Curated Resources for The Witness
NOTE for REFLECTION: After reading through some or all of these selections, please take time to reflect on the following questions in order to begin to ‘climb’ through your understanding of the topic from the perspective of the lineage and yogic tradition as a whole.
Please comment on one of these questions:
Which teaching about The Witness really spoke to you, and why?
Which of these teachings really aligns with the way you practice the witness, and why?
How do you feel ShambhavAnanda Yoga defines the witness?
How is the witness state defined by the broader vantage points of the Shiva Sutras, Yoga Sutras and/or Kashmir Shaivism (all of which were included in this post)?
Sri Shambhavananda’s recent satsang discussing aspects of the Witness State:
Excerpts from Sri ShambhavAnanda’s book “Spiritual Practice” on “TheWitness” state and practice
Can you talk about beginning a meditation practice?
Sitting and just thinking is not meditation. Meditation involves focusing the mind. In our tradition, mantra and pranayama are ways to do that. They help us get beyond the superficial chatter of our minds that we all have to deal with to obtain some separation from our small minds. When we can do a mantra and keep our attention on it, we may not always stop thinking, but what happens is that we are able to tell the difference between
our everyday minds and being focused inside. We learn to stay conscious of a particular mantra or a practice. In the end we gradually begin to reach the witness state, where we clearly observe the activity of the mind.
When we sit down to meditate we might have great thoughts, or think of many things, or have dreams. When this happens it is important to refocus our minds by pulling ourselves back to the moment, breathing into our hearts and feeling the heart chakra. We take a breath into the navel and try to focus on the here and now. That will help us see how much influence these passing thoughts, TV, movies, etc. have on us.
We have a constant commercial running in our heads about who
we are, what we want, and what we need, what is going to happen tomorrow and what happened yesterday. This movie is constantly playing, and we are caught up in it. That is really not who we are. Be- ing able to witness the comings and goings of all our mental activity is a
very desirable state to achieve. Everyone has good thoughts, bad thoughts, and indifferent thoughts. We are each like actors playing a role in a movie, and we forget we are actors playing a part. Being in the meditative witness state allows us to see the movie for what it is, and to touch a much deeper sense of who we are and what is possible.
Since I began meditating I have been having really strange images come up that don’t make sense to me. What is that about?
I think that’s a little bit of your previous life letting loose. You should really work to facilitate the release of things of that sort. Don’t ana- lyze them or get involved with them. Meditation is defined as stilling the thought waves of the mind. Once you do that you have an inner awakening, and you begin to access very deep psychic tensions. They will bubble up and sometimes can make you feel weird. You should try to stay with your meditation and keep letting go, breathing, circu- lating and releasing. Don’t get caught up in the manifestation. Often when students are meditating, their minds start playing movies and they begin to think about all kinds of things. You have to be able to release and witness these things coming and going without following them.
When old samskaras, or old tensions, and our old pains come up, that’s a good thing. But you don’t wish to grasp or analyze them. You wish to release them. In the more advanced practices you need a teacher. You can’t do it out of a book because you are delving into ar- eas of the unconscious where you are uncovering your demons. You need to be grounded all the time and functional in your life so these things can be surrendered. We accumulate many experiences in our lives, which are all stored in our unconscious mind. Part of growing and evolving as a human being is being able to release these experi- ences so they don’t define us. We are looking for a higher definition of ourselves, not the accumulated tensions of our lives.
I have a tendency to distract myself when I feel stuck, instead of taking a breath and surrendering and going deeper. How can I work past this resistance?
Almost everyone has that pattern. We know what we need to do, and we know what’s productive, and then we do the opposite. We should step back from that movie in our minds that has nothing to do with growing, but is trying to kick in and take over our minds. We must learn how to untangle ourselves from such movies. Then we are able to gain the realization of what’s illusion and what’s real. The illusion is that the third slice of pizza will make you feel better, and the fifth beer will improve your life.
