The Dharma: Residing as Witness Consciousness vs Embrace a Chosen Direction with Continuity

There is definitely transmission from others and it cannot be dismissed and it is universal. This faith expressed in different languages and culture that everyOne has whatever the tradition needs to be honored respected and cannot be argued with. Yet these cultural identities only create fear and separation paradoxically and humanity has not even yet matured into seeing we are all the same despite wild and interesting differences. Argument never wins. The only thing to do, I find, is to give the faithful Yoga and then that takes them Somewhere beyond cultism.
But dharma wise this is what I recon! It is a question of, “what is your spiritual priority” to abide as witness consciousness to all arising conditions until you reside only as consciousness itself in which all “things” arise, where these are no subject object relationships only Reality. OR merge / embrace your chosen direction or object with continuity until you are completely merged with that object. In so doing you know the object but also synchronistically you know the knower of the object, consciousness itself, that in which all object / subject relations are arising. This was essentially Krishnamacharya’s teaching and he taught that it was necessary to all religious practice. It is the practical means by which the first mentioned idea, the “residing as consciousness only” would arise as a spontaneous “given” siddhi. It cannot be practiced but is given. Just like in the analogy of sleep. You cannot put your self intentional to sleep. But sleep is surely “given” when you make the conditions right. So i maintain that the senior spiritual priority is an appropriate Yoga, intimacy with all ordinary conditions. Then dissociation from ordinary conditions will never arise in attempt to be “spiritually” accomplished. That is, if one is attempting to “reside as witness only” before a life of Yoga, a life of intimacy has been established it only causes dysfunction and dissociation from life itself, which I see is the entire cause of humanity’s suffering, i.e. the lack of intimacy with life in all its forms. This has been forced on humanity too soon out by doctrine and power structure entirely out of the context of an actual Yoga, which now must be restored for everyOne. If the gift or siddhi arises genuinely, (the awareness that all is consciousness, or simply all IS One) in the life of Yogic intimacy it will never cause dissociation or cultism. And finally the merge with the object of choice is the age old anciently proven method of all the Great Traditions. The mutual love / affection between two real people IS the only method there really is in all the traditions. When it comes down to it, even in sophisticated dharma such as Vedanta or Buddhism they acknowledge that all insights arise in the fundamental relationship, one’s love for another. For example in the Mahamudra cults of Tibetan Buddhism their fundamental meditation inquiry is “no object, no subject no action,” but this meditation is gently given and practiced in the prior practice, which is mutual affection for an actual real life person, one’s Guru and intimacy compassion in all relationships. This is why Krishnamacharya would say “the Buddha was a Yogi. and Yoga is required.” That is, intimacy with all ordinary conditions. To be intimate with your own body and breath allows one to be intimate with another, one’s spouse, one’s Guru. That is body, breath and relationship in that order. And he would say Yoga is what one does as a practical response to the first sign of Grace. It enables us to stay intimate in our chosen direction, our “Ishta” with ease and continuity. Other wise we turn even Grace into an experience that has passed and the mind gets busy trying to grasp it again without the practical means of a search less Yoga.. direct participation in the Given life, which is only a nurturing regenerative continuity.
In the Great Tradition the avatar, Guru and Jivamukti appeared in a culture where Yoga was understood. It was mother’s milk of culture, a given and there was always the acharya in cooperation with the avatar, that could guide each person in there appropriate Yoga, their appropriate response to Grace or Life itself without seeking. Except Yoga has almost disappeared and something else exaggerated is being taught. Those who are spiritually sensitive, when they see modern day yoga reject it as being irrelevant, which it is. Real Yoga for real people must be given now as the fundamental and practical means of a spiritual life or any kind of life that wants to feel all that there is to feel.

Asana, your first spiritual responsibility and the Eros of God.

