In the traditional idea of Shakti we find a blending of two elements, one empirical and the other speculative. On the empirical side the idea of Shakti is associated with cosmogony. It has been the un-contradicted experience of man from the dawn of understanding that there cannot be any origination whatsoever without the union of the two principles of Shiva and Shakti, the Male and Female aspects. The human analogy was naturally extended to the universe as a whole, and thus we came to the concept of the primordial Father and Mother.

In India, from the age of the Indus civilisation of Harappa and Mohanjoi-daro down to the present, the Father God is represented by a linga (the male symbol) and the Mother Goddess by the yoni (the female symbol). This conceptual representation of Shiva and Shakti by the linga-yoni is quite common and in many temples the two are worshipped in their symbolic form. In both Hindu and Buddhist literature the lord (male deity) is symbolically represented by a white dot (shveta bindu) thus suggesting the likeness with semen, while the devi (female deity) is symbolically represented by a red dot (rakta bindu) to suggest the analogy with menstrual blood containing the ovum.

Philosophy

From the speculative side it was observed that everything which existed, did so by virtue of its power or powers. So God who exists as the creator, preserver and destroyer of the universe must possess infinite power through which He creates, maintains and destroys. In. fact, His very being presupposes infinite power by virtue of which He himself exists. This belief is a universal one. Tantrics tend to view this power or universal energy as something like a female counterpart of the possessor of the power. Shakti, being conceived as the counterpart of the possessor (Shiva), came to be recognised as the consort of Shiva.

This is responsible for the fact that, not only in the Shakti tradition (believers in Shakti in whatever form as the supreme deity) but in almost all other traditions – the Saivas (believers in Shiva as the supreme) the Sauras (believers in the Sun), the Ganapatyas (believers in Ganesha), and the Vaishnavas (believers in Vishnu) – an important place is occupied by Shakti. There is seldom a god or demi-god for whom a consort is not conceived as an inseparable shakti.

A strong belief in this Shakti has brought about a popular synthesis among philosophies like Sankhya, Vedanta, Vaishnavism and Tantra. Sankhya speaks of ‘Purusha’ and ‘Prakriti’ as two independent and ultimate realities whose interaction is a mere attribute resulting from the contact of the two. In the Puranas and other literature. Prakriti is plainly conceived of as being the female counterpart of Purusha, and as such the two realities have been practically identified with the Shakti and Shiva of the Tantras. In a similar manner the principle of Maya (illusion) has been conceived as the Shakti of Brahman, These pairs were later viewed in the form of Vishnu and his Shakti, Lakshmi: of Sita and Ram, and later of Radha and Krishna. Thus, in popular belief, Shiva-Shakti of the Tantras, Purusha-Prakriti of Sankhya, Brahman-Maya of Vedanta, and Vishnu-Lakshmi, Sita-Ram and Radha-Krishna of Vaishnavism, all mean the same.

The philosophy of Shakti is clearly suggested by the two passages in the Brihadaranyak Upanishad (1:4, 1:3) where it is said that in the beginning was the Cosmic Being as the Atman in human form, who could never feel satisfied and content for he was all alone. So he desired a complementary aspect. His being was something like a natural point where the ultimate principles of male and female lay unified as it were in a deep embrace. He divided himself into two, male and female, which formed the first pair, and all the pairs of creation are said to be the replicas of this original pair.

These passages of the Brihadaranyak Upanishad have been used extensively in the Puranas, Tantras and later Buddhist and Vaishnava Sahajiya in which Shakti played an important part. Whatever has been created in this phenomenal process has been created from the union of the two- energy and matter, the consumer and the consumed. They represent the two aspects of the one non-dual truth, one internal and the other external; one illuminating, unchangeable and immortal and the other obstructive, gross and perishable.

Distinct mention of the various powers of God is found in the Swetaswatar Upanishad, in which it is said “‘Various powers are heard of this Brahman. It possesses power as knowledge and power as force or activity by virtue of its very nature.” (6:8). “Know Maya (the unspeakable mysterious power) as Prakriti and the possessor of the Maya as the Great Lord Maheshwara (a name of Shiva)” (4:10). “He who is one and colourless brings forth various colours through the agency of his various types of powers” (4:1), The possessor of Maya created the universe, and beings are fettered by his Maya.

Vaishnavism & Shaivism

The elaboration of this Shakti-vada is to be found in most of the Puranas, Upa-Puranas, samhitas and mainly in the Tantras, both Hindu and Buddhist. There is no systematic discussion on the philosophy of Shakti in the Puranas, even in the Markan day a Purana, which contains the Chandi, the most important text of the Mother worshippers in India; discussion on Shakti in the Puranas is sporadic and scrappy. The main discussions are found in Tantric literatures. So far as the Hindu tantras are concerned, they seem to have flourished in the two borders of India-Kashmir in the north-western border and Bengal, the easternmost province.

So far as the tantric literature of Bengal is concerned, scholars are disposed to think that none of these texts were composed earlier than the 10th century A.D. The tradition of the tantras in Kashmir seems to be earlier. The well-known Trika school of Kashmir Shaivism seems to have derived many of its ideas from the earlier tantras of Kashmir, some of which have been quoted and referred to in important texts of Shaivism. The Kashmir school of Shaivism most probably flourished between the 9th and 10th century A.D.

Some of the tantric texts must have been composed earlier but it has to be noted that some of the Samhita texts belonging to the Pancharatna school of Vaishnavism (sometimes referred to in the Trika school of Kashmir Shaivism) were composed earlier than the Shaivite texts, and the Ahirabudhya Samhita, belonging to the Pancharatna school, contains a good exposition of the philosophy of Shakti, though of course of Shakti as associated with Vishnu and not Shiva.

It has been said in this text that the ultimate being has two aspects, one of which is the inactive or negative state, where all his creative impulses lie dormant within Him, and the whole universe lies infinitely contracted in. Him as a mere possibility and potency. This negative state may be said to be a state of nothingness. Even in this state there is Shakti, but she remains perfectly absorbed in the Lord, as if in a union of deep embrace. With the urge of the first creative impulse, there comes from within the Lord, a determination (sankalpa), which results in his ‘willing’. This ‘willing’ of the Lord may be recognised as the first vibration of the Shakti – the first cosmic rhythm in the absolutely calm and quiet ocean.

When Shakti first wakes from her absorption in deep embrace, into the first vibration of activity, she acquires something like independence and tends to manifest herself in her triple functions of ‘willing’ (icchha), ‘knowing’ (jnana), and ‘activity’ (kriya), These three functions are symbolised by the inverted triangle, yantra of the Mother Goddess. Sometimes it Is held that Shakti is nothing but a figurative representation of the Lord, for the power cars never be viewed as being a separate entity from the agent that possesses the power.

The rise or awakening of Shakti therefore means the awakening of the Lord from his infinitely contracted state to the state of full-fledged ‘I-ness’. Shakti is thus the full ‘I-ness’ of the Lord. Her nature is infinite bliss. This Shakti can again be viewed in two of her aspects – the internal aspect in which she coexists with and is in the Lord (samavayini shakti), and the external aspect in which she, as Prakriti, and the repository of the three natural qualities, manifests herself as the external universe.

According to the tantric texts of Kashmir also, Shakti inheres in the Ultimate Being as a latent potency of infinite possibilities, as a seed of the future worlds, mobile and immobile. As the Ultimate Being is real and eternal, so is Shakti, who is coexistent with Him. The awakening of Shakti is something like a self-projection of the ‘I-ness’ of God which is accompanied by an internal process of self creation.

Shiva and Shakti

There are different views on the relation of Shiva and Shakti as propounded in the Puranas and Tantras. One view holds that neither Shiva nor Shakti represents the absolute truth; that the absolute reality is a State of neutrality where Shiva and Shakti remain in a state of perfect union (yamala). This is called the ‘samarasya’, where all things become one in a unity of blissful realisation. Shiva and Shakti ate two aspects of the one truth – the static and dynamic, the negative and the positive, the abstract and the concrete, the male and the female.

Another view holds Shiva as the Ultimate Being to whom Shakti eternally belongs. Nevertheless, neither Shiva nor Shakti is ‘real’ without the other. As Shakti cannot be conceived of without Shiva, so also Shiva becomes ‘shava’ (dead) without Shakti. The two are therefore eternally and inseparably connected.

