Tale 42 · The Vāsiṣṭha Atlas
Nirvāṇa · first half · Mitra VI.1.115 · 1,861 words
Do everything, enjoy everything, relinquish everything; hold on to nothing.
Vasiṣṭha urges Rāma to be the greatest in deed, enjoyment and relinquishment, and cites the teaching Śiva once gave on a northern peak to the lord of the Bhṛṅgis. Bhṛṅgī, grieving at the dark waves of the world, asks for one certain truth to rely on. Śiva answers: rely on unshaken patience, care and fear for nothing, and be foremost in action, enjoyment and relinquishment. The great doer acts as things arise, good or ill, without hope of reward or fear of result, "as a mere witness", without the vanity of being the doer. The great enjoyer takes what comes with equal relish, salt and sugar alike, ruin and fortune alike, as an unconcerned spectator. The great relinquisher gives up not things but thoughts: of life and death, pleasure and pain, merit and demerit, and finally the mind itself, so that bodily pain is not taken up. Śiva does not ask for withdrawal; he asks for full action with an unattached interior.
Equanimity is prescribed for the whole of life, not only for meditation: action, enjoyment and relinquishment each have a 'great' form (VI.1.115.9).
The witness can act: one can do one's work fully "as a mere witness", without the sense of being its doer (VI.1.115.15, 115.18).
Pain becomes trouble only when the mind takes it up: whoever "does not take to his mind the pains, which invade his body" has cast away the troubles of mortal life (VI.1.115.35).
Real renunciation is of thoughts, not of things: of life and death, pleasure and pain, merit and demerit (VI.1.115.33–34).
Enjoyment is greatest when it stops selecting: the one to whom "salt and sugar are both alike" enjoys "the best bliss of his life" (VI.1.115.30).
The Vāsiṣṭha Atlas
Grieving at the world's dark waves, Bhṛṅgī asks Śiva for one certain truth to lean on: a mind that wants its uncertainty closed and its pleasures chosen. Śiva answers with Ease rather than certainty, 'unshaken patience' and 'neither care nor fear' for anything else (VI.1.115.9), and an enjoyer to whom 'salt and sugar are both alike' (VI.1.115.30), acting fully 'as a mere witness' (VI.1.115.15).
The great enjoyer meets ruin and fortune, salt and sugar, with equal relish (VI.1.115.30): the full range of experience held without being swept away or numbed, while action goes on.
All actions are done by the guṇas of nature, and only the one deluded by I-making thinks “I am the doer”. Śiva's great doer, who acts without “the vanity of being the doer” (VI.1.115.18), is this verse in practice.
In the Sallattha Sutta the trained disciple feels the first dart of bodily pain but not the second dart of mental pain. The great relinquisher, who lets go of thought so that bodily pain is not taken up (VI.1.115.35), describes the same split.
Yoga nidrā often includes the pairing of opposite sensations, heaviness and lightness, heat and cold, pain and pleasure, each held in turn without preference. It is a felt rehearsal of the great enjoyer's equality.
IEAF: Integrative Emotional Alchemy Framework (Gallardo, Frontiers in Psychology, 2026). FP20: the Fundamental Peace Scale. ITM: the Integrative Transformation Model. Parallels in other yogas are contemplative correspondences, not claims of influence.
Vasiṣṭha has a closing counsel for Rāma: be an example, the greatest of men, in your deeds, your enjoyments and your bounty, and rest on unshaken endurance in defiance of every care and fear. Rāma asks what makes the greatest actor, what the highest enjoyment is, and what the great bounty is. These three, Vasiṣṭha answers, were explained long ago by Śiva, who wears the crescent moon on his brow, to the lord of the Bhṛṅgis, who was thereby released from all disease and disquiet.
