Upanishad Said
Witnessing of the Self
“Gargya then asked: ‘Master, when a man’s body sleeps, who is it within that sleeps, and who is awake, and who is dreaming? Who then experiences happiness, and with whom are all the sense organs united?’”(Prashna Upanishad 4:1)
Anyone who ponders the nature of consciousness comes to realize that there are three modes of experience: waking, dream, and dreamless sleep. All three of these states are experienced by a single witness who says: “I slept without dream,” “I slept and dreamed,” and “I am now awake.” Who is that witness? This is Gargya’s inquiry. Who is the unchanging witness of change? Who is the unseen seer? For no intelligent person of unclouded intellect can doubt the existence of such a one.
“‘As the rays of the sun, O Gargya, when he sets,’ replied the sage, ‘gather themselves up in his disk of light, to come out again when he rises, so the senses gather themselves up in the mind, the highest of them all. Therefore when a man does not hear, see, smell, taste, touch, speak, grasp, enjoy, we say that he sleeps. Only the Pranas are then awake in the body, and the mind is led nearer to the Self.’” (Prashna Upanishad 4:2-4)
Prana is the primal life-force or vital energy. The prana that manifests in the evolving universe also manifests in the evolving body of each human being. In the body there are five basic forms of prana:
1) Prana: the prana that moves upward;
2) Apana: The prana that moves downward, producing the excretory functions in general.
3) Vyana: The prana that holds prana and apana together and produces circulation in the body.
4) Samana: The prana that carries the grosser material of food to the apana and brings the subtler material to each limb; the general force of digestion.
5) Udana: The prana which brings up or carries down what has been drunk or eaten; the general force of assimilation.
The pranas also correspond to the five elements: earth (prithvi), water (apa), fire (tejas), air (vayu), and ether (akasha). One of these five elements is the foundation for one of the five senses: earth=smell, water=taste, fire=sight, air=touch, and ether=hearing/speech.
In the waking state all the pranas are quite active and fundamentally outflowing, even those that maintain the internal functions of the body being externalized through being expended in the fulfillment of their tasks. But in sleep they withdraw into the inner reservoirs of the body and the state of sleep occurs. On the subtlest energy level they withdraw into the manas, the energy field we call the mind. For the mind is the highest “sense,” being the sum and goal of them all. It is not amiss to say that the senses serve the mind–at least when the right order prevails. Otherwise they drag the mind helplessly along addicting and enslaving it. Breaking the web of this addiction-slavery is then impossible without the practice of pranayama–control and refinement of the pranas. For this reason all viable spiritual traditions have methods that involve breath–the most objective manifestation of prana– to some degree.
When the pranas withdraw into the mind, their distracting activities lessen–unless they occupy and overwhelm the mind with constant and vivid dreaming. When/If the mind is thus granted a reprieve from their clamor, it begins to sense what is behind it, just as it is behind the senses. The mind is the witness of the senses, but it is also witnessed. That ultimate witness is the Self. Therefore the upanishad says that in sleep “the mind is led nearer to the Self.”
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