Tag Archives: Satchitananda

Operating on All of Your Cylinders

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By George A. Boyd © 2019

Q: What does the expression, to operate on all cylinders, mean?

A: We can draw an analogy between the awareness and functioning of human beings and the operation of a 12-cylinder car, like a Jaguar. These inner shifts in awareness and functioning appear to take 12 postures:

  1. Only senses function – You are aware of your body and the world around you. You dwell in the world of consensual reality at your waking state of awareness.
  2. Senses interface with memory – You activate the faculty of imagination. You are able to tell stories and express your creative ideas.
  3. Ego activation – Your desires are highlighted. The world revolves around you. You may wish to present the best impression of yourself to others, which may engage your defenses and lying to not show others any weakness or vulnerability.
  4. Mindfulness – You are able to collect your attention and observe the contents of awareness. You become aware of what is arising in the present time.
  5. Attentional travel – You are able to shift your attention and examine the focal points within your mind, and consciously shift perspective.
  6. Third eye opening – You awaken as the attentional principle, and you are able to use intention and suggestion to work on your life issues.
  7. Conscious life direction – You awaken the Self, which directs your entire personality through volition. You take charge of the direction of your life.
  8. Awakening of the heart – You become aware of your spirit. You awaken your inner wellsprings of love and devotion.
  9. Archetypal identification – You awaken a nucleus of identity and identity with it. You express the native virtue, abilities, and intuitive knowledge that this essence holds.
  10. Enlightenment – You become aware of the Soul and identify with it. You experience enlightenment and Gnosis.
  11. Higher octave awakening – You awaken an ensouling entity, spirit, or nucleus of identity in the Transplanetary, Cosmic, Supracosmic, or Transcendental bands of the Continuum. You identify with the essence and express it.
  12. Satchitananda – You awaken as the Infinite Consciousness, and behold each of these other octaves within you.

Those that meditate open the possibility to activate cylinders four to twelve; those that don’t awaken their witnessing faculty, commonly are delimited to operating only with their first three cylinders. We teach you how to awaken cylinders four through ten in our intermediate courses, the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program. We introduce you to cylinders eleven and twelve in the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation.

Through awakening your awareness and learning how to do inner work, you can activate each of your human and spiritual potentials, and begin functioning on all of your cylinders. If you are interested in learning how to do this, we can teach you how.

What Is An Ensouling Entity?

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By George A. Boyd © 2019

Q: In your writings, you talk about an ensouling entity. What is that?

A: When we examine the four poles of being, the ensouling entity dwells on the first pole of being. There are 13 of these ensouling entities—these are the master integration centers in the Superconscious mind for different segments of the Great Continuum of Consciousness. These include:

Ensouling Entity Number

What We Call the Ensouling Entity

Where It Operates

1

Soul
Spark (Jivan Atma)

Entire
Subtle Realm

2

Soul (Atma), also called Higher Self,
or Transpersonal Self

Entire
Planetary Realm

3

Monad
(Paramatma)

Entire
Transplanetary Realm

4

Astral
Soul (Hansa Atma)

Entire
Cosmic Realm

5

Supracosmic
Soul (Binda Atma)

Entire
Supracosmic Realm

6

Soul
of the Bridge Path

Transcendental
portion of the Bridge Path

7

T1
ensouling entity

First
Transcendental Path

8

T2
ensouling entity

Second
Transcendental Path

9

T3
ensouling entity

Third
Transcendental Path

10

T4
ensouling entity

Fourth
Transcendental Path

11

T5
ensouling entity

Fifth
Transcendental Path

12

T6
ensouling entity

Sixth
Transcendental Path

13

T7
ensouling entity (Satchitananda)

Seventh
Transcendental Path

The ensouling entity is the Divine Atom that ties together the activity of the awakened vehicles of consciousness in that band of the Continuum of Consciousness, links with the development of the spirit through that level, and is the focus of the attentional principle that brings about enlightenment and Gnosis for that segment of the Continuum.

In many spiritual traditions, they teach you to focus your attention on the third pole, and identify with a nucleus of identity. In some of these traditions, they may not be aware that there is the overshadowing ensouling entity; and some of them may also not be aware of the spirit.

