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KOSHAS: OUR ILLUSORY LAYERS [for yoga geeks]

Here’s a link to my favorite online resource on Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras – specifically to a section on the koshas – described therein as five lampshades covering our light: Swamij.com/Koshas.

I suggest that there’s a very direct correlation between the five koshas and the last six of Patanjali’s eight limbs: as we gain proficiency with a limb, we begin to experience a deeper, subtler aspect of our being:

Limb

Kosha
Postures Outer physical
Breathing Inner physical/energetic
Concentration Conscious mind
Meditation (3 levels) Sub-conscious mind (3 functions)

When we meditate, we sequentially transcend [from densest to subtlest energetically] three states of generally sub-conscious mind, evidenced by our (i) sensory processing, (ii) memory storage and (iii) sense of individuality.

Beyond that point we meditate without specific focus or obstruction, having come as close as physically/mentally possible to consciousness itself.

I skinny the eight limbs down to six: the four above plus the yamas & niyamas [the two most important based on prioritization and because they make up ~70% of the eight limbs!!].

I group the last three limbs together – not just because they’re very notably placed in a separate chapter in the Sutras – but because the physical/mental action associated with them (seated meditation) is identical.

While we sit and meditate, we descend three progressively subtle energetic densities of sub-conscious mind (each evidenced by a distinct mental function – and very different perspective!) – which takes a LONG time.

At the end of the day there’s no incorrect way to meditate – it just takes practice, and as Patanjali said, we’ll know it when we get there!

😊❤️🕉

Meditate – you can’t do it incorrectly [just more efficiently – that’s why I’m here]!!

$15 – scheduled group “meditation prep” classes

Current class schedule

  • Skype lessons
  • seminars
  • lectures
  • private lessons

Proud sponsor of Yoga Instructors Association (MA)

#BringBackPatanjali

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Susan is a Saint

As I type this my wife Susan is driving her eighth Girls Inc. college mentee to look at a university over an hour’s drive from here.

I’ve said it for over 30 years, if it weren’t for her I’d go through life thinking I was right ALL the time.

Just now:

SUE: Did you hear how you spoke to them?

ME: Argh! [sounding like a cross between a mad pirate and a lion in pain]! I’m frustrated – though admittedly, it has nothing to do with the towel rack!!! Sorry if I embarrassed you.

SUE: I’m not embarrassed. That’s on you! But you might want to think about how you speak to others.

ME: 💔

I’ve devoted the rest of my time here in what’s left of the Garden of Eden to my two loves: Susan and Patanjali [don’t worry S&J, you come under the heading of “Susan”❤️].

Btw – if it wasn’t bloody obvious, there’s a reason I practice yoga 12 hours a day – but as one of my teacher’s teachers said: ”A zebra is always going to be a zebra” or as Popeye used to say “I yam what I yam”.

Blessing to all who read this; may you know half the bliss I’ve know in my lifetime.

Allan

😊❤️🕉

Meditate – you can’t do it incorrectly [just more efficiently – that’s why I’m here]!!

$15 – scheduled group “meditation prep” classes

Current class schedule

  • Skype lessons
  • seminars
  • lectures
  • private lessons

Proud sponsor of Yoga Instructors Association (MA)

#BringBackPatanjali

 

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THE SCIENCE OF MIND CONTROL

I teach the science of mind control: Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras.

MEDITATION:

as it was originally practiced!

developed by devout EMPIRICAL scientists – without Google!!!!!!

using just their bodies and minds!

MEDITATE – you can’t do it wrong!! But if you want to find TRUE inner peace please read a translation (or two or three!) of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras!

If you want a place to start here are links to personal translations of the first half of Patanjali’s epic poem:

Chapter One – the science

Chapter Two – preparing to meditate

😊❤️🕉

Meditate – you can’t do it incorrectly [just more efficiently – that’s why I’m here]!!

$15 – scheduled group “meditation prep” classes

Current class schedule

  • Skype lessons
  • seminars
  • lectures
  • private lessons

Proud sponsor of Yoga Instructors Association (MA)

#BringBackPatanjali

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WHAT DOES CONSCIOUSNESS HAVE TO DO WITH RELAXING? [Alternative title: Why is the Raja Yogi teaching Medical QiGong?]

