#34 That Which Can Be Transcended Is An Illusion | Yoga Sutras Of Patanjali

Namaste and a very warm welcome to all of you in this daily live meditation session with me the answer.

We're going through yoga sutras of Patanjali and at a milestone where Patanjali is breaking apart all our conventions.

Patanjali is breaking apart all what we know,

The very foundations of mind,

Of how we understand things.

So,

It is important for us to reflect along this journey and while we go through these sutras take time to internalize,

To reflect,

To have your original thought and reflection on what this means to your life.

Is this something that is remaining only as a philosophy or is this something that has practical implications in your life and has the power to transform your life for good?

Before we get into the sutra for today,

I would like us to reflect on what is an illusion and what is reality.

When we call something an illusion,

When we call something reality,

What are we really referring to and how to judge what is an illusion,

What is reality?

Think about it when you are from your own experience when you call something this is an illusion or this is the reality.

What do you mean by that?

In my understanding,

Whatever you can transcend,

Anything that you can transcend is an illusion.

If you are right now sitting in a room and just thinking that there is this room and this is what exists and there is nothing that exists more than the room,

Then that illusion is your reality.

But when you transcend that,

If you can transcend,

If your consciousness can transcend and see that there is something more than the room and you see there is some space above the room,

Then suddenly that notion of reality is shattered and that notion becomes incomplete.

In that incompletion,

It remains as an illusion and you look for reality which is higher than your earlier notion of reality which is now your consciousness has expanded,

Now you see there is something like clouds.

You may assume that whatever is below the clouds is reality and there is nothing more than that.

Then again,

If your consciousness expands beyond the clouds and if you see beyond the clouds,

You see that there was just an illusion that below the clouds is the only space that is true,

That is reality.

So if you extrapolate and if you extend this further,

You see that anything that can be transcended,

It is an illusion and when your consciousness is unable to transcend,

You call that illusion as reality.

So that reality is somewhat of a state which you cannot transcend and in absolute terms something that cannot be transcended,

Ultimately the ultimate reach of the consciousness towards reality is to a point,

Is to that which cannot be transcended.

So any experience that you come across in life,

If you can transcend that,

Make a note that there is so much more to reality and what you are experiencing is just an illusion.

With that backdrop,

Let us go into what Patanjali has to say because he is exactly hitting the same point by framing that there is a seer in you and then there is a scene in you or in front of you.

So once again,

The scene is all your experience that you are experiencing right now,

Not just what you see with your eyes but the entire experience of every moment,

Patanjali is calling as the scene,

The experience and he is saying that there is this seer in you which goes through that experience,

Which goes through that scene.

So the experiencer is calling the seer,

The experience is calling the scene or the scene and this relationship,

This frame is very important to understand because it helps to break down the illusion from reality,

It helps us to transcend the illusion and come to reality.

Patanjali says,

Drishta drishimatra shuddho api pratyaya anupasyaya The seer is nothing but the power of seeing,

Which although pure,

Appears to see through the mind.

Here Patanjali is focusing not on the scene,

In the past sutras that we have been discussing in the past sessions,

He was in very much detail going through the nature of this scene,

Nature of this experience,

Nature of this illusion and now he is focusing on the seer,

He is elaborating who is the seer,

How is the seer existing and what is the seer in relation to the scene doing.

So he says,

The seer is nothing but the power of seeing,

Which although pure,

Appears to see through the mind.

Here he makes two breakthrough points,

One that is something obvious to those who are sensitive,

To those who are on the path of meditation,

On the path of spirituality,

Are reflective enough,

That point is,

The obvious point is that the seer sees through the mind.

So the seer who is the experiencer,

He is seeing through the mind,

There is mind in between the seer and the scene,

Therefore all the experience that you are having is determined by your mind.

Mind is the medium,

Mind is the prism through which the experience is experienced.

So for the same thing,

You may have a different experience because you have a different mind and another person may have a completely different experience of the same thing because he or she has a completely different mind.

So he is saying this mind is the prism that determines the experience and the seer always sees through the mind.

Here he is saying,

Stating this obvious and if you analyze what whole meditation process is about,

You will see that it dissolves this medium,

It makes the observation,

It makes the experience,

It makes the scene independent of the mind.

If you see Zen,

The whole tradition is about dropping the mind,

To have a state which they call as no mind.

In other words,

To have a state where the mind is not in between,

Where all your thoughts,

All your emotions,

All your plans,

All your projections are not in the way.

Only in that silent state,

When there is no mind,

When the mind has settled,

Then there is a possibility for the seer to see the scene without the mind.

And in that possibility also,

Then the scene will be the same for everyone who has dropped the mind,

Who has dropped their medium,

Dropped their prism,

Which is the medium in between,

That unique medium which everyone is carrying in them based on their backgrounds,

Based on their conditionings,

Based on their learnings,

Based on their knowledge.

All of that,

Once that drops,

Once there is a state of no mind,

Then the scene is the same,

It doesn't matter who the seer is.

