The Heart of the Matter
Part 1 Part II Part III Part IV
Listening To Infinite Mind The Void Original Sin Natural Discipline - Awareness Yoga Symposium.24.38
earthworm (earthworm, 1/28/99 3:17:50 PM)Yoga Symposium.24.39
Bob Cox (tympanachus cupido, 1/29/99 9:13:26 PM)
That was deep Gena.
Yoga Symposium.24.40
ya know, it's all in the void . . .;-}(earthworm, 1/30/99 9:53:47 AM)
Yoga Symposium.24.41
I like this Void transmission stuff. (schiffmann, 1/31/99 11:58:56 PM)
Yoga Symposium.24.42
I don' know - I aVOID it if I can ;-) (tympanachus cupido, 2/1/99 11:12:46 AM)'Yoga Symposium.24.43
At Last (SuZie Coyote, 2/2/99 3:14:42 PM)
...a conversation I can fit into my schedule...
Yoga Symposium.24.56
The Heart of Our Natures (suz coyote, 8/30/99 9:25:21 AM)From what I can tell, few in this forum accept the concept of "original sin." I'm not sure I believe in it either. Perhaps, "original flaw" may be a better term. Interesting that we point out the often, irrational views of the fundamentalists who believe in original sin. This is an "issue of faith" to them.
How is "non-belief" in "original sin" any different? Is it not a matter of faith as well? It is a position taken somewhat blindly as a foundation stone of a philosophical system( that humans are love and light and that if we could only get these nasty fundamentalists off us, then everything would be cool and we would all be non-neurotic about sex and other issues.) We have no "proof" one way or another as to the validity or falseness of the concept of original sin (but as I said, history would tend to highlight the possibility that there is something flawed in us.)
What interests me is our tendency to slight fundamentalist views because they are "irrational beliefs" [I.e., " faith"] while justifying our own views with a similar faith. Another version of "they're wrong and I'm right" because I believe it to be so?
When I was in the Air Force, I was given a course in logical thinking. Air Force training is not ivory tower stuff; it tends to be very practical and useful. We investigated a list of several common mistakes in reasoning; one was "on the horns of a faulty dilemma" thinking, and that is what I see here. There is a thread of "Everything must be allowed, nothing must be forbidden, otherwise, we'll all end up as repressed robots" - an either/or approach that rules out any middle-ground solutions.
I lean towards the Inverventionist theory. That is, I believe that the course of human development has been affected or even initiated by others (call them extra-terrestrials, aliens, beings from another dimension, or the dream of dolphins - what have you.) This may seem an odd view, but it is "a belief" shared strongly by others, such as William Reich (whom you mentioned, Donny, and who suffered his ultimate defeat at the hands of the FBI for these beliefs), Alan Watts, Zacheriah Sitchen, William Brambly. Ken Alford, Richard Thompson (a Vedic scholar) and others. In short, I believe humans may be sort of a 'Frankenstein" creature, possibly biologically engineered to serve as slaves (to "worship" originally meant "to serve.")
Eric Hoffer discusses repression in his book, The True Believer, and asserts that most humans need and seek out a repressive structure around themselves, because they cannot cope with open-ended freedom. Almost all attempts to provide large groups of people with freedom fail. Look at the US. Originally started as a state dedicated to freedom, we now have a higher percentage of our populace in prison than any other industrialized nation, except China, and not just invasive personal intrusion from our Government, but from our corporations as well..
At one end of the spectrum is absolute adherence to tribal (extended family) rules - at the other end, adherence to a fascist governmental tyrant, even at the expense of our families. Perhaps we were not created for freedom and must learn how to manage it? (Mind you, I think some of us, at least, have the capability of transcending the urge toward repression and that yoga is THE tool for that transcendence.) Hoffer points out that in the absence of a strong, repressive structure, humans will create one. He illustrates (through an analysis of populist revolutions the world over) that when current repressive belief systems fail, the people themselves quickly put something even worse in its place.
What are the yamas and niyamas but strictures designed to channel human behavior away from our negative tendencies and towards our higher ones? Yoga itself is pointed towards liberation through "yoking" with something bigger than ourselves.
