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"The Physics of Going Within" - RS 5 Word / Name Mantra - Jot Niranjan, Onkar, Rarankar, Sohang, Sat Nam - Understand the process from a different vantage point, which in itself may be both instructive and helpful for the neophyte [beginner] meditation practitioner. Article analyzes Shabd Yoga Meditation of Radhasoami Faith, Beas, Agra, Ruhani Satsang and others. Breaks down the Radha Soami (RS) meditation technique into precise components.
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1 THE PHYSICS OF GOING WITHIN
The Physics of Going Within
Notes on the Technical Mechanics of Shabd Yoga Meditation
ध्यान
2 THE PHYSICS OF GOING WITHIN
In analyzing shabd yoga from a more dispassionate
viewpoint (putting in brackets such spiritualized
concepts as guru-bhakti and grace), it is possible to
breakdown the meditation technique into precise
components. Such an analysis allows one to
understand the process from a different vantage
point, which in itself may be both instructive and
helpful for the neophyte.
Saying the five name mantra of Jot Niranjan, Onkar,
Rarankar, Sohang, Sat Nam silently but methodically
takes anywhere from 5 to 8 seconds. Roughly
speaking we can repeat this mantra about 8 times a
minute, give or take a couple rounds. If one
meditates 2 hours it translates as about 1000 rounds
of repetition.
The 8 second mantra can be broken down further to
its separate words: Jot Niranjan (1 second plus),
Onkar (1 second or less?), and so on. In terms of
computational language, each letter equals a byte. If
we include the spaces between each word, the entire
five name mantra is equal to 42 bytes of information.
[ Sidtenote: Of course the number 42 was made famous by
Douglas Adams in his widely read science fiction novel,
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Universe, where he alleges
that the natural number is the “Answer to the Ultimate
Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything.” It also
3 THE PHYSICS OF GOING WITHIN
has the distinction of being known by computer
programmers as a wildcard since it is represented by an
asterisk. It is also the atomic number of molybdenum.]
Thus 2 hours of simran equals 42,000 bytes or
approximately 41 kilobytes. Since the object of
repetition is concentration, the key is to see how
focused the mind can be in any singular moment. But
exactly what is a moment in awareness? In the mid-
19th century Hermann Helmholtz and his assistant
Wilhelm Wundt studied how fast nerve impulses
traveled which turned out be much slower than first
expected. Whatever we might presume about
“immediate” one thing is certainly clear: it is never
instantaneous. As John McCrone explains:
“Modern research has since shown that human
nerves actually conduct at a whole range of speeds,
the rate depending on the size of the axon and also
the thickness of a fatty insulation material, known as
myelin, wrapped around it. The nervous system is
like a road network with a few fast motorways and
many winding country lanes. Large, heavily
myelinated nerves — such as the muscle and sensory
nerves which must run the length of the body —
transmit their impulses at up to 240 miles per hour.
But the congested network of small unmyelinated
nerves which make up the bulk of our brain, work
much more slowly. Once inside our heads, impulses
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tend to crawl along at between two and 20 miles per
hour. What such conduction speeds mean is that
while consciousness might be fast, it cannot be
instant. It takes a minimum of 10 to 20 milliseconds
(thousandths of a second) for any sensory message to
reach the brain. After that, the brain must spend yet
more time in evolving a response.“
An easy way to grasp the significance of this is to see
how easily the brain can be duped into believing that
still pictures are moving when they are shown in
rapid succession (usually 24 frames per second). We
tend to “blur” any image that is shown sequentially
in less than 50 milliseconds. Accordingly, a
perceptual moment apparently can range anywhere
from a minimum of 40 milliseconds to 500
milliseconds. Or, as Benjamin Lipet suggested there
is a half-second delay relay in our perceptual
awareness. No matter how we parse a moment, we
know that it takes milliseconds for something to be
perceived and that it can disappear within seconds.
By paying attention only to the word being repeated
silently within, the moment gets occupied by the said
word and hopefully with the next word and so on.
However, within these segregated instances the mind
often roams in and out of other thoughts which
distract from the desired object of attention. The
difficulty is that it is exceedingly troublesome to stay
5 THE PHYSICS OF GOING WITHIN
concentrated on any particular word or sequence of
words consistently for a sustained duration of time.
The end result is a lack of progress in meditation and
the practitioner ends up spending more time either
daydreaming or temporarily (if not more
permanently) falling asleep.
Perhaps the secret to deep concentration in
meditation resides in how well we can thicken (or
immerse) our focus in any particular moment. By
this, I mean increasing our ability to “stay” or
“reside” within the stream of our repetition while
centering on any emerging light that may arise.
Hence, in this context, meditation is not something
we do for 2 hours at a stretch (though such a
parameter may be our alarm clock goal) but rather
developing our ability to keep fully focused for 8
seconds (or computationally 42 bytes). Of course, this
can only be achieved if we can first master 500
milliseconds, 1 second, and so on.
However, if such concentration can be achieved
certain telltale signs arise which can be both
attractive and distracting. Distracting because when a
certain level of concentration is achieved one tends to
divert one’s attention away from simran and start
enjoying the increasing bliss of calmness. In addition
when the body starts to go numb (due to the
withdrawal of awareness from the sensory
6 THE PHYSICS OF GOING WITHIN
apparatus) a certain anxiety arises as if something
unusual is about to occur. This feeling of expectation
increases as the concentration increases which
conversely limits the continued withdrawal since one
then gets distracted anew by the surprising sensation
of unexpected numbness.
This is precisely when and where doing repetition
within the series of moments gets more difficult,
since keeping at the focus provides ancillary flashes
of pleasure. If one can indeed stay focused, sparks of
light begin to illuminate what otherwise appears to
be mostly smeared darkness. Doing simran looking
at the light (especially one particulate which stands
out from the rest) actually increases one’s
concentration since it now occupies the visual sense,
which prior had nothing to center on precisely.
If one can steady into the light and keep the mantra
intact one’s consciousness then starts to go
consciously within, not dissimilar to the process of
falling asleep except that in this case one’s keen self-
awareness and lucidity increase manifold, so much
so, in point of fact, that there is a pulling sensation
that emerges that tugs one into a different state of
reflection.
In shabd yoga, however, the final pull-out of
awareness is optimized by listening to subtler and
7 THE PHYSICS OF GOING WITHIN
subtler sounds (usually musical in intonation, which
in the preliminary stages is similar to cascading bells)
which become markedly distinct as the concentration
becomes steadfast within the eye focus. At this point,
the danger is that such sounds distract one from
repeating the mantra so that one can often get
bifurcated and lose the full power of their leveraged
concentration. It is perhaps for this reason that shabd
yogis have suggested concentrating on simran and
dhyan first without attending to the inner sounds
that may arise.
If the simran is mastered to a significant degree the
switchover to listening to the inner sound doesn’t
necessarily lessen the concentration that was gained
by constant and attentive repetition, particularly if
the sound is strong and pulling and provided one can
become so absorbed into the sound wave as to ride
with it and merge from which itself forms.
8 THE PHYSICS OF GOING WITHIN
“The first leg of meditation is mechanical”
“Being still is a technical skill that can be learned”
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