While it is true that disidentification from egoic identity is the goal, it is not achieved merely through the omnipotent fantasy of wishful thinking. The neo-advaita approach of instant enlightenment through mental edict is part of the problem, not the solution. A mere conceptual recognition of the ego’s unreality will be of no avail during moments of severe testing. That is when the neo-advaitin who claims to be realized but has not done the rigorous inner work of purification of the unconscious may be embarrassed by a sudden loss of nerve, a temper tantrum, or a psychosomatic reaction. And without completing such formal training, one will continue to live within the veils of Maya, emitting projections constantly and being affected by, and unconsciously identifying with, the projections of others. The Advaita tradition historically was linked to the esoteric schools of yogic training. Once that link was lost, and once yoga itself took a wrong turn into the defiles of the emphasis on physical rather than psychospiritual training, the power of Indian spirituality went into decline. Similar deviations have occurred in all the other spiritual traditions. That is why it is imperative that spiritual training be revived and restored to its full strength.
The sat yoga approach is an effort to do that. This path is mutidimensional, consisting of the practice of preliminary methods of relaxation and concentration; meditation proper; the attainment of samadhi, egoless presence; ethical parameters for living and sustaining a transformational community; dietary and other health considerations; the mastery of psychospiritual understanding (including the ability to analyze dreams) in order to work through one’s own psychic knots, and then to help others with theirs; and the practice of verbal and other aesthetic expression of one’s insights, one’s victories in the battle of self-overcoming, and the resultant transcendental ecstasies.
Such creative expression—through poetry, dance, music, drama, and other arts—inspires others into the flow of the upper death drive (our inherent urge toward death of the ego and divine rebirth into pure luminous blissful awareness) and crystalizes new forms of being for the benefit of all members of the community, thus functioning as a ladder that others can climb to attain Self-realization more easily. A community that is open to a continual flow of new spiritual forms—new manifestations of the archetype of Self—will remain healthy, rather than petrifying. It is when the sun door has been closed, when a society refuses further prophets, further words from the Supreme Logos, when the ideology claims that there was only one son of God or that the last prophet already came and went, that the dogma is set in stone—and then artistic and psychological development goes in another direction, enters the downward flow of the lower death drive, and humanity loses its sublime nature and begins to experience its demonic possibilities.
This produces a kali yuga, a time of darkness and degradation, from which we are only now emerging (as we enter into the deepest depravity, the light of Spirit is dawning anew). The act of separating from the darkness and entering the light is a revolutionary act. Now is the historic moment on this planet for such a celestial revolution.
The sat yoga approach is designed to support the celestial revolution. It involves the following benefits, among others: the development of self-discipline; the strength to maintain appropriate boundaries; the skill to act gracefully and decisively under pressure; balanced judgment; the capacity for diplomacy and non-aggressive assertiveness in the service of the whole; the augmentation of the capability for critical thinking; open-mindedness; greater awareness and understanding of the essence of all the world’s spiritual traditions and the writings of the great metaphysical and mystical geniuses of East and West, North and South, ancient and modern; an understanding of contemporary scientific thought and its place in a greater and more multidimensional paradigm of reality; the mastery of the mind itself, including the capacity to concentrate and reach higher states of consciousness at will; the sublimation of base tendencies—greed, narcissism, anger, pettiness, ruthlessness, sexual compulsivity, anxiety, and depression—into divine qualities of compassion, wisdom, spontaneous egoless action, serenity, patience, and a variety of other specific manifestations of spiritual power.
These benefits grow out of the commitment to inner work and self-knowledge; the regular practice of meditation and contemplative prayer; ceaseless efforts to uplift human consciousness as a whole; the consistent willingness to challenge one’s limitations, to stretch oneself to the maximum, and to accomplish more than one had believed oneself to be capable of doing; and supreme dedication to serving God, to living in sublime union with the Absolute, rather than living a conventional ego-centered existence.
In any type of human organization, including that of a spiritual school or community, ego conflicts are naturally going to arise among members. The difference between ordinary organizations and a true spiritual school is that, in the latter, those conflicts are employed as wonderful growth opportunities.
