Social Action as Yogic Sadhana

Social Action as Yogic Sadhana

Recommended companion reading
Diary of a Social Activist
Preamble to the Diary of a Social Activist
The Mission and the Path
Sri Anand Yoga – Fountain of Youth

When we consider the object of Social Action, one way to look at it is to work towards the mission of ushering in a golden age. Another way is to act as ‘soldiers of the divine’. Still another is to fulfill our duties and obligations towards our community, state, nation, humanity etc. These all are very much NOBLE pursuits and are sufficient reasons in themselves to get engaged in the social action. However, it still would not be SADHANA as I envisage it in Sri Anand Yoga – which is a foundation to the Integral Yoga of Sri Aurobindo.

We all tend to get into our comfort zones. This is an intrinsic and subconscious tendency. Our relations with our family, neighbours, community, boss, colleagues, friends etc get ‘SET’ over a period of time and we learn over a period of time ‘NOT TO CROSS THE LINE’ so that the relations remain at cordial level as a minimum requirement for our survival.

When we do our Sadhana, we get into our PEACE ZONE. We turn INWARDS. We attain a sort of STABLE and PEACEFUL state of mind. At least this is our objective. When we are in our comfort zone as explained above, the PEACE ZONE which we attain through Yoga, is SUPERFLUOUS. It is not based on FIRM FOUNDATION. We still harbor in us SEEDS OF NEGATIVE FEELINGS like jealousy, ego, hurt feelings, hatred, anger etc. We do not realise about this aspect because the WATER IS CALM at the surface as the WINDS HAVE FALLEN. Our aim in INTEGRAL YOGA is to achieve the DIVINITY INTEGRALLY – leaving no part of our being remaining to be transformed. With the practice of yoga and meditation we make some progress towards this direction. However it is still very much partial progress. Further advance on the Path is not possible unless we dive into ourselves and discover these seeds and transform them into divine attributes of love and compassion and joy. Here is the catch. It is NOT POSSIBLE, in ordinary manner, just with the aid of yoga and meditation to do this job. This is possible with the GRACE of the GURU. However, even this has limitations because of the NON RECEPTIVITY and BLOCKAGE in our part to receive the grace.

Here comes the DYNAMIC aspect of Sri Anand Yoga. It is the SECRET PURPOSE behind the Social Action which is other than those explained above. When we are engaged in the social action, we are trying to change our governing system and our environment for the better. Any change meets resistance – mild or strong, manageable or indomitable. It also involves INTERACTION with people without having any SET RELATIONS as happens with our family and friends. This necessarily STIRS UP various emotions in us – originating from these seeds which I explained above. We get angry, frustrated, vulnerable, aggressive, depressed, agitated over the state of things and the attitude of people. This is precisely the OPPORTUNITY to take a grip with these seeds and use it as an opportunity for transforming them (NOT eliminating) into positive feelings of hope, patience, love, compassion, calm, joy.

The first step is to apply the technique of SRIKENSHO. It helps us to get these emotions as our ‘handles’ so that we can work with them. Next comes the Art of Positive Dieing and Rebirth. During the process of our social activism, we sometimes hit a wall. We pursue with relentless zeal to break this wall. This is a good attribute. Unfortunately, we get so much involved in the game that we overlook the Global Vision. This is also a dangerous situation in that we may emotionally harm ourselves caused by the setback due to a serious of failures. During such a time, we can apply this Art of Positive Dieing and Rebirth.

Next come the meditative technique of the Meditation on Death. This technique teaches us the ultimate RELEVANCE OF THINGS in our life. It is a sequel to the Art of Positive Dieing and Rebirth.

I am coming now to the TOP SECRET of this exercise. All the above are only the techniques. One may get EXPERT in handling the situation with these techniques. This is good. Yoga means EXPERTISE IN WHATEVER WE DO.

