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1、Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega, Vol 7Discourses on the Yoga Sutras of PatanjaliTalks given from 01/01/76 am to 10/01/76 amEnglish Discourse series10 ChaptersYear published:During the early 1980s it was planned to publish the Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega volumes as Yoga: The Science of the Soul. Only
2、 the first three volumes were actually published, the title stayed as Alpha and Omega for the other seven volumes.Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega, Vol 7Chapter #1Chapter title: Ask a Question Close to Home1 January 1976 am in Buddha HallArchive code: 7601010ShortTitle: YOGA701Audio: YesVideo: NoLength
3、: 87 minsDHARANA, CONCENTRATION, IS CONFINING THE MIND TO THE OBJECT BEING MEDITATED UPON.DHYAN, CONTEMPLATION, IS THE UNINTERRUPTED FLOW OF THE MIND TO THE OBJECT.SAMADHI IS WHEN THE MIND BECOMES ONE WITH THE OBJECT.THE THREE TAKEN TOGETHER - DHARMA, DHYAN, AND SAMADHI - CONSTITUTE SAMYAMA.BY MASTE
4、RING IT, THE LIGHT OF HIGHER CONSCIOUSNESS.Once a Master of Zen invited questions from his students. A student asked. What future rewards can be expected by those who strive diligently with their lessons?Answered the Master, Ask a question close to home.A second student wanted to know, How can I pre
5、vent my past follies from rising up to accuse me?The Master repeated, Ask a question close to home.A third student raised his hand to state, Sir, we do not understand what is meant by asking a question close to home.To see far, first see near. Be mindful of the present moment, for it contains answer
6、s about future and past. What thought just crossed your mind? Are you now sitting before me with a relaxed or with a tense physical body? Do I now have your full or partial attention? Come close to home by asking questions such as these. Close questions lead to distant answers.THIS is the yoga attit
7、ude towards life. Yoga is not meta-physical. It does not bother about the distant questions.-faraway questions, about past lives, future lives, heaven and hell, God, and things of that sort. Yoga is concerned with questions close at home. Closer the question, the more is the possibility to solve it.
8、 If you can ask the question closest to you, there is every possibility that just by asking, it will be solved. And once you solve the closest question, you have taken the first step. Then the pilgrimage begins. Then by and by you start solving those which are distant - but the whole yoga inquiry is
9、 to bring you close at home.So if you ask Patanjali about God, he wont answer. In fact he will think you a little foolish. Yoga thinks all metaphysicians foolish; they are wasting their time about problems which cannot be solved because they are so far away. Better start from the point where you are
10、. You can only start from where you are. Each real journey can begin only from where you are. Dont ask intellectual, metaphysical questions of the beyond; ask the questions of the within.This is the first thing to be understood about yoga it is a science. It is very pragmatic, empirical. It fulfills
11、 all the criteria of science. In fact what you call science is a little far away, because science concentrates on objects. And yoga says unless you understand the subject, which is your nature, closest to you, how can you understand the object? If you dont know yourself, all else that you know is bo
12、und to be erroneous, because the base is missing. You are on faulty ground. If you are not enlightened within, then whatsoever light you carry without is not going to help you. And if you carry the light within then there is no fear: let there be darkness outside; your light will be enough for you.
13、It will enlighten your path.Metaphysics does not help; it confuses.It happened When I was a student in the university. I joined the subject of moral philosophy, ethics. I attended only the first lecture of the professor. I could not believe that a man can be so outdated. He was talking almost a hund
14、red years back, as if he was completely unaware of what new growth has happened to the subject of moral philosophy. But that could have been forgiven. He was tremendously boring, as if he was making all efforts to bore you. But that was also not a big problem; I could have slept. But he was annoying
15、 also, jarring - his voice, his manners. But that, too, one can become accustomed to. He was very much confused. In fact I have never come across a man with so many qualities all joined in one person.I never went again to his class. Of course, he must have been annoyed by that, but he never said any
16、thing. He waited for his time, because he knew one day I will have to appear in the examination. I appeared. He was even more annoyed because I got ninety-five percent marks. He could not believe it.One day when I was coming out of the university cafeteria and he was going in, he caught hold of me.