A third view considers Shakti as the highest truth and Shiva as the best support for Shakti. Shakti is more important as ‘the contained’, while Shiva is the ‘container’. Shakti is the all-creating, all-preserving and all-destroying power of which Shiva is the adhara (base).

In some of the Puranas the male deity, as the Shaktimat (the possessor of Shakti) has been described as the male aspect of the Ultimate Truth which is Shakti. It is from this point of view that the Mother worshippers would give a subsidiary place to Shiva, where the Shakti as Mother is taken to be the highest object of adoration. In this, her sovereign majesty, the Goddess, is sometimes called Lalita Devi from whom the male deity proceeds as a transformation of her own self. Apart from this conception of the Goddess, Lalita often stands as the general Mother Goddess of India. She is called Tripurasundari in the Tantras.

Puranas: Chandi Saptashati

Shakti as the Great Mother and highest truth has found an elaborate exposition in the Devi Mahatmya, (Glory of the Goddess) of the Markandeya Purana, and this portion of the Purana, comprising thirteen chapters, is regarded as the most sacred text of Mother worshippers and is known as Chandi or Durga Saptashati. Here the goddess is seen as Devi and becomes well known later as Durga. The name Durga has been variously interpreted in Puranic and Tantric literature which means she is the Mother Goddess who saves us from all sorts of misery and affliction, from all dangers and difficulties. She is also known as Chandi the fierce goddess as she incarnates whenever occasion demands, for the purpose of destroying the asuras (demons) who may threaten mental peace and the heavenly domain of the divine beings.

Durga is the Mother Goddess whose worship during the Autumn is a most celebrated one. She is also worshipped as Annapurna or Annada (goddess of corn and food). In Autumn she is also worshipped as Jagadhatri (the maintainer of the world). During the Spring she is Vasanti (Goddess of Spring). In some Of the Puranas Devi is said to be worshipped by 108 names in 108 sacred places (in the Matsya Purana, chapter 13, it is said that, though she is all-pervading and underlies all forms, the devotee desirous of attaining perfection should worship her in different places).

In the Devi Kavacha of the Chandi, the Devi as Nawadurga is described as Shailaputri, Brahmacharini, Chandraghanta, Kushmanda Skandamata, Kutyayani, Mahagauri and Siddhidatri. Other forms of Shakti are Chamunda (seated on a corpse), Varahi (on a buffalo), Aindri (on an elephant), Vaishnavi (on the bird Garuda), Maheswari (on a bull), Kaumari (on a peacock), Lakshmi (on a lotus), Ishwar (on a bull) and Brahmi (on a swan). Many of the Shaktis are associated with different godheads, such as Varahi, Shakti of Varaha (the boar-god), Narasimhi of Narasimha (the man-lion god).

Some Shakti forms are also found within the Buddhist tradition. For instance, Tara, a popular Indian goddess, is also a famous Buddhist goddess, while Chhinnamasta may be compared to Vajrayogini of the Buddists.

The story of Chandi first introduces Shakti as the principle of great illusion (mahamaya) which prevents us from viewing the things of life and the world around us in their true perspective. It creates in the mind a fierce attachment to the world and thus binds us down to a lower plane of existence. But where does the principle of objective illusion originate? It is an aspect of the same divine power which is responsible for the creative process, and which is shaping the universe eternally to its end. It was there as one with the Supreme Being even when the cosmos was not, and it remains there absorbed in the existence of the Supreme Being even after the dissolution, as a potency, a seed of future creative manifestation. It has its sway, not only on all animates but also on the Supreme Being, and in connection with the latter it is called Yogamaya, the maya which is a direct part of the Lord.

Mahamaya, as the Mahashakti, remains absolutely inactive at the time of dissolution and this inactivity of the Shakti lulls the Supreme Being lo profound sleep in the ocean of causal potency. She is the Mahakali since she contracts eternal time (kala) within her and from her time proceeds again as an endless flow of creative vibration. It is incorrect to consider this power as being spiritual alone. She is ‘The’ power – spiritual, mental, intellectual, physiological and biological. Whatever exists is due to Her; whatever works, works due to Her.

(Courtesy : Yoga Magazine, Jan, 1991)

In the Rig Veda the goddess Usha is consistently associated with and often identified with the dawn. She reveals herself in the daily coming of light to the world. She has been described in the Rig Veda as a young maiden drawn by one hundred horses. She brings forth light and is followed by the sun who urges her onwards. She is praised for driving away, or is petitioned to drive away, the oppressive darkness. She is asked to chase away evil demons. As the dawn she is said to rouse all life, to set all things in motion and to send people off to do their duties. She sends the curled-up sleepers on their way to offer their sacrifices and thus render service to the other gods.

Usha gives strength and fame. She is that which impels life and is associated with the breath and life of all living creatures. She is associated with, or moves with cosmic, social and moral order. As the regularly recurring dawn she reveals and participates in cosmic order and is the foe of chaotic forces that threaten the world. Usha is generally held as an auspicious goddess associated with light and wealth, and is often likened to a cow.

In the Rig Veda she is also called ‘the mother of cows’ and like a cow that yields its udder for the benefit of people, so Usha bares her breasts to bring light for the benefit of human kind. Although she is usually described as a young and beautiful maiden, she is also called ‘the mother of the gods and the ashwins’. Considered as mother by her petitioners she tends to all things like a good matron and goddess of the earth. She is said to be ‘the eye of the gods’ and is referred to as ‘she who sees all’, but is rarely invoked to forgive human transgressions. It is more typical to invoke her in times of need to drive away or punish one’s enemies.

Usha is known as the goddess, reality or presence that bears away youth. She is described as ‘a skilled huntress who wastes away the lives of people’. In accordance with the ways of Rita she wakes all living things but does not disturb the person who sleeps in death. As the recurring dawn, Usha is not only celebrated for bringing light from darkness, she is also petitioned to grant long life, as she is a constant reminder of peoples’ limited time on earth. She is the mistress or marker of time.

The ancient Vedic tradition has viewed Usha as the harbinger of light, awareness, activity. People divided time into the form of day and night. At night all creation rests and in the day the whole of creation is active. The transformation which takes place from night to day is known to be the attribute of Usha, the awareness that stirs up the activity of creation, the light that gives sight to the eyes, that gives power to the senses, that gives power to the mind and intellect, Usha has been regarded as the light, or the dawn of human consciousness.

Another goddess commonly referred to in the Rig Veda is the goddess Prithvi who is nearly always associated with the earth, the terrestrial sphere where human beings live. In the Rig Veda furthermore she is always coupled with Dyaus the male deity associated with the sky. So dependent are these two deities in the Rig Veda that Prithvi is rarely addressed alone but almost always as part of the dual compound Dyaus-Prithvi, Sky-Earth. Together they are said to kiss the centre of the world. They sanctify each other in their complementary relationship. Together they are said to be the universal parents who created the world and the gods. As might be expected, Dyaus is often called ‘father’ and Prithvi ‘mother’.

In addition to her maternal productive characteristics, Prithvi usually, along with Dyaus in the Rig Veda is praised for her supportive nature. She is frequently called ‘firm’, ‘she who upholds and supports all things’. She encompasses all things, is broad and wide, and is motionless. Although elsewhere she is said to move freely, Prithvi with Dyaus is often petitioned for wealth, riches and power. The waters they produce together are described as ‘fat, full, nourishing and fertile’. They are also petitioned to protect people from danger, to expiate sin and to bring happiness. Together they represent a wide, firm realm of abundance and safety, a realm pervaded by the order of Rita, which they strengthen and nourish. They are un-wasting, inexhaustible and rich in gems.

In a funeral hymn the dead one is asked to go now to the lap of his mother earth, Prithvi who is described as gracious and kind. She is asked not to press down too heavily upon the dead person but to cover him gently as a mother covers her child with her skirt. The most extended hymn in praise of Prithvi in vedic literature is found in the Atharva Veda. The hymn is dedicated to Prithvi alone and no mention is made of Dyaus.

The mighty god Indra is her consort and prefects her from all dangers. Vishnu strides over her, and Parjanya. Prajapati and Vishwakarma all either protect her, provide for her or are her consorts. Agni is said to pervade her. Despite this association with male deities, the hymn makes it clear that Prithvi is a great deity in her own right. The hymn repeatedly emphasises Prithvi’s fertility. She is the source of all plants, crops, and nourishes all creatures that live upon her. She is described as patient and strong, supporting the wicked and the good, the demons and the gods, She is frequently addressed as ‘Mother’ and is called to nurse all living things.