The soul’s relationship to God is described in religious traditions as an erotic play between male and female divine personalities. There are many examples. Sita and Ram, Radha and Krishna, Shiva and Shakti. These human stories do not by pass the extreme sensual pleasure of a love relationship. The ‘erotic’ quality is of course in the most positive use of the word. It is the eros or utter connection; the connection of the soul to the Lord, the individual to the universe. This Eros quality is ‘eros ive’ to the soul’s obstructions (heavy like rock or soil) and allows the soul’s reunion with its source. My personal research with the dying showed me that in death there is an utter pleasure for the person merging back to their Source. They describe it in terms like delicious, exquisite, utter peace. This religious, ‘re linking’ point of view is clearly the opposite of other religious methodologies that teach the transcendence of desire as THE way. So we need to figure this out and take a personal position on what works for us.
Believe it or not, the participation with the obvious union of opposites in our own life, as simple as left to right, front to back, above to below, inhalation to exhalation, strength to receptivity, male to female, within and without IS your ancient religious, re linking, Eros, participation in the universe, you and source reality that is nothing other than nurturing, abundance, regeneration, continuity and healing. It is the soul’s relationship to God (if that language is ok for you) and it is erotic and delightful. So what is the implication? “Do your Yoga,” not just any Yoga but your Yoga, your participation in your own opposites. Elevate asana to the extreme religious priority, non-obsessive spiritual responsibility and practical means that it is. This exquisite participation in the opposites already in erotic union as your own life may very well result in the same Eros wonder, strength receiving in the outer polarity (that is with some one you love!) although it does not need to. But it will result in the certainty of your utter connection, absorption in the nurturing wonder of this total universe, arising as the sheer regenerative perfection and extreme intelligence of life that is YOU.

Yoga: The Union of Opposites, The Heart is the whole body and all its relationships, Left is Right etc, You are a flower blooming in your own garden.

Left is Right, Inner is Outer etc
Yoga is the union of all opposites. Your participation in the opposites does more than you know. Please observe that left IS right… left is literally the right, yet can be defined and experienced independently and are also utterly the same as each other. You are the whole body. Please observe that base IS the crown… you are the whole body. And please observe that your inner IS the outer. You are literally another person, a tree, a cloud, the sky, solid ground and moon and stars. You are the whole body appearing in this vast context utterly one with and dependant on everything for your Life, yet amazingly an autonomous individual as well free to steer in any direction you choose. By these simple means you know your Reality. Nurturing source reality is appearing in you as you.
You are a flower blooming in your own garden
Your first form arrived as one cell known as the heart. A spark of Life, initiated by male female, giving and receiving union of opposites, the catalyst of nurturing, your spirit took form and the source became seen. This one cell is the portal to absolute nurturing reality, mother source. Poetically it is the jewel in the lotus. She has unfolded like a flower in bloom as a subtle body, the movement of energy through your whole form. And she has manifested as your physical form. Well, you are not a flower. You are a human. But the same life beauty, wonder, intelligence is blooming as you. Indeed there are subtle structures in your body like flowers. So you ARE a flower blooming in your own garden. Rest in that. Searchlessly see the flower petals unfolding from the heart. Be in the tips of petals. Be in your skin and all ordinary conditions. Nurturing energy flows from the heart. The love prana flows from the hridaya and everything is nurtured in all directions.
The Heart, The Whole, Source of All Appearance, From Where Opposites Originate, Served and Sustained by Union of All Opposites
In Yoga there is no requirement to manipulate the body or the energy in attempt to know the source, rather it is the other way round. We start with the heart that is felt in the simple participation in the union of all opposites. The heart or “hrid” is felt as the place where all opposites are in union and the origin of all opposites, from where the life energy flows, nurturing the physical and all its relationship. Yoga starts and ends with reality participation. The hrid manifest as all life as the giving and receiving functions of life. (hri = to give, d = receive).
It is felt in the body as:
1. heart on the right (hrid, causal nurturing origin)
2. heart in the center (anahata heart chakra and all chakra, the nurturing energy flow base to crown from the hrid enjoyed as mantra and yantra)
3. physical pumping heart on the left.
There is no value system one higher than the other. Resting in one gives access to all.
They are the same originating heart reality. Intimacy with the physical is the primary means. The attempt to reduce the physical to realize the subtle or causal heart is not required and disturbs our heart and life.
Yoga is not about self-consciously trying to realize anything. That creates the false identity of one who is seeking. It is surrender participating in what is already true. We are completely nurtured. This we can depend on any time in the future. Just wait relax and be healed. If there is pain it is the healing. The nurturing is always operating and cannot be lost in the extreme wonder and intelligence of the universe always functioning to maximum degree to keep you well and happy… like a mother does!

Esalen Talk 8/13/09

Mark speaks recently at Esalen, California. His friend John Patrick was visiting. He had moved in his life from praticing as a monk in a religious order to become a yogi. Mark discusses the dissociation of meditation (as if it it is something you can do as a separate practice) from its Yoga context. “The Buddha was a Yogi, not a meditator” The pervasive doctrinal social influence to abide as witness consciousness diminishes the value of experience and creates conflict with ordinary experience including and especially sex, the the extreme intelligence of ordinary Life. The Buddhist, Vedantic or Christian monastic life, going within, has destroyed the value of the individual and all natural relationship. “It is intimacy we want, not enlightenment.” The very concept of enlightenment is only a power mechanism, a hoax that has destroyed humanity’s inherent intimacy with life. Yoga is a the return to intimacy for everyOne. Yoga is direct embrace of reality, which is only nurturing, abundance and continuity. Yoga is the embrace of all ordinary experience, not merely to be aware or witness experience. Then we spontaneously feel the Source of all experience.

