Sensory Awareness/Concentration/Visualization/Pranayama

[Mike Dubbeld]

Sensory Awareness

In 1974 I found a very nice little book called OM A Guide to Meditation
and Inner Tranquility. I still think highly of this book by Frank J. Mac
Hovec. I thought I would share a few pages of it.
My comments are in brackets [ ]. Yogic meditation is one-pointed
concentration. It is not allowing your mind to day-dream and 'build sand
castles in the sky.' (Sivananda) The goal of yogic meditation is to hold
the object of your concentration in your minds eye as clearly with your
eyes closed as open. (more clearly) The image stays fixed immovably on
target in the minds eye effortlessly with no effort on your part. You
'become' the object - the dual relationship of 'you' and 'it' dissolves.
You become one with it. From this one-pointedness, a freedom and rapture
flows that is indescribable. You are no longer burdened by the clunky
mechanical thinking mind. If a man plays the violin and thinks 'I am
playing the violin.' He will never excel in playing the violin. It is
only when the man 'becomes' the music itself - part of the experience
and transcends the 'I' that anything showing any great happens. To let
go of your 'I' one must trust. You must be open to experience and not
rattling on and on with your useless dreaming and scheming of the mind.

Men have reasoned for thousands of years but it does not bring them God
Realization. That you day dream all day long is an indication that this
is an activity the ego is fond of. But this also is a useless activity
for bringing God Realization. The ego will tell persuade you to continue
your usless dreaming and scheming and call it meditation also. Then when
you fail, it will claim credit for having warned you that meditation is
a useless waste of time. The scheming and dreaming of the mind must come
to an end with concentration to develop laser-like focus gathering the
rays of disipated energy from the mind.

Once awareness detaches itself from all thoughts except the object of
your visualization, and develops the habit of remaining on the object of
your meditation, it becomes easy to then detach awareness from that as
well and allow awareness to turn inward on itself to discover its own
essence. It is this freeing of awareness from thoughts that constitutes
freedom.

The body can not be free. It is bound by the universe from gravity. The
mind can not be free. It is matter also. The ego, as a reflection of the
soul, falsely believes itself to be Perfect, All-knowing, etc. This
leads to problems in a limited body and mind. Detachment of awareness
from all thoughts is what is necessary to discover the Self-God beyond
the stilled mind.

Freedom from thoughts is freedom from the mind. The mind is matter. It
is part of the universe. But we are not part of the universe. The
universe comes and goes but we remain the same. Nirvana or Liberation is
exactly what this means. You are not your personality. Your personality
is nothing more than ego-mind. You are not a 'special' individual. These
are ego-mind dreams. Day dreaming is awareness floating from one thought
to the next. Thoughts are nothing more than subtle matter and part of
the mind and universe. There is release from the burden of the conscious
mind when you close your eyes and daydream - because the ego-mind can go
and do whatever it pleases. But this is still awareness entangled in
thought. Awareness must be detached from all thoughts. The only way this
can be done is by concentration. The deliberate detaching of your
awareness from distractions and returning it to your object of
visualization.

After awhile the mind develops a habit of remaining on the object and
the ego gives up knowing you are determined and can not win. The ego
then take the curious position of wanting to get credit for success you
may have in meditation and cooperates - until the next time it will kick
and scream to get you out of controlling it. The ego will make you too
tired to concentrate-meditate. It will ensure you run out of time so
that you can not concentrate-meditate. It will make you hungry while you
try to meditate. It will persuade you the phone ringing is something
important. The ego has millions of games it can play with you. But from
habit it comes to know you are serious and can not win. Then only will
it give up its antics and begin to cooperate to get it over with as fast
as possible and attribute any success you have to itself.

From concentration miraculous things happen. From simply performing
concentration practice, the mind forms a habit to remain focused on a
single thing. When you get up from meditation no matter what you do,
your mind will effortlessly remain focused on that. It will not be
scattered with useless daydreams. You will find that when you go to
work, you finish things faster. You then find yourself doing a lot more.
Problems in your life effortlessly disappear and you are fearless. Bold.
You act in a deliberate manner without second thoughts. You are far more
open and people you talk to notice your openness/you can literally 'suck
their brains out.' They can not tell you enough. Your eyes become
'little vacuum cleaners.' Sucking up everything in sight. Before
concentration practice you may have the attitude of not wanting a single
new thing cause you have too much to think about already. But after
concentration and meditation because of your openness people flock to
you because they feel that at least you will listen to them.

