Everyone always asks, “How do I do it? What are the techniques?” But there cannot be a technique for this because the whole point is that it is a surrender of the illusion that you are an “I,” that you are a somebody who wants to know something. There has to be a letting go of the intention to grasp this higher knowledge, because that would be trying to pull the higher into the lower. You have to surrender to the higher and then it comes as grace. So there can’t be any technique except complete emptying out. And it’s when you become total emptiness and freedom from thought that the fullness of the supramental and the light of God and the love and the bliss fill you.
So, as long as you feel you are a separate individual, your job is to empty, to surrender, and to wait upon the grace of God—but in silence and stillness, without intention except to receive. Then you will be filled with that grace. But it can’t be brought about through effort or through some attempt to conquer the higher. It has to be a complete letting go. Or, on the contrary, asking the question (as Ramana recommends), “Who am I?” and then being in such stillness that you realize you’re not the lower knowing. That’s not who’s asking that question. You are the higher one and have always been that. But until you reach that point where you can actually stay in the silence long enough to be able to recognize that Supreme Self, surrender is a strategy that works much more quickly because the higher knowing responds to your love and to your surrender and fills the emptiness.
So another point in this Netra Tantra that I think is of interest is that the author of this incredible text reformulates Ashtanga Yoga. He says that Patanjali was totally wrong in the way he understood the eight limbs of yoga, and he redefines them much more accurately. So I’ll give you their redefinition, which is really very simple and very straightforward.
In Patanjali’s approach, in the yamas you have all of these five different things you have to do (become nonviolent and non-covetous and be in truth, etc.). But all of that is from a dualistic frame of reference. So the Netra Tantra says there’s one yama: “Detach from the world of becoming.” That’s your yama, that’s the vow you take: “Detach totally from this phenomenal plane because it’s an illusion; be in the real.”
And there’s one niyama, not the five of Patanjali, and that is: “Be in constant contemplation of the Supreme Self.” In other words, don’t ever stop meditating. Don’t ask, “When do we meditate next time?” No, you’re always meditating because you’re always remembering the Self and never totally investing in the phenomenal plane, even when your body is in action. Sri Ramana was often asked that question, too. “How does the gyani stay in higher consciousness when he has to work?” And he would point to the women in India who would carry big pots of water on their head, and they would be walking down the road and talking and laughing with each other. But their consciousness was very much attuned to making sure they didn’t spill that water or let the pot fall over. So they had to have absolutely perfect balance and equanimity and total attention even though they seemed to be playing casually with each other as they were walking, they were very much in yoga. (But don’t you be in yoga with a pot—be in yoga with the Supreme Being.) OK, so that’s the niyama.
Asana—he says, there’s one asana. Forget all of these exercises you’re probably doing (sorry, Vajra). The one asana you should be doing all the time is: “Be seated” (“asana” means “seat,” you know). Originally, the only asana was the cross-legged position to meditate in. But even there, he’s saying Patanjali was wrong. He’s saying you should be seated on the supreme energy of pure awareness and actually feel that energy. That’s what you’re levitating on—you’re floating on energy. Your consciousness doesn’t touch the ground. You’re seated on this throne of powerful presence and shakti (the Kashmir Shaivites call it the spanda). It’s the vibrational, frequency of God-Consciousness; and, if you’re in that state, then you are untouched by maya and by the world of becoming.
Pranayama. Only one—not a whole bunch of hyperventilation exercises that you have to do—and that is: “Leave the gross prana behind.” Forget it. You should be in the highest level of prana, which is the shakti and feeling the shaktipat, the descent of that shakti filling you all the time and staying in that vibration. Don’t be in the prana, because what is called prana is bioelectromagnetic energy, and that’s a very low level of the spectrum. You don’t want to be in that because then you’re attached to the physical body. Be attached only to the Supreme.
And then we get to Pratyahara, which is Przywara ‘s idea, and it’s pretty much the same as what the Netra Tantra says: “Put the mind in reverse.” Retrace your externalization of your consciousness through the senses in perceiving the world. Retrace its direction and return to the Source of who it is who’s actually perceiving through the senses and then remain as the Source and let go of sensory data and focus only on the energy of the Source. Then you will be liberated.
Dharana is defined here as “the holding of the Supreme Self in your consciousness at all times.” That’s what you’re concerned with. You have no other investments of interest except the Supreme Self, and that energy is always foremost in your consciousness.
After dharana comes dhyana, and they call it paradhyana—the supreme dhyana or meditation. And in this dhyana, your job is to become mrityunjaya. Mrityunjaya means the conqueror of death. That’s what your aim should be in meditation—you become “the conqueror of death.” Another word for that is mahakal, the great death, the death of death. But that’s another name for Shiva. You become Shiva and you conquer death in the sense that you realize you are the deathless Spirit. You’re not the mortal body that is born and dies; you are the eternal Spirit. It’s not just that you feel it, or you connect with it, or that you hold it in your consciousness (which was the previous level), but that you are it. So now there’s no holding, there’s no effort any longer; you are that.
