Meditation is cheating

Happiness which is sustainable is impossible in this world.

Following is the mechanism of happiness and unhappiness.

First a thought (as desire) arises in the mind.

This creates a disturbance in the natural peace of the consciousness.

This disturbance then creates the potential energy which goads us to achieve the object, which we think will give us happiness.

This object will make us feel fulfilled, because it will remove the disturbance creating potential.

This is the mechanism by which work is happening in the world.

So it is quite clear, the basis of the activities in this world is the disturbance created which creates a potential which then impels us to remove this disturbance by obtaining the happiness attributed object.

This is how the system was designed by its clever designer (hat tip to God).

The Vedantins and the Buddhists are then trying to hack the system.

By meditation you bypass the whole thought->attachment->disturbance->energy->attainment->cessation cycle required for object attainment.

You stop it at the attachment phase itself.

This way disturbance is never created and one can remain happy.

This is why the meditators can remain happy they have hacked the system to give them happiness by bypassing the whole business.

http://www.businessinsider.com/how-scientists-figured-out-who-the-worlds-happiest-man-is-2012-11

We can say that the world is created to not give us happiness by for us to chase happiness and never get it.

Unhappiness/dissatisfaction is the potential energy that makes the world run. Once it becomes permanent then how will the activities of the world take place.

By bypassing the rules of life meditators are thus cheaters.

The three gunas

There are three gunas that are said to operate in the mind.

The three gunas are sattva, rajas and tamas

Tamas is inertia, it is the feeling of helplessness of laziness of depression. It is not all bad however, when you sleep you need tamas

Rajas is energy, it is the can do spirit enthusiasm, bubbliness

Sattva is harmony, it is the discriminative intelligence, wisdom which can recognize and balance the other two.

Sad to say however that Sattva is the rarest of gunas, and so people that are wise are rare.

Rajas is celebrated in today's society as a "man of action", "always doing something or other" things "full of vigor".

Tamas is however universally condenmed.

The upshot of all this is that there is an excess of Rajas in today's society.

Two forces

Two forces is all that is required to understand the seemingly myriad complexity of life.

The two forces are simply awareness and attachment.

Awareness is simply the fundamental force of life on which everything else is built.

Whatever is built on awareness is simply due to attachment.

If attachment were not there objects will arise randomly in awareness.

And as they arise they will also dissolve.

However, due to attachments things are propagated.

This whole world beautiful or ugly as it may seem is the handiwork of attachment.

However, it is built on top of awareness.

When awareness is gone the world cannot exist. There first needs to be an observer to see the world.

However, just seeing will create transient objects in the world that rise and fall randomly.

It is attachment that then binds awareness to objects, once awareness is attached to an object, then the object derives stable existence.

At the very heart we humans are no complex than just this interplay of two cosmic forces.

Vedanta and Science as means of Knowledge

Vedanta and science are ultimately descriptions of the universe.

Science has a way of describing things based on what they infer from their instruments.

Atoms, electrons, photons quarks, mass gravity.

This is good as it goes, but in our day to day life scientific instruments is not what we live life through.

For us the scientific description of the universe is not useful.

An object can have various levels of description.

For example, a car can be described in terms of its brakes accelerator and steering wheels.

It can also be described in terms of the intricate mechanics that make it up, such as gears, levers, engines and such.

For a driver driving a car what is useful is how the brakes and the accelerator works.

He should have an intuitive understanding of these things rather than the in depth understanding of combustion engines.

Similarly for us and our instruments of perception, the theories of Vedanta are much more meaningful and impactful.

They have a profound impact on our way of living on our mental health our feelings and emotions.

Life is simply the interplay of forces.

See it as it is through deep observation. Vedanta only gives you hints into what you should look for.

To perceive it clearly is to move away from darkness into light where things become meaningful. Life is no longer a mystery and the universe is your own.

Observe with your instruments the interplay of attachment and awareness that is your life.

The goal of life

Since childhood we have been asked to do this or that.

Otherwise we are not worthy.

It is always about becoming something or other.

The spiritual pursuits are similar with things to be done and goals to be achieved.

All this is bogus.

There are two forces of attachment and awareness that create this world.

Indeed they create us as we are.

Being created by the interplay of the forces of nature there is nothing worthy or unworthy here.

Attachment and Awareness: The fundamental nature of the universe

Attachment is considered a negative thing in spiritual teachings.

However, like awareness it is also one of the things that makes the world.

Awareness and attachment together make the world possible.

You attach to your body, without it you will not care for hunger and thirst and die.

If attachment were not there awareness will not thus perpetuate objects such as the body.

This will not cause the universe we see today.

Attachment is not a problem.

On the other hand like awareness it is one of the fundamental forces that build the universe.

Subject and Object

Vedanta boils down to just one statement:

"You are the subject and not an object."

Anything that can be perceived is an object.

