Friday 1st August 2008
I read a brilliant article in a recent edition of New Internationalist by John F Schumaker entitled “The Triumph of Triviality”.
It’s a rather negative, unflattering view of our consumer culture, but it sure rings true to me.
He started off by saying
“The results of the cultural indoctrination stakes are not yet in but here is a definite trend – triviality leads, followed closely by superficiality and mindless distraction. Vanity looks great while profundity is bringing up the rear. Pettiness is powering ahead, along with passivity and indifference. Curiosity lost interest, wisdom was scratched and critical thought had to be put down. Ego is running wild. Attention span continues to shorten and no-one is betting on survival.
It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Half a century ago, humanistic thinkers were heralding a great awakening that would usher in a golden age of enlightened living.”
(Essay writers in the book I recently read called “The Mystery of 2012: Predictions, Prophecies and Possibilities” also seem to be naively optimistic about the future of our race, many of them believing we are on the brink of a massive global shift to a higher consciousness – BOLLOCKS!)
I quote further from Schumaker’s article…
“But something happened along the way. The pyramid (Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs) collapsed. Human potential took a back seat to economic potential while self-actualization gave way to self-absorption on a spectacular scale. A pulp culture flourished as the masses were successfully duped into making a home amidst an ever-changing smorgasbord of false material needs.
Operating on the principle that triviality is more profitable than substance and dedicating itself to unceasing material overkill, consumer culture has become a fine-tuned instrument for keeping people incomplete, shallow and dehumanized. Materialism continues to gain ground, even in the face of an impending eco-apocalypse.
Pulp culture is a feast of tinsel and veneer. The ideal citizen is an empty tract through which gadgets can pass quickly, largely undigested, so there is always space for more. Reality races by as a blur of consumer choices that never feel quite real. We know it as the fast lane and whip ourselves to keep apace.
Today, the demand for triviality has never been higher and our tolerance for seriousness has never been lower.”
No wonder I just don’t fit in anymore.
1 August 2008
27 June 2008
Halfway Up The Mountain
Saturday 20th July 2008
Over recent months I've been silenced...
As my ego shrivels up so does my tongue.
It's difficult to talk about one's spiritual/yoga practice when the actual practice becomes an authentic penetration into the ego's stronghold.
Talking about oneself is ludicrous when trying to get rid of the very self that is doing the talking!
All true practice must go there eventually but it can be very unpleasant territory to be working in.
But oh so elegantly humbling.
Yoga Practice
My physical yoga practice continues, but with very little direction attached to it. I'm happy for it to go nowhere. There are no poses I want to improve or master, no goals to reach any more. All those years of hard-core yoga practice worked to open up my body and energy channels and I was really getting somewhere, transforming from a non-conscious blimp into an awakened one. But you know what...during all that time of spiritual practice I was under the unconscious spell of the ego, that part of me that wanted to become a better person, some vague idea of being an enlightened human being.
We think the desire to improve is a healthy one, but if you really investigate this desire and the REAL feelings behind it you realise that it actually PREVENTS us from entering into deep spiritual communion. That will only come when we fully accept, embrace and receive/surrender to what is occurring on the full spectrum of subtle levels (from gross to sublime) Here and Now.
So I get to the mat about 4 times a week now, and spend that time rediscovering yoga all over again. My attention to detail is finer, more subtle, more acute, more in the moment, more aware and alive. It's bliss to fall down that rabbit hole. My energy level and mood determine my practice. Sometimes it's an Ashtanga Primary practice, sometimes a long, intense session taken from one of the courses at the back of Iyengar's Light on Yoga book. It's all yoga. It's all good. The inversions transport me deep into mystical realms so I'm enjoying longer and longer stays in them (Shoulderstand and Headstand), first refining the alignment of the outer pose then purifing the flow of inner subtle energies. I've been exploring all the variations of these poses (courtesy of Light on Yoga) to push out the time I can spend in them before I get tired or my head starts to spin or my eyes start to glaze.
More important to my practice than an hour or two of daily yoga is the moment to moment context in which I am living and breathing now. A new paradigm. It's like having eyes that look out at the same landscape as everyone else but the ability to see the pulsing web-like energy that connects it all, a penetration through the hard surface to the other fleshy organic internal workings of life.
Do I really need to spend two hours a day on a blue mat when every person I come in contact with is unwittingly showing me the precise areas where I need to purify my thoughts?
I catch myself many times a day, sometimes in time, sometimes too late, it might be something I say, something I think, something I feel that I cringe at, it's that immediate response to another person's words or actions that gives me vital data on where I need to work on myself.
I'm constantly watching.
Seriously, I'm embarrassed at what I'm learning about myself....it's humbling to realise how blind I've been to my own impurities. And yet it's beautiful.
At last there are cracks appearing in my ego. The light is beginning to shine through.
Given the choice most of us would like to have our cake and eat it too, along with the icing and all the goodies on top...we're happy to do all of these spiritual practices as long as we can keep all the goodies they provide. Yoga, meditation, purification...they improve our health, cleanse our energy systems, raise the quality of our awareness to higher realms, and make us feel good about ourselves as we watch the progress and enjoy the fruits of our labour, but who REALLY wants to lose their identity. Because if we do, then 'I' won't be able to enjoy the rewards of my spiritual practice? 'I' won't be there anymore! What a paradox...that is the goal. Trouble is, 'I' doesn't want to destroy itself so it's not difficult to see why we end up in this merry-go-round of spiritual practices that the ego is enjoying. In reality all that yoga/meditation/contemplation/prayer we call 'spiritual practice' is not destroying the ego or helping us to recognise the ego, it's actually FEEDING the ego.
Realising this Truth is harsh, but it's the start of the real work involved in waking up.
Where to from here?
Oh boy...a teacher is needed here...someone who has been all the way there and back again, someone who has done the long hard work of persistently humiliating the ego to its death and who is now residing permanently in the illuminated space that is left - egoless.
