This is a 12 day course for seekers of Truth. Here we will be contemplating and practicing Gyan Yoga which is a path that uses Self Inquiry to awaken to the truth of who we are. Most of the time, we take ourselves to be all that has been projected by others through our name, relationships, stories and roles we play. Discovering who you are, gives you the opportunity to retreat back to the beginning and start creating a life that you envision for yourself by being exactly who you want to be. Instead of living as if you are in an inescapable story of your past, through self awareness you harness the energy to create a life of your dreams.
Here is an overview:
As the name of the course suggests, we will be focusing on ourselves and invoking a healing process in our lives. This will be an initiation into a life-long undoing and recreational process. For healing is not just healing an illness or some pain be it physical or mental. Healing is developing a sense of wholeness with all aspects of experience and this needs to be continuous, despite the difficult situations one may encounter.
The intention of the course is to set into motion a clarification to deepen the experience of life and to value even the simplest occurrence and welcome it as the divine.
The course will cover,
Breathing techniques – which will give you the direct experience of the practice on quietening the mind.
Tuning into the quiet mind to ask intuitive deeper questions through meditation.
Movement of energy through the body and energy centres. Effects of thoughts on the energy field of the body.
Affects of energy on physical conditions and on life conditions.
Chakra meditation. Sound and colours.
Delving into Self. Self inquiry. Talk on abiding as self.
Guided meditation into self inquiry.
Talk on tendencies of the mind to go back and forth from presence to past and future thoughts and fantasies.
Presence Meditation.
Talk on patterns and becoming aware of them through being guided by one’s emotions.
Journaling to clarify emotions and patterns and bring up unconscious beliefs to light so they can be let go off so new neural pathways are formed.
Emotional health and healing through heart opening meditations.
Theory on manifestation. To control or not to control? Conscious creation and surrender.
ONENESS. Concepts and contemplations on oneness.
Guided meditation.
Self actualisation and the importance of honouring one’s needs and staying on one’s path. Finding purpose.
Nature of reality. The emotional intelligence of an awakened being. And What now?
The Natural State. Meditation being the natural state.
Practice meditations. Sitting in silence. Aloneness. Open focus.
Be ok to be alone. Be ok to be committed. Know everything to be love.
Use this platform for community.
Day 2
Breath
As we all know as soon as we take our attention to the breath we find that our minds quieten down. This is the most natural was to rest our attention which is otherwise pulled in so many directions. Breathing right ensures that the body is expelling toxins and creating space for renewed energy to be harnessed. The breathing practices that we will cover is as follows:
1. Abdominal breathing – The correct way to breath and slow down a racing heart
2. Inhale nostril exhale mouth. 1:3 – Improves lung function
3. Alternate nostril breathing – Cleansing, Calms nervous system
4. Ujjai breathing – improves digestion, increases energy
5. Bhastrika – Cleansing, Increases energy
6. Tiger – De tox
7. Bramhari – Soothes ent
Meditation
Direct attention towards he background space of awareness. Notice that thought appear and disappear within this space. Allow attention to stay with that background space with no expectation, waiting, interpretation or judgement. Let attention sink deep into this silence.
Here ask the question, what you need, lack, want. Be honest.
If there is a barrage of thoughts allow these thoughts without judgement or interpretation.
Let this subside on its own and let the answer be formed.
It may be an insight that has a deeper quality than thought. Open your eyes and share your insight.
Energy
Movement of energy, energy centres, affects of thoughts on the energy field of the body.
This is not the energy we study about in our science lessons. This energy we speak about is what we directly feel or know as our self.
When you check in with yourself, how you feel.
Energy manifests as everything including our internal states. Self study is the best way to understand this energy.
Self study starting with being aware of how you feel. If you are ok with how you feel then in that moment there is nothing to do other than enjoy the state. Deep honesty is needed in this exercise and no denial.
States come and go and never stay constant. So having an understanding of our energy body will help bring some perspective which could prove healthy when you are faced with a criseis or pain. The self could draw on this knowledge without being weighed down with only a personal view of the story. The perspective that all that is happening is happening to me and that I am the one who suffers is a limited one that has no understanding of the human organism or any other reality other than the personal one.
