Lesson 37 – Dancing with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

What Is the Nature of the Charyā Pāda?

ŚLOKA 37
Charyā is the performance of altruistic religious service and living according to traditional ethical conduct and culture, by which the outer nature is purified. It is the stage of overcoming basic instinctive patterns. Aum.

BHĀSHYA
Charyā, literally “conduct,” is the first stage of religiousness and the foundation for the next three stages. It is also called the dāsa mārga, meaning “path of servitude,” for here the soul relates to God as servant to master. The disciplines of char­­­yā include humble service, attending the temple, performing one’s duty to community and family, honoring holy men, res­pecting elders, atoning for misdeeds and fulfilling the ten classical restraints called yamas. Within a strong society, one performs char­yā whether he wants to or not. Young or rebellious souls often resist and resent, whereas mature souls fulfill these obligations most naturally. Right behavior and self-sacrificing service are never outgrown. The keynote of charyā, or karma yoga, is sevā, religious service given without the least thought of reward, which has the magical effect of softening the ego and bringing forth the soul’s innate devotion. The Tirumantiram ex­plains, “The sim­ple temple duties, lighting the lamps, picking flowers, lovingly polishing the floors, sweeping, singing the Lord’s praise, ringing the bell and fetching ceremonial water—these constitute the dāsa mārga.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 37 – Living with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Keeping Peace In the Home

Santosha is the goal; dharma, good conduct, remains the director of how you should act and respond to fulfill your karma. This goal is attainable by following the ten Vedic restraints: not harming others by thought, word or deed, refraining from lying, not entering into debt, being tolerant with people and circumstance, overcoming changeableness and indecision, not being callous, cruel or insensitive to other people’s feelings. Above all, never practice deception. Don’t eat too much. Maintain a vegetarian diet for purity and clarity of mind. Watch carefully what you think and how you express it through words. All of these restraints must be captured and practiced within the lifestyle before the natural contentment, the santosha, the pure, serene nature of the soul can shine forth. Therefore, the practice to attain santosha is to fulfill the yamas. Proceed with confidence; failure is an impossibility.

I was asked by a cyberspace cadet among our Internet congregation, “Where do we let off steam? Mom works, dad works, the kids are in school, and when everyone comes home, everyone lets off a little steam, and everyone understands.” My answer is don’t let off steam in the home. The home is a sanctuary of the entire family. It should have an even higher standard of propriety than the office, the factory or the corporate workplace. When we start being too casual at home and letting off steam, we say things that perhaps we shouldn’t. We may think the rest of the family understands, but they don’t. Feelings get hurt. We break up the vibration of the home. Young people also let off steam in school, thus inhibiting their own education. They behave in a way in the classroom that they would not in a corporate office, and who is hurt but themselves? It’s amazing how quickly people shape up their behavior when they sign a contract, when they get a job in a corporate office. They read the manual, they obey it and they are nice to everyone. This is the way it should be within the home. The home should be maintained at a higher standard than the corporate office.

The wonderful thing about Hinduism is that we don’t let off steam at home; we let our emotions pour out within the Hindu temple. The Hindu temple is the place where we can relate to the Gods and the Goddesses and express ourselves within ourselves. It’s just between ourselves and the Deity. In a Hindu temple there may be, all at the same time, a woman worshiper crying in a corner, not far away a young couple laughing among themselves with their children, and nearby someone else arguing with the Gods. The Hindu temple allows the individual to let off steam, but it is a controlled situation, controlled by the pūjās, the ceremony, the priesthood.

So as to not make more karma in this life by saying things we don’t mean, having inflections in our voice that are hurtful to others, we must control the home, control ourselves in the workplace, keep the home at a higher vibration of culture and protocol than the workplace, and include the temple in our lives as a place to release our emotions and regain our composure.

It is making a lot of really bad karma that will come back in its stronger reaction later on in life for someone, the husband or wife or teenager, to upset the vibration of the home because of stress at school or in the workplace. It is counterproductive to work all day in a nice office, control the emotions and be productive, and then go home and upset the vibration within the home. After all, why is someone working? It’s to create the home. Why is someone going to school? It’s to eventually create a home. It is counterproductive to destroy that which one works all day to create. That’s why I advise the professional mother, the professional father, the professional son and the professional daughter to use in the home the same good manners that are learned in the workplace, and build the vibration of the home even stronger than the vibration of the workplace, so that there is something inviting to come home to.