But am I really truly prepared to renounce my identity, surrender to the highest ideal and fully commit to the path that leads there?
What a bizarre question...do 'I' want to destroy my Self?
If this weird conundrum resonates with you, get your hands on a book called 'Halfway Up the Mountain' by Mariana Caplan.
Only when the student is ready to give up everything that matters, will the awakened teacher step forward to assist.
Over recent months I've been silenced...
As my ego shrivels up so does my tongue.
It's difficult to talk about one's spiritual/yoga practice when the actual practice becomes an authentic penetration into the ego's stronghold.
Talking about oneself is ludicrous when trying to get rid of the very self that is doing the talking!
All true practice must go there eventually but it can be very unpleasant territory to be working in.
But oh so elegantly humbling.
Yoga Practice
My physical yoga practice continues, but with very little direction attached to it. I'm happy for it to go nowhere. There are no poses I want to improve or master, no goals to reach any more. All those years of hard-core yoga practice worked to open up my body and energy channels and I was really getting somewhere, transforming from a non-conscious blimp into an awakened one. But you know what...during all that time of spiritual practice I was under the unconscious spell of the ego, that part of me that wanted to become a better person, some vague idea of being an enlightened human being.
We think the desire to improve is a healthy one, but if you really investigate this desire and the REAL feelings behind it you realise that it actually PREVENTS us from entering into deep spiritual communion. That will only come when we fully accept, embrace and receive/surrender to what is occurring on the full spectrum of subtle levels (from gross to sublime) Here and Now.
So I get to the mat about 4 times a week now, and spend that time rediscovering yoga all over again. My attention to detail is finer, more subtle, more acute, more in the moment, more aware and alive. It's bliss to fall down that rabbit hole. My energy level and mood determine my practice. Sometimes it's an Ashtanga Primary practice, sometimes a long, intense session taken from one of the courses at the back of Iyengar's Light on Yoga book. It's all yoga. It's all good. The inversions transport me deep into mystical realms so I'm enjoying longer and longer stays in them (Shoulderstand and Headstand), first refining the alignment of the outer pose then purifing the flow of inner subtle energies. I've been exploring all the variations of these poses (courtesy of Light on Yoga) to push out the time I can spend in them before I get tired or my head starts to spin or my eyes start to glaze.
More important to my practice than an hour or two of daily yoga is the moment to moment context in which I am living and breathing now. A new paradigm. It's like having eyes that look out at the same landscape as everyone else but the ability to see the pulsing web-like energy that connects it all, a penetration through the hard surface to the other fleshy organic internal workings of life.
Do I really need to spend two hours a day on a blue mat when every person I come in contact with is unwittingly showing me the precise areas where I need to purify my thoughts?
I catch myself many times a day, sometimes in time, sometimes too late, it might be something I say, something I think, something I feel that I cringe at, it's that immediate response to another person's words or actions that gives me vital data on where I need to work on myself.
I'm constantly watching.
Seriously, I'm embarrassed at what I'm learning about myself....it's humbling to realise how blind I've been to my own impurities. And yet it's beautiful.
At last there are cracks appearing in my ego. The light is beginning to shine through.
Given the choice most of us would like to have our cake and eat it too, along with the icing and all the goodies on top...we're happy to do all of these spiritual practices as long as we can keep all the goodies they provide. Yoga, meditation, purification...they improve our health, cleanse our energy systems, raise the quality of our awareness to higher realms, and make us feel good about ourselves as we watch the progress and enjoy the fruits of our labour, but who REALLY wants to lose their identity. Because if we do, then 'I' won't be able to enjoy the rewards of my spiritual practice? 'I' won't be there anymore! What a paradox...that is the goal. Trouble is, 'I' doesn't want to destroy itself so it's not difficult to see why we end up in this merry-go-round of spiritual practices that the ego is enjoying. In reality all that yoga/meditation/contemplation/prayer we call 'spiritual practice' is not destroying the ego or helping us to recognise the ego, it's actually FEEDING the ego.
Realising this Truth is harsh, but it's the start of the real work involved in waking up.
Where to from here?
Oh boy...a teacher is needed here...someone who has been all the way there and back again, someone who has done the long hard work of persistently humiliating the ego to its death and who is now residing permanently in the illuminated space that is left - egoless.
But am I really truly prepared to renounce my identity, surrender to the highest ideal and fully commit to the path that leads there?
What a bizarre question...do 'I' want to destroy my Self?
If this weird conundrum resonates with you, get your hands on a book called 'Halfway Up the Mountain' by Mariana Caplan.
Only when the student is ready to give up everything that matters, will the awakened teacher step forward to assist.
18 April 2008
Kalutskikh Brothers
Saturday 19th April 2008
Have a look at this 'dance routine' with Daniel and Kirill Kalutskikh.
Can you spot the yoga poses? Can you name them?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kh4XXuAzuy4&NR=1
Have a look at this 'dance routine' with Daniel and Kirill Kalutskikh.
Can you spot the yoga poses? Can you name them?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kh4XXuAzuy4&NR=1
14 April 2008
On the mat
Tuesday 15th April 2008A left wrist problem arose at the start of practice this morning and quickly worsened during the Surya Namaskars. By the 3rd B I couldn’t put enough weight on it to push into Upward Dog Pose because a sharp pain was warning that something was wrong. The standing poses were unaffected except the vinyasa between Ardha Baddha Padmottanasana and Utkatasana. Preparation for Handstand showed that kicking up would be out of the question too.
Strangely I had no problem with the weight bearing on my wrist in Purvottanasana or Urdhva Dhanurasana which must have a different weight bearing angle. Maybe it has something to do with my elbow/shoulder action in the push up to Upward Dog. I'd played with moving the weight to the inside wrist to alleviate the pressure on the outer wrist but it didn’t help much so to avoid making it worse, I cut out all vinyasas from the seated poses and inserted Purvottanasana in between poses to get the counter backbending effect.
