The mind can be defined as "The human consciousness that originates in the brain and is manifested especially in thought, perception, emotion, will, memory, and imagination" as per the http://www.freedictionary.com/.The mind is such a vast subject and yet it is what is used to live through our days. In the Yoga Sutras (YS) IV - 15 Vastu Samye Citta Bhedat Tayor Vibhaktah Panthah is translated as " Due to difference in various minds, perception of even the same object may vary." This is very evident in how our day unfolds. We see this everyday in the news. Because there are differences in people' s minds there are uplifting events as one helping others or stealing and/or killing others. Due to these varying emotions and wills we vote for people, tolerate situations or petition for different beliefs we have. These differences are reflected in how we live, what we wear, how we eat and what we focus on.
It is interesting to note in the Yoga Sutras how Patanjali explains the vrittis:
Vritti (plural: Vrittis), in the context of Hinduism and its yoga stream, is the name given to different tendencies which come to our mind without our conscious knowledge. In YS I-5 Vrttayah Pancatayyah Klista Aklistah it is stated that there are five kinds of mental modifications which are either painful or painless. Swami Satchidananda's commentary of this sutra is to substitute "painful" or "painless" as "selfish" thoughts and "selfless" thoughts. Satchidananda states that "The selfish thoughts ultimately bring pain." and that selfless thoughts will bring peace. Near the end of this sutra commentary he states "In our daily lives we always work with these two categories of thoughts....We have to watch carefully the moment a thought-form arises in the mind. We become analysts. This itself is Yoga practice- watching our own thoughts and analyzing them."
In YS I-6 Pramana Viparyaya Vikalpa Nidra Smrtayah Patanjali lists the five types of vrittis (mental modifications) as right knowledge, misconception, verbal delusion, sleep and memory. As you can see this all affects the mind. How is your mind?
Study your mind and stay tuned.
2 comments:
Being mindful of our thoughts can be overwhelming since it often seems the mind is a bottomless pit - filled with them...unbridled and unrelenting. As you teach us here, yoga and meditation can help us with this, still the thoughts persist - we can only learn to 'manage them'.
See cOM for another spin on "selfish".
Blessings...
It's true that it can appear overwhelming to be mindful of our thoughts. Of course thoughts will always persist and we must everyday, every moment also persist in our mindfulness as well. With practice it will become a habit. And reminding ourselves to breathe consciously, to take a deep breath will slow the mind down. Of course with the effort there will hopefully be "Grace" to help us.
Thank you again for your comments SS and I will look at cOm as well
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