Many monks, many methods

Namaste, I'm in Rishikesh the "Yoga Capital of the World" in the foothills of the Himalayas where the Ganges is still comparatively clean and fast-flowing between forested hills. There's a lot of yoga here...many ashrams and many courses.

In the West yoga has been marketed as a health and fitness aid..yoga for bums and tums and to stay trim, flexible and healthy. A sort of cleaned up version of yoga has been imported into the West for a long time - since Swami Vivekananda went to the West in the 1890's. It has been stripped of its tantric part and then cleaned up and stripped of its central core as a spiritual practice. The tantra had already been pushed well underground from eight hundred years of occupation of India by Muslim, Portugese and then British puritans. For example Vivekananda's guru was Ramakrishna who certainly practised Bhairava tantric rites that your average Sunday school teacher wouldn't approve of.

Swami Satyananda Saraswati, Founder of the Bihar School of Yoga wrote ..."yoga and tantra are in essence the same system......tantra is the mother and yoga is the son......asanas and pranayama form a most essential part of the tantric system."

There are thousands of books on yoga and varities; Jhana Yoga, Bhakti Yoga, Karma Yoga, Raja Yoga, Hatha Yoga, Laya Yoga, Kundalini Yoga, Tantra Yoga, Kriya yoga, Japa Yoga, Iyengar Yoga, Vinyasa Yoga, Ashtanga Yoga, Bikram Yoga and many more. Patanjali was the first to write any of the practices down, about two thousand years ago. In his sutras (which were not text full of illustrations of how to tie your body in knots!) , he makes clear that the purpose of yoga is meditation and the purpose of meditation is to realise Atman; union with the Divine. Manifesting the resonance between the microcosm of your body and the macrocosm of the universe. Its not about health or even about energy. Yoga should therefore be done with eyes closed as an interior practice focusing on the chakra or the internal flow of subtle energy sensations.

The West, of course as a materialistic culture wants material results; a better shaped body, better stamina, more flexibility or a longer life. These may be a by-product of yoga but they are not the point. When westerners came to India they wanted yoga from the predominantly Vedanta-based ashrams. So the ashrams obliged their rich customers; but the Vedantic tradition of India is opposed to tantra. Vedanta is only interested in the top three chakras. Vedanta was religion for generally intellectual Brahmin males. So yoga gets again restricted.

Anyway, back to all these varieties of yoga. It is simple, they all suit different sorts of people. Tantra and yoga are very pragmatic. Jhana Yoga and also some of the Kashmir Shavite practices are best for people who are more intellectual; Bhakti Yoga, the yoga of love and surrender to the Divine is best for people who are naturally centred in their hearts, Karma Yoga is great for those intersted in the social and political world around them Mahatma Gandhi was a great Karma Yogi. Of course the greatest and first yogi was Shiva. Whatever you practice do it fully, regularly and with awareness. The best practices are always the ones closest to your natural interests. From them great bliss will arise.

The Shivalingam

It's pretty amazing to be in a city where the lingam is everywhere. Walking by the Ganges, or through the narrow alleyways of the old city of Varanasi; in alcoves, in little shrines, glimpsed through windows and doorways or embedded in the pavement are shivalinga. They do not represent the phallus, or vajra (penis) - it is the other way round. The phallus is a particular form of the symbol (Jung would call it an archetype) of the lingam which represents Shiva and is a reminder of the vertical dimension of life; the connection with Spirit.

Even more amazing is that they are not dusty old relics of a bygone age. Most, are freshly decorated with flowers and colours. In the recent festival of Mahashivaratri they are annointed with Ganges water, milk, curd, flowers, garlands. Some are tenderly dressed like precious children.

In the West anything that could connect with associations to the lingam is either ridiculed, shamed, shunned or analysed in reductive Freudian terms. The celebration of anything like this we have left is the Maypole; not long now till May day!

Tantra. Vedanta

As a change from the travellogue I thought I would write a bit about the shastras, the scriptures and the view they give. It seems to me that there is a clear division between the tantric scriptures and those of Vedanta. The situation is confusing as words are translated in many different ways. In much Vedanta teaching there is little good to say about the mind and the ego. Both are the source of delusion and illusion and only serve to separate us from the Divine. They perpetuate maya the illusory world experienced through the senses. The best we can do is withdraw from having anything to do with thoughts or the mind and seeing everything as an illusion, rest in consciousness.

The tantric view, is different. It is developed most fully in the Kashmir Shavite tradition. The greatest exponent was Abhinavagupta about 900 years ago in works such as Tantraloka. For him, the world is not an illusion to be shunned. Everything is real and everything can lead us to God-consciousness. All things are within consciousness and can only be discovered through reflective awareness with the mind. Shiva's power is consciousness which sustains everything. There are some aspects of the mind such discriminating wisdom and curiosity which are important. The problem with the ego is twofold. Firstly, we tend to from childhood identify the ego with the body and secondly take that as a primary identification so we think we are our body or that we are our thoughts. This universe is Lord Shiva's work of art; not maya. Enjoy it.

City of Light

Its five thirty in the morning and for the first time in India, I feel cold despite a fleece. The crescent moon is still high in the night sky waning towards the New Moon for the festival of Mahashivaratri here in Kashi (also called Varanasi and by the British , Benares) in a few days time. A few bright candles float down the Ganges in front of me. To my right a fire flares as a chai stall wallah lights his fire for the first brew of the day. In the distance I can see the fires of the main burning ghat as more bodies are dispached, fortunate enought to be burnt next to the Ganges at Varanasi - every Hindu's wish. This city of Shiva is where he traditionally appeared as an infinite pillar of fire to win the contest between Shiva, Visnu and Brahman. It is called the shining city and is full of shivalingams every few yards in the street. Nearly allways with some fresh flowers or bel leaves on it. We are more used to associating fire with Shakti as the fire of kundalini than Shiva the fire, from his third eye which can turn opponents to ash. The boatmen are coming now, looking for trade. The dobhi wallahs are starting their day of thrashing the dirt out of clothes in the river. The sky ahead becomes redder, soon the sun will rise it will warm up and I can chant the Gyatri mantra to start the day.
Namaste. Sat, Chit Ananada; truth, consciousness and bliss.

