[FairfieldLife] Re: Once again, killing time.
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tomandcindytraynoratfairfieldlis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Vaj writes:snipped The basic reason often given is that cultivation of siddhis thru samyama causes one to become vyuthana or outward and attached to the outer world. Tom T The Sutras of Patanjali are a description not a prescription as so many have supposed. Read them after thirty years of practice and recognize how much of what is presented is now your day to day experience. Tom T Bingo. As has been discussed here before (at least by me and Marek), it's the same relationship that the Tibetan Book of the Dead has to death and dying. Those who see it as a prescription for dying well have kinds missed the point. It's a description of living well, a description of every moment of everyone's life. In the Bardo between death and rebirth, ritam rules. Everything the self has ever feared appears before it, tempting the self to believe in it to the extent that it forgets the Self. Everything the self has ever desired also appears before it, tempting it again to lose itself in the desire-manifestations and forget the Self. In everyday life, it's the same situation. Interestingly enough from a Tibetan perspective, those who have become most proficient at ELR ( everyday life ritam ) and can easily manifest their desires *also* become equally proficient at manifesting their fears. What you focus on, you become. Neither the desire-manifestations nor the fear-manifestations really exist, nor does the self that's manifesting them. All of it is just a set of distractions that is designed by the self to help it pretend that it exists. But the Self always has the last laugh. It can wait patiently as the self tries to manifest this desire and that desire, hoping to gain the peace of eternality from them. It can wait patiently as the self runs away from the fear-images it has manifested, hoping to find the peace of eter- nality by putting distance between the things it fears and itself. And all the while the Self just sits there, eternal, waiting for the self to realize that whether it was running towards eternality or running away from it, it was, is, and always will be eternal.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Once again, killing time... : /
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, cardemaister [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: To paraphrase kRSNa's last words in the Giitaa: iti matir mama... ;) Oops! I guess those were Sañjaya's (but not Malakar's) words. http://news.sawf.org/Gossip/36317.aspx
[FairfieldLife] Re: Once again, killing time... : /
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Jun 4, 2007, at 2:55 AM, cardemaister wrote: Why is it, that some sour grapes svaamiis think Patañjali advises people not to practise siddhis? The reason might well be that the Sanskrit skills of many of them are not too good. The more likely reason is the almost universal insistence that siddhis are impediments to spiritual growth from numerous scriptures and sages. The jivanmuktiviveka, the primary text on enlightenment in the Shankaracharya tradition is an excellent example because Shankaracharya Vidyaranya gives us numerous quotes from sages explaining this. Swami Brahmananda Saraswati shares the opinion. FWIW, according to /Shankara-dig-vijaya/ by Maadhava-VidyaaraNya, Shankara [...] left Prayaga, and travelling through the skies, reached the splendid city of Mahishmati[...]. If VidyaaraNya was opposed to siddhis, he might not have specified how Shankara went there.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Once again, killing time... : /
Why is it, that some sour grapes svaamiis think Pata�jali advises people not to practise siddhis? The reason might well be that the Sanskrit skills of many of them are not too good. Vaj wrote: The more likely reason is the almost universal insistence that siddhis are impediments to spiritual growth from numerous scriptures and sages. Would that include all the numerous Buddhist scriptures and sages, most of whom, if not all, advocate the development of various siddhis? And would that include the Shakyamuni himself who once demonstrated a feat of yogic flying by rising up above the city of Shravasti in order to impress the people? The jivanmuktiviveka, the primary text on enlightenment in the Shankaracharya tradition is an excellent example because Shankaracharya Vidyaranya gives us numerous quotes from sages explaining this. Swami Brahmananda Saraswati shares the opinion. The primary text of the Shankaracharya tradition is the 'Tripura Upanishad' which promises untold siddhis from the practice of bija mantra meditation on Tripurasundari. Shankara advocates the use of siddhis in his famous 'Ode to the South-facing Form' and in the 'Ananda Lahari'. Shankara does not dispute the words of Patanjali. You should read Shankara's vartika on Vyasa's commentary on Patanjali's Yoga Sutras. The basic reason often given is that cultivation of siddhis thru samyama causes one to become vyuthana or outward and attached to the outer world. The more precise, yogic reason has to do with *where* the siddhis manifest in the subtle body. The siddhis, these perfections, all relate to various petals or dalas in the sahasara-chakra. Normally, in the process of spiritual unfoldment as shakti awakens and unfolds, these dalas are activated as a side effect of that unfoldment. You need to get some smarts, Vaj, according to the Tripura Upanishad, the 'sahasara' isn't a chakra. You've made a fundamental mistake if you consider the yogic body to have a more that six exoteric chakras. Work cited: 'The Svacchanda Sangraha' Bhaskara's Lalitasahasraranama Bhasya p.53 'The Serpent Power' by Arthur Avalon pp.169-170, 'Shakti and Shakta' by Arthur Avalon p.409. However, when the siddhis are cultivated directly, as in the TM sidhi pogram, what it can do in some people is force the kundalini-shakti up the vajra or saraswati nadi, diverting it from the sushumna, the central samadhic channel of unification. In such a case one cannot access bindu, the point of return for the shakti. You really need to get some smarts: the bindu is not the 'point of return' for the shakti - the bindu is the point of origin. Every Shankara tantric knows the order of evolutes contained in the Sri Yantra. The bindu is the point of origin - the petals and the gates are the point of return. Perhaps you should read the primary texts of the Shankara Sri Vidya - the Saundaryalahari. Have you ever even seen an image of the Sri Yantra? If so, did you see that little dot in the middle of of the intersecting triangles? That's the bindu, the central focus of every Dasanami Sanyasin. Instead the shakti remains trapped in ascending nadis which do not culminate in an experience of unity or unification. Thus the student is left in a sort of limbo. Some disreputable pseudo-masters will even utilize this fact to make dependent, slave-like students who hang around waiting and waiting. The Shakyamuni was not a 'pseudo-master' you idiot!
[FairfieldLife] Re: Once again, killing time... : /
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Jun 4, 2007, at 2:55 AM, cardemaister wrote: Why is it, that some sour grapes svaamiis think Patañjali advises people not to practise siddhis? The reason might well be that the Sanskrit skills of many of them are not too good. Instead the shakti remains trapped in ascending nadis which do not culminate in an experience of unity or unification. Thus the student is left in a sort of limbo. To paraphrase our former President Ronnie Ray-Gun: If you've seen one ascending nadi, you've seen 'em all. Or put another way, People in glass houses *should* throw stones-- in the hopes that someone on the outside will throw one back, shattering the glass house. :-)