Śiva lived then on a northern peak of the north polar mountain with his family and attendants. One day the lord of the Bhṛṅgis, mighty but of little knowledge, came before him with folded palms and bowed body. I am overwhelmed with sorrow, he said, at the boisterous waves of this deep, dark world in which we are tossed forever without finding the calm harbour of truth. Tell me what certain truth and inward assurance we can rely on, and so find rest in this shattered mansion of the world.
Śiva replied: "Place always your reliance in your unshaken patience, and neither care nor fear for anything else, and ever strive to be foremost in your action and passion and in your relinquishment of everything." Bhṛṅgī asked what it means to be greatest in action, in passion, and in relinquishment.
The greatest actor, Śiva said, does his deeds as they come to him, good or ill, without fear or desire of their fruit. He acts, loves and hates, feels pleasure and pain, without attachment to person or thing and without expecting consequences, the greatest actor "in the theatre of this world". He does not vex his mind over what common opinion calls auspicious or inauspicious, righteous or unrighteous. He "witnesses all objects as a mere witness" and goes on with his business without craving or deep entanglement. He keeps an even tone of mind and clear understanding, neither elated nor dejected; does his work without the vanity of being its doer, acting with his body while his mind stays unattached. Calm by nature, he does good to friends and evil to enemies without taking either to heart, and looks on birth, life and death, rise and fall, in the same light.
The greatest enjoyer envies no one and pines for nothing, accepting whatever falls to his lot with composure. He "receives with his hands what his mind does not perceive", acts with his body without being conscious of it, and enjoys everything without taking it to heart. He watches the doings of mankind as an unconcerned spectator, craving nothing for himself. Pleasure and pain, gain and loss, do not move him; he greets decay and death, danger and affluence, with an equal and even cheerful eye, and holds the ups and downs of fortune as the deep sea holds its waves. Sour and sweet, bitter and pungent, savoury and unsavoury taste alike to him; "salt and sugar are both alike"; he makes no distinction between foods and yearns for nothing beyond his reach.
The greatest relinquisher has given up the thoughts of life and death, pleasure and pain, merit and demerit; he has dropped his desires and exertions, hopes and fears, and wiped his resolves from the tablet of the mind. He does not take to heart the pains that invade body, mind and senses, and so casts away all the troubles of mortal life. He gives up care for body and birth and the thought of what acts are proper or improper for him; he sacrifices his mind and all its functions at the shrine of self-abnegation; he lets the visible fall from view and keeps the objects of sense from intruding on the senses.
This, Vasiṣṭha tells Rāma, is how Mahādeva taught the lord of the Bhṛṅgis, and by these precepts Rāma will perfect his self-abnegation. Meditate on the spirit without beginning or end, which is this whole immensity and has no part or partner; nothing exists apart from it. Look always to the soul within, perform all outward actions with the outer members of the body, drop the sense of ego, and be free of care.
Passages from Mitra’s translation (1891–99), cited by book, chapter and verse.
“Place always your reliance in your unshaken patience, and neither care nor fear for anything else, and ever strive to be foremost in your action and passion and in your relinquishment of everything”“He is said to perform well his part, who is not affected towards any person or thing, but witnesses all objects as a mere witness; and goes on doing his business, without his desiring or deep engagement in it.”“He who does his works with unconcern and without assuming to himself the vanity of being the doer of it, is accounted as the best actor, that acts his part with his body, but keeps his mind quite unattached to it.”“He also is said to enjoy every thing well, who receives with his hands what his mind does not perceive; and acts with his body without being conscious of it and enjoys everything without taking it to his heart.”“He to whom salt and sugar are both alike, and to whom both saline as well as saccharine victuals are equally palatable; and who remains unaltered both in his happy and adverse circumstances; is the man who enjoys the best bliss of his life in this world.”“He who does not take to his mind the pains, which invade his body, mind and the senses, is said to have cast away from himself, all the troubles of his mortal state. (Because the mind only feels the bodily and sensuous pains, and its unfeelingness of them is its exemption from troubles).”In the textA single triple directive ("ever strive to be foremost in your action and passion and in your relinquishment of everything") is unfolded in a litany of nearly thirty parallel sentences ("He is said to act his part well, who ...").
