We can have two different
approaches concerning our psychology. The first approach forces us with
despair to accept the natural condition of our mind and soul, just like
it is now, with all of its shortcomings, its fears, its depressions,
its griefs, and to consider it an unalterable state of affairs, a
predicament, a scourge of fate for the whole human race, something we
are born with, that we have to put up with, all the way up to our dying
day. In this approach ´being human´ means the same as being
fallible, being fearful and full of sorrow. This is the approach most
of us humans have. It is provoked by the state our soul is in. When we
close our eyes we see only demons, the demons of our past and the
demons of the society we live in. They make us run away as fast as
possible. This is the reason we fear our solitude. Because our soul is
a junkyard of sad and fearsome memories.
The demons of the world
behind our eyelids make us want to escape our own very self. And modern
day technology is both a mean and a cause in offering us plenty of
means to do so. At every single moment we are alone, we run to the
computer, switch on the television or check out our cell phone for
messages. Modern day humans have become so very restless because of
these distractions, haunted as they are by an internal tension that
oscillates between exaggerated, almost preposterous excitement and
resigned boredom, that they are not satisfied anymore with their own
self. Just look around you in the train or in the bus. People cannot do
nothing anymore. They have to be distracted by something external. Even
reading a book has become for most people too demanding, because
concentration in reading presupposes a certain peace and inner
tranquility, that most of us have lost in our zest for external
stimuli. Reading is boring. It is not excitement and fun for most
people. Let alone sitting all by your self. That would really drive you
nuts, wouldn´t it?
Why are we so afraid of our
selves? Why do we want to run away from the darkness inside? Why
does closing our eyes scares the hell out of us? It seems that we are
lost and cannot find any meaning in our selves nor in the world around
us. There is no meaning to the darkness inside, as our fear tells us.
It seems that introspection brings us only closer to our subconscious
where all of our demons are stored and the malevolent Earth ghost roams
about. We certainly do not want to approach Him, for we might be
swepped away by its demonic powers. So we decide to avoid. But in the
darkness of night and in the quiet hours of the morning our Earth ghost
breaks free. In our dreams we are still being haunted by the thing we
want to avoid the most. And what is worse still: during the day also
the demonic state of our subconscious begins to show, in our words and
actions. We are neurotic, and we know it. The things we say and do make
us only feel guilty.
an alternative
approach
So this first approach to the
problem of our interiority -accepting in sighing resignation the state
we are in- is not a solution. For we cannot accept a state of affairs
that drains us of our very life blood. We do not want to live our whole
life with the demons of our past. And the problem only seems to worsen,
because the old demons become stronger and new ones come up and seem to
multiply with the day. So something needs to be done. We are poisoning
ourselves, our relations and the society we live in, with the way we
are. If we want to make a better world, we have to make a better self.
That is the only solution to the problem of self and to all of the
global problems that come along with it.
Let us turn our alternative
approach into an experiment. Let´s simply be curious about what
will happen. It will probably take a lot of courage and perseverance to
perform the experiment right to the very end, but it is something worth
trying, because the experiment has been tried before and not
unsuccessfully. A number of men and women have given us the example of
their lives. They have proved the experiment to be feasible. So it is
worthwhile to follow in their footsteps.
For the experiment is this:
what will happen if we train ourselves in some form of one pointedness?
If we reserve some periods during the day for closing our eyes and
fixing our attention at something that is one (and the same) and
recurring? We can let all our thoughts and all our emotions for what
they are, without condemnation or approbation. In this experiment
we´ll only try to come back to this ONE thing we have chosen, all
the time. It may be a mantra, it may be the tip of our nose, it may be
the in and out flow of our breathing, or some lofty thought about
something that transcends our small personal self, like God or love,
you name it, but crucial for the experiment are the demands of oneness
(so stick to the mantra you have chosen or stick to the image of Jesus
or Krishna in your meditations, if this divine person is meaningful to
you) and recurrence (do it over and over again, as much as you can
during the day, relentlessly, with great perseverance).
The first purpose of this
experiment is making the mind and body more stable and concentrated. We
have to see that the problem of the neurotic mind is its volatile and
fickle condition. The modern mind has become, because of all of its
distractions and because of its almost absurd extroversion, animal
like, it has regressed to an ape like condition. It jumps feverishly
from one mental branch to another in a desperate attempt to control and
understand. But the result is only a mad monkey jumping up and down in
fear and bewilderment. He makes a lot of noise and acts like there is
something going on, but it is only ´much ado about nothing´.
