When your spiritual practice takes the form of Kundalini Yoga and you begin the inner occult process of Hatha Yoga, then, with the rise of the power of the Kundalini from the lower mystical centres (Chakras) into the higher mystical centres, which are in the occult body of each being, there arise various extraordinary powers and experiences. Why? There are mystical spheres in the inner realm of the universe and each Chakra governs certain mystical spheres and all the phenomena of those spheres become the experience of the seeker when he ascends upon this path of Kundalini Yoga and operates upon that particular Chakra. Kundalini Yoga is something which I always condemn. In this Twentieth Century, to the vast majority of modern persons, Kundalini Yoga is unsuited. And unless one has the extraordinary good fortune of coming across a perfect Guru who has achieved his Illumination through Kundalini Yoga, I would not advise one to go near this science at all. When people question me about these inner centres, I invariably tell them, “It does not hurt you not to know”. Some knowledge is better left to itself and it is better not to know. Kundalini Yoga is a violent method, a forceful method, a method to try to force into awakening certain dormant powers. Yoga is a method of intensified evolution; and Kundalini Yoga is a still greater intensification of this method, and therefore, it is dangerous. It is playing with fire.
In all paths of Yoga—whether in the Yoga of pure love for God (through prayer, through faith, through worship, through the Divine Name, devotion and surrender) or in the Yoga of the intellect (the philosophical Yoga of rationality, of hearing and reflecting over the words of the Guru and deep meditation upon the great Truth) or in Raja Yoga (the Eight-fold Ascent of a virtuous life, daily religious observances, steadiness of pose, control of breath, withdrawal of mind, concentration, meditation and superconsciousness) or in the Yoga of cosmic service (serving all with absolute humility, egolessness and total self-surrender unto the Divine Power, considering yourself as an instrument of God; selflessly serving God in and through man in this universe and worshipfully dedicating all your service at the feet of God)—the awakening of Kundalini and its ascent from Chakra to Chakra takes place spontaneously, until Kundalini reaches the highest occult centre. In the Jnani, in the Raja Yogi, in the Bhakta and in the Karma Yogi, in all of them, this activation and awakening of the Kundalini power and its gradual ascent from the lowest centre to the highest centre takes place within the hidden occult personality of the seeker; so it is something which comes about as a matter of course. But, if you deliberately try to bring this about by specific forceful techniques, there is always—and I say always—the danger of arousing powers when your personality is not pure enough to assimilate and absorb them, is not ready to withstand them. Whereas in the other paths of Yoga, as you progress, you bring about a total change and perfection in all your personality, in this forceful Kundalini Yoga, what happens many times is one goes all out for the technique and neglects the prime preliminaries, neglects the essential preparations, and then, before the seeker is ready, these powers unfold. Kundalini Yoga is an exact science, and its techniques are unfailing if properly followed. Thus the seeker finds himself in a position with an excess of power and not able to manage it, not able even to bear it and then all Yogic life comes to an end for him.
It is in Kundalini Yoga that extraordinary powers, occult phenomena and all these occult experiences manifest most intensely, because it is the scientific technique of awakening the greatest power that is within you. In the other paths, through purity, the dormant powers in the various spiritual centres of your being manifest...right up to the end when through Cosmic Consciousness, you are endowed with all the divine powers, and then there is nothing which you cannot do! Through perfection, when you get to the end of Yoga, you are endowed with the eight major Siddhis such as “Anima” (i.e., the ability to reduce yourself to microscopic proportions), “Mahima” (the ability to expand to gigantic proportions), “Laghima” (i.e., weightlessness), “Garima” (i.e., extraordinary increase in weight), etc. For instance, Laghima. If one who has gained this Siddhi is taken to the top of the Eiffel Tower or the Empire State Building and dropped, he would not fall, but would just float to the ground like a wisp of feather-down. These powers have been demonstrated by Yogis under observation. I have heard that excessive heaviness was demonstrated by a Yogic Master in the West during the early years of his stay in the United States in order to make the people understand that he was not just ‘talking through his hat’, and that the subject of his talk was something which was based upon experience and upon fact. In public lectures, he sometimes used to demonstrate (as a token) the truth about Yogic power. He would, for instance, sit there and call upon anyone from the audience to try to lift him and there were instances when not one, but several together, tried unsuccessfully to lift him. Once a police constable, a very big and powerful man, tried to shake this young Yogi, who was not very big at that time, and the constable could not even budge him, not even by a hair’s breadth, and this was demonstrated before an audience of five to six hundred people in the city of New York. These phenomena are all a part of the Yogic ascent.