Prithvi is also said to manifest herself in the scent of women and men, to be the luck and light in men and to be the splendid energy of maids. In brief, Prithvi is a stable, fertile and benign presence in Vedic literature-It is clear that those who praise her see her as a warm, nursing goddess who provides sustenance to all those who’ move upon her firm, broad expanse. The Rig Veda nearly always links her with the male god Dyaus but in the Atharva Veda and later vedic literature she emerges as an independent being.

(Courtesy : Yoga Magazine, Jan, 1991)

Everyone tells everyone else to obey. The parent tells the child to obey. The teacher tells the school-boy to obey. The traffic cop tells the motorist to obey. Even the State tells the citizen to obey.

It is only the wise guru who says ‘Surrender’. For, in the act of surrendering, is the act of both disobeying and obeying. It is like creation. Unless you destroy something, you cannot create anything. When you make ice from water, what are you actually doing? You are destroying this ‘state’ of water and are creating or making ice. The carpenter first destroys the wood to make the chair. Even the guru first destroys all the negativity in the disciple, so that the disciple can be led on the path of spirituality. Thus, obedience and disobedience are actually two sides of the same coin.

Disobedience – every step of the way!

In Patanjali’s Yoga, the eight milestones on the yogic path, maybe we don’t realize it, but we disobey in order to obey, at every stage. Let’s take asanas. If we try to sit still for some time, the chances are, unless we have been practising yoga, we will find it difficult. After a few moments, we will start fidgeting. We will begin to scratch our nose, drive away an imaginary fly, or even shake our ears! That’s because our limbs are obeying their natural instincts to keep moving. So asanas teach us to disobey our natural ‘way of being’ and to control our natural tendencies.

Now, the actual asanas too have disobedience inherent in them. When we sit padmasana, our ankles begin to ache. Our ankles are not used to being folded up. So what do we do? Gradually, stage by stage, we begin to sit longer and longer until we reach a stage where we have totally disobeyed the natural inclinations of our ankles, as we go on obeying our teacher.

Then we find that the very act of ‘obedience’ disappears, and we sit comfortably for a long time. What has actually happened is, while starting to disobey our inclinations, we have begun to obey the instructions of the teacher and gone on to a stage where we are no longer obeying anything at all. We are simply sitting in padmasana. We have surrendered our self to the asana.

As you are learning or rather ‘obeying’ the instructions about the other asanas, you find that your spine, your shoulder blades, your hip joints, your stomach, in fact, different parts of your body in different asanas grumble. But you ‘disobey’ what they don’t want you to do. Instead you go on with your practice. And, as in the case of padmasana earlier, you surrender yourself totally to the asanas, one by one.

Of course, all this does not happen overnight, but in a gradual, continuous process and as days go by, you cease even to notice that your limbs have totally surrendered to the asanas. The same process takes place with pranayama. You or that part in you disobeys what your breathing pattern used to be. You now bring in a certain regularity and soon, you begin to master the different pranayamas. From this, you can now understand that in order to achieve even sthiram, that unique stillness and steadiness you find in a yogic body, one has to disobey many ‘natural’ inclinations.

Neti, neti, neti

However it is not so easy, when you come to pratyahara or the withdrawal of the senses. Since birth, your mind has been ‘obeying’ the messages of the sense organs and acting blindly according to the sensations. In fact, like a disciple surrendering to the guru, the brain has surrendered to your sense organs.

In order to achieve pratyahara, you must teach the brain to ‘disobey’ the sense organs, which were originally created to warn the brain of things happening around. This disobedience of a habit from birth, pratyahara, takes a long time to achieve. In other words, in order to obey the fifth limb or stage in ashtanga yoga, you disobey habits or ‘practices’ from birth. It is a hard task to convince yourself. ‘Not this, not this’.

This sense of ‘disobedience’ is inherent in all the other steps of ashtanga yoga.

Disobedience in evolution

We all know that man and other living beings are continuously evolving. While other living things evolve physically only, it is only man who is evolving both physically and mentally. In fact, more than the mere physical evolution, it is the evolution of the mind or consciousness that sets man apart from other beings, though there is the same atman or soul in every being.

In the tree of evolution, man is sitting right at the top. And he has to evolve his consciousness into that of a divine consciousness. That is the ‘raison d’etre’ of being born a human being. If as apemen we had all been ‘obedient’ in our activities, not straying from the trodden path, we would never have evolved to the present state of consciousness. We would still be lumbering along, eating roots and berries, living in packs instead of in societies, and our bodies would still be covered with long hair.

Somebody at different times had the conviction to question ‘Why?’ ‘Why not this way?’ and so on.

And with each question came an answer in practical terms. No matter if the answer was not really an answer. But the very act rocketed man’s consciousness to the next higher stage of evolution.

Obedience as an act of surrender

Now, disobedience is one aspect of obedience, but implicit obedience is more militaristic. The sense of implicity, obeying without questioning, stresses only on the obedience part of the act. Thus, while one implicitly obeys, the consciousness may be independent of such obedience. Given a chance, one could question.

It’s like shrugging your shoulders and saying, ‘Well, these are orders’, as you might find in a business environment, a state or a political set-up or even in some theoretical religions which go by the book. To quote a book is to quote a rule and your obedience to the rule is limited to a particular time, a particular place or a particular environment. It’s like ‘when in Rome, do as the Romans do’. What happens when you get out of Rome? What happens when you get out of that age or environment to which the book was relevant? Logically, you are no longer bound by the rule.

You are Free

Yoga, as the path to spirituality, is truth for all times, for all climes, in whatever language you speak. Therefore, implicit obedience cannot be part of spirituality or yoga, unless it represents surrender to the living ideal or path of truth.

So, blind or implicit obedience without awareness is not the answer. Nor is surrender in bits and pieces, grass-hopping to different stages. Instead, we need a steady, maybe even slow, but continuous surrender with total awareness of the act of surrendering. We must go beyond the sense of mere obedience. We must learn to temper obedience with a sense of surrender.

(Courtesy : Yoga Magazine, Sep, 1990)

Nayatma balhinena labhyaya – This atman cannot be attained by the weak- is the upanishadic pronouncement. Obedience is born of strength, faith and devotion. I am an instrument and you are its manipulator. I move as you make me move. I speak as you direct. My doings are all your doings. In ananyaya bhakti, that is the state of unswerving devotion, the sadhaka submits to the spiritualised nature of an illumined one. He recognises nothing but his Lord, and his activities are ever directed towards the divine. He has no individuality apart from the Lord. Obedience is an intrinsic part of him. obedience without ‘self’ consciousness.

Hanuman, the most perfect example of devotion, strength and obedience, was able to leap across the ocean to Lanka on the strength of Ram’s name, while Ram had to build a bridge! Another example of a great yogi who epitomises this sublime state of obedience is Gorakhnath. Guru Matsyendranath, wanting to test his disciples, commanded them to jump from a spot which would have meant certain death. All the disciples took to their heels except Gorakhnath, who unhesitatingly followed his master’s command. He was, of course, saved by Matsyendranath’s yogic powers.

Like guru and disciple, mother and child are also psychically linked. The mother is the slave, and the baby is the divine master. When the babe calls, the mother acts without ‘self’ consciousness. As soon as the babe grows and begins to assert itself, the mother becomes ‘self’ conscious; duality creeps into the relationship.

Likewise, when a ‘self’ conscious state exists in the disciple, there are bound to be fluctuating states of obedience, according to the mental and physical imbalances of the sadhaka. It is this egoistic feeling that ‘I am the doer’ which leads to delusions of grandeur, imagining oneself to be indispensable. This retrogressive state leads the sadhaka downhill.

Before we can realise the role of obedience in relation to spiritual evolution, a stable base has to be created for the mind. Just as when we receive a mantra from the guru, and start practising japa, the mind oscillates from one thought to another. With persistent yoga abhyasa, the mind becomes calm and the trinity begins to take shape. You, your mantra and your guru all merge into oneness. In the same way, one enters the state of spontaneous obedience, where there is no awareness of being obedient. It is a state where the awareness of being obedient is not experienced, because of dis-identification between the thinker and the process of obedience.

This transcendental state of obedience becomes a way of life. No more conflicting thoughts plague the sadhaka. Obedience occurs spontaneously just as one leg moves forward and the other leg follows. No questions are asked; there is no analysing, no doubts or fears, and most of all, no making excuses and justifying one’s act of disobedience. In this sublime state, obedience becomes a role which the less one identifies with, the better one can play it.