Assume for a minute the Interventionists are right and we were created as slaves? (You don't have to accept these arguments, just consider them for a while.) Is this original sin? Or is this just how we are built - original flaw? I maintain (in the absence of an unreasoned "faith" one way or another) that it is possible to entertain the idea that we may have been created in such as way as to make us susceptible to both being slaves and making slaves of one other. Proof? There is none, except for a tantalizing trail left in the writings of the ancient Summarians, Hindus, Meso-Americans, and Hebrews and in the recurring lessons of history.
Transcending this powerful part of our programming is very difficult and I think it hinges on a few fundamentals. The first is that we are enslaved to the degree we enslave others - always. Keeping slaves (even if the slave is a "wife" or "son" or "daughter" or a widowed seamstress in Calcutta being paid next to nothing for sewing our clothing) always comes with a price. If we learn in our homes that Daddy is superior to Mommy, then we buy into the dynamic that some of us are born to serve others by virtue of our birth as a woman or "lesser man." It is no accident that civilization, as we know it, is built upon strict patriarchal "family values" - in other words, inequality between people due to physical characteristics - and that most of our "holy books" advocate for one form or another of slavery, differing only in who gets to be on top. Cultures often cry out against overt slavery, but never the covert slavery in the family, upon which all other slavery is built.
So, perhaps we, as humans, MUST develop our own set of controls, optimized to provide us with both the freedom to discover our spiritual natures, as well as the means to transcend our slaving nature? Iyengar, in his book, The Tree of Yoga, says:
"Why do you think of the violence of the world? Why don't you think of the violence in you? Each one has to train himself or herself, for without discipline we cannot become free, nor can there be freedom in the world without discipline. Discipline alone brings true freedom."
And
"Today, in the name of freedom, everyone behaves like a libertine, but the life of a libertine is not true freedom."
SuZ
Yoga Symposium.24.58
Erich Schiffmann (schiffmann, 8/31/99 12:52:52 AM)The way to get the proof [about original sin, or original flaw, or true original nature] is by sinking into yourself and diligently staying with your actual now experience. This is what the practice of meditation is all about. I’ve been very hesitant about prematurely saying anything about the nature of God or Reality, and have attempted to be alert to the possibilities of self-deception in this regard. It is my feeling, however, that we ARE like waves on the ocean, specific and unique expressions of the one and only Omnipresence... Mind/God/Awareness being Itself as everything that is, including you and me. And that when you sink into yourself and feel what you feel, not knowing in advance what that’s going to be, not having or not having faith in any preconception about what that Reality might be... what you’ll experience is what has been called satchitananda: the bliss (ananda) of conscious (chit) being (sat.) Or, in easy words, you start feeling LOVE without knowing why, and without doing anything to conjure it up. Gradually, one comes to the ongoing realization—not just conclusion—that who we are is that Love, embodied.
I also think it is more accurate to think of yoga, not as “yoking,” but as the conscious realization that we are already yoked. It is not about establishing a new union through such practices. The ocean only seems bigger than the wave [to the wave] to the extent that the wave hasn’t yet experienced the rest of what it has always been. Yoga is not about joining with something bigger than yourself. It’s about realizing you’re bigger than you thought you were.
Yoga Symposium.24.59
kevin wood (sahaj, 8/31/99 5:30:00 AM)Is there a natural discipline that isn't imposed from the outside? I agree that discipline is neccessary but doesnt it have to come from the inside out or else how are we to know if it is someone elses Idea that will create repression?
Yoga Symposium.24.61
Erich Schiffmann (schiffmann, 8/31/99 11:03:46 AM)The natural discipline is awareness. Be aware, aware, aware... This puts you in the position of no longer energizing thoughts or projections about the past or future, or at least more aware of when you are doing that—which then gives you a choice about whether to continue energizing them or not—and leaves you wide awake and available for the clear experience of what God is currently being in your experience. I mean, if you want to know who you are, then be aware of what you are. And if you are being aware, then what are you? You are Awareness! The other discipline I employ is that of active listening, both to the inner feeling of the energy that constitutes my specificness, LOVE, and for my deepest impulses about what to do or not do on a moment by moment basis.