Who Am I?

Ramana Maharshi's basic method for realising the Self was one of Self-Enqiry. It was how he at the age of 16 became enligthened. With any experience we have from out mind - a thought or a feeling we can do one of four things; we can suppress it, we can express it, we can witness it or we can ask the question, who is it that is experiencing this? For many people suppressing feelings is how they were brought up and it is a great liberation when they give themselves permission to do the opposite and express. This permission may come from therapy or from being in an environment which supports them. More energy is liberated this way.

But tantra is always about the dance of energy and awareness. Eventually we realise that just expressing can lead to personal chaos and more stuckness as we can easily become addicted to the dramas. So we move towards the witenssing of feelings and thoughts; more like a meditation. However the more we sit as a witness the more things there are to witness (Mooji said that the actors only come on stage when the audience is there! http://www.mooji.org/ ). The process of true liberation comes when we turn from the seductive play of phenomena, as if a mirror is put in front of our face, and ask, "Who is it that is experiencing this?". If this is done the mind quietens and a spacious sense of "I am" arises. It is a spaciousness that is not empty but full of bliss. Finally the "I AM" expands as AM, loosing the personal sense of I. Only Existence remains. This is it. Thre are many ways of quietening the mind and coming to a space of being. Using mantra is one way. Of course I like using the energy of the body through touch and breathing to do the same. In erotic trance and expanded orgasmic states we can experience this dissolving in to Existence and it can open up the question Who Am I?

Namaste from India. Next week I am in the City of Shiva - Varanasi.

Arunachala

It's twilight and above me the sacred mountain of Arunachal is becoming a silhouette against the sky, a mountain older than the Himalayas, dedicated to Shiva. In its caves over thousands of years many have realised enlightenment or samadhi. Ramana Maharshi lived on this mountain in modern times. It is the eve of the full moon and hundreds of thousands of people are walking aound the mountain, though it feels more like walking though a long funfair of stalls with small temples every few yards. Some walk in silence, many are in groups chattering excitedly. At other times, some even roll around the mountain for all of its 14km circumference. I walked alone a week earlier in the early morning chanting all the way Om Namah Shivaaya and singing Arunachala Shiva. The cave where Ramana lived for several years is particularly powerful and we were able to chant in there, the vibrations of the chants filling our heads and bodies shaking out thoughts to create luminous space to dissolve in to. All spiritual practices require some way of stilling thoughts to allow the spaciousness of being to a recognised and mantra is a particularly powerful way to do this (see www.mantra-yoga.com) . Ramana at the end of the ninteenth century experienced sahaja samadhi (spontaneous awakening) when he was sixteen years old and from that experience developed Self-Enquiry as a method to realise the Self. It is simple to enquire in the identity of the experiencer. Can the seer be seen? We so readily get caught up in the experiences or try and become the witnesser of the experience and never enquire into the nature and reality of the expereincer.

India is a great place to practice this. Old distractions are muted and the sheer intensity of the experiences in the present moment make it easier to stay present and then, as if putting a mirror in front, look for the reality of the experiencer. So who walked around the great mountain of Arunachala? And were they separate from the mountain and the crowds.?

Pilgrimage

I am off to India for a three month visit! Yippee! It is a sort of pilgrimage. Like all pilgrimages it is an outer journey which is a reflection of an inner journey.  The inner journey is towards deeper self-knowledge and connection with the Self an inward journey to a Divine core; a central tantric insight, actually that of all mystical traditions, that the way to the Divine is within. 

In particular it is a journey to discover a better understanding of the deep masculine; Shiva at my core.  In the West we have had such a distorted conception of the masculine for so long, partly from two

 world wars last century and then the reactions against them, that so many men and women have no idea of what a man is.  After; being told that we are all potential rapists, then just used as sperm and then cash donors, then given role models such as professional footballers who are permanently juvenile and now portrayed in almost every TV sitcom for the last twenty years as emotionally teenage; men are pretty confused. Much tantra in Britain seems to be based on the idea that tantra is workship of the divine feminine and that men should just get on with that. This is a long way from most classical conceptions of the relationship of Shiva and Shakti. I shall be in Varanasi, the city of Shiva and the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world, for Mahashivaratri, the great festival of Shiva at the end of February and also studying and practicing from the Kashmir Shavite tantric tradtion there.

I am also going to further my study and practice of mantras for healing. Particularlymantras that are chanted on to the body to release the trauma and blocks in the body.  To begin, I will be in Tamil Nadu. The people of South India are desecended from the Dravidian people who lived in India before the Aryans took over several thousand years ago. The Shiva temples of the South are ancient and full of power.  I will visit the five Shiva temples in the South which are connected to the five elements; earth water, fire, air and space. Whilst there, I will be doing a tantric meditation of seeing the whole of the world; every sense-aspect, every phenomena, as the opposite gender. This is easier in India which has a lot of feminine energy. So for me, everything is Shakti, to be honoured, worshiped and connected to with passion, presence and awareness.

I may write more on this blog as I travel; but right now, I am not sure.  Writing can serve to distract from being immersed in the experience. Shiva, consciousness is very much about awakening to what is; not writing commentaries on it.  Either way, I am back by Easter.