Yoga

Uma M Mullapudi

In these Yoga for Modern Life video gems, Daaji explains how and why to integrate spirituality and yoga into our lives and strips esoteric issues into simple, elegant and authoritative explanations that should guide the practice of yoga and a rigorous analysis of spirituality.
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Yoga for modern life

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From the desk of Daaji

Sahaj Marg

Message on the Occasion of the 90th Birth Anniversary of Pujya Shri Chariji Maharaj, 24 July 2017, Kanha Shantivanam 
We regularly witness how flocks of birds feed, move and journey together, and how those of the same kind assemble together. Our assembly is likewise. We aspire to soar majestically towards the Unknown with wings outstretched. In the language of Yoga, the cycle of samsara culminates in the hansa or the transcendent swan state: the swan that separates milk from water! Yet this discrimination or viveka, highly praised as the first step in Sadhana Chatusthaya, still eludes us.
A common bond unites us here. May this bond foster mutual trust and respect, and hasten the future forward into this very moment, so that we see our united enterprise achieved in utter harmony and in the service of one another in simple anonymity.
Some of us are nonetheless tormented by a continuous preoccupation with the feeling of ‘lack’ in life. This preoccupation, or constant craving to fulfil that lack, results in a chronic predicament of enough-lessness or incompleteness. We are fixated on that lack until it is fulfilled, and when it is we dig up another lack.
Our habitual awareness of an unfulfilled state within us stirs an activity within the mind that affects the brain’s neural network. It is well known that neurons that fire together wire together. Per contra, those neurons that do not work together risk losing their links within the neural network; they must be retrained to connect to the network.
Ceaseless brooding over any lack or any excess in our lives creates a pattern in our minds, and subsequently a neural network that supports the brooding mind. If the pattern triggers fear and worry, surely the neural network will adapt to boost the fear and worry. The mind impacts the brain, and thereafter the brain impacts the mind. Meanwhile, life seems to speedily move on when we are preoccupied with detecting what we lack and finding ways to fulfil it! 
How to overcome this pattern that hurts us?
A gentle nudge that deflects the habit of brooding helps us to avoid the valleys of fear and worry. During any ideal meditation are we not successfully deflecting unwanted thoughts, by reminding ourselves of what truly matters? This awareness – at any given moment of what truly matters – can save us from deep troubles, including the ceaseless brooding that may make us bitter towards life.
Here’s what you can do. Cultivate and steadfastly implement a routine of daily meditations, weekly group satsanghs, and weekly individual sittings. Establish a biological rhythm that trains the mind and the brain to establish specific neural pathways that support our noble effort in evolving. Allow the spiritual condition to percolate deeply to firm up those pathways. Dedicating such effort to the Divine will only intensify the pathways.
By now we know well the significance of meditation before sunrise, cleaning before sunset and prayer at bedtime. We do have a choice to tap into our limitless inner resource where stillness, peace and contentment flourish – a treasure of unparalleled riches and supreme strength.
Focusing on this treasure will only fortify our resolve; but staying away from it can weaken our resolve to continuously improve. Often when it is ideal and most necessary to reconnect with our Beloved Master we deviate from that awareness. Such deviation, even for a few seconds, can drastically change our inner environment.
How to prevent this deviation?
By micromanaging with micro-meditations. Meditating even for a few seconds during our daily rush can prepare us to regain our meditative state at a moment’s notice. In no time we can cultivate the meditative state if we remain even a bit vigilant.
Is it mental gymnastics we are learning? No! In fact, we progress naturally and joyously towards the Source within us. By cultivating the attitude of relying on the supreme strength inside us, we create superior neural networking that surpasses the networking of a mind focused on what we lack.
What then is needed from our side to facilitate this joyful journey? A heartfelt desire that, “I must go on continuously improving myself,” and to recognise that a simple practice such as ours cannot be ignored. Once we sense the inner stillness, the next evolutionary step will unfold naturally.
Constant remembrance, the art of building a bridge between my Maker and myself, is a result of well-finished meditation. Pushing oneself to ‘think’ of the bestower of spiritual conditions is not the same as ‘remembrance’. Remembering the Beloved is never a torture, while thinking can become a torture. In fact, it may give us a headache. Instead let the remembrance of the Beloved be a natural outcome of our passionate practice of Sahaj Marg.
Our way is very simple, its naturalness extraordinary, and to become natural ourselves is a sure outcome. Gently, steadfastly, in utmost care, and in loving remembrance, let us tread on this sacred path that the Great Hierarchy treads ahead of us.
Like birds of a feather, as seekers of Reality, let us make this way of life our primary focus. Let us carry this message out to the world and allow it to permeate our lives. Let us keep flocking together as swans and, soaring high, spread the message of love in a majestic way. On this most divine of days, let us catch up with our Beloved Master.
Kamlesh D. Patel
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Spread the Message of Love

