Nei Jing Tu
Category Archives: neuroscience
Resting in the Stillness of Being
Notes from Boston, April 2019
Only 10 left of the 44 radiation treatments taking place here in Boston. Along with all of your love and prayers, an extraordinarily wonderful group of people at The Brigham and Women’s Hospital, the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, and my cancer club friends here at Hope Lodge, are all taking care of me. A minor set of challenges and annoyances are arising from the accumulation of the radiation, mostly centered around fatigue and bladder confusion, but, all in all, I’m doing just fine. Life wants us to keep growing and evolving, so new challenges are created to keep us focused. (Fill in you own political metaphor here, if you choose!)
Where is the growth and evolution arising from? From a spiritual perspective, from the “Ground of Being”. As noted in the chart above, the terms at the top: ‘Ground of Being”, Tao and Brahman are interchangeably used to make an attempt to express the inexpressible. ‘Before all duality’ implies time, which is relative. ‘Beyond all opposites’ implies space, also relative. In the world of form, which includes our body/minds, all of creation and anything we put into words, everything appears as part of a pair of opposites. But know that in the depths of silence all duality dissolves and what remains the ineffable mystery. Be there. You are always there already. We have just forgotten to notice. We practice stillness or silence to ‘remember’ who we truly are.
There is no substitute for the practice of silence. There are no techniques, breathing practices or asana sequences that can lead you to what always was, is, and ever shall be. And yet if we do not make a conscious choice to make ‘being in silence’ a priority, the healing power, growth and insight that arises from the stillness will never be fully received. Spirituality grows in the world of paradox and is nurtured in meditation.
In sutra I-3, tada drashtuh svarupe’avasthanam, Patanjali describes yoga as ‘resting in our own true nature’, the unbounded Silence of Being, or Ground of Being, or Tao, and ‘staying there’. I love the word ‘resting’ as it is clearly not about ‘doing something’. Sometimes the word abides is used, as in “the dude abides’. Here the implication is that of finally coming home, recognizing home, and staying home.
As someone who has become addicted to ‘doing’, resting is not easy for me. There are so many layers of mental chatter, conscious and unconscious, that want my attention. My confusion from skandha 1 has left a belief system that says I have to ‘heal’ myself’, and has confused the layers of form that comprise the body/mind with “I’, myself. There is no solution from this perspective. Only an endless chasing after the illusion of ‘finally getting it right’ and an attentional field that never rests.
When we make a conscious choice to practice silence, something else happens. The mental chatter and the physical sensations do not go away in the beginning. And if they do temporarily disappear, they will come rushing back sooner or later. What arises is the possibility of a change in perspective. In the early stages of meditation, there is the cultivation of what is called ‘witnessing’. Whatever arises in awareness, usually thoughts sensations, emotions or an amalgam of all of these, is ‘seen’ and thus recognized as ‘not me’. If ‘I’ can see it, it cannot be ‘I’. We differentiate seer and seen. This process involves the two crucial components of spiritual awakening; attention and identification.
In witnessing, our attention is not drawn to what arises (the seen) but to the process of witnessing itself. We allow what arises to come and go as it will, and also allow our attention to turn inwards, not to thought or the inner sensations, but onto itself, where it spontaneously dissolves into silent unchanging awareness. We begin to notice that attention is the root of self ‘identification’. The more I habitually attend to the world of form, the more my self sense or identity becomes entangled there. When my attention dissolves into silent awareness (this is the meaning of citta vrtti nirodha, sutra I-2) my identification with the world of form also begins dissolve. Here is where we begin to more deeply question just exactly ‘who or what am I?
In sutra I-4, Patanjali describes this crucial piece to the spiritual conundrum: vrtti sarupyam itaratra or (at other times, that is when not in the state of yoga) there is identification with the world of form, the vrttis. Identification is the key. The egoic self, arising in skandha 1, begins to create a ‘me’ or ‘self’ from the likes and dislikes and then this entity evolves through the rest of the skandhas to fill out the egoic self. We make the mistaken belief that what arises is all part of me and therefore I am impelled to respond by grasping (likes), avoiding (dislikes) or ignoring. Grasping and avoiding, and all their behavioral cousins are mentioned by Patanjali in sutra II-7 and II-8, and the whole process we are describing in sutras II-1 – II-17.
