I often get very thoughtful questions from meditators that represent experiences that may be shared by other meditators.  Knowing that you are having experiences in common with other meditators, and my answers to these questions might be beneficial to many of you.  I therefore like to share these exchanges with our community from time to time.  I hope you get something from the following exchange.

– Thom

Question: How can there be any intelligence in the laws of nature when hundreds of thousands of innocent people suffer and die from an earthquake, as is happening in Haiti?
What thoughts go through your mind, Thom, when you hear of such an event?
How does meditating help a suffering world?
Aren’t we just turning a blind eye when we meditate?

Thom:
Every single day, much of our world’s vast population experiences appalling suffering of every kind; most of it is unimaginable to us.  The deaths, the gruesome suffering, the starvation and thirst after the earthquake in Haiti is well-covered by the media; it is shocking to learn of these horrors, and it is extremely frustrating to witness the obstacles to bringing meaningful help after-the-fact.

This notwithstanding, the media has not documented the hundreds of millions of people worldwide who suffer horribly in myriad ways every minute that we sleep, wake, and eat.

When given no alternative, occasionally the media will pause its program of reporting upon trivia and the “rich-people-problems of the non-entities” (by the latter term I mean ‘persons of little consequence or significance’).  Then the media will present us with a few days’ snapshots of one horrible set of events in one place outside the bubble of safety from which we view –and it is shocking to us.  Remember: we see only a snapshot before the trivia reports recommence.  What else is happening to our fellow humans while we gorge ourselves on trivia?  The experiences of the rest of our world’s people will go unreported.

Because no one knows what to do about the suffering of the world, unfortunately, the response of the majority of people in developed nations is merely to continue to ignore it. The media simply reflects its constituents’ willingness to ignore.  This collective reaction is unsustainable; it invites destruction.

The true problem in our suffering world is the chronic failure of people in developed nations to correct their priorities.  A developed nation that is fascinated by trivia and willing to ignore is, in fact, engineering its own demise.  Stress accumulation and obsolete education are twin causes of developed nations’ ignorance of the true needs of their fellow humans.  Stress makes one ignorant by causing chronic brain failure collectively.

Haiti was a disaster waiting to happen.  An earthquake triggered that disaster, but humans inside and outside of Haiti set up the initial conditions for the magnitude of the catastrophe.  Far from its being unlikely, only the most likely outcomes eventuated in Haiti, caused by humans failing to foresee the obvious future-in-the-making.  After the disaster hit, we moved to provide aid provoked more by conscience than by other motives.  To do so is a laudable act of charity, but it is not enough.

Consider this: how many more major disasters are waiting to happen right now in our world?  I suggest to you that these are too numerous to catalogue.  Can we deal with another ten or another fifty if they all happen together?  Of course we cannot.

The use of available human brain power has bottomed-out in our generation, averaging just 2%.  Let me congratulate you for practising your meditation technique regularly; you have joined a growing cadre of people who can see the reality of the world around them, because, like them, you are no longer averaging a mere 2% use of your available brainpower.

We cannot help the world by conforming with the majority who use only 2% of their brains.  We must continue to develop our fullest potential in order to make a significant difference.   I invite you and your friends to help me realise the plan of bringing a new age to this suffering world by popularising meditation and thereby decreasing ignorance.

After practising a session of meditation, dynamic activity stabilises the deep inner silence (Being) that we locate within.  Once Being is stabilised, 100% of the brain’s organising power is unleashed.  Regular twice daily meditation allows your entire brain to be fit and available fully for the big, important and urgent projects in the world that deserve high-quality attention, in order to achieve “what should have been done” before disasters underscore it.

Now, as regards nature’s intelligence, if one were to watch impassively as a child crawled excitedly toward a glowing ember and is burned, does this sequence of events negate the existence of intelligence in the laws of nature? Perhaps it does, for those who use 2% of their brains.  You are not one of those.

What I teach is that ignorance creates the weakness that attracts destruction.  A suffering population is a symptom of a world that is ignorant and weak; the suffering population is not blameworthy.  Blame lies with those who do nothing new and thereby enable the world’s capability to ignore its fellow humans.

Don’t wait for others, especially don’t wait for governments.  Identify and address now what is being ignored.  Take that brilliant meditator’s brain of yours and put it into action!

