Lesson 295 – Dancing with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

How Is the Affirmation of Faith Used?

ŚLOKA 140
Intoning the affirmation of faith, we positively assert that God is both manifest and unmanifest, both permeating the world and transcending it, both personal Divine Love and impersonal Reality. Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

BHĀSHYA
On the lips of Śaivites throughout the world resounds the proclamation “God Śiva is Immanent Love and Transcendent Reality.” It is a statement of fact, a summation of truth, even more potent when intoned in one’s native language. “God Śiva is Immanent Love and Transcendent Reality,” we repeat prior to sleep. “God Śiva is Immanent Love and Transcendent Reality,” we say upon awakening as we recall the transcendent knowledge gained from the ṛishis during sleep. These sacred words we say as we bathe to prepare to face the day, God Śiva’s day, reminding ourselves that His immanent love protects us, guides us, lifting our mind into the arena of useful thoughts and keeping us from harm’s way. Devotees write this affirmation 1,008 times as a sahasra lekhana sādhana. It may be spoken 108 times daily in any language before initiation into Namaḥ Śivāya. Yea, the recitation of this affirmation draws devotees into Śiva consciousness. The Tirumantiram says, “The ignorant prate that love and Śiva are two. They do not know that love alone is Śiva. When men know that love and Śiva are the same, love as Śiva they ever remain.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 295 – Living with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Philosophers’ Magic Barge

We are told that hundreds of years ago in the city of Madurai, known as the Athens of India for its cultural pre-eminence, there was constructed at the Meenakshi Somasundareśvara Śivan Koyil, within the vast temple tank, a magic boat called the Philosophers’ Barge. Ṛishis came from the Himalayas, pandits from all corners of India and humble bhakta siddhas from the South to sit together and discuss life, illumination and release from mortality. This boat’s singular magic was its extraordinary ability to expand to accommodate any number of people who conversed with an attitude of respect and harmony. But, miraculously, it grew smaller when discussion turned rancorous, and those who brought about the contention suddenly found themselves in the water, swimming to shore in embarrassment. In Śiva’s temple, it seems, only nonargumentative discussion was allowed.

We have no magic boats today, …or perhaps we do. During a recent pilgrimage to India, I spoke to several large groups of devotees, including hundreds of sādhus of the Swaminarayan Fellowship, about zero tolerance for inharmonious conditions. Everyone found the message pertinent, yet difficult to practice, for there is no group of people on Earth for whom living in harmony is not a challenge at one time or another. But it is true that among my monastics we have zero tolerance for disharmonious conditions of any kind.

Harmony is the first and foremost rule of living in all spheres, but particularly in spiritual work, where it is an absolute must. Striving for harmony begins within the home and radiates out into all dimensions of life, enhancing and making joyous and sublime each relationship for every devotee. Thus, each strives to be considerate and kindly in thought, word and deed, to unfold the beautiful, giving qualities of the soul, to utter only that which is true, kind, helpful and necessary. The great Tamil saint, Tiruvalluvar, offers the following sage advice in Tirukural verse 100: “To utter harsh words when sweet ones would serve is like eating unripe fruit when ripe ones are at hand.” Yes, this is the ideal. I was asked by the swāmīs in Gujarat, time after time, “But what if conflict and contention do arise?” My answer was that in our fellowship all work stops and the problem is attended to at once. It is each one’s responsibility to follow this wisdom. Nothing could be more counterproductive and foolish than to continue work, especially religious work, while conflict prevails, for demonic forces have been unleashed that must be dispelled for any effort to be fruitful and long lasting. Any breach in the angelic force field of the home, monastery or workplace must be sealed off quickly.

