Mind: In the process of saiṋcara, the transcendental entity Puruśa, under the localized influence of His immanent principles, is transformed into Mahattattva, Ahaḿtattva and citta. In the first two stages the bondage, being theoretical in character – that is, the movement or vibration being unrestricted by the relative factors of time, space and person – does not come within the scope of perception. But in the third stage, He, under the influence of the static principle, is converted into the objective “I” and this objectivated “I” comes within the jurisdiction of autoperception. Mind is a coordination of the aforesaid three factors, that is, the Mahattattva, Ahaḿtattva and citta. In the process of pratisaiṋcara, the crudest matter, by division and decimation, gets metamorphosed into subtler factors and the unit mind is created. The stuff of the unit mind is just the same as that of the Cosmic Mind. The Cosmic Mind is formed in the saiṋcara process under the influence of the innate tendencies, while the unit mind is created in the process of pratisaiṋcara under the influence of the belligerent crystals of the Macrocosm.

In the extroversial phase, both in Macrocosm and microcosm, the static principle predominates, while in the introversial phase the predominating principle is the sentient one; but in both phases all three principles are in existence. Even in Nirguńa Brahma, or the Unsubjectivated Transcendental Entity, these principles do not cease to exist. It is the stage of pará shánti (absolute peace) because there the three principles are present in a balanced style. Hence in Nirguńa Brahma there is no humming up of waves, no clash within or without. Prakrti, the omni-active entity, lies quite in a quiet stage; the transcendental sublimity remains unpolluted. In Tantra this latent Prakrti is known as Anucchúnyá Prakrti. This Anucchúnyá Prakrti is the causal stage of the three expressed principles and is purely abstract in character. When the Anucchúnyá gets disturbed, the three fundamental principles start functioning, and as a result of their expressed svabháva (characteristics), Saguńa Brahma, or the Subjectivated Transcendentality, gets stirred in Its impersonal exhibition.

Saguńa Brahma is exhibited through the activities or the activating potentialities of the three expressions of Ucchúnyá Prakrti. These three expressions are the fundamental creative principles and they are sattva (sentient), rajah (mutative), and tamah (static). They are known as guńa in Sanskrit. These names have been allotted according to their respective functions, and the diversities of the created world depend upon the comparative domination of one over the other two. In both the saiṋcara and pratisaiṋcara processes, that is, in the entire survey of the Macrocosm, the Supreme Entity appears to have lost its transcendentality under the influence of these three fundamental factors.

Activation of any force signifies a change in position of the body on which said force is applied. Hence during the creation of mind certainly a localized change takes place within the infinite space of the Transcendental Entity. The Cosmic Mind, though big, is therefore limited; and as such its localized characteristics debar it from becoming absolute.

Mind cannot maintain its existence without objectivity. During its course of creation, mind automatically gets an objectivity in the form of the done ego or static “I”. Thus the fundamental mental objectivity is, correctly speaking, a projected objectivity. The mind where the projected objectivity presents itself in a collectivated form, maintaining closest alliance with the projector, is called the “Macrocosm”, or the “Cosmic Mind”; and where this projected objectivity (or objectivities) appears to be independent of other diversities and detached from the projecting apparatus, it is termed “microcosm” or “unit mind”. So to the Macrocosm the projected objectivity (or objectivities) is neither diverse nor without, while to the microcosm, it appears to be in diversities and also beyond the scope of its existence.

One more vital difference between Macrocosm and microcosm lies in their capacities of thought power. The former, by mere vibration of its thought-waves, is able to get itself metamorphosed into many, which for the latter appear to be the original actualities of the physical strata. The imaginative process of the microcosm can produce no actuality in the physical world. In case of hypnotism or ghost-affectedness, the mental image of the unit mind gets projected and appears to be a fact, but actually it has no physical existence. In the physical world, whatever the microcosm creates with the help of its physical structures is nothing but a chemical or physical transformation of the five fundamental factors created as actualities by the Macrocosm in the saiṋcara process.

Práńendriya: During the mental process of extrovert and introvert, there is always a clash within the physical body due to the external pressure of static Prakrti. The resultant interial and exterial forces working within the physical structure are known as práńa; and the cooperative activity of the ten váyus – five interial and five exterial (práńa, apána, samána, udána and vyána; and nága, kúrma, krkara, devadatta and dhanaiṋjaya) – is known as práńáh.

The positions of the indriyas are actually in the brain and not on the external surface of the physical body. There are gateways of the indriyas on the external surface of the physical body receiving tanmátras emanated from different objects. The tanmátras received through these gateways are converted into psychic objects according to the inherent saḿskáras of the individuals. The position of práńendriya is in the heart – not in the mechanical heart which palpitates but in the yogic centre of heart, that is, in the middle point of the anáhata cakra.

During enumeration práńendriya does not come within the category of indriyas, not only because its site or controlling point is different from that of other indriyas, but for another reason as well. The ten indriyas function only to perceive tattvas, but práńendriya, being the collective name of the ten váyus (and váyu being a bhútatattva and a fundamental factor formed due to crudification of ether), comes under the category of tattvas. Indriyas, therefore, are the activators and perceivers of the bhútatattvas, and práńendriya is more or less a correlated activity of ten analysed sub-factors of váyutattva.

Práńendriya plays the most vital part on the physical and psycho-physical level. Every activity of the práńendriya is pulsative – contracting and expanding (saḿkoca-vikáshii). The auxiliary waves of the práńendriya flow in a pulsative manner, that is, there is an arrangement of alternative motions and pauses in their flows. It is during the state of pause and potentiality that the citta is able to receive the tanmátras and takes the form of shapes represented by those tanmátras. Unless citta takes the form of incoming tanmátras no perception is possible, because the ego can work only when the citta adopts a form.