Yoga Symposium.24.62
kevin wood (sahaj, 8/31/99 6:15:55 PM)Thanks Erich that is very true. But I wonder, how can you be sure if the impulses are for your greater good or if they are the impulses of vasanas that are delusional? What is your way of knowing, or what signals to you that you have heard the authentic voice of your deepest truth?
Yoga Symposium.24.63
I won't go astray. (Lotus183, 9/3/99 7:48:42 AM)So much questioning! How could you not trust yourself? Not trusting yourself is the path to self-destruction. If you do not trust yourself, than you can not trust anything and then reality fades away. We are all too scared of dying. We have to forget about death, stop protecting ourselves (stop contracting). I am sick of protecting myself and I am learning now from asking Infinite Mind and putting aside my thoughts about other people that they (the other people) are not harmful (that they will not harm me) that I am harming myself by believing the stupid missleading thoughts that make me dazed and confused when I beleive them!
When I let go of everything I think I know about myself, I DO experience clarity and peace of mind, when I think that beleiving what is given to me in the form of knowledge from Infinite Mind is delusional of missleading, then it feels like I am dying, my whole energy feels like it is being sucked out of me.
William
Yoga Symposium.24.64
Kit Spahr (Kit Spahr, 9/3/99 10:44:47 AM)Beautifully said William. I don't enjoy feeling contracted either. I think there's a Rumi poem which I'm not going to look up just now...that says something about feeling trapped in a prison until he realized that the door was unlocked and all he had to do was step outside.
kit
Yoga Symposium.24.65
Probably not this one... (crotalus, 9/3/99 12:28:48 PM)"Someone who doesn't make flowers makes thorns.
If you're not building rooms where wisdom can be openly spoken, you're building a prison." -Rumibut it has punch
Yoga Symposium.24.66
Complusion VS Love (Shakti Das, 9/3/99 4:09:53 PM)I think Kevin was asking how do we know the message is coming from infinite mind (and trust it) versus when it is coming as a vasana (or compulsion). In other words, not all of us have their good instincts and intuition intact. I know that I, for one, do not. That is one of the reasons that I "do" yoga in the first place -- to recover. Yes, to borrow a phrase I am in recovery from my past programming. I have chose to enter a recovery program and its name is sadhana.
Now everyone has heard of the twinkie defense, right i.e., the twinkies made me do it. Well even more poular is " I heard voices and they told me to do it, or God told me to do it, or I was just following my bliss, or the like.
Now if everyone here has their intuition on full board and can tune into infinite mind like a reliable radio, then I'm really impressed, no I'd be amazed. I know that I don't. So I could try to ask the savants here how to do it all the time, but I think that answer can't be answered here but in general terms, yes?
Simply, when we are not in tune with Infinite Mind, it's the same for me as saying that I am out of my heart or core energy. Nothing really will adequately compensate for that. If I realize that, then I can take measures to get back on track.
Here's an example, I am in the supermarket and I'm paralyzed in decision. One part of me says eat the chocolate mousse and follow it down with the marguerita herring wine sauce and jalapeno pepper puree, while another voice says have the fruit sald. Now which one to follow (yes, I know the fruit sald is not a wise choice ;-).
Assuming that the "link" to infinite mind is broken, how do we fix it, or if we receive a somewhat garbled message in this state of confusion, how do we verify the Source?
Sure the glib answer is easy, just tune into infinite mind, but the question wouldn't arise if we were already firmly so connected. So only when when our connection is iffy, these "choices" or "questions" arise. Since they can not be solved adequately with just logic, but only through wisdom i.e., infinite mind, then DON'T MAKE IMPORTANT DECISIONS IN THIS STATE. If it doesn't feel right, don't do anything. What if we are on the freeway? Potential trouble then? So again nothing replaces this union (yoga).
