Hypnotism And The Vedanta
1. Emerson says, “Call one’ a thief and he will steal.” In other words, make any kind of suggestion and you will see the corresponding result in action. This statement is true in some cases, but not universally. A suggestion can produce a direct effect in certain cases, but in other cases it may produce quite the contrary effect. Thus those who lay undue stress upon the direct applicability of suggestion are aware of half the truth only. According to the Vedanta, suggestions produce their effect in the same way as electricity does, viz., by induction and conduction. In those cases where our suggestion can directly touch the subject, the result is direct and homogeneous with the suggestion, but in cases where our suggestion cannot reach the patient directly, viz., the state where the reason of the patient has antipathy against the man who makes the suggestion, intervenes and does not allow the suggestion to come in direct touch with the causal body of the subject, the result produced is quite the contrary to the one intended. This is hypnotism by induction, the former being hypnotism by conduction.
2. The Causal Body is the subconscious storehouse of all the impressions and latent energies of man. All the actions, movements, behaviour and circumstances of man are simply the working out of the hidden material in the Causal Body, and the corresponding result is sure to follow. The causal body is the core of man, the very centre, the king, or you may call it, the subjective mind of man.
C – Causal Body.
B – Subtle Body
or Mentality and Reason.
A – Physical Body.
Any act done by the physical body is immediately transformed into mental energy or thought, and after dwelling for a time in the mental plane, which is re – presented by B in the annexed figure, passes on into the Causal Body, represented in the figure by C, and all those ideas that spontaneously appear in the mental plane B, without having come from the physical world, are simply the old stored – up energy of the Causal Body making its appearance on the lower plane B. Thus the relation between A, B, and C or the three bodies, is something like the relation between air, water, and aqueous vapour, or is analogous to the relation between the snows, the mountain stream and the same stream on the plains, in fact, a relation of continuity.
Supposing you see a sick man lying on the road; Instinctively you go up to help him, and when you are attending to his wants, you do not think anything about the deed, but you are doing everything you can to relieve the suffering man, all your senses and organs being in full activity. After you have finished your attentions to the man and your physical organs and senses are brought to rest, you will naturally see that the activity and energy which was at first working in the plane of the senses, the plane A, passes on into the plane B. In other words, your mind begins naturally to reflect upon the acts you have done and you are consciously dwelling upon the virtue or heroism of the deed. After a while this energy which operated on the plane B will be observed to be no longer there. Where has it gone? Has it disappeared? That could not be, because nothing is lost in nature. According to the Vedanta this energy has become invisible, and passed into the subconscious state C, the Causal Body, and it is the energy stored up in the Causal Body in such ways that will appear on the plane B in our dreams, or in our inner emotions, inner inclinations, tendencies and propensities. This explains the rationale of inclinations according to the Vedanta.
Experimental proof
Let the Causal Body of a man be reached directly or indirectly in his wakeful or hypnotized state. The inclination or tendency imparted there will manifest itself undoubtedly in due time. When a person is hypnotized, a post – hypnotic suggestion which requires him to do a particular thing at a particular time after waking up, will unfailingly bear fruit at the proper time in the shape of a strong inclination to do the deed, Thus, as in this act, which can directly be brought about by a suggestion entering the Causal Body, so in all the acts that a man does, the Vedanta points out the presence of previous suggestions having entered the Causal Body. Those suggestions may have been due to the hypnotism of the senses, to the hypnotism of inner impressions, or any form of hypnotism of which the whole world is made according to the Vedanta. Let the Caudal Body be instilled with the suggestion of health, and the physical body is bound to be healthy. Let the Causal Body be saturated with the suggestion of Godhead, and the man is bound to be a prophet. Let the Causal Body be imbued with the suggestions of slavery and weakness, and the physical body must be weak and slavish. A man is the architect of his own product, inasmuch as it is his own Causal Body that is responsible for all his environment.
3. As in a somnambulistic or hypnotic state, a man sees a lake where there is no lake for others, he sees a fish – pond where for others there is none, and he sees things which never existed for others; all these phenomena are sustained and borne out by his own Self. Similarly according to the Vedanta, all the world seen by a man is purely and simply sustained by his own Self, the difference between the worldly and somnambulistic phenomena being that the latter are comparatively short – lived and of less duration. It is just like a man being put in a hypnotic state and being forgotten to be dehypnotized. All the people in the world are thrown into a queer hypnotism of the world and they will take a long, long time to be dehypnotized till there comes a free man of God – Consciousness, and he dehypnotizes them to their Real Godhead and they wake up. That which is substantial and which underlies all the phenomena must be the reality, and all that which is imposed upon it must be the hypnotic phenomena. Now the substratum of the Causal Body remaining the same under all states, the state of hypnotism, the state of wakefulness, the state of dreaming and deep sleep etc. is the Real Self or one Reality. Everything else is imposed upon it and is a hypnotic phenomenon. Self – Realization means to get rid of the helplessness, the hypnotism and merge the phenomena into this final reality. Through the suggestion of mother and father borne out by the suggestion of the senses, was the hypnotic sleep of the world brought on and through the counter suggestion in the right way it is shaken off.
Why did the Real Self start wrong?
This why and wherefore and all anxiety are a part and result of hypnotism; they are the children and subjects of the Real Cause. To put this question means the hope of mastering the cause through the effect, to place the child before the father, to put the cart before the horse. This whying tendency and this querying inclination and all this questioning propensity is a part or manifestation of the inductive hypnotic state. In the dehypnotized state none of these is present. In the real original state none of this is present, no questions are possible. All this chain of causation is an unending spiral drawn upon a piece of paper. This chain of causation will never stop, will go on winding round and round, but the one Reality is like the piece of paper supporting all these convolutions and revolutions. That is beyond the chain. Thus to try to put the questions, 1 why and wherefore etc.,’ is like making the paper this end or that end of the spiral, as if the paper was not present in all the convolutions, involutions and revolutions of the spiral. So Rama’s command to the whole world is not to think yourself to be involved in the chain, or in the spiral, or in the coils of the snake. Feel, feel and realize yourself to be the controller, governor and master of the coils of the snake, and you are sure to be above causation. Verily, verily. OM!