This fact becomes evident by analysing a very common experience. Even if the tanmátra-discharging objects be present and the afferent nerves working quite all right, there may not be any perception if the citta does not receive the tanmátras. If one eats something while walking or running, one is not able to enjoy the taste fully. This is due to the citta not being able to receive the tanmátras under such a circumstance. One is not able to receive and understand a bháva (idea) simultaneously with some other physical and mental activity. The secret is with the práńendriya.

Práńendriya has got the capacity to let all the nerves flow in the pattern in which it itself is flowing. This means that if práńendriya is in the expansive stage and not in the contracting one, every nerve, along with citta itself, is in the expansive stage flowing in the same wavelength. The result is that incoming tanmátras face hindrance and cannot activate the citta. Thus either there is difficulty in perception or there is no perception. Therefore, even if all the other factors responsible for perception are working quite satisfactorily, the práńendriya in its expansive stage will cause the citta and nerves to vibrate sympathetically and thereby hamper the movement of the incoming tanmátras. But if the práńendriya be in the controlling position or at a pause, it creates such a calmness throughout the psycho-physical structure that the correct perception is possible. So actually práńendriya plays a vital part in helping the organs indirectly to receive the tanmátras, in assisting the citta to perceive them correctly, and thus in letting the ego have a cognition in that connection.

This is the psycho-philosophy behind the practice of práńáyáma, wherein the sádhaka tries to let this práńendriya remain in the state of pause, thereby merging the paused unit mind into the ocean of consciousness just to have the experience of the supramental stratum.

In our daily life the experiences of soft and hard, melodious and harsh, hot and cold are being experienced by our práńendriya. These experiences do not come within the scope of the five fundamental perceptions of shravańa (hearing), sparshana (feeling by touch), darshana (vision), ashvádana (taste) and ághráńa (smell). The aforesaid subtler experiences, not coming within the jurisdiction of crude fundamentality, are felt by the sixth organ – práńendriya. The special function of práńendriya is to recognize the objectives from different experienced sense perceptions and innate psychic projections. Práńendriya also works as an auxiliary force in some of the internal mental activities, and with the help of this práńendriya one feels that a particular person is very kind and affectionate, or a particular person is unkind and antipathetic. (Such an experience is based more on a subjective feeling than on any outer objective correlation.)

In certain philosophies the word bodhendriya is also used for práńendriya, but a better term for expressing the essence of this indriya shall be bodha vivikti. And the other fundamental indriyas may be conveniently termed bodhendriyas.

Vrtti: Mind is a state in the process of Brahma Cakra. It, being the result of changing positions, is essentially a stage in the process of motion, and implies a momentum which it has to express. To find expression the mind adopts certain inter- and intra-ectoplasmic occupations. These occupations (love, hatred, fear, etc.) are known as vrtti. In other words, vrtti may be defined as “the way of expression of mind”. On the psychic level this occupation is called “expressed sentiment”.

Sentiments affecting subsidiary glands are known as “instincts”. Here the term “subsidiary gland” has been used for any gland other than the pineal and the pituitary. Some psychologists define “instinct” as “accumulated sentiment”. By this they imply that instincts are later stages of sentiments, that is, that instincts are created when sentiments get themselves habituated. This is a theoretical definition. A sádhaka, who is a practical psychologist, realizes that instinct is a sentiment affecting the subsidiary glands.

These subsidiary glands are the sub-stations of organs whose main controlling station, as already discussed, is located in the brain. For the evolution of saḿkalpátmaka and vikalpátmaka mind (the mind is said to be saḿkalpátmaka when its internal occupations lead towards the Great, and vikalpátmaka when they lead towards the mundane or crude) and for the creation of external waves, the help of the organs has to be taken. This help is also essential for crude manifestation in the physical stratum and other multifarious activities. The subtle brain does not work directly. It requires cruder sub-stations under its control.

Waves have to be developed for other manifestation of the internal saḿskáras, and these waves have to be created in the nerves and in the blood. According to the sanguinary flow and strength of the nerves, sub-stations of the mind go on transmitting the waves.

The seed of every vrtti is in the brain. But the first expression occurs in the sub-station. Waves, after being created by the glands or sub-stations of the mind, are expressed outside through efferent nerves. The motor organs work with the help of efferent nerves, but the secret of the working lies with these mental sub-stations or glands.

The number of vrttis varies according to the complexity of the physical structure. The more complex the structure, the greater shall be the number of vrttis. The more-developed animals, therefore, possess more vrttis than the less-developed ones. Generally there are one thousand vrttis in the human structure. In their development and expression on the ordinary crude level they are fifty in number. The collective number being one thousand, the seeds of all those thousand vrttis are present in the brain. Because of the existence of these seeds of one thousand vrttis in the pineal gland, the yogins have named it sahasrára cakra [sahasra means “thousand”]. The subsidiary glands control forty-eight vrttis and the pituitary controls two – saḿkalpátmaka, or one leading to parávidyá (knowledge of the Great) and vikalpátmaka, relating to aparávidyá (knowledge of the mundane). The pineal as a structure controls all these fifty vrttis taken internally and externally by all ten indriyas. 50 x 2 x 10 = 1000. Yogis having control over the sahasrára cakra attain nirvikalpa samádhi, a state where they are beyond the approach of all the vrttis. Within the scope of these vrttis lies the seed of saḿskára – good or bad. So the attainment of such a state means the end of all the saḿskára, exhaustion of all the previous momentum accumulated by the mind due to its previous journeys in Brahma Cakra. This is what is called mokśa – union with the Transcendentality.