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DEAR DIARY

My teacher reminded me again today that in order to be truly yogic (loving all, including myself) I need to release the painful, negative energy attached to my own memories.

In short, I need to sympathize with my self.

HOW? It takes faith and balance: equal amounts of courage and wisdom – and it MUST come from a place of love (the absence of judgment: acceptance).

Yes – it’s the Serenity Prayer. THINK IT. ACT IT.

THAT gets us 80% of the way to eternal bliss according to the ancient Raja Yoga text. That’s the easy part: thinking and acting with complete self-awareness.

The last 20% of the journey to everlasting peace consists of preparing to pray (15%) and actually praying (5%) – but not the way I was taught as an Episcopal Acolyte, to look outwardly for guidance.

Meditation

Meditation preceded prayer as we typically think of it. The practice of reverently searching for universal Truth is literally prehistoric; it’s the basis of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras which are the basis of the Serenity Prayer.

The practice of sitting still in reverence and gratitude for the miracle of one’s life grew out of a time in human history when our ancestors were beginning to realize that the whole “sacrificing something to please God” only worked half the time (like flipping a penny).

Meditation turned the whole “Hey God” thing upside-down, inviting us to sacrifice/offer the most valuable thing we each uniquely have to give: our time.

When we meditate, we sit still, maintaining a reverential attitude of appreciation and compassion, settling first our conscious mind (thoughts accompanied by the voice in our head) and then the three progressively-subtle functions of our typically sub-conscious mind: senses, memory, and ego: the source of our fears and desires.

We do it with love, curiosity, compassion, patience, and awareness – without judgment (mimicking consciousness itself) all in an effort to draw closer to consciousness.

Why? The awareness OF our thoughts (our consciousness) is as different from our thoughts as our thoughts are from our body!

The awareness OF our thoughts is not of-this-earth!! It never changes!! As far as we’re concerned, it is eternal and universal: yours is EXACTLY like mine, yet simultaneously uniquely aware of our respective personal, perpetually-changing thoughts and bodies!

Prayer

Somehow over the millennia the mental discipline of meditation…

searching internally for Truth or evidence of God – lovingly calming one’s mind in hopes of glimpsing – behind the chaos of normal thought – our eternally-still, serene, compassionate essence: the awareness OF our thoughts (the aspect of each of us that Amma says is essentially divine).

…itself was turned upside-down and morphed into an exercise in looking outside of ourselves for guidance, fulfillment and restoration.

Personal story

Part of me died when I was 12….

When I was 12, I had my heart ripped out, squashed and stomped on. We’ll call her “Holly”.

Part of me died that sunny day at the public swimming pool when one of Holly’s friends returned the ring I’d given my true love earlier that summer, and let me know that I was “too slow” for Holly – evidenced by the fact that at that moment, I had no idea what the hell she was talking about!!

I consciously killed a part of myself that day out of self-preservation. I NEVER wanted to experience THAT again. I was 12.

Now I’m 60, and my teacher says if I want to be more emotionally available to students, I have to suffer through it all over again. Lord, I hate her sometimes!

But it didn’t really…it was just buried.

But it wasn’t a 12 year-old pubescent girl that gutted my heart and triggered a tsunami of grief (that kept me bedridden and in tears for two days) and consciously began construction of an emotional wall that would give 45 a stiffy – she was just the last straw. My emotional suffering and scars go back almost 12 years before she came along.

So how do I get release the pain that fuels my anger?

Like a witch’s curse, my teacher says that I must re-experience the pain that 12 year-old Holly dropped like Thor’s hammer on my blissful naiveté. OUCH, and here’s the tricky part: the re-triggering must be precipitated by someone else.

The idea is that now – as a presumed adult – I can absorb and release the emotional trauma I’ve been lugging around in this old memory bank – and thus weaken its ability to derail my good behavior!!

“Suffering is growth” says my @#%^& teacher!!

So please bear with me as I chase down my own inner dragons, so that I may better connect with and assist those who come to me in pain!

Meditation isn’t easy, but neither is suffering. The teacher is also a student.

Meditation provides stress relief and is available to everyone.

God bless us all, Allan

Class schedule

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Happy Birthday!

