Swami Satyananda Saraswati said, “If we hold ourselves responsible for the future, our own and our children, then we will ensure that the evolution of man is along positive lines. Only then will wars cease, only then will man be able to love his fellow man, and only then will adults understand the young and the young understand the old.” Continue reading
Do you know your own self as well as you know your own house. You know where everything is in place in your home. You know your bookshelves, what is in your kitchen, in your cupboard. When you lay the table, you take the cutlery out of the drawers, place the plates, etc. There is no confusion in your mind. If you invite someone for a meal, you may take out your grandma’s lace tablecloth and your mother’s silver. Your writing desk, what is in the drawers, your files, your clips, stapler, everything is in place. You know where your cheque books are kept, have an idea how much you have in the bank. You are very familiar with your home. Continue reading
Both Swami Sivananda and Swami Satyanananda were clear that if you want peace of mind, balance and want to follow the spiritual path, you have to tame your mind. Swamiji said that if you have a quarrel with your partner or family, you may sleep in a separate room but your mind cannot be put in another room. It will sleep with you, it will play with your thoughts, give you dreams and wake you up the next morning not rested but more upset. So how does one quieten this mind. Swamiji has laid emphasis on the mind. Swami Sivananda has emphasised on developing positive qualities of the mind and eradicating the negative and restrictive qualities of the mind. Continue reading
How do we view work? I remember as a child when I was asked to do work, I felt that I was being treated like a slave. I read a lot and I could never stop reading once I started. So for me when I was told to clean my room, iron my uniform, I felt that I was being exploited like the slaves of Sparta. My father said that it was important for us to learn how to work as one never knew where life would take us. Continue reading
Silence exists within oneself. We can be in a forest and have a clamour of thoughts within us. The first ashram of the Bihar School of Yoga was near a railway track in Munger. The track has goods trains running on it, and they had steam engines. It was noisy and every hour the quiet would be pierced with a shrieking engine whistle. Continue reading
As parents and caregivers we are concerned about our children. We are overly worried, as to how others will perceive them and it will reflect upon us that we are not good at parenting. We also tend to inflict on our children, the values instilled in us by our parents. I am speaking from my own experience. I was not a perfect parent and I would catch myself sounding like my mum or dad. Continue reading
BFF. It is an abbreviation for Best Friends Forever. It is a term of endearment. We all have a BFF. Just saying it makes us happy. It brings a smile to our faces. Everyone knows it, even kids, little ones. I know that we all like the abbreviation very much. We feel good with it. Have you thought what is with you all the time and never let’s go. Your thoughts. Continue reading
Talk 3 of Swami Nityabodhananda at Yoga Vidya Center in Cologne, Sept 2019.
Question and answers. Human pursuits. Roles in life and attitudes. Need for a teacher. Self inquiry. Vedanta and you are that. The tenth man. Sadhana.
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Revision and conclusion. What is the meaning of ignorance? The oneness of the individual and the supreme reality. The method of Vedānta. How to get a sattvic mind. Jñāni. You are the happiness you are looking for. You have to go beyond the gunas but in the end there are not even gunas. Direct experience of the self. Tat tvam asi. Neti neti.
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How Ira met Swami Dayānanda. Q + A. Books of Shankaracharya. Study Brahma Sutras only with a qualified teacher. Vivekacūḍāmaṇi. Are Advaita Vedānta and Yoga Philosophy harmonious? Vedantic dhyana. Kaṭhopaniṣad and vedantic meditation. Books and articles of Ira.
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Introversion of the mind and the witness. Intellectual knowledge is not helpful. Discriminative wisdom comes only to bhaktas. Bhakti means love of god. Unless you turn your mind to him he won´t reveal himself to you. The highest teaching in Vedānta is not this not this. Q + A. Ira and his teacher. Mumukshuttva.
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Discussion of the three states. The beauty of Vedānta is that it is based on common experience, not on mystical experience. Pūrṇa anubhava. 2 experiences: being aware of something or being not aware of anything. The states are not in the world. The states are not in time. Avyakta and deep sleep. Dream and waking are both private. Are you the
witness of the dream and the waking state? You are not in time because time is in the states. Is sleep the self? The Bhagavad Gītā has not to be studied sequentially.
Deliberate superimposition Bhagavad Gītā ch. 13, 13. īśvara and māyā. The world is imagined by ignorance. Ramanuja.
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Nirvāṇa–ṣaṭka. Morning remembrance prayer. Vedānta and modern science. No conflict 
between science and Vedānta. Science makes statements about the waking state. Vedānta is a subjective science: its about your own experience. Analyse of the three states according to Gauḍa-pādas kārikā.
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Vedānta is not a business. The highest teaching of Vedānta. The method of Vedānta: deliberate superimposition for the purpose of teaching and negation of this teaching in the end. Mutual superimposition. 3 identifcations: knower, doer, experiencer. adhyaropa and apavāda. Tat tvam asi. Role of the teacher. You are everything. Is samadhi necessary?
Making the knowledge of the self firm? How many jñānis are there?
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2 ways to get vairāgya: 1. seeing the defects of happiness from objects (it has a beginning and an end) 2. understanding that objects are not real. Bhagavad Gītā ch. 13, 7-11. Spiritual sadhana: developping qualities. Humility is knowledge because it leads to knowledge. Cultivate the qualities through effort. Only if a person has these qualities
direct knowledge can arise. Bhagavad Gītā ch. 13, 12. If you negate everything existing and non existing the self remains. There is no other way to teach the self except by
negation: neti neti. Is vers 13, 12 a contradiction? That which is devoid of all duality is described by adhyaropa and apavāda,” i.e., by superimposition and negation, by
attribution and denial. Intuition of the self. After negation of objects, even the mind, the self stands self revealed.
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