Neither Aversion nor Attachment

Vijñāna Bhairava Tantra · dhāraṇā 101 · verse 126 (Jaideva Singh numbering)

Door 101Verse 126ordinary life · gapPracticeDraft · awaiting guardian review

Notice each like and dislike, feed neither, and rest in the open middle between them.

The verse

na dveṣam bhāvayet kvāpi na rāgam bhāvayet kvacit | rāgadveṣavinirmuktau madhye brahma prasarpati ||

Let one cultivate aversion nowhere and attachment nowhere; when one is free of both attachment and aversion, brahman spreads forth in the middle.

School paraphrase drawing on Jaideva Singh (1979), Christopher Wallis and Bettina Bäumer (as printed in Wallis's concordance); not a quotation.

Commentary

Singh: equality of consciousness (samatā) is the point of both verses 125 and 126; in 125 it comes from contemplating brahman's presence everywhere, in 126 from rejecting both aversion and attachment. Wallis: 'neither hatred nor craving'; the absolute unfolds in the centre.

How to sit with it

As you go through the day, or sit quietly, notice each pull toward something you like and each push away from something you dislike. Do not feed either one. Rest in the open middle that appears between them.

Where attention rests

Moments of liking and disliking, not fed

The open middle between them

Not a body shape. The map is two pulls, toward and away, and the open middle that appears when neither is fed.

Breath

Natural breath. Count about four in and four out only if it helps you settle, then let the count go. No forced hold.

The counts are an optional school pacing aid, not part of the verse. Hold is always 0: this school never adds a deliberate breath-hold.

Any steady, comfortable position (school addition)

Any steady, comfortable position: sitting on a chair, sitting on the floor with support under the hips, or lying on the back. Standing or walking slowly is also acceptable when that is easier. Choose the position in which the body needs the least effort.

School addition. Verse 126 does not specify a body position. The seat is a convenience so the dharana can be practised; it is not part of the technique and makes no claim of tradition.

Safety

Pain is information. Pause, regress, or exit. Never push through sharp pain.
General practice caution only; not medical advice. This is not suppressing feelings or ignoring danger; it is simply not feeding the pull or the push. If anything feels distressing (dizziness, agitation, strong emotion), stop, open the eyes and rest attention on the feet and the floor.
This door needs no particular posture: sit on a chair, sit on the floor with support, or lie down. Eyes may stay open.

Honesty

Door 101 follows Vijñāna Bhairava Tantra dharana 101 (verse 126) in Jaideva Singh's numbering. The door-to-dharana index is a School of 112 Doorways teaching device. Singh's sequence is one edition's count, not an ancient one-to-one canon. The seat, counts, reaction and beat scripts are school additions.

Door index = Jaideva Singh dharana number: Door 101 is dharana 101, verse 126. Other editions number differently (see dharana.numbering_variants).
The seat, breath counts, reaction metaphor, attention-map drawing and beat scripts are school devices, not part of the verse.
The English is a school paraphrase, not a quotation from any translator.
No medical claims. Reaction names are metaphors, not biochemistry.
New door researched on 2026-10-06 on branch research/vbt-houses-2-7; awaiting guardian review.

Verse verification: verified. Sanskrit: verified. English: school paraphrase. Review: pending guardian review.

The eight beats (spoken script)

Name the door. This is Door 101: neither aversion nor attachment. Vijñāna Bhairava Tantra dharana 101, verse 126.
Geometry. No shape to make. Sit, or carry this into the day. The map is two pulls, toward and away, and the open middle.
Orientation. Let the floor or the chair carry you. Eyes closed or soft.
Breath. Natural breath. Count about four in and four out only if it helps. No forced hold.
Attention. Notice a pull toward something. Notice a push away from something. Feed neither. Rest in the middle that opens.
Reaction cue. School image: an open space between two pulls. A metaphor, not medicine.
Adiyogi thread. Verse 126: cultivate aversion nowhere and attachment nowhere; free of both, brahman spreads forth in the middle.
Exit / integrate. Take a slow, free breath. Carry the open middle into the next like or dislike that comes.

Sources

Jaideva Singh, Vijñānabhairava or Divine Consciousness: A Treasury of 112 Types of Yoga (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1979) [Dhāraṇā 101] VERSE 126: numbering, translation and notes. Checked against a scanned copy (text extracted with pdftotext), not a print copy.
Vijñānabhairava, GRETIL e-text (data entry Marino Faliero, 1998) verse 126: Sanskrit source for the IAST (input errors corrected against Wallis and the Singh scan where noted in dharana.sanskrit_variants)
Vijñāna Bhairava Tantra: The Mystery Within (2019 compilation of translations: Bäumer, Singh, Chaudhri, S. P. Singh & Maheshvarananda, Silburn, Dubois, Figueroa) 'Session Two' list: 'Dharana 101' = verse 126 (numbering cross-check; follows Singh). Parallel-translations section labels verse 126 as 'Dharana 103' (disagrees; see dharana.numbering_variants).
Christopher (Hareesh) Wallis, Vijñāna-bhairava-tantra translation concordance, Part 2 verse 126 = 'Neither hatred nor craving (Y101 ~ B3)'. Sanskrit and parallel translations (Wallis, Singh, Dyczkowski, Bäumer and others) used for the paraphrase.
Gabriel Pradīpaka, Vijñānabhairava (Sanskrit & Trika Shaivism) verse 126: Sanskrit compared. Pradīpaka's text shares much of GRETIL's input (it repeats several GRETIL errors), so it is not counted as an independent witness.
School of 112 Doorways: seat, breath counts, reaction metaphor, attention map drawing and beat scripts School devices, following the House 1 conventions (doors/HOUSE-1-REGISTRY.md, guardians/CHECKLIST.md). research/PROMPT_TEMPLATE.md is not present in the repository at 32e76c4.

Pain is information, never a badge. Never force the breath. Practice is not medical treatment. The door-to-dhāraṇā index is a School of 112 Doorways teaching device (school_device), not an ancient one-to-one canon.