#9 Zero-Mind Meditation

The five voids is a reference to the five senses. The senses of touch, taste, sight, hearing and smell. One is to meditate on the five colored circles found on a peacock’s tail. These circles represent the five senses.

• Look at a picture of a peacock’s tail.
• Now focus your awareness on the five circles on the peacock’s tail.
• Keep looking at them without moving or blinking the eyes. If your eyes feel tired, or start watering, close your eyes.
• After a while, open your eyes, and continue with this practice.
• A time will come when the circles dissolve.
• The circles disappear because the mind has disappeared. Without the mind, it is not possible to see anything. The mind is like a data processor. It processes the input received by the eye into the final image that we see. Without the optical center in the brain, one would not be able to see anything.
• When the mind disappears, momentarily, the forms we are looking at disappear. When the circles dissolve, one will enter into the Supreme Void within.
• When the circles dissolve, the mind disappears, and one is liberated. The Supreme Void is another name for God. God is found within. When the circles dissolve, the mind disappears, and our true nature unfolds. One enters God, or one becomes God.
• In this meditation, one has to look at the circles on a peacock’s tail. One has to look continuously till the circles disappear. At that point, one achieves enlightenment. Because the circles disappear, it does not mean that we become blind, or cannot see anything. It only signifies the point when the mind disappears. This posts uses the terminology of the mind disappearing or dissolving, very often.

This does not mean that the mind no longer exists. What it means is that the mind is now under our control. We can use it whenever we want to and not use it when we don’t. In most people, the presence of the mind is felt continuously. One is always thinking, moving from thought to thought. This inner chatter never dies out. When the post says the mind disappears, it means that we have become internally silent. The mind’s presence is no longer felt continuously. The inner chatter has finally ended. In the context of this meditation, the circles dissolve and the mind disappears. The circles then reappear, but now everything has changed. The mind is gone (or is under our control), and one is now free, liberated. It is like a person who always lived in a small village. He knows nothing of the outside world. He then gets a chance to travel and see the whole world. When he comes back to the village, he is a changed person. The village may be the same, but now he is different. He has grown. His experience has broadened his vision. Similarly, when the circles reappear, the outside world may be the same, but now you are different. You are now liberated.