only’, our functioning demands that we use the mind on an ongoing basis in the world. It is easier to discriminate between the body and the self as opposed to the self and the mind, the mind being more subtle from the body. -
The ego is always seeking for something to attach itself to in order to uphold and strengthen its illusory sense of self. The notion of self or self-identity is the core around which the psychological patterns and the reality of the individual develop, and this notion becomes therefore the subject of change for the purpose of self-development and psychotherapeutic healing. The beginning of freedom is the realisation that you are not the possessing entity – the thinker. Knowing this enables you to observe the entity. The moment you start watching the thinker, you begin to realize that there is a vast realm of intelligence beyond thought, that thought is only a tiny aspect of that intelligence. You also realize that all the things that truly matter – beauty, love, creativity, joy, inner peace – arise from beyond the mind.
Yoga psychology tells us that it is the mind which is excited, that it is the mind that is sorrowful. Indian philosophy believes - even Sage Patanjali says - that the Self does not have anything of the nature of pain, pleasure, loss, gain, success, failure, fortune, misfortune... All those polarities, those dualities are not for the Self, they are all for the mind.
Subject and object relationship
Philosophy and metaphysics suggest that we are not the mind. The word ‘antahkarana’ or inner instrument is used to denote the mind and its aspects. Clearly, the mind is our instrument – to be used by a self other than the mind.
Since correct knowledge of the Self is not a pre-requisite to know the world outside properly, we just ignore ourself. The ability to know an object does not presuppose the existence of the correct knowledge of ourselves.
The term 'object' refers to anything anyone might be aware of or pay attention to. The term refers, then, not only to 'physical' objects, including whatever material processes, states, or conditions one might discriminate, but also to such 'mental' or immaterial entities or processes as pains, sensations, memories, images, dreams and daydreams, emotions, thoughts, plans, numbers, concepts, moods, desires and so on.
The term, 'subject' refers to I-who-am-aware. One is likely to know immediately, without having to stop and think it over, or having to collect any evidence, which is I and which is the object. Three guidelines could be: (1) I, subject, can be aware of some object (2) I can focus awareness in attention (3) I can distinguish myself from the object I attend to.
Anything one can objectify is the object and the one who objectifies is the subject. In an object, one does not have the I-notion. The subject and object are two distinctly different entities. The knower of anything is distinct from the thing he knows.
The distinction between subject and object, and our capacity to make that distinction, is prior to any particular opinion or theory about what either the subject or the object may be. You can distinguish yourself as subject from any object whatsoever ('physical' or 'mental') any time you direct your attention to that object and realize that it is you who are aware and who pay attention, not the object. The real nature of the object and the real nature of the subject may be baffling mysteries to us, but these mysteries are no barrier whatever to knowing which is obviously which. There is a greater entity which objectifies the events of the mind – emotions, thoughts, memories etc. Therefore, the problems of the mind cannot be solved on the level of the mind. The seer is different from the seen; the subject cannot be the object.
Indian secularism is not about empowering minorities or communal harmony. Even historic figures like Dara Sikoh are sacrificed or sidelines at its altar. It's about subliminal acceptance of Turk-British superiority and not genuine multiculturalism or pluralism.
When Notre-Dame in Paris caught fire, there was an outpouring of grief from Bollywood. At that very time, 7 temples in Tamil Nadu caught fire, not a word from anybody.
All the leaders of the Muslim League who demanded Pakistan never went to Pakistan. They stayed in India to carve out more Pakistans with the help of Nehruvians & Marxists
You must be knowing about the Jallianwala Bagh massacre, but did you know about the Bhairanpally massacre, the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of South? In 1948, Nizam’s police made 200 Hindus stand in a line & shot them dead. Their crime? They refused to pay Jizya tax. Bhairanpally (also Bhairavunapalli & Bairanpalle) is a village in Maddur Mandal of Warangal district in Telangana. While Jallianwala Bagh is taught in schools, Bhairanpally massacre is ignored.