This is a shout out to the young lady I met at Starbucks this morning! I hope you had an awesome birthday! It’s always a pleasure to meet kindred spirits – especially those who meditate!

I wish we’d had longer to chat. As you know, meditation is a deeply personal, unique experience every time we do it!

The easy part is sitting as still! The effectiveness of doing so depends on our intention, preparation and experience level – which is part of the reason we’re encouraged to meditate daily!

Here’s how Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras (the prehistoric poem I mentioned: the bible of Raja Yoga) breaks down the practice in terms of emphasis and priority:

80% – to be practiced all day, every day: think and act with serenity, courage, wisdom and devotion, treating others and ourselves lovingly.

 20% – to be practiced routinely: (15%) three types of physical and mental exercises to still the body and mind to facilitate meditation; (5%) actual meditation.

In other words, 95% of what’s required to find eternal bliss takes place before we even sit down to meditate!

That makes intuitive sense: if we’re constantly scheming or otherwise playing mental ping pong over what we could or should have done, we’re going to have a much harder time settling our emotional energy and the thoughts it triggers.

And if we haven’t stretched our legs, practiced rhythmic breathing and concentration exercises, we’re not as likely to have a fruitful quest to witness our True Self – which requires prolonged physical and mental virtual stillness!

Patanjali’s Mind Control

While we’re sitting there simply witnessing our thoughts, the aim is to become intuitively (NOT cerebrally) aware of the source of the emotions > that trigger our thoughts > which precipitate our actions > which account for 80% of what’s preventing us from experiencing eternal bliss: effectively, union or “yoga” with the Divine! Yes – Amma says consciousness is essentially divine – and I believe her!!

To do that we first need to distinguish between our mind and consciousness; specifically, between our a) conscious and b) sub-conscious mind – characterized by words/thoughts, and images/sensations, respectively, and c) our awareness OF the voice, sensations and images reflected in our conscious mind. Our mind obscures our underlying essence: our consciousness.

  • Conscious mind’s words and mental chatter obstruct awareness of what our body is sub-consciously sensing and doing, and keeps our memories at bay.
  • Sub-conscious mind’s images and sensations – including manifest affects of our fears and desires – obstruct awareness of our essence: the immutable awareness OF what we’re thinking and doing!!
  • That awareness – our consciousness – is the aspect of each of us that’s not affected by time and space; in that sense, it’s eternal – at least for as long as it’s associated with our body/mind.

Consciousness is evidenced first and foremost by our awareness, but also by curiosity, compassion, intuition and true bliss. Exposing fears and desires to the eternal compassion of consciousness lessens their energy!

New Age Stuff

I haven’t read Tolle or any of the other – what did you call them? “Modern Transcendentalists”(?) because I’m a devotee of Patanjali.

While I certainly applaud and admire the help they’ve provided millions of people, it ALL seems to trace back to Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, the original treasure map to eternal life: Truth and nothing less than union or “yoga” with God.

Our [My] True Self

The Truth is that we ARE intangible, eternal beings living a tangible, temporary experience.

At our essence we are the awareness OF what we are thinking and doing.

That awareness – our consciousness – is NOT of-this-earth. It’s literally the only “thing” known to exist (remember, without it you don’t know you’re reading this) that’s NOT affected by time and space.

That immutability becomes abundantly clear once we understand the distinction between our own thoughts and consciousness. Without the latter we wouldn’t know we were alive – let alone reading another of these paradigm-shifting, life-altering posts!

Once we accept that part of us is immutable (“bulletproof” according to the adolescent in me), life becomes MUCH less stressful and our time and experiences – on and off the mat – become turbo-charged!

Wishing you many more happy birthdays, and wonder-filled journeys on and off your mat!

Allan

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Thinking about God [aka The Source]

Have you ever tried? I mean seriously tried? Technically, humans aren’t capable of understanding, let alone experiencing, the concept or dimension of God. [For purposes of this blog, “God” refers to the Source of everything – however that concept manifests in your mind.]

How did we go from yoga to God?

Raja Yoga is the prehistoric practice of meditation or mind control, a devotional discipline that fosters a deep, intuitive sense of self-awareness.