In the clinicThe repetitive, parallel structure of a direct-suggestion script, and an unusually positive one: it prescribes an identity to grow into ("the greatest actor") rather than a symptom to stop.
In the textThe great actor "witnesses all objects as a mere witness"; the great enjoyer looks on "as an unconcerned and indifferent spectator"; Rāma is told to "look always to the inner soul within thyself, and perform all thy outward actions with the outer members of thy body".
In the clinicThe observing self held during activity, as in mindfulness-based decentering and self-as-context in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (Hayes, Strosahl & Wilson 1999); in hypnotic terms, a witness stance meant to persist with eyes open.
In the textThe best actor "acts his part with his body, but keeps his mind quite unattached to it"; the great enjoyer "receives with his hands what his mind does not perceive; and acts with his body without being conscious of it".
In the clinicDissociated action in Hilgard's neodissociation theory (Hilgard 1977), in which behaviour runs under a control system split off from the monitoring of awareness; the text cultivates it as a virtue rather than a symptom.
In the text"He who does not take to his mind the pains, which invade his body, mind and the senses, is said to have cast away from himself, all the troubles of his mortal state", with Mitra's gloss that "the mind only feels the bodily and sensuous pains".
In the clinicHypnotic analgesia acting on the affective dimension of pain: suggestions can reduce pain unpleasantness without changing sensed intensity (Rainville et al. 1997), the distinction between pain and 'trouble' that the verse draws.
Read upward — stage 1 at the bottom, stage 7 at the top
Integration zone
Pure-awareness trance and silent presence — not another state to enter but the ground recognised in every state. Jīvanmukti; Fundamental Peace.
Integration zone
Perceptual shift — the boundaries of things soften; consciousness expands past its usual partitions.
Integration zone
Post-trance integration — sustained non-reactivity carried into behaviour; what was seen in depth becomes how one lives.
Integration zone
Hypnotic absorption meets direct knowing — identity deconstruction at full depth. This is YVH's primary therapeutic zone, and the model's central testable hypothesis.
Integration zone
Progressive relaxation and deepening — the habitual self loosens enough for new pattern to take.
Integration zone
Self-inquiry joined to guided suggestion — narrative reframing and Socratic dialogue inside a gently focused state.
Integration zone
Therapeutic motivation — disillusionment with suffering becomes readiness for change. The first honest wish to be free is itself the induction.
A note on what this map claims. The alignment between stages of knowledge and trance depths is a clinical map — a heuristic correspondence proposed for research, not a claim of identity between contemplative attainment and hypnotic depth.
Bhūmikā 5 · Asaṃsakti
The conduct described is asaṃsakti in action: acting, enjoying and relinquishing while "not affected towards any person or thing" (VI.1.115.15). VI.1.115.38 (letting "the sight of the visibles" fall away) gestures toward bhūmikā 6, but the frame is engaged life (115.43).
Zone · Light
The stance is meant to be carried, eyes open, into daily action ("perform all thy outward actions with the outer members of thy body", VI.1.115.43), like a waking-trance set; its analgesic element (115.35) can be deepened in medium trance.
In Calcutta in the 1890s, the translator chose the vocabulary of hypnotism to name these states. More →
(Because the mind only feels the bodily and sensuous pains, and its unfeelingness of them is its exemption from troubles).VI.1.115.35Indications. Performance anxiety and perfectionism, where fear of the fruit spoils the act (115.11). Caregiver and clinician fatigue: doing the work fully without carrying it home (115.17). Chronic pain, worked on its affective side (115.35). Rigid preference and decision paralysis driven by what others will say (115.14, 28–31).
How to use it. As metaphor, the theatre image is the easiest entry: the client is invited to play the part fully, as "the greatest actor", while knowing it is a part. As protocol, the triad gives a three-stage script (act, receive, release) followed by a post-hypnotic suggestion tied to an everyday cue, for example the touch of the hands on a keyboard or a steering wheel, carrying the phrase of 115.43 into the day.