In sutra II-11, Patanjali brings in meditation as the means to disentangle the identification process. II-11 dhyaana-heyaas tad vrttayah: Meditation eliminates the changing mind states (created by the kleshas). Meditation, that is, resting in stillness leads to citta vrtti nirodha and drashtuh svarupe avasthanam.
We now add to Patanjali, Mr. Donald Hebb and his famous axiom: ‘neurons that fire together wire together’. Our attentional field sets up neuronal firing patterns that get stronger through repetition. Our attention, identification and power of belief all function in this domain. This is the insidious side of habit. Neuronal energy wants to follow the easiest pathway and when our habitual attention is driven by the unhealthy skandhas, these pathways go through the fight or flight/fear’ center also known as the amygdala. The unhealthy skandhas become stronger and stronger. As the news continues to remind us, this plays out on the cultural level as well as the personal one.
However, meditation practice has been shown to shrink the amygdala and create growth in the neuronal connections of the pre-frontal cortex where we develop the capacity to see from a place of integration, clarity and wisdom. We might say that the buddhi or ‘intelligence’ is the linking of the pre-frontal cortex and with the emotional and spiritual intelligence of the heart heart. Here ‘citta vrtti nirodha‘ is seen as a re-wiring of the brain and its patterns of firing. Resting in stillness is a self-organizing process. Because of the nature and strength of habit, tremendous patience is required. In sutra I-12 abhyasa vairagyabhyam tan nirodhah: Practice and dispassion lead to the resolution (of the dysfunctional mind states). Patanjali lists the two key components of meditation, dispassion and stability.
I-13 tatra sthitau yatno’bhyasah
Practice leads to stable healthy mind states and stillness.
I-14 sa tu dirgha-kala-nairantarya-satkarasevito drdha-bhumih
Stability of mind requires continuous practice, over a long period of time, without interruption, and with an attitude of devotion and love.
Deeply ingrained habits do not go away overnight, whether in an individual or a society. The neuronal connections and cultural fields can be strongly wired, especially if they have been repeated over and over. To lay down new neural pathways and weaken the old ones takes time and patience. Devotion and love are required to make sure the new pathways are healthy and not dysfunctional. It is quite easy to react to an unhealthy pattern by creating another unhealthy one. “”I hate myself for having all this judgment,” is a common thought/vrtti. Learning to gently and compassionately see the thought and recognize it for what it is requires discipline and patience. Meditation practice allows us to see these thought and behavior patterns from a distance, as a witness to them, which is the first step in transforming them.
What we pay attention to receives our energy. By choosing to not react to our thoughts, but just let them come and go, we are withdrawing from them. We are letting them go. This is vairagyam, described in the next sutra. There are many vrttis floating about the mind field that are triggers for suffering, and they keep returning, even if we let them go, if they have strong roots. The ‘heavenly realms and the hell realms are both attractive to the unhealthy skandhas, and attachment to even the heavenly realms is a set-up for more suffering. That is why patience and persistence are the two key supports. Vairagyam is sustaining a healthy and alert immune system for the mind.
I-15 drshtanushravika-vishaya-vitrshnasya vashikara-sanjna vairagyam
The control over craving after any experience, whether sensual, psychological or spiritual, is known as dispassion.
The root of dysfunctionality is craving, the intense desire to acquire or get rid of ‘something’, to create a temporary feeling of wholeness or relaxation. These are emotional or limbic responses, that evoke a threat to our existence. To a self-sense that feels inadequate, there is always something that is threatening, that needs changing. Craving, as we soon find out in life, is a self-perpetuating path of inadequacy and subsequent suffering. Life is what it is happening moment by moment and true happiness is not dependent upon the constantly changing circumstances of life. If I believe that my happiness depends upon this moment being different from what it actually is, I will suffer. Seeing through this delusion is a crucial component of yoga. The true nature of the Self, the unchanging limitless existence and consciousness, (sat – chit – ananda) is undisturbed by any and all possibilities life throws our way.