You have a virus!

The attempt to change your self in terms of any social idealism, god realization, enlightenment, peace, love, whatever it is, invades the body like an intractable virus. It is an imposition of mind on this wonder full organism, this utterly perfect life that you are. There is truly nothing you can do about it except know that you have the virus and wait for life to heal you. Life heals all disease in time. It can be painful, but pain IS the healing. You can also practice the yogas of intimacy in the meantime. That will heal you too.
Stop looking start living.

It is just What is. You Don’t have to Realize anything.

 

 YOU ARE LOVED YOU ARE NURTURED

AND YOU LOVE AND YOU CARE this is the Natural State

There is no need to try to realize anything in the conventional spiritual effort of Yoga and meditation or philosophy. It is just a matter of seeing how things are, what is actually happening, what is actually the case. Not spiritual language and not poetry but really how things are. Then we just relax into that. Reality is a nurturing abundant, always regenerating healing force. Your body is the unfolding, blooming effulgence of nurturing source. If reality is a nurturing force then everything happening in reality is nurturing, including pain. Pain is the healing. It is the regeneration and new growth. In this understanding we have a new grateful relationship to pain as she does her work. We can accept pain, we can face pain and are no longer blinded in an attempt to get rid of pain through yoga and meditation and all religious attempt and denial of the real situation, the natural state, which is a nurturing abundance, motherhood.

 

Your Yoga is to engage the real, the ordinary conditions of Life in the intimate embrace of Life. This is the embrace likewise of nurturing source. It is not about trying to manipulate the mind in trying not to feel pain, stepping back from experience as awareness, as the witness only or some such religious nonsense. It is intimacy we need, not enlightenment and it is indeed possible to learn how to do an actual Yoga that is right for you. It is about perfect connection to reality in every way.

Teachers who spontaneously  who are born or fall into peace are said in the Yoga Sutra not to be the best teachers because they do not understand Yoga or the individualized process of Yoga. It even says such people are dangerous. Through their charm and power they mislead humanity with their idealism and hopeful ideas. It is not to deny that some folk with a predisposition for non attachment find them selves in a deep state of carefreeness. That is interesting for sure. But we have had a long history of such people describing their experience and think up ways that everyone else can have it. But they do not understand Yoga. They do not understand the ordinary life and the process of moving from restriction to intimacy, suffering to freedom. Further more some have been completely dishonest about it and claim to be in a state they are actually not in. They make the claim as a power mechanism. It is hard to find someone who actually understands yoga that is right for you.  That is why we are here.

I

In ancient culture of Yoga everything was known to be arising from motherhood taking form as everything. Everything is her, known as Shakti and by many names and forms, yantras and mantras and human form. There is some ancient poetry that describes the Mother Source as a bee that comes out of the Hridaya, the first cell of life that is created when your mother and father surrendered to each other. The Hridaya blooms in all directions to form your perfect body. This is of course is literal. You start off as one cell from which the whole body grows. It is just that you come from this primordial power that creates all existence. You are presently sustained by this delicious nurturing. And your decline and death perfect nurturing of mother reality. Like a bee Shakti moves among the petals of your lotus heart that blooms as the whole body as she constantly arranges the petals in Life’s perfect appearance as you. At death mother source goes back in to the inner ovary of the lotus, which then folds up and dissolves.

Some speak of this as the subtle body or life energy or prana body as if it is different from the gross body but it is not. Without the subtle there is no gross, so they are the same. Your body is perfectly nurtured. You are loved and cared for. And you love and care. This is the natural state.

