Yoga Sutras
The Yoga of Wisdom
By Kosi
The ancient teaching of Ashtanga Yoga documented in the Yoga Sutras is revered as the yoga of wisdom that leads you to the eternal salvation known as moksha—unending happiness. According to the ancient sutras of Ashtanga Yoga the purpose of yoga is nirodha—the process of ending the vritti, which are endless thought-waves or streams of consciousness flowing through your mind and body that are both conscious and unconscious. Ramana referenced this ancient text when he said, “Ancient and timeless sense attachments in the shape of vasanas may rise countless like waves of the sea, which will all be destroyed as dhyāna progresses.” Dhyāna means meditation as the deep absorption in the Self—a vast unseen presence. It is an essential aspect of vichara or self-inquiry, but does this yoga negate the other seven spokes of this ancient dharma wheel? What if the other seven spokes are necessary for the stillness of dhyāna to manifest in your experience?
If you focus only on the yoga of dhyāna rejecting the other seven spokes of this ancient wheel it is a bit like opening pandora’s box. It inflates your ego leading you into the house of mirrors of your own reflective consciousness. The inflated ego ultimately careens headlong into violence, arrogance, and the endless grasping of the egoic mind for power and control. Instead of opening the door of liberation this one-spoke approach slams it shut locking you in a prison of your mind and endlessly changing states of consciousness. You might wonder, violence, arrogance, and grasping for power and control? How is this even possible in the context of dhyāna or deep meditation? Perhaps it is better to ask if dhyāna is even possible without the support of the other seven spokes of Ashtanga Yoga.
Just one look at the record of human history and you can immediately see the genetic propensity for violence and the pursuit of power and control that has played out time and time again. This is the unending tide of the karmic genetics of suffering—the great ocean of suffering known as samsara or the karmic wheel that eternally spins throughout the endless landscape of time. The movement to fight is deeply ingrained in human physiology and psychology as a primitive mechanism for survival. Dhyāna can be effective for stopping the erratic movements of your mind, known as the monkey mind, but it does nothing to address the underlying karmic genetics of suffering stored in the biology of your body most of which you are completely unaware exists.
The one-spoke approach of dhyāna definitely takes you directly through the gate of the ego into the realm of the endless Turiya stateless state of pure awareness, but it leaves you trapped an endless loop of reflective consciousness. This reflective loop of consciousness generates the delusion illusion of enlightenment, which in reality is the inflated ego with all the underlying tendencies left hidden in your subconscious. The great trick of dhyāna as a stand-alone yoga is it generates feel-good bliss states that are often mistaken as signs of actual progress when in reality it is a trance state generated by the mind—an endless loop of reflective of consciousness bouncing off the reflective surface of your ego. It feels good, but like all states, bliss states invariably disappear as old patterns of suffering continue to reassert their power over you.
Although, dhyāna is an extremely potent yoga, it was never meant to be a standalone yoga. The spokes of any wheel work in unison with the entire wheel. If, for example, you take a bicycle wheel and remove all the spokes except one the wheel cannot move—in fact it breaks and is useless. The same is true for the dharmic wheel of ashtanga yoga—each spoke supports the entire wheel—one spoke has no power without the support of the other seven spokes. If you remove the other seven spokes this ancient dharmic wheel breaks transforming the yoga into an ineffective and corrupt teaching.
It is important to understand that the teaching of Ramana Maharshi has nothing to do with states that change. Chasing after states of bliss as some kind of holy grail that will set you free from the morass of despair, sadness, or the overwhelming sense of hopelessness your mind generates has absolutely nothing to do with his teaching. Bliss states cannot be maintained due to the fact that states regardless of the feelings they generate and no matter how euphoric they might feel, is a state of consciousness that will change, which is the very nature of all states of consciousness. Bliss states feels better than sadness states, but the truth is they are both states that cannot be maintained over time.
The idea that bliss is a great sign of progress is a result of the oversimplification of Ramana’s teaching. This oversimplification is a corrupt teaching that can’t liberate you from the karmic wheel. The purpose of the yoga of vichara is to remove all the layers of reflective consciousness that are in a constant state of change until all that remains is the pure stateless state of turiya—as the continuous samādhi or continuous unbroken deep meditation. The purpose of Ramana’s teaching is moksha—the direct permanent realization of the ever-present unchanging self-luminous Self. This is what his famous drawing featured below depicts—the Self is the unchanging source of life itself—it is ever-present, infinite, unchanging pure conscious awareness. It is simply always here—period. But this vast unseen eternity will continue to remain elusive to your conscious awareness due to the layers of consciousness that obscure this real eternal presence.