Hinduism recognizes One Self in all beings and all existence as Upanishads proclaim. Yet those who divide humanity into believers and nonbelievers (kafir & heathen), the saved and the damned, criticize Hindus as casteist. Believers versus non-believers is the ultimate religious casteism.
Every year, Hindu temples & mutts across India hold Iftaar party
On Ganesh Chaturthi, Ganesh Pandal offered space for Namaz
On Durga Puja, Durga pandal played Azaan
But Waqf board went to SC against HC order of celebration of Ganeshotsav at Idgah Maidan, Bengaluru. For records, Idgah Maidan is govt property. When will Hindus learn?
What a Secular Nation India is!
Here, ruckus is created at midnight on the death of terrorists like Afzal Guru but on murder of girls like Ankita Singh, neither SC judges take suo motu cognizance, nor the PM condemns the murder.
Vin V
Being woke means you group people by skin color, gender, ethnicity. You take away individuality and assign group characteristics and thoughts they are allowed to have.
2 years ago | [YT] | 9
View 0 replies
Vin V
A Vedantic Exploration of Mind as the Object of the Self
[This is part 2 of a 2 part series]
Projections of the mind due to superimposition
Just as while seeing a movie, we are all the time seeing the screen, even while seeing the world of objects, emotions, and thoughts, we are really seeing the Self. A person who is ignorant of the screen may consider the various images projected on it to be real and may become frightened on seeing a scene of fire. However, if our attention is on the screen, we will not be affected by any of the images seen on it as we know that they are not real. The purpose of practice of seer-seen discrimination is to shift our attention from the seen objects to the Seer, the Self. Since we do not know the nature of the self, we think that whatever we are intimately associated with is me. We can liken this to our dream state where we are able to make that distinction of seer – seen. We witness very vividly various images depicting our thoughts and emotions in various situations and the distinction is clear because it is another state – we remain unaffected.
Necessity of Seer-Seen Discrimination
When two entities are similar, discrimination becomes more difficult, for example, it is difficult to separate sago and white stones. Discrimination is also not possible when we do not know that there is a second entity. For example, if a person thinks that she or he is the distorted reflection in a mirror and suffers due to it, the only solution is proper discrimination between the actual person and the reflected image. Due to ignorance we think we are the body-mind and suffer. We are in fact the Seer of the body-mind, and the limitations of the body-mind cannot affect us if we properly discriminate between the Self, the Seer, and the body, the seen.
"Who Am I?"- Nature of the self
I, the Seer, cannot be the body or mind. The body is an object of the sense organs. Although, the thoughts are subtler than objects, they are seen (perceived) by me as my thoughts. Therefore, I cannot be the mind, which is made up of thoughts. Further, I exist in the state of deep sleep without mind (thoughts). Then, Who am I?
Sri Lakshmidhar Kavi in his short treatise of 28 sutras called Advaita Makaranda (the nectar of Upanishad mantras) refers to the nature of the self in the 8th and 9th verse:
I am not the body, nor the sense organs, nor the pranas, nor the mind and nor the intellect, because these are all objects of the my-thought or of the ‘this thought’.
I am the witness, all pervading and dear, and not the ego (ahamkara) ever, which has the calamitous associations with modifications, limitations and afflictions.
He further elaborates on the ahamkara and the self which is not within the scope of this article.
The scriptures declare that the Self is of the nature of existence-consciousness-bliss. Existence expresses as the thought "I am." Consciousness expresses as the thought "I know." Bliss (happiness) expresses as the thought "May I always be." The very fact that we want to live for ever shows that our nature is happiness and not sorrow.
As the Self, the Seer, is always distinct from the body and mind, which are seen, the idea "I am such and such a person" does not belong to the Self. Also, the body, mind, ego, etc., are inert and cannot say "I am such and such a person." The question arises, "Who is the embodied individual?" This empirical embodied individual is an illusion created by mutual superimposition of characteristics of the Self and ego (I-thought). (There is also mutual superimposition of characteristics of the ego and body, which makes us say, "I am the body.")
"Who Am I, The Individual?"