So concentration is the first
stage. The mind must focus on one single object. This concentration of
mental energy brings all of the mind´s power together at one
point, just like the looking glass collects the light energy of the
sunbeam at one single spot. This concentration creates an enormous
power in the mind, the same power that has created great scientific
discoveries or sublime works of art. These could only be accomplished
because of the collected energy of concentration.
Besides building up energy,
concentration has the result of calming down your mind. Devoting
yourself to a task, studying for an extended period of time, training
to get your body into a certain shape are all forms of concentration
that make you feel better, because the one pointed effort needed to get
the required result entails calmness as a byproduct. Concentration
spins off inner peace and tranquility, because concentration brings
about the order and harmony of oneness, just like the magnet makes
beautiful patterns out of a chaotic heap of pulverous iron. In the
experiment we make use of this calming effect of concentration. Our
mind becomes more tranquil when concentrating on a mantra or on the
thought of God. This has nothing to do with the content of the
concentrating thought -it might even be absurd in its meaning, like
with a mantra, or in the case of a divine person you might even have
doubts about the real existence of a personal God- but this tranquility
is the result of the training of the mind in repetition. It is a merely
a physiological process.
This concentration needs to
be trained. Just like in any skill, art, profession or study, here also
the mind needs to get used to focusing its attention. In art, sports or
study we focus our attention at a certain ability or a certain content
of excellence. But here in practicing our mantra we focus our attention
on concentration itself. We simply become good in concentrating, not in
concentrating on anything whatsoever. The experiment is not
concentration at something.
It is simply concentration, period. This
concentration without any specific content makes our mind extremely one
pointed. With practice the mind will become concentration itself.
emptiness
But concentration is not our
goal. It is simply a mean to reach to a deeper level of interiority. In
reaching this deeper level the whole body/mind structure will
experience -or perhaps it is better to say: will realize- a condition
of wide open spaciousness and bliss. For concentration without content
is like a black hole that sucks the psyche into another inner
dimension. The concentration will afford the psyche the possibility to
transcend her own limited condition and reach the inner world of
non-dual oneness, where the world of our interiority together with the
world of our exteriority are both realized as one in actuality and
potentiality. This potential-actual world is experienced as a deep
limitless emptiness, the non-spatial spaciousness that opens up once
our concentration falls away and our consciousness sinks into its own
ground of being. This happens in between two points of concentration.
With this falling away of the concentration, we, the experiencer,
we, the concentrator, also fall away into this emptiness. The
self subsides into the Self. Now we are one with It. This is not an
experience, it is more a res negativa,
a cessation and a transcendence
of all dualities, including the one between the experiencer and the
experience. In the Void we are the world and the world is us. We do not
merely experience is as such.
Some have written in a
condemnatory tone about this technique of concentration and meditation,
objecting that it might make the mind inert and somnolent; that it
might damage most of the vital functions of our brain, with the
exception of this small part of our choice. But in fact it is more the
opposite: conversely the mind becomes more alert and energetic and all
of its vital functions become more pure and healthy. This is not a
technique aimed at starving out our emotions. It is a technique
validated by tradition for giving us pure, healthy emotions. Meditation
does not make us impotent. It purifies us to our fullest potency.
Maybe the technical term
kenosis (´emptying out´) has suggested this misconception,
that the meditator in employing the technique of ´emptying
out´ might make her mind dull and feeble. That the technique
effects a kind of brain damage, showing itself in loss of memory and a
reduction of personal will power. Some critics have even compared the
mystic with junkies and other addicts and mentally disabled persons, in
describing her mental condition as a form of
´depersonalization´. The drug addict (and also some cases
of schizophrenia), just like the mystic, also suffers from memory loss,
a desintegration of the personal self and a blurring of the
destinctions between self and its surroundings, they say. They point to
the fact that most mystics, just like junkies and schizophrenics,
become sooner or later socially marginalized, because they are no
longer able to cope with their surroundings. Loss of personality would
lead to a disability to be socially active and to face the more
demanding tasks of life. A person without a circumscribed persona is
not able to defend itself, they explain.
These critics have no
adequate insight into the difference between the depersonalization of
the addict and the ego reduction of the mystic. For in the latter case
the
personality is not lost, but transcended, which is something completely
different. In the mystical transcendence of the personality the self
becomes strengthened, instead of weakened. The self is in this
transcendence of its own limited psychic scope broadened, by employing
the technique of concentration and meditation, to encompass a far more
wider reservoir of energy than in the case of ´the old
self´. The junk closes in on itself. The mystic opens up from
itself. The actual consequence of these diametrically opposed
tendencies can be seen and felt in the psycho-dynamic energy of love:
the junk and the mentally ill shut the world out; the mystic embraces
the whole world in total, selfless and unconditional love.
