Mind Journey

Mind Journey

Mind journey is a part of this blog devoted to issues such as Cosmic Awareness, channeling cosmic awareness via such methods such as natural herbs, other plants used by shamans throughout the centuries etc. A page devoted to exploring the possibility of the theory where certain entities may or can exist in more than one reality.  At this page you will find personal accounts from people who ventured deeper into the human psyche and had found a “deeper” awareness of the universe around them…an awareness not found throughout everyday life as we generally know it.

This page will be containing issues that are not entirely supported by the webmaster, but are here for the pure purpose of exploring the human mind in hopes of uncovering the hidden mysteries that are core to the human beaing and our very origins itself!

If you have any experiences you want to share for this part of the site, you are always welcome to contribute.

What is Cosmic Awareness?

Cosmic Awareness is the force that expressed Itself
through Edgar Cayce, Christ, the Buddha, Krisna, Mohammed,
and other great Avatars who served as “channels” for the
“Heavenly Father” (our Father/Mother God),
and who speaks again today as the world begins to enter
the New Age of spiritual consciousness and awareness.

*It is the universal vibrations and the movement of planets, the movement of the sun in its sojourn through its orbit, through its orbit around Sirius in the Orion constellation and the variation that it meets in its movement that determines the Earth ages of approximately 2200 years each, and it is this movement into these new vibrations that trigger certain frequency reactions among the planets of the solar system so that the vibrations are altered on Earth and on the other planets in such a manner that it changes the consciousness of individuals on earth. It is this that is causing and bringing about the New Age. Awareness tells you not to believe anything, but to question, explore, doubt and discover for yourself what is the truth. Cosmic Awareness only indicates and suggests.

This Awareness has been known by many names throughout eternity, throughout many cultures on various planets and on this planet of yours. This Awareness indicates that these names varied according to the language, according to the ability of entities to conceive of that which is infinite.

This Awareness indicates that entities upon this plane have referred to this Awareness by various names as God, as Brahmin, and as other names unknown in present time. This Awareness indicates that It has spoken through many prophets through many ages, and religions have formed around these prophets.

This Awareness indicates It has spoken through musicians, through artists, through those inventors, and those great architects-through all entities upon this plane, this Awareness has moved.

This Awareness indicates that It comes again with Its name being that which cannot be mistaken, cannot be personified, but to allow entities the realization that that which is God, that which is Brahmin, that which is of Divine energy is that which is their own awareness. This Awareness indicates that all entities have a direct pipeline to the source of all life. That each of you is capable of being a channel, of being in tune with the infinite. This Awareness wishes that whatever name you choose to use for describing the spiritual energies, that you remember always that you are a channel for this energy.

This Awareness wishes you to understand that each of you is within the arms of this Awareness. That each of you is within the body of a living universe. That there is nothing in the universe which is dead, or which ever dies-that everything lives eternally. This Awareness indicates that everything also changes.

This Awareness wishes to inform entities upon this plane, that the universe appears and disappears every four-quadrillionth of a second. That within this brief moment, there is that which entities perceive and experience. That each of these four-quadrillionth of a second intervals contains within itself the eternal now. That entities is moving from one macro-moment to another, carry with them that which they choose to carry from one universal moment to the next. This Awareness indicates that wherein you carry that which is sorrow, carry that which is depressing; wherein you carry that which is fear–that your next moment shall carry with it the fear, depression, and sorrow which could have been left behind in your previous moment.

This Awareness asks entities upon this plane to think in new ways, to begin to look in new directions, to begin to explore within themselves those areas of the psychic sea, to move beyond the third dimensional thinking into the fourth dimensional ecstasy. This Awareness indicates that energies of ecstasy are pouring in upon this planet at this time. That those who can experience those energies shall rise, shall find health, vitality and joy. That those who cannot see those energies, but who continue dwelling in old patterns of thought, in patterns of fear, insecurity, greed and selfishness–these entities shall be missing out on much of the joy and beauty which shall begin on this planet to make itself present.

This Awareness suggests that entities begin to look deeply into the eyes of one another–beyond the faces, beyond the clothing, beyond the shape of eyes and colors of skins, beyond the language barriers, beyond beliefs and attitudes–but that they look deeply into the eyes of one another to communicate with the soul, with the God which resides behind each mask. This Awareness indicates that every human face is every other human face, and all entities are one within the body of this Awareness.

