Samadhi - Communion with Light and Love

Many parts of Swami's Teaching are concentrated to the explanation the essence of humans' real Self, humans' goals on the Earth, the relations between human beings, between human beings the nature and God (Brahman, Atma, Absolute). Among them, the significant global role plays the spiritual development and educare of a humanity. Without spiritual development of humanity there is needless to expect to reach to the higher state of society - 'Golden Age'. The spiritual development begins from a person's spiritual, moral, ethical values and skills as Swami has many times has mentioned. One of the skills is a personal awareness. How to reach to this? It is possible when there is a will through different Sadhanas, rituals, scholarships, worships. There are many ways and methods, about what I will hope to write time-by-time. Swami indicates: "Samadhi is as the ocean to which all Sadhana flows. The seven streams of Yama, Niyama, Asana, Pranayama, Prathyahara, Dharana and Dhyana all find their consummation in it. Every trace of name and Form disappear in that Ocean. He who serves and He who receives the service, he who meditates and He who is meditated upon, all such duality is dispelled and destroyed. One will not experience even the experience, that is to say, one will not be aware that he is experiencing! Oneself alone, naught else - that will be the Samadhi. If there is aught else, it cannot be Samadhi. It is something like a dream, a fantasy, a passing vision at best. Samadhi can admit of nothing other than Brahman."(Excerpts from: Sathya Sai Baba."Prashanthi Vahini," p. 60). Samadhi is as the central point for spiritual awareness about what is interesting to contemplate by the guidance and help of Swami's quotations. "What is Samadhi? In common parlance, in the eyes of worldly people and in the books written by worldly individuals, Samadhi may be described in various ways. One may be a state of trance during meditation. But this cannot be called Samadhi. Samadhi means merging the mind in the Atma. In that state there are no two entities. Samadhi is a state of equal-mindedness. It is the state in which the oneness of everything is experienced." (Excerpts from: Sri Sathya Sai Baba. SSS. Vol. 23. Chapter 21). Swami explains the inner meaning of Samadhi: "It is not a state of unconsciousness or some kind of consciousness. Samadhi is "Sama-Dhi" - the state in which the intellect has achieved equanimity. Whether in pleasure and pain, in praise or blame, in gain or loss, in heat or cold, to be able to maintain in equal mind in Samadhi." (Sri Sathya Sai Baba. SSS. Vol. 22. Chapter 21). The essence of Samadhi one cannot easily to understand. Various spiritual circles have a little different explanations and approaches to Samadhi. By my insight the most clear for Westerns are explanations made by Swami. He indicated to the variety of approaches to Samadhi and concluded that the ways may be many however, the God is One. "Samadhi is ordinarily mistaken to be an emotional state in which a person acts abnormally, as if in a state of high excitement or trance. You may think that Samadhi is something different from the waking, dream or deep-sleep states. But, truly, Samadhi is something common to all three states. A person who is immersed in Samadhi, whose mind is in equanimity, will always be in a state of bliss, whether he is in the waking state immersed in his every-day life, or whether he is in the dream-state or in the deep-sleep state. To attain it, a great deal of spiritual practice is necessary. After describing the noble characteristics of a truly wise man, Krishna told Arjuna, "Arjuna, Follow my commands! Discharge your duties while all the time thinking of me. Then you will be able to experience and enjoy the divinity that is everywhere. This divinity is the unity which underlies all the diversity in the world. Base your actions on that. Constantly concentrate on that divinity. I am that divinity and you are very dear to me. When you concentrate on me, then I will be fully concentrated on you." ( Exerpts from: Sai Baba Gita. XXII, page 222). The first advice to humans for the sake their awareness through meditation and its final state Samadhi is constantly concentrate to the God and to dedicate all actions to Him as through this is possible to experience the divinity everywhere. Devotion and faith has a profound importance in the development of meditative states and Samadhi Oneness of the Self, God. Devotion draws the interest of the God and attracts spiritual initiation. Devotion focuses the mind more intently and gives for meditation feeling and power. It allows one to turn mind completely within. Faith is implicit in devotion. Without devotion one will has no results. A great saint can achieve Samadhi without a formal meditation. Devotion brings meditation naturally. However, all happens by the Divine Will. By Swami suffering is caused because there is lack of faith that Divine is in person. The religions and beliefs are different, but Brahman is the One. The human life path is expressed through actions in past and present lives. However, it is an illusion. When a person acknowledged it he/she achieve to Brahman, to own real Self, Samadhi. By Yoga-Sutra, the three main practices that produce Samadhi are austerities*, "self study," and "devotion to the Lord." There is mentioned that Samadhi is more easily understandable through the cultivation of wisdom (jnana). Wisdom is the knowledge about the Self, the divine inner Self as the 'self study' (1, 2). (*The Vedic word for austerities is "tapasya" meaning to burn. Austerities purify the physical and astral bodies and burn away karma that obstructs practice. The true austerities are: Sexual Restraint, Meditation, Pure Food, Pranayama, Fasting, Silence, and Solitude). Obtained wisdom, one comes to the realization that the outer material world is not more real than our nightly dreams and not any more important. This knowledge makes it easier for the mind to turn inward and the world represents as a beautiful dream of the Divine. The modern science has discovered tens of years ago that there is abyss of 'emptiness' between atoms' nucleons and electrons. Practically all around us so-called material world in fact consists in 'emptiness' by scientific term - consists in physical vacuum). Humans bodies are also practically consist in physical vacuum where 'swim' the particles of atoms formed molecules. The structure of atoms today knows any student of high school. This scientific truth as underlines the Vedic wisdom by what "Form is emptiness, emptiness is form." (1). The recent discoveries made under guidance of CERN (The world's largest particle physics laboratory) show the that two entangled photons can be far away from each other and still yield correlated results for measurements. A more exotic scenario, and one that has recently been measured, is when a photon hits a beam splitter and turns into what are effectively two versions of itself in two different places, which display the same sort of correlations between its two manifestations. Is it not an indirect scientific proof that all is the same Atma, Brahman? By the same research, the bizarre predictions of quantum mechanics really do hold in our universe (3). In this bizarre illusion the nature of life is not a life, not a death, there is no coming, no going only being in one state or another...what in essence are only appearances of eternal Atma. However, the predictions of quantum mechanics being connected with spiritual wisdom alias parts from Swami's Teaching are not bizarre at all. What is life's meaning without devotion, faith, spiritual awareness? "To a superficial observer, the life of man appears as an endless round of eating and drinking, toiling and sleeping. But, verily life has a much greater meaning; a much deeper significance. Life is a sacrifice, a yagna. Each little act is an offering to the Lord. If the day is spent in deeds performed in this spirit of surrender, what else can sleep be except Samadhi? Man commits the great fault of identifying himself with the body. He has accumulated a variety of things for the upkeep and comfort of the body. Even when the body becomes weak and decrepit with age, he attempts to bolster it up, by some means or other. But, how long can death be postponed? When Yama's warrant comes each has to depart. Before Death, position, pride and power, all vanish. Realizing this, strive day and night, with purity of body and mind and spirit, to realize the Higher Self, by the service of all living beings." (Sathya Sai Baba. Prema Vahini, p. 5).