Cautions. Verse 115.19, "does good to his friends and evil to his enemies; without taking them to his heart", and the indifference to "common opinion" about right and wrong (115.14) describe the actor's equanimity, not a licence; they must never be offered as permission to harm, and in the room the benevolence of 115.27 governs their reading. Acting "without being conscious of it" (115.22) can reinforce numbing in trauma survivors and in clients with depersonalisation or derealisation: screen for dissociative symptoms, ground and strengthen first, and keep the witness warm. Not taking pain to mind must never delay medical assessment of new, changing or unexplained pain.
Practise with a qualified professional if you have a history of dissociation, trauma or psychosis.
Great Doer, Great Enjoyer, Great Relinquisher
Read aloud, slowly, in your own voice; about fifteen minutes. Sit upright.
Before you begin. This practice rehearses a way of acting, receiving and letting go. It is safe for most healthy adults. If you have a dissociative disorder, a psychotic illness, or trauma that still brings flashbacks or numbness, use it only with a clinician who knows your history. If you are in pain that is new, changing or unexplained, have it assessed medically first. Never practise while driving, operating anything, or in or near water.
How to return at any moment. Press your feet into the floor, say "I am here," count from one to five and open your eyes on five.
Sit, and let the breath slow by itself.
Ask the question the lord of the Bhṛṅgis asked: what can I rely on? Do not answer. Let the answer come as a weight, low in the belly, steady. Unshaken patience. Let it settle there, like a stone in clear water.
Now the great doer. Choose one task from tomorrow, ordinary, something you must do. See yourself doing it fully, promptly, well. And notice that part of you is watching, as a mere witness, the way an audience watches a good actor. The hands work. The witness rests. There is no need to say I am doing this. It is being done.
Now the great enjoyer. Imagine a grain of salt on the tongue. Receive it with interest. Now a grain of sugar. Receive it with the same interest. Salt and sugar alike. Now recall something pleasant that happened this week, and receive it; then something unwelcome, and receive it with the same even face, as the deep sea holds its waves.
Now the great relinquisher. One by one, set down the thoughts you carry. The thought of success: set it down. The thought of failure: set it down. Praise. Blame. The thought of what is proper for you and what is not. Lay each one down like a garland on the ground.
If there is any discomfort in the body, find it. Let the sensation be exactly what it is. And let the mind decline to pick it up. Sensation here; trouble set down. Notice the space between them.
Rest now in what remains, without beginning or end.
(Silence: one to two minutes.)
Take one phrase with you: I act with my hands and rest in myself. Say it once inwardly.
Now begin to return. Breathe more fully. Feel the weight of the body on the seat and the feet on the floor. Move the fingers and the toes.
One. The breath is full and ordinary.
Two. The hands and feet are warm and your own.
Three. The sounds of the room come back.
Four. Stretch the shoulders and the back.
Five. Eyes open. Fully alert.
Say your name aloud, the day and the place. Name three things you can see. If you feel at all distant, count again from one to five, stand and walk a few steps before you drive or work.
Meta Pets World · Your ally · Meta Pet 28
I embrace my dark side with love and courage.
Bhṛṅgī arrives in Purposelessness, tossed by the world's dark waves and searching for one certain truth to lean on. Śiva's answer is Totality: do everything, enjoy everything, relinquish everything, the bitter with the sweet. Its fruit is Immortality, the release from the very thoughts of life and death, which leaves a self without beginning or end.
Purposelessness is Bhṛṅgī's lament, adrift on the deep, dark waves without a harbour of truth, and Śiva's first word names what he lacks: “Place always your reliance in your unshaken patience, and neither care nor fear for anything else” (VI.1.115.9).