This transcendental state of obedience can be compared with humility. Conscious humility in a sadhaka is a form of ego manifesting. A saint is cot aware of his humility; he is humility personified. In other words, awareness of obedience is a transitory stage which has to be transcended in order to obtain the higher experience. This can only be experienced when the ego is erased. There are no shortcuts. In Swami Satyananda’s words, ‘The aim of a sannyasin should be to merge his thoughts and actions with the cosmic will. One must try to follow the gentle voice of intuition, for it is this that whispers the instructions of the cosmic will.’

How do sadhakas, while living in a state of self-complacency, become aware of the cosmic will? When the mind is like a railway station, and precious moments are wasted in useless pursuits and controversial conversations? Self-complacency is spiritual suicide, cancer of the soul! Self-awareness is what distinguishes a man of spiritual calibre from a man of the world. The self-complacent sadhaka lives a life of lies, a spiritually diseased state, and on the road to obedience, self-complacency points in the opposite direction. Sometimes a sadhaka may obey through fear of the preceptor. The guru is then regarded as a rewarder or a punisher. In this diverse state, the sadhaka is unable to experience complete identification with the preceptor. A sadhaka may also be obedient in an ostentatious way, for show, for advertisement, or for self-glorification. These attitudes are detrimental for spiritual progress. In Swami Sivananda’s words, ‘Simply looking at the face of the guru is not devotion. Disobedience even in little things is not devotion. Indiscipline is not devotion. Self-justification is not devotion. Self-assertion is not devotion.’

A true devotee does not deviate from the path of obedience for any reason whatsoever. While being independent in thought and action, he is willing to follow the instructions of the guru and adhere to them. The sublime state of obedience is a stepping stone towards the path of samadhi. Sannyasins as ‘divine soldiers’ should be ever ready to march into hell for a heavenly cause.

(Courtesy : Yoga Magazine, Sep, 1990)

I was motivated to write this message after reading a passage from a newsletter written by some disciples who had recently had the darshan of Pujya Swamiji. The passage read as follows : ‘And Swamiji said, ‘I do remember you all. but I don’t want to, because it disturbs my sadhana’, and then Swamiji wiped his eyes.” This made me think that we, as disciples, know very little about Swamiji. How little have we been able to grasp in all these years of discipleship, if we still think that a person who has reached such a high stage of awareness is bound by attachment or emotion. While Swamiji was physically present, he was constantly teaching us, but how much did we, with our narrow minds, understand of it?

Swamiji has said that pain and pleasure are only manifestations of nature, and that pain is higher than pleasure. Bat are we ready to accept pain, are we ready to suffer for others even once? No, we only think of Our own comforts and facilities, of our own ego. And how much of Swamiji’s teachings do we practise? How much of the sadhana given to us by him do we do regularly? Very few people have actually kept up with it sincerely, and they are the ones who are not craving for Swamiji’s personal and physical darshan. Those few are the ones who have established an inner link with Swamiji and they are the ones who understand him better.

We all come to this world with our own purpose, and we do not need to envy others in order to fulfil our own desires. We must analyse our own attachments, our own passions and emotions, and our own samskaras in order to live a peaceful life. In order to do this, we must practise yoga as per Swamiji’s instructions. Practices like kriya yoga, raja yoga, bhakti yoga, karma yoga etc., are all very powerful, and we have had many experiences from these practices, although we may not be aware of it.

However if you really want to follow the path, it is very simple – just try to do what Swamiji has already told you to do. If you go through the Teachings books of Swamiji, I am sure that you will be able to mid the answers to all your queries. Start your mind working on a higher level through the means of yoga practices. Then you will be able to understand the world, and if you understand the world you can live with inner peace.

Swamiji received Paramahamsa diksha long ago. To fulfil his guru’s orders, he could have done something more simple, and it would have been sufficient. However, all that he has accomplished was for us only, to help mankind evolve spiritually. Now, it is our duty in return to see that the mission of yoga continues to grow all over the world. After analysing Pujya Gurudev’s teachings, we come to understand that he has given us everything. He has with great patience shown us the path, however, we prefer to remain blind. Why do we want his darshan? Oh, because we want to discuss a stomach problem we have been having for the last few months, or we want to know if our daughter is old enough to get married. Or, no, it is nothing like that, we want to ask him why it is that we cannot meditate; whenever we sit for meditation all these thoughts come into our mind. How many times has Swamiji explained to us the real cause of our disease? So why don’t we look into that and try to resolve it for ourselves?

Swamiji himself has said, if we were to get the darshan of God in our present state, we would still be asking, ‘Oh God, please help me to get my daughter married.’ Of course, you can always say, ‘Is it not natural that, as a disciple, I would like to have the darshan of my guru?’ But wait a minute, do you know if you are a true disciple yet? And if you are a true disciple, then why do you worry about his darshan? I am sure that if you are a true disciple, he will give you darshan without your craving or asking for it, and not only that, he will guide you, not just for now, but until the end of your life. It all depends on you.

These are things for all of us to think about. We still have time for spiritual development, and we should never give up our aspiration. United, we must try more than ever to continue with our spiritual life in the best possible manner and to have faith. We must remember that Swamiji is now at a higher level of yoga consciousness, and he does not want to come down again and again to repeat what he has been saying to us for so many years. This disturbs him and constantly breaks his inner awareness and sadhana.

If you think that Swamiji is unhappy because he is sleeping in the open air, on the bare ground, or because he is not going to see you again, you are completely wrong. Swamiji has always been a man of strong resolutions. Once he takes a resolution, he will never break it. Swamiji has resolved to become a jivanmukta in this life, and he will achieve it. We should all be proud of being devotees and disciples of such a great soul, especially in this era, when people like him have become very rare, and pray that he will continue to guide us from his higher abode.

(Courtesy : Yoga Magazine, Sep, 1990)

(An impromptu seminar at Ganga Darshan, January 1990)

Opening game

Stand up in two’s and we shall play a game. One person is the blackboard and the other person will write on their back. The blackboard should be very clean for writing on, so rub it well before commencing. Now write a number from 0 to 9 and see if your partner (the blackboard) can guess what you have written on their back. If they guess correctly they are very attentive. You can go on to write a letter and even experiment with other shapes depending on how attentive your partner is. Keep on changing round so both of you can try. In order to ascertain the letter, number or shape which has been drawn, you have to prepare your tactile attention because every sense has got its own attention. This game does not allow for absent-mindedness. You have to be constantly vigilant, constantly aware.

Constant

I shall give you one small instance in relation to Swami Satyananda Saraswati regarding awareness in simple everyday living. Some years ago Swamiji visited France for a seminar on transmission. It was held near Paris in a beautiful park in whose grounds stood a castle. Close to this park was a railway line. One afternoon, as we were on our way to lunch with a group of swamis around Swamiji, a train suddenly whooshed by. Swamiji turned to watch it as it sped past and when it was out of sight he turned back and said smiling but very pointedly, ‘It was a goods train with fourteen carriages.’

We were completely taken aback because we had only seen n train flash past. He explained that being attentive to the outside world is the best training for watching the inside world. Being attentive with the five senses teaches us how to prepare for ekagrata, one-pointedness, the finest aspect of dharana, and conversely, attention to the world within helps us to live more fully and attentively in the world outside. We should never be vague or uncertain to any of our interactions with life. We should even, as Swamiji once said, count the stars when we are out at night to keep our mind sharp and alert, keen and acutely perceptive.

In the Mahabharata, when Drona is training Arjuna how to become a fine archer, he trains him how to concentrate on the eye of the bird alone, not on the whole bird, sitting in the tree etc., just the eye to the exclusion of all else. This is one-pointed attention. However, there is another form of attention which has a panoramic view. For instance, in yoga, bhoochari and unmani mudra are practised to obtain such expansive attention. They develop the power of concentration and also of memory, apart from tranquillising the mind in preparation for meditation. You can see everything without seeing anything as it were, while being fully attentive in the process. This is multidirectional attention which is useful in life when you wish to have a very wide view of a situation. Then slowly, slowly it can close up to one point.

Is there some kind of opposition between attention and relaxation?

