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                                                         QUOTES ON YOGA

1.     Yoga means to encounter the reality as it is.

2.      You can go on doing asanas, postures; that is not yoga. Yoga is an inward turning. It is a total about-turn. When you are not moving into the future, not moving toward the past, then you start moving within yourself – because your being is here and now, it is not in the future.

3.     Yoga doesn’t say to believe in anything. Yoga says, experience. Experiment and experience are both the same, their directions are different. Experiment means something you can do outside; experience means something you can do inside. Experience is an inside experiment.

4.  Gurdjieff says that you are not one, you are a crowd, not even when you say” I”, There are many ”I’s” in you, many egos. In the morning, one” I”; in the afternoon, another” I”; in the evening, a third ”I”, but you never become aware of this mess because who will become aware of it? There is not a centre who can become aware.

5.   As you are, you are a crowd and a crowd have many phenomena. One is, you cannot believe a crowd. Gurdjieff used to say that man cannot promise. Who will promise? You are not there. If you promise, who will fulfil the promise? Next morning the one who promised is no more. And you are a Rotary Club: the chairman goes on changing. Every member becomes a rotary chairman. Rotation is there. Every moment someone else is the master. Up until now you have lived as a chaos, a crowd.

6.  A crowd cannot be blissful; a crowd has got no self.   Bliss means absolute silence, and silence is possible only when there is harmony-when all the discordant fragments have become one, when there is no crowd, but one... Right now, everybody else is in your house, you are not there. Only guests are there, the host is always absent. And only the host can be blissful.

7.  Discipline means the capacity to be, the capacity to know, the capacity to learn. ...All the yoga postures are not really concerned with the body, they are concerned with the capacity to be. Patanjali says if you can sit silently without moving your body for few hours, you are growing in the capacity to be. …. the body will become a slave; it will follow you. ..... if the body is not moving your mind cannot move, because mind and body are not two things.... You are not body and mind, you are body-mind...The mind is the subtlest part of the body. Or you can say the reverse, that body is the most gross part of the mind.

8.  Whatsoever happens in the body happens in the mind, and the vice versa.... In a non-moving body, the mind cannot move; it needs a moving body...If the body is non-moving, the mind is non-moving, you are centred.

9.   Only through discipline you will become a disciple. Only through being centred you will become humble, you will become receptive, you will become empty, and the guru, the Master, can pour himself into you.

10.  The basic definition is, YOGA IS THE CESSATION OF MIND –

11.  Yoga is the state of no-mind. The word” mind” covers all – your egos, your desires, your hopes, your philosophies, your religions, your scriptures. ”Mind” covers all. Whatsoever you can think is mind...Cessation of the mind means cessation of the known, cessation of the knowable. Yoga is a jump into the unknown.

12.  When there is no mind, you are in yoga; when there is mind you are not in yoga. So, you may do all the postures, but if the mind goes on functioning, if you go on thinking, you are not in yoga. Yoga is the state of no-mind. Because the basic thing to be understood is: when the activity of thinking is not there, you are there;

13.  When you can simply look without being identified with the mind, without judging, without appreciating, condemning, without choosing – you simply look and the mind flows, a time comes when by itself, of itself, the mind stops.

14.   When there is no mind, you are established in your witnessing. Then you have become a witness – just a seer-a drashta, a sakchhi-a witnesser. Then you are not a doer, then you are not a thinker. Then you are simply being pure being, purest of being. Then the witness is established in itself.

15.  Patanjali will never say that, “I am hungry.” He will say” The body is hungry”; he will say, ”My stomach is feeling hungry”; he will say, ”There is hunger. I am a witness. I have come to witness this thought, which has been flashed by the belly in the brain, that ’I am hungry.’” The belly is hungry; Patanjali will remain a witness. You become identified, you become one with the thought.

16.  When mind ceases, you are established in your witnessing self. In other states, except this, there are identifications. If you are in the identifications, you are in the world, in the misery. If you have transcended the identifications, you are liberated. You have transcended this world of misery and entered the world of bliss.

                      HOW TO MEDITATE IN YOUR SLEEP

                        (Based on Osho’s talk on The Last Testament)

Meditation should slowly be spread all over your life, even while going to sleep. When you are lying down on your bed, it will take a few minutes for you to go to sleep. For those few minutes, be alert of the silence, of the darkness, of the relaxed body. Remain alert as sleep starts descending on you, till you are completely overwhelmed by sleep and you will be surprised. If you continue to the very last moment when sleep takes you over, again in the morning the first thought will be of awareness. Whatever is the last thought before you go to sleep is always the first thought in the morning when you wake up because it continues as an undercurrent in your sleep.

Nobody has time for meditation - the day is so full. But six or eight hours in the night can be transformed into meditation. You are taking a shower. Why not take it with awareness? Why take it mechanically, like a robot? You have been doing it every day, so you go on doing it and it becomes mechanical. Do everything non-mechanically, and slowly, slowly meditation will spread all over your day, twenty-four hours. Only then are you on the right track. Then there is an absolute guarantee that success is going to be yours.