Cosmic mind journeys and actual readers experiences

Have an experience you want to share? Send it in and it will appear in the readers experiences section of this page.

A contribution from a friend of mine, Phillip:

A personal journey by Phillip

Posted 4/6/2011

Preface
My terror/fascination with ET started when I was 9 years old after FOX
aired footage of supposed Roswell alien dissections.   Over the course
of the next few months I checked out every single UFO book the library
had to offer.  I was afraid to take out the trash alone at night or
sleep near my window for fear that I’d be abducted.   Little did I
know that years later I’d have actual encounters of my own.

My experiences involve 2 different types of beings – the greys and a
slightly cartoonish reptilian variety.
I like to think that the greys are actually an archetype of sorts (a
universally-accesible aspect of the collective unconscious).  I say
they are an archetype because I’ve also had very vivid visions of the
goddess shiva before I really even knew anything about her.    I
cannot really explain the reptilian ones.

Experience 1
February 26, 2009  (day after fat tuesday)
Location: Home bedroom, Mobile, AL

This was the first time I tried oral DMT / ayahuasca (though not the
traditional recipe).     Basically,  I had a drug-induced, full-blown
mystical experience.  My crown chakra and 3rd eye were forced wide
open and a bright pillar of the brightest, purest white light I’ve
ever seen blasted out of my forehead.   After violent vomiting, womb
flashbacks, visions of my dead grandmother and experiencing the
concept of eternity and cosmic consciousness, there came a buzzing
sound.  It wasn’t coming from my ears, but the air itself and all of
my cells buzzed.   Lying on the floor, staring into the ceiling, i
began to see the head of a grey come into view.  No words were said
but  there was this telepathic feeling that it acknowledged my
presence.   It had a blank stare but its presence felt ominous and
slightly threatening.   I became more terrified as it got clearer into
focus.   I was able to shift my attention onto something else and it
vanished.

There weren’t any distinct changes brought about by this alien
experience.   the ayahuasca session on the whole gave me a much more
hopeful outlook on life as well as newfound energetic awareness of
reality beyond the mundane and ordinary.

Experience 2
Fall 2009
Location: Home bedroom, Mobile , AL

On a whim one night I ate a few small psilocybin mushrooms I had saved
for a rainy day.   I quickly realized it was a mistake and that I was
tired so I drifted off to sleep.   At some point I awoke to a phone
call from my girlfriend.   i was only semi-aware of what had just
happened, so I managed to hold a quick conversation with her and tell
her what I had been up to that night.  After hanging up I realized
what actually just happened.   I had been on this multi-colored
(primarily pink) holographic plane of sorts.  I was having a 1-on-1
conversation with a grey alien.  It had a body this time.  I remember
its head moving and gesturing.   I don’t remember at all what was
said.  I know that I sped away from it like a lens zooming out upon
awakening.   I felt like we had a constructive conversation and there
was no sense of fear.

This experience left me slightly confused about what sort of realm I
was opening up.  It was unexplainable and beautiful..  I was only left
with lots of unanswered questions.

Experience 3
Early 2010
Location: Girlfriend’s living room, Mobile, AL

By this point I had obtained more DMT and been smoking it often.   I
brought it over to my girlfriends’ for one of her friends to try.
Beforehand, she asked if I was going to smoke it too.  It wasn’t my
intention but I figured it would make her feel more comfortable.    I
smoked it on the couch and quickly realized it was too much.
Projected there on the wall was a vivid grey head with an animated
spiraling double helix below it.     It went beyond words but a very
clear telepathic message told me “i am consciousness”.      The girls
didn’t have any idea what had just happened.  I had to walk outside
and be alone for a moment.

Another extremely confusing experience but this at least helped me
piece together that the alien realm had something to do with DNA and
life itself.

All my friend saw when she smoked were swirling colors and breathing
fur on the couch.

Experience 4
12/9/ 2009
Location: Friend’s apartment, Mobile, AL

I prepared some very strong ayahuasca with the intent of holding a
gathering of consciousness exploration at my friend’s apartment.  3
friends and I drank the brew in a very non-traditional ceremony.    I
didn’t really realize how strong I had made it.   Within an hour we
were projectile vomiting, having spirit visions, crying, and curling
up on the floor.   Lots of visions happened that night.  I awoke to
full-on planetary consciousness and had visions of mass spiritual
awakenings.  At some point during all the chaos I saw aliens.   These
beings were presented to me in almost a family portrait style.  It was
a family of 3 and they were adorned in clothing of sorts.  Their faces
were almost frog-like.   The telepathic feeling and message was
benevolent and went along the lines of “we are home.  we are
conscious”       There was a roaring resonant noise that i still
remember and associate it with their home planet.

