On Being Yogic
This article comes to me through various discussions in the past weeks on the topic. I find, particularly among yoga practitioners who are familiar with the philosophy of yoga, that a set of rules are adopted and life stops being free. A new set of controls are created that become so similar to organized religion which most committed yogi’s are set to avoid. Yoga becomes an external lifestyle based on these rules and regulations and no longer a practice of Union.
In the 8 limbs of yoga, the first two limbs, Yamas and Niyamas outline outward and inward practices respectively in order to attain Bliss, which is my understanding of Union. These practices are guidelines to living and I think they are profound, I just think most of us stop at ahimsa (non-violence) – outwardly, because it is tangible and easier to master and also easier to show the fruits of our labour through.
This doing of Yogic lifestyle instead of being Yogic and therefore affecting our lifestyle has become clear to me recently, through intellectual observation, and I am still learning to not fill my intellect with ideas and notions as I think this is where half the problem arises. Nonetheless, Lent came around this year, and sometimes I participate in Lent as a personal offering and sacrifice, 40 days of giving up something…I usually succeed because of the spiritual impetus behind my intention. I also usually give up something tangible – sweets, meat, and alcohol. This year I decided to give up something different – I gave up negative thoughts. I am not sure I succeeded. I observed some negative thinking, and sometimes, I pretty much know that I forgot it was Lent altogether. Doing outwardly being so much easier than not doing inwardly.
I could recycle, I could use electricity saving light bulbs, I could save the earth – these could all be testament to my choice to live a physical yogic lifestyle, but these are things I am NOT doing. Though they do count, I just don’t know how much. I think the focus of being “good” is about the external measure of my labour, so I have to ask the question, would it not be much better to achieve 40 days of no negative thinking than 40 days of using the water saving toilet flush mechanism? For me, on my path, I strive to achieve the former, but in this trying, I again create discord. I am not naturally there yet…
Union, I believe is when there is no discord within our being (not trying to be what we are not naturally i.e. without intellectual decision making). I liken this experience to a radio that is out of tune, the fuzz of disconfigured sound is usually the backdrop of our lives as we try our best to be yogic and to live a purposeful life, against our own Nature. The white noise is the duality of trying to be something we are not, of trying to do instead of BE.
I create my own buzz of background noise because through yoga philosophy I struggle with understanding how to be content for example, how to be always balanced in mind and body when life is happening to me. I realized that for a long time I avoided with all my being, anything that LOOKED out of balance. So the fire of my anger was drowned, the water of my vulnerability was evaporated – all so I could appear outwardly in balance. I wonder, like I often say in tree pose, Vrksasana, life is not about being in balance, but about learning to return to balance without reaction or resistance being the internal – mental (or deeper sensational) response to falling out of balance. It seems that in trying so hard to be in balance, I pull myself more and more out of balance with the Divine – I create a lot more mental activity that is not positive – directed to me or out into the Universe. It seems that in trying to be in balance I strain against the rhythm of life and am no longer free.
Krishnamurti in his book, Freedom from the Known, expresses that true Freedom is the free-flow of everything through your mind and body – unreacted to, unchecked, unedited. When we start to censor ourselves toward an ideal, we create the noise of duality and this suppression veils our True Selves. When we live in truth to what is, even if it looks “bad” then we start to embrace living in Union with the Divine, we start to return the pendulum from its extreme swings to a neutral place (without any particular DOING!) Because, despite how it looks, in THAT very moment, we are in Union with the Truth, by accepting what is (contentment?) and there is no signal out to the Universe that is cluttered or unclear. The Truth is a perfect broadcast of each moment as it is!
Our thoughts are energy, energy that cannot be created or destroyed and yet we focus more on our outward actions, almost victim or resigned to the internal world. Mindfulness speaks of being witness, observer to all that is. I believe in my attempts to be yogic, although I can also witness that, I am no longer mindful. I am doing my life and not being my Self.
We practice awareness, but it is easier to be aware of how much fuel we are using and therefore must plant trees than how many negative vibes we have sent into the Universe that also affect our Earth, our lives and others’.
I think that everything we can do is good. I just have to wonder if the focus is not misplaced. I wonder if I left myself to my own devices, who I would BE? I wonder if I stopped filling my intellect with ideas and notions of philosophy, how my life would look? In striving to be so good and yogic, I have become the very antithesis of YOGA.
