The ancient principles of meditation highlight a few very important and basic factors. One of the most important things is that there is nothing called ‘trying’ to meditate because one cannot really ‘try’ to meditate. Meditation as a process is to become free of the thought process. Ancient texts do not recognize the process of meditation as an achievement. Many yogis who believe and still follow the ancient practices are of the view that earlier than five decades, meditation was never discussed as an achievement in social gatherings. To consider mediation as a feather in the cap is negating the whole concept. But this has become a theme for many modern people. They freely discuss their imagined or experienced states of mind as an achievement Meditation is personal feeling of communication with the divine. It is a feeling of oneness with the supreme consciousness. It cannot be boasted about or even discussed if it has been truly felt. This is because the sense of achievement itself is a feeling that negates the possibility of all other desires.

Most believers of ancient yoga still feel that the modern yogis have invented many processes just to aid their convenience and to satisfy the needs of the modern practitioners. If effort is involved in any form of meditation that in itself is a denial of the exercise of meditation. The ancient texts recognize certain practices that help the practitioner to reach the mind into a stage of meditation. The modern yogis have developed many different forms of meditation that are based on the modern day needs of desire and fulfilment, conflict and corrective action. Some of these ancient concepts are:

Bhavnas: The word Bhavna in Sanskrit means feeling or emotion behind anything. In meditation the Bhavnas have been recognized of many types.

Pratipakshabhavna: The vicious tendencies present in the human mind are called vitarkas. These are of many types and generally speaking all that is negative can be called as falling under this category. Yoga tells to examine these vitarkas under three categories.

• The source of their origin.
• The state of their presence.
• The results of their action.

If an instance of violence is taken for analysis of vitarkas. It can be of three types:

• The one that is actually done by an individual.
• The one that is actually managed by others but the individual is a witness to it.
• The one that is tolerated in principle by an individual.

Vitarkas have negative impact on the entire system and they do not let a person be free from them.

Ancient principles say that controlling a train of thoughts is just not possible. This is especially so if the thoughts have been motivated in some way or the other with vitarkas. The only way of controlling them and coordinating them is to develop a rational feeling of awareness about them. This is called Pratipakshabhavna. It is looking at these vitarkas with a kind interest of an external observer. Until and unless this awareness is developed a person will not be able to control these thoughts from flowing in and out of the mind.

Maitri and other Bhavnas: The general broad categories of proceedings that one meets in one’s lifespan can be divided into four types. These are:

• Events of pleasure.
• Events of misery.
• Events those are virtuous.
• Events those are sinful.

Every human being is prone to feelings that are resultant of events and can be broadly grouped in one of these categories. An event of pleasure for one can give rise to a feeling of misery and sin for others. An example jealousy upon someone’s achievement is pleasurable for the achiever but may be miserable and sinful for others.

The recommended attitude is to develop feelings that are:

• Of friendliness for pleasurable events. This is the Maitri Bhavna, maitri meaning friendship.
• Of compassion for misery: This is the Karuna Bhavna. Karuna meaning sympathy and empathy.
• Of joy towards all that is virtuous: This is the Mudita Bhavna. Mudita meaning happiness.
• Of forgiving towards all that is sinful: this is the Upeksha Bhavna. Upeksha meaning not paying attention by being magnanimous.

Pracchardana and Vidharna: Pracchardana and Vidharna are basically breathing exercises that are to be followed during meditation. Pracchardana is breathing out suddenly and forcefully as is done in Kapalabhati. Vidharna means holding out the breath and keeping it out without leaking into the system. These are very powerful procedures to controlling the thoughts and making the mind calm.

Ancient texts believe the vital prana and the citta to be interrelated. Citta is the mind and the process of thoughts. They are inter-dependent and one cannot exist in totality without the other. So the easiest way to control one is to control the other. Therefore it is necessary to control prana while trying to control the citta. We can see this that when prana is activated the citta also gets aggravated. This is evident in a condition when a person is breathing fast in a state of shock or threat the mind also starts working very fast. By silencing the prana the citta also becomes calmed down.

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