What are Our Mind States?
Ram S. Ramanathan MCC
Systemic, Sustainable, and Spiritual Self Development Coach Author: Coaching the Spirit & Re-creating Your Future Books & Programs
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The objective of Yoga is stilling the mind, through cessation of mind movements, leading to lifting the veil of ignorance covering the self-realisation that we are energy beings.
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There are 5 types of mind movements.
·????? Knowledge, pramana
·????? Error, viparyaya
·????? Delusion, vikalpa
·????? Sleep, nidra, and
·????? Memory, smriti
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To understand Patanjali’s statements better, let’s understand how the Vedic system explained the mind.
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Western science did not understand the intimate connection between the mind and the body, and the brain and the mind, until very recently, when neuro-biological sciences gained a much better understanding of cellular-level intelligence. Till about a century ago, when Freud made the unconscious conscious, no one knew the difference. Over 5000 years ago, Veda mapped the mind in 4 parts as it is understood today by science,
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·?????? Manas, the 5 sensory perceptions
·?????? Chitti, memory storage, hippocampus
·?????? Ahankara, ego, hypothalamus, amygdala
·?????? Buddhi, Intelligence, frontal cortex
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All mind states and movements that Patanjali describes are within this framework.
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Right Knowledge arises from the sensory perception of what we experience through our five senses of sight, sound, touch, smell and taste. These are first stored in chitti to be inferred as emotions by the limbic brain and thoughts by the frontal cortex organs of the brain, through the ego ahankara state. For knowledge to be right, these inferences need to be supported by valid evidence through cognitive intelligence, buddhi.
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This, in the gurukul system, was the learning taxonomy of sravana manana nidhityasana, sensing reflecting and experientially validating. Knowledge without being tested in the crucible of experiential and critical discrimination is garbage. When reflected critically and verified experientially knowledge becomes wisdom, Right Knowledge. This is one of the Noble Paths of Buddha.
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Error is to assume all knowledge, garbage or valid, as Right Knowledge. Error is wrong knowledge; in today’s speak Fake News. Errors are derived from what is perceived by the senses, but incorrectly by missing critical elements, in what the Neurolinguistic Program would call as deletion. Such knowledge does not correspond with reality, and when verified turns out to be incorrect. Hence, the NLP presupposition that ‘the map is not the territory’, which means what we perceive as our mind map is not the reality of the situation.
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Delusion is maya, a deliberate misconstruction through fanciful imagination, not concerned about whether the knowledge arises from perceptions or reality. This is deliberate fake news designed to mislead. The mind can do this unconsciously based on past experiences. Then, it’s even more dangerous. It becomes a blind spot.
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Sleep is when the mind is inactive and unconscious. Patanjali and Upanishad knew that the mind functioned in deep sleep. Deep Sleep is explained as an awareness state, sushupti, in the Mandukya Upanishad. However, we are not conscious of this state for the most part. The function of sleep is to rest the mind, to regenerate.
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Memory is the remnants of the sensory perceptions of all past experiences stored in the mind in chitti. Nothing of what we have experienced is ever lost by the mind. It’s all stored somewhere, some easily recoverable, and some not. Neurosciences tell us that memories, even pre-birth memories, are stored in the brain stem area and more recent ones in the hippocampus. The first responder sensory data are compared with data stored in the hippocampus, and inferred as emotions by the amygdala, before transmission to the frontal context for cognitive construct and action. Unfortunately, what Buddha called sati, right memory, devoid of conditioning has been wrongly interpreted as mindfulness of sensory perceptions, which may lead to more negative memory impressions of emotions and thoughts.
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These are the 5 movements of the mind, vritti.
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Reflection
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Of the 5 vritti, only one, pramana, is considered good. Sleep is neutral. Error, delusion and memory are negative mind states. It’s worth analysing the negative states since it’s rather difficult for most to be aware in sleep.
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Error is obvious, often deliberate and avoidable. Learn to reflect and verify with experience. Delusion, vikalpa, is also translatable as imagination and hence may be good. Perhaps. However, fanciful flights of imagination are for the most part escape mechanisms from reality. Learn to visualise creatively and positively using your strengths and passion to reach your potential.
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Memory is for the most part for most of us is about troublesome negatives. Even when it’s about the good experiences, it may be a need to hold on to the past. Right knowledge is about learning from the past, letting go and moving on.
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As one reflects from experience over all these 5 vritti, even the right knowledge can lead to suffering at times, while error, delusion, sleep and memory need not always lead to suffering.
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As the bard may have said, there is nothing that is either good or bad, but the mind makes it so.
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Ram is a co-founder and mentor at Coacharya?https://coacharya.com. Ram's focus is the integration of Eastern wisdom with modern science, spiritually, systemically and sustainably. Visit Coacharya.
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HR Leader, Executive Coach & Business Advisor, MBA - HR from JBIMS, GPHR (SHRM), Professional Certified Coach (PCC) from ICF (International Coach Federation)
1 年Superb Ram Sir, very deep thought, I got a glimpse of Vedanta insights as well,, keep sharing the knowledge ??
Co-Guide Mtech - Tunneling Engineering , Member of Governing Council - Tunneling Association of India ( TAI ) BE in Civil Engineering
1 年Great , Explained very well.