By Matsyavatara Dasa
From toxic psychic contents to healthy psycho-ecological energy
The phenomena of Perception can be described as follows. An external object, constituted of five basic elements or bhuta (earth, water, fire, air, ether) stimulates the senses (indriya) which respond by activation. Segments of information, previously external to the subject, in this manner, penetrate the conscience as vrittis, especially in the form of names (nama) and forms (rupa).
Upon entering conscience, sensory data move quickly into the subconscious to build a new samskara or enforce an already existing one.
This new sensorial experience in fact aggregates with other similar previous experiences, building sets of samskaras loaded with a power directly proportional to the number of agglomerating experiences.
Subordinately, on the physiological level we can see this process at work by observing the enforcing of the synapses related to certain sensorial experiences. Synapses are transmission areas for nerve signals.
These messages ensure communication between the different parts of the body that are represented by the single nerve cells.
A synapses is a conjunction that happens, most frequently in human beings, between the dendrite of a neuron (bunch of fibers that receive information) and the axon (bunch of fibers that deliver information) of another neuron.
There are also synapses between dendrites and somas of different neurons or between the dendrite and the axon of the same neuron, but these are rare cases, especially the latter. The sensorial stimulation happens by transmission of electrical impulses, that is as transduction of a sensorial stimulation into electrochemical energy (synapses level). The nature of the impulse transmitted by synapses can be electrical or chemical, with exciting or inhibiting functions.
The number of neurons present at the moment of birth will tend to be more or less constant for the rest of one’s life. The number of connections however, will multiply exorbitantly during the first few years of life. For example at the age of 3 the number of synapses for each neuron is around 10,000.
Experience strengthen some synapses and inactivates others, while those in excess are eliminated. Some will remain dormant because they are underutilized, but they are ready to emerge in case a pathology or a cerebral illness causes malfunction in the other ones.
In a human being there are between 1014 and 1015 synapses: they can be rearranged until old age, as demonstrated by recent researches on cerebral plasticity.
Previous experiences bring about patterns and views of the world, grids of preconceptions and prejudices, which coercively move wishes, thoughts and actions from the subconscious, densely populated with samskaras, as new samskaras form during the existential cycle of the conditioned personality.
The structuring of samskaras and their interactions originate automatic responses (vasana), which the subject passively endures, deluding himself over believing he is the actual author of his choices.
Actually the person is not free but enslaved by an automated process of thoughts caused by the new samskara which interacts with the old ones to produce a returning vritti. Emerging on the conscience, returning vrittis determine thoughts, choices and decisions for the unaware puppet which is the conditioned ego.
This way it is possible to explain the differences in the personality of individuals as birth default configuration of a different synaptic apparatus, dictated by guna and karma, which is later rearranged under the effect of individual experiences as explained above.
The above described process produces pathologically settled neural circuits, in which the subject is entrapped like a mouse in a cage: scenarios and protagonists alternate but reactions and automated thought mechanisms remain the same: compulsory, coercive and reiterated, because a samskara always produces the same results.
In a broad comparison, we could say that on the mental subtle level we find what the Behavioral School has widely described for observable, physical behaviors, particularly in the Skinnerian Operating Conditioning Theory.
In fact it is possible to say that, if adequately reinforced, a certain behavior tends to repeat itself irrespectively of the context and initial stimulus which triggered it. In the same way, sense vrittis joining with old samskaras or forming new ones tend to feed themselves on the coercive behaviors that they produce, as in a circular trap.
It is however possible to free ourselves from such pathological neural circuits following the method suggested by Patanjali : meditation on the opposite thought.
Meditating on the opposite thought is not limited to thinking rationally and superficially only on the level of nama and rupa; it means living in the opposite thought (bhavana), lingering on it, by going in the depths of conscience and at least reaching the bio-energy level (vibhuti).
Only by developing a strong sentiment and emotion connected to the opposite thought we can oppose the latent samskara, the fixed, pathological and enslaving idea, de-potentiating the synapses which formed it while feeding other more positive ones.
