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Upadesa Sara

Sloka 16

Vision of Reality

 The following verse explains the method of contemplation and summarizes the topic of Ashtanga Yoga.

drsya-varitam cittam-atmanah,
cittva-darsanam tattva-darsanam.

drsya-varitam – withdrawn from the seen (objects); cittam – the  mind; atmanah – of its own; cittva-darsanam – vision of the  form of Consciousness (which is called); tattva-darsanam – the  vision of Reality

The mind withdrawn from the objects sees itself as Consciousness and that is the vision of Reality (Self-realization).

As explained earlier in verse 14, the objects of the world including the body, mind, and intellect are manifold and known, but the Knower – the Witnessing-Self, is the One Consciousness.

We should contemplate thus – many thoughts arise in the mind, ‘This is a book’, ‘This is a watch’, and so on. This can be expressed differently as ‘I see this book’ or ‘I know the watch and the time it shows’. The objects of such thoughts keep on changing, but the ‘Seer’ or ‘Knower’ does not change.

Generally, our mind is extroverted. When we see an object and a thought arises in our mind we start brooding over the object and our mind plays about with thoughts associated with the object. We never think of turning our attention to the Seer of the object or on our Self. In contemplation our attempt is to shift the attention of our mind from the object and turn it towards the Consciousness which illumines the object by the thought, ‘I am the Witness Consciousness’. When a continuous flow of the same thought is maintained, we experience that the mind withdraws from the objects seen and merges in the Consciousness. Consciousness being the Reality, the experience is called the ‘Vision of Reality’. The meaning of the words ‘experience’ and ‘vision’ is not to be understood literally. In this ‘experience’ or ‘vision’ the duality of the experiencer-experienced or seer-seen is not there. The abidance of the mind in its own nature of Consciousness is the ‘Vision of Reality’.

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