Yoga and the whole duality

The whole contains duality, duality does not contain one-ness

The real you, infinite self, is famously described by Deepak Chopra as a quantum self, an “Ageless Body, Timeless Mind”. Yoga, amongst has as its highest goal to show us, and trains us, to uncover this self by “going within”. Inhabiting both the little self and the infinite self is akin to looking at the detail without losing sight of the big picture. The yin, and the yang.

Self here is the energy behind the thinking being, the force behind the persona, which is represented by the person, or the picture of a person, like in the ID book. Like in an ID book we sense that we are not that image, yet we identify with it. For practical everyday purposes it makes sense, though unfortunately for us we tend to over identify with that self.

Becoming aware that ordinary reality is not the only reality, that there is also a non-dualistic whole, is the first step to uncover the true self. Then we don’t need to control, and we go beyond being controlled. This resolves everything because it already is everything, a state of one-ness. We stop worrying. Suffering ends, joy flows.

Ascension from ignorance to no mind is a gradual process. Yoga suggests that we begin with the practice of postures, to prepare the bodymind to become unstuck from ordinary reality by tapping in to the life force of all that is. That life force may arise gradually, or spontaneously, in stops or starts, as we develop our concentration practices, breath practices and ability to focus inwards. Development of intuition and spiritual practice of compassion for others, practice of self care or self love, and generally placing oneself in some form or another in altruistic service of humanity, coupled to a process of self-enquiry, erodes identification with the thinking mind, to uncover true self, until “self” is “realised”.

In the real world you will most likely continue to feel ups and downs, desire thing or things, think that someone is a prick and consider blowing up countries. Yet a self a aware person is less of a slave and a fool to the egotistical puppet masters who controls us for their gain, of course by virtue of our greed and fear rooted in our egos.

This is why religion is at best a step towards salvation, it cannot be salvation. This is why negotiating for peace is a temporary step towards peace, it cannot produce peace. For the same reason conventional (unholistic) medical health care can save lives, but is only a step towards healing, Only aware, conscious one-ness can do these things.

This is how meditation dissolves suffering. While in meditation you may pleasantly find your attitude, opinion, want for stuff and revenge dissolve. You may even be able to bring some of this forward into your daily living. As with anything else, the more you practice, the better you will get at it. You will feel less need for control, and become less vulnerable to control.

This state of no mind-self cannot negotiated for or purchased. Only inner peace can produce outer peace. Illness, consumerism and war goes away when the self is rooted in self-awareness. This is why yoga says health is not the absence of disease, health is the presence of well-being. Likewise is peace is not the mere absence of war.

This self is equal to God because God is everything and self is everything. We are already that self. All we have to do is know ourselves and realize it.

I wrote this on a flight from Varanasi to Delhi, 11 November 2014.
See the other half of this blog No mind is everything.

Buddha, Jesus, Mohammed… the great yogis…  as well as common sense, dictates, quite practically, very similar spiritual truths.
The picture below is from Swami Sivananda’s Divine Life Society Ashram, Rishikesh.