Over the years, some students buckle down and are too hard on themselves. Then they get to the point where they resist everything. It’s regularity over time--practice, in other words--that really builds a strong discipline, a strong practice. You can’t keep score, minute-to- minute, hour-to-hour, day-to-day. You can’t judge where you are un- til you can get above it. Often we expect things from others or from our lives that are illusions, or impossible for someone else to give.
When you are balanced and a little above the fray, then you are more easily able to prevent, or direct and manage, the situa- tions that arise in your life. If you are coming from a place of will and are trying to engage horizontally, you will be less effective.
Do you understand what I am saying? If two people are fighting, and you get in the middle of it and tell them to calm down, then you are feeding into the situation. On the other hand if you are very balanced and calm in yourself, then you may be able to influence the outcome. You don’t run away from the situation.
When I talk about the witness state in meditation, I am referring to the ability to observe the comings and goings of your mind and emotions. That doesn’t make you asleep or less conscious or less engaged in life. It
allows you to see the patterns established in your life and to improve yourself.
Occasionally I have succeeded in releasing my tensions, but they always come back.
...Seeking the witness state in your meditation will help you make a transformation in the way you view yourself, your life, and your karma. You repeat a mantra or you do pranayama, and you work at being present. If you succeed in becoming expansive enough, you will feel or visualize a thought arising. If you catch it when it first demands your attention and you don’t give in to it, it will start to dis- sipate. In the witness state you allow the thoughts, feelings, and emo- tions to come and go without identifying with them. It is as if you are emptying a huge warehouse full of junk that you carry around in your unconscious mind. Who knows how long you have hung on or clung to it. The ability to allow these thoughts, feelings, and emotions to come and go without attaching to them will give you a deeper experience of your true self-- your true nature.
We identify incorrectly with parts of ourselves that are created and built upon tension and misunderstanding. We become tangled in the definitions that we have created. The experience of the witness state teaches us how to avoid being sucked into our old, old patterns and we learn new ways to be inside. This is how we find out who we really are as opposed to exploring all those products of tension that usually crop up in our minds.
I have lately experienced very weird things in meditation. I have had experiences that are totally unfamiliar to me. Is there something I should do?
You know how people sometimes do fasts and cleansings to get rid of physical toxins? We also have psychic toxins. They are the old pat-
terns, from God knows when that we carry around with us. These patterns are floating around inside of us, and if they find an oppor- tune moment, they will come up. We’ll find ourselves thinking, “Oh, it is time for a cigarette,” even though we don’t smoke. Our job is not to analyze that occurrence, nor to wonder where it came from. We all have this stuff from the past buried in our unconscious minds. If you have a solid practice you can allow this material to arise. It makes you feel weird only because you start engaging it. If you can breathe into it and release it, it is a kind of a purge.
Part of the process of meditation is the purification of the unconscious. All sorts of emotions, including fear and anxiety, may pop up into our consciousness. Much of it is material we have been stuffing for a long time. Much of it we have created from our own experi- ences. It can be a little terrifying, but regular practice over time will help us clear out this old stuff. In the 70’s people were doing various drugs. They would blow their psychic systems open, and they would have freak-outs and strange experiences. What they were doing was blasting open the doors to the unconscious into areas that should
be approached with conscious awareness and discipline. That’s why psychedelic drugs are dangerous. Rudi once said it’s like swallowing a stick of dynamite. Certainly you are going to have an experience, but it could really damage you. External solutions to internal problems seldom work.
When we have a thought, whether we are angry or afraid or happy or unhappy, we have to understand that this thought moving through us is not a complete picture of who we are. We have to do enough practice and meditation to get to the witness state. Otherwise, our minds wander all over the place. That is how most people function. We are programmed that way. When we watch television, we see short snippets flashing at us to grab our attention. Madison Avenue knows we can’t focus. Advertisers know all about how to mess with our small minds. An interesting experiment when watching televi- sion is to turn off all the
lights in the room as well as the sound on the TV to see what the advertisers are doing to us. They are flashing light at us. We see things moving and jumping all around. They are pulling our attention here and pulling our attention there to keep us engaged. Our minds behave in the same way.