Our approach is simple. We are all committed to the shared sādhana that all difficult feelings must be resolved before sleep, lest they give rise to mental argument, go to seed and germinate as unwanted, troublesome vāsanās, subconscious impressions, that cannot be totally erased but only softened and neutralized through the mystic processes of atonement. Disharmony is disruption of the harmonious prāṇic flow: anger, argument, back-biting, walking out of meetings, painful words and hurt feelings. The Vedas pray, “May our minds move in accord. May our thinking be in harmony—common the purpose and common the desire. May our prayers and worship be alike, and may our devotional offerings be one and the same” (Ṛig Veda 10.191.3. VE, P. 854). One of the principles of harmony is that the commitment to harmony has to be greater than any commitment to any particular issue or problem. Problems change, but the strength of harmony has to be the ultimate priority. This is a conceptual tool to use whenever differences arise.

NANDINATHA SŪTRA 295: VISITING SHRINES TO GODS AND GURUS
My devotees all revere and pilgrimage to Nallur and Murugan’s six South Indian temples, Gaṇeśa’s many temples and shrines, especially Kumbhalavalai, and the samādhi shrines of our lineage. Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 295 – Merging with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Nature’s Two Basic Forces

There are two basic forces in the universe, which you can look up in the dictionary. One is called odic force. The other is actinic force. Odic force is magnetic force. Odic force is the force of collective energies that make things—trees, chairs, tables, houses, the physical body. Odic force is of the material world—dense and heavy. The aura around the physical body and the forces of nature which govern much of man’s life on Earth are odic force.

Actinic force is your pure life force coming from the central source deep within, out through the nerve system. But as soon as this pure life force begins to mingle with the astral atoms and the physical body atoms, it turns to odic force. The study of these two forces can give you a great awakening—two primal forces.

The sahasrāra chakra, the ājñā chakra, the viśuddha chakra—the top three, the head and throat centers—are primarily actinic force centers of rarefied inner consciousness within the superconscious itself. The anāhata chakra, the heart center, which allows us to look out into the external world and within to the internal areas, is primarily a mixture of actinic force and odic force. It’s called actinodic. It’s a mixture of these two forces. However, the lower three chakras—maṇipūra, svādhishṭhāna and mūlādhāra—are primarily odic force chakras. They are the forces that make up what we call the world.

The iḍā and piṅgalā forces are basically odic forces. So, therefore, when the odic force is withdrawn back into the sushumṇā, back into its actinic substance, we completely lose awareness of the external world. That is how we enter meditation, by withdrawing the odic forces. The prāṇa is the in-between. It is the actinodic force that flows in and through odic and actinic forces. It is the binder of these two forces.

But it’s easier to relate to the word odic and the word actinic and compare these two forces, because you can feel them through your physical body. Lift your arm. The movement of the spirit within is actinic force, and all the rest that happens is odic force, including the arm itself, the vibrations around the arm. They’re all odic force. The mixture of what is going on is actinodic force, which is the closest, in looking at it in this way, that we come to prāṇa.

When we are in actinic force and we are aware of it, we have harmony, we have peace in all aspects of our external life. Everything goes right and everyone sees eye to eye and finds points of agreement, one with another. There’s no argument, and there’s no confusion. However, when we become conscious in and awareness is flowing through the odic force realms, awareness actually thinks it is odic force. Then we have inharmonious conditions to live in. No one sees eye to eye, one with another. There’s argument, and there is contention.

Look at these chakras as vast fields of collective related and interrelated thought realms, like vast cities, and look at awareness as the traveler through these chakras. When you are flowing awareness through one of these vast energy fields of actinodic force or actinic force, with these thought or perceptive layers within it, you think a certain way as you hit each of these strata of thought. Think of it in that way. As you travel through, the nerve ganglia within the spinal cord are registering all this and bringing what you are experiencing into your immediate consciousness. You become aware of it through the nerve ganglia within the spine.

