Nayaswami Padma McGilloway

“The law was given by Moses, but truth and grace came by Jesus Christ.” This quotation from the gospel of St. John, Chapter 1, is not a critique of Moses. It describes the universal truth that the evolution of consciousness requires that we first learn the do’s and the don’ts of behavior before we can begin to experience transcendent truth and the love of God. The great yogi-preceptor Patanjali stated the same essential truth in his outline of the 8-Fold Path.

There is a story from India about the medieval saint known as Guru Nanak. Revered by both Hindus and Moslems, a Moslem cleric once found Nanak lying in the mosque with his feet facing the altar. Outraged by this insult, the cleric demanded that Nanak move his feet in another direction. Guru Nanak replied that perhaps the cleric could tell him where he could move his feet that God was not present. But every time the cleric tried to move Nanak’s feet, the altar would move and remain in its fixed position relative to Nanak’s feet! Guru Nanak’s state of God-consciousness was such that the relatively minor temple etiquette rule no longer held sway!

When Moses came down from Mt. Sinai with the ten commandments, he found that the Israelites were worshipping a golden calf, the symbol of their own materialistic tendencies. It is tempting to the ego to seek fulfillment through the senses and in the creation and to ignore the Creator, invisible behind all appearances. But in succumbing to this, we are forced to learn our lessons through the operation of the laws of karma and duality.

The very first time Dr. Lewis (who was Yogananda’s first disciple in America) met the Master he asked Yogananda what was meant by Jesus’ words, “If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be filled with light?” In the course of a dramatic first meeting, Yogananda, pressing their foreheads together, showed him the spiritual eye, the inner light. This experience stayed with Dr. Lewis the rest of his life even as meeting his guru changed his life!

Self-realization teaches the importance of experience over belief. That passage from the Bible made no sense to Dr. Lewis until he experienced it for himself. In the story, Way of the Pilgrim, a devotee wanted to understand how to “pray unceasingly” as Jesus taught. After much searching, the pilgrim found someone who taught him to repeat “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy upon me” thousands of times, in synchronization with the breath, until all distracting thoughts subsided and his consciousness was immersed in God. It is in God-consciousness that we find freedom.

As Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagavad Gita: “Precious Thou art to me! Give Me thy heart! Cling to Me! For Thou art sweet to Me. Let go those rites and writ duties! Fly to Me alone and I will free Thy soul from its sins!”

Nayaswami Jamuna Snitkin

Swami Kriyananda’s study course Material Success through Yoga Principles has been a major focus of my teaching for the past two years here at Ananda Seattle. 2010 is the third year of teaching this course and I find that the experience just gets richer and deeper with each go-around.

Recently in class, we were discussing Lesson #9, The Importance of Human Values, and Lesson #10, How to be a Good Leader. These two topics are well paired together. In the first, Swami encourages the reader to appreciate the fact that people everywhere share the same basic human values and needs. In the second lesson, he explains that a leader should take into account not just the project and its goals but the feelings of those whom he serves and his own inner feelings. Avoid, he writes, becoming “thing-oriented.” What we hold in our consciousness greatly affects our experience. Being open and caring is the true measure of refinement. Each of us is responsible for the attitudes we hold and the opportunity to become a positive force in our environment. This will increase our spiritual vibrations and the outward success of our endeavors. “True success requires sensitive awareness of realities outside the narrow confines of your egoic existence.”

We then launched into a review of Patanjali’s yamas and niyamas (the universal, spiritual “do’s and don’ts”). The first of the yamas is ahimsa, non-violence. One of the students told a story about his own encounter with facing the fear of violence with calmness and faith in a rough neighborhood.

He had to walk to public transportation several blocks from his house through this neighborhood. One morning, he witnessed an attempted mugging where the intended victim ended up beating up the mugger! He approached to help and alerted the police but the experience was disconcerting, to say the least! After this and for several months, he walked his morning route with a knife in his pocket, ready for self-defense. Finally the built-up fear was too much.

So, first he got rid of the knife, then came the idea of a slight alteration that could make his route safer, and immediately his fear was replaced by a feeling of grace and protection. Is this not the power of ahimsa? Please join the discussion by posting a comment  – What attitudes might you be holding in your work environment that are drawing negativity to you?