This chaotic event started making me question if my soul was in fact
of alien origin.   The vision was so incredibly vivid and life-like.
At the same time it made me feel incredibly organic and of this earth.
All in all a balance of being earthly and cosmic at the same time.
One in the same.

Experience 5
May 27, 2010
Location: My house

This was a special day on the NewAge interpretation of the Mayan
Calendar.   Referred to as the 2nd harmonic convergence,  the
planetary alignments on this day were as such that they formed a
perfect harmonic resonance to Dec 21, 2012.    Coincidentally (or not)
it was that fateful tense night when America had all of its attention
glued to the TV watching robots try to plug up one of the greatest
environmental catastrophes of their time and also begin to seriously
question their mortality.
I hastily made some weak ayahuasca with the intent of meditating that
night.   I lost focus and got the message that I needed to be out with
friends and live the dream.  There were no profound visions.   I went
to a concert and returned a few hours later and decided to try
something else.  I took 3 hits of really strong, pure LSD I recently
purchased.
I believe that the cosmic alignments and drug combinations sensitized
my consciousness on an extreme scale.   Basically I felt the planet
receiving a strong cosmic energy.  It felt incredibly alien, but
wasn’t taking on any physical form.   It had a distinct buzzing
vibration that surged through my own body.
This lasted for several minutes and got so intense that I started
looking out my window expecting to see a ufo beaming down any moment.
I felt like a complete loon.
Finally aliens did begin materializing into my physical reality in a
circle around me.  they had the classic tiny bodies and large heads.
There were no faces however, only shadow.     I panicked and began
chanting “you are me, you are me, we are one”.   This made them
disappear.

Recollecting back on this experience, I believe I may have caught a
glimpse of queztacoatl.   (in the form of that strong energy)    One
interpretation I read of the feathered serpent stated that it is
symbolic of ascending consciousness.   The serpent being DNA or mortal
man and feathers being flight / ascension.    This pretty much
solidified my belief in alien consciousness.

More recently I’ve been able to channel this grey alien head into my
vision (superimposed in my visual field as a 3d eye visualization
rather than strictly from my eyes.  i.e. it was still there if I
closed my eyes)

this involves no drug usage.   For example I was meditating in the
shower thinking about the oversoul and I began to see this form of a
grey head outline.  the stronger it got, the closer it became until I
felt like I was looking out of its 2 large grey eyes.

these greys never have the bulgy eyes like you sometimes see in
pictures.  they’re just hollow almond black holes.

Terence Mckenna himself stated that alien abductions are probably just
a coverup for the real truth which is something we cannot fathom.
Despite this, he claims he was abducted by a saucer in the late 70s in
the Amazon after several days of ayahuasca and psilocybin mushroom
sessions.

Comedian Bill Hicks has an abduction story from the 1st Harmonic
Convergence of 1987.  His also involved psilocybin mushrooms.  Both of
them spoke so fondly of this experience as something beautiful.

The Consciousness of the World

MYSTICS, SEERS AND PSYCHICS have been telling us for a long time now that we are all connected. The consciousness of all people connect and interact with each other in a very real way on a fundamental level. Some believe this applies not just to people, but to all living things – perhaps even to inanimate objects. For just as long, most scientists have dismissed this notion as fantasy, wishful thinking or outright kookiness.

Yet people throughout the ages and around the world have experienced this psychic connection. We’ve all heard the stories:

* Identical twins who can sense when each other is in trouble or injured, even to the point of physically feeling the other’s pain. Similar connections have been documented between parent and child, husband and wife, even close friends.
* A person awakes from a disturbing dream of a specific calamity that minutes later plays out in real life on the television news.
* A mysterious but audible voice tells a commuter to take a different train than she always takes. It is advice that saves her from injury or death in a train accident.
* A dog, separated from its owners while on a trip, somehow finds its way across hundreds of miles to again find his family.

The list of such things could go on and on, and they seem not to be bound by distance or time. And whether the skeptics accept them or not, they happen all the time. These events and other everyday miracles are evidence that we are all connected and, in turn, connected to a greater consciousness that at present is beyond our understanding.