With the discipline of vairagya we stop believing the craving thoughts, even if they keep arising. No, my happiness is actually not dependent upon getting rid of Donald Trump! This eventually leads to dispassion towards most craving. The subtle forms are dealt with in the next sutra.
The neuroscientific perspective on inhibition offers tremendous insight for yoga students. In Buddha’s Brain” authors Rick Hanson and Richard Mendius describe the capacity to “simply not respond” to limbic (emotional) activity. There is not the inhibiting of the emotional activation which manifests as physiological sensation, but rather inhibiting the next level of neural activity, the story I tell myself that perpetuates the suffering. Repressing emotional content is not healthy on any level, but recognizing it as it arises, positive, negative or neutral, awakens a meta level of awareness. Then I can use skillful means to help the emotional energies move to a more integrated state.
Important note! Vairagyam is not the absence of passion! An integrated self is highly passionate, just not insecure and needy.
I-16 tat param purusha-khyater guna vaitrshnyam
The more advanced form of dispassion involves the full realization of self as the absolute and the dropping away of the most subtle forms of craving and attachment.
see also sutras II – 26, III – 5, IV-29 – 31
In I-16, Patanjali restates I-3, the knower/seer resting in its own nature, as an example of the culmination of refined discipline/dispassion. My mind may generate wants, needs and desires, but I can see their origin and not turn them into issues of survival. I may want an ice cream cone, but getting one, or not getting one is not a big deal in the overall scheme of things. Or, I have been diagnosed with cancer, which is the last thing I want, and the mind wants to rebel. At some point in time, I will face the reality of this and do whatever I can, in the world of form, to help heal. But in any case, I recognize the undying Nature of the Self, and take refuge there.
Somatic Meditation and the Skandhas
(For a review of the skandhas, please see the previous few posts.)
The Three Key Steps
Somatic meditation practice takes us right to the second skandha, sensation, where the nervous system has immediate encounters with the more tangible aspects of the world of form. This realm is pre-story, pre-thought and thus where we want to ground our attention. Meditation begins with gaining proficiency in directing and sustaining the faculty of attention and the sensory realm is a great place to start. Following the breath is the foundation of somatic meditation and one of the best ways of reigning in the wandering mind away from its addiction to thought. As simple as it sounds, this process takes years of practice and even then, the mind, by nature, wants to keep moving. Patanjali describes this concisely and elegantly, in sutras I-12 – I-16, abhyasa and vairagyam, the first practices given in the Yoga Sutras and the root of all to come.
To practice somatically, sitting, or in any posture, we start with the intention to keep our attention localized in the breath, recognizing that the habitually wandering mind will resist. When the mind wanders off into thought, as it will, we lovingly and compassionately bring our attention back to the breath. We then ask ourselves where in our bodies do we feel the breath most clearly, and that area becomes the ‘seed’ or ‘bija’ for our attention. We are not trying to change or alter the breath, but just feel it, receive and release it, one breath at a time. Our practice unit is ‘one breath’. Then we begin again. Just one breath. This is the first step and amazingly enough, we are always taking the first step.
The area of the body where the breath is felt most clearly is liable to move around and that can be a very revealing experience. Married with attention is an underlying intelligence known in Sanskrit as the buddhi, and as the buddhi awakens, another level of our somatic practice begins to emerge. We may feel that we only feel the breath on the right side, and the intelligence notes that you are unconsciously leaning to the right. A subtle shift of your weight allows the breath to be a little more even. Notice this was not an attempt, based upon an idea, to change the breath, but a felt recognition of a somatic imbalance that, when adjusted, released the breath into a more open spacious feeling.
A similar phenomenon can occur when you notice the sensations of breath remains up in the chest. The buddhi recognizes that this is caused by tension in the belly, and when you drop the belly, the breath opens more fully into the lower body. How does the buddhi know this? Because you have been practicing for a long enough time that it has learned what that sensation is trying to tell you. Those of you following these blog post for several years might recognize this as ‘samyama in asana‘ where, as Iyengar described, the organs of action, organs of perception and the intelligence become a single conscious movement in the entire body. The term ‘samyama’ comes from Patanjali’s sutras III-1 – III-8, and samyama in asana is somatic meditation. This awakening of the buddhi/intelligence is the second step in somatic meditation and the possibilities growth here are infinite.