|
Next: Chapter 2: Occult Phenomena—Their Place In Yoga, 6.Persons Blessed with Mystic Powers
Energy Enhancement Enlightened Texts Sri Swami Sivananda The Path Beyond Sorrow
Chapter 2
- Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga
Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, The term Yoga, unfortunately, has been connected with notions of strange and extraordinary experiences, mysterious occurrences and mystical powers. The term Yogi is popularly understood to mean not an adept in Yoga, but one capable of doing certain things which ordinary people are not able to do. In a way this is true, as a Yogi is capable of doing certain things which are not possible for many persons, but a Yogi should not be conceived of merely as one who is capable of flying through the air, going without food for months and being buried alive underground for several weeks, or of such other feats as are considered spectacular, extraordinary and unbelievable unless seen at energyenhancement.org
- Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 1.Yoga Is Conscious Hastening of the Process of Evolution
Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 1.Yoga Is Conscious Hastening of the Process of Evolution, First of all, it is necessary for us to have a clear conception of what the Yogic way of life is. The destiny of the human being is evolution and we are all progressing towards ultimate perfection, since we are all meant to realize once again our innate divinity. However, the normal course of human evolution is very, very slowperhaps spread over countless years and requiring many lives, taking only a few progressive steps in each life at energyenhancement.org
- Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 2.Changes Upon Five Levels of the Yogis Being
Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 2.Changes Upon Five Levels of the Yogis Being, During the process of this evolution, this unfoldment, various transformations arise in the individual upon five different levels of his being. On the physical level, various changes and experiences are seen. Upon the psycho-mental level (the mind and the Prana), certain changes take place, certain abilities come in the natural course, and certain phenomena are witnessed, subjectively by some, and objectively by others at energyenhancement.org
- Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 3.Some Psychic Powers
Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 3.Some Psychic Powers, On the psycho-mental level it is the very common experience of those who have done a little sincere seeking (whether they have known it by the name of Yoga or just been seeking and practising certain physical exercises) to find that they have developed certain abilities. The most common of these abilities or inner occult experiences is thought-reading. You may be talking to someone, and before the other person speaks, you know what that person will say at energyenhancement.org
- Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 4.Pure Occultism Which Is Not Yoga
Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 4.Pure Occultism Which Is Not Yoga, Here I have to tell you a fact of which you had better take serious note. The first three powers upon the mental level, the psycho-mental level, and the astral levelall these powers one can have by sheer effort. If the necessary effort, with determination, is made, one can develop them. In Yoga they come through purification, and in the second case, which I have just mentioned, they come through will-power, practice and unceasing efforts at energyenhancement.org
- Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 5.Playing With Kundalini Is Playing With Fire
Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 5.Playing With Kundalini Is Playing With Fire, When your spiritual practice takes the form of Kundalini Yoga and you begin the inner occult process of Hatha Yoga, then, with the rise of the power of the Kundalini from the lower mystical centres (Chakras) into the higher mystical centres, which are in the occult body of each being, there arise various extraordinary powers and experiences at energyenhancement.org
- Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 6.Persons Blessed with Mystic Powers
Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 6.Persons Blessed with Mystic Powers, There is a totally different type of mystic phenomena and powers that come through the Grace of God and a person who has not practised any of the Yogic techniques may just obtain all of these powers spontaneously. This happens only when God wants to make use of a person for some Divine purpose and He has found a person who, through absolute life-long moral perfection, is found fit as a perfect channel, as an instrument which is fit and worthy at energyenhancement.org
- Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 7.Occult Powers and the Spiritual Seeker
Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 7.Occult Powers and the Spiritual Seeker, What is the place of these various inner powers in Yoga? What are their uses and abuses? What is the attitude of the true seeker to these powers? What are the attitudes of Masters towards these powers? What is the place of these powers and the various experiences in the life of the Yogi? at energyenhancement.org
- Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 8.Uses of Occult Phenomena
Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 8.Uses of Occult Phenomena, To seekers, to aspirants, to those who want God and are trying to make use of their life to attain God, there is no question of the uses of these powers, for the true seeker just ignores them, and for him they have no content or value, but are things which he passes by on the way. However, if I may speak of these powers independently of the seeker, then there are uses to which these powers can be put, in a limited way. Supposing a person is not in any way a seeker of God, and especially if these powers are in the nature of healing, or magnetism or of prophetic vision (where one is able to know of certain things before they happen, due to clairaudience or clairvoyance), then use may be made of them, but it has been observed that in such situations when these powers are made use of, after some time, they leave the individual at energyenhancement.org
- Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 9.Avoid All Occult Phenomena
Sri Swami Sivananda, The Path Beyond Sorrow Chapter 2: Occult PhenomenaTheir Place In Yoga, 9.Avoid All Occult Phenomena, On the lower level, these occult powers can become the greatest of corrupters, the greatest of obstacles for all true seekers. Ultimately, seekers have to realise God and once one has realised through his own discrimination that everything except God is just transitory, evanescent, just a shadow-play, a momentary thing with which one has no lasting connection, once one knows this, then everything except He, from the little speck of dust to the highest power, all occult phenomena, mystical experiences, become devoid of substance. They all partake of the same nature of this passing, transitory, evanescent world. They are not real. They are not true and they have no ultimate value, no inherent worth at energyenhancement.org
|