The skeptics can dismiss them as coincidences, luck (whatever that means), or misinterpreted experiences. But those who have experienced these wonders know differently. They know there is something greater to this existence than the clinical studies of many scientific labs can explain.

Science is catching up

I say “many scientific labs” because there are a few labs that are examining the ideas of so-called psychic powers and global consciousness. And many are housed in our most prestigious learning institutions.

What psychics and mystics have always known, science is beginning to understand: that we are all made up of energetic vibrations, and that the energy of any individual can communicate and interact with the energy of others and of the universe itself. This is a powerful idea, and I’m convinced that it is true.

How else can we explain the experiences mentioned above and the many thousands of similar and more remarkable experiences that take place every day, and have taken place daily throughout the world since the beginning of recorded history. This can include all manner of psychic phenomena, divination, ghost phenomena and more.

More important, perhaps, it can explain the work that has been conducted at the Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research program for decades now. Led by physicist Robert Jahn, the program has time and again shown that the human mind can remotely influence the workings of machines.

It can explain how agencies of the U.S. government were able to institute a successful program of remote viewing, a highly disciplined form of psychic “seeing” that transcends space and time.

It can explain the Global Consciousness Project (also known as the EGG Project) – a global network of random number generators that seem to go haywire during and even in anticipation of significant worldwide events:

* On September 11, 2001, the EGGs spiked remarkably four hours before the planes struck the World Trade Center towers, as if the global consciousness sensed it was going to happen.
* On September 6, 1997, there were large deviations in the number generators. It was the day that close to a billion people globally tuned into the funeral of Princess Diana.
* The EGGs regularly react to New Years Eve celebrations.

There are many other examples.

You can even keep an eye on the pulse or mind of the globe online. The Global Consciousness Project now has a real-time display that shows in graphical form how its EGG network is reacting. It even has a pulse-like sound and pings and clangs when there are spikes. Just go to the The GCP Basket Observer section of the Project’s website. It is a Java applet, so you will need to have Java installed on your computer, and there is actually a 10-minute delay is what is happening and what you are seeing.

But what you are seeing just could be nothing less than a representation of the consciousness of our world.

The Upanishads

Supreme Work of the Hindu Mind

New post for 5/25/2011

The Upanishads form the core of Indian philosophy. They are an amazing collection of writings from original oral transmissions, which have been aptly described by Shri Aurobindo as “the supreme work of the Indian mind”. It is here that we find all the fundamental teachings that are central to Hinduism — the concepts of ‘karma‘ (action), ‘samsara‘ (reincarnation), ‘moksha‘ (nirvana), the ‘atman‘ (soul), and the ‘Brahman’ (Absolute Almighty). They also set forth the prime Vedic doctrines of self-realization, yoga and meditation. The Upanishads are summits of thought on mankind and the universe, designed to push human ideas to their very limit and beyond. They give us both spiritual vision and philosophical argument, and it is by a strictly personal effort that one can reach the truth.

Meaning of ‘Upanishad’

The term ‘Upanishad’ literally means, “sitting down near” or “sitting close to”, and implies listening closely to the mystic doctrines of a guruor a spiritual teacher, who has cognized the fundamental truths of the universe. It points to a period in time when groups of pupils sat near the teacher and learnt from him the secret teachings in the quietude of forest ‘ashrams’ or hermitages. In another sense of the term, ‘Upanishad’ means ‘brahma-knowledge’ by which ignorance is annihilated. Some other possible meanings of the compound word ‘Upanishad’ are “placing side by side” (equivalence or correlation), a “near approach” (to the Absolute Being), “secret wisdom” or even “sitting near the enlightened”.

Time of Composition

Historians and Indologists have put the date of composition of the Upanishads from around 800 – 400 B.C., though many of the verse versions may have been written much later. In fact, they were written over a very long period of time and do not represent a coherent body of information or one particular system of belief. However, there is a commonality of thought and approach.

The Main Books

Although there are more than 200 Upanishads, only thirteen have been identified out as presenting the core teachings. They are the Chandogya, Kena, Aitareya, Kaushitaki, Katha, Mundaka, Taittriyaka, Brihadaranyaka, Svetasvatara, Isa, Prasna, Mandukya and the Maitri Upanishads. One of the oldest and longest of the Upanishads, the Brihadaranyaka says:

“From the unreal lead me to the real!
From darkness lead me to light!
From death lead me to immortality!”