Jai Guru Deva,

Thom

In Vedic Meditation, an Advanced Technique is designed to take one’s awareness to that stratum, that layer of consciousness, that comprises the interface between thinking and pure silent consciousness.  

During meditation, sometimes we experience a state where the mind is virtually in the “no mantra, no thought” condition, and yet we are experiencing something that is so fulfilling – we may not be able to pinpoint what exactly it is — but nonetheless it is something — it is not the Absolute, not the pure silent awareness of transcendence.  Instead, there is some faint thinking there, extremely subtle, but there nonetheless.

The point here is that there is a layer in meditation in which our mind can think and also can Be simultaneously.  (Here, Being is the innocent silent witness to thinking).  That condition has a Sanskrit name: “Ritam Bhara Pragya”, also known simply as Ritam.  Ritam is expressive of ‘whole truth’.  So Ritam is ‘the state of consciousness that contains the whole truth’.

What do we mean by whole truth?  It is not the whole truth that our true nature is limited to our body, this individualised mortal set of physiological functions with a history (when it was born, where it has been, what experiences it witnessed, etcetera).  Nor is it the whole truth that (after meditation has revealed the Absolute state of Being) our reality solely is that immortal unboundedness of Being, the unmanifest source of everything.  

The whole truth, the Ritam, is that one is both these realities simultaneously; we are relative and Absolute at the same time.  There is a place in our consciousness, a level, a stratum, deep in the least excited state in meditation where Ritam can be experienced; and it is right on the cusp of transcendence, in the super-subtle field where thinking and other cognitive phenomena are adjacent to Being, just emerging from Being.

With  our “First Initiation” technique, the mind glimpses occasionally this in-between Ritam state, but the First Initiation technique is designed to cause the mind to jump into pure transcendence (the state of “no mantra, no thought”) quickly and to bounce back into the grosser fields of thinking as the body releases its stress.

An Advanced Technique is designed to take the awareness into Ritam (the in-between state) and to linger there; to familiarise the mind with Ritam.

When the mind becomes familiar with Ritam, the subtle perceptual capability of the senses is very engaged; the state of Ritam is absorbing and the senses become enchanted by their experience – something akin to experiencing nectar.  Simply the phenomenon – the mere process of experiencing – intrinsically is fascinating to the senses.  

So, this fascination (experienced in Ritam, during meditation) gives the senses a naturally refined liking for and a capacity for discernment of the subtle.  The senses develop an habituation to find that super-subtle layer outside meditation, in the eyes-open state.  The regular daily experiences of that super-subtle value in Ritam hones the senses to a razor-sharpness, giving them acuity – an acuteness – of sensory perception with eyes open, whilst engaged in activity.

Now, outside of meditation (with eyes open) the senses will delve into their objects in order to locate that same level of satisfaction that they acquired inside meditation (with eyes closed).  Consequently, one’s capacity for super-subtle sensory perception outside meditation is enhanced markedly.

Possession of highly-enhanced sensory acuity gives one the advantage of being able to detect subtle change occurring in the phenomenal world.  

At every moment, everything is changing to assist the inexorable process of evolution.  All seeds of future events are available here in the present.  If only we possess the sensory sensitivity to be able to detect change-in-genesis, then we are able to detect the future-in-the-making.  When we can detect the subtle shifts that occur constantly causing progressive change, then, also, we will find that our expectations spontaneously align themselves with what actually is going on, rather than our relying utterly upon the shoddy guesswork of a speculating intellect— whose capacity for forecast and prediction is notoriously inaccurate.

Much suffering in life is brought about by our being blind-sided by changes that occur when change is not expected by us.  This suffering makes it extremely difficult to understand how change is evolutionary, and this can cause deep sadness.  

However, when, through regular practise of our Advanced Technique, the senses gain that capacity for super-subtle perception of minute progressive changes, then we are more attuned; we are able better to sense probabilities, better equipped to avert dangers before they become inevitable, and able better to be in the right place at the right time, able to identify opportunities and to make the most of them.

In addition, the greater joy of subtler, more acute perception in daily life increases our wisdom, our ready insight into and understanding of everything.  Ultimately, one is liberated by ever-increasing degrees to enjoy life more and more, and thereby to fulfill life’s purpose.