So can we connect to infinite mind anytime we realize that we are not connected (say when we are far away from the yoga mat)? Sure, if we know how, but I think the question was are there even better methods to test the link and/or clarify the messages other than the obvious techniques already discussed such as coming back to the breath, asking for guidance, and the usual? An extension of the same question would be to ask how do we stay connected all the time so that the dsiconnection never occurs in the first place, but this is the question of how to stay in nirbija samadhi (samadhi without seed) and it seems no one has a fast and easy answer for that.
Erich said; "if you want to know who you are, then be aware of what you are. And if you are being aware, then what are you? You are Awareness! The other discipline I employ is that of active listening, both to the inner feeling of the energy that constitutes my specificness, LOVE, and for my deepest impulses about what to do or not do on a moment by moment basis."
This is wonderful. This says to me that we can stay in the dance continuously if we stay attuned to the dance. It is when we get out of step due to lack of awareness, lack of being present, lack of feeling the love, then that is when the "problems" occur. So is even a furthe r extension of the question is to ask how to recognize the heart in all situations and in all things and how not justify its denial?
Yoga Symposium.24.67
Interesting (Lotus183, 9/9/99 11:32:59 AM)Wow...So much of that is what I wanted to say. Is maintaining a link with Infinite Mind easier of more effective when we are in the present, attunded with the breath and not thinking. I feel better when I'm in this state, I love being aware and I seem to gain spontaneous knowledge in this state. Sometimes when I mentally ask Mind I get a logical answer, but it's fun to do it and I'm going to continue as with being present.
My happiness is growing :-) Will
Yoga Symposium.24.69
Erich Schiffmann (schiffmann, 9/11/99 12:55:08 PM)
Nice posts above. Thank you! I want to discuss Heart more, but first...I’ve been meaning to get back to this question of inner guidance, and how do you know that what you’re hearing is the real inner voice or just more ego. Well, at first, you won’t know! You just dare to trust into this thing. And then later, in retrospect, you’ll get some sort of confirmation one way or the other, which will encourage you to continue inner listening and sharpen your ability to do so.
The analogy I use in this regard is that of the traffic helicopter. Do you know that one? It’s in my book, Chapter Eleven, Listening For Guidance. Simply, the idea is that from ground-level one’s perspective on anything and everything is limited. From the ground, I can only see so far. I cannot see what’s happening around the corner, for example. But a helicopter flying around in the air, looking down at exactly the same thing that I’m looking at, but from a different perspective, can see the whole picture. It has the aerial view. The practice, then, is that of inwardly asking for Guidance, as though you were asking the helicopter, and then Listening, then Hearing, and then daring to do as you are prompted to do. In this way you can access and avail yourself of the aerial perspective while still on the ground.
The insight is that it makes ground-level sense to do this. This has always been the big point in my mind. It makes ground-level sense to ask Big Mind, even if you’re not sure whether or not there is a big Mind to ask. If you are clear that your perspective is limited, then it’s no longer so reasonable to insist on your particular viewpoint. When I first stared doing this, that is, asking for Guidance throughout the day, I wasn’t at all sure there was really anything out there to be asking guidance of. It seemed like I was getting more and more involved with some sort of fairy tale fantasy. But the thing works! That’s what’s so cool about this. This is one of the biggest discoveries available: When you ask for Guidance, you get a response! And you’re likely to think that you’re just making it up. That’s what I thought. That’s what other people tell me they think. So, be suspicious. Ask again. Listen again. Continue the process. Pretty soon you find yourself beginning to trust into it. And that's yoga.
Now, I think yogasana, pranayama and meditation are all very important aids in this regard. They help clean you out, they help get your mind quiet, so that when the impulses or guidance of the Infinite flow through you, you feel it more clearly. If your mind is quiet, attentive and still, yet you are experiencing a distinct energetic push or pull to do something or other, you can be pretty sure you’re not making it up. And if you disregard the Guidance, hesitant that you might be energizing an ancient vasana, how can you be so sure at that point that your hesitancy to follow the Guidance is not merely that very same vasana? At some point, you just dare to go with the flow and trust what you trust.