And that is why we also say that in silence we all meet,

We are all one.

In silence there is no perception,

There is only reality and everyone sees the same reality.

And that is why in the mind,

In the interpretation,

In the medium,

There are a thousand ways to explain the truth,

There are a thousand ways to have concepts,

Different religions,

Different belief systems,

But they all meet at one point.

Then the scene is the same if there is no mind,

If the mind,

The prism in between drops,

If your concepts,

Your notions,

Your ideas,

Your thoughts,

Your conditionings are not in the way,

And there is a way to be in that state of no mind,

Then what you see is the same for everyone.

That is the obvious point that Patanjali makes.

But then there is something even more profound that he brings in the sutra,

Which breaks down the entire foundation of mind,

And not only mind,

The entire foundation of this idea of reality,

This idea of self,

This understanding of what is happening,

What is this consciousness doing in this world.

He says the seer is nothing but the power of seeing.

So earlier he had destroyed the seen for us.

He said the seen is an illusion.

Now in this one sutra,

He is also completely shattering the idea of the seer as well.

He says the seer is also the power of seeing.

So the seer also is sourced from the seeing,

From the consciousness.

Take a moment to internalize this.

The seen,

The projection is an illusion.

What he is saying,

Even the seer is nothing but just the power of seeing.

So it doesn't have any specific,

Defined,

Unique identity of its own.

It is also an illusion.

It is not the reality.

The seer,

When we say I am,

When we say I,

When we say I am experiencing that I,

Or even that sense of self which is experiencing,

He is saying even that is not the reality.

Even that is sourced from the power of seeing.

What that means is there is only seeing.

There is only pure consciousness which has no individuality,

Which has no self.

It breaks down into the seen.

It breaks down into the self.

It breaks down into the mind and the entire phenomena of the seen,

Of the mind and of the seer is born and out of that we have our individuality,

We have the sense of that I exist,

We have the sense of that I am experiencing all this.

And in the deepest states of samadhi,

In the deepest clarity,

When nothing is left,

When only pure consciousness is there,

There is nothing more to transcend than pure consciousness is the reality and in that reference of reality,

Everything else is the illusion.

The seer is the illusion,

The seen is the illusion,

The medium,

The mind is also the illusion.

These days there is also a movement towards psychedelics.

And I want to bring this point about psychedelics because somehow people have considered psychedelics as the shortcut to reality.

So they are using psychedelics to see a totally different reality with images,

With very vivid patterns,

With even entities and so on.

And they call that as the reality,

They call that as the expansion of consciousness.

If you are having those experiences and if you are calling that as reality,

Ask yourself is the seer dissolved or the seer is still the same or an alteration or a variation of the same.

If the seer is still there,

Then whatever you are experiencing,

Howsoever vivid,

Howsoever profound it may be,

It is not the reality.

There is something more to be transcended.

You may have transcended the physical,

You have now entered into another realm of the psyche,

But as long as the seer is there,

As long as the seen is there,

You have not yet reached to the truth.

So psychedelics are nice,

Are great for fun,

For experience,

For breaking the notion that this physicality is the only reality,

But they are not the end.

They are definitely not the substitute to spirituality,

To meditation,

To taking that path where the consciousness is absolutely pure and has no mind,

Has no seen,

Has no seer and there is only experiencing,

There is only seeing.

There is no seen,

There is no seer,

There is only seeing,

There is only consciousness.

With that,

Let us move into silence and meditate over this sutra,

Internalize this wisdom in our own experience.

Close your eyes,

Take a posture that is comfortable for you.

Take a nice deep breath,

Inhale from the nose and exhale from the nose,

Allowing your body to rest,

Allowing your mind to be here,

Allowing your awareness to turn inwards.

Start off by paying attention to the seen,

Whatever is arising in your experience,

In your sense perceptions,

In your mind,

In your body.

Give yourself a moment to become aware of the seen,

Of the experience that you are having right now.

And shift this awareness from the experience to the experiencer,

To the one who is experiencing the sense of self.

The awareness may get distracted towards the experience,

Towards the seen.

Bring it back,

Focus on the seer,

The self,

The one who is experiencing.

Come back,

Relax,

Get United Consciousness,

This isIOfeolive.

Com.

At all times awareness focus on self,

On the seer,

Hold your energy,

All your awareness,

Attention on the self.

And move to the source of the self.

From your attention at the self to the source.

From the defined to the undefined,

From the manifest to the unmanifest.

1 Don't try to grab anything.

Don't try to change anything.

Please stay silent and in awareness of the Source,

Pure consciousness.

Please stay silent and in awareness of the Source,

Pure consciousness.

In this awareness,

There is no seer.

There is no seen.

Only seen,

Only pure consciousness.

Please stay silent and in awareness of the Source,

Pure consciousness.

Don't try to judge it.

Stay on pure consciousness.

Maintain the state,

Pure consciousness.

One more minute before you open your eyes.

Namaste.