Ancient Indian Education (Brahmanical and Buddhist) c16.187

c16.187

**Process of ‘Chitta-vṛitti-nirodha’: its different Stages.** It is to be noted that the process of Yoga which is defined to be *Chitta-vṛitti-nirodha* does not mean the annihilation of Chitta. For Chitta cannot be annihilated according to Sāṁkhya-Yoga logic, the doctrine of *Satkārya-vāda* which holds that the effect is latent in the cause, ‘like oil in the seeds.’ Besides, Chitta = Buddhi is, as we have seen, an evolute of Prakṛiti which is eternal. The Yoga process of *Chitta-vṛitti-nirvodha*, therefore, signifies (1) the process by which the cognitive operations of the mind by which it is brought into touch with matter or objects, physical and mental, past and present, cease, and the mind is emptied of its contents of sensory experience. Only the innate qualities of psychic life, its awareness (*prakhyā*), its impulses (*pravṛitti*), and the impressions of past experience (*sthiti* = *saṁskāra*) remain as grist for the mill of the mind. (2) These subjective processes are, however, readily projected to the external world. When the sense-organs reveal the realm of independent realities, impulses (*pravṛitti*) seize upon them; the vestiges of past experience (*saṁskāra*) impart to them familiar forms; and awareness (*prakhyā*) pervades the object in such a manner that no line can be drawn between that which comes from without and its conscious apprehension. If the world of objects can be rendered into nothingness, if the sense that there are external and independent objects ceases altogether, the emanations of consciousness recoil on the self. The vestigial dispositions are no longer felt as qualities of the object; the impulses turn on the self and blend with the self-feeling; the quality of awareness itself becomes an attribute of the self. This is the condition described as that of oneness of the mind with self (*sārūpya*). (3) The mind is now left alone with its own innate tendencies which now require to be regulated in their turn. This end can be achieved by steady and strenuous cultivation of the placid states of mind and inhibition of those that promote inertia or action (*avṛittikasya* = rājasa-tāmasa-vṛittirahitasya praśāntavāhitā = vimalatā sāttvika-vṛitti-vāhitā ekāgratā = sthiti). This placid state is the state of what is called *Sthiti* which leads (4) to that of *Vairāgya* in which the mind has acquired control over the impulses that are directed to objects of enjoyment (dṛishṭānuśravika-vishayavitṛishṇasya vaśīkārasaṁjñā vairāgyam).