What Raja Yoga refers to as consciousness has become commonly referred to as our “spirit” or “soul” by historical religion – similar to the way that meditation has evolved into prayer over the millennia.

Raja Yoga recognizes that we are truly three-dimensional beings: a tangible body/mind with an intangible awareness. According to some, the latter is essentially divine.

The discipline of Raja Yoga makes it abundantly clear to the practioner that the awareness OF our thoughts is as distinct and different from our thoughts as our thoughts are from our physical body.

 

Here’s the bottom line: we’re aware that we’re alive.

That awareness is our consciousness. It’s the one aspect of all of us that literally NEVER changes – at least not in a manner that we can experience, simply because it’s not affected by time and space the same way our physical bodies and tangible minds are. Right, “not affected by time and space”!! See where this is going?

Our awareness OF what our body/mind is doing/thinking is immutable.

The ancient, pre-historic Raja Yoga texts say it’s the part of each of us that no amount of fire or water (hint: polar opposites) can affect – BUT without which you wouldn’t realize you were alive(!) let alone reading this life-altering post! Just sayin’…..

We are all (yes, ALL) are miraculous – in the same scientific, factual sense that all life is miraculous. Try calculating the odds of you reading this post given that literarily everything that’s ever happened since the dawn of time had to happen EXACTLY as it did in order for this to be your current reality. Right: friggin’ miraculous!!

But the part of each of us that’s most miraculous – our consciousness – without which there would be no point to life – is literally indistinguishable from one of us to the next. For better or worse, your awareness is EXACTLY like mine, though obviously, WHAT we’re each aware of is unique to us – forever (again with the polar opposite theme: simultaneously universal AND unique!)

NOW, once you accept that simple yet mind-altering factoid, you begin to wonder about the nature of this immutable (eternal?! WTF?!) yet crucial aspect of all living things, and guess what?

It’s not something you can look up online. Sorry. It’s not something you can ask someone else about and be convinced (too bad for yours truly)! You have to go there. You literally have to experience the affects of drawing closer to the part of you that you literally can’t experience (again with the ironic, bipolar theme) – which convinces you of your own – and everything’s – true nature.

BOOM. Mind blown. Mike drop. Is anyone listening?!?!

Krishna

My simplistic understanding of the complexity of thoughts, practices and beliefs that constitute Indian philosophy (of which Raja Yoga is one of six orthodox systems) is that there’s general consensus that THE God or Source of the universe is Krishna.

I’m not aware of a singular term like “Christians” that refers to Krishna devotees (I’m not sure all “Hindus” believe that Krishna is the Big Dog) but there seems to be consensus among them that at some distant point in human history, God manifest as the blue-hued, impish Krishna who explains life in metaphors to Arjuna midfield (think basketball court: two-sided) on the brink of battle in the Bhagavad Gita (literally, “God’s song”).

Personal opinion: Krishna’s well-intended modern day, orange-robed, bald-headed friends have done Him a grave marketing disservice!

Ganesha

While Krishna is the widely recognized as the Big Dog (“God” in the subsequent Judeo-Christian system of divine thought), his buddy Ganesha – who’s likeness is reflected in the picture – is a “lesser” god [sorry to be irreverent if not seasonal, but think “Santa’s helper”!] who’s primary job to is facilitate our earnest endeavors. Ganesha is believed to be the “remover of obstacles” but like the Big Dog, Ganesh has a sense of humor. He essentially runs the school of hard knocks.

According to Wikipedia, “Ganesha is widely revered as the remover of obstacles, the patron of arts and sciences and the [god – lower case] of intellect and wisdom.”

According to Chopra.com, “Ganesha plays the dual role of a supreme being powerful enough to A. remove obstacles and ensure success – OR – B. create obstructions for those whose ambition has become destructive.”

Who’s crazy?

When you comprehend that a part of YOU is virtually – if not – eternal, you begin to wonder about the Source of that part of you. Bones, muscles and thoughts (the whole body/mind bits) are readily explained away by modern science, but you won’t find ANY scientific research on consciousness – BECAUSE IT CAN’T BE DONE. Consciousness – our awareness OF our thoughts – is NOT of this earthly realm!

