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Emil
Australia
141 Posts |
 Posted - Feb 05 2011 : 10:31:33 AM
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I was reading the following quote from Lesson 184:
quote:
As for seeing your long absent friend, if you have this desire, it will happen in due time. Making it a primary goal of your yoga could be a distraction to your spiritual progress though, and could generate more karma (future consequences) than it would release. My suggestion is to focus on your spiritual practices, with the goal for enlightenment, and let the rest happen naturally. Then all of your actions will become an expression of the divine within, which is what you are.
It got me a bit concerned because I personally have a great interest in siddhis. I love super natural powers so much and there's nothing I can do about it. It's my nature! I love anything that is cool and "gadget like"! Anything that is exotic or does something weird at the press of a button I'm a fan of it, let alone being able to do magic with dropping a coin into the inner silence!!
Very often when I'm practicing samyama, a certain sensation comes up and whether it is moving energy, vibration or bliss, I immediately wonder what's gonna happen next? is something cool going to happen? Am I becoming a perfect Siddha yet?  :)) I know it's childish but I've been practicing Samyama like this for a number of years and it just doesn't seem to go away because my interest in "cool stuff" is very genuine :))
So my question would be: Am I producing more karma than I'm releasing? If so, how can I address this? |
Edited by - Emil on Feb 05 2011 10:36:11 AM |
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Shanti
USA
4854 Posts |
Posted - Feb 05 2011 : 12:34:22 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Emil
So my question would be: Am I producing more karma than I'm releasing? If so, how can I address this?
I cannot speak in terms of karma... it is such a vague word.
But if you are trying to control the outcome of samyama with your mind, you are getting in the way of the process.
Samyama is a technique for learning to let go. So right now, in the beginning, do samyama with no attachment to results. The main reason we say this is because, our mind does not know what is best for us. We all have certain special qualities that is revealed to us as we get more and more in touch with our stillness. In order to read books, we need to learn our ABCs then words then sentences... only then can we read big books... if we want to read Shakespeare, but don't know our ABCs yet, it wont help... like that, till you learn how to completely let go, you cannot gain siddhis... in order to lean how to let go you need to practice samyama. Baby steps ya know? |
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Shanti
USA
4854 Posts |
Posted - Feb 05 2011 : 1:35:47 PM
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PS: If we have a desire to read Shakespeare as we are still learning to read, it will take a long time to read the book and we may even get frustrated along the way and quit... like that, if we keep trying to manipulate the results/ the outcome of samayam with our minds before we have learnt the technique of samyama (and letting go), it may take us a long to to receive any of the siddhis and we may get frustrated along the way and give up.
Better to just go with the procedure and be surprised by siddhis. |
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Emil
Australia
141 Posts |
Posted - Feb 06 2011 : 08:15:35 AM
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Hi Shanti,
I understand your point. However so far I haven't managed to find out how I can let go. As you know there is not "let go" switch. How do you let go of the Sutra and/or its outcomes when deep down you're really interested in them? and how can you tell in Samyama if you have managed to let go? |
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gentlep
USA
114 Posts |
Posted - Feb 06 2011 : 9:36:24 PM
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| I am with you on that. I am not able to get this "let go" thing either, which is also popular with the "Law of attraction" world. Let go of what you want so that you get it. If I am letting go to get it then I am still wanting it, isn't it? |
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Holy
796 Posts |
Posted - Feb 06 2011 : 9:56:18 PM
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Letting go is nothing you can really do, nor you can really avoid. It is also a word like karma that tries to explain something that already happens out of itself.
Letting go practically means, decrease the friction of energy within the body-mind complex by cleaning the system via spiritual practices to make "letting go" a more complete and total happening.
Another word for "more letting go" is becoming "more centered in the now". And by letting it go totally/becoming totally centered now, some centers in the brain open up/awarness increases and everything is yours again.
Everything being yours/you does not mean everything is concentrated and displayed on that level you want to have it. The mountains are yours, but are they in your room? Too big for the room as it seems. Also, most of the siddhis are too "big". Those grossly siddhis you have read about are just nothing in comparison, some little play on the grossly plane. Sooner or later, when you start seeing the infinite game on all levels, the wish for having the mountain in the room may go aswell. Everything is already perfectly placed and just waits your discovery. The playing rooms are waiting inside! |
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Shanti
USA
4854 Posts |
Posted - Feb 07 2011 : 4:47:47 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Emil
Hi Shanti,
I understand your point. However so far I haven't managed to find out how I can let go. As you know there is not "let go" switch. How do you let go of the Sutra and/or its outcomes when deep down you're really interested in them? and how can you tell in Samyama if you have managed to let go?
Hi Emil,
You have it right, there is no switch that can be flipped to say"let go"... letting go will happen.
The example I give people is, when you want to fall asleep, you get into bed, turn off the light, lay down, at times you may even have a cup of chamomile tea, or take a shower or read a book or watch some TV.. these are all steps we take to relax and get into bed and then... falling asleep happens... "we" cannot fall asleep, we can do all the preparations to make sure we fall asleep, but falling asleep just happens.
Like that, letting go will just happen, we can only do various practices to get us to a point where letting go will happen, but just like we cannot make the mind help us fall asleep.. in fact when the mind is involved, we may not fall asleep, like that we cannot make the mind help us let go, while the mind is involved, the letting go will not happen.