In reality, this process of inner representations, apparently difficult, is exclusively the fruit of training and practice: learning to visualize is possible through the evocation of constructive and evolutionary emotions. These emotions allow us to ascend to higher levels of conscience. We might have sporadically experienced them during our existence but, due to their rarity, they have had no chance to adequately strengthen, as instead did more frequent negative experiences or general sensorial experiences. In fact samskaras are not necessarily negative, the moral character of good-bad (shuba-ashuba) pleasant-painful (sukha-duhkha) of such experiences does not alter their conditioning effect: they will nonetheless tend to produce automated responses and in this automatism lies the deprivation of freedom and spontaneity for the conditioned personality set. The conditioned personality could free itself from such slavery only by a deliberate act of will in search for an experience in contrast with the disturbing thought.
Besides generating disturbing thoughts in one’s psyche, the cultivation of harmful intentions, sentiments and thoughts (envy, hatred, rancor, revenge or similar), unloads these thoughts in the collective unconscious which connects us all, and engenders these evil sentiments also in those they are addressed to. The latter will consciously or subconsciously react by producing similar sentiments, therefore the sender will receive virtually endless damage in return.
This is why, in order to eliminate the toxic causes of a disturbing thought, it is opportune to meditate on opposite thoughts.
By cultivating and visualizing constructive attitudes for himself and others, the individual can gradually apply the principle of not hurting anyone (ahimsa) and thus exit the prison of the unconscious matrix, free from the painful sense of guilt for harvesting a destructive and harmful will directly and indirectly towards others.
Only he who is free inside, by the application of abstinence (yama) and prescriptions (nyama), can think independently and freely decide, acting with emotional detachment and with no interest for the result of his actions but only constructively in favor of all creatures.
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“In a human being there are between 1014 and 1015 synapses:”
This must be a typo, especially since a couple paragraphs above we are told there are 10,000 synapses for each neuron at age 3.
I am intrigued by Matsyavatara Prabhu’s “psychology of yoga” brand of preaching. This could potentially reach a wide and influential audience…
I am having trouble understanding what Patanjali means by the “opposite thought.” If the unwanted thought is “cherry pie”, what is the opposite thought? Banana cream pie? Salad? A lump of coal?
Does every thought have its opposite?
We get so much direction from Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita. By contemplating the objects of the senses, one develops attachment…etc. The simple idea is that attachment comes from the deeper plane, ie from the conscious soul. Nityo nityanama…eko bahunam yo vidhadhati kaman. The Upanishads declare that our desires or attachment are witnessed by the Paramatma. He can sanction or not the outcome of our desires.
Therefore, when the jiva-soul is awakened to its real self-interest, grace of Sri Gurudeva, then attention and desire are cultivated in the direction of Krishna, Krishna consciousness. Then when we sit in the theatre of the mind and disturbing thoughts enter, we remember our Gurudeva’s guidance and return to the shelter of Sri Krishna’s Name, etc. In one purport in the Bhagavad Gita As It Is in the sixth chapter, Srila Prabhupad describes how we control the mind according to Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur Prabhupad. He advised that we beat the mind with a shoe 100 times in the morning and 100 times in the evening. We ignore the mind and dedicate ourselves to Sri Gurudeva’s guidance and remembrance of Krishna.
We do not want to get caught on the mental platform rationalizing that one thing is better than another, and then carry on from the mode of ignorance, to passion, to goodness, when we have a qualified Gurudeva to guide us Home. Thoughts, toxic or not, enter the mind, and it is our goal to avoid chasing these dreamlike puffs, and rather take shelter of the Holy Names. With just a little detachment, we can perceive the self as different from the mind, and thus not become victimized again and again by the mind. Then, when favorable thoughts of Krishna enter the mind, we can allow that favorable breeze to carry us further Home. I hope that these analyses help some to find their way through the quagmire that the mind can be, friend and enemy both for the soul.
Hare Krishna
Pusta Krishna das
Hare Krishna
Please accept my obeisances, all glories to Shrila Prabhupada!
Yes, in the text there is a typo error due to a wrong cut&paste. In fact the text means 10^14 10^15 synapses. It’s my fault, I’ve published the article on behalf of my Guru Maharaj Shriman Matsyavatara Prabhu.
Thank you Pusta Krishna Prabhu for your remarkable comment.
Your servant
Anantadeva dasa.
http://matsyavatara.blogspot.com
I was really interested in Bhanu Swami’s recent class at the Mayapur festival that was posted on Dandavats. It is interesting how, even in the Bhagavatam and Bhagavad Gita, so much attention is given to sankhya and mystic yoga and the universal form and karma yoga and varnasrama dharma and all these other things that are not important to the great devotees who are already spontaneously attracted to Krishna.