As a consequence, you see these groups identifying with a nucleus of identity, and using transformational methods to unfold it. When spiritual practice is done in this way, you will often see that a selected nucleus of identity is moved off of the axis of being, and aspirants’ attention is fixed in this integration center of the Superconscious mind. This strategy for spiritual development brings about imbalances.

In our Integral meditation program, we teach you meditations to awaken your spiritual essences on all four poles of being. We teach you how to do this in our intermediate classes, the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation, and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program. This strategy unfolds all four poles in synchrony, so you do not generate imbalances.

 

What Is Satchitananda?

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By George A. Boyd ©2019

Q: When people talk about Satchitananda, they seem to refer to different experiences. It appears to me when a Yogi Preceptor speaks about Satchitananda as the experience of realizing Brahman, he is pointing to something else than what your second teacher, Sat Guru Balyogeshwar Paramahansa, was describing. Could you shed some light on this?

A: There appear to be seven major orders of experience that different sources have labeled Satchitananda. In these varying perspectives, Satchitananda is:

  1. The experience of the Soul (Atma) – Those who hold this view say that the Soul contains an atom of the Divine that is eternal existence, eternally conscious, and eternally joyous and blissful. New Age teachers embrace this viewpoint.
  2. The experience of the Monad (Paramatma) – When the Soul completes its spiritual evolution, it merges in the Nirvanic Flame, and is reborn as the Monad. The Monad is the fullness of conscious immortality, infinite knowledge and power, and bliss. Planetary Adepts and their disciples adopt this standpoint.
  3. The experience of cosmic consciousness in union with Brahman – When the cosmic consciousness nucleus of identity unfolds and ultimately opens the seventh chakra of the Cosmic Man or Woman, it enters the state of union with Brahman. The fifth Maha Vakya or Divine Realization Affirmation is Satchitananda Brahman. This is the state of conscious Godhood—you experience yourself as one with the Divine Self of the Universe. Jnana Yoga Preceptors, and teachers of Vedanta and Advaita disseminate this perspective.
  4. The experience of the Supracosmic Soul on any Supracosmic Path, when your Supracosmic Seed Atom fuses with it – At the culmination of spiritual development on any Supracosmic Path where your Supracosmic Soul dwells, you can experience Divine Realization. This occurs when your Supracosmic Seed Atom merges into your Supracosmic Soul. Supracosmic Gurus like Ramana Maharshi and Shirdi Sai Baba experienced and embodied this state.
  5. The experience of the Transcendental Ensouling Entity on its own Plane, above all coverings – On Transcendental Paths one through five, the spirit opens the channels of the Nada to a Plane where the ensouling entity gains realization of its own nature above the worlds of matter, energy, and mind. Sat Gurus of Transcendental Paths one through five point to this advanced state of Realization as conferring the highest knowledge and bliss.
  6. The experience of the Transcendental Ensouling Entity of the Seventh Transcendental Path – The Sat Guru of the Seventh Transcendental Path reveals Divine Knowledge or Brahma Vidya, when he unites your attention with this ensouling entity. This teacher and his disciples label this state of eternal existence, infinite consciousness, and unending bliss as Satchitananda.
  7. The experience of the Avatar on the Third Transcendental Path – This highest Initiate on the Third Transcendental Path experiences infinite love, infinite intelligence, and infinite bliss as he consciously incarnates God. The Initiates and disciples of the Third Transcendental Path identify the conscious experience of the Avatar as Satchitananda.

When we speak of Satchitananda in Mudrashram®, we point to this sixth order of experience. In the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation, we guide students up to experience Satchitananda as the ensouling entity of the Seventh Transcendental Path. Experiencing this spiritual essence is important because:

  • Satchitananda is the source of the Alaya, the Divine energy that animates your ensouling entity at the cutting edge of spirituality. Upon liberation of any of your ensouling entities, this animating energy returns to Satchitananda. This energy then reanimates another ensouling entity on another level of the Great Continuum of Consciousness.
  • Satchitananda is the highest state of conscious experience in you.
  • Satchitananda transcends the dualities of the lower Planes—Subtle, Planetary, Transplanetary, Cosmic, Supracosmic, and Transcendental Paths one through five—and is experienced as the core essence from which all other states of conscious experience emanated.
  • Satchitananda brings highest Realization. Realizing it beings Supreme Gnosis, Brahma Vidya, or Divine Knowledge. It is the ultimate synthesis of all varieties of spiritual experience.