Just because we’re not equipped to literally experience or fully comprehend consciousness – think about this:

Here’s how consciousness has been described since the dawn of our species:

  • Infinite – unaffected by space
  • Eternal – unaffected by time
  • Omnipresent – everywhere
  • Omnipotent – all-knowing
  • Omniscient – all-powerful
  • A balance between wisdom and curiosity
  • A balance between awareness and clarity
  • A balance between bliss and compassion

A source of courage, wisdom, serenity and faith – Patanjali

Infilling everything, pervading everywhere, impelling all – Amma

Tap into THAT PART OF YOU and experience what happens!

 

Relaxing? Yup.

Here’s how I experience it:  [remember, meditating is uniquely personal. It’s something you do for yourself – lovingly(!) – because like physical exercise, ONLY YOU CAN. Ironically, it works better when our intention is to better serve others!]

I find meditation relieving, reassuring and reaffirming in a loving, non-judgmental accepting sense. Sometimes it almost feels as if I’m being holistically embraced. I often reemerge from my sub-conscious journeys feeling subtly holistically energized!

Little picture: How we get our physical body and non-physical mind to relax sufficiently to enable that sense of holistic union or yoga doesn’t matter. That’s where QiGong’s breathing, movement and visualization comes in!

😊❤️🕉

Meditate – you can’t do it incorrectly [just more efficiently – that’s why I’m here]!!

$15 – scheduled group “meditation prep” classes

Current class schedule

  • Skype lessons
  • seminars
  • lectures
  • private lessons

Proud sponsor of Yoga Instructors Association (MA)

#BringBackPatanjali

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THE END IS COMING (MAYBE)

“Divine” in this context refers to something that a) NEVER changes; b) is unaffected by time & space; and c) without which we don’t know we’re alive: our consciousness – WHICH IS NOT A MENTAL FUNCTION!!!

 

When we meditate, we transcend conscious and ultimately sub-conscious mind, becoming more self-aware en route. Over time, we draw a deepened sense of serenity, courage, wisdom and ultimately faith from having witnessed evidence of our own divine essence: our consciousness, the awareness OF our thoughts.

Raja Yoga is a lifelong, exhaustive study and practice in self-awareness and self-control – ALL of which is intended to prove to yourself beyond all doubt that there’s an aspect of you that’s divine.

Big picture:

When it sinks in that part of you may indeed be immortal [here’s the math: what are the odds that THIS aspect of each of us – our consciousness – which NEVER changes while we’re walking around in this body/mind – that IT “dies” along with the physical/mental parts of us? By definition, it CAN’T! It’s literally “NOT OF THIS EARTH!!”]

RIGHT!!!!! WAKE UP EVERYBODY!!!!

 

The end of your body/mind is undoubtedly coming. Wake up to the most miraculous aspect of YOU before you’re forced to as you pass on from THIS body/mind.

😊❤️🕉

Meditate – you can’t do it incorrectly [just more efficiently – that’s why I’m here]!!

$15 – scheduled group “meditation prep” classes

Current class schedule

  • Skype lessons
  • seminars
  • lectures
  • private lessons

Proud sponsor of Yoga Instructors Association (MA)

#BringBackPatanjali

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EH?

One of Sue’s favorite new TV shows is “Grown-ish”, a spinoff of “Blackish”. Skin color aside, I’ve discovered another reason I may be having trouble enlightening today’s youth: we don’t speak the same language!!

I watched an entire episode, after which I told Sue, “I have NO idea what they were talking about!”

One of my teachers believes that our species has literally evolved: that children born after 1990 have developed a new predisposition. Give a two year old a phone and watch what happens!!

Evolutionary time warp or not, we haven’t changed physiologically in thousands of years.

The holistic practice of Raja Yoga (meditation) is timeless.

 

It’s the oldest (read most time-tested!) form of self-care known to man – of any age!

Mind control or meditation hinges entirely upon a single principle: that consciousness is NOT a mental function!

 

Once that “clicks”, well……..you and your problems seem somehow lighter, certainly less stressful!

😊❤️🕉

Meditate – you can’t do it incorrectly [just more efficiently – that’s why I’m here]!!

