process of evolution. Also, the very fact that we are aware of it shows that we have
some connection with it. If we are totally unaware of it, that is a different matter,
because according to the system that we are studying, every awareness is a contact of
consciousness with an object; and every such contact is brought about by some
reason behind the cause, which is the product of previous karmas. So we have some
connection with this experience; and whatever we experience, whether we like it or
not, is a necessary experience. It is, therefore, to be taken as a step in one’s education
towards higher experiences.
Therefore, there should be no attitude of like or dislike in respect of an experience.
This impartial attitude that we are supposed to develop is what is meant by viveka
khyati, or discriminative understanding. We should not say, “Oh, how pleasurable it
is,” or “Oh, how horrible it is.” That is not proper, because a thing is neither
pleasurable nor horrible. It looks like that due to some mistake in the perception of
values attached to the experience. The causative factors behind the experience are
completely out of the ken of perception and, therefore, the experiences look
pleasurable or otherwise. If the causative factors are known, there would be a
scientific perception of things and not an emotional reaction in respect of things. An
impartial perception is impossible where emotion is attached to that experience, and
emotion goes with the experience on account of feeling being there behind it—that is
called avidya. The discriminative faculty gets submerged temporally by the
preponderance of the feeling aspect, and that is what is called emotion. The
dominance of feeling over understanding becomes the cause of our reaction in terms
of pleasure and pain, and viveka khyati is not there. Hence, what is expected of us is
not merely an emphasis on feeling or emotion in respect of an experience, but a
probe that is of a more impartial character. That is viveka khyati.
All this is terrible for a beginner in yoga because emotions are part and parcel of our
nature, and we cannot exist without them. We are what these emotions are. And so,
we can imagine the extent of training that is necessary to allow the understanding to
gain an upper hand in our life, far surpassing the forces of emotion which try to
supplant it; but this is a precondition to yoga. Yoga is the most scientific of attitudes
that we can think of because it is the most impartial.
Chapter 69UNDERSTANDING WORLD-CONSCIOUSNESSWhat is known as the perception of an object is really a reading of some meaning into
the object by the perceiving consciousness. It is not merely a bare reflection of the
object in the mind, as something may be reflected in a mirror without the mirror
having any say in the matter. It is not simply a featureless, bare, unconscious
reflection. If it were a mere mechanical reflection, there would be no attachment
towards objects. For instance, I may physically touch an object and yet I may have no
contact with it, because psychological contact is different from physical contact or
proximity. The bondage of the soul is not merely the physical contact or the
proximity of one thing with another. It is a psychological transformation which
affects oneself wholly. That is what is known as the bondage of the soul.