Prana pratishtha and meditation

https://youtu.be/4hQdRTKlf2g

On 4 Sep. 2024, Daaji gave a wonderfully clear explanation for how people benefit from temple visits and so continue to go.

In the same Q&A, Daaji said that meditation takes us further into our superconscious mind, while cleaning takes us further into our subconscious mind.

He also gave a new perspective - superconscious is about the future and subconscious is about the past.

When I go somewhere with faith - śraddhā, my attention is more focused there.

And if I believe the deity or the idol is powerful or charged or gives blessings, my attention is even more focused on the mūrti.

Assuming 2.5 minutes of effort-less attention is dhyāna, I am now meditating on the mūrti while in the temple.

(Logically, of course, there is also a problem if I don't meditate on what is signified by the mūrti.)

Meditation on a mūrti which has a limited form

 (even if we give it unlimited attributes like

 omniscience - "you" know every problem in my life,

 omnipotence - "you" can help with any problem in my life),

is not as subtle as meditation on the unlimited and so

the effects are not as transformative.

But it is still meditation!

And since it pertains to the future

- I pray to have my present conditions changed -

there is an effect.

So an effect arises

  by my faith,

  by my focused attention,

  by my meditation,

  by my changing mentally,

all leading to mental clarity -
i.e., knowing or perceiving

  how to act or

  how to change my actions,
so that the resulting future situation is

 different from my present situation.

If these effects occur repeatedly, I then believe firmly that the deity has caused them!

This increases my faith and I become even more devoted to that temple.

Really, though, I have only tapped into my own mental powers!

The ambient

•  cleanliness,
•  fragrance,
•  sattvic food,
•  immune-boosting
•  tīrtham and phytochemicals from the surrounding herbs and trees,
•  acupressure via bare feet, etc.
• of the temple, and
• my own super-conscious
• - inside me - and
• the overt faith

  of surrounding devotees in a temple:

all these help me to go further into

my own super-conscious

- inside me - and
so change my future behaviour, and
in turn my future life events.

(There is also cleaning and clearing of my sub-conscious through bhogam - unpleasant or pleasant experiences at temples.)

A huge factor here -

outer peace or joy or sattva

evokes the ever-present

inner peace, joy, or sattva!

The effects of proper śraddhā - faith - in a temple are excellent.

But if we now consider the outside trigger of temples as necessary for what we feel on the inside?

That is not so excellent!

All because our mental processing is faulty! We correctly attribute to the outside circumstances the arising of what is inside us. But we don't realise that those things are already inside us. And since we don't know how to make the awakening or arousal happen repeatedly or at will, we try to recreate that through those outside circumstances.

Temples and other places of outer worship should evoke initial inner experiences.

Then one should try to retain and re-evoke those same inner experiences without needing to resort to such outer places.

And finally, those inner experiences should become a permanent flow, a continuous experienc-ing. Then onwards, inner experiences need not be wilfully remembered or repeated - they simply flow.

In Reality at Dawn, Babuji writes that, earlier, mūrtis were charged by the prāṇa pratiṣṭa done by a competent person [paraphrased].

[Me]

Competent how?

Through meditation, aided or not aided by mantras, such a person could reach a subtle state of consciousness that resonated with a god - an energy entity of specific characteristics. Upon reaching which, a certain amount of the energies of that entity was transferred into that person's heart.

Next, most or all of this energy was transferred into a receptacle made to radiate that energy - in a suitable form, or at a grosser frequency, for those who could not pick it up by themselves!

A reasonable analogy is a futuristic step-down transformer which taps into the power surge of a lightning strike that lasts barely a second. The transformer then charges a battery to become an energy source.

Imagine how potent such circuitry would be! It has to work at amazing speed - milliseconds or microseconds - and not get burnt up itself while trying to convert that incredible voltage of 100-300 million Volts into 230 or 110 Volts. The receiving part must be exponentially purer and faster than the other(s)!

Something like that was the original prāṇa pratiṣṭa!

Here's another example to appreciate the enormous purity needed. Imagine someone who thinks, speaks, and acts without harming anyone for 12 years - continuously, unbroken even for a second. Per the yoga sūtras, in the presence of such a person, no harm can occur to anyone or will occur from anyone.

In Sahaj Marg, practitioners go to levels even subtler than that! Not more energetic but subtler. Not quantitatively within the same or similar gross levels, but qualitatively to subtler levels.

Chariji gave a beautiful example in referring to early planes vs. cars. The first planes, in 1903, were much slower - 30-35 mph - than the then fastest cars - 65-85 mph. But planes travelled in a completely different space or dimension, not stuck to the earth's surface!

Similarly, these energy entities or gods, with name and form, and whose charges power the temple mūrtis, are much grosser compared to the described, yet unnamed, form-less and attribute-less being upon which we meditate in Sahaj Marg.

(After all, isn't the source of the energy entities - the gods - itself subtler than they are? Consider e.g. the kena upaniṣad yakṣa story where even the subtlest and strongest deva - Indra - could not even approach, let alone understand, Brahman.)

Even "Divine light" or "light without luminosity" - the liṅga or mark or signifier in Sahaj Marg meditation - is not subject to our imagination as Babuji didn't want abhyasis to get stuck with their own images. How much subtler then must be that which is signified!

And, in fact, Babuji has no qualms in saying that [paraphrased]:

 in sahaj samādhi, only experiencing occurs at the heart,

not even conscious awareness which is needed to remember what was experienced.

[Note that conscious means the "I" is active. When activity occurs subconsciously, the "I" is inactive, so who is to remember what?]

Nowadays, such potent meditators or yogis are few and far between. And how many of even those who are around do prāṇa pratiṣṭa?

Per Daaji, those who do the prāṇa pratiṣṭa these days simply utter mantras without understanding the meaning.

[So even if blind mantra chanting without love and devotion evokes those energy entities, would such would-be yogis really able to interact with them consciously?]

Then, how effective would the resulting mūrtis be at taking devotees to levels of great subtlety? Or to transcendental levels?

Not very effective at all.

Practised correctly, Sahaj Marg turns abhyasis into living mūrtis.

Their own prāṇa can resonate with the subtle levels of those energy entities, from the grossest to the subtlest name and form. And go beyond name and form as well.

But what about the siddhis of those entities? The Sahaj Marg Guide blocks the siddhis - indeed nullifies them - so that the abhyasis do not know about them and cannot use them.

After all, those who use these siddhis usually get stuck at such grosser levels, no matter how energetically powerful.

In the introduction to Babuji's Towards Infinity, Daaji writes:

Each time a seeker passes through a chakra, it becomes the duty of the Guide to nullify the associated powers in order to protect and ensure the onward journey [continues]. Without this protection, it would be easy to go astray due to the alluring miracle-performing capacities that develop.

The Heartfulness Guide has to do something similar for fanatical temple goers too, since temple mūrtis with proper prāṇa pratiṣṭa are designed to take devotees through the energy levels of various cakras.