The third step begins with allowing the self organizing capacities of the body awakened in this practice to continue on, sustaining the posture, and to let your attention move to the overall 
field of energy that extends out beyond your skin. This field is transparent, and if you can relax without letting your mind wander, your attention may flip, like with the famous young woman/old woman optical illusion, from being the field, to being infinite, timeless spaciousness, the Ground of Being in which the field is continuously arising.
When you can rest in this stillness stably, and recognize ‘I am This’, you will have the direct experience of both the PYS I – 3: tada drashtuh svarupe avasthanam: then the identity of the Self (I am) with pure Awareness becomes stable; and the famous Vedantic mahavakya, ‘Tat Vam Asi’ or That You Are. The first section of the 46th Psalm verse 1, Be still, and know that I am God, unfolds the Christian version of the same sutra, however, with usually a different interpretation.
Resting in stillness is likely to be an unstable state and the mind will return to thought and the process begins again; pause, relax, feel the breath, allow it to flow. We are always beginning again. Somatic meditation can be done in any pose, not just seated ones. Restorative yoga poses offer many different opportunities to explore samyama. Remember, step one is to bring your attention to the breath/qi/pranic flow, step two is to open to the deeper realms of intelligence waiting to be discovered, and step three is to expand towards and then rest in the stillness when the intelligence takes over the operation of the pose. The stronger the coherence in the energy fields, the easier it is to rest in silence without distraction.
When you are not in a somatic meditative state, the intelligence continues to operate, keeping the flows of digestive peristalsis, circulation, respiration and cerebro-spinal circulation going, but it is non-conscious and shaped by old habits in the musculo-skeletal and nervous systems. These patterns tend to become more deeply embedded in the tissues and more difficult to transform. This is why aging brings out all sorts of issues. Through conscious somatic meditation, the opportunity arises to let the entangled energy patterns to release into more coherent, more efficient ones. Aging, if experienced as a state of continuous somatic meditation, can then be a way to become less stuck and more open, rather than the opposite.
The education of the buddhi is crucial for this process to deepen and build greater coherence. When are attention and psychic/mental energy is constantly being consumed by trivia or dysfunctional thought patterns, learning ceases. The reliance on habitual patterns can be very useful if they are wisely chosen and continually checked for relevance. This frees up attention for observing what is new, more subtle, more ineffable and allowing this new information to be integrated. This is described by Patanjali in sutras I-23 – I-27 as ‘ishvara pranidhana’. Difficult to translate, Ishvara can be seen as the foundation intelligence of the universe, and all of its manifestations, and all of its possibilities, in all realms of creation. Pranidhana is intention-less total devotion or bhakti, here dedicated to the mystery of Ishvara. In somatic meditation, this is a living presence.
The buddhi is nurtured in silence, so this third step cannot be over emphasized. It is also the most elusive and challenging, as the mind really dislikes stillness and rushes in to fill the space. Discipline is crucial in not getting sucked into the habit. Another challenging aspect is that often, when the buddhi is engaged, the thoughts can be ‘enlightening’, as they are coming from a deep connection to the core of being. The fourth klesha ,asmita, mentioned by Patanjali in II-6, addresses this dilemma. The buddhi is still of the world of form, and the small self insidiously attaches to and takes claim for the buddhi and the revelations. Another version of possible confusion arises because the buddhi is channeling insight is still a transient state that will come to an end. If we ‘believe’ that this is the awakened state, when it does end, as it will, we are likely to feel that this means we have ‘lost’ our way and plunge back into the confusion of the dysfunctional skandhas.
In the silence of stillness, the egoic thoughts begin to dissolve. In ishvara pranidhana, the devotional mind set, coming from the heart, also helps negate the attempts of the egoic self to stake its territory.
In the next post, I will present some alternative poses to practice and more subtle layers of the energy fields to explore.