Through a mixture of actinic and odic force, willpower and awareness motivate the travels through these layers of the mind. When the nerve force does begin to register when you’re in a certain chakra, it begins to vibrate, and it throws off color and it throws off sound, and then, within you, you do see these disc-like wheels spinning. I have experienced that. I have seen them, and they’re just like they are represented in the picture books, but much more vivid. They have sounds—in fact, they’re quite noisy—because color and sound and energy are all the same thing in the inner realms, and that is how they have produced these images that you see in books on mysticism and occultism. However, they are greater than that. They are great energy fields in the inner man, and they flow. They are what make up people. The physical body has a connection to each one of these seven chakras, though you may not be aware of all of them—you may only be aware in one of them or two of them—and that is the way you think.

Lesson 294 – Dancing with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

What Is Śaivism’s Affirmation of Faith?

ŚLOKA 139
The proclamation “God Śiva is Immanent Love and Transcendent Reality” is a potent affirmation of faith. Said in any of Earth’s 3,000 languages, it summarizes the beliefs and doctrines of the Śaivite Hindu religion. Aum.

BHĀSHYA
An affirmation of faith is a terse, concise statement summarizing a complex philosophical tradition. “God Śiva is Immanent Love and Transcendent Reality,” is what we have when we take the milk from the sacred cow of Śaivism, separate out the cream, churn that cream to rich butter and boil that butter into a precious few drops of ghee. “God Śiva is Immanent Love and Transcendent Reality” is the sweet ghee of the Śaivite Hindu religion. In the Sanskrit language it is Premaiva Śivamaya, Satyam eva Paraśivaḥ. In the sweet Tamil language it is even more succinct and beautiful: Anbe Sivamayam, Satyame Parasivam. In French it is Dieu Śiva est Amour Omniprésent et Réalité Transcendante. We strengthen our mind with positive affirmations that record the impressions of the distilled and ultimate truths of our religion so that these memories fortify us in times of distress, worldliness or anxiety. The Tirumantiram proclaims, “Transcending all, yet immanent in each He stands. For those bound in the world here below, He is the great treasure. Himself the Parapara Supreme, for all worlds He gave the way that His greatness extends.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 294 – Living with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Getting Hold Of Your Mind

Those who are not considerate get very hurt when someone does not consider their feelings. Why? Because their feelings, their personality, are sticking out like antennas all over them, ready to be kinked up and twisted up when somebody is not considerate or loving toward them. Yet they don’t show others the same consideration which they expect for themselves.

That is what creates the negative dream—everyone expecting everyone else to be very considerate of their feelings. And that is why we have etiquette books, to teach people to be considerate of other people’s feelings—to teach those who really don’t want to be considerate, but have to learn to be because they are out to build careers and make money, and they know they won’t do so well unless they learn to be considerate, so they have to intellectually know how. But it is all surface. The word insincere describes the person who doesn’t fulfill what he knows he should fulfill, but pretends that he does. We call him insincere.

That insincerity doesn’t hurt anybody but himself, because you can’t send out anything out into the world but that it comes back. When does it come back? It comes back later in life. He may get along fine when his body is young and healthy. He can be just as insincere as he wants to be, but later on in life he won’t get along so fine, because the karmic rebounds start coming back, the reactions start coming back. They start coming back from other people, who become insincere with him. They also start coming back from deep within himself, from his conscience, when he learns that the way he had been was not right. Someday, unless he is fortunate enough to study yoga and clear it all up—perhaps through burning up the emotional memory patterns using the vāsanā daha tantra—he will suffer over it. And he will suffer over it a great deal.

The art of consideration is a real art, because it is a constant study. It really is a constant study. And it is a creative study. It is the art of learning how not to just get by; it is the art of learning how to fulfill your destiny through following the knowing principle inside you.

When you are in for the realization of the Self, you have to stop the cycles of hurt feelings and regrets. Just stop! You have to learn by exercising your knowing power and realize, “If I do this, it is going to have that kind of result. If I do that, which opposes my knowing of what I should do, I also have to know what kind of result that is going to create.” Everything we do does have its consequences. It is up to you to sit down and meditate on such matters. That is what meditation is for. Meditation in the beginning stages is for getting a grip on your lower states of mind, so that the lower states of mind come under your control, so you learn to use your brain and don’t loan it or rent it out.

