Beyond duality

Vitarkabādhane pratikpakṣabhāvanam*

Yoga Sutra 2:33

Translations:

When the mind is disturbed by passions one should practise pondering over their opposites.

Swami Satyananda Saraswati

In order to exclude from the mind questionable things, the mental calling up of those things that are opposite is efficacious for their removal.

William Q. Judge

When distracted by wayward or perverted rationalization, suitable counter measures should be adopted to keep away or remove such obstacles, especially by the contemplation of the other point of view.

Swami Venkatesananda

When negative feelings restrict us, the opposite should be cultivated.

Alistair Shearer

When disturbed by negative thoughts, opposite [positive] ones should be thought of. This is pratipaksha bhavana.

Swami Satchidananada

Cultivating of opposites

The phenomenal world is a world of opposites: Hot/cold, big/little, smart/stupid, black/white, me/you. It is a world of dualistic opposites. It has to be so. Whatever we are experiencing now, the opposite is also here, or at the very least, waiting in the wings. Our thinking is in opposites, our feeling and emoting is in opposites. 

Yoga Sutra 2:33 recognises that we become embroiled in disturbing cognitions and feelings and counsels the cultivation of the opposite. You might ask, if the opposite can always be here too, why do I get caught up in the most uncomfortable of the pair, in distress instead of in comfort? 

This has to do with the way our brain has evolved to keep us safe.  We have a negative bias.  Better that we mistake a stick for a snake than a snake for a stick. What happens though is that we get a bit trapped in the negativity and begin to  suffer.  We believe it, so we suffer.

In this age of the wonders of imaging the brain scientists have now shown how cultivating gratitude for example can change the very structures of the brain, growing the hippocampus and shrinking the amygdala. Cultivation of gratitutde is an example of cultivating the opposite.  When doom and gloom is all around, practice noticing what there is to be grateful for.

Welcoming opposites

The practice becomes even more powerful when we also practice welcoming both sides of the pair, not rejecting that discomforting side, not clinging on to that more comfortable side, but being open to them both.

In the practice of iRest® yoga nidra meditation we do this, moving between the two sides of the pair, welcoming both, whether it is a feeling in the body, such as hot/cold, an emotion and its feeling in the body, such as sad/happy, or a thought or belief, such as I am stupid/I am smart. We always notice how they feel in the body and go between those feelings, not just summoning them as a thought.  What does it feel like to believe I am stupid? What does it feel like to believe I am smart?

Both together

It is when we reach the point where we hold them both together that the really big power moment comes. It is not a merging, but both here together, both opposites at the same time. 

Wow! The resolution opens up to a state that is beyond opposites.  This is a sense of open, welcoming, Presence that is full of equanimity. How so?

Moving beyond duality to the simple way things are

This embodied form incudes all the thoughts, emotions, and every perception that we have, including the me thought. This embodied form is constrained by thought into believing in separation, a me and a you. It is in this state that the opposites arise.

The mind of thoughts is so powerful, and we are so habituated to its illusions, that we need a few tricks if we are to see beyond it and experience another Reality. And one of those little tricks is this work in opposites. When we hold these two opposite constructs of the mind at the same time, we may be able to "see" beyond them to the simple awaring Presence that everything is. 

Everything is. It is not was or will be, it is. 


* vitarka - doubt, discussion, discursive thoughts, passions
   badhane - disturbance, harrassment, torment
   pratipaksha - the opposite
   bhavanam - should be thought of, pondered, state of mind

Opposites

Can you imagine hot without cold? Heavy without light? Night without day?

Opposites are everywhere, they are a natural part of the universe. But when we experience only one half of a pair of opposites we become stuck. As Rumi puts it:

Your hand opens and closes, and opens and closes.
If it were always a fist or always stretched open, you would be paralyzed.

When we find that we are becoming stuck, remembering to use the Law of Opposites, which is a tool of iRest®, can be magic.

Are you stuck on one side of the pair?

Perhaps in deep grief, or in anxiety or fear, or in despair.

Remembering the Law of Opposites, that there are always opposites, could you find a memory or image that could evoke an opposite.

It doesn't need to be an exact opposite, as that might be a step too far, too hard to make. You can imagine a spectrum full of alternatives, the true opposites might be at either end, but wherever you are stuck on the spectrum, there is an alternative available to you. Perhaps just "I am OK".

We are not denying our grief, or our fear or our despair, we are simply posing the alternative. The next thing we do is to move between them, fully experiencing each in turn.  Watch what happens as you do this. You are focussing on one, and then the other.

But then, could there be a moment when you experience them both at the same time.  The defocussing diffusion that can occur moves us to a completely different space or open spaciousness.