Ajna/ Brow Chakra

Ajna is the brow chakra, the divine eye also called the command centre, and is located between and behind the eyes on a line up from the bridge of the nose. It is associated with the pineal and pituitary glands, the frontal lobes of the brain and the nasocillary plexus. It is said to be indigo, or purple-blue-black in colour Its traditional symbols are: the winged globe or disk. Its Element is sometimes said to be that of Mind. The associated animal can be, for example, the scarab, the dragon or snake. It is beyond the level of the Four (or Five) Elements. It works through the balance of the human and divine, stability and change; and through the dynamic of blessing, tension and release. Ajna is the location of the relationship with what in Hinduism and Buddhism has been called the guru, lama or vajra master. We will look into this a little in this section. Ajna is concerned with vision in all senses. Within its scope it includes all the meanings of vision, sight, insight and so on that we have used throughout this book both relative and absolute. So it is associated with conceptual vision which is expectation; the vision which is your view of yourself, who you are and where you are going; the vision which is your originality and creativity (ajna here links by reflex with swadisthana, on the pivot and balance of anahatta). It is also associated with non-conceptual vision that is the view of vipasyana and eventually mahavipasyana/ rigpa it is the sense of seeing what was not seen before or seeing in a completely new way. In this way, then, it is the balance of the human and divine. It is the meeting in clarity of the mind and that which is beyond the mind as the Path of our practice. This is also how it is the balance of stability and change: in ajna one arrives at the changeless state, which is none other than the process of continual change. Now, this means nothing to our conceptual mind yet we somehow find a kind of sense in it. We realize that it is just how things are. Why? and Because! are no longer the final judge and jury in our life. Beyond logic and reason, not only do we not lose sight of logic and reason, we are even more aware of just how important they are important in the world. So then blessing. Blessing seems to be commonly understood as some kind of sweetie or nice thing that we can get from God or the Goddess or the Buddhas or Lady Luck or whoever. Well, ok, if that helps. Blessing though has a far bigger connotation: blessing is that which changes the mind. Through the power of blessing, the normal mind can be changed in an ordinary way, from a state of negativity to one of positivity, from a state of accumulating bad karma to one of accumulating good karma. And in an extraordinary way, from a state of relative to a state of absolute; from within the limited mind, to beyond the mind; from the human to the divine. And the source of this blessing? Well, from our normal state of consciousness we cannot say. Sure, we can put labels on what we think it is. But what it actually is, is beyond the mind anyway. Like it says in the hymn: Immortal, ineffable (i.e. unknowable), God only Wise/ In light inaccessible hid from our eyes This is the view from the relative mind, standing in the face of the Mystery with faith, belief, trust and devotion. On the other side, as it were, there are the remarkable poems expressing realization and enlightenment from the great masters. Whatever the source of blessing might actually be, it is not understandable by the normal mind. This, by the way, does not mean that we cannot realize it at all. Understanding is not realization. And, as it reminds us in the teachings, realization is not to be confused with enlightenment. So the source of the blessing, then, we can call God or the Goddess. We can think of it as the deity or divinity whose image we contemplated in our version of the guru yoga, called 2=0. We can think of it as the Buddhas and bodhisattvas. In whatever way we think of it, whatever label we attach to it, from its own side -- it is what it is. Yet from our side, from the side of the limited and

the relative, not realizing our true nature, we definitely need a path and a guide. The view of ajna from within the relative is the intelligence to realize that we need help. Now, there are some who will tell you that all the help you need is already within you. There are others who will tell you that you cannot hope to gain realization on your own and that you need to find a guru. Actually both are true and both are false (isnt it always the way when the relative mind tries to analyze anything?). So far in this book we have given the impression that its all within you and that you can do it by contacting God directly as it were! This is fine as far as shamatha practice goes, and that is all we have really been concerned with. It is not the whole story, though, so we cannot leave it there especially when talking about ajna. We remind you that our discussion here the place that we are talking from and you (probably) are listening from is manipura, the dualistic mind. Such problems as having an outer teacher or relying on an inner teacher more properly belong in manipura and are resolved in anahatta. By the time you actually get to ajna, as it were, such conflicts are long gone We can resolve this impasse to have a spiritual master or not to have a spiritual master by considering two things. Firstly interdependence: everything depends on everything else in this world; nothing is completely independent. Even if we think we are doing something all by ourself, this is never actually the case. From this, arises the view in the western tradition of co-creation as being more powerful (because it relates more with how things actually are) than just creation. Whereas in swadisthana we believed or took for granted that we create something by ourself, from the greater view of ajna, we realize that all acts of creation are actually acts of co-creation; the most fundamental one being the union of absolute and relative. In anahatta we experience co-creation emotionally and in the mind, in ajna we now realize and actualise it. Our illusion that we are independent and can act entirely on our own is the result of ego. From this view, people who say you can do it all yourself are deluded. Secondly we can consider what the nature of the teacher/ master actually is. In the Dharma teachings it talks of four teachers: i. ii. iii. iv. The outer (i.e. physical, flesh and blood) teacher The inner teacher your wisdom nature The teachings written, spoken and otherwise Life as your perfect mirror and therefore teacher

