Vedantham : ( 07/11/2012. )

. Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Part-14. The Real is not ultimate in the sense of a distant or remote object. It is logically remote, but not physically remote. The distance that we feel between ourselves and that which we wish to achieve in yoga is logical, not geographical. It is not far away in the sense of several millions of kilometres or light years. I t is as far away from us as the waking state is away from dream state. There is a large distinction, of course, and a difference between dream and waking – a world of difference. Yet, we know the difference is logical, not physical. Dream and waking are not two different locations physically. Therefore, inasmuch as the distance between our present consciousness and the state which yoga wishes to attain is only logical, and not physical, there is a great hope for us. It is in this sense that we say that Reality is immanent in every one of the degrees of its expression. It is immanen...

. Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Part-13. If this had not been the case, we would be totally satisfied with everything that we have and anything that we are; there would be no need to think anything or do anything, and there would be no needs of any kind at all. But the world is full of needs, and it is nothing but that. The needs arise on account of the fact that our existence is finite, and we want to break through this finitude by any method that is available to us. But all these methods that we employed, and we are employing now in the pursuit of a non-finite being of ourselves, have failed throughout history. Yoga has a new method altogether, and that method finally hinges upon what is called meditation. It is, of course, the last stage in yoga, but it has its impact upon the lower stages also. Though the finale of the education career is the achievement of some perfection in one's personality, the characteristics of the educational p...

Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Part-12. What is yoga, then? It is that sort of expanding the 'being' of our consciousness. It is not the expanding of the consciousness of possession of anything; it is not to become a rich person, and it is not to become a very important person in the world in the eyes of people. Nothing of the kind is yoga. It is to become important in a different sense altogether – 'important', because that which is 'not you' becomes 'you'. The anatman, as they call it – the not-self, or that which is not at all us – which is threatening us, and which we would like to subdue and make a part of ourselves, that ceases to be 'that which we have to deal with externally'. We are struggling, actually, with our own higher nature. All our struggles, finally, are struggles with our own selves. It is not a struggle with people, it is not a struggle with things or the world outside, because the ...

Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Part-11. Consciousness refuses to be artificially and externally associated with anything outside it because, basically, yoga tells us that our being is infinite. It is not a finite dimension that we are seeking to achieve; it is an unlimited dimension that we are asking for. This is the reason why nothing that is given to us can make us happy. May the world be ours, but we are still unhappy, because we know that there are more things than this world. Finally, even if the whole universe is under our possession, we may be cut off by death, and we do not know what happens to us at that time. The fact that our psychophysical existence can be wiped out in a moment by operations which are beyond our control is also a feature which demonstrates the artificiality of the way in which we are living, and the non-yogic way in which people conduct themselves. Swami Krishnananda To be continued  ..

Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Part-10. The power of yoga is a different thing altogether. It is a power which is identical with our very existence itself, and not because people have voted for us as a political leader. It is not a political power that we are wielding, because we can be rid of it in a moment if we get fewer vote. So is the case with wealth of any kind. We can be robbed of all the wealth we have, and we will be a pauper in a moment. But the power of yoga is that of which we cannot be dispossessed at any time. Our strength lies not in what we possess, but in what we are. Yoga is, therefore, that sort of integration of being, whereby our state of existence – what we 'are' – becomes larger than it is now. We are something more than what we are now. Remember these words. We do not become larger by possession or by reaching up to a distant space by travelling geographically or astronomically. The power of yoga is the...

Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Part-9. There is no relation whatsoever; it is a relationless widening of the dimension of our being. When we widen our dimension, we exist as a non-separate, indivisible, secure something, and not merely in a state of artificial extension of our dimension – as is the case with a rich man, for instance, or a political ruler whose jurisdiction or dimension of existence is artificially expanded to the extent of the area of his operation. A king or a political administrator is integrated very, very artificially with the area which he rules, and the rich man is artificially integrated to the extent which his wealth can go. But no one can possess wealth, because the wealth is something outside the consciousness of one's being. The possession of wealth and the security that one feels in its possession is totally artificial, because one can be dispossessed of it in a second. So is the case with land, property, and polit...

Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Part-8. Thus, no human being can be said to be really secure and happy. There is only an imaginary satisfaction we are creating – a fool's paradise, as it were, is this world. We seem to be quite secure, happy and comfortable because we have created a fool's paradise around ourselves, in which we are ruling like masters. This is a fool's paradise because it is not really a paradise. It is not real, because no real integration has been established by our consciousness in respect of the atmosphere around it – call it people, call it things, call it the world of nature. Yoga does not tell us to be satisfied with this artificial integration. It is seeking to establish real integration. Again, to come to the point, what is real integration? It is not a tentative adjustment that consciousness makes with its atmosphere by love or hatred or by political manoeuvres, but by a real embracing of the very bei...

Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Part-7. Consciousness cannot brook the presence of anything outside it; the whole question boils down to this issue. We cannot tolerate the presence of anything else, but we cannot help being conscious of there being something outside us also. So, there is a tentative, artificial adjustment which the human consciousness makes with everything around it, which is what is called social concourse. It does not mean that we are friendly with anything. But we know very well that we cannot help it. There are occasions when we cannot establish this friendly reconciliation with objects, for reasons known to our own self. Then, we retaliate, and create a circumstance wherein again we are under an impression that we are integrated, in the sense that the object outside the consciousness is not there. In circumstances where it is possible for us to abolish the existence of that object by absorbing it into our own self by love,...

. Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Part-6. A person who is intensely in love with something abolishes the insecurity that is apparently there, arisen out of the independence of that object in respect of the experiencing consciousness. A person who is hateful in his attitude also is engaged in a similar act of abolishing the feeling of insecurity arisen on account of a hateful thing, by engaging himself in that procedure of behaviour by which the object does not any more exist as an outside something. I do not know if I have mentioned to you that in love as well as in hatred, we are engaged in a single operation – namely, the abolition of the independence of the object, and an insistence that it is no more there outside us. In love, we absorb it into our consciousness, and it is no more there outside us. In hatred, we try to abolish it in some way or the other, by various means, and it is no more there as a contending party. Swami Krishnananda To b...

Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Part-5. This is something like what goes by the name of 'intuition', in a very, very specific sense. It is a direct entry into the object, so-called, of consciousness – an object, which need not necessarily be a physical something. By 'object', we have to understand here anything that lies outside consciousness as the content thereof. A content which cannot be assimilated into consciousness but remains outside it somehow, with which the consciousness has to struggle to establish a sort of relationship – this is our present life. We know very well that the world of people, the world of things, the world of nature, is outside our consciousness; and yet, we cannot rest quiet by merely being aware that it is outside our consciousness. We are terribly insecure by being aware that there is something outside the purview of our consciousness, and we wish to abolish this insecure feeling in us by imagining that...

Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Pat-4. It is only the discriminating consciousness that feels dissatisfied with its present achievements. Ignorance is bliss, and when we know nothing about what lies ahead of us, and we are not even conscious of there being anything at all beyond our possessions and our areas of operation and action, we are kept in a state of This ignorance also brings a sort of joy, because of the disconnection of consciousness from the awareness of there being something beyond itself. So, the ignorant person is happy, and we too are happy, though we know very well that our very physical existence here is not secure. It is a terrible insecurity in which we are placed, and the next moment's fate of our physical existence is not known to any wise man in the world; yet, we are happy. This is an instance of how ignorance can be bliss. However, yoga is that art of awakening the sleeping consciousness of the human individual to...