Over time you will gain some experience from doing your practice. You will learn how to work with these things that come up and make you crazy, or with the things that are evoking a negative response
in you. You can be ahead of them. They don’t have a hold on you. You can deal with the situation you are faced with as it is, instead
of bringing history or your tensions and your fears into your reac- tion. Then you are able to take care of the situation in a very simple and conscious way. That is the way a spiritual person should live--in a simple, conscious way. Your life will then be very rich and very fulfilling. No longer will you be dragged through the mud over and over again so that you eventually are worn out and self-medicate to the point of oblivion. That is not a solution. It is just creating more samskaras. You can’t change everything all at once, but meditating everyday has a cumulative effect. You can’t give up doughnuts in one day. You have to break your goal down to a doughnut every other day and then a doughnut once a week and then once a month.
Lately, I am realizing how good I am at avoiding emotions. I have been doing that for a while.
Avoiding is not enough. You have to learn how to detach from and surrender your emotions. Avoiding them is not wrong. We all have emotions. We all have reactions that we can’t control. We all have feelings that we don’t understand. But the best thing to do is to wit- ness this play of energy that goes on in your mind. Witness how you are busy redefining everything each moment as things happen. This redefining
absorbs an enormous amount of time and energy that you should spend searching for your true self. Search to find out who you really are. We all have things happen to us that we attach to and that we allow to define us. Those things become the basis upon which we live our lives. Some of the events are painful. Some of them are pleas- ant. This is the dualistic nature of samsara.
We are dragged from one extreme to another because of our attach- ments. People think that detachment is a numb, dull state. It is not. When you separate from the things that pull you around emotion- ally and physically you will find a very good state to be in. As you become more centered, you will learn to engage in life and the world without paying the price that you normally would pay. You will begin to address the problems that arise in your life with a much broader vision than is possible when you are totally drawn into your sams- karas.
What is it like to be in a deep state of surrender and meditation?
I think if you are in a deep state of surrender and meditation, you are way beyond the sense of your ego. You are in an expanded state and are connected to something much purer and much bigger than your I-ness. “I am this, I am that, I am so and so.” In a deep state of medi- tation, your thoughts stop. During my day, in all sorts of situations, if my mind is getting too noisy I will just stop, and I will become totally present.
When I become totally present there is no Baba. There is no past. There is no future. I am totally present. When I was walking every morning in Hawaii I would go to this big soccer field where Faith and I would walk for an hour. There was no past and there was no future. Yet, I was walking. I wasn’t thinking about me or what I was doing or where I was, but simultaneously I was aware of all those things, even though they had absolutely no hold on me. I observed them from a distance and I functioned. I didn’t trip over anything or fall down or bump around. That is what it is like. It is exhausting to be in your ego. You have to spend somuch energy to support its misinterpretations of reality. The ego is a necessary part of living in the world, but I don’t take it seriously.
Excerpts from Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras on “The Witness”
Yoga Sutra 2.20
The only constant is the Self, which is often called the Witness. The Self is conscious of everything, yet remains unchanged. The only way for us to really see the truth of something is to view it from a state of complete immersion in the Self.
Yoga Sutra 3.49
Only one who can distinguish between the Witness and manifestations of
individuality can gain omnipotence and
omniscience.
Yoga Sutra 4.23
It is easy to think that the mind is the source of consciousness, yet, when in the Witness State, one can observe the mind with all its impressions and colorations.
Yoga Sutra 4.24
That is not to say that the mind is useless. Despite its innumerable impressions and desires, it exists to serve and is therefore a close ally.
Yoga Sutra 4.25
When one understands the relationship between the mind and the Self, the colorations of the mind no longer cause difficulties.
Yoga Sutra 4.26
Then the whole mind may flow unimpeded towards the complete freedom of the Self.