It also says that the job of the outer teacher is to introduce you to your inner teacher. And your inner teacher is your wisdom nature. This is where the people who say that you have it all within you are, in a way, right. It all depends on whether you have realized your wisdom nature or not. And if youre not sure you havent! Beware also at this point ego can say it is sure about things, so you need to be completely and scrupulously honest. On our definition of honesty from earlier on, you need to be able to see right through yourself completely to be honest in this way. So our normal mind cannot have any realization by itself to think that it can is an ego-trip. Yet to say that we have to depend on a master, can be an ego trip, or it can be the truth: the difference lies in your motivation, your understanding and your relationship (from your side) with the master, which is really none other than your relationship with your own wisdom nature. The outer master is a mirror showing you your relative mind and its attitude (i.e. hangs ups and ego). If you have the wisdom to see it. The outer master is none other than the manifestation of your inner teacher. Now this only works with a genuine master one who has complete realization and is actually able to introduce you to your true nature; to who you really are. Yet also to follow a master in some sort of snivelling, Im not worthy, youre so great and I am a toad kind of a way, is also a huge ego-trip (even if there is some sort of ironical truth in

it!). If you are fortunate enough to be in contact with a genuine master, s/he will guide you safely through whatever ego trip youre on. If youre not so fortunate, you could spend a very long time following your own ego-guru who has manifested magically as an external tyrant, or wolf in sheeps clothing. You need to be careful and use your intelligence in a good way. So finally then, the answer to our conundrum is that yes, you do have all the wisdom already as part of your nature, yet it is impossible to realize it without help as impossible as facing West and seeing the sunrise. The only thing that gets in the way of finding and following a teacher is the ego. Once the realization of wisdom dawns in ajna, all sense of ego is gone anyway and there is no difference in essence between the inner teacher and outer teacher except that your appreciation and naturally arising devotion for the outer teacher is even stronger. If this still remains a problem for you, check your motivation is it to embellish your ego? This, then, is how the 2=0 yoga becomes the infinitely more powerful guru yoga. When the magickal display of your fortunate karma results in the appearance in your reality of an outer teacher in human form, you can be sure that you now have a real chance at realizing your enlightened nature. Grab this opportunity with both hands! Please note, this is not a recruitment drive for guru Dave! I am not a realized master I am sure of that. Beyond the scope of this book, please direct your attention to your own tradition and lineage. If you dont have one particularly, you could do a lot worse than look to Tibetan Buddhism the Dzogchen lineage in particular. In ajna, then, we find the true meaning of yoga. This is the inseparable union of absolute and relative, divine and human. Here is the dawn of wisdom which is synonymous with absolute bodhicitta. Here we enter the Path of Seeing. Here, on the inner level, the master or guru is the atmosphere in which you practise. And this atmosphere is one of safety, presence, inspiration, love, joy, compassion, equanimity and so on. You could simply say it is the atmosphere of truth. It is the atmosphere of the View. The guru, then, is the circumstance of mind which opens the Path of Seeing. In ajna the Elements arise in their pure form as the five coloured lights. The skandhas/ aggregates of sense consciousness (a way of describing ego-reality, you can say) form; feeling; perception; formation/ motivational tendencies; consciousness arise in their true nature. Associated with each of these pure elements is a pure consciousness that apprehends it usually described by the Five Wisdoms of the Mirror: i/ mirror-like wisdom; ii/ equalizing wisdom; iii/ discriminating-awareness wisdom; iv/ all-accomplishing wisdom; v/ all-embracing wisdom. There are many teachings on this subject and we direct you to those if you find this interesting. For now lets look at ajnas connection with the pituitary gland as we described it in the 7EM. If you remember, rising out of the anger associated with the thyroid gland, we come to pain, associated with the pituitary gland. So now we need to make something very clear. Remember that we are looking from our view of the limited, thinking mind at this point. We are stood below, as it were, looking up at the radiance of the higher chakras. Above anahatta there is no mind at all in the way that we usually think of it. As such it is not really possible to differentiate between the upper three chakras. They are three in one, so to speak. And here we invoke the mystery of the trinity as it appears in all spiritual paths and traditions. Realization above anahatta includes vishuda, ajna and sahasrara all together. There may be different ways, different levels and so on, yet its not like you can have the realization of vishuda in a full way without also ajna and sahasrara. And by realization of vishuda in less than a full way we mean the realization of emptiness (tongba) at the level of anahatta it is tongba but is not yet rigpa or rig-tong which rigpa and tongba together. The pain we are talking about can be experienced as actual physical pain, yet there is more to it. At the level of ajna we are beyond grief and fear and hope and all the other gross manifestations of ego-reality. We are at the level of the initial division into duality from unity, from the source of our being. So pain here is referring also to a more fundamental pain, a more fundamental suffering. It