To elaborate, As our stories unfold and we are in situations where we feel stuck, we usually only attribute it to ideas such as, “that is life”. On looking a little deeper we are likely to find patterns that we are stuck with which are usually repetitive and on questioning could probably trace back to certain core beliefs that we hold about ourselves and life in general. Here if there can be an openness to study ourselves and understand the originations of these beliefs we may find that all patterns govern our apparent stories are due to the energy we give these beliefs. But before we go deeper into this, we will look at the 7 energy centres according to the study of ancient Tantric Yoga, famously known as the Chakras.
Mooladhara, Swadistana, Manipura, Anahata, Visuddhi, Agna, Sahasrahara.
The practical session, will give an Explanation of each Chakra and End with Chakra meditation.
Energy body – part 2
In this session we get a little deeper into what to do when recurring patterns are noticed.
a. Ask – what am I believing about the situation on what is happening to me.
b. Get into the space of quiet you practice at the beginning of the course and let it reveal all that is believed.
c. Now ask what is a belief.
Belief is energy given to a thought and concluded to be true in the subconscious. Investigate this. Ask what is actually true. With this questioning you diminish the power the belief has over you. Bringing what is in the subconscious to the conscious allows it to be freed so that there is space for new insights rather than carrying on with old hardened beliefs that may have formed due to some wounds or experiences.
This practice is not just what you do during the course. This is practice that you do in your daily life. This is the way that you use your days to explore deeper into yourself objectively rather than just be pulled along with your apparent personal circumstances. Make this an exploration that you enjoy and have interest in. This is the start of self inquiry.
Energy body – part 3
Self inquiry – Who Am I
Am I the body? Am I the name, Am I the roles I play, Am I the gender, Am I my profession, Am I the character in the stories?
After all negation, what is left.
All attention to stay there in that simple place of aliveness.
No tags description past or future.
Proceed with presence meditation.
Recognise the IAM without any identity.
This is not just something that we do during the course. Daily life is where you practice. Practice is being aware of the tendencies of the mind to deeply identify with one’s roles and descriptions. This is not to suggest that you need to turn away from all responsibilities. This is a suggestion to just notice the tendencies without judgement or interpretation as it being right or wrong. Just a witness. Just an observer.
Also notice the consequences of being deeply identified with what is going on and the consequences of that and affects of that on the mind and body. Allow energy to flow as it will. This is not to change any behaviour. This is just study. In fact, allow mistakes. Notice without even judging the other, by understanding that they too are identified with their individuality.
You can allow mistakes and so-called wrong actions or thoughts without being identified because now you know that it is almost automatic, based on conditioning and you are in the process of studying yourself. Now you are not just pulled along as a character in a story. This is not about getting any right answers. This is simply research. You are just asking “Who Am I” with wonder.
There may be days when the mind is very strong and other days where it quieter. The days when the mind is stronger are the days of deep opportunity.
Notice all the longings. Notice the judgements against oneself and others. Notice emotions and question these emotions as to their origin of story and the belief that you hold that activates these emotions.
The objective of this course is not to improve one’s life or story. The objective of this course is simply an interest in nature of reality. Everything else should just be received as a by-product which is really the natural state that is veiled as long as we have only a limited perspective of being a person that is bound by a body and controlled by a conditioned mind.
The normal state of the person is otherwise always to become. From here is where the energy starts to settle into the reserves which is an ocean, while the story of becoming is the story of the waves.
The mind and body may start going into more discomfort when such awareness is exercised and attention is allowed to rest, as this is not something that the mind and body is accustomed to if you have been someone in the fast pace of a life of achievements. It may be more appealing to a one who has had a harder life with deep suffering to come to this than someone who is quite happy only enjoying all the various relationships, activities and stories.
This process could continue for years and reveal many insights about oneself and the reality of thought and what one is driven by and the consequences of these drives. This is not to say that the consequences are bad. It could just be that due to your personality and drives you do great things that serve yourself and many around you. This course is simply for those with an inclination and interest in that which is other than only the physical manifestations.
Energy Body Part 4
When one practices to keep coming back to being, eventually there may seem to be a limbo. A feeling of what now. This being if you are coming back to with effort and practice you can also lose when you are not practicing or are apparently engaged with daily life. This next session we will be drawing the energy out to reconnect to everything but this time not as a person but as being itself. So while there is a negating in the beginning and a drawing back of energy from all external distractions. And then a resting in a being that is unattached, there needs to be a further movement that is not moving back or forward but is everything including the source and the manifestation. Here there is an integration and a revelation that there is no inside or outside. Everything is being.