We have seen so many times, professionals, men and women, behave exquisitely in the workplace, but not so exquisitely at home, upset the home vibration, eventually destroying the home, breaking up the home. And we have seen, through the years, a very unhappy person in retirement, a very bitter person in retirement. No one wants him around, no one wants to have him in their home. Therefore, he winds up in some nursing home, and he dies forgotten.

The Sanātana Dharma and Śaiva Samayam must be alive in the home, must be alive in the office, must be alive in the temple, for us to have a full life. Where, then, do we vent our emotions, where do we let off steam, if not in our own home? The answer is, within the temple.

NANDINATHA SŪTRA 37: MURUGAN, LORD OF YOGA AND HARMONY
Śiva’s followers all believe in the Mahādeva Kārttikeya, Son of Śiva-Śakti, whose vel of grace dissolves the bondages of ignorance. The yogī, locked in lotus, venerates Murugan. Thus restrained, his mind becomes calm. Aum.

Lesson 37 – Merging with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

The Mind Is Complete

Should we acquire the ability to identify as the experiencer instead of the experience, the true and valid nature of awareness and its patterns of movement in the mind become evident. We see the mind as a total manifestation, containing all of the past and future evolutions in the eternal now. The mind is vast in its combinations of time, space and form. It contains every vibration, from subtle to gross. Awareness is free to travel in the mind according to our knowledge, our discipline and our ability to detach from the objects of awareness and see ourselves as the experience of awareness itself. This explains many of the so-called mysteries of life.

There are people with the ability to look back into the past and ahead to the future accurately and in detail. That feat is understood clearly in the light of awareness traveling through the mind. The entire mind exists right now—past and future included. These psychically talented individuals have trained their awareness to flow into areas of the mind that are unavailable to the average person. They go into the mind itself to view these phenomena. Similarly, esp, mind-reading and other mystical wonders are illumined by the knowledge that there is only one mind, and all phases of it are open to the spiritually awakened person.

What we term states of mind are, therefore, areas of distinct vibration. On the Earth we have continents, nations, regions, states and cities. Each is distinct and unique. Denmark is different from Spain. Australia is different from China. Paris is not at all like Honolulu. So it is in the mind. We have five states of mind—conscious, subconscious, sub of the subconscious, subsuperconscious and superconscious—and within each are hundreds and thousands of cities. In the subconscious area, the traveler can encounter fear, hatred, love and good memories. In the conscious-mind area he can experience business, human relationships and intellectual, social vibrations. In the superconscious area, there are even more regions, and he comes into visions, light, sound, overwhelming joy and peace.

Lesson 36 – Dancing with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

What Are the Four Stages on the Path?

ŚLOKA 36
The path of enlightenment is divided naturally into four stages: charyā, virtue and selfless service; kriyā, worshipful sādhanas; yoga, meditation under a guru’s guidance; and jñāna, the wisdom state of the realized soul. Aum.

BHĀSHYA
Charyā, kriyā, yoga and jñāna are the sequence of the soul’s evolutionary process, much like the natural de­­­­vel­opment of a butterfly from egg to caterpillar, from caterpillar to pupa, and then the final metamorphosis to butterfly. These are four pādas, or stages, through which each human soul must pass in many births to attain its final goal. Before entering these spiritual stages, the soul is im­mersed in the lower nature, the āṇava mārga, or self-centered path, bound in fear and lust, hurtful rage, jealousy, confusion, selfishness, con­science­less­ness and mal­ice. Then it awakens into charyā, un­selfish religious service, or karma yoga. Once ma­tured in charyā, it enters kriyā, devotion or bhakti yoga, and finally blossoms into kuṇ­ḍa­linī yoga. Jñāna is the state of en­light­ened wis­dom reached toward the path’s end as a re­sult of Self Realization. The four pādas are not al­ter­na­tive ways, but progressive, cum­ulative phases of a one path, San Mārga. The Tiruman­tiram says, “Being the Life of life is jñāna worship. Beholding the Light of life is yoga worship. Giving life by invocation is external worship. Adoration that displaces anger is charyā worship.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 36 – Living with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Santosha: Contentment

Contentment, santosha, is the second niyama. How do we practice contentment? Simply do not harm others by thought, word or deed. As a practitioner of ahiṁsā, noninjury, you can sleep contentedly at night and experience santosha then and through the day. Contentment is a quality that everyone wants, and buys things to obtain—“Oh, if I only had my house redecorated, I would be content.” “A new wardrobe would content me, give me joy and serenity.” “To be content, I must have a vacation and get away from it all. There I can live the serene life and have joyous experiences.”