We encourage you to become familiar with each of these varieties of spiritual essences that have been labeled Satchitananda up to the sixth order of experience. The seventh order is the unique experience of that Initiate chosen to embody the Avatar on the Third Transcendental Path, so accessing this state of consciousness may be challenging for most aspirants and disciples.

The other six orders are readily accessible to those who master the art of Raja Yoga. This confers the ability to travel to any level of the Great Continuum of Consciousness in full consciousness. [We teach you how to practice direct projection, the inmost practice of Raja Yoga, in our intermediate classes, the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and on-line Accelerated Meditation Program.]

Those who complete one of our intermediate courses, and go on to take the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation, actually travel in the advanced course up through each of these six states of the experience of Satchitananda.

Why Mystics Don’t Identify Consciousness with the Brain

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By George A. Boyd © 2017

Q: Many scientists say that consciousness is a product of neuronal functioning. They purport to measure it through the electrical currents emanating from the brain. They say there is no Soul other than an evoked potential of the word, “Soul” in the brain, and no God but the evoked resonance of the word, “God” in the brain. How is it that mystics testify to the existence of a Soul and the all-pervading Presence of God, when this cannot be detected in the brain?

A: Science objectifies phenomena, and only considers that which the senses [or their technological extensions] can detect, that reason can verify, and that the intellect can represent and manipulate as words, mathematical formulas, symbols, and models of correlated ideas.

For this reason, scientists cannot detect attention, the attentional principle, the spirit, or the Soul. They cannot examine the strata of the mind. They cannot explore the Continuum of Consciousness. They cannot find God in neurons, in the logical circuits of reason, and the problem-solving strategies of the intellect.

To have the experiences of the mystics, who encounter the Soul and God, you need to have a subjective experience, drawing attention along the thread of consciousness, where it can detect the focal points at each layer of the mind, unite with the essences of consciousness—attentional principle, spirit, and Soul—and follow that thread into the presence of the all-pervading consciousness of God.

This withdrawal of attention from full brain identification to union with the highest state of consciousness, Satchitananda, appears to pass through seven steps:

  1. Consciousness appears to be a product of brain activity.
  2. You observe the activity of the brain as a detached witness, from the standpoint of your attention. You collect attention into a sphere and become present and aware. This stage is the beginning of mindfulness. It appears that your attention is the carrier of consciousness.
  3. You gain the ability to follow the thread of consciousness with your attention to observe the content at the different levels of the mind. You may variously experience this material at each level of the mind as a seed atom upon which you contemplate, a field of phenomena, a form or vehicle of consciousness that has discrete functions, or as ever-changing content that arises in the present time. It appears that your attention is the carrier of consciousness, and it perceives the content that is present in altered states of awareness through shifting its focus.
  4. You move along this thread of consciousness with your attention until you unite with the attentional principle, and as you gain union with this essence, you shift into its perspective. It appears consciousness is innate to the attentional principle.
  5. Your attention travels further up the thread of consciousness until you gain union with the spirit. As you contemplate this spiritual essence, you merge with it and view from its perspective. It appears that the spirit also has innate consciousness.
  6. Your attention rises up into the Soul and you gain union with it. You become aware that your Soul is also a conscious essence.
  7. Your attention follows the thread of consciousness up to the highest stage of consciousness, Satchitananda. You become aware that the energy that animates the Soul and activates it emanates from this source. You become aware of the eternal source of consciousness, Satchitananda.

The methods of the scientists use senses, reason, and intellect to gather data, to organize that data into the schemas of knowledge, and to use that knowledge to predict phenomena and to invent new technology, methods, and products. Since attention cannot be reduced to neural functions, the scientist must shift from brain awareness to witnessing mind (attention) to begin the journey of meditation—to embrace a subjective, non-empirical way of knowing that the external senses cannot detect, that reason cannot verify, and that the intellect cannot fully comprehend.

You can only understand the ways of the mystic through adopting his practices. You cannot know it from without, only from within. You must shift from an objective orientation to the world to a subjective one, and journey into the depths of that subjectivity to encounter the Soul and God.