If you are doing pranayama at the same time you may have to carry a
stick around to beat them back with...... Your excess energy spills over
like water goes over the top of a glass when it becomes too full. Prana
can be discharged just by your proximity. It can be given simply with a
look. But the voice becomes sweet and mellodious and others hang on to
your words. Many other things happen that you likely would not believe.
Hatha yoga (not silly power yoga) teaches you how to learn to move
energy in your body. When the nadis are purified and you audibly chant
OM it is like setting a field of dry grass on fire. You learn what the
breathless state is and unmani avastha. There are dead giveaways on your
progress. It is a huge mistake to believe everyone is the same. That is
one of the funniest things there is. Like hiding behind a piece of
cellophane and lying through your teeth cause no one can know you are
there. BOO! ha ha What people think on elevators is a riot!

THE YOGA METHOD

'[Sensory Awareness] means developing your senses,
sharpening them. It means tuning in or focusing in on only one sensory
aspect of a thing to the exclusion of all else, sensing it for what it
is and not for what we think it is or want it to be. It is letting the
object exist of and by itself and to experience it for its own sake.
[Sensory Awareness] is unlearning, unconditioning, overcoming your own
fixed idea
of what you see, hear or touch. It is looking at an object and "letting
it be," receiving its signals in an open and receptive attitude.

You can develop [sensory awareness] by having a tea ceremony just before
your
meditation. It should be a tiny cup of fragrant tea. Jasmine or oolong
is
very good. No sugar. But hot, and only one tiny cup. Place it on your
altar. Close your eyes and concentrate on its aroma. If you can't smell
it, lean closer. Hold the cup in the fingers of both hands. Close your
eyes. Think on the cup's warmth. Place the cup to your lips but before
you drink smell the aroma again and think on it, sense it thoroughly.
Taste just a tiny sip. "Go with" the taste. How delicate. Enjoy the
pleasure of the immediate moment. Sense the warmth on your tongue. When
you sip again, sense how its warmth travels down your throat, even into
your stomach. Focus the taste on your tongue, how the flavor is centered
there.

You are surrounded in your home with hundreds of opportunities to
develop [sensory awareness]. There are sounds: clocks, washers, dryers,
furnaces,
creaky floors, lawn mowers, dishwashers, garbage disposals, running
water, closing doors, to name a few. There are "people sounds" all
around you. Listen not only to what they say but how they say it, their
tone of voice, the speed at which they talk, the pauses, what they do
while talking. And "nature sounds" such as birds, rustling leaves,
brooks, rain, wind. Listen. Really listen.

Develop your sense of sight by "seeing as if for the first time." If a
sunrise, sunset, or blue sky with clouds, is not available to you, look
a some of your clothing, the colors of your walls, carpets, furniture.
Have you really see them before? Visit an art gallery or museum. What a
feast of images and colors.

Touch things more. Feel different textures, tree bark, glass, cement,
leather, wool, metal, skin, hair. There is magic in touch. Johnson and
Masters have a sequential program for married couples to teach how to
sense each other. Humanistic psychologists recommend a paired exercise
where one partner closes his eyes and the other partner leads him around
the room, having him touch things and try to guess what they are. Most
people who try it learn a great deal about trust, the feel of familiar
things and how wonderful it is to be able to see.

And what of taste ? We wolf our food. You can develop your sense of
taste by trying foods seasoned differently. Here again, the Hindus for
centuries have been preparing curries and chutneys. Enjoy your food.
Savor it. Make it a kind of ceremony. Linger on the taste awhile longer.
Slow down. "Turn on" to the taste.

There is a whole world of sensory awareness. Is it really possible to be
bored surrounded by such excitement every day? The everyday world is
full of sensory explosions we can experience simply by being receptive
to them, simply by being an interested spectator. Achieving [sensory
awarness] is becoming a finely tuned receiver, studying and enjoying
everything
that enters the senses, What the Buddhists call "windows of the mind."

Practicing [sensory awareness] means overcoming distractions. After all,
if you
tune into total sensory input, you'll have trouble sorting them out,
ther are so many signals received. It would be relatively easy to be
confused by "sensory overload." But then, you've been meditating long
enough to take care of that. Tune out all but one thought or object.
Become a gardener of the soul, turning over the soft, rich, rich soil
with an imaginary spade, gently, easily. Focus on the spadeful, not the
whole garden. We sense fully only what we select. We thoroughly sense
only specific features of the object.

Begin to sharpen your sense every day, on the job, at home, on vacation.
You can do this even at meetings, in waiting rooms, driving to and from
work. Do you ever really look a traffic light right in the eyes? Sense
the red. Polish the senses. See, hear, smell, taste, touch! There is a
whole new world out there, waiting for you to explore it. It is truly a
great adventure, for all who have eyes to see, ears to hear, fingers to
touch. [sensory awareness] is to have a third eye, a third ear and a
third hand.

