THE MYSTERIOUS MIND AND ITS CONTROL : 1. Sri Swami Chidananda.

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Tuesday, June 28, 2022. 08:00. AM.

1.THE MIND AS SEEN FROM A VANTAGE POINT :

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Glorious Immortal Soul! A great deal has been written in the West lately about psychological theories and investigations. The subject we are going to discuss, therefore, may contain several ideas already familiar to most of you. Nevertheless, so important and invaluable are the things which have to be known and remembered about the mind that frequent repetitions are necessary. These are facts which have to be carefully considered and properly assimilated, not once, but many times. If they ever happen to be forgotten, you should be able to remind yourself by such repetitive thinking. The knowledge about the mysterious mind is ancient. From the dawn of civilization, these truths have been expounded by the Great Ones. From times immemorial, man has been reminded of his true supra-mental nature by the revelation of the wise sages and illumined seers.


We shall consider also certain aspects so entirely new that until recently very few, if any, of the modern-day psychologists were even aware of them. In the West, knowledge of the human mind has been acquired by what is known as the 'scientific method'. It has been more or less an inductive approach. The students have sought to study the behavior of individuals, and from their behavior, to infer certain facts relating to the mind, and then generalize it all. They proceeded from "outside to inside" as it were. In the East, the investigations have been on a different line altogether. Their method has been the method of intuition, and their approach has proceeded from "inside to outside". Their method, though inductive in nature, has been proved through the test of time to be beyond error, because their first premise was infallible - based as it was upon intuition.



1.THE MIND AS SEEN FROM A VANTAGE POINT :


In the East, the scientists of the spirit rose beyond the mind through processes of Yoga, and totally separated themselves from the mind and all its associated functions, and from that point of vantage, untouched by the mind, and entirely free from influence of its habitual patterns of thought, patiently studied its essential, inherent nature and its behavior. They beheld it in the light of a tangible and higher spiritual experience upon which they were established, and from where the mind was seen to be a distinct object apart from the seer, a thing to be observed and studied. How many of the modern psychologists of the recent century or two can claim to have thus risen above the mind and gone beyond its irresistible influence and from that vantage point studied its behavior as a master-witness and observer ? The Yogic masters, scientists avowedly of the inner realm of man, did gain a supra-mental freedom and independence and were able, as it were, to "put the mind before them"; and then they carried on their study of its working in an objective and masterful way.


When the observer is himself involved in the subject of his study, his results are bound to be incomplete and colored, because he himself becomes a factor in that thing he tries to study. It is impossible to get a perfectly undistorted and distinct view of his subject unless and until he finds out how to study it in a totally objective way. So long as you have not developed a faculty other than this mind (in this case, the supra- mental faculty), so long as you have not disentangled yourself from the mind, you will be unable to conduct competent research in the realm of the mind. As the Indian expression has it: "You cannot see your own eyes". For this, a mirror has to be placed before your face. Similarly, for studying the mind, objectification of the mind is required. Long ago, there were great seers who managed to reach the supra-mental state in which suitable methods for such objectification could be adopted, and out of their deep studies came great discoveries which have given man powers which hitherto he was unable to possess.

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NEXT -2. MIND IS A MARVEL :

To be continued ....


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