dhyana

In order to understand the fifth transformationstate of dhyana it is necessary to understand the nature of objects. This is only truly possible, of course through dhyana and samadhi. An object is not so much a thing as an event. It is an act of perception. Those characteristics, and their underlying formative qualities, whereby any object is defined and differentiated from any other exist as they are as functions of perception. The characteristics of a cat perceptible to a dog are quite different to those perceptible to a human being. A cat is not the same thing to a human being as it is to a dog. Equally, no person is the same to any other two people; no event is the same to any two participants. Even on the most basic sensory level this remains true. No nervous system exactly replicates the functioning of any other.

The transformation from dharana to dhyana is a spontaneous one that reflects a deep resolution, that is almost complete, of the perceptual split. In it the initial perception suspended (dharana) in awareness unravels itself. This unraveling elucidates all of the perceptible characteristics of the initial perceptual object. This elucidation is inherently neither linear nor quantative. It is inclusive and qualitative. The perception or object gives itself up fully to the light of awareness. Patanjali classifies this unravelling according to three criteria: form, implications and context.

The form of an object or perception is the aggregate of coarse and subtle characteristics of which it is constituted. Underlying the defining or perceptible characteristics are formative qualities. The type of these characteristics and qualities vary from one category of perception to another. An image has different characteristics and qualities from a feeling or thought. Obviously every member of each category of perception also has different characteristics than any other member of that category. The underlying, formative qualities include, for example, colour, texture, pressure, intensity, dimension, duration etc. These qualities combine to generate the specific characteristics of the form of the object. A bulbous, inflamed nose consists of a specific configuration of redness, pinkness, whiteness, longness, roundness, fullness, which give its form its unique characteristic pattern whereby it is definable as an individual perceptual object.

The implications of an object refers to its specific origins and impact. During meditation all perceptions arising from the actiondeposit into the stillness of dharana, which are then unravelled in dhyana, have a specific source or origin. They arise from a vasana, but also from either one specific samskara within that vasana, or a coagulation of resonant samskaras. Each samskara originates in a specific unresolved past action.

All perceptions arising from the actiondeposit into the unconscious mind generate a chain of reactions (impact). This chain reaction maybe purely mental or may lead to an action. The specifically conditioned nature of the mind means that certain kinds of perceptions trigger certain kinds of associative reactions and lead to certain kinds of actions. Any kind of action has a causative chain, leading back through the initial (unconscious) perception to an unresolved past action, and forward to its consequences. This chain constitutes the implications of an object (perception). In dhyana the arising perception does not produce a conditioned unconscious chain-reaction leading to further karma. Instead it reveals to the light of open awareness the totality of its form, its implications and also its context.

Any phenomenon exists within a context. Its significance derives as much from its context as it is inherent in its form or implications. The unravelling of the origins and implications of any perception also sheds light more broadly through the structure of the mind within which it occurs. The context of any perception is the web of interrelated behavioural tendencies and their historical origins, events constituted of objects interacting, within which it has arisen. Elucidation of this web is endless in linear terms. All objects upon thorough investigation elucidate, and derive their significance only from, the inter-relatedness of all other objects. The ultimate context of any perception is the totality of manifestation (prakriti). Within totality no individuated substantiality can be found to pertain to any apparent object. Objects, it turns out, are devoid of any specific, differentiating substance, consisting instead of fluctuations in and of emptiness.

To the linear mind the form, implications and context of a perceptual object can seem to imply huge amounts of data that would take time to grasp. However, in dhyana the linear modality of the mind has long been suspended. Its suspension brings to the foreground the nonlinear quality of Awareness to which linear characteristics do not apply. Awareness of the form, implications and context of an object does not take time, does not involve data, analysis, evaluation, or judgement. Nor does it directly lead to knowledge in the usual sense. When dhyana is ripe the elucidation of an object reveals its inherent nonseparateness from all other apparent phenomena. It is non separateness that is known, which Patanjali refers to as emptiness (shunyata). In this way dualistic perception arising from the sense of separate self is further undermined from the level of the mind as it deepens its meditative state.

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