Part 18 of 46
‘Your waking state — master it first’
Mandukya Upanishad-1-1-9
The simplest, smallest mantra — the AUM, is also the toughest to hold on to. It’s most inaccessible to turbulent minds and near impossible to master. People will experience an irritation when they try the AUM as a silent chant.
It seems as if the surface mind does not need or want this imposition upon itself, and views the chant as a challenge to its freedom. Very soon the mind pulls a trick on the AUM and slips away into other thoughts, leaving the mantra in some irrelevant corner. After a while the individual will either stop chanting, or simply forget it altogether.
This is how the surface mind is. Stubborn, undisciplined and very resistant to any attempts to gain control over itself. In fact the more you try, the more stubborn it gets and the more devious its tricks become. People spend decades sitting in silence yet nothing happens. They just become more miserable, more frustrated than before.
How can we break the firewalls inside the mind and penetrate to the pure Intelligence within? This is the essential challenge before all of us. The ancient Vedantic practice of mastering the waking state — the jagritha sthan provides the key. This is the mindfulness approach. It’s straightforward and effective. If you are not able to meditate on the AUM, observe what else the mind is doing. Just follow the mind like a dog follows its master. Go where it goes. Never leave it out of sight. The mindfulness technique can be very valuable. As you keep following the mind, you also gain a sense of camaraderie with it — a sort of empathy as to why it is unable to stay in one place. This empathy can bring you to contact with your mind. This might sound weird but it is a fact that the mind always controls us. We never question this so we never actually come to contact with our own minds. With the mindfulness technique we detach ourselves from our minds and slowly, eventually achieve a mastery over it.
Behold the awesome power of your waking state — the surface mind. Most people, in a hurry to delve within, ignore this most potent part of their being and suffer as a result. The waking state is where your life happens. This mind is always under great strain. It has to keep worrying about a zillion things all the time.
It has to help you win the battle called your life. If you don’t respect its efforts and just keep saying AUM, it will horsewhip you out of irritation. This is why most so called meditators have strained and pulled down faces. They are trying to meditate blindly and are being punished by their minds as a result. Unless your surface mind wants it you will never be able to open the door to deeper domains. Lao Tze said a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step — well this is that single step. Master your waking state first. Figure out a way to open that door.
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( Source: Mani Shankar/ Deccan Chronicle, Hyderabad 10th May 2009 )
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