The Bhagavad Gita by Eknath Easwaran

╭ chapter five
very deep, breathing becomes slow, steady, and even, and the
windows of the senses close to all outward sensations. Next
the faculties of the mind quiet down, resting from their
usually frantic activity; even the primal emotions of desire,
fear, and anger subside. When all these sensory and emotional
tides have ceased to flow, then the spirit is free, mukta
– at least for the time being. It has entered the state called
samadhi.
Samadhi can come and go; generally it can be entered only
in a long period of meditation and after many years of ardent
endeavor. But one verse (5:28) adds the significant word sada,
“always.” Once this state of deep concentration becomes
established, the person lives in spiritual freedom, or moksha,
permanently. This is extremely rare. Mystics of the West as
well as the East have attained brief glimpses of unity, but very
few can be said to have dwelt in it permanently, as if it were
their natural habitat. In the West the most prominent figures
are Meister Eckhart, St. Teresa of Avila, and St. John of the
Cross, though there have been others. In the Hindu tradition
there is a long line of saints and mystics who have tried
to communicate something of the nature of this union with
Reality or God, from the unknown recorders of the Upanishads
through the Buddha, Shankara, and Meera, to Ramakrishna
and Ramana Maharshi.
– d.m.
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