The point is that for those of us who are still attracted to jnana and karma and ethics and helpful practices, assimilating all these lessons from the right persective is really helpful.
I recently attended a level one Bhagavat Life japa retreat in Joshua Tree, California, and it struck me how much the japa portion of our sadhana really does correspond to the Sixth Chapter of Bhagavad Gita. We should have a sacred place, sit properly, not be distracted, bring our mind back whenever it wanders, etc.
Srila Prabhupada describes in his Sixth Chapter purports that Patanjali Rsi actually accepts there is a spiritual identity that enjoys with transcendental senses, but the mayavadi commentators misconstrue his sutras. At any rate, Krishna clearly says the goal of mystic yoga is to make Him the center and come to His place (yukta asita mat parah … mat samstham adhigacchati)
The Sixth Chapter of the Gita and Prabhupada’s purports there are extremely important.
I used to want to compare and contrast Patanjali’s yoga darshan (which I am told is similar to atheistic Kapila Muni’s sankhya darshan) with the vedanta darshan Krishna expounds in Bhagavad Gita. However, a spiritual mentor has advised me that, for me personally, I should not even read Patanjali, at least for the time being. So it is not a project I can even speak knowingly about. Still, I am glad there are qualified devotees who can do this kind of work.
On book distribution I found that people who were interested in the Jungian mythology professor Joseph Campbell were very receptive.
Some get turned off by “religion” and “God”.
Matsyavatara Prabhu’s intellectual-style preaching could reach people who might be turned off by a more frankly devotional style. All the wealth of knowledge of psychology and philosophy and “mythology” and sociology contained in Prabhupada’s books should be appreciated by those who care about such things, even if they have a hard time immediately accepting that the “invincible purpose” of all such studies is descriptions of Krishna’s lila.
I realize my last post was a little abstruse. I was trying to say too many things at once, and really did not succeed in saying much of anything very clearly.
I guess what I was really mainly trying to do was react to the many nice writings posted by Matsyavatar Prabhu lately and recognize that there is perhaps a valuable place for this different style of preaching.
When I first became a devotee I thought surely my father would, too. From the time I was little he was reading books on Buddhism and “cosmic consciousness.” Later in the ’60s, when he lived in the Bolinas artists’ colony and ran a fabric warehouse in Sausalito, California, he struck up a friendship with Alan Watts, who lived on a houseboat nearby.
So sometime in 1976 I sent him a bunch of Prabhupada’s books, a Gita, 1st Canto Part One, Isopanisad, maybe a Krishna book. He just couldn’t get into them. “Not my cup of tea”, he told me. He still never has read them.
He just cannot get past phrases like, “The Blessed Lord said.” His atheistic tendency is too deep. He actually thinks that Jesus was some sort of impersonalist yogi and that all the devotional aspects of Christianity were added by unenlightened followers.
I realize that makes him sound shockingly stupid, but in fact he is very well educated, well read, creative, has written some really fabulous poetry and short fiction. He is just too much of a “duskrtina” to be attracted to Krishna. One of his strongest poems ends, “I damn heaven. I am heaven.”
And still I think he might be attracted to Vedic knowledge that leads to Krishna if someone could find the right “hook” to capture his interest. I have not spent much time with him (we are not close in that sense) and have never found a hook for him, but I think Matsyavatara’s approach might work for him and those like him.
It reminds me of how H.H. Bhakti Caru Swami told a Prabhu in “The Yoga of Kirtan” about the connotations of law class, immoral conduct that turned him off from Gaudiya Vaisnavism at first. There were just these cultural or sociological misconceptions or stereotypes. Of course, as a great soul, Maharaja was bound to soon be attracted.
When I was a child I did not like papaya, and my father told me: “You’re just thinking of it wrong. Think tropical paradise and you’ll like it.”
I am going to visit with him in April and I hope I can finally convince him he is just “thinking wrong” about Krishna consciousness.
I am very glad to see that the work of Shriman Matsyavatara Prabhu is appreciated. In fact, his preaching is oriented towards the spreading of Vedic and Vaishava Culture at large, thus trying to reach people at different level of society. All this without rejecting traditional approach to preaching. Thank you Akruanatha Prabhu for your post.
Your servant,
Anantadeva dasa