When a tiger is ready to jump you may think that he is very tensed for the spring but it is not so; he is completely relaxed. This idea that attention is linked to tension is a most false assumption. The best way to be attentive is to simply relax. In our society the reverse prevails; that in order to be attentive you have to be tensed. When your mind is tensed it is difficult for you to absorb anything being taught to you, but if we look at ‘Super Learning’ the process is to completely relax the mind through playing music and yoga nidra like techniques. In this way learning is made easy. However, by the act of tensing, you restrict all your sensory channels. Even when you wish to see from afar you should relax the eyes and not screw them up. So there is no opposition between attention and relaxation. On the contrary, the union of both is one of the great achievements of yoga. Relaxed vigilance is the best formula for learning.

Do you think the mind can be fully attentive to more than one task at a time or can we only concentrate on one thing?

Napoleon Bonaparte used to dictate four letters to four different secretaries simultaneously, and when he had finished dictating the fourth sentence to the fourth secretary who was writing the fourth letter, he would come back to the first letter exactly at the point where he had left off. His mind was so efficient and well-organised that he had quadruple attention. Of course he was an outstanding figure and this ability is very rare but it can be developed through the practices of yoga; and you will find that most yogis and enlightened saints have this ability to a very much higher degree than this great general. When we do kriya yoga we must be attentive to so many things maintaining the asana, movement of breath, visualisation, number of rounds etc., so we are involved in a very complex form of attention.

Is it not better to concentrate on just one thing at a time in order to develop attention?

It is a matter of awareness. When you expand your awareness and do many things at the same time, being attentive to all, that means you have achieved a high state of positive attention. However, when you try to do many things at the same time without being fully aware of any one of them, confusion ensues and instead of building up your attention you are destroying it. For such people it is better to concentrate on just one thing at a time to develop attention. So this is something yoga can teach- how to fix our awareness on just one point and how to expand our attention in all directions.

In France I have a funny little cartoon of an animal reading a book. It is actually an advertisement for a bookshop. This fellow is so engrossed in his book that he is paying not the slightest attention to the fact that his tail is on fire. So, the question is, ‘Is his mind attentive or unbalanced ?’ Certainly he is not a yogi. A yogi is attentive and alert on all sides.

Breath awareness for attention development

We shall close now with ten minutes of breath awareness. Take any comfortable meditation asana and become perfectly quiet and motionless. Be aware only of the breathing process, and unite your awareness with the flow of the natural breath. These two forces, breath and awareness, are moving together up and dawn the frontal psychic passage between navel and throat, between manipura trigger-point or kshetram and vishuddhi trigger-point or kshetram. Awareness is a force, a mental prana, and these two forces of mind and breath constitute our being. They move together within a path of power. Try to feel this movement with ever-increasing attention. Be aware of the energy as the breath moves up and down, up and down, up and down.

Now become aware of a third force moving. The breath is moving and along with it the prana is also moving – breath, prana and awareness. Feel them moving up and down in the psychic passage between manipura and vishuddhi. This movement of prana is neither heavy nor light, neither hot nor cold. It is not a physical sensation. Prana moves in the form of life. Come closer and closer with your attention to the movement of prana.

Then try to visualise the prana as it moves through the psychic passage together with the breath, together with the awareness. You may see it as a tube of golden light, or a tube of transparent glass in which the mercury is rising and falling, or as a beam of red or yellow light. Each practitioner will have his own particular manifestation. There is no set rule for this. The important thing is constant awareness of whatever you can see and/or feel – constant attention to the movement. Get ready to end the practice. Leave your awareness of the psychic passage, of the breath and the prana and become aware of your eyebrow centre – brumadhya, the trigger-point for the command centre, ajna chakra. Fix your attention there and try to see a tiny point of light or a tiny little star. Once you see it try to hold it steady. If you cannot see it you need more practice; it will come eventually. We shall chant Om three times together to end.

Om, Om, Om.

(Courtesy : Yoga Magazine, Nov, 1990)

Swami Sivananda Saraswati

Will

Will, if it is rendered pure and irresistible, can work wonders. There is nothing impossible for a man of strong will to achieve. The vast majority of people have no consciousness of will or mind or intellect. Their will has become impure and weak through desire. When a desire is controlled it is turned into will. Sexual energy, muscular energy, anger etc., are all transmuted into will-force when they are controlled, and the fewer the desires the stronger the will.

You will have to be very careful in the use of the will. It is always advisable to reserve the will force for the achievement of higher spiritual success. Worldly success is nothing. This life is a mere bubble. This world is a long dream. Worldly success will not give you everlasting peace and happiness. Try your will in one or two instances of worldly matters. You will understand and realise its power. Then apply the will in the realisation of the Self. Ignore mundane affairs. They are worthless like straw or dung.

How to develop willpower

Attention, power of endurance, overcoming aversion, dislikes and irritations, fortitude in suffering, austerity, lasting, keeping up a daily diary – all pave the way in developing the will. Patiently hearing the words of others though they are not interesting develops will and wins the hearts of others.

Never complain against bad environments. Create your own mental world wherever you go. There are some difficulties and disadvantage wherever you go. If the mind deludes you at every moment and at every step, try to overcome the obstacles and difficulties by suitable means. Do not try to run away from bad, unfavourable environments. God has placed you there to make you grow quickly. If you get all sorts of comforts in a place you will not grow strong. Try to live happily in any place under any conditions. You will become a strong and dynamic personality.

The practice of concentration is of great help to strengthen the will. You must have an intelligent understanding of the habits of the mind – how it wanders and how it operates. You must know easy and effective methods to control the wandering of the mind. The practice of thought-culture of concentration, of memory-culture are all allied subjects. All these are of immense help in the practice of will-culture. You cannot draw a line of demarcation to denote where the practice of concentration or memory-culture ends and the practice of will-culture begins. There is no hard and fast rule.

Those who want to become magnetic and dynamic personalities or prodigies should utilise every second to the best possible advantage and try to grow mentally, morally and spiritually every second. Idle gossiping should be given up entirely. Everyone of us should realise the value of time. Will is bound to become dynamic if one utilises one’s time very profitably. Application and tenacity, interest and attention, patience and perseverance, faith and self-reliance, can make a man a wonderful world figure.

You will have to apply your will according to your capacity, otherwise your will deteriorates. You will become discouraged. So make a program of work or daily routine according to your capacity and see that it is carried out daily. Keep only a few items. If you keep several items which cannot be executed in a day, which are beyond your capacity, your interest will slowly wane and your enthusiasm will gradually decline. Your energy will be dissipated and scattered. You will get brain-fag. Whatever you wish to do daily must be carried out to the very letter.

Nimbarka Acharya willed that the sun should not pass beyond the neem tree that was in front of his house: it came to pass exactly. Nalayani willed that there would be no daybreak; it came to pass accordingly. These people had strong willpower. If you also ‘will’ like this in the beginning when you are a neophyte, when you have developed your will to a very small extent, you cannot succeed.

Right thinking

Thinking too much is a hindrance in the execution by the will. It brings confusion, diffidence and procrastination. There is slackening of the force of will. The opportunity will slip away. You may hesitate to put the thing in action. Think for sometime correctly and then decide. As soon as you have resolved you must ‘will’ immediately. There must not be any necessary delay. Sometimes you ‘will’ and do not succeed. This is due to lack of right thinking and right feeling. You must think rightly and at the same time feel rightly. Then the ‘will’ is bound to succeed. Right feeling should invariably accompany right thinking.

Have a cool and balanced mind

He who is attempting to develop the ‘will’ should always try to keep a cool head. He should keep a balanced mind under all conditions. He will have to train or discipline the mind. Balance of mind is one of the vital characteristics of a developed jnani or yogi. That yogi who can keep a balanced mind at all times is really a strong and happy man. He will get success in all his undertakings.

Do not be carried away by undue sentiments and bubbling emotions. Control them. Reflect how a calamity or trouble or catastrophe has come. There is always scope for suitable effective and easy methods to tide over the crisis or trying situation. Develop discrimination and fore-sightedness. Many obstacles and calamities can be obviated quits easily. Do not brood over failures, defects and mistakes. This will weaken your will. Let the defects remain there. They will be removed quickly when the ‘will’ grows and becomes purer and purer, stronger and stronger.

Signs of growing will

Unruffled state of mind, poise, cheerfulness, inner strength, capacity to turn out difficult works, success in all undertakings, power to influence people, a magnetic and dynamic personality, magnetic aura on the face, sparkling eyes, steady gaze, powerful voice, a magnanimous gait, unyielding nature, fearlessness, etc., are some of the signs or symptoms that indicate one’s ‘will’ is growing.

