[Advaita-l] waking, dreaming, sleeping, as mutually supportive

Michael Shepherd michael at shepherd87.fsnet.co.uk
Fri Nov 6 06:58:25 CST 2009


I agree. 'I'll sleep on it' is a revealing truism.

Russell Braddon's 'The Naked Island' describes how in the most inhuman
conditions of a labour camp, the expression on the fces of all the exhausted
sleepers was blissful.. and so too, presumably, on the faces of their brutal
daily aggressors...

That suggests that the nightly return -- beyond pashanti -- to para renews
available energies for the next day of sadhana or its deterioration ? So
life advances day to day, one way or the other.

I don't know enought to take this more deeply than the usual lables of the
'states'; but it does suggest to nme that there is more to be investigated
in the actual process of the 'advaita' which makes those states mutually
supportive. And again -- what the 'dreaming' state may contribute to what we
call 'imagination' and great art.

Michael

-----Original Message-----
From: advaita-l-bounces at lists.advaita-vedanta.org
[mailto:advaita-l-bounces at lists.advaita-vedanta.org]On Behalf Of
Shrinivas Gadkari
Sent: 06 November 2009 11:57
To: advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org
Subject: [Advaita-l] waking, dreaming, sleeping, as mutually supportive



Namaste, Question that one may ask is: Does the fourth state support only
good/ auspicious/ divine - daivi svabhAva? Or does it also support the not
so good Asuri svabhAva? I tend to view fourth state as a state that supports
both deva-s and asura-s. Then bhakti which encompasses only auspiciousness
possibly is different from just the fourth state. We need to explicitly
implant and nourish bhakti. It belongs to the domain of saguNa when there is
more weightage to sattva and just enough weightage to tama to sustain
existence, and moderate weightage to raja. Regards, Shrinivas

---------------------------------------------
Yes, I agree totally. The desirable state is to allow the light of atman to
pass unclouded through the clear glass of buddhi -- or be reflected
perfectly from it -- and illuminate all actions in its purity. In terms of
the 'four states', wouldn't this be to allow this 'fourth state' of perfect
function of the other states, which is atman, to illuminate whatever may be
shared on occasion between those states, whil allowing each of those states
to be complete in itself ?
.
.
.
Michael.




----- Original Message ----
From: Shrinivas Gadkari <sgadkari2001 at yahoo.com>
To: advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org
Sent: Fri, November 6, 2009 10:54:27 AM
Subject: waking, dreaming, sleeping, as mutually supportive

Namaste,

One important point on this topic:

By incorporating the wisdom of states of consciousness and their
interrelationship may make us more capable beings. There however
is no guarantee that just this knowledge itself will guide people on
the "correct" path. We need to connect this knowledge to "something"
that will help us from starying on wrong path, help us to use only that
much vidyA that our mind-body (and also our surroundings) can handle, ...

Bhakti towards sadguru or hari bhakti - which is no different from
sadguru bhakti (finally) are time tested disciplines which achieve these
goals (and more). hari om.
(bhakti here means the standard dvaita, saguNa bhakti)

Regards,
Shrinivas



----- Original Message ----
From: Shrinivas Gadkari <sgadkari2001 at yahoo.com>
To: advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org
Sent: Wed, November 4, 2009 5:15:23 PM
Subject: waking, dreaming, sleeping, as mutually supportive

Namaste Shri Sunil,

I think you are on right track here. Every person who is successful in
a vyAvahArika sense, has some degree of siddhi of the vidyA that is
described in mANDukya upanishad. It is a different matter that most
people may not know that the source of their skills lies in their innate
ability to use this vidyA of mADUkya upanishad in their daily lives.
(very likely these people studied this vidyA in their previous lives).

It is said that the only vidyA one needs to learn is the vidyA described
in mANDukya upanishad. (I think this is a statement made by shrI rAma
to shrI hanumAna.)

Regards,
Shrinivas  



--------------------------------------------------------
Dear Michael,
Can we say that during the night-dreaming the subconscious mind can act
on a problem and that can give some indication of things going to happen in
the future but in day-dreaming the sub-conscious mind would not act that
freely.
 I understand that with training one can however train the sub-conscious
mind
to analyse problems even in the waking sate. Some executives light a
cigarette
and keep quiet fort a short while and leave the problem to the sub-conscious
mind to analyse and by the time cigarette is half smoked the answers are
ready.
Some people believe like that. I too subscribe to that thinking to some
extent
though I do not smoke. Any comment?

Regards,
Sunil

 


----- Original Message ----
From: Shrinivas Gadkari <sgadkari2001 at yahoo.com>
To: advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org
Sent: Wed, November 4, 2009 11:54:38 AM
Subject: waking, dreaming, sleeping, as mutually supportive

Namaste,

Revisiting this thread after several days:
In our daily experience we are awake, we sleep and we
see dreams. Now we have three states of consciousness
"awake state", "dream state" and "sleep state".

Based on my understanding and experience it will be too
hasty a conclusion to equate:
"awake state" = what we commonly mean by "awake experience",
"dream state" = what we commonly mean by "dream experience",
"sleep state" = what we commonly mean by "sleep experience".

It is true that "dream state" dominates the "dream experience",
and "sleep state" dominates the "deep sleep experience",
However, the "awake experience" (based on my understanding)
is quite complex. Though the "awake state" is easily
recognized in "awake experience", there are interspersed
experiences of "dream state" and "sleep state" in
the "awake experience". Recognizing/ examining this
phenomenon, in my opinion, forms the foundation for
study/ exploration/ understanding of the three states
of consciousness. hari om.

Regards,
Shrinivas



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