I have always been someone with a short attention span. And at the same time deeply interested in all limbs of Yoga. And this was quite a paradox. Ashtang-yoga as the name suggests has eight limbs. Of which five – Asana, Pranayama, Pratyahar, Dharana, Dhyan in that order, require an increasing amount of attention lock-in from the Sadhak. However, I wasn’t wired for that.
I experimented with a variety of mindfulness disciplines (Dharana practices) – Soham meditation, Anapanasati and Tratak but fell flat on my face every single time. I also attended a long Vipassana camp but I couldn’t lock in my attention sufficiently to be able to derive much benefit from it. I would be ‘there’ for a few fleeting moments and then I would happily drift away in thought. Only to feel very bad about myself later. I tried this for quite a few years – on and off – but I was hardly making progress. My self-esteem would suffer and I would only end up beating myself up for that psychologically.
What came to my rescue was the Samadhi Abhyasa that I had learnt along the way from my master Guruji Rishi Prabhakar (founder of SSY). Samadhi Abhyasa is one step subtler than awareness, mindfulness and witnessing. In fact in many ways its diametrically opposite to a mindfulness technique. In fact its all about de-focus rather than focus. If you observe, mindfulness or witnessing also involves an element of effort while the Samadhi Practice that I learnt as a part of SSY is all about non-doing. All you do is just ‘be’. There is no place for ‘watching’ either. The closest one finds to the Samadhi Abhyasa is the original Zazen meditation.
Samadhi practice immediately struck a chord with somebody like me who couldn’t get himself to adapt to the discipline of mindfulness. I would find myself in deeply blissful states within a matter of minutes. For upwards of a decade, I have been pursuing it on a daily basis now. The stillness and contentment it leaves me with has been most profound. While I earlier beat myself up for being too distracted, now in retrospect, I feel I am blessed. Owing to a poor threshold for the frustration induced by failed mindfulness experiments, I landed up in a technique that directly lands one in the transcendental space (the Turiya avastha that’s beyond the mind) in a matter of 3-4 minutes. This is the best part – that it’s least a dozen times faster than anything else i have come across.
Second thing that came to my rescue is the teachings of no-mind from Zen and Taoism. I realised that both Zen and Taoism had a more direct approach to meditation. You can bypass all forms of ritualistic disciplines and operate from (and thereby abide in) the source without any discipline whatsoever. The purpose of mindfulness is also so that culminates in no-mind. The Taoist prefers the direct route. Taoism nudged me to operate from the no-mind (also called the unborn mind) rather than do anything in particular to still the mind. I nevertheless still combine the Samadhi ritual and the Breathwork rituals with Taoistic no-mind.
Operating from no-mind requires you to operate from a place that’s beyond any form of distinctions or polarities. Operating from no-mind requires you to get in touch with the seat of spontaneity (sahaja) within you thats beyond the opposites. And as you operate more and more this way, you generate a certain momentum that only adds more and more freshness and delight to your life. There is a place for mindfulness practices for those who are wired for that. I personally know quite a few who have benefited from it. However, a defocusing practice like the Samadhi Abhyasa and operating from no-mind is to my mind a far easier and far more expeditious alternative.
I am endeavouring to master this space better and better with every passing day. It works like a 24*7 open-eye meditation that keeps your mind free of clutter, the body full of prana and the spirit full of enthusiasm.
