Functional Yogic Practices that liberate pramana-vrtti

In meditation all vrtti then must be liberated, be led into the great silence of beginningless awareness, become remediated and nullified, suspended, and cease. We liberate the citta-vrtti because they have the potential to produce further hindrances (kleshas) for yogis, which further obscure the field of consciousness. This is at first to be practiced in dhyana (meditation practice) which proves Patanjali correct from our own experience. The practicing yogi must go beyond ordinary pramana to Direct Inner Non-Dual Experience -- to awaken the inborn self effulgent intelligence within (Rtambhara -- see Sutra 48). Later on in the sutras Patanjali elaborates the methods of yoga that destroy the vrttis by destroying ignorance (avidya) itself, but this can not be accomplished without giving up pramana in practice. It is this basic ignorance which obstructs our essential self nature -- our self existing innate natural wholeness called swarupa. For a true yogi, any "view" that is not universal eventually must be surrendered into the fire of yoga -- all limited views based on time and place must be thoroughly challenged, melted down, purified, disengaged from, and surrendered. This is the deeper meaning by which the authentic practices of vairagya, isvara pranidhana, tapas, and swadhyaya reveals by itself (through practice of all the limbs of astanga yoga).

Also this is facilitated by objectless/unsupported meditation (dhyana), but the problem is how do we extend that to all our relationships; i.e., how is that integrated? If you are engaged in your work especially one that demands your full attention on a gross level, driving an automobile, engaged in complex mathematical calculations, operating dangerous machinery, etc., you have to depend greatly on your senses, reasoning, as trusted indicators of course. However the so called "exterior world" does not have to obstruct inner wisdom/intuition, albeit it often supersedes it; i.e., it becomes a limited/fragmented framework as a citta-vrtti. Even though we can maintain much awareness and communion with transconceptional consciousness and/or use our imprint of that awareness as a guide, such everyday challenges become "demanding" in the everyday circumstances of a householders life. It tends to draw our energy and awareness outward and dissipate it. Living in retreat and/or in nature, it is easier to see the one in the many -- to live in a non-dual state, where dualistic perception, reasoning, and agama are irrelevant -- where sacred presence is immanent. Thus, in yoga we try to continue to extend that non-dual realization (samadhi) into All Our Relations all the time. We call this integrative process, yoga.

Eventually we can throw out all of that "philosophy" thing, all of good and evil, all belief systems, dogmatic faith, ideology, the imposition of a straight plane rigidity upon the innate creative healing and beauty way of life, once we have realized to some degree the living reality of the organic world as being a reflection of the creator once we see its true nature and how it is an obstruction. We thus take refuge in this aliveness, our essential nature, after it has become rekindled through practice, action (karma), and/or grace.

A beginner, lacking this guidepost of a living awareness usually can not effectively throw out all structure before they establish a trusted, firm grounding, or true clarity of the nature of the unconditioned mind with confidence. However authentic yoga practice will break up old holding patterns (citta-vrtti) and allow the yogi to continue to let these structures go (vairagya), while observing what comes up, arises, appears to exist, and declines. By letting go (non-attachment even to non-attachment) doesn't mean that we are losing anything, but rather we may be gaining something by creating space. Just as one clears out old junk from the shelves, then something new that has more functionality may fit there. This suspension of belief is the same as to entertain asking for guidance -- surrendering to isvara. Here, the yogi is not simply giving up in surrendering, but specifically surrendering to one's innate guide and light. That is part of the practice.

If we are playing a game or buy into some common rules, then within that framework there exists at least a temporary or conditional belief system that has concluded a right and wrong or good/bad, or contractual rules. However if two people are of a different religion or believe in a differing value system, it might be impossible to to agree on a common good or bad or right or wrong. This needs repeating, only if one presumes a universal ethic or principle acceptable to all (such does not exist) -- only then, it would be useful to use the words "good" or "bad", so these terms are best avoided for clarity's sake. Good/bad are merely statements that affirm personal like or dislike, preference or aversion, desire or fear, and the like. Lacking a universally agreed good/evil that is a way one could approach ethics as a philosophical system. Yoga however is beyond ethical philosophical debate.

This is not just another way of saying that good/right and bad/wrong exist, but that it is wise to choose different words in order to avoid relative confusion. It is by all means necessary to use different words, because good/bad and right/wrong depend on the game -- they are culturally or religiously conditioned/determined -- they are artificial results (the works of man) unless we assume the imposition of a universal ethic or principle. Actually this commentator does believe that Reality has such universal all pervading principles, but it can't be translated in terms of good and bad. Secondly, not everyone is ready to intimately see and live in such a Reality (yet); so such principles can not be universally accepted and described as even being desirable by all, let alone "good". But even beyond desirable and undesirable, that is where the Reality of "what-is-as-it-is" (swarupa) the Reality of I-AM is found without being filtered by preference or preconception. That is not a neutral existential reality, but rather a profound non-dual transpersonal sacred communion with everything, everywhere, and all the time. To talk "about it" as in exteriorize or objectify "it" through philosophical methods will wind up extracting the inquirer away from "it". Speculation and over-elaboration are dead ends to be avoided. One must go beyond dislike/like (aversion and attraction), where all attachment is dissolved in the living presence of the Great Integrity in which we intimately share.

Nothing is truly "wrong" or "bad" about the world as-it-is; rather what appears as bad is only people bitching and complaining or stating their preferences, their needs, cravings, and sense of separation really. In a primal sense (in the beginningless beginning), there was awareness of our inseparable timeless unity with Beginningless source, but then came the rend, rift, separation, estrangement, spiritual self alienation of ego. It was a rend/estrangement in both awareness and in beingness. That illusion/delusion has become institutionalized by a conspiracy of men's fabricating forces aligned with the matrix of ignorance (the primal rend of unawareness)-- negative programming. manipulation, and exploitation of the future generations in order to provide for their neurotic security, comfort, selfish needs and self-gratification. The Reality is that such alienated men will never find fulfillment unless they re-enter the living community -- the whole system and find their place as one with it, acknowledging their place in the over all context of the inseparable inter-connectedness of the web of life. The good news is that this wholographic trans-cognitive and non-dual transpersonal Reality is always accessible by virtue of its inseparable original Beginningless nature. The very fabric of the matrix is illusory -- an artificial game that represents events in terms o isolated frozen fragments of time and space, which twist reality and create a localized spin, prejudice, fragmented framework, or citta vrtti..

So Patanjali and Buddha give us practices to transform illusion, ignorance, estrangement, and suffering into realization. It is instructive that Patanjali not once uses the words good or bad and his system of yama/niyama is not at all meant to be a system of ethics or moral laws as so defined in the Western context. The latter system of ethics is simply another way of manipulating and intimidating people.

"Because entrenchments in views
aren't easily overcome
when considering what's ...grasped
among doctrines,
that's why
a person embraces or rejects a doctrine —
in light of these very
entrenchments.

Dutthatthaka Sutta