When somebody causes you to do something that you don’t feel that you want to do, or that you know is not the right way for you to behave, you are loaning out your brain to him. If somebody can make you feel antagonistic all day long because he didn’t treat you right in the morning, he is using your brain, because he put that feeling into motion. He started something in you that you cannot conquer. But if, at the time of the incident, you straighten out the vibration with the person who made you feel antagonistic, by being considerate of his feelings, then you would be using your brain, and that is what you have to do. Maybe he is a young soul who will not learn to be considerate for a long, long time, and we couldn’t expect that of him. That is why you have to meditate; that is why you have to get these things figured out—who’s who on the scale of evolution.

Remember these three principles: 1) Your thinking is going to fight what you know. It is going to fight it all the time. You know you should do certain things, but you may not do them, because you have other reasons, and your other reasons will be good reasons, which you quickly forget because they are only good for the moment; 2) If you allow your knowing to dominate, you will be exercising your spiritual will. You will be alive. You will be dynamic. Spiritual forces will flow through you; 3) If you exercise your spiritual will, you will have a great power of observation and a great power over your own mind. No one will do your thinking for you.

After you have awakened your power of observation, your soul shines forth, and after meditation you will go into contemplation. You may think you are attaining high states of spiritual consciousness, but for real progress, your soul will have to manifest itself in what you do on the Earth all the time. So, these are your steps. Don’t allow the thinking to fight the knowing. Don’t allow the thinking to rule your willpower. Then you will be spiritual.

NANDINATHA SŪTRA 294: PILGRIMAGE TO ŚIVA’S SPECIAL ABODES
My devotees hold as most sacred and pilgrimage to each at least once: Śiva’s San Mārga Iraivan Temple on Kauai, His Himālayan and Gangetic abodes, His five elemental temples and the Madurai Meenakshi citadel. Aum.

Lesson 294 – Merging with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Closing the Door To Lower Realms

When at the moment of death you enter the astral plane, you only are in the consciousness of the chakras that were most active within you during the later part of your lifetime and, accordingly, you function in one of the astral lokas until the impetus of these chakras is expended. It is the chakras that manufacture the bodies. It is not the body that manufactures the chakras. Since you have fourteen chakras, at least three are the most powerful in any one individual—for example, memory, will and cognition. Each chakra is a vast area of the mind, or a vast collective area of many, many different thought strata. Generally, most people who gather together socially, intellectually or spiritually are flowing through the same predominant chakra, or several of them collectively. Therefore, they are thinking alike and share the same perspective in looking at life.

The chakras exist as nerve ganglia that have a direct impact on organs in the physical body, as psychic nerve ganglia in the astral body and as spinning disks of consciousness in the body of the soul, ānandamaya kośa. The power to close off the lower chakras—to seal off the doorway at the lower end of the sushumṇā—exists only when the soul is presently incarnated in a physical body. All fourteen chakras, plus seven more above and within the sahasrāra, are always there. It is up to the individual to lift consciousness from one to another through right thought, right speech, right action, showing remorse for errors committed, performing regular sādhana, worship, pilgrimage and heeding other instructions the satguru or swāmī might offer for personal guidance. All this and more teaches the prāṇas of consciousness, and most importantly, individual awareness, the art of flowing up through the higher centers through the process of closing off the lower ones.

Spiritual unfoldment is not a process of awakening the higher chakras, but of closing the chakras below the mūlādhāra. Once this happens, the aspirant’s consciousness slowly expands into the higher chakras, which are always there. The only thing that keeps the lower chakras closed is regular sādhana, japa, worship and working within oneself. This is demonstrated by the fact that even great yogīs and ṛishis who have awakened into the higher chakras continue to do more and more sādhana. They are constantly working to keep the forces flowing through the higher centers so that the lower ones do not claim their awareness.

