Focus on fire
Just lie down. First conceive of yourself as dead; the body is just like a corpse. Lie down, and then bring your attention to the toes. With closed eyes move inwards. Bring your attention to the toes and feel that the fire is rising from there upwards, everything is being burned. As the fire rises, your body is disappearing. Start from the toes and move upwards. Why start from the toes? It will be easier, because the toes are very far away from your I, from your ego. Your ego exists in the head. You cannot start from the head, it will be very difficult, so start from the far away point. The toes are the most far away point from the ego. Start the fire from there. Feel that the toes are burned, only ashes remain, and then move slowly, burning everything that the fire comes across. Every part – the legs, the thighs – will disappear. And just go on seeing that they have become ashes. The fire is rising upwards, and the parts it has passed are no more there; they have become ashes. Go on upwards, and lastly the head disappears. Everything has become… the dust has fallen unto dust… until the body burns to ashes but not you. You will remain just a watcher on the hill. The body will be there – dead, burned, ashes – and you will be the watcher, you will be the witness. This witness has no ego. You are neither the mind nor the body.
Before first go and meditate on the burning ghat, on the burning ground, so you can see how the body burns, how the body turns to dust again – so you can imagine easily. Right before entering the technique, for fifteen minutes exhale and close the eyes; allow the body to inhale and open the eyes. For fifteen minutes feel a deep relaxation and then enter into it.
The inner mechanism is very complex. Memories are part of the body & is matter; that’s why it is recorded in the brain cells. If really you go deep in the feeling that the body is dead, burning, and the fire has completely destroyed it, you will not have any memory in that moment. In that moment of watching, there will be no mind. Everything will have stopped – no movement of thought, just watching, just seeing what has happened. And once you know this, you can remain in this state continuously. Once you have known that you can separate yourself from the body…This is just a method to separate yourself from the body, just to create a gap between you and the body, just for a few moments to be out of the body. You are different from all that surrounds you and also from your periphery.