Strangely I had no problem with the weight bearing on my wrist in Purvottanasana or Urdhva Dhanurasana which must have a different weight bearing angle. Maybe it has something to do with my elbow/shoulder action in the push up to Upward Dog. I'd played with moving the weight to the inside wrist to alleviate the pressure on the outer wrist but it didn’t help much so to avoid making it worse, I cut out all vinyasas from the seated poses and inserted Purvottanasana in between poses to get the counter backbending effect.
So practice was a modified Primary today, but still a thoroughly enjoyable 2 hours. Without the vinyasas to link the poses into a continous flow I had to keep my ujjiya breath strong and even to give the practice the required intensity and keep it rolling along. Easy to fall off the tracks halfway through if the energy and strong intention wither away.
When comparing my two wrists after practice I noticed a rather prominent mound on the outside of the left wrist, protruding from underneath the ulnar styloid (the knobbly bit at the bottom end of the ulna – identified as ‘b’ in the image). The lump is about 1cm diameter and slightly tender so it could be a small cyst. I suppose I should get it x-rayed but a trip to the doctor for me is like being forced to swallow poison.
When comparing my two wrists after practice I noticed a rather prominent mound on the outside of the left wrist, protruding from underneath the ulnar styloid (the knobbly bit at the bottom end of the ulna – identified as ‘b’ in the image). The lump is about 1cm diameter and slightly tender so it could be a small cyst. I suppose I should get it x-rayed but a trip to the doctor for me is like being forced to swallow poison.
11 April 2008
On the mat and more 2012
Saturday 12th April 2008
On the mat
I had a fantastic practice at Kosta’s studio this morning. Not that I whizzed through the 2 hours easily, more like I practiced with an absolute honesty and willingness to be present that is both confrontingly painful and deeply fulfilling.
It was the first time in weeks that I’d done a full primary practice from beginning to end, so it was heartening to realize I’m still capable of it; everything was in its proper place, bandhas, ujjiya breath, drishti, awareness and precision.
The studio was really warm, and because it was an 8 o’clock start I decided to have a teeny weeny coffee when I got up. Probably the reason why my breath occasionally got very ragged during practice - as if I was doing that pranayama exercise when the inhalation gets broken up into sections (inhale a quarter breath, short retention, inhale again to half capacity, short retention, inhale to three-quarters capacity, short retention, then inhale the last bit of breath, short retention, then long, slow exhalation).
Occasionally during an intense practice, or during a particularly difficult pose, my inhalation will turn into a succession of short sips. Seems to be a gripping response to great stress (like when I probe too close into the dark hole in my lower back). When it happened in Marichy D today there wasn’t anything I could do to calm it down so I just stayed deep in the pose, held on to what I had and watched the pose stab my breath to pieces. When the breath got ragged in a couple of other poses, it was a very different scenario...I was able to consciously calm the breath until it became round and smooth again, but not Marichy D today.
Maintaining a consistent Ujjiya breath in this practice makes you very aware of how the breath reflects our state of mind instantaneously. If a pose takes me to my absolute edge (and I often go there), my breath sometimes quickens into a frenzy of short bursts. But who hasn’t experienced that powerfully deep sonorous breath that saturates every layer of your being in the intense forward bend following Urdhva Dhanurasana/dropbacks. Untying the body from the intense backbending is a process of edging it gently in the opposite direction, bit by bit, breath by breath, leading it into the quietness of outer space where the breath resonates and echoes like wind through the long tunnel of the body.
I must admit that when I’m in an Iyengar class trying to keep my Ujjiya breath barely audible, I’m actually grateful that I can turn the volume to zero when I feel it getting ragged…neither the person next to me nor the teacher gets to know that I’m stressing in a pose. It's my secret, the silent breath doesn't give it away.
Speaking of Iyengar classes, I missed Darren’s led Friday class yesterday. I got up early enough but felt like I didn’t want to be around any other people. More and more I’m isolating myself these days, much preferring my own space and company. So I did my own practice at home yesterday, a shorter session that’s been an almost daily ritual of late because of a pulled calf muscle and a tortured lower back.
My short version goes something like this:
5 Surya Namaskar A
3 Surya Namaskar B
All Ashtanga standing poses in their correct sequence (but occasionally without the Virabhadrasanas if I’m short of time)
Forward bends – usually Paschimottanasana, Ardha Baddha Padma Paschimottanasana and Janu Sirsasana
Backbends: Dhanurasana and Ustrasana before 2 or 3 Urdhva Dhanurasanas
Paschimottanasana again
The finishing inversion sequence from Shoulderstand through to Padmasana.
But today was full primary so I’m not yet on the downhill slide to senior citizen’s yoga.
The Mystery of 2012: Predictions, Prophecies and Possibilities
Here are some more excerpts from the book 2012 that I’ve pulled out because when I read them I thought “YES!”
Might post some more excerpts if they feel important enough to type up and keep.
"Never before have we been able to access so much spiritual wisdom. A century ago, the only spiritual tradition available to most people was the one that was indigenous to their own culture. Moreover, with rare exceptions, they did not have the benefit of learning from a truly enlightened being. Today we can access teachings from many different traditions and cultures, discover their common underlying truths, and translate that perennial philosophy into the language and terms of our own time. Something completely new is emerging: a single spiritual teaching that is a distillation of the world’s wisdom traditions. This is coalescing and being disseminated globally through a variety of information technologies: books, tapes, Web pages, online forums, and Internet broadcasts.
At the same time, a growing number of people are becoming fully awake and proving themselves to be excellent teachers. Many are using the Internet to share their wisdom and help awaken others. Instruction in practices that facilitate awakening are already online and could become much more sophisticated. It may even turn out that darshan, the Indian word for a direct transfer of higher consciousness, can be transmitted via the net.