My feeling is that the smoother you are, the more peace you are experiencing, the easier it’ll be to distinguish which voice is which. That’s why meditation, especially, is the main practice. In general, though, if there is a lot of sensation in the area of your solar plexus, sort of like the queasy feeling you get when going down in a fast elevator, I would take that as an indication that the ego is at work. And when the energetics in that area are smooth, you are hearing clearly. But, again, it just takes practice. Lots of practice. And persistence. And the overwhelming clarity of the insight that it makes ground-level sense to trust into your deepest feelings about what to do or not do.
And how do you do it all the time? By doing it now! Now and now and now . . . and I know that is easier said than done. Fortunately, though, the more you do it the easier it gets. The more you Listen, the better you Hear.
I hope this is somewhat helpful. I like this topic. I know there is more to be said. Let’s say it, back and forth. More people will get into this as they hear more about it, and that’s good for everyone. This internet stuff is pretty cool. A single voice goes a long way.
What have you come up with? How do you determine which voice to trust into? . . . because all of us, even in our mistrust, ARE trusting into something. We’re either making decisions based on past experience, trusting into our finite understanding, and it makes a sense to do this, or we’re aware that it also makes sense to reach beyond one’s current level of knowing and ask for Guidance. And then hesitantly, probably, in baby steps, beginning to do as one’s deepest feelings prompt. We’re constantly demonstrating which perspective we ascribe to, seen in the way we live our life, through what we do or don’t do. What we do arises from what we perceive needs to be done. How do you determine which voice to trust into?
Yoga Symposium.10.42
Instinct-Injury Remediation (crotalus, 10/25/98 2:51:11 PM)
Does learning to trust Infinite Mind return one to the mode of instinct enabled?
Does meditation and the meditative practice of asanas, in a way that consciously limits the influence of the dogma and doctrine of the foundation renunciate moralities that seem to have grown up with the various yogas, accelerate the return from capture and soul-famine?
Most of the people involved in Western Yoga today seem to be women. Are they instinctively turning to yoga with whatever intuition that has not been conditioned out of them in some desperate attempt to reclaim their natural selves?
Might some of the men into yoga be doing the same thing, troubled as they may well be by the authoritarian patriarchal environment in which only a few are permitted to really "thrive," that is, limit the control other men and institutions have over them?Yoga Symposium.10.45
Erich Schiffmann (schiffmann, 11/11/98 10:28:22 AM)
I would like to add my two-cents worth—as fertilizer for further discussion or grist for the mill—with regard to anti-authoritarianism. From the ground-level perspective, I totally agree. It is not intelligent to yield to psychological authority. It is intelligent, however, —as the bumper sticker says— to“Question authority.” The ground-level perspective is obviously lacking the requisite data necessary to make intelligent decisions. It makes ground-level sense, at some point, to willingly abandon one’s necessarily limited ground-level opinion for the Wisdom and Guidance of the one and only Infinite Mind. It makes ground-level sense to do this! But when one is asking for Guidance, reaching beyond one’s current point of view, asking for clarity and a bigger understanding, you are yielding to authority—but it’s a yielding to the Author of all.
When you mentally reach beyond your current understanding of things and ask for Guidance, you are going straight to the Source—voluntarily yielding up your obviously limited perspective with the hope and educated guess that there really might be a larger “aerial perspective” available that you can tap into and access. No one is certain at this stage that such a perspective exists, otherwise they’d be operating from there already, so it’s always a little scary making the transition and beginning to trust in Guidance. But once you gather sufficient courage to dip your toe into the silent experience of Mind, your mind, available to you by going within, you’ll begin to suspect and know—through direct experience—that what one is tapping into is the One & Only Infinite Omnipresence being the life of all. And though this can be frightening at first, because you don’t yet know you’re leaning into safe hands, you’re not actually yielding to an authority other than you (!!!). And, therefore, it is not actually a frightening thing to do. You cannot actually get hurt by yielding ... and so it does not deserve one’s fright.
And so, asking for Guidance, Listening, and then yielding to Infinite Mind is consistent with anti-authoritarianism because one is not actually yielding to something other than yourself, an authority outside yourself. You’re yielding into a larger sense
of Self.