Once that sets in and you accept the completely intangible nature of the essence of who we are (like my mom used to say, “it’s not about what’s on the outside” whenever she had a prospective date in mind for me!) – but if you’e like me, having nary a clue as to WTF the Source of our consciousness might be like – we pick something simple that we CAN relate to in some personal way to remind us of the Truth. Recently the image of Ganesha keeps pooping up for me.

Raja Yoga is a science – there’s no such thing as coincidence.

The statue was my mom’s – no idea where she got it, but it became mine last year. I wink at him; I have conversations with him. Am I crazy imagining that somewhere in a dimension beyond my comprehension, my intentions are heard, received – and heaven forbid – acknowledged?! Maybe. Does meditation, or trying to draw closer to the Source help keep my stress level under the boiling point? ABSOLUTELY.

Perhaps best of all, meditation never produces a hangover – ever.

Why Ganesha? I don’t know; maybe because our daughter loves elephants. I have no mental image of God – the Big Dog – the creator and CEO of the universe. Not a clue. BUT – having something tangible like a crucifix, a statue of Buddha – or Ganesha – or pictures of ancestors – whatever resonates with you personally and elicits a sense of connection with something beyond your experience and understanding – keeping it around as a constant, silent reminder of one’s purpose and pursuit – I don’t see the harm.

And besides, it’s not technically crazy. Devotees of any faith expect to experience the same consequence every time they pray/meditate: an odd sense of intimacy with something “other-worldly”: something divine.

Hugs to those who need one,

Allan [“Skip” to my family and pre-enlightenment friends! C’mon; that’s funny, right?!]

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An Authority, a Devotee, and God Walked Into a Bar

Edwin F. Bryant is an authority on all-things-yoga. He’s one of two or three people who will forever be known as successors to the traditional yoga commentators. Mr. Bryant is a devout Bhakti yogi.

I am NOT an authority on anything, though I have a good depth of knowledge on two subjects: one I made a living at – the other is Raja yoga.

I am a Raja yogi, a devotee of Patanjali’s. The strength of my conviction has turned my family upside down, as I recently quit a lifetime of punching numbers for a living to – as I told an old friend yesterday – “introduce people to God.”

One of my problems is that I still want to punch something!! Service announcement: be kind to anyone who’s good at accounting; they don’t process information the same way other people do!!

It seems to me that if Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras (Raja or “generic yoga”, according to my Bhakti friend and teacher) are a treasure map to eternal life, Bhakti yoga is a celebration of it.

The nine practices of Bhakti yoga are:

1   hearing about God;

2   singing about God;

3   remembering God;

4   serving God;

5   worshiping God;

6   glorifying God;

7   considering oneself God’s servant;

8   considering oneself God’s friend;

9   surrendering completely to God.

This holiday season express appreciation to the universe for your miraculous life. Be thankful for your body (the part that functions), your mind (the part that thinks) and your consciousness (the awareness OF both).

Love, Allan “Skip” Dowds

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FOR SHANNON

yoga

This is for Sue’s niece whom we love, adore and cherish as our own! <3

Kid, there’s a link below to an meditation exercise post – but here are a few words about preparing to practice.

Most of my posts are about the importance of preparing to meditate, the science, philosophy and consequences of meditation – because the actual act of meditating is simple:

Sit as still as you can for as long as you can.

 

That’s it. Not much to write about. You can’t do it incorrectly – just more or less effectively!

While I don’t recommend diving into Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras (what I teach) without a map, keep this in mind:

25% is devoted to preparing to meditate – and 50% of that is devoted to the importance of our attitude; the other 50% is devoted to how to act OFF the mat to more effectively meditate!

 

Bottom line: make your time on the mat or cushion count; make it special, something you look forward to. Pick a time, place, lighting, etc. that you find welcoming and calming. Approach meditating with a devotional, loving attitude – for YOURSELF!

Close your eyes almost all the way (‘cause you don’t want to fall asleep!) and turn your attention internally – behind the voice in our head. 😉 Don’t worry; it gets easier!

Just LISTEN to your body/mind. What’s it telling you? NOT the noisy, loud part (the voice that speaks in words) but the much more subtle part that gets your attention using sensations and images.