[This leads to what I have phrased 'heaven on earth.' The meek shall
inherit the earth! Also, when we go on vacation we break out of our
subconscious habit mind and look at things again as if for the first
time - because it IS the first time.
Even when we return from vacation, the subconscious being re-programmed
in this way provides a benefit. Sharpening the senses causes the mind to
become radically tranquil and peaceful also. Instead of losing patience
standing in line in the store or in traffic - practice this sensory
awareness on all that you see - the biggest building, the brightest red,
the biggest tree, Bluest house, etc]

Dharana is knowing, fully knowing. Dharana is one-pointed concentration.
It is undistracted, intense involvement with something, putting it in
extremely fine focus, being totally occupied with it. It differs from
[sensory awareness] in that dharana uses all the senses and embraces a
whole
object or idea. It doesn't sort out the senses and embraces a whole
object or idea. It isn't merely sensing the colors of a sunset. It seeks
to "know" the sunset, the totality of it, the identity of it. [Sensory
awareness]
means seeing, touching, feeling, smelling, perhaps tasting, a rose (in
the Middle East roses are used for flavoring). It is appreciating the
rose for specific attributes in terms of the senses. But dharana
concentrates on the rose, all of it. It focuses on total "roseness."

You can practice dharana using your meditation candle. Gaze upon it as
you did in earlier meditation. Observe the flame, its reflection on the
wax at the top, how the light is diffused just below the surface. See
the waxy texture of the candle itself, how it fits into the holder.
Close your eyes and envision the candle. Hold the candle in your mind's
eye. Bring it to life in your mind. Make it real in your imagination.
Know the candle, really know it.

The ancients used flowers or fruits to develop dharana. It's interesting
to note that the world's artists do much the same thing trying to bring
to
life flowers and fruits in still-life painting. You can do the same with
the oils and canvas of your mind. An apple, an orange, banana, or pear
will do nicely. Concentrate on it. Touch it, study it closely. Use your
sharpened senses. Then close your eyes and duplicate the fruit in your
mind as clearly as if your eyes were open and you were looking at it.
Make it equally real with or without your eyes being focused on it. As
a close to this part of your meditation, further your pratyahara by
experiencing the fruit -- eat it. But slowly, savoring it.

A glass of water can be your dharana model. Through your senses you can
know the shape and feel of the glass and the water within it. There is
the seemingly perfect circle of the glass rim, the vertical lines of the
sides, the reflection of light from your candle. But you must graduate
from sensing to knowing. Concentrate on the total sensory input of the
glass so that you duplicate the glass in your mind. It is there just as
vividly as the glass you see when you open your eyes. It is equally
real. It is "knowing" the glass.

A freshly sharpened pencil is another good model for dharana. Feel the
eraser, the metal cap which holds it, the smooth enameled sides, the
rough texture of the wood near the point, the sharp point itself. Does
the bare wooden section have an odor? The eraser? Study it, its parts,
the whole pencil. Know it in part and as a whole. Concentrate on it.
Eyes closed, picture it. Make it real. Know it.

Seeing, even appreciating a sunrise or sunset for its own sake is
pratyahara. Being "into" it, getting with it, knowing it is dharana. As
your skills improve, it will won't seem like concentration. Its more
like absorption. Total absorption. You can achieve dharana in nature by
knowing mountains, deserts, rivers, oceans, trees, flowers, soil, the
moon, stars, sky, clouds, and so on. And if indoors, paintings and
pictures can provide the means. You will know you have achieved dharana
when the thought so permeates your mind that nothing else comes through,
and it is so vivid that it is the same whether your eyes are open,
seeing the object, or closed and imagining it.

Dhyana is at-oneness, total absorption, becoming. It is transcendental
consciousness, contemplation so deep that it is impossible to separate
the "you" from the "it," the object being concentrated upon. It begins
as dharana, firm, strong, one-pointed concentration to the total
exclusion of everything but the one thought or image allowed to come
through. This involves both the intellect, conscious concentration, and
the senses, sensing what is there for its own sake. It is factual and it
is felt. It is thought about and experienced. It thus involves total
perception and judgment, the mind and the senses. But doing this is but
the beginning stage of dhyana.

Gradually, the intellect fades. It is no longer needed. The mind's eye
sees the object without thinking. The mental image exists by and of
itself, focused immovably on target. As the intellect fades so also the
object and, a feeling of well-being, of freedom, of rapture, flows.
Everything flows together. Some experience a floating feeling at this
stage. If this happens, do not be frightened by it. Go with the feeling
for it is part of the dhyanic process. It is a good sign. Relax with it;
let it come. Don't resist it, "do not push the river." Finally, dhyana
peaks in a feeling most experienced meditators describe as
"selflessness." The intellect is a strong supporter of ego. Only the
perceived, felt object exists and you are one with it, transcending
everything, even you.