Now, all of this perhaps seems very complex and esoteric. But these are aspects of our nature that we use every day. We use our arms and hands every day without thinking. If we study the physiology of the hands, we encounter layer after layer of intricate interrelationships of tissues, cells, plasma. We examine the engineering of the structural system of bones and joints, the energy transmission of the muscular system, the biochemistry of growth and healing, the biophysics of nerve action and reaction. Suddenly a simple and natural part of human life, the function of the hands, seems complex. Similarly, we use the various functions of consciousness, the chakras, every day without even thinking about them. But now we are studying them in their depths to gain a more mature understanding of their nature.

Actually, there are more chakras above and within the sahasrāra. Buddhist literature cites thirty-two chakras above. Āgamic Hindu tradition cites seven levels of the rarefied dimensions of Paranāda, the first tattva, as chanted daily by hundreds of thousands of priests during pūjā in temples all over the world. Their names are: vyāpinī, vyomāṅga, anantā, anāthā, anāśṛitā, samanā and unmanā. I have experienced these higher chakras or nāḍīs, as they are in this subtle region, as conglomerates of nāḍīs. These force centers are not exactly chakras, as they are not connected to any organ or part of the physical body. They are chakras or nāḍīs of the body of the soul, which when developed as a result of many, many, many Paraśiva experiences, slowly descend into the mental and astral bodies. The mental body becomes permanently different in its philosophical outlook, and the astral body begins to absorb and be transformed by the golden body, or svarṇaśarīra.

Lesson 293 – Dancing with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Is Initiation Necessary to Perform Japa?

ŚLOKA 138
The most precious of all Śaivite mantras, Namaḥ Śivāya is freely sung and chanted by one and all. Mantra dīkshā bestows the permission and power for japa yoga. Without this initiation, its repetition bears lesser fruit. Aum.

BHĀSHYA
The Pañchākshara Mantra is the word of God, the name and total essence of Śiva. But to chant Namaḥ Śivāya and to be empowered to chant Namaḥ Śivāya is likened to the difference between writing a check without money in the bank and writing a check with money in the bank. Namaḥ Śivāya is the gateway to yoga. Initiation from an orthodox guru is given after preparation, training and attaining a certain level of purity and dedication. The guru bestows the authority to chant Namaḥ Śivāya. After initiation, the devotee is obligated to intone it regularly as instructed. This forges the śishya’s permanent bond with the guru and his spiritual lineage, sampradāya, and fires the process of inner unfoldment. From the lips of my Satgurunātha I learned Namaḥ Śivāya, and it has been the central core of my life, strength and fulfillment of destiny. The secret of Namaḥ Śivāya is to hear it from the right lips at the right time. Then, and only then, is it the most powerful mantra for you. The Śiva Saṁhitā affirms, “Only the knowledge imparted by a guru, through his lips, is powerful and useful; otherwise it becomes fruitless, weak and very painful.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 293 – Living with Śiva

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Emotional Slumps

Everybody falls into negative slumps at one time or another when they deny the God principle within themselves, when they deny their knowing power, absolutely, deliberately deny it, by allowing their thinking principle—what they themselves think as a little ego—to take hold and cancel off, just like an eraser on the blackboard of life, the soul’s attempts to express itself.

For example, you are going along fine, just wonderful, you are feeling great, and a little opportunity to serve comes up and you miss it. You know you should, but you don’t think it is quite the time, when it would be just as easy to fulfill whatever you know you should fulfill. But you think, “Well, this isn’t exactly the best time for me.” You have very good reasons to say no, excellent reasons, because the thinking mind is always filled with excellent reasons. They are wonderful for the time, but they wear out. That is why we don’t exercise our memory and remember all the reasons we had for our actions.