Awakening is often a sudden event. Once a person is ready – the necessary groundwork done, the circumstances propitious – the shift can happen more or less instantaneously. It’s possible that research into the neurological correlates of spiritual awakening will lead us to methods of promoting the process directly. There will likely be other unforeseen discoveries or developments that will help us free our minds. Whatever they may be, the more we learn how to facilitate a shift in consciousness, the faster it will happen.
As this becomes a mainstream phenomenon, humanity will relate to the world in wiser, more compassionate ways. Problems would still exist. Global warming would not suddenly cease; pollution would not evaporate; extinct species would not suddenly return. On the other hand, we might then have at our disposal new technologies that could help us solve the problems we have created. We can only guess at the ways in which this marriage of high technology and higher consciousness would play out. We have not been there before.
When we look at what is happening in the world today, it is understandable that we might scoff at the very idea of a collective spiritual breakthrough. The daily news may well lead us to believe that we are heading ever more rapidly toward breakdown rather than breakthrough.
That is, indeed, one likely possibility. I do not want to downplay the dire urgency of the world situation. If we don’t make some radical changes, we are surely headed for disaster of one kind or another.
I also believe that positive change is possible. If we can develop the wisdom needed to navigate our way through these turbulent times safely, the potentials are staggering and unimaginable in scope. Let’s put our hearts and minds to proving that we can pass Buckminster Fuller’s final evolutionary exam and become a truly magnificent species. We are, after all, our only hope.”
-Peter Russell A Singularity in Time
“Personally, I don’t believe that anything dramatic will unfold in December 2012 (although those who fear Armageddon might create their own private doomsday). Yet, when we look back, we will see a sweeping change in human consciousness over the past decade, as if we had collectively awakened form a dream.
As we move toward the great shift, countless people are letting go of old habits, patterns, relationships, and situations, often being apparently forced to release whatever holds them in the past, or keeps them stuck. We can no longer pretend that we are happy if we are not. We have to face up to whatever is not working or falls short of our dreams and desires. This means we must become accustomed to rapid change, personally and globally. If we can learn to ride this tidal wave of change, then our global awakening will be relatively easy and even exhilarating. The more we resist change or close down, the tougher it gets. We have to be willing to let go, to make unexpected changes in our lives. We have to be willing to open our hearts, to follow our bliss, to trust and go with the flow. We also have to be willing to put down roots and make commitments when that is where our hearts lead us. As Paulo Coehlo suggests, freedom is not the absence of commitment, but the ability to commit to whatever is right for you. That kind of commitment – unlike one that comes from duty or obligation or promises – always feels joyful and liberating and expansive. If it feels heavy or restrictive, it invariably means we are “trying to be good” and so are splitting, or dividing our energy.
-Gill Edwards Wild Love Sets Us Free
"Did you know that at this very moment a new world is emerging right through the cracks and crevices of the old world? It’s alive, growing, and vibrant, in stark contrast to the old world which is running on fear, anger and greed. By 2012, this new world, born out of the creative minds and compassionate hearts of self-empowered visionaries everywhere, will be even more visible and influential, affecting every aspect of life.
These practical visionaries, whom I call “the builders of the dawn,” are found in all fields of life an din all nations. They’re bringing new ideas and solutions to our problems – from war and terrorism to poverty and environmental destruction. These visionaries often seem like they are glowing form within, as if they are filled with light and passion."
-Corinne McLaughlin 2012 Socially Responsible Business and Nonadversarial Politics
"We have entered a time of global crises. We live surrounded, almost suffocated, by the debris of our dying civilization. The last centuries’ belief in dualism and separation with its focus on rational thought brought great scientific and material progress, but it also created a life-denying split between spirit and matter. It banished God to heaven, and stripped the Earth of its sacredness. Now, all reverence for our own bodies and the body of the Earth lost, we are systematically plundering and polluting our world, destroying the very ecosystem we depend upon for survival. Steeped in materialism, we have forgotten why we are here. We have created a physical and spiritual wasteland, and our own souls and the soul of the world are starving.
Life is one, has always been one.
The world is a single, living, organic wholeness and everything in creation is a part of it, as vitally and inseparably related to the whole of life as an individual cell or organ is related to the larger organism of which it is a part. Life is alive with its own intelligence and purpose. That purpose, which is our own purpose because we are not separate from life, is one of revelation. In its multitude of forms, creation reveals the hidden face of God.
But we have forgotten this. Our present world bears witness not to the divine but to our own hubris, our greed, and our delusions of power. In our obsessive desire for material comforts, for more and more things, we have plundered the Earth as if it was a mere commodity to be exploited, and we have desecrated our world. We live as if life were something apart from ourselves – something we can master and control – rather than part of our very being. We have lost all sight of life’s real nature and purpose and our relationship to this purpose. And life has allowed this to happen. Until now, life has, for the most part, remained receptive, waiting, watching us follow our desires, and saying very little, even as it has felt the sorrow of a people who deny its divine nature.
Now, something deep within life is changing; an era is ending and at the core of creation, something is coming alive in a new way. A light at the center of the world that has been dormant for millennia has been rekindled. This is the light of life itself, waking up, remembering its own real nature and divine purpose. With this awakening, the living being that is our world is undergoing a transformation in its very essence.
There is a growing awareness of a shift in consciousness toward global oneness. With regard to ecology, we have been forced to recognize that we are one planet, one interconnected living ecosystem. Internet and cell phone technology has given us the tools of global communication and commerce and finance also have a global dimension. Few, however, have recognized the depths of this change, the signs that the world is awakening. Most are too busy, caught up in their own affairs to notice something so new. Those who are fixed on the image of an Earth that has no soul will not recognize its new light, will not allow it into their lives. It would be too threatening. Yet this awakening light is beginning to affect human consciousness. It is sending message of hope into a collective despair, a collective soullessness. And it is attracting those who want to work with it.
Our true light comes from the divine spark within us. It carries the deepest purpose of our life, which belongs to the divine purpose of creation. We are born with this spark; it is quite visible in children, in their eyes, their laughter and joy. But as we grow older, it “fades into the common light of day”. Then, we must reclaim and reignite it through the sometimes painful process of remembrance and reawakening that spiritual practices and inner work provide.
