Yoga Aphorisms of Patanjali

Author(s): Prabhavnanda Swami, Christopher Isherwood
Publisher: Ramkrishna Math Madras

Page 52

42
PATANJALI YOGA SUTRAS
वीतरागविषयं वा चित्तम् ॥ ३७ ॥
37. Or by meditating on the heart of an illumined soul, that is free from passion.
Let your mind dwell on some holy personality-a Buddha, a Christ, a Ramakrishna. Then concentrate upon his heart. Try to imagine how it must feel to be a great saint; pure and untroubled by sense-objects, a knower of Brahman. Try to feel that the saint's heart has become your heart; within your own body. Here, again, the localization of the image will be found very helpful. Both Hindus and Christians practise this form of meditation-concentrating not only upon the heart but also, sometimes, upon the hands and the feet and the whole form.
स्वप्ननिद्राज्ञानालम्बनं वा ॥ ३८ ॥
38. Or by fixing the mind upon a dream experience, or the experience of deep sleep.
By "a dream experience" Patanjali means a dream about a holy personality or a divine symbol. Such dreams can properly be called experiences, because they bring a sense of joy and revelation which remains with us after we have awaked. In the literature of Indian spirituality we find many instances of devotees who dreamed that they received a mantram from some great teacher. Such a dream-mantram is regarded as being just as sacred as one which is given in the waking state, and the devotee who receives it will continue to use it and meditate upon it throughout the rest of his life.
Another method of calming the mind is to concentrate upon that sense of peaceful happiness with which we awake from deep, dreamless sleep. According to Vedanta philosophy, the Atman in man is covered by three layers or "sheaths." The outermost of these is the physical sheath, which is the layer of