If I asked why did you do this and that and those unseemly actions, you might say, “Yes, I know what you’re thinking. I had a very good reason at the time, but I can’t recall it just now.” You don’t want to remember the reason, because you know it was only an excuse sufficient for a time. Yet the action remains, along with the reason, which was a weak one, vibrating in the subconscious mind. If you accumulate two or three such incidents, pretty soon you fall into a negative slump, where you don’t feel like doing anything and nothing seems to make sense to you in the spiritual world or any other world. You just drag along and say, “Oh my, the burdens of life are getting pretty heavy.” Eventually that condition wears out, too, and you swing back and get a little light in you. That is why people turn to stimulants, excesses of chocolate, sugary yum-yums (the junk food business makes millions on the negative slumpers) and various innervating beverages, such as coffee and soft drinks, to pep up the physical body. But the body can take only so much of these negative slumps before it reacts and, in its reaction, becomes unhealthy. Finally it succumbs to disease; it is not at ease within itself because the subconscious mind is not at ease.

When you refrain from denying that soul source within you and fulfill what you know you should do, then you are filled and thrilled with life force. Your soul is shining out in the material plane. You don’t go into negative slumps. You become like the people who don’t just get up to do things, they jump up and are happy to do anything they have an opportunity to do. But deny your knowing principle, and it becomes an effort to do anything—even an effort to remember how you should respond and what you should do.

Many people know they should do certain things to help out, to help their families, their relatives and friends. But as the weeks go by, what they know they forget, because they really didn’t want to do it in the first place. They didn’t think they had time; they didn’t think they could help; they didn’t think they could afford it. They have so many limitations. They put their poor old soul into a cage. Excuse me, I am going to rephrase that. They put their poor young soul into a cage, because old souls manifest consideration. Young souls are just learning how. And this poor young soul climbs right into this little cage and sits, like a newborn baby, waiting for the subconscious mind—which has been filled with negative activity, negative thoughts and a negative approach to life—to unwind itself. But the soul within has to first watch itself wind up—and it winds up through the many lives, with all its negative creations, all of its thinking versus knowing, and thinking winning out every time. Then it has to unwind, and when it does unwind, pretty soon knowing gets stronger than thinking. Then we notice a spiritual unfoldment. Then we know that observation is taking hold.

Do you know how I can tell when someone is spiritually unfolding? When I suggest something, and he takes me up on the suggestion and observes and thinks of the next step before I think of it, I know that he is spiritually unfolding, because through his observation he is producing knowing, and through his knowing he is being considerate of his fellow man, just as he expects everyone to be considerate of him.

NANDINATHA SŪTRA 293: LIVING NEAR ŚAIVA TEMPLES
My devotees wisely settle in areas where Gaṇeśa, Murugan or Śiva temples exist for their frequent pilgrimage, worship and spiritual security. None should live farther than a day’s journey from such sacred sanctuaries. Aum.

Lesson 293 – Merging with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Consciousness And the Chakras

Gaining stability in any of the chakras above the mūlādhāra avails a certain control over the related chakras below the mūlādhāra. For example, the mūlādhāra has power over the second, fourth and sixth chakras below the base of the spine, the centers of anger, confusion and absence of conscience. Maṇipūra, the third chakra, has power over the mūlādhāra and the same Narakaloka centers in an even more expansive way. The reason center, svādhishṭhāna, chakra two, controls the centers of fear, jealousy and so on. The cognition, seeing-through-worldliness chakra—anāhata—the fourth center above the mūlādhāra, controls the reason chakra and the centers of fear, jealousy, egotistic self-preservation and so on.

All the chakras, indeed, are functioning in everyone, as everyone has willpower, memory, reason and so on. But each soul has a home base. The ahiṁsā person whose home base is anāhata chakra would not harm others, because he perceives the unity of all. The person living in the ājñā chakra above could never harm others, because he is immersed in divine love. The home base of the terrorist who takes pleasure, joy and pride and receives medals of honor for his disdain of human rights is the pātāla chakra, at the bottom. The average person, and this is what makes him average, functions predominantly in about six chakras. These would be six below the mūlādhāra for someone for whom fear is the high point. Three within that six are the sustaining elements.