And my yoga practice can be more observation and less of everything else.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Mystery of Being Me
The Mystery of Being ME
Have you spent your adult life searching, trying to uncover how to live your life? Have you read books on this subject only to learn their solution to despair or feeling that something is missing in life is always: Know Thyself? Do you feel that there is a huge mystery that is YOU that needs to be unraveled and the obstruction, that the mystery doesn’t really want to be revealed, making life an obstacle course of trickery and veils and illusion that you feel you have to win over?
Many of us feel that we don’t have the tools to unravel the big mystery of who is “I am”, and that if for one moment we cast an unconscious eye in any direction we might miss the biggest clue of life and stay trapped in the darkness forever. This causes a heavy fear of missing that one big opportunity to understand “myself”. Fear causes procrastination. Fear becomes waiting. Waiting for some benevolent act of God to show us what we need to know. Fear that this act of God may never happen to ME. It seems that many of us still hold a belief system that God is only benevolent if ‘I am good’! And this belief system comes often from either religion or yoga philosophy! Unfortunately, in the vedic era of yoga, rites and rituals were engaged for the purposes of finding favor with God, to have God bestow luck and bounty upon the yogi and community. The mindset of our practice on the mat and in life easily diverts to action to win favor from the Gods for the purpose of getting the clues to know “myself”. This striving for perfection in intention, attention, and thoughts, words and deeds to earn and to deserve to receive favor or to avoid the threat of discredit from the heavens is a heavy burden to bear. (And sometimes it is not the Heavens we fear but our own reflection in our friends and family!)
How much fear is ruling your life? What belief systems are you stuck in? Reflecting on this answer takes you into that maze of ‘know myself?’. More importantly, is your mantra that you think you don’t know yourself and still have a long way to go, or can you simply now embrace yourself?
Neale Donald Walsh in Book 2 of Conversations with God puts the power back in the individual’s own hands. His idea is that there is NO obscure TRUTH to UNRAVEL, but rather a TRUTH TO CREATE.
The duality that is made clear in this article outlines the option of adopting a passive versus proactive life philosophy. The passive option is to be your observer – the yoga journey of self-realization. The proactive option is to be the creator – ‘The Secret’ inspired journey. “Thoughts become things” are the famous 3 words for realizing the life you want to live by Mike Dooley of The Secret. The life you live is a representation of your “I am” consciousness, it’s the manifestation of your inner self, not what you do but how you do it!
Yes, yoga clarifies the relationship with “myself” through observing the internal dialogue and the experience and relationship with ‘me’ on the mat. Being on the mat in yoga, you see what goes on inside, and so learn about your subtle madness and idiosyncratic belief systems that you wouldn’t believe if a stranger pointed them out. But taking yourself so close to the center of your own crazy can become a self-obsessed egocentric focus and a life-destructive process. Being the observer or witness is confusing because in watching, you listen to the drama of your minds, and by listening, too often become involved in it. You become one with your drama instead of with your creative power.
So, instead of observing yourself to learn about you, you could create an attitude and live it, both on the mat and off the mat. Yoga on the mat is a microcosm of life off the mat, the macrocosm. Who you are on the mat with yourself is who you are off the mat, with influences around you. But by practicing joy and abundance on the mat, which is a safe space without the world tugging on you, you can develop the muscle to and practice being forever in joy and abundance even while off the mat.
By micromanaging yourself through your undisciplined witness, you makes yourself passive to your creative energy. This is Neale’s message as I interpret it. Instead of wasting all this time watching yourself to understand who is “I am”, rather spend the time and energy creating whoYou want to be, and recreating and reaffirming that Creation in every moment! Who you are in the observation of a moment ago does not necessarily exist in this moment! It implies you live in the past of yourself instead of in the present, or future of who You create. Instead of realizing who You are, You decide to embrace the potential of who You could be, and put that emotion of self-realization into the present moment!
Viktor van Kooten is quoted from his book with Angela Farmer ‘From Inside Out. Book III’, “In yoga asana we pray with the physical in order to connect with the great, invisible source, making use of duality to come to and into unity. All effects, flexibility, health etc., sprouting from this practice, are trivial and not the reason for this practice. Yoga asana is a prayer that brings creation back home where it belongs: in the hands of the Creator.”
It might seem like a lie to be creating and recreating yourself at every moment, and perhaps not very reliable, since we all rely on the past of who we have been to define and identify ourselves with today and how others have come to know us, and anything deviating from that seems to be a misrepresentation. The old adage “fake it till you make it” comes to mind!