Now we are being asked to wake up to our light and assume our real co creative role in the evolution of the world. The light of the world is waking up and our consciousness is needed to help bring its hidden meaning into the consciousness of the world and of humanity. We can help the world come alive again. And we can help to shape the next stage in its evolution.
There are no books, schools, or traditions that will tell us exactly how to do this work. Only in the meeting of our consciousness with the awakening consciousness within life – our own awakened consciousness as we bring it to life in each moment – will we find the information we need. For at its core, life knows everything it needs to sustain itself; it knows how to evolve and how to recreate itself anew, and because it is a continual response to the divine moment, it knows precisely what is needed in each moment.
When we open ourselves fully to life as it really is, we will experience again that life is alive and that it can communicate with us directly and interact with us in may different dimensions – not just the physical dimension we now take to the world, but also in the symbolic realms and the realm of pure consciousness and light – dimensions of magic, wonder and awe that have not been manifest in our world for a long time.
There are primal changes taking place within life, and they are farther-reaching than we dare to imagine. One thing is certain: the world as we know it is ending. Our drama of greed and materialism, our hubristic belief that we re the lords of the world, which we can exploit at will, has created a nightmare that is draining the very lifeblood of the planet. But in the midst of this dying dream, another dream is being born, one based upon the consciousness of oneness, the knowing that we are one living ecosystem, one global community. And within this dream of oneness are signs that the world is awakening.
Perhaps the prophecies of the year 2012 point to this possibility, a moment in cosmic time when, with an outpouring of energy, the world will awaken to its divine nature and throw off the debris of materialism. Those identified with the dying dream would experience this as a cataclysm, a global disaster. But others might recognize it as what we have unknowingly been waiting for, a new Golden Age in which we can return to the simplicity and joy that belong to life in its essence, life as it really is – a time when we will no longer need to distract ourselves with our toys and addictions, because the simple wonder and joy of being alive will nourish us and our world, when the song of the soul of the world will sing to us and to all of creation, and we will discover that the magic inherent in life is healing and beneficial, and that in it wisdom and oneness the world knows how to support itself and its inhabitants.
Our light is a part of the light of the world awakening to its divine nature. Working with it, we can become co creators of the next era. This is the choice we are being given: not to wait for the future but to help bring it into being.
-Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee An Awakening World
On the mat
I had a fantastic practice at Kosta’s studio this morning. Not that I whizzed through the 2 hours easily, more like I practiced with an absolute honesty and willingness to be present that is both confrontingly painful and deeply fulfilling.
It was the first time in weeks that I’d done a full primary practice from beginning to end, so it was heartening to realize I’m still capable of it; everything was in its proper place, bandhas, ujjiya breath, drishti, awareness and precision.
The studio was really warm, and because it was an 8 o’clock start I decided to have a teeny weeny coffee when I got up. Probably the reason why my breath occasionally got very ragged during practice - as if I was doing that pranayama exercise when the inhalation gets broken up into sections (inhale a quarter breath, short retention, inhale again to half capacity, short retention, inhale to three-quarters capacity, short retention, then inhale the last bit of breath, short retention, then long, slow exhalation).
Occasionally during an intense practice, or during a particularly difficult pose, my inhalation will turn into a succession of short sips. Seems to be a gripping response to great stress (like when I probe too close into the dark hole in my lower back). When it happened in Marichy D today there wasn’t anything I could do to calm it down so I just stayed deep in the pose, held on to what I had and watched the pose stab my breath to pieces. When the breath got ragged in a couple of other poses, it was a very different scenario...I was able to consciously calm the breath until it became round and smooth again, but not Marichy D today.
Maintaining a consistent Ujjiya breath in this practice makes you very aware of how the breath reflects our state of mind instantaneously. If a pose takes me to my absolute edge (and I often go there), my breath sometimes quickens into a frenzy of short bursts. But who hasn’t experienced that powerfully deep sonorous breath that saturates every layer of your being in the intense forward bend following Urdhva Dhanurasana/dropbacks. Untying the body from the intense backbending is a process of edging it gently in the opposite direction, bit by bit, breath by breath, leading it into the quietness of outer space where the breath resonates and echoes like wind through the long tunnel of the body.
I must admit that when I’m in an Iyengar class trying to keep my Ujjiya breath barely audible, I’m actually grateful that I can turn the volume to zero when I feel it getting ragged…neither the person next to me nor the teacher gets to know that I’m stressing in a pose. It's my secret, the silent breath doesn't give it away.
Speaking of Iyengar classes, I missed Darren’s led Friday class yesterday. I got up early enough but felt like I didn’t want to be around any other people. More and more I’m isolating myself these days, much preferring my own space and company. So I did my own practice at home yesterday, a shorter session that’s been an almost daily ritual of late because of a pulled calf muscle and a tortured lower back.
My short version goes something like this:
5 Surya Namaskar A
3 Surya Namaskar B
All Ashtanga standing poses in their correct sequence (but occasionally without the Virabhadrasanas if I’m short of time)
Forward bends – usually Paschimottanasana, Ardha Baddha Padma Paschimottanasana and Janu Sirsasana
Backbends: Dhanurasana and Ustrasana before 2 or 3 Urdhva Dhanurasanas
Paschimottanasana again
The finishing inversion sequence from Shoulderstand through to Padmasana.
But today was full primary so I’m not yet on the downhill slide to senior citizen’s yoga.
The Mystery of 2012: Predictions, Prophecies and Possibilities
Here are some more excerpts from the book 2012 that I’ve pulled out because when I read them I thought “YES!”
Might post some more excerpts if they feel important enough to type up and keep.
