Progress Towards Parama Purusha

Shrii Shrii Anandamurti

Every movement in this world is characterised by speed and pause, pause and speed, like the earthworm’s movement. We tend to determine human development by observing external progress. But if we are stuck at the same place where we initially started our journey, that is not progress. By building a road you do not progress. You will have to move along the road. So, too, we must progress in the psychic realm. In the process of movement, we will reach a stage when the mind becomes non-existent. Unless the mind reaches that supreme point, we will remain imperfect. This path of movement is divided into four stages: yatamana, vyatireka, ekendriya and vashiikara. Yatamana is the stage when the spiritual practitioner makes sincere efforts. Time passes and you might say, “I am trying”, but if your effort lasts for three, four, five or 25 lives it may lead to regress. So to say, “I am trying”, is not enough. Yet, the benefit of the first stage is that at least we make constructive efforts. This is yatamana. In vyatireka the feeling is “I must succeed”. Firm determination is the precondition for success. When the Buddha practised sadhana for long but still did not attain the final goal, he sat down the second time and resolved: “Unless I attain the supreme height of enlightenment, I won’t move an inch from this posture, even if my body withers, and my bones, flesh and skin are destroyed”. This is the stage of vyatireka. You gain a degree of temporary control over some psychic propensities (vrttis). It is often noticed that many saints and monks who give up hearth and home have a weakness for food. They are pleased with anyone who offers them delicious food and drink. Others, however, who have overcome their weakness for food, get angry if their visitors don’t pay obeisance to them. These are all weaknesses of the mind. This is vyatireka. The third stage, ekendriya, means gaining full control over a particular vrtti (psychic propensity). Once controlled, it will never return, will never cause further degeneration. For example, if a person gains full control over the vak indriya, the organ of speech, whatever he says will come true. This is vak siddhi. In the final stage, vashiikara, all the psychic vrttis are brought well within control. Suppose someone wants to know what happened 20,000 years ago. The moment the desire to know arises, his mind will return to the distant past and will see what really happened then. Or if someone wants to know what is written on a particular page of a book printed in a certain country; he sends the mind to that page and comes to know the contents. This is absolute vashiikara siddhi. About the man with vashikar, people may think that he is a very well-read person, but actually he comes to know things from his vashiikara siddhi. He can project his mind anywhere to know anything. At that stage everything comes within his perfect control and he attains a kind of godhood. But if he fails to surrender himself to Parama Purusha, after acquiring various occult powers, he will develop ego. He will curse those he hates and thus, unknowingly, will gradually degenerate. So after attaining vashiikara siddhi, you should surrender your unit soul to Paramatma. Then you will become one with Parama Purusha, you will become Parama Purusha.