17、He stopped me and said, Listen. How did you manage? You only attended my first lecture, and for two years I have not seen your face. How did you manage to get ninety-five percent marks?I said, It must be because of your first lecture.He looked puzzled. He said, My first lecture! Just out of one lect
18、ure? Dont try to befool me, he said. Tell me the truth.I said, Propriety wont allow it.He said, Forget all about propriety. Just tell me the truth. I will not mind.I said, I have told you the truth, but you have misunderstood it. If I had not attended your lecture I would have got a hundred percent.
19、 You confused me! That accounts for those five percent I lost.Metaphysics, philosophy, all distant thinking simply confuse you. It leads you nowhere. It muddles your mind. It gives you more and more to think, and it doesnt help you to become more aware. Thinking is not going to help: only meditation
20、 can help. And the difference is: while you think, you are more concerned with thoughts; while you meditate, you are more concerned with the capacity of awareness.Philosophy is concerned with the mind; yoga is concerned with consciousness. Mind is that of which you can become aware: you can look at
21、your thinking, you can see your thoughts passing, you can see your feelings moving, you can see your dreams floating like clouds. Riverlike, they go on and on; it is a continuum. The one that can see this is consciousness.The whole effort of yoga is to attain to That which cannot be reduced to an ob
22、ject, which remains irreducible, to be just your subjectivity. You cannot see it because it is the seer. You cannot catch hold of it, because all that you can catch hold of is not you. Just because you can catch hold of it it has become separate from you. This consciousness, which is always elusive
23、and always stands back and whatsoever effort you make all efforts fail. to come to this consciousness - how to come to this consciousness - is what yoga is all about.To be a yogi is to become what you can become. Yoga is the science of stilling what has to be stilled and alerting what can be alerted
24、. Yoga is a science to divide that which is not you and that which is you, to come to a clear-cut division so that you can see yourself in pristine clarity. Once you have a glimpse of your nature, who you are, the whole world changes. Then you can live in the world, and the world will not distract y
25、ou. Then nothing can distract you; you are centered. Then you can move anywhere you like and you remain unmoving, because you have reached and touched the eternal, which never moves, which is unchanging.Today we start the third step of Patanjalis YOGA SUTRAS, Vibhuti Pada. It is very significant bec
26、ause the last, the fourth, Kaivalya Pada, will be just attaining to the fruit. This third. Vibhuti Pada, is the ultimate as far as means are concerned, techniques are concerned, methods are concerned. The fourth will be just the outcome of the whole effort. Kaivalya means aloneness, absolute freedom
27、 of being alone, no dependence on anybody, on anything - so contented that you are more than enough. This is the goal of yoga. In the fourth part we will be talking only about the fruits, but if you miss the third you will not be able to understand the fourth. The third is the base.If the fourth cha
28、pter of Patanjalis YOGA SUTRAS is destroyed nothing is destroyed, because whosoever will be able to attain to the third will attain to the fourth automatically. The fourth can be dropped. It is in fact, in a way, unnecessary because it talks about the end, the goal. Anyone who follows the path will
29、reach to the goal, there is no need to talk about it. Patanjali talks about it to help you, because your mind would like to know, Where are you going? What is the goal? Your mind would like to be convinced, and Patanjali does not believe in trust, in faith, in belief. He is a pure scientist. He simp
30、ly gives a glimpse of the goal, but the whole basis, the whole fundamental basis is in the third.Up to now we were getting ready for this Vibhuti Pada, the ultimate in means. Up to now in two chapters we have been discussing means which help, but those means were outer. Patanjali calls them bahirang
31、. on the periphery. Now these three - dharana, dhyan, samadhi, - concentration, meditation, samadhi - these three he calls antarang, internal. The first five prepare you, your body, your character - you on the periphery - so that you can move inwards. And Patanjali moves step by step: it is a gradua
32、l science. It is not a sudden enlightenment; it is a gradual path. Step by step he leads you.The first sutra:DHARANA, CONCENTRATION, IS CONFINING THE MINDTO THE OBJECT BEING MEDITATED UPON.The object, the subject, and the beyond - these three have to be remembered. You look at me I am the object; th
33、e one who is looking at me is the subject. And if you become a little more perceptive, you can see yourself looking at me that is the beyond. You can see yourself looking at me. Just try. I am the object, you are looking at me. You are the subject who is looking at me. You can stand by the side with