It is good after each successive year of regular, twice-daily meditation to learn the next iteration of one’s meditation technique, to enhance the depth and the regularity of the experience of Ritam.
 
Advanced Techniques are available to be taught by specially-qualified Initiators of Vedic Meditation worldwide.

Jai Guru Deva,

Thom Knoles

I often get thoughtful questions from meditators that represent experiences that may be shared by other meditators.  Knowing that you are having experiences in common with other meditators, along with my answers to these questions, may be beneficial to many of you.  Therefore, I like to share these exchanges with our community from time to time.  I think many of you may find the following exchange interesting.

                           – Thom

Question 1:   For over a year now I’ve experienced significant bodily sensations during, and sometimes outside of, meditation.  Often the sensations feel like electric shocks.  Sometimes my shoulders jerk up violently or my head will quickly turn left or right.  I experience tingles and twitching. These sensations often occur in patterns.  Sometimes significant heat is generated followed by a feeling of release.  I’m assuming that this is stress release procedures, because that is what it feels like.  I don’t know of other people who have had similar experiences. Can you elucidate and give a context for these experiences?

Question 2:  Because of what I just described, most of my meditation time is devoted to awareness of these body sensations.  In one respect, they often replace the mantra as my focal point, and I follow the awareness through my body because it is more charming than other thoughts.  The sensations themselves have deeper and deeper levels of subtlety as well.  However, I don’t often (as far as I can tell) transcend thoughts (because the sensations are there), and there is limited time during meditation when it is effortless to hear my mantra.  Do you have advice on the matter?

Thom:  “Kundalini” is the name given to consciousness-energy that unites one’s individuality with The Totality.  This lively energy stream enters the body through the soles of the feet, rises through the legs and then pools at the base of the spine.  From the base of the spine it moves upward through the spine via a chimney, the “shushumna”, which acts as the conduit through which the kundalini reaches the brain.  Finally, kundalini exits the body through the crown of the head.  Its effect is to awaken consciousness in the direction of Unity Consciousness, from whatever state of consciousness one is in.  
A certain minimum flow of kundalini is required to be conscious at all.  Complete absence of kundalini means absence of consciousness in the human body (“body death”).  A trickle of kundalini, at least, must occur at all times.

When stress is present in the body, one effect is that food fails to be digested completely.  One product of undigested food, “ama” (a sticky white viscous substance) builds up in all the conduits (“shrotas”) of the body, including within the shushumna-shrota.  When, during meditation, the body gains deep rest twice daily, the digestive system becomes more powerful and ama is dissolved naturally from within all the shrotas, including the shushumna-shrota.  The kundalini, which has backed-up in a pool at the base of the spine, is released to travel up the shushumna exactly at the rate that the ama-blocks dissolve from within the shushumna.  So, if a sudden dissolution of ama occurs, then a sudden release of kundalini will accompany that.  When kundalini rises suddenly like this, it creates the range of sensations you describe (and others), as it flows up the shushumna.  When the flash-flood of kundalini meets a new block within the shushumna, it creates impact sensations, heat, coolness or other sensations caused by friction, as it works at removing the blocks.  This is not unlike a flash-flood of river-water being released and removing boulders, tree-trunks and other obstacles in its way.

When the shushumna becomes cleared of ama, the sensations of kundalini fade to nothing.  In a meditator whose shushumna is relatively clear to begin with, the kundalini rises without sensation and is either unremarkable or not even ever detected as a sensation.  Likewise, if considerable purification occurs, then the kundalini will have risen and will remain flowing, but without sensation.  

In this light, you surmise that your sensations are related to stress-release is absolutely correct.

It is important to note that the benefits of a rising kundalini are present, whether or not we feel anything while meditating.  Those benefits include more creativity, greater alertness, heightened perceptual acuity, and a healthier body.  In short, the many advantages you’ve reported upon.

Your approach is correct of continuing to meditate effortlessly when kundalini sensations and movements occur.