"Never before have we been able to access so much spiritual wisdom. A century ago, the only spiritual tradition available to most people was the one that was indigenous to their own culture. Moreover, with rare exceptions, they did not have the benefit of learning from a truly enlightened being. Today we can access teachings from many different traditions and cultures, discover their common underlying truths, and translate that perennial philosophy into the language and terms of our own time. Something completely new is emerging: a single spiritual teaching that is a distillation of the world’s wisdom traditions. This is coalescing and being disseminated globally through a variety of information technologies: books, tapes, Web pages, online forums, and Internet broadcasts.
At the same time, a growing number of people are becoming fully awake and proving themselves to be excellent teachers. Many are using the Internet to share their wisdom and help awaken others. Instruction in practices that facilitate awakening are already online and could become much more sophisticated. It may even turn out that darshan, the Indian word for a direct transfer of higher consciousness, can be transmitted via the net.
Awakening is often a sudden event. Once a person is ready – the necessary groundwork done, the circumstances propitious – the shift can happen more or less instantaneously. It’s possible that research into the neurological correlates of spiritual awakening will lead us to methods of promoting the process directly. There will likely be other unforeseen discoveries or developments that will help us free our minds. Whatever they may be, the more we learn how to facilitate a shift in consciousness, the faster it will happen.
As this becomes a mainstream phenomenon, humanity will relate to the world in wiser, more compassionate ways. Problems would still exist. Global warming would not suddenly cease; pollution would not evaporate; extinct species would not suddenly return. On the other hand, we might then have at our disposal new technologies that could help us solve the problems we have created. We can only guess at the ways in which this marriage of high technology and higher consciousness would play out. We have not been there before.
When we look at what is happening in the world today, it is understandable that we might scoff at the very idea of a collective spiritual breakthrough. The daily news may well lead us to believe that we are heading ever more rapidly toward breakdown rather than breakthrough.
That is, indeed, one likely possibility. I do not want to downplay the dire urgency of the world situation. If we don’t make some radical changes, we are surely headed for disaster of one kind or another.
I also believe that positive change is possible. If we can develop the wisdom needed to navigate our way through these turbulent times safely, the potentials are staggering and unimaginable in scope. Let’s put our hearts and minds to proving that we can pass Buckminster Fuller’s final evolutionary exam and become a truly magnificent species. We are, after all, our only hope.”
-Peter Russell A Singularity in Time
“Personally, I don’t believe that anything dramatic will unfold in December 2012 (although those who fear Armageddon might create their own private doomsday). Yet, when we look back, we will see a sweeping change in human consciousness over the past decade, as if we had collectively awakened form a dream.
As we move toward the great shift, countless people are letting go of old habits, patterns, relationships, and situations, often being apparently forced to release whatever holds them in the past, or keeps them stuck. We can no longer pretend that we are happy if we are not. We have to face up to whatever is not working or falls short of our dreams and desires. This means we must become accustomed to rapid change, personally and globally. If we can learn to ride this tidal wave of change, then our global awakening will be relatively easy and even exhilarating. The more we resist change or close down, the tougher it gets. We have to be willing to let go, to make unexpected changes in our lives. We have to be willing to open our hearts, to follow our bliss, to trust and go with the flow. We also have to be willing to put down roots and make commitments when that is where our hearts lead us. As Paulo Coehlo suggests, freedom is not the absence of commitment, but the ability to commit to whatever is right for you. That kind of commitment – unlike one that comes from duty or obligation or promises – always feels joyful and liberating and expansive. If it feels heavy or restrictive, it invariably means we are “trying to be good” and so are splitting, or dividing our energy.
-Gill Edwards Wild Love Sets Us Free
"Did you know that at this very moment a new world is emerging right through the cracks and crevices of the old world? It’s alive, growing, and vibrant, in stark contrast to the old world which is running on fear, anger and greed. By 2012, this new world, born out of the creative minds and compassionate hearts of self-empowered visionaries everywhere, will be even more visible and influential, affecting every aspect of life.
These practical visionaries, whom I call “the builders of the dawn,” are found in all fields of life an din all nations. They’re bringing new ideas and solutions to our problems – from war and terrorism to poverty and environmental destruction. These visionaries often seem like they are glowing form within, as if they are filled with light and passion."
-Corinne McLaughlin 2012 Socially Responsible Business and Nonadversarial Politics
"We have entered a time of global crises. We live surrounded, almost suffocated, by the debris of our dying civilization. The last centuries’ belief in dualism and separation with its focus on rational thought brought great scientific and material progress, but it also created a life-denying split between spirit and matter. It banished God to heaven, and stripped the Earth of its sacredness. Now, all reverence for our own bodies and the body of the Earth lost, we are systematically plundering and polluting our world, destroying the very ecosystem we depend upon for survival. Steeped in materialism, we have forgotten why we are here. We have created a physical and spiritual wasteland, and our own souls and the soul of the world are starving.
Life is one, has always been one.
The world is a single, living, organic wholeness and everything in creation is a part of it, as vitally and inseparably related to the whole of life as an individual cell or organ is related to the larger organism of which it is a part. Life is alive with its own intelligence and purpose. That purpose, which is our own purpose because we are not separate from life, is one of revelation. In its multitude of forms, creation reveals the hidden face of God.
But we have forgotten this. Our present world bears witness not to the divine but to our own hubris, our greed, and our delusions of power. In our obsessive desire for material comforts, for more and more things, we have plundered the Earth as if it was a mere commodity to be exploited, and we have desecrated our world. We live as if life were something apart from ourselves – something we can master and control – rather than part of our very being. We have lost all sight of life’s real nature and purpose and our relationship to this purpose. And life has allowed this to happen. Until now, life has, for the most part, remained receptive, waiting, watching us follow our desires, and saying very little, even as it has felt the sorrow of a people who deny its divine nature.
Now, something deep within life is changing; an era is ending and at the core of creation, something is coming alive in a new way. A light at the center of the world that has been dormant for millennia has been rekindled. This is the light of life itself, waking up, remembering its own real nature and divine purpose. With this awakening, the living being that is our world is undergoing a transformation in its very essence.