Excerpt from the text “Introduction to Kashmir Shaivism”, about the anatomy of the mind.
Tattva 14. Buddhi
The experience of the Purusha-Prakriti state is like the individual's experience of dreamless sleep - vague, indefinite, and undefined. This is an important point. Since this is the experience of the Purusha-Prakriti state, the manifestation which immediately follows is,
in one respect at least, not unlike the experience one sometimes has at the moment of waking. It is technically called, as in Sankhya, the Buddhi, which is better left untranslated. We shall only explain what it means. For a clear compre hension of what Buddhi really is, it has to be considered along with two other tattvas which follow it in the, order of manifestation. These are technically
called Ahamkara and Manas. Ahamkara may be translated as the individual egx? and Manas as mind. For the purpose of
clarification, we shall take them in the reverse order - Manas, Ahamkara, and Buddhi.
When we think or speak of a thing, saying "it is such-and-such" - it is a cow, for instance - our verbal concep tion of this cow, whether spoken or thought of, involves a complicated process which consists of at least four clearly defined operations, even though they may not always be clearly defined as four steps at the time one goes through them. The steps follow one another so swiftly that in many cases they are virtually simultaneous. They may be explained as follows:
*See Kashmir Shaivism by J.C. Chatterji. " ->.---.-•- 22
The first step involves the senses and is referred to as sensation. This very first operation involves another, namely, attention, without which there can be no sensation at all. There is yet another operation which carves the image of the particular object out of the totality of sensations which press upon the experiencing subject from all sides. This operation is one of "desiring," that is, selecting a certain category or object, to the exclusion of others, out of the confusing mass.
This desiring, seeking, and singling out a certain special category or object from among a whole crowd of sensations is quite different from mere sensation itself. This is the second operation and is called "image-making." However, this image^making is not sufficient to enable a person to speak or think of the object as a cow. What is now actually perceived is no more than a color-form in space with a particular shape. To transform this mere pattern into thought, it must also be endowed with various other properties such as solidity and life. The sense of perception does not perceive these properties. They are supplied from somewhere else, namely, from the memory of the individual's own past experience. There is absolutely no other source but the individual himself from which they can be obtained. Nor can the properties supplied be any thing but a part of his own personal self based on exper iences he has had as a particular person born and brought up in a particular situation. In other words, before a mere color-form, carved out of the block of sensations, can be transformed into the live object he thinks of as a cow, it has to be endowed with something of himself.
In addition, it has to be assimilated and identified with. An individual cannot think or speak of the object as a cow unless he realizes that it is something similar to an experience of his own in the past. It is this identifying of the sensation with part of himself and assimilating it which constitutes the third operation in the psychical process and which ultimately gives him the perception of a cow.
But even this operation does not quite add up to a cow, so that he can think and speak of it as a cow. Before a person can speak thus of the new assimilated image, he must not only make a comparison with other cows he has seen in his past personal experience, but also classify it under the species cow. But where does he get this idea of a species? He has probably not experienced a cow in terms of a species as far as his personal experience is concerned. He has known only particular and individual cows. He must therefore have a standard of reference which has this impersonal notion of species. It is only by referring to this standard that he is able to form the judgment that it is a cow. This ref-
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erence to such a standard is the fourth operation in the process of thinking and speaking of an object of percep tion as a cow and not as a horse or dog.
Of these four operations, the first is accomplished by the senses. The means of the three subsequent psychic operations are respectively termed the Manas, the Ahamkara, and the Buddhi.
_<Manas_)i.s^ what desires. seeks fo3i*_ajnL.^ingl..g_S—out a particular gFolip of sensations from a mass__af__themy^#»d-builds up or carves a particular image
therewith.