And then samadhi, “complete freedom.” There are no longer, then, any mental representations; there is only the Supreme Intelligence and the Absolute Self.
So that’s Ashtanga Sat Yoga and how the Netra Tantra presents what the program of yoga is really about. I think we can learn something from it.
I want to go into one other module, one other approach, tonight and talk about the phases of the purification of the soul. Actually, when we do this work, what we discover is that there are three minus phases, and you have to go through the minus phases before you get to the four real phases of purification.
Phase minus three is where people usually start the spiritual journey, when they get serious and they are horrified by recognizing that their ego is totally out of control. It’s wantonly acting out its drives, its conflicts; it’s rationalizing its inaccurate behavior; it may be pretending to be already enlightened; it’s defending against any self-reflections or uncovering of unconscious material that would bring shame or guilt or release traumas again that have been repressed so that they cannot be purified. And there’s a resistance of the ego to growth, to maturing, to changing; to letting go of its opinions, its sentiments, its attitudes; and to becoming different from the way it is. There’s often a very petrified and hardened resistance that has to be gotten through.
Many people don’t get past phase minus three—they’ll drop out of the work, because it’s too threatening and unbearable to begin to feel things that have been repressed your whole life. And the longer you wait to do it, the more difficult it is because the shame of knowing you’ve wasted your life prevents you from letting go of it. It shouldn’t, but it often has that effect. So it’s better to start out as early as possible in life, doing this work and releasing the childhood traumas and all of the other attitudinal limitations so that you are able to be reborn and make use of your energy, your life energy. But that phase minus three is the real point where most people fail to go further. They won’t even know what this process is really about, because they would rather remain as instant gurus or reiki masters—or they’ll become a coach, they’ll do something to give them a sense of spiritual status without actually doing the work of purification or Self-realization, and they’ll remain in an ego master’s discourse. So this is a very difficult kind of obstacle that many people fall into and don’t get out of. But once you get past that, then the work becomes very fascinating with everything that becomes uncovered. Anyway, phase minus three is the difficulty, and we can just call it wanton resistance.
Phase minus two, if we get past the first one, is where the ego admits it recognizes it didn’t know itself—it was living on a very external shell or crust of its being. It doesn’t go even into the mantle, let alone into the core. There’s a contriteness, a remorse, and then the beginning of a desire to do the processing but a sense of weakness—”I wish I could do it, but I can’t; I can’t meditate; I can’t sit; I can’t free-associate in a session, let’s say; I can’t process; I can’t deal with the feelings that come up.” So there’s a sense of weakness that then interferes with your spiritual discipline: “I can’t get up that early in the morning to come to morning class. I can’t do this or that.” So you say, “No, no, no, I wish I could, but I can’t. I’m too weak, I’m too fragile, I’m too delicate”; and you put up resistances based on a lack of capacity. This is also always false, but you can convince yourself and you can create physical symptoms that will seem to justify it. But none of it is real, and you mustn’t buy into it or you’ll never get past phase minus two. You have to be very tough on yourself. You have to apply the law and discipline your ego and your body to do what is necessary to break you free of the illusion of weakness. So weakness is the minus two.
Then phase minus one is where you begin to engage in partial uncovering and partial sublimation, and you reach a point where you begin to experience soul-consciousness and you have in a way mixed that with a kind of healthy level of narcissism. But you’re still in the narcissistic ego. That ego feels a lot fresher and a lot more full of knowledge because you’ve read a lot and studied and you say, “OK, that’s enough. I can rest my laurels here. I’ve done some purification, now I’m just going to coast on that.” So the phase minus one also is a very dangerous reef that you can get caught on thinking, “Well, I’ve gone past where some of the others are, why should I do extra work? Why don’t I just accept where I am and enjoy that level of consciousness? It’s better than where most people are.” But that kind of discourse is then, of course, going to cause you to be at a dead end. So don’t settle for that. That is part of the impacted sublimosis we talked about before.
If you can get past that, then you enter into phase one of the real purification. This is where you begin to do serious battle with your ego and the subconscious resistances, including the Censor. Of course, the Censor is the main enemy, and you can’t defeat it from the level of the ego. You can only defeat it from the soul level, so you have to be in that level. And the discipline of the soul has to become very strong—ascetic even—very unwilling to accept excuses for laziness or for falling into a non-dharmic lifestyle. If you engage in that battle seriously, you will discover then that you have much more power than you thought you had. And by applying the law (the dharma) to your ego, you will then open up your soul’s level of heart-consciousness and the law will then morph into love.
So at phase two, the law in a way becomes love—your motivation then is out of love of God. It’s not out of simply having to fight off an ego that wants to resist growth, but now you’re being drawn by the higher.
In phase three, you are able to receive the grace that comes from that love. Then you gain wisdom, you gain power, and you gain the ability to complete the ascent.