There is a growing awareness of a shift in consciousness toward global oneness. With regard to ecology, we have been forced to recognize that we are one planet, one interconnected living ecosystem. Internet and cell phone technology has given us the tools of global communication and commerce and finance also have a global dimension. Few, however, have recognized the depths of this change, the signs that the world is awakening. Most are too busy, caught up in their own affairs to notice something so new. Those who are fixed on the image of an Earth that has no soul will not recognize its new light, will not allow it into their lives. It would be too threatening. Yet this awakening light is beginning to affect human consciousness. It is sending message of hope into a collective despair, a collective soullessness. And it is attracting those who want to work with it.
Our true light comes from the divine spark within us. It carries the deepest purpose of our life, which belongs to the divine purpose of creation. We are born with this spark; it is quite visible in children, in their eyes, their laughter and joy. But as we grow older, it “fades into the common light of day”. Then, we must reclaim and reignite it through the sometimes painful process of remembrance and reawakening that spiritual practices and inner work provide.
Now we are being asked to wake up to our light and assume our real co creative role in the evolution of the world. The light of the world is waking up and our consciousness is needed to help bring its hidden meaning into the consciousness of the world and of humanity. We can help the world come alive again. And we can help to shape the next stage in its evolution.
There are no books, schools, or traditions that will tell us exactly how to do this work. Only in the meeting of our consciousness with the awakening consciousness within life – our own awakened consciousness as we bring it to life in each moment – will we find the information we need. For at its core, life knows everything it needs to sustain itself; it knows how to evolve and how to recreate itself anew, and because it is a continual response to the divine moment, it knows precisely what is needed in each moment.
When we open ourselves fully to life as it really is, we will experience again that life is alive and that it can communicate with us directly and interact with us in may different dimensions – not just the physical dimension we now take to the world, but also in the symbolic realms and the realm of pure consciousness and light – dimensions of magic, wonder and awe that have not been manifest in our world for a long time.
There are primal changes taking place within life, and they are farther-reaching than we dare to imagine. One thing is certain: the world as we know it is ending. Our drama of greed and materialism, our hubristic belief that we re the lords of the world, which we can exploit at will, has created a nightmare that is draining the very lifeblood of the planet. But in the midst of this dying dream, another dream is being born, one based upon the consciousness of oneness, the knowing that we are one living ecosystem, one global community. And within this dream of oneness are signs that the world is awakening.
Perhaps the prophecies of the year 2012 point to this possibility, a moment in cosmic time when, with an outpouring of energy, the world will awaken to its divine nature and throw off the debris of materialism. Those identified with the dying dream would experience this as a cataclysm, a global disaster. But others might recognize it as what we have unknowingly been waiting for, a new Golden Age in which we can return to the simplicity and joy that belong to life in its essence, life as it really is – a time when we will no longer need to distract ourselves with our toys and addictions, because the simple wonder and joy of being alive will nourish us and our world, when the song of the soul of the world will sing to us and to all of creation, and we will discover that the magic inherent in life is healing and beneficial, and that in it wisdom and oneness the world knows how to support itself and its inhabitants.
Our light is a part of the light of the world awakening to its divine nature. Working with it, we can become co creators of the next era. This is the choice we are being given: not to wait for the future but to help bring it into being.
-Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee An Awakening World
The REAL New Age
11 April 2008
I’m reading a book at the moment titled The Mystery of 2012: Predictions, Prophecies and Possibilities.
I picked it up reluctantly from the library because I have a friend who is convinced that the Mayan prophecy of planetary upheaval - said to be coming in the year 2012 - is going to be the end of life as we know it.
I’d never been interested in these kinds of predictions and prophecies, especially after the landmark years of 1984 and the new millennium year of 2000 (Y2K) came and went without an incident. I live intently in the beauty of Now. But flicking through the book, I noticed essays from quite a few people I’d come across in my literary spiritual travels: Gregg Braden, Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee (Sufi), Peter Russell and many others.
They're all writing from different perspectives about the rapid changes occurring right now on our planet, a quickening into a new age unparalleled in human history.
Some of the writers have spent years researching the Mayan civilization and their prophesy of the great change culminating on 21st December 2012. Other writers offer their interpretation of what is currently happening on earth, how it could unfold between now and 2012 and what may be in store for all of us lucky people who’ve chosen to be here and be part of this extraordinary time.
Christine Page writes at the start of her essay:
“Congratulations – you are among a select group of souls who won the lottery to be here, on this planet, at this time! The prize not only ensures you a front-row seat but also the unique opportunity to cocreate the future of the human race. Your contribution, along with that of other awakened souls, will create a blue print, which will influence your ancestors and the next 26,000 years of human existence. This is what you have been working toward during your many incarnations; this is the moment you’ve been awaiting. This is a time to remember.”
But the essay that most caught my interest was one by Arjuna Ardagh.
He writes about awakening (enlightenment):
“In every culture and in every age, a few isolated individuals have broken free of this hallucination and have realized that the sense of a “separate me” is actually a fantasy. This is not a question of self-improvement, or working on yourself to make yourself into a more loving, conscious, better person. It is a sudden and radical shift from a preoccupation with “me” and “my story” to a realization of the space, the vastness, the eternity in which that story is occurring.
In the last two decades, there has been an explosion, all over the world, of people having direct realizations very similar to that which Buddha recognized under the Bodhi Tree – that what I truly am is not only Bill, or Cynthia, or Robert, but what I really am is budh: awareness, consciousness, presence. This realization may come as a snapshot out of time and then be overshadowed by the pressure to pay the rent. It may come as a more sustained opening. It may even become the very fabric of day-to-day life. But ultimately, it does not really matter. Once the truth has been seen, the game is up on the hallucination of separation. The undying allegiance to the seductive stories in the mind has been broken and something more sane, more present, and more stable has a chance to shine through the habits of personality.
I call people who have been transformed in this way “translucent”, which Webster’s dictionary defines as “letting light pass through, but not transparent”.