Our policy is that there is no sensation that causes us not to be able effortlessly to think thoughts.  Therefore, effortless favouring of the mantra, even with these sensations, is a possibility, and is our preference.  However, we are not willing to use effort to enforce that preference, so if at any time you seem to be forgetting to repeat the mantra, then do not try to persist in repeating it, do not try to keep on remembering it; it is okay if you lose the mantra spontaneously.  When consciously you realise that the mantra is gone, then do come back to repeating it, just as a faint idea, and take it as it comes.

Feeling the sensations of the kundalini is an alternative, any time that the sensation is so powerful that you cannot be effortlessly with your mantra.  It is important to remember that, as your meditation progresses, your ability to experience the Absolute field of Being, along with thinking, is going to enhance.  The Absolute field becomes less and less transcendental (beyond thought) as practise continues more and more.

Finally, some Vedic Yoga and Vedic Pranayama (breathing technique), done before each meditation, will strengthen the body subtly and lessen the impact of these natural kundalini sensations during meditation.  Go to vedicnetwork.com and locate any convenient Initiator of Vedic Meditation, who will be happy to demonstrate the procedures for you to learn to do them at home.

Question 3:  Meditation has improved nearly all aspects of my life in subtle but dramatic ways.  I could go on and on.  Fundamentally, I make choices and have thoughts that are efficient and positive and improve my life and the lives of my friends and family.  It is happening right under my nose and is becoming more and more powerful.  There are certain irrelevant psychological responses, however, that have hung around and even augmented.  In particular, for the past 5 years I have had a fear of flying on airplanes, because of the enclosed space and lack of air etc.  I know planes are absolutely safe and I’ve travelled around the world countless times before.  But now, as I get deeper into meditation, this fear has augmented, such that I can hardly bear even the thought of flying.  On planes themselves I have quite frightening stress reactions.  I’ve become hyper aware of my stress reactions which causes some stressors to affect me more potently now than they did previous to meditating.  Is this hypersensitivity an often seen phase that meditators go through?

Thom:  This fear naturally will evaporate, as meditation progresses, as will all fear.  Instead of suppressing the fear, your body now is offering it up for deletion.  Before we can delete something from our computer, we have first to highlight it.  This fear is now highlighted for deletion, and its high-lit status is making it appear to be stronger.  Just go ahead and delete it now.

Thank you for your questions and your report of progress!

Jai Guru Deva

Thom Knoles

Narayana (na-RAA-ya-na) Ragain-Knoles was born to Tiffany Ragain and me on August 28th.  With three brothers and four sisters, Narayana evens up the girl-boy ratio in my children.

Now in my 37th year of fatherhood, and with the arrival of a new child, here are my reflections on the art of parenting.  I think this will be informative to the parents, and non-parents in our community as it speaks to each one of us, born into this world from the field of absolute manifest and striving to live our dharma. 

Though a child’s consciousness is new-born to this generation, it is not new to life or to living.  Parents do set the initial conditions and attract the consciousness to be born; but the art of parenting goes beyond that.

Every newborn consciousness brings with him ambition kindled by his unfulfilled desires, but vibrant deep within his very existence is his dharma, his personal role in the evolution of his generation.

In the Vedic worldview, unfulfilled desires are one product of one’s karma, while the personal evolutionary role vibrant within one is one’s dharma.  A child’s dharma forms the foundations of his character; a child’s karma forges his personality.  

When dharma is recognized and lived fully, then the growing child works out his karma naturally and frictionlessly, either by fulfilling his desires through manifesting their objects, or by experiencing the desires’ source within the inner bliss of Being, thereby expanding beyond the desires’ boundaries.  The result of dharma-recognition is liberation, a life of heaven on earth.

The art of parenting lies in helping the child to discover first his dharma as the means to prevail over his karma.  That is, for the child first to re-cognise his personal role in the evolution of his generation, then to use that role to fulfill his desires.  This approach will employ desire-fulfillment as a training ground for exercising one’s dharma.  For this to occur spontaneously, regular practise of Vedic Meditation by parent and child is pivotal.

In the absence of dharma-recognition, the child’s only remaining endeavour, attempting solely to fulfill his unfulfilled desires, will possess life and misguide the process of living.  This makes life karma-oriented rather than dharma-oriented, dominated by personality instead of identified with radiant character, ruled by ambition without embracing its purpose.