Just LISTEN. Lovingly. Without analysis or judgment. There’s plenty of time for that off the cushion!

Meditation is a practice in self-love. In the process you get to know a part of you that you didn’t even know existed! And when THAT happens – I promise: you’ll smile more than you frown.

Ironically, once we begin to see our self differently (specifically, as the friggin’ miracle we each are!!) we begin to understand LIFE, including the other people in it, and see them more clearly and lovingly as well.

Simple, not easy. But as with everything, we get out of it what we put into it.

God bless!! Hugs!! Is it Christmas yet?! Vegans rule!!

Meditation Exercise

 

 

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Mindfulness?!?

Mind vs. Consciousness

Our mind is tangible and perpetually changing; it has two aspects: (i) our conscious mind: the aspect we’re aware of, evidenced by thoughts, and (ii) our sub-conscious mind, the aspect we’re not conscious of, evidenced by sensations and actions.

Our consciousness, on the other hand – is as different from our thoughts, as they are from our body! Our consciousness is the intangible, immutable awareness OF our thoughts; it’s the essence of what and who we are.

Conscious vs. Sub-Conscious Mind

Our conscious mind generates a perpetual stream of individual thoughts which are either analytical or observational, and which either elicit emotions or not.

We can’t stop our mind from thinking any more than we can stop our heart from beating – though seriously advanced Raja yogis can feign death!

Our conscious mind works like our heart and lungs: generating single, consecutive, hopefully constant beats, breaths and thoughts. One of the side-benefits of meditation is that after awhile, the three systems tend to synchronize, eliciting a sense of deep inner calm.

Our sub-conscious mind contrarily, simultaneously processes countless bits of information received from our environment, and issues countless commands in response. Our sub-conscious mind also stores our memories, the source of our emotions, which color our thoughts and precipitate our actions.

Under stress our most pressing fears and desires (energetic manifestations of memories) percolate up into our conscious mind via sensations and images and we become aware of otherwise sub-conscious concerns.

Obviously, the two aspects of our mind function very differently:

  • in short, one we hear, the other we don’t;
  • one communicates bluntly using words, the other communicates subtly using sensations and imagery; and
  • one makes decisions; the other affects our decision-making, and precipitates our actions.

They both play equally critical roles in our survival: effectively, our sub-conscious mind runs the ship, and our conscious mind acts as the ship’s rudder!

Meditation vs. Concentration

Concentration may involve focusing our attention externally, for example on our actions, an object or a mantra; concentration teaches us how to control our conscious mind; specifically, to distinguish between the two aspects of our mind, and distinguish between analytical and observational thoughts.

Meditation focuses our attention internally; it teaches us to hold our conscious mind in benign, compassionate observation mode – to bear witness to the energy of our memories, fears and desires – exposing them – albeit indirectly through our open conscious mind – to the infinitely calm acceptance of our own essence: our consciousness.

Observation vs. Analysis

“Mindfulness” is synonymous with our conscious mind’s “observation” mode. It’s a passive mental state of witnessing without analysis or judgment – NOT evidenced by the voice in our head. To get a sense of the difference between analytical and mindful or observational conscious thought:

>  If we’re making a decision, we’re engaging our conscious mind and thinking analytically; [i.e., we’re “in our head”; we’re not being “in the moment” or mindfully observant; we’re not being “mindful”]; however,

>  If we’re silently, wondrously watching a Monarch butterfly land on a big, bright yellow sunflower, and the butterfly begins to slowly open and close its wings, and it strikes us that it seems to be sunning itself – our conscious mind is likely in observation (aka “open”, “pause”, “neutral”, “sleep”) mode: just witnessing (without analysis or judgment) whatever sensations and/or actions our sub-conscious mind is processing [i.e., we’re being “mindful” inasmuch as we’re wholly engrossed in what we’re sensing]; and

>  If we’re so engrossed in a task that we sub-consciously tune out our other senses, (e.g., we don’t hear the phone ring!) – and we don’t hear the distracting voice in our head – it’s very likely that our conscious mind is simply observing our sub-conscious mind in action [i.e., we’re being “mindful” inasmuch as we are wholly engrossed in what we’re doing].