Translucent people also appear to glow from the inside. They have access to their deepest nature as peaceful, limitless, free, unchanging, and at the same time, they remain fully involved in the events of their personal lives. Thoughts, fears, and desires still come and go; life is still characterized by temporary trials, misfortunes and stress. But the personal story is not longer opaque: it is now capable of reflecting something deeper, more luminous and abiding that can shine through it.”
I’ll post some more of the excerpts that speak intimately to me as I read on further tonight….
I’m reading a book at the moment titled The Mystery of 2012: Predictions, Prophecies and Possibilities.
I picked it up reluctantly from the library because I have a friend who is convinced that the Mayan prophecy of planetary upheaval - said to be coming in the year 2012 - is going to be the end of life as we know it.
I’d never been interested in these kinds of predictions and prophecies, especially after the landmark years of 1984 and the new millennium year of 2000 (Y2K) came and went without an incident. I live intently in the beauty of Now. But flicking through the book, I noticed essays from quite a few people I’d come across in my literary spiritual travels: Gregg Braden, Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee (Sufi), Peter Russell and many others.
They're all writing from different perspectives about the rapid changes occurring right now on our planet, a quickening into a new age unparalleled in human history.
Some of the writers have spent years researching the Mayan civilization and their prophesy of the great change culminating on 21st December 2012. Other writers offer their interpretation of what is currently happening on earth, how it could unfold between now and 2012 and what may be in store for all of us lucky people who’ve chosen to be here and be part of this extraordinary time.
Christine Page writes at the start of her essay:
“Congratulations – you are among a select group of souls who won the lottery to be here, on this planet, at this time! The prize not only ensures you a front-row seat but also the unique opportunity to cocreate the future of the human race. Your contribution, along with that of other awakened souls, will create a blue print, which will influence your ancestors and the next 26,000 years of human existence. This is what you have been working toward during your many incarnations; this is the moment you’ve been awaiting. This is a time to remember.”
But the essay that most caught my interest was one by Arjuna Ardagh.
He writes about awakening (enlightenment):
“In every culture and in every age, a few isolated individuals have broken free of this hallucination and have realized that the sense of a “separate me” is actually a fantasy. This is not a question of self-improvement, or working on yourself to make yourself into a more loving, conscious, better person. It is a sudden and radical shift from a preoccupation with “me” and “my story” to a realization of the space, the vastness, the eternity in which that story is occurring.
In the last two decades, there has been an explosion, all over the world, of people having direct realizations very similar to that which Buddha recognized under the Bodhi Tree – that what I truly am is not only Bill, or Cynthia, or Robert, but what I really am is budh: awareness, consciousness, presence. This realization may come as a snapshot out of time and then be overshadowed by the pressure to pay the rent. It may come as a more sustained opening. It may even become the very fabric of day-to-day life. But ultimately, it does not really matter. Once the truth has been seen, the game is up on the hallucination of separation. The undying allegiance to the seductive stories in the mind has been broken and something more sane, more present, and more stable has a chance to shine through the habits of personality.
I call people who have been transformed in this way “translucent”, which Webster’s dictionary defines as “letting light pass through, but not transparent”.
Translucent people also appear to glow from the inside. They have access to their deepest nature as peaceful, limitless, free, unchanging, and at the same time, they remain fully involved in the events of their personal lives. Thoughts, fears, and desires still come and go; life is still characterized by temporary trials, misfortunes and stress. But the personal story is not longer opaque: it is now capable of reflecting something deeper, more luminous and abiding that can shine through it.”
I’ll post some more of the excerpts that speak intimately to me as I read on further tonight….
31 March 2008
The Beach
Saturday 15th March 2008“Adelaide set an unenviable national record today when it recorded the longest-lasting heatwave - 11 days - of any Australian capital city.
The record for the longest number of days reaching 35 degrees Celsius was broken when the city's temperature reached 35.1C at 10:30am.”
The record for the longest number of days reaching 35 degrees Celsius was broken when the city's temperature reached 35.1C at 10:30am.”
And the heatwave will continue this week with temperatures forecast at 38/39 for the next few days and the mid 30’s until next Friday, making it 3 weeks total with temps above 35.
Putting aside all global warming and environmental issues, I LOVE THIS WEATHER.
But I can’t love it without guilt and sadness. The trees are dying, the crops have failed, fruit and vetgetable prices will skyrocket, rivers are drying up, animals and wildlife are suffering.
It’s being labelled the heatwave tsunami.
Warm nights lure me to the beach. I finish work, eat dinner and head for water, arriving just after the sun has disappeared beyond the ocean. We descend into the warm water, the sky still blushing apricot and pinks, the grey blue of twilight surrounding and finally engulfing the last of it. I float deathlike upon silvery water, looking up into space. For half a minute I AM the water, expanding beyond the boundaries of my skin, floating on nothing, existing in nothing, then my body temperature starts sliding down the microscale, goosebumps arise and bring me back into my flesh. Time to swim in and dry off.
Figures along the beach are now dark, lithe silhouettes against the backdrop of the silvery still water. Waves lap quietly, licking the shoreline with soft tongue kisses. The moon must be somewhere – I can feel it.
I lay on the beach, gazing upwards, waiting for more stars to appear.
The salty air is warm, the night sensual, thick, alluring.
I drift easily into a reverie that is painstakingly present. I’m so fully aware that I’m alive, that I’m a human being infused with life force, that my personal journey back to The Source is ultimately the same as everyone elses. Some know it, most don’t.
There is one Being in this Universe. And Only One. It is magnificent, eternal, Absolute. It is everything and nothing exists outside of it.
And It is drawing each one of us back into Itself.
That is our journey – a journey of discovering that where we are going is where we came from and it is also where we are if we care to look deeply. A cosmic dance inwards to finally reunite with our creator, a creator that has made our DNA of its living, breathing intelligence.
I’m on the beach, but I’m also immersed joyfully in the great mystery.
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