For practice:
We will do the open focus meditation and heart meditation. But like everything else the real practice is in daily life.
Here is where you practice not rejecting anything, yet no interpreting anything, while asking deeper questions when thoughts that carry a lot of meaning for you come up, such as:
a. what is thought made of? Quite clearly nothing
b. Where does thought derive its meaning from? Belief
c. What is a belief? Energy that is contracted from a state of non-interpretation.
d. What happen when there is no contraction? Emptiness
e. Now, what is thought again? Empty
f. What is meaning? Belief
g. What is belief again on understanding that it is contracted energy? Emptiness
h. Is this a sad a depressed emptiness? Only if there is still a contraction
i. Without contraction what is left? Fullness of energy that is completely empty
j. No contraction, no person, no separation – recognise oneness
Energy body part 5
This part we delve into who is the doer. What makes apparent energy move or things happen.
Check as to if the thought is actually personal and belonging to an actual person. When there are apparent things done, is there a person doing this or is energy moving and things apparently happening?
If when not seen only from a linear point of view of the story happening in time, what is actually happening? Just colours, sounds, sensations. Energy moves but does this energy belong to someone personally?
Every thought is an appearance just like everything else. It does not have an owner. It is nothing appearing as thought.
The question such as “ What is the nature of this reality?” is also just a thought. There is no one who asks or thinks or answers. It is nothing appearing as an apparent thought that says “What is the nature of reality.” No nothing is actually happening. Only as appearance, which also disappears and so its all just nothing.
So if this is not owned by a person, and this is just energy and the story is simply that, an imagination in our mind, what is reality?
When energy is not given to the personal story, then the self-structure starts to fall away.
With no self that veils reality, there is boundless freedom, unconditional love and wholeness.
When there is a disillusionment of the self the patterns start to break down. You may find there is nothing left. The mind may go into a limbo state as it is not used to- not allowing. It is used to controlling and with no control exercised anymore there may be this limbo. But when the fear of losing this control subsides or fades then another reality emerges which was always in wait under all the frenzy of being a person. This reality is liberated and spontaneous and unconcerned with uncertainty of survival as there is no one in the centre. There is just this energy which has always been. There is no need for fear. There is just a sinking back into this to allow freefall.
Here we encounter connection and a wholeness after a period of emptiness. Here the emptiness is the fullness of being.
Here is there spontaneity, unknowing, no free will, energy moves as it does but there is no one who can claim I am doing anything. No control. But that is not the same as out of control. It is just that there is no one who is there in the centre who ever had any control to lose control.
Here it can be seen that purpose and passion are one.
Unconditional love is all there is. Except in story of appearance which is all just unconditional love. Even an apparent fight.
Pain and joy belong to no one.
Wonder and awe at the appearance that is real and unreal at the same time. It is real as it is happening and unreal as it never happened. A beautiful paradox.
Nothing and everything is no different.
Silence and sound is no different.
There is No Two. This is Advaita.
Energy Part 6
Actualisation
One thing that is quite common among spiritual seekers is that there is a denying oneself with the idea that there needs to be a rejection of worldly things and a turning away from wants. This is based on the idea there is a person and that person needs to be good and pure so that it realises the truth or liberation. But the premises it starts from itself is faulty as it is from the perspective of being limited and a person that needs to get somewhere. If there is energy that moves in a particular way, there can be a recognition that it is just energy that moves in that way. There may be a going along with the energy of not, and both are not wrong. It is only the notion that I am making the choice of going along or not, that is not really happening, as there is no I.
Energy moves in any or every direction. But there is no need anymore, to find absolute fixed outcomes as life is a discovery of the unknown in every moment. Ever fresh. Ever new.
In the unknowing there is an unfolding that appears completely natural.
It is never about perfection. For there is perfection in everything as it is.
There is only appreciation.
Even an apparent energy that moves to change something is not a personal energy, as it belongs to no body.
Nothingness is the fullness. This cannot be known.
This is mystery appearing as life energy.
There is only energy.
Energy with no definition.
Infinite. Eternal.
Characteristics of the Awakened
Forget all that was learnt. There is just what is. This indescribable, unconditional that is infinite love and appears as complete mystery.
No Past or Future. Timeless.
Free without boundary, yet unafraid of boundaries and completely autonomous. Anarchic in a sense that there is no hierarchy or lineage that it needs to belong. No organisation or authority.
Always Fresh. Always New.