Transmutation of Personality through Preksha Meditation

Author(s): Tulsi Acharya
Publisher: Jain Vishva Bharati

Page 22

erate worldly pursuits; to think less, to speak less, to restrict the movement of the body as much as possible. That is, non-thinking, non-speaking, and keeping the body motionless-that may be said to be the programme of preksha. In order to fulfil it, one has to abjure other activities. The consummation of such a programme of non-activity is religion and spirituality.
We accept religion as the truth which gives us something extra. If religion gave us merely that which is got through the acquisition of material goods, it would cease to have any special utility. Religion gives us that which material objects do not, cannot give. Therefore the contribution of religion is a special one. Engaging in mundane activity is a part of the nature of a living being. Normally, no living being can survive without indulging in some form of mundane activity. However, there is nothing remarkable about the gains to be got from worldly pursuits; whereas what the renunciation of thought, speech and action gives us, is something unique.
The fundamental objective of preksha dhyana is the practice of three-fold steadiness (trigupti). Trigupti means renunciation of three-fold activity. The mind, the speech and the body are the means of worldly activity. In order to negate worldly pursuits, it is necessary to understand these. Because unless a phenomenon is properly understood, its goodness or badness cannot be ascertained. Knowledge available to man through the mind, speech and the body is limited to the physiological or the psychological sphere, but it is not capable of touching the farther levels. Those whose understanding is based upon these two disciplines, know very little about the mind from the spiritual point of view. As in the case of the mind, spiritual views about speech and the body are also quite different.