The scriptures state that in reality, I, the Self, am of the nature of absolute existence, consciousness, and bliss, the question remains, "Who am I if the embodied individual, who transacts with the world, does actions and enjoys the results of actions, is born and dies?" This empirical embodied individual is comprised of the many factors. Firstly, there is the Witness, the pure Consciousness-Existence, without which nothing can exist. However, the reflection of this Consciousness alone gives sentiency to the mind, and the mind can function only through a physical body.
Implications for mind management
Who I am, is beyond the mind: This is the way in which Patanjali introduces Yoga in the first four instructions of the Yoga Sutras. Paraphrasing, he says:
- Now, after all the preparation of life and practices, begins the study and practice of Yoga.
- Yoga is the nirrudah (mastery, control, regulation, transcendence, restraint) of the many levels of thought patterns in the field of mind.
- Then, with that achievement, one rests in the awareness of their true nature as Self or pure Consciousness.
- At other times, when not in this higher, truer state of awareness, one is falsely identified with those many levels of thought patterns contained in the mind field.
Being the witness/saksi : There is a single process that threads its way throughout the Yoga Sutras. That is to witness everything. Sakshi-bhava is the attitude of remaining as a witness or the ability to objectively look at the world, situations and problems. To witness everything involves systematically disentangling from the thought patterns, witnessing thoughts, cultivating remembrance or mindfulness, moving through the levels of awareness, and dealing with the gross, the subtle and the subtler.
Witnessing the thought process means to be able to observe the natural flow of the mind, while not being disturbed or distracted.
Witnessing thoughts does NOT mean a psychological suppression or repression of thoughts and emotions. This is a great quality by itself. Normally we are so conditioned with our likes & dislikes, that we either crave or are averse to situations. Mindfulness or cultivating a witnessing attitude is a universal human faculty that is recognised in all cultures of the world for its intrinsic and transformative qualities.
Buddha not only rediscovered Vipassana meditation, one of India ‘s most ancient meditative practices but also recommended that meditation must be an essential part of life as a continuous process. Vipassana which means ‘observing in a special way’ is also synonymous with being conscious or aware, observing and paying attention.
This brings a peaceful state of mind, which allows the deeper aspects of meditation and samadhi to unfold, revealing that which is beyond the mind.
Personal experience: At a personal level, it took a lot of unlearning to think of myself as not the mind because my profession and my identity came from the working of my mind primarily. The recognition that I am more than my body-mind-sense complex is liberating. I continue to be amused and blessed (contradictory as it is) at how the mind works and why shouldn’t it? It is the nature of the mind to think. The practice of sakshi bhava has brought a lot of equanimity in my life as one is able to view events of the mind and not get carried away which contributes to functioning more effectively. In my work with street children which is very intense, what has worked for me is knowing that:
However gratifying the work, it still is a role, Observing situations objectively and responding proactively to do the best in the given situation and gracious acceptance of the results.
At a deeper level, I am blessed with the scriptural teaching about satyam and mithya and that I am Consciousness awareness and continue to prepare the mind to absorb this.
In conclusion:
Excessive identification with the mind has caused us to confuse thinking with identity and hence being. The problems of the mind cannot be resolved from the standpoint of the mind. The ability of viveka or discrimination is required to establish the distinction between seer and seen/subject object – I am not the body-mind sense complex. The principle of seer seen discrimination with respect to the self and the mind is one of the key steps to understanding the true nature of the self. Yoga sutras mention the practice of witnessing to objectively look at the world and its situations which brings about peace and reveals what is beyond.
-Mrinalini Rao
[Mrinalini Rao is a clinical psychologist & she is currently involved with developmental work for street children in India]
2 years ago | [YT] | 15
View 0 replies
Vin V
A Vedantic Exploration of Mind as the Object of the Self
[This is part 1 of a 2 part series]
In this information technology age, knowledge is at a premium and a greater emphasis is on occupations where the use of the mind is at its highest. People seek to define themselves by their thought processes – I am a complex person..I am sad when I think about my past…I am intelligent .. I have a poor memory…I am stupid and take time to understand things…I am so troubled my thoughts…wish they would stop…My mind is full of continuous chatter … I am sad..