Therefore, as parents we have the responsibility not merely to help our children fulfill their desires, not merely to help them figure out ‘who’ they are.  Rather, we must encourage them to re-cognise what they are [all-inclusive consciousness]; to know why they are here in this generation. 

We must help children to live their dharma.

Jai Guru Deva,

Thom Knoles

We should re-examine ‘the purpose of meditation’.   To do this, first we must clear away preconceived ideas of “what should be happening during my meditation”.

In this meditation, we do not try to control our experience.  What we want is to transcend control, to let go, to allow Nature’s intelligence to take over.  That is why we say that this is a natural practice.  Nothing is involved but the nature of the mind and the nature of the body.  No intervention by one’s individuality is necessary.  And that is why during this practice we do not use effort.  Effort means control and its use in meditation takes away naturalness.

When we say ‘nature of the mind’ and ‘nature of the body’ we mean this: By nature the mind’s tendency is always to move toward greater happiness (whenever a choice presents itself).  It is this tendency that causes the mind to follow the mantra, whose nature, in turn, is to become more and more subtle simply through effortless repetition silently in meditation.  The subtler strata of thought are more charming intrinsically than the gross conscious thinking level.

As the mantra becomes subtler it also becomes more charming.  This increased charm attracts the mind inward – and here is the crucial point – as far as the body will allow.  Why do we say ‘as far as the BODY will allow’? 

Because mind and body are intimately connected.  If the body is storing some fatigue (and whose body is not?), then, in the midst of meditation, the body may recognise an opportunity to rid itself of that fatigue.

Dozing will indicate that the body has used a portion of the meditation sitting to purify itself of deep tiredness; the body is attempting to normalize – that’s all.

However, if intellectually we decide that this natural function does not match our concept of ‘the purpose of meditation’, then we may reject our own natural response, and resent our body’s need to rest in that way. Then we are in danger of using effort to ’stay awake’ because of an intellectual idea we cherished about ‘the purpose of meditation’.

Instead of that approach, what we should know is: “The use of effort defeats the purpose of this meditation”.

So the true purpose of this meditation is simply to allow whatever happens naturally to happen, and not to wish that it shouldn’t happen.  The true purpose of meditation should be to allow our own intelligence to be one with nature’s intelligence.  To that end, we take it as it comes.  This is why we do not reject any experience that occurs spontaneously in meditation.

By the way, there is a limited amount of fatigue in the physiology, so the dozing trend will clear up.

Jai Guru Deva,

Thom Knoles

We can feel the stress increasing in the collective consciousness of our countries and of our world.  We read and watch daily the effect of the collective unhappiness of billions of individuals.  Perhaps we feel the effect of that collective stress tarnishing our own lives – in our family dynamics, in our own bodies.  It manifests in the form of fear or anxiety; a feeling that time is running out.  This, in turn, can manifest the twin diseases of selfishness and desperate behavior.

Vedic Meditators possess an uniquely powerful strategy for reversing this polluting effect: we know and use the power of orderliness and coherence that regular meditation brings.  We have seen it work in our own lives; we have seen it work in the lives of our family and friends.  We have also seen the positive effect our own meditation has had on those who have no interest in it!  We have verified that the unit of collective peace and abundance is individual peace and abundance.  What we need is more meditators- and the need is urgent.

We stand at a turning point in world history. We could watch as collective stress forces the minds and hands of national politics, driving an agenda of selfishness and desperation.  Or, in their own quiet way, meditators could bring about a more ordered and coherent influence in the collective consciousness by awakening more creative intelligence from within ourselves, and then increase this by bringing our friends and family to it.

I will do what I do best, and I will need your help.

Those who meditate already should attend my meetings and courses whenever possible.  And for to those who have not yet availed themselves of this supreme knowledge, come to my introductory talk and let me show you – not merely tell you – what meditation can do to make your life better in every way.

Anything of this importance and urgency deserves to be done on a big scale.

We need urgently to bring Vedic Meditation into the lives of as many new people as we can.

Almost everyone – thousands – come to learn meditation because they see its effect on family and on friends.  This fact alone is very telling of its verifiable effects.

I look forward to seeing all of you again, to feel and witness the powerful effect of our collective meditations.

Jai Guru Deva

Thom Knoles