37. Whatever you Experience is Imagination🔗

Let us enter into the ninth sutra: Śabda jñāna anupātī vastu śūnyo vikalpaḥ Imagination, as opposed to reality, which is the result of mere words - this is known as vikalpa or fantasy.

Yesterday I was talking about viparyaya, wrong knowledge. Today, I will explain about vikalpa, imagination. What is the difference between wrong knowledge and imagination? Superficially, both look the same. But are they the same? No! Let us look into the subtle differences between wrong knowledge and imagination.

Please understand: when the mind brings wrong ideas or misconceptions in front of your consciousness, it is called 'wrong knowledge.' For wrong knowledge to happen, your consciousness needs to be present and your mind needs to do something. But for imagination to happen, for vikalpa to happen, nothing needs to be done. Anything experienced by you, other than your pure consciousness, is vikalpa. Anything experienced, is imagination. That is why we call samadhi state 'nirvikalpa' – imagination-free space. Patanjali is taking us to a very subtle plane.

Sometimes, you may not have wrong knowledge, but you will have imagination. A small story: A guy walked into the bar and sat next to a man who was sitting with a dog at his feet.

The guy asked the man, 'Does your dog bite?' The man said, 'No.' The guy bent and petted the dog. Suddenly, the dog bit him! The guy shouted, 'You said your dog doesn't bite?! But he has bitten me!' The man said, 'Yes, my dog doesn't bite - but this not my dog.'

You may not have wrong knowledge, but you have your own imagination. Understand?

Many a time, imagination brings more suffering than wrong knowledge. Today I have a lot of stories on imagination! Imagination is my favorite subject, because so much of suffering can be avoided if you understand imagination. Even viparyaya is not that deep. If your mind can relax from constant movement in the conscious layer, you can come out of viparyaya. But vikalpa - even your sleep is vikalpa!

Please understand: Viparyaya can happen only in your waking state or dream state, but vikalpa can happen even in the deep sleep state. Deep sleep is vikalpa. Viparyaya can touch only your conscious mind and subconscious mind. Wrong knowledge can touch you, disturb you, only in the waking state and dream state. But vikalpa, imagination, can disturb you even in the deep sleep state; it can disturb you in all three states.

Another small story:

A guy goes to Africa and sends a letter to his mother saying, 'Dear Mother, I am sending some pills which a witch doctor gave me. If you take one, it will take years off your life.'

After a month, when the guy comes back home, he sees a beautiful woman sitting outside his house with a baby.

The guy asks her, 'Where is my mother?'

She says, 'Don't be silly! I am your mother. And those pills are marvelous.'

The guy says, 'Oh God! I can't imagine! Only one pill and you are able to have a baby?'

She says, 'Are you crazy? That is not my baby. That's your father. He took two!'

If you take viparyaya and vikalpa both, just see the chaos that can happen! Imagination can touch deeper zones than wrong knowledge. Wrong knowledge is more like wrong logic. When you have wrong logic, it is wrong knowledge. But imagination is much deeper than wrong knowledge.

Patanjali says, 'Imagination as opposed to reality, which is the result of mere words - this is known as 'vikalpa' or fantasy.'

Every word of Patanjali brings so much clarity, so much depth. He is saying, imagination is that which is created merely by words, merely by words!

Write ten incidents where you came to the wrong conclusion because of the past conditioning, and understood the whole incident differently when you looked into the same incident with restful awareness, without carrying your past incompletions into it.