As long as I am my mind, I am those cravings, those needs, wants, attachments, aversions, and apart from them, there is no ‘I’ except as a mere possibility or an unfulfilled potential. Excessive identification with the mind causes thought to become compulsive. The incessant mental chatter prevents people from finding that realm of inner stillness that is inseparable from Being. It also creates a false mind-made self .
The philosopher Descartes believed that he had found the most fundamental truth when he made his famous statement, “ I think, therefore I am.” He had in fact given expression to the most basic error: to equate thinking with being and identity with thinking.
Most of us think compulsively and therefore live in a state of apparent separateness and fragmentation of the mind. Identification with the mind creates an opaque screen of concepts, labels, words, judgments, images and definition that blocks all true relationship. It comes between you and yourself, you and another person. It is this screen of thought that creates the illusion of separateness, the illusion that there is you and a totally separate other. Because we are so unconsciously identified with it, we don’t even realise that the mind is using us and we are not using it. It ‘s almost as if you were possessed without knowing it and so you take the possessing entity to be yourself.
Many people seeking to know the self think that there is a great deal to be learnt about the working of the mind before they are anywhere near spiritual enlightenment. Studying the mind ‘s complexities certainly helps in mind management but doing so won’t take you beyond the mind.
Some of the features of having or deriving a strong sense of self due to identification with the mind are as follows:
-People feel very stressed and are so busy getting to the future that the present is a means to getting there.
-The past takes up a great deal of attention – with frequent talks about it, positively or negatively in the form of talking about past achievements or failures, adventures, experiences or stories or terrible things done to the self or the terrible things done to others.
-People are plagued with ‘what if’ thoughts that show the identification with the mind which projects itself into an imaginary future situation and creates fear.
-Most times, the thought processes create guilt, pride, resentment, anger, regret or self-pity.
-The mind says that you need time – to sort out, do, achieve, acquire, become or understand something because ‘you are not good enough’.
-The manifestation of defining the self as the mind is a deep sense of finitude – every pursuit is an act of rebellion against the sense of limitation that the individual feels.
According to Vedanta, self knowledge can be understood by an adhikari – a prepared student, one of his foremost qualities being viveka or the ability of discrimination. One of the things to be discriminated is what the self is and what the self is not.
Identification with the mind only strengthens a sense of self that is a substitute for your true self rooted in Being. The individual recognises that ‘I am not my hand, I am not my leg’. He says "my hands, my legs, my body, my brain." He also says "my intelligence." Though we also say "my mind,", we identify so much with the mind. This is very significant. Although it is your mind, it is one of the instruments within one of the parts of you. Just as the leg is a part of you, and the hand and the brain - similarly, the mind is a part of you just as the limbs are different, as your body is different from you. Between the "I" and the mind, there is so much attachment and mine-ness that anything happening to the mind is happening to us. Even if we make this paradigm shift, of ‘I am not the mind only’, our functioning demands that we use the mind on an ongoing basis in the world. It is easier to discriminate between the body and the self as opposed to the self and the mind, the mind being more subtle from the body. -
The ego is always seeking for something to attach itself to in order to uphold and strengthen its illusory sense of self. The notion of self or self-identity is the core around which the psychological patterns and the reality of the individual develop, and this notion becomes therefore the subject of change for the purpose of self-development and psychotherapeutic healing. The beginning of freedom is the realisation that you are not the possessing entity – the thinker. Knowing this enables you to observe the entity. The moment you start watching the thinker, you begin to realize that there is a vast realm of intelligence beyond thought, that thought is only a tiny aspect of that intelligence. You also realize that all the things that truly matter – beauty, love, creativity, joy, inner peace – arise from beyond the mind.
Yoga psychology tells us that it is the mind which is excited, that it is the mind that is sorrowful. Indian philosophy believes - even Sage Patanjali says - that the Self does not have anything of the nature of pain, pleasure, loss, gain, success, failure, fortune, misfortune... All those polarities, those dualities are not for the Self, they are all for the mind.