34、in yourself. You can see that you are looking at me. That is the beyond.First, one has to concentrate on the object. Concentration means narrowing of the mind.Ordinarily, mind is in a constant traffic - a thousand and one thoughts go on moving, like a crowd, a mob. With so many objects, you are conf
35、used, split. With so many objects you are moving in all directions simultaneously. With so many objects you are always, almost, in a state of insanity, as if you are being pulled from every direction and everything is incomplete. You go to the left, and something pulls you to the right; you go to th
36、e south, and something pulls you to the north. You are never going anywhere, just a muddled energy, a whirlpool, constant turmoil, anxiety.This is the state of ordinary mind - so many objects that the subjectivity is almost covered by them. You cannot have a feel who you are, because you are so much
37、 concerned with so many things you dont have a gap to look into yourself. You dont have that stillness, that aloneness. You are always in the crowd. You cannot find a space, a corner, where you can slip into yourself. And the objects continuously asking for attention, every thought asking for attent
38、ion, forcing exactly that the attention should be given to it. This is the ordinary state. This is almost insanity.In fact to divide mad people from nonmad people is not good. The distinction is only of degrees. It is not of quality: it is only of quantity. Maybe you are ninety-nine percent mad and
39、he has gone beyond - a hundred and one percent. Just watch yourself. Many times you also cross the boundary in anger you become mad - you do things you cannot conceive of yourself doing. You do things for which you repent later on. You do things for which you say later on, I did it in spite of me. Y
40、ou say, . as if somebody forced me to do it, as if I was possessed. Some evil spirit, some devil forced me to do it. I never wanted to do it. Many times you also cross the boundary, but you come back again and again to your normal state of madness.Go and watch any madman. People are always afraid of
41、 watching a madman because, suddenly, watching a madman you realize your own madness also. Immediately it happens because you can see at the most the difference is of degrees. He has gone a little ahead of you, but you are also following, you are also standing in the same queue.William James once we
42、nt to a madhouse, came back, became very sad, covered himself with a blanket. The wife could not understand. She said. Why are you looking so sad? He was a happy man.He said, I have been to the madhouse. Suddenly the thought occurred that between these people and me there seems to be not much differ
43、ence. There is a difference, but not much. And sometimes I have also crossed the boundary. Sometimes in anger, sometimes in lust, sometimes in anxiety, depression. I have also crossed the boundary. The only difference seems to be that they are stuck and they cannot come back and I am still a little
44、flexible and I can come back. But who knows? Someday the flexibility may be lost. Watching those madmen in the madhouse I became aware that they are my future. Hence. I am very much depressed. Because the way I am moving, sooner or later I will overreach them.Just watch yourself, and go and watch a
45、madman the madman goes on talking alone. You are also talking. You talk invisibly, not so loud, but if somebody watches you rightly he can see the movement of your lips. Even if the lips are not moving, you are talking inside. A madman talks a little louder; you talk a little less loudly. The differ
46、ence is of quantity. Who knows? Any day you can talk loudly. Just stand by the side of the road and watch people coming from the office or going to the office. Many of them, you will feel, are talking inside, making gestures.Even people who are trying to help you - psychoanalysts, therapists - they
47、are also in the same boat. In fact more psychoanalysts become mad than do people of any other profession. No other profession can compete with psychoanalysts in going mad. It may be because living in close quarters with mad people, by and by, they also become unafraid of being mad; by and by the gap
48、 is bridged.I was reading an anecdote:One man was attending his local doctor for an examination. Tell me. Do you get spots before the eyes? asked the doctor.Yes, Doctor.Frequent headaches? asked the doctor.Yes. said the patient.Pains in the back? Yes, sir.So do I, declared the doctor. I wonder what
49、the heck it can be.The doctor and the patient, they are all in the same boat. Nobody knows what the heck it can be.In the East we never created the profession of psychoanalysts, for a certain reason. We created a totally different type of man the yogi. Not the therapist. The yogi is one who is qualitatively different from