The crux of the Upanishads is that this can be achieved by meditating with the awareness that one’s soul (‘atman’) is one with all things, and that ‘one’ is ‘Brahman’, which becomes the ‘all’.

Who wrote the Upanishads?

The authors of the Upanishads were many, but they were not solely from the priestly caste. They were poets prone to flashes of spiritual wisdom, and their aim was to guide a few chosen pupils to the point of liberation, which they themselves had attained. According to some scholars, the main figure in the Upanishads is Yajnavalkya, the great sage who propounded the doctrine of ‘neti-neti’, the view that “truth can be found only through the negation of all thoughts about it”. Other important Upanishadic sages are Uddalaka Aruni, Shwetaketu, Shandilya, Aitareya, Pippalada, Sanat Kumara. Many earlier Vedic teachers like Manu, Brihaspati, Ayasya and Narada are also found in the Upanishads.

The human being is the central mystery of the universe holding the key to all other mysteries. Indeed, human beings are our own greatest enigma. As the famous physicist Niels Bohr once said, “We are both spectators and actors in the great drama of existence.” Hence the importance of developing of what is known as the “science of human possibilities.” It was such a science that India sought and found in the Upanishads in an attempt to unravel the mystery of human beings.

Science of the Self

Today, we see a growing urge in everyone to realize the ‘true self’. We are keenly feeling the need to make our knowledge flower into wisdom. A strange yearning to know about the infinite and the eternal disturbs us. It is against this background of modern thought and aspirations that the contributions of the Upanishads to the human cultural legacy become significant.

The purpose of the Vedas was to ensure the true welfare of all beings, worldly as well as spiritually. Before such a synthesis could be achieved, there was a need to penetrate the inner worlds to its depth. This is what the Upanishads did with precision and gave us the science of the self, which helps man leave behind the body, the senses, the ego and all other non-self elements, which are perishable. The Upanishads tell us the great saga of this discovery — of the divine in the heart of man.

The Inside Story!

Very early in the development of the Indian civilization, man became aware of a strange new field of human experience — the within of nature as revealed in man, and in his consciousness and his ego. It gathered volume and power as years rolled on until in the Upanishads it became a deluge issuing in a systematic, objective and scientific pursuit of truth in the depth of experience. It conveys to us an impression of the tremendous fascination that this new field of inquiry held for the contemporary mind.

These Indian thinkers were not satisfied with their intellectual speculations. They discovered that the universe remained a mystery and the mystery only deepened with the advance of such knowledge, and one of the important components of that deepening mystery is the mystery of man himself. The Upanishads became aware of this truth, which modern science now emphasizes.

In the Upanishads we get a glimpse into the workings of the minds of the great Indian thinkers who were unhampered by the tyranny of religious dogma, political authority, pressure of public opinion, seeking truth with single-minded devotion, rare in the history of thought. As Max Muller has pointed out, “None of our philosophers, not accepting Heraclitus, Plato, Kant, or Hegel has ventured to erect such a spire, never frightened by storm or lightnings.”

Bertrand Russell rightly said: “Unless men increase in wisdom as much as in knowledge, increase in knowledge will be increase in sorrow.” While the Greeks and the others specialized in the subject of man in society, India specialized in man in depth, man as the individual, as Swami Ranganathananda puts it. This was one ruling passion of the Indo-Aryans in the Upanishads. The great sages of the Upanishads were concerned with man above and beyond his political or social dimensions. It was an inquiry, which challenged not only life but also death and resulted in the discovery of the immortal and the divine self of man.

Shaping the Indian Culture

The Upanishads gave a permanent orientation to Indian culture by their emphasis on inner penetration and their wholehearted advocacy of what the Greeks later formulated in the dictum “man, know thyself.” All subsequent developments of Indian culture were powerfully conditioned by this Upanishadic legacy.

The Upanishads reveal an age characterized by a remarkable fervent of thought and inspiration. The physical and mental climate that made it possible is the land of plenty that was India. The entire social milieu of the Indo-Aryans was ripe with great potentialities. They had found leisure to think and ask questions. They had the choice to utilize the leisure either to conquer the outer world or the inner. With their mental gifts, they had turned their mental energies to the conquest of the inner world rather than of the world of matter and life at the sensate level.

