Memory - Smritih YS I - 11

Memory. What does that word bring to mind? Ironically you have to use memory to think about the word. A definition for memory is the ability of the mind to store and recall past sensations, thoughts, and knowledge. The Sanskrit word for memory is smritih.

This writing today continues with a review of the five vrittis (the modifications of the mind) in the Yoga Sutra (YS). The fifth and last vritti is YS I- 11 ANUBHUTA VISAYASAMPRAMOSAH SMRTIH. This means When a mental modification of an object previously experienced and not forgotten comes back to consciousness, that is memory. Swami Satchidananda's commentary of this sutra is that "memories create impressions in the mind" that come up to the surface from time to time whether we want them or not. He further states there are two ways memories surface: 1. as dreams when we sleep and 2. as daydreams during the day. "Both are impressions which, when formed, slowly descend to the bottom of the mind and come to the surface when they are rekindled for some reason." Satchidananda concludes his commentary he as explained what the five vrittis, thought forms, are that "must be controlled".

Swami Muktananda, author of "Mystery of the Mind" comments on this same sutra as the "memory is nothing but the impression of the other four modifications, that are not allowed to escape." To remind you again of the other four vrittis: right knowledge, misconception, verbal delusion and sleep. He gives an example how one could be sitting in meditation and a thought pops up of a fight twelve years ago with someone. Or a person who cannot forget a girl and the thought disturbs them. Muktananda says that "memory is the secretary of the other four vrittis ; no matter where one is, it opens the file and shows one what took place in the past." He concludes that we are not tortured by the mind but by the five vrittis. As long as these modifications are active we do not have peace and that we act according to the feelings of the mind.