Acharya Mahaprajna
Central Chronicle
Life becomes very small if it is confined to making a living. People live just for earning money. Life has been depreciated by such a narrow outlook and as a result we are getting entangled in more and more problems
Pranshakti (bio energy) is the main basis of life. In Sanskrit life and pran are synonyms. Acquiring this understanding is the main subject of Preksha Dhyan. Ten prans have been mentioned. The energy that keeps the body going is pran. Then there are the senses and their pran. The energy that keeps the senses functioning is pran.
Next is the mind and its pran. Similarly, there is breath and its pran. There is a practice in Preksha Dhyan: breathe and experience the inhalation. It is pran, which makes inhalation possible.
Practise to see pran and breath as two distinct things. During this practice the subtlety and concentration of the mind register a high rise. It feels like a scientist becoming so absorbed in a major experiment that he becomes completely oblivious to all external goings-on.
Once Einstein invited a friend to dinner. The latter arrived at dinnertime but found that Einstein was totally absorbed in his research. In fact, he had forgotten all about the dinner. The guest sized up the situation, helped himself with the food and quietly returned home. When Einstein finished his experiment he found empty used plates on the dining table. He said to himself that possibly he forgot that he had already eaten his dinner and so went back to the laboratory.
How did such a great scientist behave so abnormally? When we are engaged in the subtle investigation of bio energy, our energy withdraws within itself and nothing external is remembered. Perception of the Body, Perception of the Sense, Perception of the Mind, Perception of the Vital Essence or bio energy and other practices are aimed at a comprehensive understanding of life. From this point of view, it can be said that Preksha Dhyan is not mere meditation, but a philosophy of life.
Let us all examine the philosophical aspect. 'Philosophy' is an ancient word, but the philosophy taught in modern universities is purely at the level of ideas or thoughts. There are two dimensions of the word 'Philosophy' - one of its meanings is related to it as a subject and another as a body of ideas. The subject of philosophy is facts. Science has also the same subject. The only function of philosophy from this viewpoint is to know reality. It can be factual or fact-oriented philosophy. Knowing reality is knowing the truth. In philosophy, it represents the existential stream of thinking.
The second stream is utilitarianism. It is concerned only with utility, not with reality at all. These days there is a lot of talk about 'Applied Philosophy'. Anything that cannot be applied is not philosophy. Philosophy should not be merely factual, it should be utilizable. Traditionally philosophy split into two schools: idealistic and realistic.
In the latter, existence or reality is central, while in the former, the whole thing moves around an idea or presumption. Let us veer away from both approaches and link philosophy to life. Let us refrain from explaining the world or the highest or absolute truth. Let us explain only life and try to understand it. Such a philosophy is the philosophy of understanding life.
Let us develop a viewpoint, which helps us understand life.
Today the entire energy is being spent on understanding the means of livelihood or earning a living. I asked a few students who came to meet me, "Do you ever think about life?" They could not understand what I meant. Then I asked, "What is the purpose of your studies?" They replied, "The aim of studying well is to earn sumptuously." A girl would put it thus, "The aim of studying well is to get a good match." The whole life has got cribbed and confined and it has led to all sorts of problems.
The Ramayana cannot be understood by reading just a line. A hundred thousand hymns of Valmiki explain its full meaning. Today, we have no Valmiki (author of the Ramayana) or Vyas (the author of the Mahabharata) or Hem Chandra and Jinsen (authors of long Puranas). Why then is it not thought necessary to write a long treatise on life? Life becomes very small if it is confined to making a living. Life is held to be so insignificant that its very distorted image emerges. People live just for earning money, which gives status, honour and happiness. Life has been depreciated by such a narrow outlook and as a result we are getting entangled in more and more problems.
Preksha Dhyan is a philosophy of life. Its chief message is: Try to understand the importance of life also along with that of earning a living. Man as a social being has got to earn a living. Its importance cannot be underrated. At the same time, we should also know the value of life. After all, what does one earn a living for? Is it not for the sake of life? So how can the importance of life be under-estimated? Many people die young of heart ailments. Why should the heart stop functioning at a young age? In physiological terms, the heart has the capacity to function for over a hundred years. So the minimum life span should be a hundred years. If people die much earlier, one reason is the overwhelming importance given to livelihood at the cost of life. Preksha Dhyan is a philosophy, which can change the above angle of thinking. But justice will not be done to Preksha Dhyan merely by spending an hour on close-eyed meditation. The purpose of Preksha Dhyan is to first understand life in its totality and then treat it justly and in a balanced manner. By giving equal importance to life and livelihood, we can ensure that life is lived well and peacefully.