Category: Yoga West

Integrating Perception with Experience with Reality

In our healing, we rely on the totality of our undifferentiated (non-dualistic) experience to produce the aspect of mind that manifests our healing intentions.  We call that aspect the projective meditative mind, or simply, shuniya.  What brings that experience to us is the reality of our perception, pure and unaffected.  Pure perception is pure experience, is pure reality.  Unfettered, the experience of reality forms the integral perception, where our intentions interact with the reality to make our intentions reality.

Fundamentally, our perceptive field is integral to our experience.  Even so, we tend to separate the various phenomena that we witness and feel from the experience of witnessing and feeling them.  In our mental processes we hold various biases and prejudices about an experience,  for some purpose of describing the experience in a detached way.   It’s as if we objectify the experience and hold it in our memory or other historical catalog for the purpose of recalling it for some future application or use.

If we examine this tendency and the separation that it brings, it becomes apparent that a fabricated experiential object of this sort will inevitably interfere with the full appreciation of the future experience to which it is intended to apply.  So, it is useful to free the mind from encumbrances that serve to distract from pure experience in the moment.

The healing space, shuniya, includes the totality of experience.  When experienced as a whole, all of the information contained in that experience is allowed to express reality.

In our workshop we performed three kriyas, or meditative exercises, which have the effects of putting aside bias and judgement, telescoping our perception to infinity, and practicing reading the space from its phenomena.

Meditation: LA004 780109 Experience the Experience

Meditation: LA082-790123 Telescopic Infinity

Meditation: M061b-19901124 – Know the structure of the mind

Now, hear the lecture and instructions for the healing exercises from the Workshop.

 

See a recap of other workshops,
posts related to the meditative mind
and posts related to shuniya

The Projective Meditative Mind part 2

We held a workshop at Yoga West on May 3, 2019.  In this class, we stabilized and developed the projective meditative mind.

In our healing tradition, healing begins when we can adjust our awareness to a specific aspect that we call the projective meditative mind.  Other names for this are shuniya and the sacred space.  Once we stabilize that position of awareness, we begin to relate with the patient (event) in a way that produces healing in the event.  We call the aspect projective because in that position of awareness our intention becomes projective, in that it manifests in our relation with the event.  Our intention to heal impacts the relation.

Literally, shuniya describes an aspect of mind that is empty.  Not void as in nothing, as there is always activity in the mind, rather empty of any tendency to move or direct the experience.  Sitting in shuniya, our mind  allows the flow of our experience without interfering with it or imposing any bias or preconception onto the experience.  See Milarepa’s Song to Lady Palderboom.  Shuniya is a most profound state of being.  It is most effective for healing.

Arriving at this awareness is not an accident.  Nor is it likely that we should recognize it without preparing the mind with certain exercises, or kriyas.  Of the many kriyas that come from the tradition of Kundalini Yoga, many deal directly with the development of shuniya.

If we could arrive at shuniya by thinking it or by verbal instruction, we would.  Instead, we allow our practice of the kriyas to instruct our mind subtly.  The kriya tricks our mind into moving our awareness toward shuniya, giving us a direct experience of being empty.  With the repetition of kriyas, we practice accessing that place in our awareness, ultimately allowing us to stabilize it at will.

In this workshop, we performed two meditations.
Meditation: LA950 A00214 20000214 Develop Self-Reliance
and
Meditation: KYB117-19860822 – Achieve an Experience of God

Instability in the meditative mind comes from several sources, among them doubt, fear, unconfidence, insecurity and preconceived beliefs and prejudices about the forms of perception that are presented to us by our sensory experience.  Our sensory field includes everything we feel, physical, emotional and otherwise, all ideas and thoughts.

Practicing the first meditation offers us a chance to rely on our perceptions without question or judgment, as they are.  It connects us with the sacred energy known as prikirti.  Prikirti helps us to transcend any struggle with accepting our perception as reality without adding anything to it.  We can direct our attention to the flow of perception without agitation, anxiety, or  distraction.  We can then abandon tendencies for interrupting the flow and any other self-motivated movement of awareness.  We can sit in shuniya.

The second meditation purifies our limited awareness, allowing it to extend infinitely within to achieve an experience of God.  We merge with infinity.

Listen to the workshop audio, which picks up after the second meditation.  The group performs healing exercises with their partners.

See a recap of other workshops,
posts related to the meditative mind
and posts related to shuniya

The Projective Meditative Mind

We held a workshop at Yoga West on May 1, 2019.  In this class, we stabilized and developed the projective meditative mind.

In our healing tradition, healing begins when we can adjust our awareness to a specific aspect that we call the projective meditative mind.  Other names for this are shuniya and the sacred space.  Once we stabilize that position of awareness, we begin to relate with the patient (event) in a way that produces healing in the event.  We call the aspect projective because in that position of awareness our intention becomes projective, in that it manifests in our relation with the event.  Our intention to heal impacts the relation.

Literally, shuniya describes an aspect of mind that is empty.  Not void as in nothing, as there is always activity in the mind, rather empty of any tendency to move or direct the experience.  Sitting in shuniya, our mind  allows the flow of our experience without interfering with it or imposing any bias or preconception on the experience.  See Milarepa’s Song to Lady Palderboom.  Shuniya is a most profound state of being.  It is most effective for healing.

Arriving at this awareness is not an accident.  Nor is it likely that we should recognize it without preparing the mind with certain exercises, or kriyas.  Of the many kriyas that come from the tradition of Kundalini Yoga, many deal directly with the development of shuniya.

If we could arrive at shuniya by thinking it or by verbal instruction, we would.  Instead, we allow our practice of the kriyas to instruct our mind subtly.  The kriya tricks our mind into moving our awareness toward shuniya, giving us a direct experience of being empty.  With the repetition of kriyas, we practice accessing that place in our awareness, ultimately allowing us to stabilize it at will.