Ahamkara la_jdj.at gathers and stores up the memory bfper_sjna-3r exper -iencesr and
identifies and jLssimilates the~exp¥rTences of the~pxes~efi^. The sum tdtaTTMof such experiences constitutes the personal ego. Ahamkara is, in other words, what com poses the artificial "I" of an individual, as distinguished from the real and innermost "I," which is Paramashiva. Finally, Buddhi is that which not only supplies the stand ard of reference which is needed to form judgments, but also serves as the means whereby concrete experiences are assimilated into itself for such reference and comparison. Buddhi may thus be spoken of as the impersonal or super-personal state of consciousness of a limited individual.
This Buddhi comes into manifestation from Prakriti as the experiencer wakes up, following the same principle which we find in operation in our daily lives, as our conscious ness passes from a state of sleep to one of wakefulness. As the Purusha wakes up, this first waking consciousness after the sleep of Prakriti is called Buddhi. Buddhi is, in other words, the memory of the Universal "All-this," which formed the experience of the Shuddhavidya but after wards became dim and indefinite in the Purusha-Prakriti stage. In addition, Buddhi has other contents which are derived from the later experiences of the individual. These are called samskaras, the refined and distilled essences abstracted out of the concrete experiences of one's daily life.
Tattva 15. Ahamkara
From Buddhi is produced Ahamkara, which is the identi fication of oneself as a particular person. It is not merely an abstract "I," but is always "I am so-and-so." This "I" or ego is an aggregate of all the experiences one has had from childhood.
The difference between Ahamkara and Buddhi lies in the fact that the former is the experience of "I am all this and all this is mine," while the latter is simply the exper ience of "all this is," without any notion of "I" or "mine."
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Furthermore, as Ahamkara exists by selecting certain elements either as possessions or as parts of itself, its function is essentially one of self- appropriation. Ahamkara may even be considered as this power ifaf self- appropriation alone - of building up materials into an ego.
Although Ahamkara is an experience in which the rajo guna predominates, it contains the other two gunas as well, but in a subdued and suppressed form. Similarly, tamas and rajas exist in the Buddhi, even though sattva is the most prominent. It is important to remember that since Prakriti is simply the gunas in a state of equipoise, all its derivatives, such as Buddhi, Ahamkara, and the others which follow, must contain all three gunas, even though only one of them predominates at a time while the other two remain in a subdued form.
Tattva 16. Manas
From Ahamkara is produced Manas. It is a state of activity which is busily engaged in building up or carving images as fast as the senses supply information regarding the external universe. It also includes the factor of attention, which constantly moves from sense to sense. A person may have the whole world before him and his senses may be bombarded by numerous stimuli; yet, these stimuli may not produce any sensation whatsoever if he is in a state of "absent- mindedness." The senses, therefore, must have the co- operation of the mind before they can function purposefully. The mind is what builds up images out of the sensory data. It is the same as Manas because Manas is the factor which comes into operation immediately after the sensory input is received. All the other elements which are necessary in order to perceive something like a cow or horse are supplied afterwards. First the picture is constructed; then it is assimilated into the accumulation of previous personal experiences which constitute the personal "I" or Ahamkara, and compared with the general concepts of the Buddhi. The Manas lies near the senses and intervenes between them and the Ahamkara, with the Buddhi lying still farther beyond.
It is obvious that Manas is intensely active and rest less since it must move constantly from sense to sense and from the senses to the Ahamkara, to which it delivers all the sensory data after it has been converted into images. Manas is, in other words, a state of activity or a kinetic state, following that of the comparatively static Ahamkara. It follows the Ahamkara in much the same way that the state of activity when a man begins to move about follows his awakening from sleep.
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In spite of its intense activity, Manas is not composed predominantly of the rajo guna. Manas by itself is an exper ience of activity in the dark, so to speak, unseen and unrevealed by the light of Buddhi. For that reason, it is primarily constituted of the tamo guna.* Although blind and working in the dark, Manas is still an experience of groping, of seeking, however unintelligently. It is there fore the origin of desires.
In short, the Lord's power of volition becomes the rajo guna of a bound soul and functions as Ahamkara or ego. His power of knowledge becomes sattva guna and functions as Buddhi, which is characterized by determinate knowledge of an object. His power of action becomes tamo guna and functions as Manas or the mind, which is characterized by doubt.