Free Will

Man must learn to separate himself from the vehicles in which he desires, thinks and acts, to know them as part of the ‘not-self’, as material external to life. Thus, the energy that went out to the objects in the lower desires becomes the higher desire, guided by the mind, and is prepared to be transmuted into ‘will’.

As the lower mind emerges into the higher, and the higher into that which is wisdom, the aspect of pure ‘will’ emerges as the power of the spirit, self-determined, self-ruled, in perfect harmony with the supreme will, and therefore free. Then only all bonds are broken and the spirit is unconstrained by anything outside itself. Then and then alone can the ‘will’ be said to be free.

Memory

The subconscious mind

The subconscious mind is termed ‘chitta’ in Vedanta. Much of your sub-consciousness consists of submerged experiences, memories thrown into the background but recoverable. When you show symptoms of losing your memory as you grow old, the first symptom is that you find it difficult to remember the names of people. All the names are arbitrary. They are like labels. There are no associations along with the names. The mind generally remembers through association as the impressions become deep thereby. You can remember well in old age some passages that you had read in school, but you find it difficult to remember in the evening a passage you read in the morning.

The reason is that the mind has lost its dharana-sakti (power of grasping ideas). The brain-cells have degenerated. Those who overwork mentally, who do not observe the rules of brahmacharya and who are afflicted with much care and anxieties, worries, etc., lose their power of memory soon.

Only ten per cent of the mental activities come into the field of consciousness. At least ninety per cent of our mental life is subconscious. We sit and try to solve a problem, and fail. We look around, try again, and again, but fail. Suddenly an idea dawns that leads to the solution of the problem. The subconscious processes were at work. The subconscious mind is your constant companion and sincere friend. When you repeatedly fail at night to get a solution for a problem in arithmetic or geometry, in the morning when you awake you get a clear answer. This answer comes like a flash from the subconscious mind. Even in sleep it works without any rest, incessantly. It arranges, classifies, compares, sorts all facts and figures and works out a proper satisfactory solution.

With the help of the subconscious mind you can change your vicious nature, by cultivating healthy virtuous qualities that are opposed to the undesirable ones. If you want to overcome fear, mentally deny that you have fear and concentrate your attention upon the opposite quality, the ideal of courage. When courage is developed, fear vanishes away by itself. The positive always overpowers the negative. This is an infallible law of nature. You can establish new habits, new ideas, new ideals, new tastes and a new character in the subconscious mind by changing the old ones. All actions, enjoyments and experiences leave an imprint in the subconscious mind in the form of subtle impressions or residual potencies.

The samskaras are the root of causing rebirth and experiences of pleasure and pain. Revival of samskaras induces memory. When you desire to remember a thing you will have to make a psychic exertion, to go down into the depths of the different levels of subconscious and then pick up the right thing from a curious mixture of multifarious irrelevant matter. Just as the mail-sorter takes up the right letter by moving the hand up and down along the different pigeonholes, so the subconscious mind goes up and down along the pigeonholes in the subconscious and brings the right thing to the level of normal consciousness.

Memory-culture

The Sanskrit term for memory is ‘smriti’. Smarana is ‘remembering’. This is the function of the subconscious mind or chitta. The samskaras of thinking and acting are deeply impressed in the chitta which is like a sensitive plate of a camera. All the impressions are indelibly recorded there. If you have a clairvoyant vision or astral eye you can clearly watch all subterranean movements of these images in the subterranean workshop of the mind.

The following are the four characteristics of good memory: (1) If you read a passage and can reproduce the same. This is termed ‘sugamata’, (2) If you can reproduce the same thing without increase or decrease it is called ‘avaikalya’. (3) If you can preserve a fact or passage for a very considerable period it is called retentive memory, ‘dharana’. (4) If you can reproduce a passage at once without any difficulty it is called ‘upaharana’.

Knowledge of the workings of the subconscious mind is very necessary for those who want to develop their memory. It works throughout the twenty-four hours. It is the subconscious mind which wakes you up in the morning when you make the firm resolve “I should catch the train at 3 a.m.”. It is a most faithful-servant, provided you know the technique of manipulating it in a masterly manner. All the prodigies or intellectual giants of the world know the art of handling and tapping this portion of mind. Before you go to bed give orders to the chitta to do any kind of work. It will keep the answer ready for the morning. The chitta analyses, sorts and takes out all old records, from the various pigeonholes of the mind and produces a clear balance-sheet of facts for your perusal and review.

Brahmacharya, dietetic adjustment, and discipline of the indriyas are very essential for developing memory. The seminal energy has a direct, intimate connection with the cells of the chitta and brain. You should try your extreme level best to preserve every drop of your vital fluid. Bad memory is largely due to heavy losses of this life-giving energy. Japa, meditation, prayer, devotion, sirshasana and pranayama develop memory wonderfully. Sirshasana develops the intellect and helps brahmacharya.

Exercises for developing memory

1. Meditate on and assert :

“I have a very strong memory” – Om Om Om

“I can remember things now nicely” – Om Om Om

“My memory has very much improved” – Om Om Om

“I have a wonderful retentive memory” – Om Om Om

2. You can talk to your subconscious mind just as you talk to your friend or servant, ‘Look here, subconscious mind, I have forgotten an important passage in “The Merchant of Venice” and another in “As You Like it”. Bring them now in my memory. I want them very badly tomorrow morning. Do it quickly’. Give the order in very clear terms.

3. Practise self-analysis or self-examination for ten minutes before you go to bed. Sit comfortably on a chair. Close your eyes. Think of all the actions, good and bad, that you did during the course of the day. Think of all the mistakes you committed consciously or unconsciously. By daily, regular and systematic practice you will be able to visualise clearly the actions and mistakes of the day. The mind becomes sharp and subtle by the practice of introspection. It dissects, analyses, groups, classifies and brings the list of actions in the twinkling of an eye. This practice will develop your memory and reduce the number of mistakes.

Conclusion

First create interest in a certain subject and memory will automatically follow. One should be in perfect knowledge of one’s subject and have a general knowledge of all subjects. A versatile and all-round nature is laudable. Try to become a versatile genius. A strong and retentive memory or a powerful will, and the practice of daily concentration and meditation will certainly make you a versatile prodigy.

(Courtesy : Yoga Magazine, Nov, 1990)

Satsang at Ganga Darshan 5.12.89

The mere fact that we have accepted somebody as our guru represents our conviction that this person can help us evolve, and that commitment or that conviction is from the level of the spirit. When I see certain things happening on the outside and I say, ‘Oh, he’s really bad’, is that my spirit talking or is that my mind talking? If it is my spirit talking then there was never any connection with that person as a guru, and I could not have accepted that person as my guru. If it is my mind talking, it is because of certain concepts and ideas that I’ve developed in my life, that guru has to be like this or like that.

I’ll tell you of one real example. I had a student in the United States who was a very good person, a very nice elderly lady. She had been to many places and finally she had come to our ashram and she was really enjoying it, having lots of good experiences. She used to ask the swamis and other people, ‘Can I make him my guru?’ They said, ‘Well, that’s up to you. How can we say?’

One day some people invited me to go to “Big Mac”, you know, McDonald’s. Alright, so we went, in three cars, the whole class and there we started having our food. This lady also came, and from that day onwards she never came back to the ashram. I did not know why, so I asked other people, ‘ I haven’t seen her for the past two or three weeks, what has happened? Is she sick?’ They told me, ‘She can’t accept you as her guru.’ I said, ‘What do you mean? I never told her that I was her guru or anything like that.’

Then I realized the whole story. She had been asking other people if I could be her guru and before I could say anything, before she said anything to me, I went to ‘Big Mac’ – and that immediately changed all her ideas. How can a guru go to a restaurant? I said, ‘Well, if chat is what she thinks, she’s in for a lot of surprises.’ If the feeling is from the spirit, then guru is simply an enlightened being no matter how he is externally.

(Courtesy : Yoga Magazine, July,1990)

Manipadma Jena

Yoga in all its ramifications is much more significant today than it was a decade ago. An accelerated life style and the consequent stress and strain, both mental and physical, accompanying this mode of living and thinking has drawn man towards yoga, because yoga seems today to have, if not all the answers to modern man’s woes, at least the maximum number and most effective of solutions to his predicament.

