The manner in which meditation takes the mind from the gross to the subtle is very simple and is based upon the innate tendency of all human minds to seek happiness. The very nature of the mind is to go to a field of greater happiness. The happiness referred to is not pleasure, nor sensual gratification, nor excitement, but tranquil and confident state of knowing—of knowing that I am, of knowing that 'I' exists and that it is permanent and unchanging.
Let us once again take for an example a flower. We look at it when it is close to the eyes and it appears large. If it is slowly moved away from us it grows smaller and smaller until it becomes no more than a point, no longer recognisable as a flower. Ultimately, it disappears from view altogether. At this moment if we were to close our eyes we would still be able to perceive the flower as a mental image; we would be able to think the flower. If we could then reduce the thought of the flower to subtler and subtler levels we would be experiencing thought in its subtler states. In the end the thought of the flower would reduce itself to a mere point of thought. When the thought of the flower is thus reduced to the subtlest state—a mere point-thought, the thinker in us, the experiencer, would still remain so long as there is that point-thought; when the object of experience is reduced to its subtlest point and when that point-state of thought is transcended, then the object ceases to be and the subject-object relationship vanishes. In such a state only the subject—the experiencer is left in its own being. This is the state of pure, unmanifest consciousness, the nature of which is absolute bliss and which is the reservoir of all creative energy and wisdom.
The state is absolute because the mind has passed beyond the finest aspect of creation, which implies entry into a state of pure Being—that which is described as the Kingdom of Heaven, or sat-chit-anandam, the. absolute bliss consciousness.
The mind, offered a choice between lesser and greater satisfaction, will choose the greater. The joyous peace of absolute bliss consciousness is such that no manifested joys or sensations can possibly compare with it, and the mind, even without experience or training, recognises this.
It is for this reason that the process of meditation is effortless—it follows the natural tendency of the mind; and once turned inwards, towards Transcendental Consciousness, happiness of absolute nature, the mind rushes towards IT. This is why this system of meditation is simple.
