LENT = TIME FOR TAPAS

What are you putting off that would deepen your yoga practice?

Is it to clean up your diet? To devote ten minutes a day to meditation? To stop bed-texting and devote time to reflecting upon the day’s events? To work on a certain pose on a regular basis?

Rather than putting it off indefinitely, consider committing to a new level of practice for a 40-day period, starting on Lent, which starts tomorrow.

Whether you are Catholic or not, Lent gives yogis a wonderful opportunity to recommit to their spiritual practice, knowing that others around the world are doing the same thing. This collective consciousness is a powerful aid.

For Lent, you can make a commitment to take on a new practice or give up an unhelpful habit for 40 days.

This practice is part of the yogic observance of tapas ,or purifying austerities. Tapas falls into three categories: austerity, worship, and charity. It can include practices to be taken up or habits to be given up.

What you choose to do for Lent should be something that is reasonable given your particular circumstances. It should also be somewhat challenging. Usually, we have an idea floating around the back of our minds. If that is the case, write it down and visualize how it could be put into action.

Remember, it should be appropriate for your particular stage of spiritual practice, and that yoga is, ultimately, about authentically wanting to clean up your act.

Once you figure out what your commitment will be, write it down, sign it, and put it into practice for your own spiritual unfoldment.

HELPFUL HINTS

It is best to write down the vow that you wish to keep for Lent. The more specific you are, the easier it will be to follow through. Include the steps you will take to accomplish it. Sign it and give it to someone you believe in. (If you skip this last part, you are likely to fail.) Then, keep quiet about it and do the work.

If you do not have any ideas, here are a few places to start:

. Give up a bad habit that is not serving you, such as bed-texting, having a glass of wine before bed, eating junk food, gossiping, or spending time with people who bring out the worst in you.

. Spend five minutes a day reading the Yoga Sutras or other scripture

. Keep a daily spiritual diary, and write down your practices and how well you kept (or didn’t keep) yama , yoga’s ethical foundation. For more ideas, read Swami Radha’s 1996 book, Time To Be Holy.

. Repeat a certain number of rounds of mantra each day, using a mala (a 108-bead rosary used for meditation). “A rosary is a whip to goad the mind towards God,” said Swami Sivananda in his book Japa Yoga.

. Develop a home practice. Resolve to do 20 minutes of asana, 12 rounds of pranayama , asana , and/or 10 minutes meditation each day. Or promise yourself that you’ll go to class a certain number of times each week. Learn more here.

. Give up eating meat. If this seems too drastic, consider going vegetarian once a week (for more info, visit meatfreemondays.com or vrg.org).

. If you are not yet ready to deepen your yoga practice, perhaps there is something in your life that needs to be resolved first. Consider diving into that project you’ve been avoiding, such as putting your finances or house in order, or clearing out a practice space in a bedroom or corner of the living room.

. Consider volunteering once a week or through selfless service or Karma yoga, which should be performed without attachment to results. For example, resist the urge to brag about it or put it on your r é sum é . For ideas, visit chicagocares.org or volunteermatch.org and read Ram Dass’s 1985 book, How Can I Help?

. Take a weekly smartphone fast, or practice silence once a week. Or vow to eat a meal in silence–no TV, no talking, no texting or reading–once a day or once a week.

. Give away one object you no longer use each day or week. Give the items to charity, or post them on freecycle.org.

. If you have a tendency to run behind schedule (i.e., you are always late), vow to arrive five minutes early to each of your appointments.

. Put the Yoga Sutras into practice. Read Yogi Cameron Alborzian’s book The One Plan: A Week-by-Week Guide to Restoring Your Natural Health and Happiness . And do the exercises.

Happy Maha Shivaratri!

ॐ नमः शिवाय
ॐ नमः शिवाय
ॐ नमः शिवाय
ॐ नमः शिवाय
ॐ नमः शिवाय

Heart is Another Name for Reality

-Ramana Maharshi

EVERYTHING HAS BEEN LOVINGLY PROVIDED FOR US

The Power That Knows the Way will take care of you. The one who makes the sun shine, the grass grow, the apples grow perfectly on apple trees. The food that sustains us, nourishes us, everything has been lovingly provided for us. Have faith. Trust The Power That Knows the Way. This is a first step. To have total faith, and total trust in the infinity, the one. You may call this God, if you want to. Makes no difference what you call it. It is within you. It is without you. It is everywhere. Always turn within. That is where all the answers are.

