knowledge
Yoga dictionary. Vairagya
This is the phenomenon on which all suffering in the material world is based. Being attached to objects of pleasure, to the comfort zone, to a habitual state of Affairs, a schedule of life, Outlook and so on, the person is doomed to sufferings. This is due to the impermanence of the material world. No material object can exist forever. Everything that is created will be destroyed sooner or later. Moreover, even what lies beyond the material – our own thoughts, feelings, perceptions, concepts, mental patterns, and so on – is also subject to constant change. And what yesterday people considered good, today can be considered evil despite the fact that the external situation has not changed. Due to constant changes in the external and internal world of man, everything to which a person is attached, sooner or later destroyed, or rather – is modified. Continue reading
Yoga dictionary. Vivec
And from the absolute point of view, these concepts are very conditional. What in one situation is poison to one person is medicine to another, and Vice versa. And the concepts of good and evil, right and wrong often turn into dogmas that cause no less harm than the absence of any principles and rules at all. In his philosophical treatise on yoga, Patanjali described such a phenomenon as “Viveka”. And this is the key to understanding how to distinguish black from white. Moreover, it is the key to understanding that life is not a black-and-white film and in addition to these two colors there is a whole range of colors.
In Sanskrit, Viveka means ‘discrimination’. This concept is revealed in Sutra 24, Chapter 4. One of the most curious translations of this Sutra is that of falkow, and His version of the Sutra reads as follows:”for one who has attained mastery of discernment, the contradictions of the nature of the soul are mitigated.” The point is that all contradictions exist only at the level of the mind. Continue reading