Durgesh Singh

Aparna Panchbhai

Swarali Joshi

Ramaprabha K

Ramprasad

Dear friends,
I remember the first time I understood the real significance of experience. I was still in college at the time. Those days, I would meditate every single day. My parents would notice me sitting down with closed eyes every morning. They never disturbed me; nor did they ask me what I was doing.
One fine day I offered to take my father to a Heartfulness Trainer who resided near our home. He was happy to try it. When he came out of his first meditation, he was speechless.
Afterwards, eager to learn from my father, I asked him if he would like to impart any of the ritualistic knowledge that he had accumulated throughout his life.
I could see tears in his eyes as he replied that this meditation was the first time he had felt anything so profound. With sadness, he looked upon the years he spent devoted to various rituals, feeling that so much of his time had gone to waste.
Examining this more closely, it is important to understand how everything has its place in our lives. As children, our parents instil values in us and teach us about worshipping God in various ways. If you are a Christian, your parents might have taught you how to go to church, how to behave in church, and how to offer prayer before eating food. If you grew up in a Hindu family, your parents might have taught you how to behave in temple and sing songs of devotion. Many of us are raised with the various rituals and traditions followed by our families. In this way, we are taught to abide by certain beliefs and values.
As children, we are filled with wonder and curiosity at the world. If you see a child playing with a top, you will notice the spark in their eyes as they watch it spin. They will try turning the top on the wood floor, on the carpet, or on a chair; they will try to spin the top at different angles and with different amounts of force. Like scientists, they test their toy thoroughly under different environments, carefully observing each result.
<img class="size-full aligncenter" src="https://hfn-strapi-bucket.s3.ap-south-1.amazonaws.com/experiences2_5646ebc984.jpg?updated_at=2023-01-04T13:13:14.343Z" alt="" width="600" height="195">Naturally, we exhibit the same curiosity when we are first taught our beliefs and dogmas. With so much innocence and love, we are eager to ask questions, “Why do we go to temple (or church)? Why are we born? Who is God?” Just as we tested the top when we were children, we now ask many questions about our respective religions. In the very same way, we try to test and understand the traditions we are taught. Our curiosity only gets stifled when someone discourages us from experimenting, or when we are told to stop asking questions. This is one of the main reasons that so many of us rebel as we grow older. As teenagers, we become skeptical of our parents’ answers. We become disillusioned by traditions, and frustrated by the inability to test those dogmas and beliefs.
That is where experience is necessary. Beliefs and dogmas can act as a foundation, but the next step is to start building upon that foundation. Just imagine a doctor who goes on studying medical textbooks but never once touches a stethoscope! Would you even consider such a person to be a doctor? Similarly, in yoga and spirituality, what use is having knowledge of chakras, of talking extensively of God or liberation if we are not working towards actualizing that knowledge?
Whenever we sit in meditation with an open heart, we receive a different experience. We enter with a hypothesis that there is a source of light present within our hearts. Like a scientist, we test this belief each time we close our eyes and attempt to connect within. When we experience answers for ourselves, knowledge truly becomes ours.
As we continue with an open and accepting heart, we begin to reach a point when experiences are no longer enough. If an experience does not transform us, does it really have value? Our experiences always reflect our inner nature. They show us what we are. In this way, they are tools in our transformational process. Eventually, we realize that the less egotistical we are, the better our experiences become. Becoming nothing at all, we are in total bliss.
But in that case, who is there to experience it?
All the best, Daaji
<h5 class="text-center">Please tune in to <a href="http://en.heartfulness.org/international-yoga-day/">http://en.heartfulness.org/international-yoga-day/</a> on the International Day of Yoga, 21 June 2017 to watch the Livecast from Daaji starting from 7 AM IST on June 21st and available all day.</h5>
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Transformation Through Experiences

Yoga for modern life

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