One of the most amazing things you discover is a radical change in how you see the world around you – nothing provokes you any longer. This is one of the greatest rewards of right meditation – a state of no provocation. People, their statements, their responses, your own thoughts, reactions, emotions and desires – none of it will be able to provoke you.
You become spontaneous like a child but you never lose your mindfulness. It sounds paradoxical but only when you go through the four stages of mental quietude, you will know what I mean.
Imagine you live in a metropolitan city and you have taken a sabbatical to spend some time in peace in a far off location – in a small, quiet, countryside town close to a seashore. Your journey involves a long drive and your goal is to get away from the hustle-bustle of the city life to the peaceful seaside. That calm seaside is the ultimate stage of meditation – infinite, expansive, oceanic. However, before you settle in such state and beyond, you will invariably go through the following four stages:
Constant Activity – The Motorway
This is the first stage. Mind is always talking and most people remain unaware. When they want the mind to be quiet, like before sleeping or when they are depressed, and it does not shut up, that is when they realize how talkative mind is. There is constant activity going on in the mind. During this stage, when a meditator sits down to meditate, his mind does not quieten beyond sporadic short periods lasting no more than a few seconds. All that the meditator hears is chatter. The more he tries to quiet the mind, the louder it becomes. Thoughts from everywhere continue their onslaught, discouraging the practitioner. At the end of their 30-minute long session, they get up more drained and tired. Some mistake it for relaxation but in reality it is no more than a short nap.
In a way, this is one of the most critical stages. Those who do not work with great vigilance in this stage, end up becoming average meditators. They may increase their meditation from thirty minutes to two hours but it will be no different. It will not yield greater results. Earlier they were doing 30 minutes of bad meditation and now they are doing two hours of it. That’s the only difference. It is like having a bad cook. He may cook one dish or fifty, if his culinary skills aren’t great, and he’s doing nothing to improve his situation, he will continue to cook tasteless food. Something’s got to change.
The first stage of mental stillness is like the traffic on a major highway. Traffic is always flowing in both directions. The meditator is on the highway of thoughts. When you are on a highway, you have no control over the traffic around you. There are multiple lanes, there will be cars in front, in the left lane, in the right lane, behind you. Some are going slower than you, many are going faster than you, others are at the same pace as you. There is traffic flowing in your direction and in the opposite direction. People are not honking so nothing abruptly disrupts your cruise mode or distracts you, but you are aware of the traffic around you and you know this is normal on the freeway. You have to drive carefully, you cannot afford any mistakes while changing lanes. A meditator in the first stage has no control on the flow of thoughts. They are on a motorway and it is the peak hour. The only thing you can do is drive with utmost caution and eventually you will get off the freeway.
Everyone, absolutely every single meditator goes through this stage. No matter if you are an introvert, extrovert, outspoken, the silent type, a believer, non-believer, a socialite or a saint, regardless of how well versed you are in the scriptures and yogic texts, if you are getting into the practice of meditation, you will go through this stage. The good news is if you persist, you will jump across it. Eventually the motorway will give way to the suburban road, the second stage of mental stillness.
Frequent Activity – Suburban Road
I have met hundreds of meditators. One on one. Most of them never cross the first stage. They never get off the motorway. The rush hour of thoughts and the restlessness of the mind stays constant in them. However, those who persist attentively and patiently, soon reach the second stage.
In this stage, the flow of thoughts is frequent but not constant. A meditator experiences easiness and many quiet stints lasting several moments where they get a glimpse of a mind free from thoughts – a no-mind state, a heightened state of consciousness. Your ability to meditate for longer period increases by a few minutes. If in stage one, you could meditate for 30 minutes, now you can meditate for 45 minutes. Most people are unable to maintain their concentration beyond a few seconds. While stage one is like the busy switchboard in a large corporate, where the receptionist barely finishes putting through one caller and the other one is already on the line, the second stage is more like the individual desk of a public relations person. He or she will be attending calls several times a day but it won’t be as busy as the main switchboard.
In this stage, thoughts continue to knock on the doors of a meditator throughout their session. But with mindfulness and alertness, you develop greater immunity and awareness. You learn to decide when to let your thoughts into your headspace. It may sound strange but it works every time: when your thoughts know that you won’t be opening the door for them, they stop knocking and leave you in peace.
Think of this stage as driving on a suburban road. The thoughts in your mind are no longer traveling in 16 lanes in both the directions. The speed has come down by half. There is still a degree of constancy to them, they haven’t come to a halt yet nor have they disappeared. Your thoughts are travelling at a slower speed now. The traffic is more manageable. Your attentiveness increases noticeably as you get to this stage.
The unique aspect of this stage is its irreversibility.
It means once you attain mental quietude beyond the frequent activity of stage one and once you go past this stage, your meditation goes to an entirely new level and there is no going back. It is like milk has become butter now and no process can turn it back into milk. After you have crossed this stage, you will no longer have to deal with an onslaught of thoughts regardless of when you sit down to meditate.
Occasional Activity – The Countryside Road
On your journey so far, you’ve come off the freeway and you have driven through a suburban road. Now, you’ve hit the countryside road, the third stage of mental stillness.
Just like effusive rivers rush into the sea but the sea remains unmoved, the mind of a yogi remains unaffected by the rise and fall of thoughts and emotions. Sea is not always calm, it has tides and it can get tempestuous, but such choppiness is not an everyday affair. A meditator in the third stage can have rough periods but they are far and few in between.
From my experience, less than half a percent of meditators get to the third stage of mental stillness. This is not because they are not earnest about it but because wrong meditation does not lead to improvement. When a meditator has gone past the first two stages, they develop an unfailing stillness of mind that reflects through their actions, thoughts and speech. The energy of a stage three meditator has a quieting effect on those around him.
The third stage is the countryside road. You can drive for several miles before you come across any other vehicle. Green fields, meadows, pastures, pristine air, blue sky, expansive views, beautiful landscapes, quiet surroundings, no rush – ah, the pleasure of countryside driving! You can go slower or a bit faster, you choose your own pace. The conditions permit you to do that. A meditator who has reached stage three learns to harness and channelize his thoughts. Most of their sessions comprise spans of quiescence and bliss with occasional thoughts emerging here and there, on and off. They don’t get up all relaxed from their meditation, for relaxed they already are, otherwise it would not have been possible to get to this stage. Instead, they get up feeling supercharged, refreshed and alert. A great meditator is always alert. Alertness is not only the reward but an essential ingredient for good meditation. A stage three meditator can easily sit unmoving for three hours.