“I create a compassionate person and act it” Done! “I create a trustworthy friend and be one” Done! “I Realize my Self” Done! “I create Eka pada rajakapotasana” Done! Well, now there is a glitch. Your body doesn’t comply with your creation? Is this the truth of life – that things take time, that the matter of our bodies cannot change in a second or can it? Only your belief systems stand as an obstacle to your power to be Creator. Time is relative, invest the time now in creation, as the time will pass anyway. You are what you think.
There is a seed that is inherently attracted to the light. In the same resource by Viktor, he speaks of a potato, put in a cupboard and left there, and in time, the potato has “pale arms reaching for its lost lover – the Sun. A seed in the ground knows where the sun is, You can separate yourself from yourself, from nature, from God, from the communion and suffering of others, but inside you is a light seeking release from your body’s darkness, and an invisible seed reaching for the light!”
The problem is that we don’t accept our light and we don’t really know who we want to be. We are confused by the media and icons and social norms that might be attractive to us, and that has dictated who we have been, so we now all own our personal trademark of ‘normal’. Actions and reactions are dictated by an inner dialogue that asks if this is what is expected of me right now, if this is the appropriate place for this behaviour right now, and so we choose to act, considering the consequences rather than what we want, and to be frank, bugger the consequences. We have been conditioned to live in the world of consequence, and learning more about karma on the yoga path instills more “God-fearing” behaviour.
The choice to be who you want to be does not require a knowing of who you are, but it will certainly highlight who you don’t think you are right now – this will unravel belief systems that clearly do not serve you.
And again we are back in the dichotomy of how to know who you are in order to create who you want to be and is the one necessary for the other?
You have a choice: you can choose to flex the detachment muscle that allows everything without personal investment, or you can flex the realization muscle that puts your own personal investment as the priority to successful living. Detachment is then from the fruits of that labour, patience a virtue in watching the magic of your Creation unfold.
Is ancient yoga philosophy out of date or have we just not adapted it to the current age in which we are living, and have we been living in the past with outdated belief systems of certain social order? The teachings of the Bhagavad Gita would teach to act according to your dharma. Has our dharma as a society not changed? Is life not about the journey rather than the obligation?
You choose!
Have you spent your adult life searching, trying to uncover how to live your life? Have you read books on this subject only to learn their solution to despair or feeling that something is missing in life is always: Know Thyself? Do you feel that there is a huge mystery that is YOU that needs to be unraveled and the obstruction, that the mystery doesn’t really want to be revealed, making life an obstacle course of trickery and veils and illusion that you feel you have to win over?
Many of us feel that we don’t have the tools to unravel the big mystery of who is “I am”, and that if for one moment we cast an unconscious eye in any direction we might miss the biggest clue of life and stay trapped in the darkness forever. This causes a heavy fear of missing that one big opportunity to understand “myself”. Fear causes procrastination. Fear becomes waiting. Waiting for some benevolent act of God to show us what we need to know. Fear that this act of God may never happen to ME. It seems that many of us still hold a belief system that God is only benevolent if ‘I am good’! And this belief system comes often from either religion or yoga philosophy! Unfortunately, in the vedic era of yoga, rites and rituals were engaged for the purposes of finding favor with God, to have God bestow luck and bounty upon the yogi and community. The mindset of our practice on the mat and in life easily diverts to action to win favor from the Gods for the purpose of getting the clues to know “myself”. This striving for perfection in intention, attention, and thoughts, words and deeds to earn and to deserve to receive favor or to avoid the threat of discredit from the heavens is a heavy burden to bear. (And sometimes it is not the Heavens we fear but our own reflection in our friends and family!)
How much fear is ruling your life? What belief systems are you stuck in? Reflecting on this answer takes you into that maze of ‘know myself?’. More importantly, is your mantra that you think you don’t know yourself and still have a long way to go, or can you simply now embrace yourself?
Neale Donald Walsh in Book 2 of Conversations with God puts the power back in the individual’s own hands. His idea is that there is NO obscure TRUTH to UNRAVEL, but rather a TRUTH TO CREATE.
The duality that is made clear in this article outlines the option of adopting a passive versus proactive life philosophy. The passive option is to be your observer – the yoga journey of self-realization. The proactive option is to be the creator – ‘The Secret’ inspired journey. “Thoughts become things” are the famous 3 words for realizing the life you want to live by Mike Dooley of The Secret. The life you live is a representation of your “I am” consciousness, it’s the manifestation of your inner self, not what you do but how you do it!
