Wednesday, 17 July 2019

TUNING THE BRAIN

What appears to us as sudden in fact has been brewing underneath for ages. A volcano erupting, slight movements of the sea bed over time that brings about massive tidal waves, a ripple that is magnified a thousand times, all had a beginning somewhere in the past as a silent occurring. Annie Besant in her talks on "The Laws of the Higher Life", the Theosophical Publishing House, 1903, states that there is nothing disorderly both in this material world and the spiritual world.  

As heads of families where duty prevails, we are obligated and responsible to many people, called the law of outer obligation. There is yet another facet of law, the inner law that demands for sacrifice from us, where everything is done gladly and willingly and in perfect self-surrender, she says. 
"Here he works because the divine outwelling finds its channel in his life, and he needs no outer compulsion because of the perfection of the inner law." 
He grows. The sacrifice that is a faint reflection of the divine grows in him as he has connected with the larger consciousness. The divine consciousness begins to work through him its laws expanding to envelope all those who he comes into contact with. A movement is generated to do His divine bidding. Whoever throws his heart at the Lotus Feet of the Divine is roped into for his mission. He becomes a channel of the divine outpouring transmitting not his love but the great outpouring of love of the divine. He becomes His apostle. Then nature is conquered through his obedience, Annie writes just as Agathiyar mentions too. 

There is a consciousness larger than the brain, a consciousness that transcends the body akin to the limited hard disk space and in comparison, that which is massive in the server or cloud. When Tavayogi spoke about the receptiveness of people to certain teachings, he classified them as having the nature of petrol, charcoal, and peat. Peat fires may burn for great lengths of time, or smolder underground and reignite later. Charcoal if fanned will catch on and burn well. Petrol catches fire easily. Annie says of those who are in the front of evolution are of a subtler nature and more easily upset by the coarser vibrations of the lower world than those adapted to it. Similarly, Annie draws two distinct division to people and their brains. The more highly evolved brain that is sensitive and readily responsive to subtle vibrations is that of the spiritual genius - spiritual, artistic, literary. Then the normal brain under undue stress and emotion becoming sensitive and tense, is the brain of the religious mystic and seer. While the former is careless of ordinary affairs, the later with its "intense desire to reach a higher life overstrains the nerves hence rendering it sensitive to answer vibrations from the subtler planes of being. Then visions and abnormal happenings will occur. The superphysical consciousness finds at least for the brief moment a vehicle sufficiently sensitive to receive and answer to its impulses. The neuropathic brain affords the conditions necessary for the vision that belongs to the superphysical world, to impress itself on the physical consciousness."

In our over-enthusiasm, and as "we are dealing with vehicles in the ordinary stage of evolution, unfit for subtle vibrations", the medium could place himself in danger. The unfit brain, in straining itself to answer to the higher could go cuckoo - a warning given by Lord Muruga too. But Annie asks us to look towards the East for answers to "how this danger has been understood and guarded against and avoided." 
"The self gathers around it upadhi upon upadhi, vehicle after vehicle, gradually shaping its own instruments." 
He shapes a mental body, to communicate his thoughts with others, he shapes an astral body expressing his emotions to others, and he shapes a physical body that works into bringing his activities alive.
"Here we see a consciousness that shapes bodies according to its needs, gradually refining them and bringing them under the control of the higher." 
Man who wished to make rapid progress escaped into the jungle, that as we know brings him into the alpha state almost immediately. Here he is saved from the constant bombardment of "coarser magnetism of the outer world", where "rougher vibrations" do not assail him. Hence he is less likely to be upset. Yogi Ramsuratkumar too expressed his sadness saying that it is a blessing indeed if one could go into a meditative state in these times where there are a myriad of waves emitted from appliances and gadgets that disturb meditation. 
"Here, in the jungle, they meditated making the brain tense and refined by the concentration of the mind, and restraint of lower faculties, fixed in rapt attention on the higher, with the consciousness working from above playing on the physical brain and tuning it to respond safely to the higher vibrations. Then it strove to draw the lower upwards (as Tavayogi says of our efforts that are only till the first two initial stages, Muladhara and Svadisthana) until it answered no longer to the stimuli of the outer world. This is a state of yoga - complete withdrawal of the consciousness from the Indriyas."
"Now making the mind steady, holding quiet the powers of the mind, the mind ceases to vibrate, and it becomes still - able to answer the vibrations coming from above."
As Bharathi sang "தன்செய லெண்ணித் தவிப்பது தீர்ந்திங்கு, நின்செயல் செய்து நிறைவுபெறும் வண்ணம், நின்னைச் சரணடைந்தேன் — கண்ணம்மா! நின்னைச் சரணடைந்தேன்!, "When the mind is made tranquil and quiet when no desire was allowed to trouble its serenity, as a lake in perfect calm, on that mind at rests and peace was thrown the reflection of the self."

Annie describes the change needed to be brought forth,
"The brain has to be changed, refined, improved, its connecting links fashioned and manufactured for the purposes of the expression of the higher consciousness." 
So it looks like there is a lot of work to be done here. It is not an easy task. No wonder Supramania Swami said we shall polish and keep polishing till it shines and Tavayogi said we shall come again and again to get it right. Maybe it is too late for us to venture into making the brain conducive to receive the consciousness and having it reflect the majesty and the glory of the self, but our children have been blessed coming with the right mindset to progress steadily and achieve what they came for as promised by Lord Muruga and Agathiyar.