The upper seven chakras spin clockwise, and this spinning creates the śānti, or ever-growing peace, within an individual dominated by them. The lower seven spin counterclockwise, and this produces an ever-growing turmoil within one so affected. The vulnerable part of spiritual unfoldment is when someone is in the higher chakras—for example will and reason—and has one or more lower chakras open as well. This means one set of chakras is spinning clockwise and the other set is spinning counterclockwise, which accounts for great mood swings, elation, depression, self adulation, self condemnation. So, Brahmadvara, the doorway to the Narakaloka just below the mūlādhāra, has to be sealed off so that it becomes impossible for fears, hatreds, angers and jealousies to arise. Once this begins to happen, the mūlādhāra chakra is stabilized and the renegade becomes a devotee of Lord Gaṇeśa. You cannot come to Gaṇeśa in love and respect if you are an angry or jealous person. That is our religion.

As awareness flows through the first three higher chakras, we are in memory and reason patterns. We see the past and the future vividly and reside strongly in the conscious and subconscious areas of the mind. When awareness flows through the anāhata and viśuddha chakras, our point of view changes. We begin to see ourselves as the center of the universe, for now we are looking out and seeing through the external world from within ourselves. We look into the primal force within ourselves and see that this same energy is in and through everything.

The chakras also relate to our immediate universe. Put the sun in the center, representing the golden light of sushumṇā. The Earth is the conscious mind; the moon is the subconscious mind. The vibratory rates of the planets are then related to the seven chakras: the first chakra, mūlādhāra, to Mercury; the second chakra, svādhishṭhāna, to Venus; the third chakra, maṇipūra, to Mars; and so forth. In this way, if you know something of Vedic astrology, you can understand the relationship of the influence of the planets as to the formation of the individual nature, and how these various chakras come into power, some stronger than others, depending upon the astrological signs, for they have the same rate of vibration as the planets. Now you can see how it all ties together.

Through the knowledge of the chakras you can watch people and see what state of consciousness they are functioning in. It is helpful to know that all souls are inwardly perfect, but they are functioning through one force center or another most of the time, and these force centers determine their attitudes, their experiences, how they react to them and more.

Lesson 292 – Dancing with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

How Is Namaḥ Śivāya Properly Chanted?

ŚLOKA 137
The Pañchākshara Mantra, Namaḥ Śivāya, is repeated verbally or mentally, often while counting a mālā of rudrāksha beads, drawing the mind in upon itself to cognize Lord Śiva’s infinite, all-pervasive presence. Aum.

BHĀSHYA
Japa yoga is the first yoga to be performed toward the goal of jñāna. In the temple perform japa. Under your favorite tree perform japa. Seated in a remote cave perform japa. Aum Namaḥ Śivāya can be performed on rudrāksha beads over and over when the sun is setting, when the sun is rising or high noon lights the day. “Aum Namaḥ Śivāya,” the Śaivite chants. Aum Namaḥ Śivāya feeds his soul, brightens his intellect and quells his instinctive mind. Take the holy tears of Śiva, the auburn rudrāksha beads, into your hands. Push a bead over the middle finger with your thumb and hold as the intonation marks its passage. The duly initiated audibly repeats “Namaḥ Śivāya,” and when japa is performed silently, mentally chants “Śivāya Namaḥ.” There are many ways to chant this mantra, but perform it as you were initiated. Unauthorized experimentation is forbidden. Those prone to angry rage should never do japa. The Tirumantiram announces, “His feet are the letter Na. His navel is the letter Ma. His shoulders are the letter Śi. His mouth, the letter Vā. His radiant cranial center aloft is Ya. Thus is the five-lettered form of Śiva.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.