When one takes no delight in anything, hates nothing, and is not contaminated

The equation of rāga-dveṣa—attraction and repulsion—governs ordinary psychology. The stillness that Vasiṣṭha describes is not affective insensitivity—“not delighting” does not imply an inability to experience beauty or joy—but rather the cessation of the lipā (adherence, contamination) that follows delight. In common experience, pleasure leaves a trace: a desire for repetition, comparison with past pleasures, projection toward future enjoyments. This trace is vāsanā, and it is what “contaminates” the mind. Nistaraṅga stillness allows delight to occur—the perception of a flower, contact with a loved one—without the mind curving toward retention or repetition. Then there is neither rāga nor dveṣa, because there is no subject accumulating experiences into a psychological estate. The Haṭha Pradīpikā (IV.66) describes this state as parama-śiva: the utmost benevolence, not as a deliberate virtue but as an impossibility of harm, because there is no separation between one who could harm and one who could be harmed.

The equation of rāga-dveṣa—attraction and repulsion—governs ordinary psychology. The stillness that Vasiṣṭha describes is not affective insensitivity—“not delighting” does not imply an inability to experience beauty or joy—but rather the cessation of the lipā (adherence, contamination) that follows delight. In common experience, pleasure leaves a trace: a desire for repetition, comparison with past pleasures, projection toward future enjoyments. This trace is vāsanā, and it is what “contaminates” the mind. Nistaraṅga stillness allows delight to occur—the perception of a flower, contact with a loved one—without the mind curving toward retention or repetition. Then there is neither rāga nor dveṣa, because there is no subject accumulating experiences into a psychological storehouse. The Haṭha Pradīpikā (IV.66) describes this state as parama-śiva: the utmost benevolence, not as a deliberate virtue but as an impossibility of harm, because there is no separation between one who could harm and one who could be harmed.