Stay centered in Consciousness
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October 18, 2010
Human mind basically oscillates between fear and greed. It continuously moves from this extreme to that extreme and that extreme to this extreme.
Take the example of this web camera here. It continuously moves from this end to that end, looking at this corner and that corner. The camera is consciousness, and the movement from this end to that end is the mind. Mind is that movement of your consciousness' attention, when it moves between the extremes of the fear and greed. As long as that movement is there, the highest possible coherence does not happen in you. The highest possible coherence happens when the consciousness just stays without oscillation. When the consciousness stays in restful awareness, then the highest possible coherence happens in your system.
How can the consciousness stay without jumping between the extremes? Whenever your unconsciousness pulls you towards the fear extreme, consciously slap it with the greed extreme. Then it will come to the center. When the unconsciousness is rushing towards the greed, consciously slap it with the fear extreme. It will come to the center.
Understand, that is what Patanjali means when he says pratipaksha bhavanam. Whenever your fear is awakened, you forget your greed and you forget about your future. You have the fear that the one mistake which you made is going to finish you off. That fear makes you forget about the possible future you can have, and the greed about the future disappears – so you do more and more messy things, and get into deeper and deeper trouble! So, instead of one crime, now you will have to face hundreds of crimes. That is the unconscious flow of mind. Don't get into that mess.
Same way, whenever you are caught in greed, you forget about the fear and you do some foolishness. Only after that do you even remember the side-effects and after-effects of your actions. So when unconsciously greed takes you over, consciously slap your unconscious with fear. When the unconscious fear takes you over, consciously slap your unconscious with greed. It will come to the center. Being in the center suddenly raises you to the highest possible coherence. That is what I call niyama.
This is exactly what Buddha calls the middle path - constantly being in the center. Many times, when people take the decision to take sannyas, I tell them, when you take any decision based on extreme fear or extreme greed, whether it is the decision of sannyas or the decision of marriage, you will be a failure. If you take either decision when you are centered, you will suddenly see that you are taking the decision out of niyama, the highest possible coherence.
Only decisions taken in the highest possible coherence should be executed. Any decision taken out of the extreme fear or greed will lead to a mess. Even if you are successful in that decision, you will be completely depressed and missing something vital in the life. Yama and niyama are not just laws and rules. They are powerful processes to put you into the state of highest possible coherence.