Om is the arrow, and Brahman is the target.
The entire creation is bound up with name and form and is thus unreal. It can be described in words, so it is limited and circumscribed by the intellect and the mind.
Only the supreme Person (Parama-purusha) is eternal, real, and pure. He is the prompter of activity and the dispenser of consequence. But He is beyond the eye, beyond the intellect. Like the spokes of a wheel that radiate from the hub, that lead from all directions to the centre, all creation radiates from Him.
The mind is the instrument to reach the central hub and know that all spokes radiate from it. Brahman is the target to be reached by the arrow-mind. Have your mind xed on the target and, using the Upanishadic teaching as the bow, shoot straight and hard, to hit the Brahman and master. Om (Pranava) is the arrow; Brahman is the target.
The Brahman illumines the individual soul (jivi) by getting re ected in the inner consciousness (an-thah- karana).
One has only to turn that consciousness away from the objective world, contact with which contaminates the mind. Now, train the inner consciousness to meditate on the Om with single-pointed attention.
Meditate on the Atma as unaffected by the individual, though It is in one and with one and activating one. Meditate on Him in the heart, from which countless subtle nerves (naadis) radiate in all directions. If this process is followed, one can attain spiritual wisdom (jnana).