Here again the mystic is a
paradox. She becomes a great, strong personality by way of losing
(transcending) her personality. Numerous examples from history show the
mystic to be a healthy, well integrated and energetic personality,
despite the fact that there seems not to be a ´he´ or a
´she´ anymore as personal appearance is concerned. In a
number of cases the mystic has accomplished deeds that were decisive in
bringing about social welfare and progress, tasks, demanding such
enormous energy and stamina that they could never have been brought to
an end by an emotionally instable person. Such tasks demand a healthy
integration of all the psychic energies, both from the heart and the
mind.
what remains?
So meditation is the use of
concentration for temporally emptying out the mind of all content. This
leads to the realization of a deep and spacious stillness in the heart
of the meditator. It is like realizing the deep abyssal darkness of
dreamless sleep, with the difference that the meditator now remains
fully awake and conscious. The psychic condition of the meditator
becomes so used to this calmness and serenity, that more and more, as
his training reaches higher stages, this serenity stabilizes itself
into his daily life. Now he has realized it also outside of his
meditations. It becomes a permanent trait of his being and character.
What remains when the heart
and the mind are emptied out from their old images, feelings, thoughts
and memories? Will we still be human? It this not a meaningless animal
or vegetable state? No, is the simple answer. It is not a regression to
an animal or vegetable kingdom. It is a progression to another kingdom:
the kingdom of heaven. The result is that we become more than human,
godlike in a way, because now we will be in direct contact, without any
interference from the vital and the mental, with that simple joy of
being, with that springlike feeling of a first day of creation, that
life intended us to have. We will have reached our home. Now at last
will we have found that love, safeness ( even a form of cosiness) and
certainty in our self, that no home, no family, no person was able to
give.
Let´s imagine a state
wherein all is lost. Our wife has left us. Our children live too far away to
meet them on a regular basis. We are all alone now. Life has proved to
be a disillusion and all we ever hoped for has proved to be a failure.
We have to live on very meager means. We do not see friends and
relatives that often. Day after day we only have our selves to converse
with. Can we be happy, aye, even ecstatic with joy, in such
circumstances? Would life still present us some meaning, when all such
embellishment is stripped off? What remains when all is lost?
Even in such circumstances a
person can be totally happy and fulfilled, if one manages to free
one´s self from all the debris of one´s past and live
completely in the here and now. In that stillness of heart and mind
there are no worries. Worries are always about the past and the future.
But in this ´state of the last man´ we have no past anymore
and we see no reason to project any hopes into the future. For life has
learned us some hard lessons and we know by heart that there is nothing
to hope for. But sitting in the peaceful quietness of our room we have
learned to live with that idea. We have even learned to laugh about
this silliness of our worries. For we have learned that there is only
this moment that we sit here. Tomorrow another day will come. But then
we will be sitting here also. In the same life. With the same life
energy.
This thought is not
depressing. For the mystic who has trained herself in resting in and
being the Self, this insight and this realization are to the contrary
pure ecstasy. After the suffering of having to give up all illusions,
she now has reached that deep inner peace that nobody can take away,
because it is part of herself, yes, it is her own very Self, indeed.
This Self is the haven we finally sail in to. This Self is the home we
finally reach after the hard travail of our life. It is the only anchor
we have. This anchor we can only drop in the dark emptiness of our own
Self. There it rests in all of its golden splendor at the bottomless
bottom of our heart, where it sends up on its cable the love of its
golden beauty to the whole of our being, to the whole of the world. So
when all is lost, we finally gain everything. Finally we have found the
love we were always searching for.
and all our emotions for what
they are, without condemnation or approbation. In this experiment
we´ll only try to come back to this ONE thing we have chosen, all
the time. It may be a mantra, it may be the tip of our nose, it may be
the in and out flow of our breathing, or some lofty thought about
something that transcends our small personal self, like God or love,
you name it, but crucial for the experiment are the demands of oneness
(so stick to the mantra you have chosen or stick to the image of Jesus
or Krishna in your meditations, if this divine person is meaningful to
you) and recurrence (do it over and over again, as much as you can
during the day, relentlessly, with great perseverance).
Our wife has left us. Our children live too far away to
meet them on a regular basis. We are all alone now. Life has proved to
be a disillusion and all we ever hoped for has proved to be a failure.
We have to live on very meager means. We do not see friends and
relatives that often. Day after day we only have our selves to converse
with. Can we be happy, aye, even ecstatic with joy, in such
circumstances? Would life still present us some meaning, when all such
embellishment is stripped off? What remains when all is lost?
