What if you could understand the Universe?

Of course, we can’t just understand or comprehend the universe, right? We need help with this.

Why do we want to understand the Universe?

Let’s recap. It all started in the first chapter of the Yoga Sutras when Patanjali introduced us to the idea that we are complete, happy, and already content. In fact, that is the natural state of our mind; yes, it is all about our mind.

Yoga is that state of mind. We no longer depend on the events of our daily lives but have gained a profound understanding, an ability to focus so deeply that this balanced state becomes second nature, no matter what life throws at us.

Whatever we have experienced in our past, i.e. being misunderstood as teenagers, all those times we were told that we were not good enough, that some goals were out of our reach, whatever we have been told as we grew up, left impressions on our growing mind.

And how our growing mind tried to make sense of it and how to cope with these messages left imprints and consequently created patterns helping us manage. Yet, unfortunately, we are reliving those coping mechanisms as adults again and again, although they might not serve us any longer.

In adulthood, that might express itself in us giving up even before we start. Our career may not take us where we envisaged being, and we hit the same roadblocks repeatedly. Or we are surrounded by people that tell us again that said goals are out of our reach, rather than being in an environment that supports and cheers us on when we want to try something new. You get the idea.

Those patterns keep us from being deeply content and happy, from being able to return to our true nature. And it is this nature, this content state, that we are missing and do not quite know where to find it.

This is, in short and highly generalised, where Patanjali's Yoga Sutras are placed at the very beginning of our search.

How it all started

In the first chapter, we learn about the goal of Yoga and what it looks like. Then, Patanjali introduces us to the different stages of samadhi, this natural state of the total balance.

This state, however, seems so far out there, impossible to even envisage how it could feel or how we could reach it.

 And although it seems beyond our scope, Patanjali also reveals how to get there. Patanjali seems to be familiar with the pitfalls of our journey. We are told that on the way to reaching that goal, we encounter hindrances and obstacles in the form of illness, laziness, overindulging, setbacks due to stop and start etc. These hindrances are called Vikshepas; we looked at them in an earlier post. Luckily, we are also given tools to overcome these hindrances.

Patanjali further reveals that we have a natural flaw which is entirely out of our influence. This flaw keeps us from seeing ourselves and the world as it is, which creates obstacles, the Kleshas. And again, there is a way we can overcome them, which is the path of the eight limbs:

Yama, niyama, asana, pranayama, pratyahara, dharana, dhyana, samadhi.

The eight limbs ask us to start with ourselves. We can’t find the solution on the outside but on the inside. We need to look at how we treat ourselves and understand our internal communication, which is, as mentioned above, based on what we have heard as children and what we still keep telling ourselves. So first, our mind needs to be reminded to be kind, content, caring, and resilient.

As we are changing our mental attitude, we practise Yoga postures, learn breathing techniques, and bring our senses in check by leading them inwards to explore our rich inner landscape rather than reminding us that we need certain clothes, cars, and houses, need to look a certain way, to be happy based on whatever information our senses scoop up from the world around us.

It’s all inside us already!

Then we arrive at the third chapter. And it is here where we start to go beyond our imagination.

The chapter begins with completing the last three of the eight limbs, the most internal ones:

Concentration – dharana,

Dharana is the binding of the mind to one place, object, or idea.

Teaching our mind to stay put, to explore that one object we focus on or this one idea we have, staying with it. Our mind wanders, and we repeatedly bring it back to that object, concept, or place frequently until …

..the state of dhyana, meditation, is evolving.

Dhyana is the continuous flow of cognition toward that object.

We reach a state where all cognition, all tools of understanding/comprehending - our senses - flow in one steady stream towards our object.

So, for example, let's say a stone is our object. We see the colours, feel its texture, smell its earthiness and so forth, and at no point does our mind wander off and say, 'Oh, do you remember when we went to this beach, there was a similar stone? Yes, oh, and we met so and so and went to have a bite in the lovely restaurant, what was its name again, oh, I can't remember, hold on, where was it again in this street with this great book shop ……' and so forth. So, when we stop having these excursions while doing whatever we are doing, we reach the state of meditation.

This is already reasonably advanced, right? In the scripture, you will often find the image of pouring oil from one pot to another to describe the process. This steady stream of oil is dhyana, the state of meditation.

But this is not all.

When we keep practising, we reach samadhi,

Samadhi is the same meditation when there is the shining of the object alone, as if devoid of form.

So, the shining of the object, only the essence of it, is so subtle we don't even see the object. So, there is no more stone, no more thoughts. Physically the stone is still in front of us, but the state of our mind is now beyond the externals, has comprehended everything there is to know through the senses, and all thoughts have been poured into the process; now there is only the essence left.

For moments, we all have already experienced this state when everything comes together. We get so immersed in whatever we do that we forget where we are, what time it is, and what people say to us. Right? We all have been there; the only missing ingredient is awareness. That is the difference between being immersed and having reached samadhi.

 When we keep practising these three internal limbs, concentration, meditation and samadhi on one object, this is called samyama. When we master samyama, the light of knowledge comes. And even this practice needs to be accomplished in stages. So it takes time.

The rest of the Yoga Sutras explains what we can experience when we practise samyama on different objects; for example, if we practise samyama (concentration, meditation, samadhi) on friendliness, and other similar qualities, the power to transmit them is obtained.

Or by samyama on the sun, knowledge of the entire solar system is obtained.

By samyama on the moon, knowledge of the stars' arrangement is obtained.

The possibilities are endless and difficult to grasp with our thinking minds. Therefore, we are encouraged never to stop and continue going deeper and becoming more subtle in our perception until,

at the very end, the power of put consciousness settles in its own pure nature.

I promised it's out there, far beyond what seems possible. So we are invited to keep practising and never stop, as there is always more to it.