For example, untransformed egos are inevitably competitive with one another. Learning to relate in a new way, free of egoic judgments and one-upmanship, is invaluable to success in life. The underlying obstacle is that everyone wants to be an insider. Egos passionately hate situations in which they are not ‘in the know’, in which they do not have mastery of the vocabulary, in which they are not the favorites, in short, in which they are seen as an outsider. This passion for insider status ironically becomes a thick wall that keeps many people from joining classes in which others are ahead of them in understanding.
Concomitant with the desire for insider status is the terror of coming too much under the influence of a teacher, of losing one’s prized sense of autonomy. This is yet another reason one may feign nonchalance about one’s spiritual training, and fail to take it with sufficient seriousness. One may skip classes or satsangs to prove one does not really “need” the help of a spiritual community, that one can “do it alone.” But in the process of inner transformation, if one is truthful with oneself, one realizes the necessity of provisionally suspending one’s spurious autonomy in order to be successful in evolving into a more elevated and spiritually aware and powerful being. In the same way that one must radically suspend one’s autonomy during a medical procedure such as surgery, the spiritual surgery of egoectomy requires a similar acquiescence to vulnerability and self-revelation. This is the real meaning of discipleship. By being willing to override the impulses of the immature ego in favor of the wise counsel of an adept spiritual guide, one will regain one’s autonomy at a much higher level.
Many people, even when they have the requisite courage to be physically present in a spiritual training course, nonetheless refuse to speak, even when they have questions, so as to hide their ignorance, because of shame. Egos hate being judged by others as inferior. This impedes learning. Unless people are willing to admit these egoic emotions and work through them, they will drop out of the spiritual educational process. Without becoming fully conscious of how their egos are sabotaging their own growth, they will leave and join other sorts of groups in which they feel more secure because they can imagine they are on top.
Without humility and the willingness to start at the bottom, however, self-transformation cannot be accomplished. In fact, this working-through of unhealthy competitiveness, inferiority feelings, and shame is the essence of spiritual training. Learning the formal material is far less important than facing the internal restrictions upon one’s freedom to learn, grow, and interact harmoniously with others. In fact, it could be argued that the transformation of fear, shame, anger, and hatred into pure egoless love and joy, the divine will to create and share, is the most revolutionary act we can perform.
This is why we refer to self-transformation as the celestial revolution. It is one of the most delicious of the many fruits of spiritual training. It leads to the attainment of such blissful lightness of being as one may have thought possible only in dreams. This is full seven-chakra living. Life becomes a dance of grace, mutuality, and synergy. It used to be called ‘living in seventh heaven’. Then, when such lives of beatitude became more rare, it turned into a facetious comment. Now we have become too cynical to dare imagine the option still exists.
But it is a fact that once the egoic issues hidden in the shadows, the subconscious levels of the mind, have been flushed out, and the psyche has been purified of all that, a delightful joie de vivre ensues that remains our constant wavelength of loveful, laughing consciousness. And as one continues on the upward path, the joy becomes ever more overflowingly blissful, until the ego dissolves in rapture. This is the supreme liberation. It is the final fruit of spiritual training—on the individual level. There are other benefits, of course, ultimately far more important: the effect upon others, in fact upon the entire planet, of living in this glorious wavelength of light and love, of transmitting to all the power of the divine presence of which one has become the vehicle. A community of such beings can transform the world.
Without a core group of victorious spiritual warriors—those who have overcome primitive emotional patterns of interpersonal relationship—a healthy spiritual community cannot crystalize and develop. We have reached a historic moment in which the emergence of such synergistic trans-egoic communities of trust is essential to carry humanity forward to the next phase of our evolution. The new kind of divine human being that our species is currently becoming requires protective sublimation-enabling spiritual communities to function as butterfly farms for our angelic metamorphosis.
Join us. Become a celestial revolutionary. You too can build your home in the seventh heaven. It is your real estate.
Namaste,
Shunyamurti