The dharmic way is to look within and bring out the latent contentment that is already there by doing nothing to inhibit its natural expression, as santosha, the mood of the soul, permeates out through every cell of the physical body. Contentment is one of the most difficult qualities to obtain, and is well summed up within our food blessing mantra, from the Śukla Yajur Veda, Īsa Upanishad invocation, “That is fullness. Creation is fullness. From that fullness flows this world’s fullness. This fullness issues from that fullness, yet that fullness remains full.” This joy we seek is the joy of fullness, lacking nothing.

Life is meant to be lived joyously. There is in much of the world the belief that life is a burden, a feeling of penitence, that it is good to suffer, good for the soul. In fact, spiritual life is not that way at all. The existentialist would have you believe that depression, rage, fear and anguish are the foremost qualities of the human temper and expression. The communists used to have us believe that joy and serenity as the outgrowth of religion are just an opiate of the people, a narcotic of unreality. The Semitic religions of the Near East would have us believe that suffering is good for the soul, and there is not much you can do about it. The Śaivite Hindu perspective is that contentment is a reflection of centeredness, and discontentment is a reflection of externalized consciousness and ramified desire.

Maintaining joy and serenity in life means being content with your surroundings, be they meager or lavish. Be content with your money, be it a small amount or a large amount. Be content with your health. Bear up under ailments and be thankful that they are not worse than they are. Protect your health if it is good. It is a valuable treasure. Be content with your friends. Be loyal to those who are your long-time, trusted companions. Basically, contentment, santosha, is freedom from desire gained by redirecting the forces of desire and making a beautiful life within what one already has in life.

The rich seeking more riches are not content. The famous seeking more fame are not content. The learned seeking more knowledge are not content. Being content with what you have does not mean you cannot discriminate and seek to progress in life. It doesn’t mean you should not use your willpower and fulfill your plans.

It does mean you should not become upset while you are striving toward your goals, frustrated or unhappy if you do not get what you want. The best striving is to keep pushing along the natural unfoldment of positive trends and events in your life, your family life and your business. Contentment is working within your means with what is available to you, living within your income, being grateful for what you have, and not unhappy over what you lack.

There are many frustrated souls on the path who torment themselves no end and walk around with long faces because they estimate they are not unfolding spiritually fast enough. They have set goals of Self Realization for themselves far beyond their abilities to immediately obtain. If people say, “I am not going to do anything that will not make me peaceful or that will threaten my peace of mind,” how will they get anywhere? That is not the idea of santosha. True santosha is seeing all-pervasiveness of the one divine power everywhere. The light within the eyes of each person is that divine power. With this in mind, you can go anywhere and do anything. Contentment is there, inside you, and needs to be brought out. It is a spiritual power. So, yes, do what makes you content. But know that contentment really transcends worrying about the challenges that face you. Santosha is being peaceful in any situation. The stronger you are in santosha, the greater the challenges you can face and still remain quiet on the inside, peaceful and content, poised like a hummingbird hovering over a flower.

NANDINATHA SŪTRA 36: GAṆAPATI, FIRST AMONG THE GODS
Śiva’s followers all believe in the Mahādeva Lord Gaṇeśa, son of Śiva-Śakti, to whom they must first supplicate before beginning any worship or task. His rule is compassionate. His law is just. Justice is His mind. Aum.

Lesson 36 – Merging with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

The Purity Of Awareness

To the awakened mystic, there is only one mind. There is no “your mind” and “my mind,” just one mind, finished, complete in all stages of manifestation. Man’s individual awareness flows through the mind as the traveler treads the globe. Just as the free citizen moves from city to city and country to country, awareness moves through the multitude of forms in the mind.

Before we meditate, we view the cycles of our life and erroneously conclude that the mind changes, that it evolves. We view joy one moment, and despair the next and, because we feel so different in these states, assume we have changed. We grow up and look back on our childhood and again see the appearance of change. Through meditation, however, we observe that we have not changed at all. Awareness becomes our real identity, and it is pure and changeless. It was the same at seven years of age as it is today. It is the same in happiness as it is in sadness. Pure awareness cannot change. It is simply aware. Therefore, you are right now the totality of yourself. You never were different, and you never will be. You are perfect at this very moment. Change is only a seeming concept created through false identification with the experiences we have in various areas of the one mind.

Everything in the world and everything in the mind is as it should be, in a perfect state of evolution. Superconsciously, we can clearly see this through the eyes of our soul. When looking at it through the instinctive-intellectual mind, we don’t see this perfection. It is as if we have blinders on both sides of our eyes, like a donkey. The carrot of desire dangles right in front of our nose when we are in the instinctive-intellectual mind, and we are going after it, step at a time, step at a time, with our blinders on. We have to go in and in and in and reach an expanded state of awareness and gain that mountaintop consciousness where we perceive that there is no injustice in the world. There is not one wrong thing. All is in perfect order and rhythm in Śiva’s cosmic dance.