$15 – scheduled group “meditation prep” classes

Current class schedule

  • Skype lessons
  • seminars
  • lectures
  • private lessons

Proud sponsor of Yoga Instructors Association (MA)

#BringBackPatanjali

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OPEN LETTER TO DAN HARRIS

Dear Dan,

Thank you. We need more well-informed, respected public figures advocating and promoting meditation. God bless you.

Please forgive my complete lack of humility, but if you’ll indulge me:

Only 10%? Keep practicing!!😊

The science of mind control or meditation is prehistoric.

Long before the advent of written language and modern religion, the original discipline was memorialized in an epic 200-line poem: Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras.

Patanjalian or Raja Yoga was developed in India at a time in human history when it was becoming apparent that sacrificing THINGS (God forbid live ones) only worked about 50% of the time.

Patanjali and his predecessors turned the practice of trying to influence that which can’t be influenced into a practice of trying to better understand and serve it. These ancient sages effectively reverse-engineered the human experience from our outer gross physical body to the essence of our being: consciousness…

…for the purpose of reducing human suffering FOR ALL MANKIND FOREVER.

 

Over the millennia, the practice of meditation (trying to tap into our divine essence) morphed into the modern practice of prayer.

That said, you are absolutely correct that meditation can be practiced in a entirely “secular” fashion….

…(i.e., without a sense of sacrifice and devotion to the Source) but that’s like walking along a beach on a beautiful day with a paper bag over your head!! Sorry – but how did none of those experts make this point?!

Here’s the “non-secular” science in a nutshell:

It’s based on Sankhya, the realization that consciousness (the awareness OF our thoughts) is not a mental function; rather, it’s as distinct from our mind and thoughts as our thoughts are from our bodies!

Consciousness alone in the entire universe is not subject to the vagaries of time and space (i.e., it’s the ONLY thing not subject to karma).

AND IT’S IN EACH OF US! Oooops, you can see how the “non-secular” aspect of the practice creeps in: life changes when we realize our own essentially divine nature.

Back to the “secular” science…

Humans exist in at least three distinguishable spatial dimensions: physical, mental and consciousness – the latter being the awareness OF the former.

Here’s the thing about consciousness that makes it unique in the universe: IT NEVER CHANGES – NEVER.

How do we know that something that’s literally intangible and never changes even exists?! And why should we care?!

Without consciousness we wouldn’t know we’re alive – let alone reading this!!

Try to imagine the nature of something that’s aware yet NEVER changes.

This aspect of OURSELVES – our intangible, essential awareness – has been described by people a lot smarter than me as eternally and infinitely compassionate and curious.

When we meditate we eventually settle through four energetically distinct states of mind before encountering our essence. The good news is there’s no wrong way to do it and the benefits are almost immediate and cumulative.

However if we practice with the original intent – as scripted by Patanjali to deepen our connection with the Source – THAT Sir, is an entirely different, much deeper, fulfilling, life-affirming and holistically healing experience.

Physiologically

Over time as we lovingly expose otherwise sub-conscious fears and desires to the light of our own self-compassion – those very tangible fears and desires dissipate, providing a physiological sense of lightness, relief and restoration lasting long after our time on the mat!

But to turbo-charge those physical and mental benefits – to experience something that will literally blow your tangible mind away – meditate with love, devotion and heartfelt gratitude as you ponder the nature of the Source of our very essence.

Thank you again for spreading the word – and your indulgence!

Blessings, Allan

 

Patanjali❤️😊🕉

https://www.rajamarblehead.com/2017/05/21/patanjalis-yoga-sutras-chapter-1-loosely-translated/

https://www.rajamarblehead.com/2017/05/21/patanjalis-yoga-sutras-chapter-2-loosely-translated/

Me

https://www.rajamarblehead.com/2018/01/06/battling-addiction-insights-60-year-old-addict/

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ISHVARA PRANIDHANA

According to SIVA REA:

“Many of us have only experienced surrendering to a higher source [Ishvara Pranidhana] as a last resort, when we’ve confronted seemingly insurmountable problems or in some other way hit the edge of our individual will and abilities.

But in the Yoga Sutras, Patanjali transforms “surrender” from this sort of last-resort, emergency response into an essential ongoing practice.

 

Patanjali repeatedly highlights Ishvara pranidhana as one of the five niyamas, or inner practices, of the ashta-anga (eight-limbed) path and, along with discipline (tapas) and self-study (svadhyaya), as part of kriya yoga, the threefold yoga of action.”