Subject and object relationship
Philosophy and metaphysics suggest that we are not the mind. The word ‘antahkarana’ or inner instrument is used to denote the mind and its aspects. Clearly, the mind is our instrument – to be used by a self other than the mind.
Since correct knowledge of the Self is not a pre-requisite to know the world outside properly, we just ignore ourself. The ability to know an object does not presuppose the existence of the correct knowledge of ourselves.
The term 'object' refers to anything anyone might be aware of or pay attention to. The term refers, then, not only to 'physical' objects, including whatever material processes, states, or conditions one might discriminate, but also to such 'mental' or immaterial entities or processes as pains, sensations, memories, images, dreams and daydreams, emotions, thoughts, plans, numbers, concepts, moods, desires and so on.
The term, 'subject' refers to I-who-am-aware. One is likely to know immediately, without having to stop and think it over, or having to collect any evidence, which is I and which is the object. Three guidelines could be:
(1) I, subject, can be aware of some object
(2) I can focus awareness in attention
(3) I can distinguish myself from the object I attend to.
Anything one can objectify is the object and the one who objectifies is the subject. In an object, one does not have the I-notion. The subject and object are two distinctly different entities. The knower of anything is distinct from the thing he knows.
The distinction between subject and object, and our capacity to make that distinction, is prior to any particular opinion or theory about what either the subject or the object may be. You can distinguish yourself as subject from any object whatsoever ('physical' or 'mental') any time you direct your attention to that object and realize that it is you who are aware and who pay attention, not the object. The real nature of the object and the real nature of the subject may be baffling mysteries to us, but these mysteries are no barrier whatever to knowing which is obviously which. There is a greater entity which objectifies the events of the mind – emotions, thoughts, memories etc. Therefore, the problems of the mind cannot be solved on the level of the mind. The seer is different from the seen; the subject cannot be the object.
to be continued in part 2.....
2 years ago | [YT] | 12
View 0 replies
Vin V
Indian secularism is not about empowering minorities or communal harmony. Even historic figures like Dara Sikoh are sacrificed or sidelines at its altar. It's about subliminal acceptance of Turk-British superiority and not genuine multiculturalism or pluralism.
2 years ago | [YT] | 8
View 0 replies
Vin V
When Notre-Dame in Paris caught fire, there was an outpouring of grief from Bollywood. At that very time, 7 temples in Tamil Nadu caught fire, not a word from anybody.
2 years ago | [YT] | 12
View 0 replies
Vin V
All the leaders of the Muslim League who demanded Pakistan never went to Pakistan. They stayed in India to carve out more Pakistans with the help of Nehruvians & Marxists
2 years ago | [YT] | 10
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Vin V
You must be knowing about the Jallianwala Bagh massacre, but did you know about the Bhairanpally massacre, the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of South? In 1948, Nizam’s police made 200 Hindus stand in a line & shot them dead. Their crime? They refused to pay Jizya tax. Bhairanpally (also Bhairavunapalli & Bairanpalle) is a village in Maddur Mandal of Warangal district in Telangana. While Jallianwala Bagh is taught in schools, Bhairanpally massacre is ignored.
2 years ago | [YT] | 19
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Vin V
Hinduism recognizes One Self in all beings and all existence as Upanishads proclaim. Yet those who divide humanity into believers and nonbelievers (kafir & heathen), the saved and the damned, criticize Hindus as casteist. Believers versus non-believers is the ultimate religious casteism.
2 years ago | [YT] | 21
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Vin V
Every year, Hindu temples & mutts across India hold Iftaar party
On Ganesh Chaturthi, Ganesh Pandal offered space for Namaz
On Durga Puja, Durga pandal played Azaan
But Waqf board went to SC against HC order of celebration of Ganeshotsav at Idgah Maidan, Bengaluru.
For records, Idgah Maidan is govt property.
When will Hindus learn?
2 years ago | [YT] | 30
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Vin V
What a Secular Nation India is! Here, ruckus is created at midnight on the death of terrorists like Afzal Guru but on murder of girls like Ankita Singh, neither SC judges take suo motu cognizance, nor the PM condemns the murder.
2 years ago | [YT] | 30
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