Again... this is like a wave on the ocean relaxing into itself. When a wave on the ocean relaxes into itself, it will inevitably begin to feel the depths of the ocean as being what it truly is. And when one takes the time to become quiet and still, and simply relaxes into one’s own mind and awareness—and pays gentle attention to what’s happening—then one’s small sense of self goes away, dissolves into the biggerness, and gets replaced by a bigger sense. You don’t disappear or vanish. You expand! And you continue to exist. But, now, you’ll have a clear understanding of what’s going on and not be so confused. You’ll experience yourself as infinite and specific at the same time, as the specifically unique wave or self that you currently perceive yourself to be and the infinity of Omnipresent Mind that you must be, also. Because remember, if there’s a wave, there’s gotta be an ocean around here somewhere... And if there is a “you” or “me,” there’s also gotta be the biggerness: Omnimind, the Author, Consciousness being the conscious awareness of every seemingly separate individuality.
So, let’s not get hooked on the word “anti-authoritarian,” thinking it’s a good thing always. From the broader view, “anti-authoritarian” is the perfect definition or description of “ego.” The ego is that which is opposed to God, the one and only Self-Presence, the Author of All being all. It’s the ego (in the name of freedom) that rebels against yielding to the one and only Will, and in so doing experiences conflict because there is only one Will: God’s, yours, mine. To go against It, is to go against oneself... and this isn’t comfortable, and can’t be, luckily.
Therefore, to reiterate, from the ground-level perspective, I totally agree. It is not intelligent to yield to psychological authority. But seen from the aerial perspective, that’s all there is!... the visible, conscious expression of the Author of Creation: Consciousness, God, Mind, Self, being the Presence, Substance and Authority of everything that is. And that’s wonderful.I think this is a very fascinating topic. Sorry it was so long!
Yoga Symposium.24.70
Kit Spahr (Kit Spahr, 9/11/99 1:10:53 PM)I suspect that we are born with the ability to tune into this Guidance and probably take it for granted, not even naming it or realizing it is a thing that we are doing. And then somewhere along the line other people teach us to doubt this inner knowing...well meaning people...people who may even love us a lot.
I feel this myself. That as a young girl I was pretty tuned in but learned not to be or at least was tempted away from that inner knowing...but I've come back to it since I began practicing yoga. I think that you really have to develop trust. Because from ground level perspective...that voice, that guidance may seem odd...like hmmm well why should I wait till later to do this if I really want to do it now? But there's that voice that says yeah but later is better.
When you get used to it...life does feel a lot smoother. You feel like water flowing over rocks in a river instead of like a ball in a pin ball machine.
Kit
Yoga Symposium.24.71
Kit Spahr (Kit Spahr, 9/11/99 1:12:34 PM)There's a part of a poem that goes something like this... Do you have the patience to wait until your mud settles and your water clears and the moment for right action appears.
Yoga Symposium.24.72
SuZett Estell (suz coyote, 9/11/99 1:53:47 PM)Kit - what a great poem. How does one avoid stirring up the mud as soon as it starts to settle? Rhetorical question, I guess.
SuZYoga Symposium.24.73
Here's the whole poem (Kit Spahr, 9/11/99 5:32:37 PM)The book is one I carry to class with me so I didn't have it handy...
The ancient Masters were profound and subtle
Their wisdom was unfathomable.
There is no way to describe it; all we can describe is their appearance.
They were careful as someone crossing an iced over stream
Alert as a warrior in enemy territory
Courteous as a guest
Fluid as melting ice
Shapable as a block of wood
Receptive as a valley
Clear as a glass of water.
Do you have the patience to wait till your mud settles and the water is clear?
Can you remain unmoving till the right action arises by itself?The Master doesn't seek fulfillment.
Not seeking, not expecting, she is present, and can welcome all things.Yoga Symposium.24.74
Kit Spahr (Kit Spahr, 9/11/99 5:36:12 PM)
Oh...that was by Lao-TzuThe words here belong to the writers - please provide attribution if quoted on other web sites or in other media. These excerpts have been selected and edited for clarity by the editor. --R. Cox
