Viveka Chudamani – Sama

Among the qualities that help us know the self is “sama” Sri Adi Shankara begins with introducing us to this.

When I just set out to read these I would find it so utopic the “sama’ peaceful, calm  there was also this belief that calm meant still and still meant non-growth.  But as I attended the sessions on Viveka Chudamani by chinmaya mission I realized that “sama” is about finding the calm or sama within us. it already exists, but we have covered it with whole lot external disturbance. It somewhere connected to the concept of Brahmasutra in the Natyashastra, the balance from where the physical movement begins, moves and returns. Or the shanta rasa… the still the calm that exists and one could travel through the navarasa and return to that shanta rasa, the sama or the shanta has the ability to both send forth other rasa’s as it has the capacity to assimilate the rasa within it.

Bhaktimarga enforces calmness by meditating on the name of the god. But an adept on the jnana marga needs to cultivate the sama until it becomes the sahaja or the natural state.

Sama is equanimous, peaceful condition of the mind, it happens with being present to the subtler field. There would of course be points of breakdown but the ability to return to the sama or brahmasutra is important.

Virajya visayavratadosadrstya muhurmuhu

Svalaksye nityavasthe manasah sma ucyate IIVC22II     

The peaceful state of mind when it rests constantly upon the contemplation of the goal after having again and again detached itself from the chaos of the sense objects through a process of continous observaion of their defects is called sama.

Probably it was this emphasis of perfection that annoyed me, when Gesila Negi was talking about language and its intepretation contemporary when he was teaching us compassionate wisdom, the ephiphany that perfection is temporary for what is perfect now need not be perfect in the next moment happened. The sama or the calmness that vivekachudamani talked about was the same nurturing moment of compassionate wisdom or so it seems now.

Key words: nurturing, calm, equilibrium.