Dhyana is a mystic leap from the you to "it," the object of
contemplation. There is no knower, only the known. And the knower and
the known are one. You are the object; the object is you. You are
absorbed totally in it. It is as if you and it are together in a single
bubble of consciousness, aware and vibrating with identity.

Dhyana is achieved naturally, easily, by following the practices thus
far described. All that has happened to you up to this point has
prepared you for this higher meditative state, and the one to follow. If
you have difficulty achieving dhyana, total absorption, being one with
the object, go back and repeat all the exercises. It may be that you
have omitted something, missed something. Emphasize the visualization of
the white lotus blossom. Include OM in your meditation. Relax. Don't
strain, don't overdo. Let if flow. It will come. Make your spirit a
receptacle. Let the hidden spring which is in each of us flow.

Samadhi is cosmic consciousness, Mystic Unity. It is achieved suddenly,
with a flash of insight. It has been described like falling off an
imaginary log. It is intuitive, not intellectual. We left the intellect
behind some time ago. Samadhi can occur anywhere along the meditative
path, spontaneously. It is caught. Not taught.

Savitarka is the beginning of samadhi. It is a feeling of "at-oneness,"
of deep and natural belonging. In this state, there are no names, no
identity, just belonging, acceptance, part of something great and
powerful. It is a feeling as if something great is about to happen,
something good, something positive.

Gradually, you "plug in" to the total universe, to the All, the One.
There is no time anymore, no place, no cause or effect, no concept of
space except boundless infinity. It's the biggest idea you've ever had;
powerful, unifying, uplifting, expansive. The ancients called it
nirvitarka, the peak of the meditative experience, the zenith.

In samadhi you are completely swallowed up in the process. You are
plugged into something truly great, to Creation itself. It is more
psychial than psychological. It is far too deep for words to describe
it. Those who have achieved it describe it thus: "I belong to no one. No
one belongs to me. I am free. Part of something great. I am with oceans,
continents, mountains, rivers, rocks, drops of water, atoms. One in all,
all in one. One. All I am one; all is one. One with the object, one with
self, one with Self, one with nothing, one with everything. There is no
more me, no more it. There is no knower, no known, no seer, no seen, no
subject, no object, no good, no evil. There is only Oneness, Unity, and
I am there, everywhere, nowhere.'

[It is highly likely this little book is out of print/I have not seen it
since 1974 and I have been to extensive bookstores that have yoga stuff.
But you never know a web search may find something used even. I see The
Peter Pauper Press as the publisher. The whole book is 64 small pages
(half notebook size and about 8 inches high)]

[One of my favorite activities is to go down to 'The Mall' in Washington
DC which is a huge grass field lined with benches with museums
(Smithsonian) on each side. On one end is the Lincoln Memorial and at
the far end - about 2 miles is the Capitol Building. People play soccer
and Frisbee all day every day there in between scheduled events.
As well as jogging and bicycle riding. I take my bike there from
Arlington National Cemetery (250,000 military graves - also where I
worked for 5 years as Security Night Manager partime). I plop down on a
bench for several hours with my bike and water and popcorn from the
vendors selling it. I practice sensory awareness deliberately on
everything going on. Sometimes the Hari Krishna's chant all day long
there. It is amazing how tranquil and peaceful the mind becomes from
simply sitting in one spot for so long. And when it is time to go, I
find it hard also. Get a lot of nice sunshine also. But I practice
sensory awareness driving to work, and anytime I move from one place to
another. Some days I look for the bluest blue (Mondays along with
water/glass/reflections) Other days I study trees. At the end of a long
day of sensory awareness I sometimes do 'Recall Meditation'. I try to
recall backward (is easier) everything I did that day. It takes you far
doing this. It also is very effective at developing ESP when combined
with becoming consciously conscious activities. It results in what I
call 'Heaven on earth' which is a condition of super tranquility of the
mind. Children are naturally studying everything because they do not
know yet what to 'watch out for' and proceed to dream of the things we
do as adults. They live closer to the Eternity of the Moment and are far
more observant than us. This sensory awareness greatly helps with
concentration and meditation and has great practical benefit instead of
getting irritated by waiting in line at a store I will study the sales
posters say. The floor - what color. What kind of ceiling? How many
isles are there? The time goes by much faster that way. Same with being
stuck in traffic - something very, very common in the Washington area.]

Mike Dubbeld