Toronto Yoga Festival

I was so pleased to participate at the recent Toronto Yoga Festival. It was a gathering of local teachers and students with a few other teachers visiting Canada. It was a very successful experiment in creating a conference that transcended the commercialism and fake celebrity that has surrounded yoga education. The venue was low cost and beautiful, a ballet school not an expensive hotel conference center. The teaching was sincere and the mix of local teachers and visiting teachers created a rich mix of people offering support, information and spirit resource to each other. It was a kumbha mela! I see that this model will become the new form of Yoga Conference that will flourish around the world. It does not take a huge commercial challenge, just sincere people getting together to share. It will give a lot more opportunity for people to get a genuine Yoga education, not the commercial marketing of the brands and styles of yoga forced on a gullible public. As UG used to say, “shoddy spiritual goods sold in the market place!” With the economic down turn, expense of travel etc we must offer a Yoga education at costs that people can afford. As the secular world becomes less and less attractive and consoling we can dive deep into our sacred intimacy with Life. It is such a better and easier option that in time will correct the secular mess we are in. So please think about creating your own Yoga festival in your town. Invite some good teachers to meet your local teachers and offer classes at moderate cost. I was so pleased to meet the local teachers and students. Michael Stone a wonderful teacher from Toronto made this curious statement, “When you look at the river it is the river looking at the river.” Hellaluiah! I knew exactly what Michael was talking  about and knew that he did too. The wonder and powers of the natural universe are of course  our condition too. The nurturing flow of life, extreme intelligence, beauty, perfect harmony is active in everyOne of us, in us as us. .It is our natural state and birth right to enjoy. Like no other time this depth of feeling is  possible. It is our personal and public peace even in the midst of the pain of a “world gone wrong.” Yoga was developed in ancient wisdom culture to gentlly reveal what we already have.

REAL YOGA FOR REAL PEOPLE.. dvd released

I am very happy with this dvd. There is a practice here that is good general instruction from which a person could design a personal practice.  Sure it would better to have personal instruction from a “live” teacher but the whole point of media is to make available the information if it cannot be directly transmitted person to person. I want to thank Richard Pendry from London who made this documentary. Richard is a BBC film maker who directed his skills on to this project. It is documentary style that tells a story as it goes. It outlines as best he could the principles of personal practice. Richard was a practitioner of the Ashtanga Vinyasa type standardized asana. He came to my class and soon saw that it was essential to add the other principles of Krishnamacharya’s Yoga teaching to ensure that the Ashtanga sequencing becomes authentic personal practice, safe and powerful, the “direct embrace of Nurturing Source.” So thank you Richard for your fantastic effort one afternoon at Triyoga, London. Thank you too for Christine McCaull who loves Yoga and organized the packaging and distribution world wide.

I particulary like the sub plot of the couple adapting to Yoga as the mutual accord between them. It is a too common story of a man being intimidated by his slim beautiful wife’s prowess in asana. He cannot see the relavance to him. It is even a threat to the continuity of their intimacy. He only feels awkward and is unable to acheive the standardized postures he is shown in the conventional Yoga studios. So we showed him how to do his own Yoga. Ofcourse he comes alive and very content to know that he CAN do his own Yoga. It enlivens his life, deepens their realtionship as strength receiving, as non dual intimacy and probably saves their marriage.

Please see this. I did want Richard to add pranayama to the prtactice, which ofcourse we did at the live session. But somehow it did not make it on to the final cut.  We saw the beautiful state of Yoga in the pranayama and meditation of the couple adapting to Yoga. For the first time. We saw how Real Yoga is so easily achieved by everyOne.

PURE LOVE PROJECT / MUSIC RELEASED ON iTUNES / REVIEWED

Here is a review from Felicia Case of the album just release on iTunes

I have reviewed your Pure Love Project from iTunes.  I burned to a CD and began my journey of exploration.  The energy was really spiraling and ethereal and I loved it.  Then, lying down to prepare for sleep, I journeyed through your songs again in yoga nidra, and let the ‘ingredients’ of the songs weave and meld.

This morning I have taken a moment while listening to express what I feel and see in your music — a tapestry of impressions, imagery (with the art of Lauri Blank, an artist I admire) and my art through words. Though everyone will likely take away something novel from your music, I believe there is yoga in your core delivery. I hope you enjoy glimpsing how your art reflects through my eyes.

Nurturing Source:

Here she comes … the Sun. … I really liked the sense of  ‘quickening’ and birth with the crisp beat and harmony with the voices. I thought of a great condor waiting earth-bound, caught in that gap between night and morning …with a maximum wingspan of 9 feet, not able to fly when wet and weighted — he waits for the great mother Sun to dry the dew of sunrise from his wings … waits for her great heat to expand the thermal currents high in the wind that will support his flight. … Muladara padma, the bliss of the physical body, and the transmutation of taking flight.

Mother Walks In

For me, Mother Walks In feels sacred and erotic. Mysterious, and naked in pure love. The building drum resonating, and then that sensual flute …. weaving and beguiling … I felt the dance in, around, and in between … Swadhisthana padma, the watery oneness of sexual intimacy and the alchemy of ojas to tejas shakti.

Obstacles Removed

I felt the shared connection and gratitude to Krishnamacharya while listening to Obstacles Removed.  The love of Father, … and his helping to direct our will, at the solar plexis, the flame of heat stoking the fire to burn the dross and reveal the gold.  The strings and the chanting felt for me, like very masculine father energy … Manipura padma …strength found at the core and the obstacles of ego removed.