Universal & Impersonal

The Upanishads have given us a body of insights that have a universal quality about them and this universality derives from their impersonality. The sages who discovered them had depersonalized themselves in the search for truth. They wanted to go beyond nature and realize the transcendental nature of man. They dared to take up this challenge and the Upanishads are the unique record of the methods they adopted, the struggles they undertook and the victory they achieved in this astonishing adventure of human spirit. And this is conveyed to us in passages of great power and poetic charm. In seeking the immortal, the sages conferred the immortality upon the literature that conveyed it.

The Principal Upanishads

Chandogya, Kena, Aitareya, Kaushitaki, Katha, Mundaka & Taittiriya Upanishads

In the Upanishadswe can study the graceful conflict of thought with thought, the emergence of more satisfactory thought and the rejection of inadequate ideas. Hypotheses were advanced and rejected on the touchstone of experience and not at the dictate of a creed. Thus thought forged ahead to unravel the mystery of the world in which we live. Let’s have a quick look at the 13 principal Upanishads:

Chandogya Upanishad

The Chandogya Upanishad is the Upanishad that belongs to the followers of the Sama Veda. It is actually the last eight chapters of the ten-chapter Chandogya Brahmana, and it emphasizes the importance of chanting the sacred Aum, and recommends a religious life, which constitutes sacrifice, austerity, charity, and the study of the Vedas, while living in the house of a guru. This Upanishad contains the doctrine of reincarnation as an ethical consequence of karma. It also lists and explains the value of human attributes like speech, will, thought, meditation, understanding, strength memory and hope.

Read the full text of the Chandogya Upanishad

Kena Upanishad

The Kena Upanishad derives its name from the word ‘Kena’, meaning ‘by whom’. It has four sections, the first two in verse and the other two in prose. The metrical portion deals with the Supreme Unqualified Brahman, the absolute principle underlying the world of phenomenon, and the prose part deals with the Supreme as God, ‘Isvara’. The Kena Upanishad concludes, as Sandersen Beck puts it, that austerity, restraint, and work are the foundation of the mystical doctrine; the Vedas are its limbs, and truth is its home. The one who knows it strikes off evil and becomes established in the most excellent, infinite, heavenly world.

Read the full text of the Kena Upanishad

Aitareya Upanishad

The Aitareya Upanishad belongs to the Rig Veda. It is the purpose of this Upanishad to lead the mind of the sacrificer away from the outer ceremonial to its inner meaning. It deals with the genesis of the universe and the creation of life, the senses, the organs and the organisms. It also tries to delve into the identity of the intelligence that allows us to see, speak, smell, hear and know.

Read the full text of the Aitareya Upanishad

Kaushitaki Upanishad

The Kaushitaki Upanishad explores the question whether there is an end to the cycle of reincarnation, and upholds the supremacy of the soul (‘atman’), which is ultimately responsible for everything it experiences.

Read the full text of the Kaushitaki Upanishad

Katha Upanishad

Katha Upanishad, which belongs to the Yajur Veda, consists of two chapters, each of which has three sections. It employs an ancient story from the Rig Veda about a father who gives his son to death (Yama), while bringing out some of the highest teachings of mystical spirituality. There are some passages common to the Gitaand Katha Upanishad. Psychology is explained here by using the analogy of a chariot. The soul is the lord of the chariot, which is the body; the intuition is the chariot-driver, the mind the reins, the senses the horses, and the objects of the senses the paths. Those whose minds are undisciplined never reach their goal, and go on to reincarnate. The wise and the disciplined, it says, obtain their goal and are freed from the cycle of rebirth.

Read the full text of the Katha Upanishad

Mundaka Upanishad

The Mundaka Upanishad belongs to the Atharva Veda and has three chapters, each of which has two sections. The name is derived from the root ‘mund’ (to shave) as he that comprehends the teaching of the Upanishad is shaved or liberated from error and ignorance. The Upanishad clearly states the distinction between the higher knowledge of the Supreme Brahman and the lower knowledge of the empirical world — the six ‘Vedangas’ of phonetics, ritual, grammar, definition, metrics, and astrology. It is by this higher wisdom and not by sacrifices or worship, which are here considered ‘unsafe boats’, that one can reach the Brahman. Like the Katha, the Mundaka Upanishad warns against “the ignorance of thinking oneself learned and going around deluded like the blind leading the blind”. Only an ascetic (‘sanyasi’) who has given up everything can obtain the highest knowledge.