Walking the Dog

Walking the dog around mother-in-law’s hood

Want to practice mindfulness? The next time you’re walking the dog around your mother-in-law’s neighborhood (or whatever YOU happen to be doing), pay attention individually and sequentially to your five inbound senses: literally witness what your body is experiencing and doing (e.g., being aware of the temperature, wind, the sensation of each footfall).

Thich Nhat Hanh may have said it best: the real miracle isn’t walking on water, it’s simply putting one foot in front of the other!

God bless.

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Open Letter of Thanks Giving

This was my week to blog about teachers – a week before Thanksgiving. Coincidence?

I hope you have a chance among all the chaos and turmoil of the Thanksgiving holiday to quietly reflect on your life.

To truly give thanks – literally for every breath, let alone for the people who love and care about you.

Meditation is about developing a deeper, intimate relationship with ourselves and in the process, finding faith in the existence of God!

Meditation isn’t easy, but neither is suffering. There are shortcuts to feeling fulfilled and happy. Perhaps the easiest is simply to do something nice for someone else.

Want to feel even better? Do it again – and give thanks for being able to.

Givers gain. Happy Thanksgiving!

Allan (“Skip”) & Sue Dowds

Why Pray?

The Marblehead School of Raja Yoga

Yoga Instructors Association

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Disagreement Without [much] Discord

Even among yogis there’s disagreement!

This is an open letter to our modern day Patanjali, Edwin Bryant:

Dearest Edwin,

Congratulations on having your latest work published! I apologize for this rant in advance because I’m only on page 4!

I have NO doubt that few living beings possess your depth and breadth of knowledge and experience when it comes to yoga – especially, your beloved Bhakti Yoga, as well as “those other generic yoga traditions”!?!?

I really must beg your forgiveness, but one CAN “attain awareness culminating in ecstatic love of that which is beyond consciousness” or God, through meditation! That’s the whole point of meditating: to literally try to “touch God”!

I ABSOLUTELY agree that Bhakti is the highest of the four types of yoga but not because as you point out it’s the easiest, but simply because it is the most direct!

On page 4, you mention Bhakti (devotion) and Jana (knowledge) by name, but instead of similarly separately mentioning that yoga may also be attained through meditation and service, you lump them together with God-knows-what and use the term “GENERIC?!?!” and say that Bhakti “reveals a higher Truth than that revealed by [here we go again] other yoga paths.”

Come on. You’re literally my hero, but I want to cry Bud.

GENERIC?! Please come back to 01945 soon because obviously I’m missing something!!

Again, heartfelt congrats on Tales and Teachings from the Bhagavata Purana! It’s an honor just to write this.

On behalf of all yogis to follow whose paths to the Truth have been shortened by your life’s work – thank you.

Allan (“Skip”) Dowds

Bakti vs. Raja Yoga

Yoga Instructors Association

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WHY PRAY?

Meditation or prayer brings relief to those of us who feel “harassed by the suffering of an un-fulfillment inherent in embodied existence” (Edwin Bryant). In other words, for the same reasons we escape by indulging in unhealthy habits: we’re unhappy!!

RAJA YOGA is the practice of meditation or mind control. We practice to improve self-awareness and control, and to reduce emotional stress and its symptoms. Raja Yoga is about tapping into our own immutable, compassionate sense of awareness (consciousness) to find relief from suffering. The practice brings realization of the Truth of our energetic and divine nature – akin to developing faith in the existence OF God [in the sense that – whatever the source of our consciousness, IT is unquestionably divine.] (source text: Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras)

BHAKTI YOGA is the practice of expressing devotion TO God. (source text: Bhagavata Purana)

In the intro to his latest work, “Bhakti Yoga – Tales and Teachings from the Bhagavata Purana,” Edwin Bryant says he wrote it for people interested in “Bhakti as a lived reality.” <3

Copies of the following works by Edwin Bryant are available to members of the Yoga Instructors Association at 50% of cost:

The YOGA SUTRAS of Patanjali

BHAKTI YOGA Tales and Teachings from the Bhagavata Purana– This is the second book I’ve recently literally hugged to my chest after reading it. The other was Amma’s biography.  <3

My sincere best wishes to all, Allan