Entering the Soundlessness (A Vigyan Bhairav Tantra Technique)

Entering the Soundlessness- Anant Sri

(A Vigyan Bhairav Tantra Technique)

Today we begin with a new technique in the series of sound based techniques from Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, that suggests that you dive deep into the centre of the sound and reach the soundless state. Another aspect in the same sutra says you plug your ears with your fingers and listen to the echo of the anhat naad within you, the echo of the soundlessness.

Sounds are all around us and they make and affect our life, whether we know about it or we don’t, but they do affect our life. Our ears are the instrument of listening within us, they do not reach out to the sounds, they are passive but the sounds from all around, reaches the ears. The ears being passive represent the feminine aspect in us, where as our eyes are active, they reach out to their objects of vision, and thus represent the masculine aspect in us. Since the eyes are active, we feel tired when we see for a considerable length of time where as sounds keep reaching us but the exhaustion is not felt that much. This is also seen in the behavior of men and women, men are sight oriented, they want to see, where as women are good listeners.

All of us have this masculine and feminine energy within us, represented as Yin-Yang in Zen and bringing about a harmony of these energies is in the root of the sadhna, because only when they are in harmony, the vertical journey of transcending duality can take place.

The sound from all around flows to you taking you as the centre, but this phenomenon is there for everybody, so there are as many centers as the number of people, each one being a centre for the sounds around him with all sounds converging on him. Being in the centre of all sounds is your natural state but when you are not established in this centre, then you desire to be the centre of the world, because you can only desire what you have experienced, and this centering is your experience deep within that is not available to you now, so the desire.

All your activities, whether good or bad is your effort to attract the world to you so that you become the centre of attraction. This is the doing of the ego that has arisen from your unawareness of your natural centre and that then tries to build a pseudo identity around you taking you away from your centre. This is the struggle of all human being giving rise to unending conflicts, pain and dissatisfaction.

Coming to the technique itself, you can experiment with the sound of the waterfalls if you happen to be near one. You can feel that you are standing in the centre of the fall with roaring waters falling over you. You can feel yourself in the centre of the sound and you shall experience that all sounds converging on you strike a soundless centre within you and become silent. Anything can be clearly experienced against a background of its opposite.

You can experiment the technique anywhere, where there is considerable sound all around, like in a bazaar, in traffic, any public place, you can find a place for yourself, close your eyes and let the sounds from all around converge to you. Best would be to experiment in a Shopping Mall, where you are amidst all hustle bustle of activities with all types of sounds around you.

In this case the sounds are heard against the backdrop of your silent state, so this technique results in your centering as you can simultaneously come to know your soundless state and peace within. Another thing that happens is that the silence arising from within you spreads around you engulfing all the sound within its fold of silence and all sounds disappear for you and only your natural soundless sound remains.

Then we come to another aspect of the technique that you plug your ears with your fingers or an ear plug, and listen to the echo of the soundless sound, the sound of sounds, the echo of the anhad naad. All sounds are created by striking of two things, by friction, but this is an echo of sound that just is, the echo of your being, and therefore it is anhat naad where anhat means non-striking. Listening to the anhat naad, your pseudo identity is lost, and you remain in your soundlessness, your natural state.

Both these aspects of the technique complete the world of sound, in one you have to accept all sounds and then reach the centre and in the other you block all sounds and enter into the soundlessness within you. This completes the cycle, bringing in the total experience within your fold. Some people experimented with only one aspect and found themselves uncomfortable in the other, this is incomplete, lopsided experience, you need to be comfortable at all times.

And one, who is familiar with the soundless centre within oneself, finds oneself comfortable in all circumstances. He is comfortable in a company, in a group and he is equally at ease when he is left to himself, in his aloneness. Now nothing can disturb this person, nothing can destroy his peace for he is established in his natural state of silence.