Sacred Journey
A Guide to Meditation in the Shambhava School of Yoga
Where is the Mind?
Did you ever wonder where the mind is? It seems to be anywhere and everywhere we direct our attention. It has no particular size or shape. Classically, the head is described as the center for the outer, or lower, mind and the heart is the center for the inner, or higher, mind. The mind is not of the physical realm. The brain is physical; the mind is subtle. It is the subtlest form of matter. The mind has force, energy, and movement. It doesn’t have a shape. It moves like the wind. The mind is very difficult to see directly. We usually see the mind’s activity by what it moves, the thoughts and emotions. Everything affects or colors the mind; everything we see or feel leaves an imprint. We must treat it with care. It is easily hurt. If you bombard the mind with too much stimuli, it can erect barriers and dull its sensitivity.
Shambhavananda describes the mind as a tool, a necessary part of our existence, but not one we want running our lives. He says: “it is very much like a crescent wrench that thinks it is your head and takes over. What? You want a crescent wrench running your life?” He suggests that we learn to witness our minds, to watch it like we would a movie, but without getting sucked into it. He says that you will soon see that “it is a pretty interesting movie and that you are the writer, the director and an actor.”
As we begin to observe the mind we see that it is separate from our awareness. Because we can observe the mind, we can de- velop witness consciousness. We can learn to watch the contents of the mind flow by without getting attached. If we are caught up in the mind’s activity, it’s hard to observe the mind. If we let ourselves become slaves of the mind then the Biblical quote “The mind is the slayer of the soul” becomes true.
The mind is like light as seen through the eyes of physics: it can be wavelike or particle-like. From a distance it looks like a wave: it comes and goes, ebbs and flows, waxes and wanes. But if you look closer, it is not continuous. It is broken up into little snapshots or particles. The particles follow each other rapidly, giving the illusion of a continuous wave. They shift and move. The good thing about seeing the particle nature of the mind is that you can become aware of the continuous field of aware- ness that lies behind the mind. The Vijnana Bhairava describes simple ways of glimpsing our deeper consciousness. One is to watch the space between thoughts.
Four Aspects of Mind
According to the yogic teachings, the mind is composed of four parts: manas, buddhi, chitta, and ahamkara. Manas is the instinc- tive mind--it is constantly active, automatically receiving and collecting sensory data. It has no ability to evaluate or make decisions about the information it brings in and it has no con- sciousness of itself. It is often referred to as the lower or outer mind.
Buddhi is intellect or intelligence, the mind’s digestive fire (or agni). It is buddhi that consumes information and processes our experiences. Buddhi is the higher mind’s capacity to discrimi- nate. It makes decisions and gives the lower mind its orders. If buddhi is weak then we become the victim of our habitual pat- terns. If buddhi is very strong and developed, it serves its highest function, that of discrimination. A sharpened buddhi is an im- portant tool in spiritual growth because when buddhi is trained and polished it has the ability to separate itself from the effects of the instinctive mind.
Chitta is the unconscious or subconscious mind. Chitta is defined by yogic scholar, David Frawley, as, “conditioned consciousness”, the part of consciousness that is bound by time and space. This is like the basement of our psyche. It is where all of our life experiences and samskaras (mental and emotional impressions) are stored. We may not always experience these impressions on the surface level of the mind. This is where our dreams come from and also where our strong emotional reactions and patterns arise. It is here that unconscious thought-waves are generated, distorting our perception and stirring up our emotions. Medita- tion is a means to calm the thought-waves. All spiritual growth is directed towards “cleaning the basement”, removing our nega- tive patterns and tendencies so that we can access chit, the pure, unconditioned consciousness that exists beyond the mind, at the deepest levels of our being. Chit is Sanskrit for “to be aware”. It is a vast ocean. Most of chit is inaccessible to the ordinary mind.