In this growing popularity of yoga in all corners of urban India, yoga schools, and mobile yoga instruction teams and self-appointed yoga teachers (this of course is in direct proportion to its popularity in the West) have grown in number. But yoga is a science, not a form of physical exercise. Erroneous yoga practice could be harmful in the extreme. What is needed in order to satisfy the public thirst for yogic know-how is the establishment of authentic yoga schools staffed with persons who have adequate knowledge about the intricacies of yoga in both its physical, mental and spiritual connotations.

The three-day 8th All Orissa Yoga Sammelana was inaugurated on the 10th of this month in the Satyananda Yoga Vidyalay premises in Vidyut Marg, Bhubaneswar. The ground floor of the building of the Vidyalaya was also inaugurated on this occasion. An informative souvenir detailing the activities of the Satyananda Yoga Vidyalaya and carrying comprehensive articles on the yoga science was also released. The souvenir was inaugurated by the then chief minister Sri Janki Ballav Patnaik who has been showing keen interest for the establishment of this Yoga Vidyalaya here. Welcoming Swami Niranjanananda, the gifted sadhak of yogic science of the Bihar School of Yoga the Gajpati Maharaja of Puri and other disciples from all over Orissa and from Munger, the chairperson of the reception committee, Smt. Jayanti Patnaik, stressed the necessity of yoga as a part of modern man’s daily routine. In the face of rising mental turmoil and physical ailments, yogic exercises would to a great extent alleviate man’s problems, she said.

The Gajapati Maharaja of Puri has been consistently taking a keen interest in the establishment of the Satyananda Yoga Vidyalaya. In February 1987 he laid the foundation stone of the Ashram and participated in the bhumi pujan. During the inauguration he spoke about yoga as part of our cultural heritage bequeathed to us by the ancient enlightened souls of our land. Yet foolishly, we, in our blind pursuit of the Western values, have discarded what is truly ours. Only when the West has adopted yoga as a cure to their mental, spiritual, and physical ills, have we been re-inspired to claim our own heritage. He expressed the hope that people would incorporate yogic advice and practice into their lifestyle. Only through yoga, he stressed, would modern man be able to cope with life’s pace.

Swami Niranjanananda, the chairman of the Bihar School of Yoga kept the gathering engrossed with his speech on human nature, and the benefit of yoga.

Man, he said, could be differentiated from an animal because of the presence of viveka in him. Where animals live in a world of instinctive feeling, man is born with intuitive knowledge. By relegating this into the background, by donning blinkers as it were, to this God-gifted faculty man has called his woes on himself. Yoga, stated Swami Niranjanananda, could once again revive this intuitive knowledge. It would bring about a total integration of the mental, physical, physiological, spiritual and social aspects of man. This harmony is education in the true sense and could remove mental imbalance and physical illness. Hence, he urged, yoga should be incorporated as a compulsory part of school.

The misconception that yoga is a religious concept is to be removed from people’s mind, he stressed. This was one reason why the common people kept their distance from yogic organisations. Yoga is in fact, said the Swami, a spiritual concept- a means to bring about inner integration, a symphony of existence as it were. Yoga realigns the mind, develops concentration and mental power, and improves family relations among other things through its asanas, pranayama, mudras and meditation.

The last two days of the Sammelana comprised of question and answer sessions, bhajan, kirtan, yoga practice and discourse. Swami Swarupananda Saraswati and Sri Samarendra Patnaik, secretary of the Yoga Vidyalaya, along with others, contributed to the success of the Sammelana. The question-answer sessions were lively. Many misconceptions of lay minds were removed by Swami Niranjanananda by his lucid answers exemplified by common real experiences. The growing interest of people in yogic science was also evident through the nature and number of questions.

(Courtesy : Yoga Magazine, May, 1990)

Satyam School of Yoga, St. Albans, N.S.W. Australia 22.5.1988

Some people have taken mantra and some karma sannyas initiation, so I will give a few guidelines in mantra sadhana and karma sannyas sadhana.

We have heard and read a lot about mantra, and I think everybody has an idea of what mantra is. Mantra deals with the body, this composition of energy, and the energy field of the body has a vibratory aspect to it. Where there is energy, there is movement, there is some type of vibration, and vibration definitely gives rise to some type of sound. What type of sound we do not know. There are sounds which are beyond and beneath the normal range of the ears. The act of moving an arm creates friction in the air and a sound is being created for a moment. You do not experience the sound as such, but sound does exist as a form of vibration, a form of movement, a pulsation of energy. These vibrations are not confined to the physical body or to the pranic body, they are also in the realm of mind, emotion and intellect.

Yoga is very clear. It says that even when we think, waves are being generated inside the mind which produce definite vibrations and definite sounds. When we become introvert, directing our faculties of mind and perception inside, then the sound is experienced and it is known as nada, the sound of the personality, the sound of being, the sound of the self. This nada is the most subtle sound that we can experience in this dimension. It is not a sound that breaks, it is a continuous sound, and this concept has been defined in kundalini yoga.

When we look at the image of a chakra, we find that every chakra has a beeja mantra and then many other mantras attached to it. Beeja mantra is the sound which controls the chakra, but the other mantras around the periphery are vibrations which awaken or stimulate a particular state of experience of the chakra. Yoga says that the sounds are aksharas, which literally means ‘sounds which do not die’. From the birth of humanity until now we have been using sounds to express these sounds ourselves. We have been utilising externally. We have experienced the quality, the power, the effect of sound externally. In yoga we experience the quality, the effect and the energy of sound internally and the process of that internal experience is known as the mantra experience. This is mantra sadhana.

When we think, what actually happens is we hear the sound inside. Of course it is not that we simply plug our ears and begin to hear the sounds within the body, within the physical or pranic structure. It is a process of becoming more sensitive on the mental or psychic plane and finding the balance between the external and the internal consciousness. When we are eternalised we do not hear the internal vibrations and sounds. When we are internalised in deep meditation we do not experience the external vibrations or sounds. A special branch of yoga has been created which is called nada yoga. It seeks to provide experience of the vibrations of body, mind, thought waves, the desires, emotions and expressions simultaneously; all in one concise shape.

As you become more balanced, as you become more cantered through the process of dhyana (meditation), through the practise of asanas harmonising the body, pranayama creating some sort of organisation in your pranic structure, pratyahara and dharana giving balance to your mental and emotional expressions, then the awareness of nada as the vibration which is behind every action and reaction and movement commences. As long as we live in this world there is movement. When we are just sitting quietly, peacefully, the body does not move, yet the thoughts are creating waves, emotions are creating waves- there is movement.

We are surrounded by an ocean of movement which is taking place in different dimensions simultaneously. When we begin to chant or to repeat a mantra we begin the process of pratyahara which is the gradual withdrawal of the sensory perceptions, and then focus on one particular point. After the process of withdrawal is complete then focussing is total and there is no distraction or dissipation of any type- That is known as dharana. Then mantra gives the ability to achieve the state of dharana, un-fluctuating mind. It can then take you deeper into the experience of the un-fluctuating mind, which later transforms itself into the practice of dhyana.

The definition of mantra is therefore, ‘the force which liberates the mind’. So when we do mantra sadhana a special awareness has to be evolved in the mind and also in the body. It is not just a process of holding the mala and starting to repeat the mantra. Of course, that is acceptable, and we do say that you can repeat the mantra anywhere at anytime- while walking, while sitting, while doing anything in life, one can be aware of the mantra. One can be aware of the mantra expressing itself in every dimension of the personality at any time. However, there is a definite scientific process involved in mantra sadhana which is awareness, not only of the mantra which we are repeating inside our head, but of the effect that it is producing in our whole structure. The mind, the awareness, the consciousness has to become one. It has to merge with the repetition of the mantra. It is not that the mind is wandering here and there and the mantra practice is going on separately. Total identification has to take place with the repetition, with the experience and with the awareness of the mantra.

Swamiji has talked about the process of dhyana. He says there are three things which happen simultaneously at the time of meditation. First is awareness of myself as the practitioner. Second is awareness of the process – that I am practising this particular sadhana. Third is the state of dhyana, the goal that is set in front of us. When all three become one, when the meditative experience is felt inside and we lose body consciousness and mental awareness, and there is nothing but the state of experience – this is called dhyana.

With mantra this same principle applies. The only difference is that we are constantly aware of the vibration, the chanting and the effect. We become one with all this. We become the mantra, we become the living mantra. The mantra becomes a living experience and this is known as liberation of mind. When the concept of duality does not exist and there is only one thing, it is known as liberation of the mind.