has been described as the pain of the split in the soul, the pain of separation from the source, from the One, and the longing that we have to return. Another way to describe this pain is as the suffering of conditioned existence it is the First Noble Truth, the Truth of Suffering. As Dzogchen Rinpoche put it: Pain isnt pain. Change is pain. Pain, then, is the ultimate weapon of ego. Beyond pain ego has nothing to attack you with. Beyond pain, ego is nothing. And here you may point out that ego was supposed to have given up the ghost and died when we entered vishuda, so whats it still doing hanging around like a bad smell in ajna? Well, one response could be this: what is deeper than the fear of death? It is the fear of pain and suffering. Beyond vishuda, which you can say is really death for the ego, there is still ajna. This, apart from anything else, should discourage anyone from suicide as a way out of pain pain exists beyond death. Not physical pain, of course there is no physical body! But emotional pain, mental pain, that sort of thing. It is this that forms the basis of reincarnation out of karma. Another response to the same question could be this: at the level of complete enlightenment, we are told, there is no subject, object and action so there is no one there to feel and there is nothing to be felt and no action of feeling. There is no pain. Yet in a way that is a mystery, and a mystery of the trinity (how three things can be one thing), pain and the suffering nature of duality exist even for very realized beings right up until full enlightenment. These arent completely satisfactory answers, I know. Yet that is how it appears to be. So the greatest purification, which means the most direct way to get past the ego is pain. This, I think, is the background to the mystery of the crucifixion. Also remember that the ego rises up stronger and stronger, the more you progress on the spiritual path it has to get stronger (or reveal more and more of what it actually is) in order to try to put you off, to prevent you realizing that it doesnt actually exist. So even though pain is terrible and takes you quite literally into the depths of samsara, into hell, if you can remember that it can also liberate you from samsara as part of the process of purification, then the pain itself can at least have some benefit, some purpose. You are not suffering for nothing. Pain manifests with the division into duality. Suffering is indeed the nature of our conditioned reality. Remembering that ignorance (samsara and the intelligence of samsara) only exists in a state of ignorance, we can take pain (our own and that of others) as a very good reason/ motivation to walk the spiritual path. Maybe we might think about walking a bit more quickly too Now if we turn to looking at the reflex between ajna and swadisthana, we see that just as swadisthana is associated with the intestines, we can say that ajna takes care of psychic excretion! In its capacity of the Eye of Shiva which in the absolute sense destroys the illusion of conditioned existence; and in the relative sense destroys all the psychic garbage, demons and detritus that keep us tied to the illusion. An empowered ajna/ third eye chakra sees with perfect discriminating wisdom what belongs and what doesnt, what is in place and what is out of place. It is through the power of ajna, that the doorway between realms opens and sends demons hurtling back to their own realm. This is called slaying or subjugating demons. Now all this talk of pain and demons and whatnot is quite harsh. So lets remember what brought us to ajna in the first place. It is the path of love and compassion, of reconciliation, reuniting and remembering that compels our movement up the central channel. It is possible to develop wisdom realizing emptiness, up to a certain point, without the heart of love and compassion. There is no way to become enlightened without love and compassion though. You might become an arhat still a good achievement but then you would still have to spend another huge length of time developing bodhicitta in order to progress any further. So to avoid wasting your time always remember bodhicitta. And if you need a sweetie to look forward to you can think of the bliss that is mentioned in the teachings incredible bliss that arises in union with emptiness. So in looking for patterns to work with in our relative expression of ajna and to empower it in our relative life, we can look to things like our creativity and our attitude to it as we find in

ourselves and others. Originality is another one. What is your view of originality and are you original? What is your concept of individuality and how does this relate with your ego? And finally how can you possibly be original and individual and follow a spiritual teacher at the same time? The resolution of such questions as these will take you to very deep places in your psyche. Resolution in ajna takes you through the pain and into the enthusiasm and spontaneity that is a reflection into the world of your true nature.