Without is a dream. Within is the Self. In reality, there is no real without, there is no within. It is a figure of explaining this. You have to turn within because you think you are living without. When you turn within, the within will eventually disappear, and the without will eventually disappear. Everything will disappear when you begin to turn within. Yet, when you awaken, everything will appear the same as it is now, except you will not be a part of it. You will see things that you do now, but you will no longer be fooled. The world will no longer fool you by telling you this is right and this is wrong, this is good and this is bad. You will be finished with all this. You introvert the mind upon itself. When the mind is introverted upon itself, it disappears, for it never existed. But, when the mind is extroverted, then you are alive and well in the world. It comes with all types of experiences. In school, they taught you to be extroverted, to have an outgoing personality. Well, what has it done for you? It made us all into a bunch of idiots. Look at the world in which we are living. See what is going on. Look at our figureheads, government officials, state officials. These are all extroverted people. We have been told that to be introverted is to be a loner, and never get anywhere. Where do you want to get? If these people only realized that the world in which they are playing is all karmic. In other words, everybody is in their right place, where they are supposed to be. There are no mistakes.

So these people do not believe they are not the body and the world does not exist. But they believe there are bodies and there is a world and a universe. They should accept the fact that karma is the ruler of the universe. And everything that appears to be is karmic in effect. This is why I always say there are no mistakes. For you are where you are supposed to be in accordance with the law of karma. But do not keep thinking about getting rid of karma, for you will have a battle on your hands. You have to grow out of this, and see that karma never existed and does not really exist. So, just wake up. Awaken.

-Robert Adams 🕉

Maya Story

Maya
from Robert Adams' Silence of the Heart

One day Buddha and his chief disciple, Narada, were walking along a country road. Buddha was discussing maya. He explained that the tree, the river, the mountains, the beauty, all of the bugs and the mosquitoes, animals all were maya. And Narada said, "But Master, how can this be? It sounds virtually impossible. I can grab the tree. I can grab your arm. I am stung by a mosquito. I feel this thing, there is a bump on my arm. How can this all be illusion? I do not understand” And Buddha said, "I am thirsty. Go get me a glass of water.”

There was a town nearby, so Narada went to the town and knocked at the door of the first house he saw. An old lady opened the door. She said, "What do you want?” Narada said, "My Master would like a glass of water.” She looked him over and saw that he was handsome, well built, healthy, and she said, "Come in.” He went into her house and there was a beautiful lady sitting on a chair. The woman said, "This is my daughter. Isn’t she beautiful?” Narada was astounded at her beauty. He said "She is the most beautiful girl I have ever seen.” The old lady said, "How would you like to marry her?” And Narada said, “Why not?” So he married the girl. They had a big wedding, and all of the people in the village came. The next day, he got a job. He was a potter by trade, and he made beautiful pots out of clay. He did this for a living.

After the first year, they had a child, and he was able to afford a beautiful house. He had a mortgage payment, and had to pay taxes. So he had to work harder and hire people to help him. He had employees. He had to pay them salaries, take out taxes, workers compensation, and everything else. Then, after two years passed, another child. He was completely enmeshed in family life. Some days were good. Some days were bad.

A couple more years went by, three years, four years, five years. One day there was a big hurricane, a very powerful hurricane that came into town. The place was getting flooded. Narada said, "What are we going to do?” All of his furniture was being ruined. Everything that he believed he owned was getting wet, totally ruined. He took his family up on to the roof. There was a clothes line on the roof. All hung onto the clothes line. The hurricane became stronger and stronger and stronger. His mother in law was washed away by the flood. Narada said, "I guess we did not need her anyway for she was old.” But the hurricane was still very strong, and his wife and two children were holding on. One of the children was washed away and Narada became very distraught. But he was holding on with his wife. Then the other child was washed away. He became very upset. But he said to himself, “At least I have my wife. We can have more children.” Then his wife was washed away and he said, "What happened to my family?! They are all gone! Everything I worked for is all gone!

Everything I strived for is all gone! I am going to end it all, commit suicide!” So he let go of the rope. The next moment, he found himself sitting next to Buddha, with a glass of water. He looked at Buddha and Buddha said, "It’s about time you brought me my water!” So Narada looked at him and said, "Now I understand what maya is!”

More on Robert Adams here.