Soundlessness – In Gita Verse 11.48 O best of the Kuru warriors, no one before you has ever seen this universal form of Mine, for neither by studying the Vedas, nor by performing sacrifices, nor by charity, nor by pious activities, nor by severe penances can I be seen in this form in the material world.
Krishna’s words are very compassionate. He says that what he has revealed to Arjuna in the form of Mine – is Truth. Which cannot be sought through vedas, or by any other activities.
In my Bhagavad Gita Verse 2.2, blog I wrote – In compassion, you simply give. In love, you are thankful because the other has given something to you. In compassion, you are thankful because the other has taken something from you; you are thankful because the other has not rejected you. You had come with energy to give, you had come with many flowers to share, and the other allowed you, the other was receptive. You are thankful because the other was receptive.
Truth cannot be sought – one can simply be receptive, that’s all. One can open the doors and wait. One can say only this much, “If the divine guest comes, you will be received, welcomed. I don’t know who you are, and I don’t know your address and I cannot even send an invitation. But whosoever you are, and whomsoever it concerns, if you come, my doors will be open.”
Receptivity is a state of no-mind. When you are utterly empty of all thought, when consciousness has no content, when the mirror reflects nothing, is receptivity. Receptivity is the door to the divine. Drop the mind and be.
People ask, “How to attain a peaceful mind?” Answer is “There exists nothing like that: a peaceful mind. Never heard of it.”
Mind is never peaceful; no-mind is peace. Mind itself can never be peaceful, silent. The very nature of the mind is to be tense, to be in confusion. Mind can never be clear, it cannot have clarity, because the mind is by nature confused and cloudy. Clarity is possible without mind, peace is possible without mind; silence is possible without mind, so never try to attain a silent mind. If you do, from the very beginning you are moving in an impossible dimension.
Let me tell you one Zen Story how they drop the mind: In Zen they use koans to drop the mind. One of the famous koans they tell to the beginner is, “Go and try to hear the sound of one hand. You can create a sound with two hands. If one hand can create a sound, hear it.”
One small boy was serving a Zen master. He would see many people coming. They would come to the master, put their head at his feet, and then they would ask the master to tell them something to meditate on. He would give them a koan. The boy was just doing some work for the master, he was serving him. He was just nine or ten years of age.
Seeing every day many people coming and going; one day he also came very seriously, put his head at the master’s feet, and then asked him, “Give me some koan, some object for meditation.” The master laughed, but the boy was very serious, so the master said, “Okay! Try to hear the sound of one hand. And when you hear it, then come to me and tell me.”
The boy tried and tried. He couldn’t sleep the whole night. In the morning he came and he said, “I have heard. It is the sound of the wind blowing through the trees.” The master said, “But where is the hand involved in it? Go again and try.” So he would come every day. He would find some sound and then he would come, and the master would say, “This is also not it. Go on trying, go on trying!”
Then one day the boy didn’t come. The master waited and waited, and then he told his other disciples to go and find out what had happened – it seemed the boy had heard. So they went around. He was sitting under a tree, absorbed – just a newborn buddha. They came back and they said, “But we are afraid to disturb the boy. He is looking just like a newborn buddha. It seems he has heard the sound.” So the master came, put his head at the boy’s feet and asked him, “Have you heard? It seems you have heard.” The boy said, “Yes, but it is soundless-ness.”
How did this boy develop? His sensitivity developed. He tried every sound, he listened attentively. Attention developed. He would not sleep. The whole night he would listen – for what is the sound of one hand. He was not as intellectual as you are, so he never thought that there cannot be any sound of one hand. If the koan is given to you, you are not going to try. You will say, “What nonsense! There cannot be any sound with one hand.”
But the boy tried. The master had said there must be something in it, so he tried. He was a simple boy, so whenever he would hear something, whenever he would feel this was something new, he would come again. But by this process his sensitivity developed. He became attentive, alert, and aware. He became one-pointed. He was in search, and the mind dropped because the master said, “If you go on thinking you may miss. Sometimes there is the sound, which is of one hand. Be so alert that you do not miss it.”
He tried and tried. There is no sound of one hand, but that was just an indirect method to create sensitivity, awareness. And one day, suddenly, everything disappeared. He was so attentive that only attention was there, so sensitive that only sensitivity was there, so aware – not aware of something, but simply aware! And then he said, “I have heard it, but it is soundless-ness. It is soundless-ness!” But you have to be trained to be attentive, to be alert.
If you drop your mind and enter into no-mind become receptive, Krishna will show his Universal form to you also, which is nothing but Truth.
Tags: Soundlessness
