Consciousness in Another
Feel awareness in another's body as vividly as in your own; releasing concern for your own body, you grow all-pervading.
दूसरे के शरीर में भी चेतना को अपने ही समान अनुभव करो; अपने शरीर की चिन्ता छोड़ते ही, कुछ ही दिनों में व्यापी हो जाओ।
The conversation of Devi & Bhairava
A faithful retelling of the dialogue that frames this verse — the Goddess asks, and Bhairava answers with the teaching above. (The śloka is the scripture; the conversation dramatizes its meaning, in English and Hindi.)
I feel awareness only here, in my own body, Lord. How can it ever be felt as everywhere?
मैं चेतना केवल यहाँ, अपने ही शरीर में अनुभव करती हूँ, नाथ। वह सर्वत्र कैसे अनुभव हो सकती है?
Begin with one other. Bring to mind a person or being, and feel the consciousness alive in their body just as you feel it in your own — the same inner sense of "being aware", there.
किसी एक दूसरे से आरम्भ करो। किसी व्यक्ति या प्राणी को मन में लाओ, और उसके शरीर में जीवित चेतना को वैसे ही अनुभव करो जैसे तुम अपने में करती हो — "सजग होने" का वही भीतरी भाव, वहाँ।
Must I begin with someone close to me?
क्या मुझे किसी निकट के व्यक्ति से आरम्भ करना होगा?
Begin with one you love, then extend it. As that felt sense of awareness-in-another grows, and the exclusive grip on your own body loosens, the place where "I" sits begins to expand.
किसी प्रिय से आरम्भ करो, फिर उसे फैलाओ। जैसे "दूसरे में चेतना" का वह अनुभूत भाव बढ़ता है, और अपने ही शरीर पर की विशेष पकड़ ढीली होती है, वह स्थान जहाँ "मैं" बैठा है, फैलने लगता है।
So through love itself I become boundless?
तो प्रेम से ही मैं असीम हो जाती हूँ?
Through love and empathy made into contemplation. Releasing concern for your own body, in days you grow all-pervading. This is the relational face of the truth: the awareness in you and in another were never two.
प्रेम और सहानुभूति को भावना बना देने से। अपने शरीर की चिन्ता छोड़ते हुए, कुछ ही दिनों में तुम सर्वव्यापी हो जाती हो। यह सत्य का सम्बन्ध-रूप है: तुममें और दूसरे में चेतना कभी दो थीं ही नहीं।
Why it works
We instinctively feel awareness only "in here", in our own body. This verse trains the opposite: to sense consciousness in another's body as directly as in one's own. As that empathic identification grows and the exclusive grip on one's own body loosens, the felt location of "I" expands until awareness is experienced as pervading all — vyāpī, all-pervading.
How to practice
- 1Bring to mind another person or being, present or imagined.
- 2Feel the consciousness alive in their body just as you feel it in your own — the same inner sense of "being aware", there.
- 3Let attention rest as much in that other body's awareness as in your own.
- 4Gradually release the exclusive concern for your own body; over time, awareness comes to feel all-pervading.
The deeper story
This remarkable verse turns compassion into a contemplative technology: by experiencing consciousness in others as one's own, the boundary of the personal self dissolves into the universal. It is the relational face of the text's non-dualism — pervasion reached not by withdrawal but by widening identification.
Terms in this technique
- cit
- Consciousness itself, the aware principle.
- ātman
- The true self; awareness as one’s own being.
- aham
- The sense of "I"; the self that is inquired into.
- bhāvanā
- Contemplative imagination; cultivating a state through felt imagery.
Sources consulted
- Jaideva Singh, Vijñānabhairava: The Manual for Self-Realization (Motilal Banarsidass, 1979)
- Bettina Bäumer, Vijñâna Bhairava: The Practice of Centering Awareness (Indica Books, 2011)
- Swami Lakshmanjoo, Vijnana Bhairava: The Manual for Self Realization (Universal Shaiva Fellowship, 2007)