In this workshop, we performed a shuniya meditation.  This particular one is the first in a series of four that Yogi Bhajan gave to us when he visited Los Angeles in the Fall of 1994:
Meditation: Shuniya Meditations as Taught by Yogi Bhajan, Yoga West, 1994.

Then we practiced some healing exercises with partners.  After a couple of rounds, we performed the meditation:
Meditation: LA004 780109 Innocent Thumbs.

As we sit in shuniya, our perceptive field tends to “crank up the volume”, so we begin to become aware of minute sensations in a big way.  They can be distracting to us if we become caught up with them.  This kriya helps us not to engage, judge, or otherwise interfere with the flow of experience.  As  result, we become completely neutral as an observer of our experience.  Then, the experience is allowed to flow freely as we simply observe sitting in shuniya.  The healing intensifies as we increase the projective power of our intention.

After the healing exercises, we considered a next step to refining our projection.  Just as we are able to train ourselves to develop and stabilize shuniya at will, we are able to merge that awareness with our radiant body.  The radiant body impacts all who stand in our presence.  Its effects are instant, so we can quickly heal people with our presence.  The homework for this practice is:
Meditation: NM345- Strengthen and enhance the radiant body.

The class audio begins after the first meditation.  It continues through the healing exercises through the end of class.

See a recap of other workshops,
posts related to the meditative mind
and posts related to shuniya

Healing with the Visual Field

We held a workshop at Yoga West on February 19, 2019 on the occasion of the full moon.

We performed a 31 minute meditation Drib Dhristi Lochina Karma.
It has an effect of giving one the capacity to heal with the eyes.

In our healing exercises we practiced recognizing and engaging the visual field to heal.

We commonly use the visual field to see objects which we perceive to be outside of ourselves.  If we turn the vision inward, we can open a new channel of perception closely linked to intuition which can merge with our healing space.  So, we are able to “see” structures in our healing relation that we can give attention to and form a healing intention.

When we look outwardly, see see more or less what we expect to see.  When we look inwardly, and renounce all expectations and preconceptions, we can begin see what was previously formless.  It adds a new dimension to our healing.

Listen to the class audio, which begins right at the end of the meditation, with a discussion of the method:

When we renounce all expectations and preconceptions, the inner vision, or “second sight” begins to clarify.  To assist this, we can practice non-reaction:
Meditation: LA907 – Kriya for Non-Reaction

Vision also clarifies when we become aware of (“open”) our third eye:
Meditation: LA827-19950307 – Third Eye

You can try these meditations.

Proving experimentally Einstein’s general theory of relativity.  A lecture by Kip Thorne.

The meridians

We held a workshop at Yoga West on January 2, 2019.  We discussed reading  the tendencies of the healing (or teaching) relation.

We performed a meditation to engage the self in one’s external reality.  This meditation improves our circulatory life, where we are able to engage our environment and other people in it in a very relaxed way, rather than checking out, separating the self and living in denial.

Meditation: KWTC 19970630 – For Faculty of Self Engagement

Then, to merge with the patient (healing) or class (teaching) in order to read what wants to be addressed.

Meditation: Know the Psyche of the Other

We performed exercises in recognizing the healing partner in the merged space, identifying the tendencies in the merged relation, then healing them.

Class audio:

 

 

The hukam

We held a workshop at Yoga West on December 10, 2018.  We performed a meditation to identify with only the self, allowing all features of the perceptive field to unify into a coherent internal context that is free of bias and personal prejudice.  It is an exercise in merging perception with the reality.

Stabilize identification with only the self:

Meditation: NM360-20000913 – Making a Mold – White Hole Mudra

We performed exercises in recognizing the role of contemplation in healing and teaching.  As a teaching protocol, we call it consulting the ‘hukam”.  Rather than teaching a preplanned topic or meditation with a preconceived goal, the hukam can tell us what wants to be taught.  For healing, what wants to be healed and how.

We engaged an exercise where healing partners spoke a statement or question to their partner.  Then the other responded to the statement.  We repeated the exercise, this time only responding after contemplating the reaction to the original statement and choosing a response modified by the contemplation. Finally, the person hearing the original statement contemplated the reaction until no more reaction was perceived.  Then spoke the response.

We then performed healing exercises that employed the use of contemplation in this way.

Class audio:

We pointed out that this class started out much the same way as last week’s class, but evolved in a very different direction.  That’s a result of using the hukam.

 

Use your attention to see what you feel

We held a workshop at Yoga West on December 5, 2018.  We performed a meditation to identify with only the self, allowing all features of the perceptive field to unify into a coherent internal context.

Stabilize identification with only the self:

Meditation: NM360-20000913 – Making a Mold – White Hole Mudra

We opened a space where the student may choose to place her attention on any or all features of the perceptive field.  We researched various  points of attention, simultaneously seeing them and feeling what we are seeing, clarifying each to reveal a more complex structure.  Simply giving attention in this way produces immediate change, and with intention, healing.  The experience is completely contained within the internal context of the [merged] self, so its reality is completely manifest, and flows, in that context.

Applying this vantage to the merged healing space, the healer is able to experience the impact of simply choosing a point of attention and stabilizing  its space.  Clarifying the space further reveals its structure and allows the application of any intentions that emerge in the process.

We practiced healing the space of such points of attention directly, particularly the neck, spine and cranium, and then related them with other points where there is resonance.  In particular, we researched resonance with brain function, which, when included, tends to initiate new patterns of existence that reinforce and stabilize the transformed state.

Achieve powerful projection: 
Meditation: LA088 790222 Egyptian Meditation