Totality is full participation without capture: the great actor “witnesses all objects as a mere witness; and goes on doing his business” (VI.1.115.15), and the great enjoyer finds that “salt and sugar are both alike” (VI.1.115.30).
Immortality is the great relinquishment of the thoughts of life and death, pleasure and pain (VI.1.115.33–34), so that whoever “does not take to his mind the pains, which invade his body” has cast away the troubles of his mortal state (VI.1.115.35).
Here is Embracing the Dark Side, and a question asked on a northern peak: what can I rely on? Śiva's answer: patience, then do, enjoy and let go of everything. Salt and sugar alike.
If you can do, enjoy and relinquish everything, light and dark alike, what holds you when even the thoughts of life and death are set down?
Tonight, write one honest sentence about a part of your life you have refused to take part in fully.
Light trance, eyes open if you prefer. For the full, deeper script, see “The practice” above and its cautions.
You embrace the dark side: today, as you did and enjoyed and let go, what embraced you?
Buryat-Mongolian · Lake Baikal, Buryatia · Om Tat Sat
Visit Oyuna, the Buryat-Mongolian shamanka of Lake Baikal, and say her Om Tat Sat as Bhṛṅgī might have on his northern peak: a word for the whole of what is, the dark water and the bright.
Guided Meditation
#28 · Embracing the Dark Side
Aim. To help the client meet meaninglessness not by finding a single answer but by participating fully in action, enjoyment and letting go, with an unattached centre.
ITM 5 Transcendent Integration. Śiva's counsel is integration in engaged life, acting with the body while the mind stays free (VI.1.115.18, 115.43), the hallmark of Transcendent Integration rather than withdrawal.
For a circle of 8–20, tell the tale and then set out two small bowls, one of salt and one of sugar; invite each person to taste a grain of each, slowly, as the great enjoyer would. In threes, each person names one task they will do fully, one pleasure or discomfort they will receive evenly, and one thought they will lay down. Guide the triple practice at light depth for everyone. Close standing, with Oyuna's Om Tat Sat said together and the affirmation.
Training and certification in the Meta Pets Method: metapetsworld.org/facilitators ↗
The correspondence between tales and Meta Pets is contemplative: the Yoga Vāsiṣṭha does not contain the Meta Pets; each tale enacts its ally’s arc. Felicia is an artificial-intelligence companion; her words are contemplative reflections, not clinical advice.
From the cycle The Sixty-Four Tales
Figure — The lord of the Bhṛṅgis, and Śiva of the crescent moon, who answers him on a northern peak.
Where in the text — Book VI (first half, Nirvāṇa-prakaraṇa), Mitra chapter 115.
Hypnotic phenomenon the song enacts — DIR and WIT, with DIS and ANA in the last lines: a litany of direct suggestion that prescribes full action with an unattached inside; the band drives like the great actor while the voice stays level like the witness, and at the end pain arrives and the voice does not take it up.
Mantra — Mahākartā mahābhoktā mahātyāgī bhavānagha (महाकर्ता महाभोक्ता महात्यागी भवानघ). Source: the Yoga Vāsiṣṭha itself: Śiva's counsel to the lord of the Bhṛṅgis, which Vasiṣṭha passes on to Rāma (Mitra VI.1.115.1 and 115.9: "ever strive to be foremost in your action and passion and in your relinquishment of everything"). Meaning: "Be the great doer, the great enjoyer, the great relinquisher, O faultless one."
Performance: the band plays full and prompt, the way the great actor works. The lead voice stays at one level from the first line to the last: no swell on the sweet line, no drop on the bitter one. The chorus is shouted by everyone. The bridge is spoken over a single held chord, then the mantra. The outro is sung almost flat.
Verse 1 On a northern peak, the moon's horn in his hair, the lord of the Bhṛṅgis bowed, palms together: "I'm thrown on the dark waves of this world — give me one sure thing to lean on." Śiva said: "Lean on your patience. Care for nothing, fear nothing; be first in doing, first in enjoying, first in letting everything go."