Lesson 35 – Dancing with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

How Does One Best Prepare for Death?

ŚLOKA 35
Blessed with the knowledge of impending transition, we settle affairs and take refuge in japa, worship, scripture and yoga—seeking the highest realizations as we consciously, joyously release the world. Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

BHĀSHYA
Before dying, Hindus diligently fulfill obligations, make amends and resolve differences by forgiving themselves and others, lest unresolved karmas bear fruit in future births. That done, we turn to God through meditation, sur­render and scriptural study. As a conscious death is our ideal, we avoid drugs, arti­­fi­cial life-ex­ten­sion and suicide. Suicide only postpones and in­­ten­­sifies the kar­­ma one seeks escape from, requiring sever­al lives to return to the evolutionary point that existed at the mo­ment of suicide. In cases of terminal illness, under strict com­mun­i­ty reg­ulation, tradition does allow prāyopa­ve­śa, self-willed re­ligious death by fasting. When nearing transition, if hospitalized, we re­turn home to be among loved ones. In the final hours of life, we seek the Self God within and focus on our man­­tra as kindred keep prayerful vigil. At death, we leave the body through the crown chakra, entering the clear white light and beyond in quest of videhamukti. The Vedas affirm, “When a person comes to weakness, be it through old age or dis­ease, he frees himself from these limbs just as a mango, a fig or a berry releases itself from its stalk.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 35 – Living with Śiva

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Humility, Shame and Shyness

The Hindu monastic has special disciplines in regard to remorse. If he doesn’t, he is an impostor. If he is seen struggling to observe it and unable to accomplish it all the time, he is still a good monastic. If he shows no remorse, modesty or shame for misdeeds for long periods of time, even though he continues apparently in the performance of no misdeeds, the abbot of the monastery would know that he is suppressing many things, living a personal life, avoiding confrontation and obscuring that which is obvious to himself with a smile and the words, “Yes, everything is all right with me. The meditations are going fine. I get along beautifully with all of my brothers.” You would know that this is a “mission impossible,” and that it is time to effect certain tests to break up the nest of the enjoyable routine and of keeping out of everybody’s way, of not participating creatively in the entire community, but just doing one’s job and keeping out of trouble. The test would bring him out in the open, into counseling sessions, so that he himself would see that his clever pride had led him to a spiritual standstill. A monastery is no place to settle down and live. It is a place to be on one’s toes and advance. One must always live as if on the eve of one’s departure.

Another side of hrī is being bashful, shy, unpretentious. The undeveloped person and the fully developed, wise person may develop the same qualities of being bashful, shy, unpretentious, cautious. In the former, these qualities are the products of ignorance produced by underexposure, and in the latter, they are the products of the wisdom or cleverness produced by overexposure. Genuine modesty and unpretentiousness are not what actors on the stage would portray, they are qualities that one cannot act out, qualities of the soul.

Shyness used to be thought of as a feminine quality, but not anymore, since the equality of men and women has been announced as the way that men and women should be. Both genders should be aggressive, forceful, to meet and deal with situations on equal terms. This is seen today in the West, in the East, in the North and the South. This is a façade which covers the soul, producing stress in both men and women. A basically shy man or woman, feeling he or she has to be aggressive, works his or her way into a stressful condition. I long ago found that stress in itself is a byproduct of not being secure in what one is doing. But this is the world today, at this time in the Kali Yuga. If everything that is happening were reasonable and could be easily understood, it certainly wouldn’t be the Kali Yuga.

If people are taught and believe that their spiritual pursuits are foremost, then, yes, they should be actively aggressive—but as actively passive and modest as well, because of their spiritual pursuits. Obviously, if they are performing sādhanas, they will intuitively know the proper timing for each action. Remorse, or modesty, certainly does not mean one must divorce oneself from the ability to move the forces of the external world, or be a wimpy kind of impotent person. It does mean that there is a way of being remorseful, showing shame, being humble, of resolving situations when they do go wrong so that you can truly “get on with life” and not be bound by emotionally saturated memories of the past. Those who are bound by the past constantly remember the past and relive the emotions connected with it. Those who are free from the past remember the future and move the forces of all three worlds for a better life for themselves and for all mankind. This is the potent Vedic hrī. This is true remorse, humility and modesty. This is hrī, which is not a weakness but a spiritual strength. And all this is made practical and permanent by subconscious journaling, vāsanā daha tantra, which releases creative energy and does not inhibit it.

