Cultivating consciousness
In consciousness based philosophies such as yoga, the fabric of the universe is understood as consciousness, and that everything in it, including ourselves, is essentially consciousness.
Cultivating states of conscious awareness is therefore necessary to know creation at this level. It is a skill and there are techniques and teachings for its development, much like developing muscle or discerning thinking is enhanced through exercise, study, community and discourse. The latter stresses the value of satsang, and within context of a healthy community.
Yoga is not anti-intlectual, it is pro inclusive. Pranayama, for example, is considered a “science of breath” that includes anatomy, but does not exclude emotion or the influences of greater environment on the breather. Yoga emphasise that theoretical knowledge and practical insight together create wisdom. In instance of breath yoga teaches that without “breath awareness” one cannot fully explore breath in context of life. In yoga metaphysics knowledge is limited, and not enough to “know who we are” and therefore the wisdom of exploring “the breather” as a multi-layered being is essential to yoga. This is also why yoga means “union”.
In the yoga tradition Everything is part of a holistic, universal non-duality, where “everything is part of everything else”. A mix of mysticism, science and philosophy wherein all that exists is part of one vibrational field. Like quantum physics it includes, for example mechanical physics, but necessarily goes beyond its limitations. It puts the whole before any aspect. In yoga the physical self, on earth, brain included, is seen as a component of a greater intelligence, a whole “self”, with the capcity to be self aware and conscious of the consciousness of All That Is.
Such “supernature” is revealed when we tap into our complete potential that includes spiritual and emotional “Q” and not only IQ. Then we align with the vibrational field where “universe” and “Source” is one. In yoga the “consciousness of the universe” is a radiation of The Supreme Being, an ineffable “All”, rather than the God in-the-image of man as depicted in various religions, or as popularly perceived (or rejected).
Such a philosophy is simple in principle, but may quickly become a complex muddle. For me, personally, it is suffice to know that in complete spirituality life itself is sacred, as is the ordinary, commonplace. All “gods” and deities are expressions of God. One may work out the meaning of life, or lack thereof, to any degree in the thinking mind, but it is the bodymind that includes the heart, and the ability to “go within” for cosmic wisdom, that leads to realise itself.
Johann, Cape Town, 6 July 2017.