Yes, yoga clarifies the relationship with “myself” through observing the internal dialogue and the experience and relationship with ‘me’ on the mat. Being on the mat in yoga, you see what goes on inside, and so learn about your subtle madness and idiosyncratic belief systems that you wouldn’t believe if a stranger pointed them out. But taking yourself so close to the center of your own crazy can become a self-obsessed egocentric focus and a life-destructive process. Being the observer or witness is confusing because in watching, you listen to the drama of your minds, and by listening, too often become involved in it. You become one with your drama instead of with your creative power.
So, instead of observing yourself to learn about you, you could create an attitude and live it, both on the mat and off the mat. Yoga on the mat is a microcosm of life off the mat, the macrocosm. Who you are on the mat with yourself is who you are off the mat, with influences around you. But by practicing joy and abundance on the mat, which is a safe space without the world tugging on you, you can develop the muscle to and practice being forever in joy and abundance even while off the mat.
By micromanaging yourself through your undisciplined witness, you makes yourself passive to your creative energy. This is Neale’s message as I interpret it. Instead of wasting all this time watching yourself to understand who is “I am”, rather spend the time and energy creating whoYou want to be, and recreating and reaffirming that Creation in every moment! Who you are in the observation of a moment ago does not necessarily exist in this moment! It implies you live in the past of yourself instead of in the present, or future of who You create. Instead of realizing who You are, You decide to embrace the potential of who You could be, and put that emotion of self-realization into the present moment!
Viktor van Kooten is quoted from his book with Angela Farmer ‘From Inside Out. Book III’, “In yoga asana we pray with the physical in order to connect with the great, invisible source, making use of duality to come to and into unity. All effects, flexibility, health etc., sprouting from this practice, are trivial and not the reason for this practice. Yoga asana is a prayer that brings creation back home where it belongs: in the hands of the Creator.”
It might seem like a lie to be creating and recreating yourself at every moment, and perhaps not very reliable, since we all rely on the past of who we have been to define and identify ourselves with today and how others have come to know us, and anything deviating from that seems to be a misrepresentation. The old adage “fake it till you make it” comes to mind!
“I create a compassionate person and act it” Done! “I create a trustworthy friend and be one” Done! “I Realize my Self” Done! “I create Eka pada rajakapotasana” Done! Well, now there is a glitch. Your body doesn’t comply with your creation? Is this the truth of life – that things take time, that the matter of our bodies cannot change in a second or can it? Only your belief systems stand as an obstacle to your power to be Creator. Time is relative, invest the time now in creation, as the time will pass anyway. You are what you think.
There is a seed that is inherently attracted to the light. In the same resource by Viktor, he speaks of a potato, put in a cupboard and left there, and in time, the potato has “pale arms reaching for its lost lover – the Sun. A seed in the ground knows where the sun is, You can separate yourself from yourself, from nature, from God, from the communion and suffering of others, but inside you is a light seeking release from your body’s darkness, and an invisible seed reaching for the light!”
The problem is that we don’t accept our light and we don’t really know who we want to be. We are confused by the media and icons and social norms that might be attractive to us, and that has dictated who we have been, so we now all own our personal trademark of ‘normal’. Actions and reactions are dictated by an inner dialogue that asks if this is what is expected of me right now, if this is the appropriate place for this behaviour right now, and so we choose to act, considering the consequences rather than what we want, and to be frank, bugger the consequences. We have been conditioned to live in the world of consequence, and learning more about karma on the yoga path instills more “God-fearing” behaviour.
The choice to be who you want to be does not require a knowing of who you are, but it will certainly highlight who you don’t think you are right now – this will unravel belief systems that clearly do not serve you.
And again we are back in the dichotomy of how to know who you are in order to create who you want to be and is the one necessary for the other?
You have a choice: you can choose to flex the detachment muscle that allows everything without personal investment, or you can flex the realization muscle that puts your own personal investment as the priority to successful living. Detachment is then from the fruits of that labour, patience a virtue in watching the magic of your Creation unfold.
Is ancient yoga philosophy out of date or have we just not adapted it to the current age in which we are living, and have we been living in the past with outdated belief systems of certain social order? The teachings of the Bhagavad Gita would teach to act according to your dharma. Has our dharma as a society not changed? Is life not about the journey rather than the obligation?
You choose!
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