Those people who have taken mantra initiation should remember that they should find at least ten minutes in every twenty-four hours where they can be alone, forget everything, and just do mantra sadhana. Initially you will have to become aware of the body, the posture, how you are sitting, whether you are comfortable or not. Initially you will have to become aware of the breath flowing up and down. Afterwards there is awareness of the symbol which has been given with the mantra. Awareness of the symbol is the final state of pratyahara. When we first try to see it, it is a process of pure imagination; we do not see our symbol clearly. When we hold a flower before our open eyes we see colour, we experience the form, the smell, everything, but the experience with closed eyes is different. However, when the mental experience becomes very strong and as powerful as the visual experience, then that is known as the termination point of the state of pratyahara. All the mental energies have been brought together, focused, and the understanding, the awareness, the experience has taken place.

So, after becoming aware of the breath and alter making an effort to visualise, to experience the symbol inside, then start with the repetition of the mantra inside in harmony with the process of inhalation and exhalation. The mantra and the breath are not two different things, they become one. It does not matter whether you breathe in slowly and deeply or if your breath is short and shallow. The mantra has to merge totally with the breath, that is all. This is the first effort of the mantra sadhak. You do this practice for ten minutes every day and when it is finished again eternalise yourself. There is no change in the lifestyle, no change in the thinking pattern. We are not trying to create any change, we are just trying to develop an experience of the mantra. When that experience is awakened it develops by itself and then the changes take place automatically, spontaneously.

Now regarding karma sannyasa. It is an attitude towards life. Those of you who have been initiated have been told very clearly that you have been initiated on behalf of Swami Satyananda and you have to keep his ideals and his mission in mind, which is yoga not as a form of spiritual sadhana, but yoga as a part of our day to day existence. The whole of life then becomes an experience of yoga. There is no separation. It isn’t just ‘every morning I get up and practise asana, pranayama, kriya, meditation’. These are yoga practices, they are not yoga. Yoga means the experience of unity, the experience of harmony and balance in all the strata of our personality. When you become aware of this process throughout the material, the mental, the emotional, the intellectual and the intimate experiences, closer than husband or wife, this is yoga.

Now, what do we expect to get out of yoga? By having this other awareness of matter, energy and consciousness; by understanding the process of body, prana, mind, ego and the super-consciousness, our dharma undergoes a total transformation. We cannot necessarily say that they become more spiritual, but we can say that they become more balanced. Only to have spiritual development is a lopsided development of human nature. Only to have development of the material aspect is also lopsided, unbalanced. Therefore, as sannyasi or karma sannyasi, we are definitely not concerned with either our spiritual state of mind nor our gross state of mind alone, but we are more concerned with trying to bring about a balance in the experience of matter and spirituality.

You have heard of karma yoga; in the life of a spiritual aspirant, if one practises true yoga at all, then it is karma yoga. When I say karma yoga, I do not mean going out to the field and working there until blood and sweat become one; that is only one aspect of it. The true spirit of karma yoga means that every action in life, whether physical, social or intellectual -the thoughts, the analytical and critical processes of the mind, or emotional feelings of anger, frustration, depression, anxiety, hatred, greed, or spiritual experiences of being in harmony, in tune with the self – everything is analysed together. They are observed, they are experienced and they are transcended. That is the spirit of karma yoga- total involvement in the fulfilment of our commitments, obligations, duties, the dharma.

Many people think that dharma means a system, a religion, a philosophy, but it does not mean that at all. There are two types of dharma. One is Sanatana dharma, the eternal duty, the commitments, responsibilities which never change according to the laws of nature and the laws of the divine. The other is the dharma which is relevant to the present time. It might change after a month, after a few years- the ideas, the commitments, the duties, all these things might change after a few centuries. However, the whole thrust here has been aimed at understanding one’s obligations and commitments. We are to improve them, to experience, not neglect them or avoid them. So being established in the dharma is the objective of karma sannyasa.

Karma sannyasa is, of course, more difficult than the process of sannyasa because in full sannyasa there is total dedication to the guru and he manages all your affairs. In karma sannyasa you maintain your spiritual identity and your external identity, and by maintaining both of these identities together you progress further in life. When both the identities, the internal and external, move side by side, we find a centre inside. We then experience the centre of our being.

You know there are two processes. One process is known as the process of becoming; we become, there is effort. Another is the process of being what we are. Full sannyasa is the process of becoming; we become. We become the instrument of the guru and he uses us in the way he thinks fit. Karma sannyasa is the process of being. You are where you are; there is no change. Only one thing is necessary, and that is to have a spiritual awareness. And what is that spiritual awareness?

We can say that the identity of Swami’ is the first spiritual awareness; the identity of ‘Saraswati’ is the second; the name, such as Niranjanananda, this or that is the third spiritual identity that one can have. Swami means ‘one who is master of himself. Of course it is an idea, which we try to approach in the best possible way- It is like obtaining a doctorate degree but you are given the degree first- okay, you can call yourself ‘doctor’ with hopes that you will now do your thesis.

The thesis that a swami has to do is a life long process of self-discovery in which he gains control over the body, the mind and the spirit, the actions of head, heart and hand, the emotions and the intellect.

So, no matter what state of experience you are in, whether it is full of tension and conflict; full of bliss, joy and happiness, or whether it is nothingness, you are understanding it as a swami. ‘I am master of the body. I am not this mind, I am master of the mind, I am not the spirit. I am master of the spirit’. This concept leads to an understanding of transcendental awareness.

Somebody asked Swamiji whether it is possible to experience transcendental consciousness in this life. Swamiji simply said; ‘No’. You might be thinking now, ‘Then what is the purpose? What is the use?’ You want to experience something. But Swamiji went further, he said, ‘If the transcendental mind can be understood by our limited mind, then it would not be called transcendental. In order to experience the transcendental consciousness it is necessary to have a transcendental brain and a transcendental mind.’ So the idea of being a swami is achieving this state. This is the first spiritual identity. From there we observe everything, we become the witness, we become the experiencer.

The second identity is of Saraswati. This is a tradition, an order to which the swamis and karma sannyasins belong. The symbolic representation of Saraswati is the goddess of learning, knowledge and wisdom. What does this mean? Never have tunnel vision. Always see everything. Never say one thing is right and everything else is wrong. That is against the principles of gyana (wisdom), because wisdom encompasses everything.

The third spiritual identity is of the name. The name which is given seems the most suitable one for our personality which is eh pressed outwardly now. For this expressed identity, the name symbolises the aim, the goal. For this body, for this head, for this action, we have a goal We have to experience this, whatever the name may be.

The fourth identity is of course the geru. This is the spiritual identity as well as the external flag of a sannyasi. It is the symbolic representation of fire. Fire can consume anything that you throw into it and yet remain unaffected. Of course if you throw in damp wood lots of smoke will come out through your ears and eyes and nose and mouth. Sometimes black smoke will come out, sometimes stench will come out, that is a different matter. Fire consumes everything- that is the idea. The mind, the personality, the attitude of a sannyasi or a karma sannyasi is of fire.

Remain unaffected. Consume everything, all the bad that the world throws at you, that your mind throws at you and all the good that the world throws at you, that your mind throws at you. There is no negation of one and no acceptance of the other. If there is negation of the bad and acceptance of the good then we are no different. Normal people get shaken up when bad things are thrown at them and they are elated when good things are given to them. If we remain like that even after we have taken sannyasa, if there is not going to be any change, then it is better not to be a sannyasi or a karma sannyasi. Therefore the awareness of fire becomes the fourth symbolic awareness of spirituality, the spiritual identity, these are the various states of experience of a karma sannyasi.

The sadhana of a karma sannyasin is the witnessing sadhana. Sit down comfortably and just observe. Observe what you are experiencing physically and consume it in the fire. Understand it, express it, transcend it. Even when you reach the spiritual level, that also you should understand, express and transcend. Sitting in meditative posture, with the eyes closed, one part of the awareness is separate and it observes everything which is going on in the other areas. Even if you are in a very stressful and tense situation or experiencing very deep conflict with conflicting samskaras, one part of the awareness should always be observing. No matter what you are experiencing or what condition in life you are expressing, always be observant. You are the seer, the drastha. This is the sadhana, for the awakening of a karma sannyasin.

(Courtesy: Yoga Magazine, July, 1990)