Ahamkara is the ego or our sense of individuality. Shambhavana- nda refers to it as “the container” we use to function in the world. We need the ego to function effectively, to get things done in ev- eryday life. But ego is also the lowest part of the mind, the most dense and constricted and it eventually must be dissolved in the light of the higher mind for us to grow.
The aspects of the mind have their counterpart in the 5 elements that make up the universe: earth, water, fire, air and ether. The mind is most like ether or space. It can contain innumerable forms. The higher mind is more expanded, the lower mind is more contracted. Negative states like depression, sadness, and anger are contracted states. The earth part of the mind is the lower mind or ego. The sensual mind and emotions are like wa- ter, less dense and more fluid. The discerning intellect is like fire, making decisions, calculating, discriminating. The mind moves like the wind (air). Bliss is wide-open expansion. Our goal as yogis is to function from the expanded aspect of mind.
In order to better understand the aspects of mind, you can think of the ego as a doorway for impressions and experiences to en- ter the mind. The intellect is like a doorman, deciding which impressions get into the deeper mind. Chitta, within the causal body, is like a huge inner room. It is the interior mind where ev- erything gets deposited--memories, tendencies, impressions, ex- periences. It is very pure--it’s your deep heart. It is very sensitive and vulnerable. It doesn’t judge--it just accepts whatever gets through to it. Impressions deposited in this space are like seeds that impel us to act. The seeds that sprout become our karma.
Not everything that hits the outer mind gets deposited in the in- ner mind. It’s only when something in us reacts to an impression that it is ushered into the inner mind. This is the vital impor- tance of developing detached observation, both to impressions presented to us and to the emotions rising up in response to the impressions. This is where it’s important to have a smart alert doorman. A good doorman (intellect) can prevent a lot of debris from being deposited in our inner mind. A lot of people have really bad doormen, they don’t pay attention or even worse they argue for letting a lot of stuff in. You want a doorman to keep out the panhandlers and the burglars and the salesmen and the telemarketers, all the superfluous junk.
If your doorman is strong from lots of deep spiritual work, you will be able to surrender, or turn away the intruder without en- gaging it. You can just let it go. Sometimes your doorman is weak or not paying attention and you find yourself caught up in a thought or emotion. You will have to apply another type of practice to extract yourself from the strong situation, such as mantra, puja, or seva.
The mind has a cycle of nutrition, similar to the body. On a physical level, your diet can have a tremendous effect on your mind. On the subtle level, the mind takes in all kinds of im- pressions and experiences. On the causal level, the mind is most affected by the people we associate with on a heart level. Shamb- havananda often reminds us that the company we keep is es- sential. This points to the importance of sangha, but also to the importance of mantra and spiritual thoughts to keep the mind pure at a deep level.
The mind has to digest its inputs. Undigested experience be- comes a toxin and can become disease. One of the most basic tenets of the Shambhava approach to kundalini yoga is that you have to fully digest what you eat. The digestive fire (or agni) of the mind is the buddhi (inner intelligence). This is, again, your doorman. If your doorman is strong and disciplined, it will di- gest everything as it comes in. If your doorman is undisciplined and lazy, there will be a lot of partially digested, rotting impres- sions lying around waiting to create obstacles.
So we are tortured not by the mind itself, but by our identifica- tion with the vrittis of the mind. All afflictions are caused by these modifications. As long as we identify with these vrittis, we will act and react according to our mental tendencies. Swami Muktananda said that there is no suffering in God's creation-- suffering occurs only when we act according to the vrittis of the mind.
The great yogic sage, Patanjali, likens the mind to a lake, or body of water. Like a lake, the mind is potentially calm and crystal clear, but waves of thought stir it into activity and obscure its true nature. So we may mistake the waves that appear on the surface of the lake for the lake itself, but they are not. If we get beneath the waves, we will find a very vast and still body of wa- ter. The practices of yoga teach us to still the thought-waves, or observe them without attachment or rejection.