Verse 2 Do the deed that comes to you, good or ill, with no eye on the fruit; play your part in the theatre of the world and watch it as a witness; work with the body, keep the mind unhooked; quick when it's time, then still as a sage.
Chorus Do it all — with both your hands! Taste it all — the bitter and the sweet! Let it all go — wipe the tablet clean! Do it all, hold nothing!
Verse 3 Envy no one, pine for nothing, take what falls to your lot; take in your hands what the mind lets pass, watch the crowd like a man at a show; hold ruin and riches the way the deep sea holds its waves.
Chorus
Bridge (mantra) (spoken over one held chord, then sung) Sour and sweet, the juicy and the dry — salt and sugar are both alike. Mahākartā mahābhoktā (be the great doer, the great enjoyer,) mahātyāgī bhavānagha (and the great relinquisher, friend without fault)
Outro (almost flat) Put down the thought of living and dying, of pleasure and pain, of merit and fault; hope and fear, wipe them from the tablet. Pain comes into the body; the mind does not take it up. Look to the one within, and do the day's work with your hands.
Interpretación: la banda toca plena y a tiempo, como trabaja el gran actor. La voz principal se mantiene al mismo nivel del primer verso al último: no crece en el verso dulce, no cae en el amargo. El estribillo lo gritan todos. El puente se recita sobre un solo acorde sostenido, y luego el mantra. El final se canta casi plano.
Verso 1 En un pico del norte, con el cuerno de la luna en el pelo, el señor de los Bhṛṅgis se inclinó, las palmas juntas: "Me arrojan las olas oscuras de este mundo — dame algo seguro en que apoyarme." Śiva dijo: "Apóyate en tu paciencia. Nada te importe, nada temas; sé el primero en hacer, el primero en gozar, el primero en soltarlo todo."
Verso 2 Haz lo que te llega, bueno o malo, sin mirar el fruto; haz tu papel en el teatro del mundo y míralo como testigo; trabaja con el cuerpo, la mente sin enganche; rápido a su hora, luego quieto como un sabio.
Estribillo ¡Hazlo todo — con las dos manos! ¡Saboréalo todo — lo amargo y lo dulce! ¡Suéltalo todo — borra la tablilla! ¡Hazlo todo, no retengas nada!
Verso 3 No envidies a nadie, no suspires por nada, toma lo que te toque en suerte; recibe en las manos lo que la mente deja pasar, mira a la gente como quien mira un teatro; sostén la ruina y la riqueza como el mar hondo sostiene sus olas.
Estribillo
Puente (mantra) (recitado sobre un acorde sostenido, luego cantado) Agrio y dulce, lo jugoso y lo seco — la sal y el azúcar son lo mismo. Mahākartā mahābhoktā (sé el gran hacedor, el gran gozador,) mahātyāgī bhavānagha (y el gran renunciante)
Final (casi plano) Deja el pensar en vivir y en morir, en el placer y el dolor, en el mérito y la falta; la esperanza y el miedo, bórralos de la tablilla. El dolor entra en el cuerpo; la mente no lo recoge. Mira al que vive dentro, y haz con las manos el trabajo del día.
EN: Do it all, taste it all, let it all go. ES: Hazlo todo, saboréalo todo, suéltalo todo.
A rare thing in this book: a teaching that sends you toward life, not away from it. The lord of the Bhṛṅgis, tossed on the dark waves of the world, asks Śiva for one sure thing to lean on, and gets three: be the great doer, the great enjoyer, the great relinquisher. What is relinquished is not possessions but thoughts: of living and dying, merit and fault, and at last of the pain itself. The clinician knows this line between the pain and the trouble the mind makes of it; Śiva writes it as a vow. A band that drives, a voice that never rises or falls, salt and sugar spoken over one held chord, and then the day's work.
Source: Vihari-Lala Mitra, The Yoga-Vasishtha Maharamayana of Valmiki (1891–99), public domain.
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