Read the full text of the Mundaka Upanishad

Taittiriya Upanishad

The Taittiriya Upanishad is also part of the Yajur Veda. It is divided into three sections: The first deals with the science of phonetics and pronunciation, the second and the third deal with the knowledge of the Supreme Self (‘Paramatmajnana’). Once again, here, Aumis emphasized as peace of the soul, and the prayers end with Aum and the chanting of peace (‘Shanti’) thrice, often preceded by the thought, “May we never hate.” There is a debate regarding the relative importance of seeking the truth, going through austerity and studying the Vedas. One teacher says truth is first, another austerity, and a third claims that study and teaching of the Veda is first, because it includes austerity and discipline. Finally, it says that the highest goal is to know the Brahman, for that is truth.

Read the full text of the Taittiriya Upanishad

The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, Svetasvatara Upanishad, Isavasya Upanishad, Prashna Upanishad, Mandukya Upanishad and the Maitri Upanishad are the other important and well known books of the Upanishads.

Brihadaranyaka Upanishad

The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, which is generally recognized to be the most important of the Upanishads, consists of three sections (‘Kandas’), the Madhu Kanda which expounds the teachings of the basic identity of the individual and the Universal Self, the Muni Kanda which provides the philosophical justification of the teaching and the Khila Kanda, which deals with certain modes of worship and meditation, (‘upasana’), hearing the ‘upadesha’ or the teaching (‘sravana’), logical reflection (‘manana’), and contemplative meditation (‘nididhyasana’).

TS Eliot‘s landmark work The Waste Land ends with the reiteration of the three cardinal virtues from this Upanishad: ‘Damyata’ (restraint), ‘Datta’ (charity) and ‘Dayadhvam’ (compassion) followed by the blessing ‘Shantih shantih shantih’, that Eliot himself translated as “the peace that passeth understanding.”

Read the full text of the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad

Svetasvatara Upanishad

The Svetasvatara Upanishad derives its name from the sage who taught it. It is theistic in character and identifies the Supreme Brahman with Rudra (Shiva) who is conceived as the author of the world, its protector and guide. The emphasis is not on Brahman the Absolute, whose complete perfection does not admit of any change or evolution, but on the personal ‘Isvara’, omniscient and omnipotent who is the manifested Brahma. This Upanishad teaches the unity of the souls and world in the one Supreme Reality. It is an attempt to reconcile the different philosophical and religious views, which prevailed at the time of its composition.

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Isavasya Upanishad

The Isavasya Upanishad derives its name from the opening word of the text ‘Isavasya’ or ‘Isa’, meaning ‘Lord’ that encloses all that moves in the world. Greatly revered, this short Upanishad is often put at the beginning of the Upanishads, and marks the trend toward monotheism in the Upanishads. Its main purpose is to teach the essential unity of God and the world, being and becoming. It is interested not so much in the Absolute in itself (‘Parabrahman’) as in the Absolute in relation to the world (‘Paramesvara’). It says that renouncing the world and not coveting the possessions of others can bring joy. The Isha Upanishad concludes with a prayer to Surya (sun) and Agni (fire).

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Prasna Upanishad

The Prashna Upanishad belongs to the Atharva Veda and has six sections dealing with six questions or ‘Prashna’ put to a sage by his disciples. The questions are: From where are all the creatures born? How many angels support and illumine a creature and which is supreme? What is the relationship between the life-breath and the soul? What are sleep, waking, and dreams? What is the result of meditating on the word Aum? What are the sixteen parts of the Spirit? This Upanishad answers all these six vital questions.

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Mandukya Upanishad

The Mandukya Upanishad belongs to the Atharva Veda and is an exposition of the principle of Aum as consisting of three elements, a, u, m, which may be used to experience the soul itself. It contains twelve verses that delineate four levels of consciousness: waking, dreaming, deep sleep, and a fourth mystical state of being one with the soul. This Upanishad by itself, it is said, is enough to lead one to liberation.

Maitri Upanishad

The Maitri Upanishad is the last of what are known as the principal Upanishads. It recommends meditation upon the soul (‘atman’) and life (‘prana’). It says that the body is like a chariot without intelligence but it is driven by an intelligent being, who is pure, tranquil, breathless, selfless, undying, unborn, steadfast, independent and endless. The charioteer is the mind, the reins are the five organs of perception, the horses are the organs of action, and the soul is unmanifest, imperceptible, incomprehensible, selfless, steadfast, stainless and self-abiding. It also tells the story of a king, Brihadratha, who realized that his body is not eternal, and went into the forest to practice austerity, and sought liberation from reincarnating existence.

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