The one that perceives is the subject.

Since objects rely upon a subject they are not unconditioned, hence they have conditional being.

An object in itself is unknown, the subject perceives a projection of the object.

While subject does not rely upon objects, hence it has unconditional being.

This last statement is hard to believe in for most of us.

We assume that once say our body is gone we will also cease to be, while vedanata says it is not so.

The subject is not conditioned upon the object body is an object hence I being the subject am not conditioned on it.

Observation is all there is

Enticing as the ideas of Vedanta are, in the end it all boils down to observation.

According to Vedanta all perceivables are objects.

Thus thoughts and emotions are also objects just like any other.

Yet we have too much attachment to them. In fact we take them as what we are.

We are not an object and can never be perceived.

However, we attach to these subtle objects as soon as they arise.

This attachment then feeds them.

Thus, we need to develop the discipline of non attaching to these objects to be as pure Brahman.

The only way to do so is observation.

In the final reckoning enlightenment boils down to knowledge.

Knowledge that you are never the object but always the subject.

While the objects come and go the subject persists.

Space

The concept of space is most amazing.

Let's say there are two kinds of space physical and psychological.

Physical space is what remains when all objects are removed.

In the absence of objects space is neither big not small.

It just is.

Neither beautiful nor ugly nor green nor blue.

Nothing can be said about it except through negation.

That is any physical object that can ever exist is not space.

Space is the absence of all.

And yet it is the basis of all.

Without space nothing could exist

It is the most fundamental.

Physical space though fundamental has little to do with us.

But curiously something analogous to it is behind I Am.

Psychological space.

When I remove all objects of perception through neti neti what remains is psychological space.

This psychological space is what is life itself

It is what makes experiencing possible.

Yet it is nothing that can be experienced.

It is the absence of all experience.

And this space is so intimate that it is the one behind consciousness itself.

I am in the purest is this.

We are this eternal indestructible object, and we barely recognize it.

The fundamental reality

The fundamental reality of the universe is what remains if we keep removing everything that can be removed.

The scientist will say if I keep removing everything then what will remain is empty space.

This is also what most of us believe in that if we keep removing everything then empty space would remain.

Vedanta however gives a different answer.

It says if you keep removing everything, the one thing you cannot remove is you.

If you remove the observer then there is nothing not even empty space.

You cannot be removed at all, what remains after you is removed still requires you to imagine it.

There is not a thing in the universe that is there without you.

The Void

Void is the absence of everything.

Void is also the space in which everything is possible.

These descriptions also apply to Brahman equally well.

Science assumes that there is something called empty space in which things can be.

For Vedanta the reality is not the empty space but consciousness itself.

Purged of all its attachments consciousness becomes empty, empty like the space of physics.

In Buddhism void is said to be the end goal of nirvana.

To return to the empty space from which the world appeared.

The space is not dead, it is life itself, it is consciousness, it is perceiving and experiencing.

Whatever in alive in us is this space, which through attached to concepts and ideas and forms does not realize its indestructible nature

Buddhism and Vedanta

Buddhism and Vedanta are kindred spirits.

The great thing about Buddhism is that Buddha's teachings have survived almost unaltered from the time he taught it.

The Vedantic tradition is strong today due to people such as  Ramana Maharishi and Nisargadatta Maharaj. The scriptures of Vedanta the Upanishads and Geeta  have truth, untruth and myths all mixed up in them and are therefore hard to make use of.

Ramakrishna Paramhansa once remarked that reading the scriptures is like trying to eat sugar mixed with sand, when you don't even know what is sugar and what is sand.

With Buddhism there is much less sand that has come in the sugar.

Weightlessness

The end goal of meditation is literally weightlessness.

All the objects bind Brahman and keep it moored.

Objects are whatever can be perceived whether physical or nonphysical.

When through the practice neti-neti all these weights are thrown overboard.

What remains then is weightlessness.

Vedanta and Religion

Religion is generally based on myths, emotions, faith and belief.

Vedanta literally means end of knowledge, it is based on none of the above.

Indeed attaching to any thought  or emotion is something that takes you away from pure consciousness.

So what about the books and teachings of Vedanta?

Yes they are thoughts and the seeker attaches to them initially.

The analogy given by Buddha was that his teachings were like a thorn used to remove another thorn.

After the thorn is removed both the thorns are thrown away.

Another analogy that was given by him is that of a man using a raft to cross the river.

When you reach the other shore you also throw the raft away.

Pure consciousness is realized when not attaching to any form that can be perceived, whether thought, emotion or a physical object.

In pure consciousness even the exalted thoughts of Vedanta are but a blemish and must be discarded as well.

But for a seeker they act as an antidote towards annihilating preexisting attachments.

In practice faith is required to be able to make use of the antidote, without faith the thoughts of Vedanta will not gain enough strength to annihilate the preexisting thoughts.