NANDINATHA SŪTRA 35: GOD’S IMMANENT NATURE AS PERSONAL LORD
Śiva’s followers all believe that Lord Śiva is God, whose immanent nature is the Primal Soul, Supreme Mahādeva, Parameśvara, author of Vedas and Āgamas, creator, preserver and destroyer of all that exists. Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 35 – Merging with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Awareness Finds A New Home

Needless to say, the Self does not mean the realization of your personality. Some people think that this is what Self Realization means. “I want Self Realization,” they say, thinking all the time it means, “I want to realize that I am an individual and not dependent upon my parents. I want Self Realization.” Other people feel it means, “I want to realize my artistic abilities and be able to create.” It does not mean that at all. All this is of external consciousness, the intellectual area of the mind. It is a lesser form of self realization. Self Realization is finding That which is beyond even superconsciousness itself, beyond the mind—timeless, causeless, spaceless.

After Self Realization, awareness has a new home. It does not relate to the external mind anymore in the same way. It relates to the Self God, Paraśiva, as home base and flows out into the various layers of the mind, and in again. Before Self Realization, awareness was in the external mind trying to penetrate the inner depths. Then it would return to the external mind and again try to penetrate the within through the processes of meditation. After Self Realization, the whole process of the flow of awareness is reversed.

Mind and consciousness are synonymous. Awareness is man’s individual spiritual being, the pure intelligence of his spiritual body, flowing through this vast universe of the mind. We want to be able to flow awareness through any area of the mind consciously, at will, as we go in and in and in toward our great realization of the Self God, which is beyond mind, beyond time, beyond consciousness, beyond all form. Yet, it is not an unconscious state. It is the essence of all being, the power which makes the electricity that flows through the wire that lights the light that illumines the room. When we sit, simply being aware of being aware, the currents of the body harmonized, the aura turns to streaks of light dashing out into the room, and we are sitting in our own perfect bliss, simply aware, intensely aware, of being aware. Awareness itself then turns in on itself enough to experience, to become, the Self God—That which everyone is seeking.

That is the sum total of the path. That is the path that you are on. That is the experience that if you keep striving you will have in this life, even if it is at the point of death. It is then you will reincarnate as a great teacher on the planet and help many others through to the same goal. For there is no death and there is no birth for the immortal body of the soul that you are, that pure intelligence that goes on and on and on and on and on and on. So go in and in and in and in and in and in. Arrive at the ultimate goal. Make it your journey, your quest. Want it more than life itself.

Generally our greatest fear is death. Why? Because it is the most dramatic experience we have ever had in any one lifetime. Therefore we fear it. We are in awe of death. It is so dramatic that we do not remember, really, what happened during part of the experience, though occasionally some people do. However, the body of the soul knows no birth, knows no death. It goes on and on and on, and its awareness goes in and in and in to its ultimate goal—awareness of itself turned so much in on itself that it dissolves in the very essence of Being, as it merges in Śiva. You cannot say anything more about the Self, because to describe the Self adequately there are no words. It is beyond time, form, cause, mind. And words only describe time, cause and mind consciousness, which is form. You have to experience It to know It. And by experiencing It, you do know It.

Lesson 34 – Dancing with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s real voice

How Should We View Death and Dying?

ŚLOKA 34
Our soul never dies; only the physical body dies. We neither fear death nor look forward to it, but revere it as a most exalted experience. Life, death and the afterlife are all part of our path to perfect oneness with God. Aum.

BHĀSHYA
For Hindus, death is nobly referred to as mahā­pra­s­thāna, “the great journey.” When the lessons of this life have been learned and karmas reach a point of in­tensity, the soul leaves the physical body, which then re­turns its elements to the earth. The awareness, will, memory and intelligence which we think of as ourselves continue to exist in the soul body. Death is a most natural ex­pe­r­ience, not to be feared. It is a quick transition from the physical world to the astral plane, like walking through a door, leaving one room and en­tering another. Knowing this, we approach death as a sādhana, as a spir­itual op­­portunity, bringing a level of detachment which is difficult to achieve in the tumult of life and an ur­­gency to strive more than ever in our search for the Di­vine Self. To be near a realized soul at the time he or she gives up the body yields blessings surpassing those of a thousand and eight visits to holy persons at other times. The Vedas explain, “As a caterpillar coming to the end of a blade of grass draws itself together in taking the next step, so does the soul in the process of transition strike down this body and dispel its ignorance.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.