Tension means the past. The past that you have not really lived but only somehow only bypassed; it hangs, it is a hangover, it surrounds you.

You will have to relax from the circumference. The first step in relaxing is the body. Remember as many times as possible to look in the body, whether you are carrying some tension in the body somewhere – at the neck, in the head, in the legs. Relax it consciously. Go to that part of the body and persuade that part, say to it lovingly, "Relax!" And you will be surprised.

If you approach any part of your body, it listens, it follows you – it is your body! With closed eyes, go inside the body from head to toe, searching for any place where there is tension, and then talk to that part as you talk to a friend. Let there be a dialogue between you and your body. Tell it to relax and tell it, "There is nothing to fear. Don't be afraid. I am here to take care – you can relax." Gradually, you will learn the knack of it.

Once the body becomes relaxed then take another step, a little deeper. Tell the mind to relax. And if the body listens, the mind also listens, but you cannot start with the mind – you have to start from the beginning. You cannot start from the middle. Many people start with the mind, and they fail; they fail because they start from the wrong place. Everything should be done in the right order.

If you become capable of relaxing the body voluntarily, then you will be able to help your mind relax voluntarily. The mind is a more complex phenomenon. Once you have become confident that the body listens to you, you will have a new trust in yourself. Now even the mind can listen to you. It will take a little longer with the mind, but it happens.

When the mind is relaxed, then start relaxing your heart, the world of your feelings, emotions – which is even more complex, even subtler. But now you will be moving with great trust in yourself. Now you will know it is possible. If it is possible with the body and possible with the mind, it is possible with the heart too. And then, only when you have gone through these three steps, can you take the fourth. Now you can go to the innermost core of your being, which is beyond body, the mind, and the heart: the very centre of your existence. And you will be able to relax too.

And that relaxation certainly brings the greatest joy possible, the ultimate ecstasy and acceptance. You will be full of bliss and rejoicing. Your life will have the quality of dance to it.

Raj Pandey

Tantra's secrecy

Yogini is an important link of the tantric system. This is a fierce force. The system has been classified into five categories. The first is Shiva-Tantra, in which Shiva is a Guru and Mother Parvati is a disciple. The second is the Shakta-tantra, in which Shakti (power) is supreme. Third is the Ganapatya Tantra, in which Ganesha is the main divinity. The fourth is the Surya-Tantra, in which the sun is the primary force. And the fifth system is Vaishnava-Tantra, in which Narayan is considered the chief. These are the top five Tantras.

Two of the five systems are currently active in India, Shiva-Tantra (Shaivism) and Shakta-Tantra. Both these systems are lively and dynamic. In Shiva-Tantra, Shiva is Guru and Shakti is disciple. A lot of sects are evolved in this Tantra. There are 10 major branches in the Shiva-tantra. In the Shakta-Tantra, where Shakti (power) is the supreme controller of the universe, there are ten Maha vidyas or great wisdoms. These ten wisdoms have ten schools devoted to them. The creator in the Shakta-Tantra appears in ten different forms. It starts from Kali, then blossoms like shodshi Tara, and expresses itself as meditative consciousness Kamla at the end. It is a power that pervades all the visible and invisible universe and reveals a person's personal and cosmic fate. All versions of it are good, kind and as loved as a shodshi. This is the last expression of Shakti Devi.

Sadhana of Shri Chakra is not the highest meditation of the system. In short, the theory behind Shakti worship is that shakti comes from a fusion of worldly law and cosmic energy. At the same time, the Tantric tradition shows that there are Chaurasi (84) Siddhas and 64 tantras that are the masters of tantric art and science.

Shakti Tantra is fruitful only when the Devi (Shakti) is seen as the supreme Guru in the form of cosmic energy. This is an old tradition. In ancient India especially, women would always get the highest position and status in the society. With medieval attacks and political upheaval, the matriarchal system was subdued, and the patriarchal system began to emerge. Tantra is a very pure tradition and pathway. Tantra has Tamasic Tantra (Kuala Tantra), Rajasic Tantra (Mishra Tantra) and Sattvic Tantra (Samaya Tantra). Most of the humans in current society know more about the Tamasic Tantra as the power to control and influence other people's attitudes and thoughts is always at the forefront. That's why most of the Sadhaks (Practitioners) adopt or follow the Tamasic Tantra method. This system is so powerful that it is often called black magic by humans.

A follower of the Rajasic tantra system concentrates on practical and social behaviour. This is the system which teaches us to control different human instincts and nature by controlling worldly desires. Those who teach this are the main teachers (Gurus). But this is not the real system (Tantra). True Tantra is considered as Sattvik Tantra, in which the secret of the way of surrender and faith, surrender to God and faith in God is described. What is the practice of yoga? This is the Sattvic tantra not Rajasic or Tamasic Tantra.

Sattvik Tantra is of the highest class. And there is power in it. It has the power to free someone completely from the cycle of birth and death. Nothing more can be achieved after mastering Sattvik Tantra except salvation (Moksha). Tantric tradition is unique, very beautiful and very organised. This is very pure, very simple and develops a nature of innocence. To be related to power you must give up your ego completely. This is considered one of the most difficult system of practices.