Page 238 - Complete Works of Dr. KCV Volume 1

The concept of dhi is at the back of the idea of Dhyana (Dhi-yana) which takes one beyond the lower levels of aspiration and enjoyment. It is sometimes identified with manas, or as a modification of manas. But it appears that this is the direct spiritual force of the Centre, a little different from the manas itself, since it is the inward-going force rather than the externally moving force. This makes for subtlety rather than grossness of presentation. It is centrifugal rather than centripetal. This force was used in dhyana or buddhi-yoga or utterance of the Vedic Gayatri - dhiyo yo nah prachodayat - which is called upon to ignite the inner ego of the individual that has turned upon its past outward movement stricken by misery, frustration, and deceit in enjoyment.
The modern psychologists recognize the mind to have the functions of cognition, affection and volition, but do not pay as much importance to the ego or personality which colours the three processes and is basic to all reactional and actional systems. Further, though they recognize the three- fold states of the human individual such as waking, dreaming and sleeping, their analysis of these is anything but complete or sound. These three conditions, as well as the three modes of consciousness, are, at their very base, dependent on the ego. The ego-awareness is identified by some with embodied existence, whereas there is every likelihood that it is something more than that - that is to say, the ego seems to have more bodies than one, such as the causal and astral, and the ego consciousness or awareness includes the awareness proceeding from the deepest or innermost body to the outermost visible body. This is well known in Indian psychological and eschatological thought.
The ego is the plurality nucleus fulgurated from the Centre, and lasts as long as the Centre is in this poise of stir (ksobh). The ego-made bodies are indeed many as the ego activities seem to take on many - as many as eleven poises, or conditions, or modifications. Each one of these may be said to form a ring or body. In the Nivrtti or Yoga, the lower bodies are slowly integrated or merged in the higher, till all are absorbed in the last form of the ego. This ego-awareness, and awareness of its eleven rings, however does not arise normally until the five material or apparently non-ego bodies are dropped. In Sri Ramchandra's Rajayoga it is possible on psychically crossing these outermost five rings.