Posted on: 18 Jun 2024
[Smt. Chhanda asked: Swami Vivekananda commented: “The highest meditation is to think of nothing. If you can remain one moment without thought, great power will come.” But Swami, in highest meditation, only the thought of pure awareness remains. Is it not? Is it possible to think of nothing then? Please comment on the real meaning of this statement.]
Swami replied:- Nothing refers to the absence of the circle of worldly thoughts. It denotes the purity of mind. The purity of mind is experienced by the awareness along with the absence of worldly thoughts. Nothing does not mean the absence of awareness. Such a pure mind in which the fascinations to all worldly bonds are destroyed is very much eligible for the attachment to God. The ‘power’ quoted by Swami Vivekananda is the power of concentration of such a pure mind, which is ready to attach to God very strongly. Shankara also says that once the mind is purified, it is eligible for Jnaana Yoga. Here, Jnaana Yoga means to know the details of God once again so that the powerful mind can concentrate on God very strongly. The initial Jnaana Yoga referred by Datta Swami is about the soul or traveler, the correct path to reach God and the details of the God-goal that attract the devotee initially and these three steps are the triad or Triputi (Datta Swami says that Jnaana Yoga is the very first starting point. Others say that Jnaana Yoga is the final point after attaining purity of mind and pure devotion. Here, Datta Swami says that Jnaana Yoga as the first point is Triputi whereas Jnaana Yoga of others mentioned in the end is only a repetition of the details of God and this may be optional because if the devotee remembers all those details got in the first step, there is no need of this repetition.). After getting the perfect purity of mind, only the third item (details of goal-God) is repeated for the sake of strong attachment of the mind to God. Shankara feels that this third step alone is Jnaana Yoga. Datta Swami feels that Triputi is Jnaana Yoga and if the soul remembers all the details of God (learnt in the beginning itself) even after attaining purity of mind, there is no need of a preacher to preach those details once again. Even if the preacher preaches those details about God, there is no harm at all. Before travelling in the path, the soul must know that it is not God and the soul must also know the correct path of knowledge, devotion and practice.