A Brief History of Meditation

The history of meditation is the history of existence itself. Science tells us that the universe came into being with a big bang. But it wasn’t just a bang—it was a big Om, which didn’t happen just once but is happening continuously.

Absolute, pure consciousness is the potential for everything but is nothing in itself, which means it is also pure silence. At some point, the absolute desired to have an experience, but as nothing else existed, it could only experience itself.

As experience is by contrast, the absolute had to move within itself to experience itself. Movement creates friction, which creates sound. However, the absolute is, by definition, silent.So, this sound had to be forced out of pure consciousness, which then became conditioned or modified consciousness. This first sound was Om, which diversifies into all the sounds and vibrations of the manifest creation.

Om is the beginning and end of the story of meditation. It is the creator breathing out and breathing in. The exhale is the evolution of the entire manifest creation, and the inhale is its return to source. All the sounds, all the vibrations of the universe, all the mantras, are contained within and emerge from Om.We are the creators of the universe, exhaling it into existence and inhaling it back into the unmanifest. The story of meditation would end here, except for one small detail: We have forgotten that we are the creator. We have become so attached to the exhale and its multifold creation that we have forgotten to breathe in. It’s as though we have exhaled fully and are now holding our breath, forgetting who we really are.The path of meditation is the story of learning how to take a spiritual in-breath and return to our essence.

The 4 Vedas—Rig, Sama, Yajur, and Atharva—are said to contain all the knowledge of the external world. Each of these ancient Hindu texts has 4 parts: The Samhitas contain the mantras, the Brahmanas explain the sacred rituals, the Aranyakas interpret the rituals’ deeper meaning, and the Upanishads discuss atman(the soul), Brahman(reality), and the inner meaning of life. Upanishad literally means “to sit near.” Originally, these texts were considered special knowledge reserved for advanced students, who received their higher teachings directly from a teacher. These early students of Vedanta were the first to use meditation as a tool to explore the inner world, rather than the outer one. The Vedas describe 4 long ages called the Yugas, each lasting for tens of thousands of years.

According to Vedic cosmology, Sat Yuga was the dawn of Vedic times. It was a golden age—a time of balance and harmony between humans and nature. Sattva guna, or goodness, dominated. Most people were enlightened and had use of yogic powers. Conflict and disease were unknown. Everything was perfect, so desire was unnecessary. Peace, compassion, and kindness were our only goals. It was a time of goodness, harmony, unity, wholeness, and infinite possibility.During Sat Yuga, the Vedic Rishis were sages who taught that humankind’s true destiny is enlightenment—the return to our perfection.

The Rishis meditated not for themselves, but for the enlightenment of the world. They recognized the subtle vibrations in everything and opened their hearts to them.  From these vibrations emerged the thousands of mantras which exist today. Vedic writings describe Treta Yuga as the start of conflicts and wars. Over time, the purity of the teachings had begun to diminish, and moral decay opened the door to this less enlightened era, in which the 3 gunas—sattva, rajas (passion), and tamas (ignorance)—were equal. We started to forget who we really are, our souls wandered lost, and the cycle of accumulating karma and the need for rebirth began. During this time, the oneness of Brahmanwas lost to duality. The concept of Ishwara, or God as a person, emerged—along with the multitude of gods and goddesses. The 6 “enemies of the soul”—desire for sensory pleasure, anger, greed, delusion, pride, and jealousy—were born.

According to the Vedas, this was also when Lord Vishnu, the maintainer of the universe, incarnated as Rama, the ideal human, to try to restore life’s values of kama (joyous relationships), artha (material security), dharma(ethical values), and moksha(liberation). This era gave us the Ramayana,a Sanskrit epic containing philosophical and ethical teachings, and the Yoga Vasistha, a text containing dialogues between Rama and the sage Vasistha. During this time, meditation was reserved for those who had access to a teacher. The wisdom of the Upanishads also became known in this era—and would eventually become the basis of today’s meditation practices. According to the Vedic writings, a fortunate few climbed out of samsara—the cycle of birth and death—but for most, the decline continued into Dwapara Yuga, wherein rajas guna dominated. Lord Vishnu incarnated again, this time as Krishna, and gave us the greatest of all the Vedic texts: the Bhagavad Gita.

While the Upanishads explore different parts of our spiritual journey, the Gita is like a practical guidebook. In it, Krishna makes spiritual practices available to everyone by introducing the 4 paths of yoga: bhakti, the path of love and devotion; karma,t he path of selfless service; gyana,t he path ofknowledge and self-reflection; and raja, the path of techniques—including meditation. He also states, “Established in being, perform action.” This guidance lies at the root of meditation. But according to the Vedic texts, only a few listened to Krishna’s wisdom during Dwapara Yuga. As delusion and chaos continued, most souls slipped even further into darkness. We now find ourselves in Kali Yuga, a time of chaos, confusion, wrong thinking, and destruction.

 Our current period is dominated by the inertia of tamas guna—overshadowed by materialism, fear, selfishness, doubt, and greed. It is said that in this age, the spiritual heart is  blocked by 3 knots: kama, excessive sensory desires; karma, the effects of past actions; and avidya, which is ignorance, anger, lust, and greed. These knots must be loosened and eliminated for our spiritual journey to be complete. Fortunately, there is a glimmer of hope. When things are going well, we oft  en forget to give thanks and appreciate the divine quality of life. This has happened in the previous Yugas, leading to our present state. However, once we have become truly miserable, we finally ask, “Isn’t there something better?” Then, our spiritual journey begins.  We meet teachers, learn techniques, begin our meditation journey, and slowly begin to remember. Great meditation teachers have existed throughout the Yugas, but many are lost to antiquity. Fortunately, we now have more direct links to the wisdom of enlightened masters. For example, the Buddha gave us awareness and Vipassana meditations. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have given us prayer and contemplation. In the Vedic tradition, Patanjali consolidated many teachings into his Yoga Sutras, giving us a practical path through the 8 Limbs ofYoga. And later, Adi Shankararevived the knowledge of the oneness of Brahmanand the nonduality of Advaita Vedanta. Most Gaja teachings reflect the lineage of the Shankara tradition. This lineage includes such luminaries as Sri Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekananda, Ramana Maharshi, Sri Aurobindo, Paramahansa Yogananda, and AnandamayiMa. More recently, we have the teachings of Swami Brahmananda Saraswatiand Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. And many more teachers, too many to list, have walked—and still walk—our planet, sharing their wisdom. Gaja Meditation incorporates breath awareness, self-inquiry, netineti, silent repetition of a mantra leading to transcendental consciousness, resting in the ground state of awareness, and planting seeds of intention for a life in perfection. The ever-unfolding process of evolution gives us the illusion of a universe with all its aspects. Meditation is a process of involution, a journey back to our source, where we realize that the universe and all its multiplicity are merely expressions or appearance of One essential reality: Brahman.