The practice that AYP offers to help us cultivate the ground on which letting go will happen is meditation and samyama. At first samyama is a very mechanical process... like training a baby to sleep through the night, give them a warm bath, sing them a lullaby, turn off the light... sooner or later the body learns that it's night now and I should sleep... and the baby falls asleep (if the parents are so blessed )... like that at first we do the mechanical process of picking the sutra and holding it for 15 seconds and dropping it... how do we drop? We just stop thinking the word (in the beginning when we don't know how to drop i.e.). Every session, we just follow the procedure given in the lesson http://www.aypsite.org/150.html
quote:
Now we are ready to begin samyama practice. Here is how we do it.
With samyama, we are initiating meaning in silence. We do it in a simple, easy, systematic way. First we create an impulse of meaning in silence, and then we let it go in silence.
Let's begin with "Love." It is a good place to start with samyama. In samyama it is suggested you use your most intimate language, the language that goes deepest in your heart, whatever it may be.
In your easy silence, pick up, just once, the fuzziest feeling of the word "Love" in your own language. Don't deliberately make a clear pronunciation, or mental images of this or that scene or situation that represent Love to you. Just have a faint remembrance of Love, and then let go into your silence, the easy silence you are in as you pick up the faint meaning of Love. Don't contemplate Love or analyze it during samyama. Don't think about it at all. Just come to it once in a faint, subtle way, and then let go into silence. It is a subtle feeling of Love we are coming to, nothing more, and letting it go. Like that.
Having thought "Love" once, be in silence for about fifteen seconds. If any thoughts come, let them go easily. Don't look at the clock. With a little practice your inner clock will tell you with good enough accuracy when fifteen seconds is up. Just be easy in silence for about a quarter of a minute. Then pick up the faint, fuzzy meaning of "Love" again, and let it go again into your silence for about fifteen seconds again.
That is two repetitions of samyama – twice picking up Love at its subtlest level of thought, and twice letting it go into inner silence.
We do this without trying to control the outcome, without trying to judge the feelings arising, without holding on to any meaning or feeling. It's not hard to do once we decide the bigger rewards are there when this body/mind lets go. Right now I follow the procedure no matter how boring, before we know it, the letting go and the wonders of samyama manifest. We continue letting go and samyama becomes every step of our life.
Hope some of this helps Emil. I am just trying to share what helped me... I was looking for this and that for a long time... this and that started showing up when I stop looking for them. |
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JDH
USA
331 Posts |
Posted - Feb 07 2011 : 9:31:50 PM
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| That was a good answer. |
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Emil
Australia
141 Posts |
Posted - Feb 08 2011 : 07:00:15 AM
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| Thanks all for comments. Shanti, in my last couple of sessions of practice I've been trying to find a "let go" button (even though I said it didn't exist) and I might have found it. I noticed that I can actually go deep at will and focus on something deep inside me which might be inner silence/self. Not sure how valid this method is but I noticed that I can package a very subtle idea of the Sutra (which is more like a reference to the sutra or a wordless answer to the question of "which sutra?") together with a "let go command". They package together nicely and stick together like the two sides of a coin and turn into something that comes and hits very quickly and done. When it ends I'm left without the sutra. The way it happens (in slow motion) is: the meaning of the sutra is almost coming to my mind but then there's a tiny moment of concentration (deliberate attention) on higher self which drops the meaning of sutra off the mind and then there's waiting without anything particular in mind (it all happens very quick). Am I any closer? Is this close to the right process? Is it likely to guide me to towards the right process in the long term? |
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Shanti
USA
4854 Posts |
Posted - Feb 08 2011 : 07:52:10 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Emil
The way it happens (in slow motion) is: the meaning of the sutra is almost coming to my mind but then there's a tiny moment of concentration (deliberate attention) on higher self which drops the meaning of sutra off the mind and then there's waiting without anything particular in mind (it all happens very quick). Am I any closer? Is this close to the right process? Is it likely to guide me to towards the right process in the long term?
Mmmmmmm... sounds like a wonderful shift.
Yes... picking the sutra at it's fuzziest level (the meaning of the sutra is almost coming to my mind), and letting it go in stillness (then there's a tiny moment of concentration (deliberate attention) on higher self which drops the meaning of sutra off the mind) and then being in stillness for a bit (then there's waiting without anything particular in mind)and then doing the process again. That is samayama for you.
Although, I am not too clear on what "tiny moment of concentration (deliberate attention)" means, is it something like giving it to your ishta? In any case, if it is working for you, you can keep going, just stay open to the idea that if someday this step dissloves, you can keep going with samyama without that one extra step. So it will be pick the word and drop it in stillness... this dropping in stillness is the "giving it to your ishta/stillnes" step, and if giving it deliberately now helps, go with it, but stay open to the idea that that step may drop and that will be fine.
So keep going this way... don't worry if it is right or not (that is where the letting go happens... as long as we have the intention of sticking to the process and come back to the process any time we realize we are lost or off the process), and be open to let it change to whatever it needs to change to. It will change. Every practice refines itself as we keep going.
But right now, you seem to have found a "let go" button me thinks.
All the best Emil.
Keep us updated on how things go.
Thanks for sharing. |
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Samyama and producing karma !?