This is the reason the one-spoke approach of dhyāna fails—absorption or meditation on the Self is only one aspect of the sadhana that removes the underlying genetic and mental tendencies that keep you trapped in an array of everchanging emotional states of consciousness. Dhyāna as complete absorption in the source is the essence and nature of vichara, but it is not a stand-alone practice—it is dependent on the other seven spokes of this dharma. All of the spokes work together in unison to remove both conscious and unconscious states of consciousness until all that remains is the self-luminous presence of God within you.
The dharmic wheel of the Ashtanga Yoga is static and unmoving until the initiation of the spoke is consummated in your heart. The moment of initiation ignites the life of the dharma. It is the cosmic push within you that begins the slow steady turn of this ancient wheel that begins the evolutionary process of your eternal salvation—like a seed that has been planted in the ground cracks open and begins the process of evolving into a tree. This first spoke is not something that can be pushed aside or ignored—it is in effect the key that starts the engine of this ancient dharmic wheel.
The first spoke is called Yamas. It is an initiation and code of conduct essential for success. If this spoke is ignored it leads to the enlightened ego that often results in the disastrous abuse of power demonstrated by several western teachers. This moral code of conduct must be earnestly and fully embraced or the underlying genetic tendencies known as gunas will not be fully addressed. As long as the potent genetic tendencies of the rajasic and tamasic gunas remain the potential for violence and sexual misconduct will continue unabated. The initiation that Yamas represent is the deep earnest commitment to non-violence and non-harm of other living beings, truthfulness, non-stealing, chastity, or marital fidelity, or sexual restraint, and non-attachment.
The second spoke in the wheel is known as Niyamas, which represents a deep commitment to the yoga, clear thinking, purity of mind, body, and speech. It is the radical acceptance of what is, contentment, and the total acceptance of others as they are, and the yogic practices of sadhana (the yoga of letting go). This includes the deep commitment to yogic practice, the study of Vedic scripture, perseverance (never giving up), self-discipline, and introspection, which also includes the deep contemplation of God, Ishvara, the pure consciousness of Brahman—the stateless state within your heart—the essence of self-inquiry.
Moving on to the next spoke in this ancient wheel of dharma is the Āsanas that we are all familiar with as a form of exercise, but this practice is more than just mere exercise. It is a physical alignment with the source, which is a purifying energetic stilling of the body that prepares the body for the immense energy of the unseen presence. It also is the essential preparation for the deep meditative state of samādhi that enables you to sit for long periods of time in deep meditation.
The next spoke in the wheel is essential for the more advanced yogic practice of self-inquiry—prānāyāma—the yoga of breath that controls your mind. This is the essential yoga for calming the endless thought-waves known as vritti. This yoga is essential for slowing down and eventually stopping the endless movements of your mind that lead to a wide array of emotions and emotional reactions to the circumstances of your life. Calming your mind with prānāyāma prepares you for the practice of pranava—meditation on the source using the power of the primordial sound OM.
The next spoke is pratyāhāra, which is the yoga of withdrawing the mind from the outer experience of the body and senses. It represents the essential transition from the egoic perspective, which naturally is focused outward on the world and the body-mind experience to the inner perspective of the heart free of the mind. This withdrawal of the mind is the essential yoga for aligning with the stateless state of Turiya. Pratyāhāra happens naturally when the ego is recognized on a visceral level to be the grand illusion of reflective consciousness.
For the awareness of pratyāhāra to transform into a permanent realization requires the one-pointed focused attention on the source of awareness in the heart—dhāraṇā. This next spoke on the wheel cultivates the permanent realization of the unmoving stillness of the Turiya stateless-state of pure awareness. Seeing through the reflective consciousness of ego through the one-pointed focus on the source eventually dissolves the egoic identity entirely.
The next spoke is dhyāna, which is the natural result of dhāraṇā. The one-pointed focus of the mind naturally leads to dhyāna or the merging of awareness with the source of awareness in the heart. This is the final step that cuts the knot of egoic identity that results in the final spoke of the wheel—samādhi—as the continuous realization that you are the eternal stateless-state of Turiya transcendent of thought and ego. In other words, it is possible to directly realize the source, but you cannot think your way to the source or know the source—Turiya is free of the mind entirely.
The permanent continues stateless-state of samādhi is not the same as the deep meditative state known as nirvikapla samadhi that lasts for a period of time until normal conscious awareness invariably returns. Moksha is the complete and total end of states that change—the continuous samadhi beyond the experience and the experiencer—often referred to as sahaja samadhi. This is the nature of moksha—it is simply not a state that changes.
It takes years, if not life times, of diligent committed yogic practice to permanently realize the endless state of samādhi free of all states of consciousness. This is the nature of the entire wheel of dharma—the yoga of wisdom arising in the Heart free of mind, body, thought, and the experiencer.
Once the ultimate state of samādhi has been permanently realized there is no one to experience or do anything—only the eternal presence remains.
This is the real nature of Sri Bhagavan Ramana’s Teaching.
It is an evolutionary yogic process of moksha.
Tat Sat
<’)
( ~ >