Source: yogajournal.com/yoga-101/the-practice-of-surrender

Patanjali: 

  • divine awareness eliminates desire;
  • self-control eliminates fear; 
  • self-awareness eliminates sorrow.

Sound familiar?

GOD GRANT ME THE:

  • SERENITY to accept the things I can not change;
  • COURAGE to change the things I can; and
  • WISDOM to know the difference.

😊❤️🕉

Tap into the power within. Meditate.

$15 – scheduled group “meditation prep” classes

Current class schedule

  • Skype lessons
  • seminars
  • lectures
  • private lessons

Proud sponsor of Yoga Instructors Association (MA)

#BringBackPatanjali

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THE POOR ME’S

The Dis-ease

Alcoholics Anonymous used to have an expression for mild, inexplicable depression: the “Poor Me’s”, characterized by:

  • Physical, energetic and mental lethargy or heaviness;
  • Lack of motivation, bordering on a sense of giving up;
  • An internal emptiness that manifests as grief: loss of appetite and caring.

Frustratingly, there’s no obvious rational explanation or cause; from the outside it doesn’t look like we have anything to bitch about!

When we do give up and stop practicing healthy habits (or practice unhealthy ones!) it takes EXTRA effort to get back on our feet again!

The Remedy

Here’s the only true relief I’m found in 60 years of looking:

Know this with absolute certainty: there is a part of each of us that’s utterly PERFECT IN EVERY SENSE: our awareness, or consciousness. 😊❤️🕉

 

Consciousness is NOT a mental function! FAR from it! Without it, you wouldn’t realize that you’re alive – let alone reading this effort to enlighten you!!

Once that clicks, it becomes possible to differentiate between “You” and “Your body/mind” (after all, whose body is it? Yours!!).

Raja Yoga is a loving, holistic, personal practice in self-awareness and control – intended to PERMANENTLY relive the emptiness and symptoms of the Poor Me’s without leaving a hangover. Here’s how it works in part:

Mentally – the objective is to take a step back from our body/mind and witness the pain, rather focusing on the parts of our body/mind that are hurt. [Extremely difficult to do without constant practice – especially, when the pain is at its worst.]

Spiritually – the objective is to identify with the eternally-aware “You” (your consciousness – aka your “soul” or “spirit” in religious vernacular! Yeah; it’s real) – rather than your temporary body/mind.

Transcend temporal suffering. Tap into the divine power within.

Meditate.

$15 – scheduled group “meditation prep” classes

Current class schedule

  • Skype lessons
  • seminars
  • lectures
  • private lessons

Proud sponsor of Yoga Instructors Association (MA)

#BringBackPatanjali

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PUBLIC APOLOGY

To the recipients of my latest marketing masterpiece, my apologies for any and all real or imagined unbalanced – specifically, “aggressive” – energy communicated!

I hope there are people in your life who love you unconditionally – and if not, a pet of some sort!

I’m uber-blessed to have both. Thankfully, my daughter Sarah is one of them. She and I have a three-tier cause > effect response system for my behavior:

  1. flinch
  2. flinch & eye roll
  3. “DAD!!”

My latest snail-mailing (pictured) elicited a wide range of responses: from loving support and encouragement from my mother-in-law Gladys to various versions of “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!” from business associates which were received with more incredulity than sympathy.

As I told an old friend this morning, almost two years ago I either:

  1. a) completely lost my mind, or
  2. b) became divinely-inspired

AND SCHOOL’S STILL OUT!!!

 

The good news is that between faith, family & friends, I WILL expedite someone’s enlightenment before I die!! 😊❤️🕉

Sorry – back to the point: Sarah said my most recent mailing – with the HOT PINK insert and BOLD font was

“a bit aggressive”

Thankfully, it didn’t warrant a #3 but was “worthy of comment!”

LMAO!!❤️

It’s difficult not to channel my inner Joan of Arc! [Yes Mr. L, it’s OK to have female heroes; they’re called heroines. After all, some of the fiercest Greek gods were female!!]

Inner-self guide for hire!

$15 – scheduled group “meditation prep” classes

Current class schedule

  • Skype lessons
  • seminars
  • lectures
  • private lessons

Proud sponsor of Yoga Instructors Association (MA)

#BringBackPatanjali