Love Srim Supreme

My heart resonated to the airy quality of the chimes in wind and the heightened vibrations, high and cool…  I found myself in mountain air, a feelong of vast expansiveness, with thinner, faster currents, and tighter energy … the Anahata padma — before, as an unstruck chord, now vibrating sweetly on the waves of our emotions birthing love.

Strength Received

My throat literally began to vibrate back to front, front to back, as all the voices in Strength Received began to layer into a type of abstract odd-numbered harmony, compatible with the resonance of 5 … the Visshuda padma transporting energy, gaining strength through receiving, from air into the ethers.

You are Loved

Yes, you are loved!…. your music is pure enlightenment with so much brilliance.  I find myself wondering why I immediately interpreted this work as each of the seven major chakras in the progression of your songs … did you mean it to happen this way? was this conscious or unconscious on your part?  Is it just me? Then, an amazing thing happened … when I heard You are Loved I found myself awakening in the Brahma Muhurta and hearing the primordial ~OM~ !!   Ajna padma … such a gift you have given in capturing this sacred tone and key in such pure exactness with indigo wisdom.

And you Love

I feel loved.  What a journey this has been to be totally immersed and stand in the gap between each note of pure tantra that is your music … iridescence … Sahasrara padma … a thousand petals opening and whispering on the winds of expectancy as Shiva awaits his Shakti and the individual self is dissolved.

I am honored you asked me to review your music and hope you have enjoyed my unique way of reviewing! I could do no other than be very thorough and present <smile> and I enjoyed it too.

Felicia Case

Yoga in Asia: Beijing, Hong Kong, Bangkok

The most inquiring group of Yoga students I have ever had the priviledge to teach was in Beijing recently. This is not a put down of all other groups!. it is just that their sincere thirst for authentic understanding and practice was intense. Presumably it reflects China’s contemporary emergence as dominant world society with its ancient Taoist roots.
Organically, naturally and spontaneously Yoga is taking its place everywhere in the contemporary world, because it is needed as the soothing balm that in time will nurture everyOne everywhere. It is coming into China driven by Chinese and US commerce. It was not until America could find its commercial potential that Yoga spread. And this is good. Money is needed to power it into the public mind. Now after only three years of operation Pure Yoga International in China sponsored the first and most successful Asia Yoga Conference. It was a hit, such a great multi-cultural event and is already set to go next year.
Being in Asia confirmed again to me the universality of Yoga. It is utterly adaptable to all body types, age, health AND cultural backgrounds. As a distinct darshana from India, separate from the six ancient philosophical systems that later developed into world religion, yoga is completely universal to all cultural systems. In fact it was Krishnamacharya’s academic view that the non dual practice of Yoga was needed to realize the idealisms expressed in dualistic religious systems. In Bangkok’s mostly Buddhist culture, it was easy to see how the impositionn of male doctrine has “once again” sadly created a suppressive society for women (and therefore men too). Just like in America, in Asia the Yoga rooms are mainly full of women trying to feel better and “feel better.” These simple Yoga practices allowed them to realize the peace of meditation of their natural state, during and following practice. They understood how much the practice is needed in the context of their Buddhism. I also saw how withhout any apparant religious imprint the young Chinese needed it too. They lapt it up as a means to absorb / enjoy reality, the natural state without religious language or context. And we realized, “the Buddha is a Yogi.”
Curiously though in China despite the vigorous efforts to rid society of religious “opiates” and superstion people had ancient wisdom in their DNA. The great society of the Tao will never vanish and is taking its contempoorary form.
Nevertheless, sadly all over Asia everyOne is cowering under the foreboding holy personality, the enlightened superperson implying that every ordinary condition is not sacred. As Juliana bent to smell a lotus bloom she was fiercely scolded.. “That is for the Buddha. Not for you.” Juliana turned, a little startled said, “I thought I was the Buddha”
Later Juliana innocently went onto a pedestal under a beautiful golden Buddha. We took a photo. We were soon told by the attendant this was “very bad” because it was reserved for the male monks. Nevertheless history has occurred. The deed was done. An ordinary woman, a mortal took her equal place on the pedestal with the Buddha. This for me was the most significant event of the Asia trip. Guess what!? The Buddha thought so too.
May all women and men realize soon that we are all ordinary Buddhas, the extreme perfection of Life, already Given as heart beat breath, sex and all natural relatedness. This is all Gautama Buddha ever was and ever wanted for everyOne.
Mark