SAMADHI: The Yoga Vashishta describes a mind that is ready for the experience of Samadhi thus: Fed on (Shravan) concentrated listening to the teacher, (Mantra) , mind made peaceful by Japa, and hushed into a blissful silence by (Dhyan) contemplation, such a mind is flight -ready for the final leap into God realisation. This is the eighth and the last stage of a yogi’s Sadhana, the ultimate goal of all his disciplines. A worldly man’s mental energies are so hugely employed in the external world where he endlessly runs, panting after ever slipping rewards of power, money, status, recognition and applause. How can he then ever aspire to still the death dance of the mind? Moving forward in life is not possible unless you wilfully reject and discard with determination the present condition. Shankara Bhashya describes the extreme peace of the minds that retire from the fruitless search for permanent joy externally, that “their spiritual unfoldment is directly proportional to their success in retirement from mental engagements with the outer world. “
As the lower mind discards its usual pleasure hunting grounds it slowly and steadily ascends to the ultimate goal of all meditation–the Samadhi. Swami Chinmayanandaji describes these rarified heights as: “Those subtler realms are the mystic regions of strange beauty, of unearthly brilliance, of heavenly melody, of super sensuous joys…….to extreme peace.”
To one who attains the Supreme in Samadhi, the scriptures promise immortality, because the one who has realised the immortal self is established in it. He is no longer dragged and tortured by the shocks of incessant change. A self -realised master in India, even when seeking alms, is called a “Maharaj” (a great King), because he no longer lives like a worm in the gutter of sin and sorrow, he for ever is established in the perfect bliss of Godhood.
Prarthna Saran, President Chinmaya Mission Delhi. Email: prarthnasaranlgmail.com
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