However, in order to get on our PATH with SUPER TURBO mode we need to change our WHOLE ATTITUDE and the PROCESS. We need to OFFER our EMOTIONS to the DIVINE WITHIN US for TRANSFORMATION and DIVINISING our whole being. Instead of doing passive meditation, we are now offering something more concrete – OUR EMOTIONS. This can be done in a silent meditation after we retreat to the safe haven of our home. We can contemplate about the events of the day, LIVE these EVENTS, let the emotions be STIRRED and then offer ourselves with these emotions to the divine for transformations. We also OPEN UP ourselves for the GRACE TO PERCOLATE through us. This is more dynamic and effective way to ABOSORB GRACE. In passive meditation, we tend to operate at our intellectual and mental level. This is NOT the effective way to call for GRACE and BE RECEPTIVE. On the other hand, when our emotional state is being stirred, and when we sincerely and with full faith offer ourselves to the divine, our CALL REACHES THE HIGH LEVELS of the divine.

I am now coming to the still next and more effective method. We do this process of offering ourselves alongwith our emotions to the divine, when we are in the MIDST OF ACTION. This is a duel process. Outwardly we are engaged in the process of social activism, doing our best with all the techniques explained above and also with all the other conventional techniques of success. At the same time, inwardly we are doing SRIKENSHO, observing ourselves for the emotions that are getting stirred up and then offering the same to the divine and calling for the divine help and guidance, opening ourselves to the divine grace and power. This may appear difficult at first sight, however, this is the SADHANA. With constant practice, we can very successfully apply it and progress on our path very rapidly.

Our engagement in the field of social activism has this secret purpose as a part of our Sadhana.

As one progresses on the PATH, one gets the POWER to CAUSE CHANGE.

There is another secret. Behind our action in this world, there are COSMIC POWERS working out the COSMIC PLANs in this world. When we engage in the field of social activism, these COSMIC powers get a very good chance to EFFECTUATE THE PLAN through us. If we align ourselves with this cosmic plan, then miraculous things happen and our progress becomes very exceptionally sure and super fast.

Hunger of Life ... Fountain of Youth Part II... Shrikant Vasudeo

Hunger of Life .....................................................................Shrikant Soman
Fountain of Youth - Part Two
My Experiments with Life

The Scientists have been able to extend the life span of a worm named Caenorhabditis Elegans (CE) by 6 times over. As against the normal life span of CE of 24 days, the Scientists were able to make the worm survive for 124 days. If we were able to apply the same technique to the humans, we would live for 500 to 600 years ! This feat was achieved by altering the signaling pathways for a protein called Insulin-like Growth Factor 1 (IGF-1). This same protein controls the longevity in humans. This is an extreme case of treating human body like a machine – completely and totally different and independent from our own Self. This is horrible – simply horrible. I am not talking of any ethical or moral issues involved. If we were able, with the help of science alone, to increase our life span without any corresponding life system development, it would drive us to commit suicides, get killed by accidents or kill each other in anarchy. To give you a simple example, consider the case of a car. If we were to produce a car which has an exceptionally high speed of say 400 km per hour, and if we, who are used to drive at 200 km per hour start driving the car, how far can we go ? We are already having cars which give much higher than even this speed of 400 kms. But for these cars to drive safely, we have racing car drivers and specially made racing tracks. The scientific research in all directions, including longevity research, is very helpful and good part of human development. However, if other part of our life systems does not cope with this research, it will cause stress and strains and will cause more damage than good. It will be like a very fast racing car with wrong alignment of wheels.
Interestingly, the subsequent research on CE has revealed that in much the same way that we humans do, the CE worm has sagging muscles and a growing middle as it ages. The survival does not automatically bring with it robust life system. Even if we assume that with some scientific breakthrough in future, we are able to have good muscle strength of CE worm even at its old age, still, for us the humans, the basic problem of improving the level of our life system needs to be tackled.
We need to develop our life system in a robust and healthy manner in all its aspects. The joy of life is an integral part of our life system. Without joy, what is left is only the survival. Even if we do not fall physically sick and live for say 200 years, it will still be a sick life nonetheless, unless there is a joy in life. Joy in life is in the beginning, it is in the middle and it is in the end – it is everywhere. The life of cells give a very interesting insight to the life system on a larger level.
A very important process involved in digesting the food is called ‘metabolism’. It is commonly understood that metabolism indicates uptake of nutrients from the blood and their conversion to energy usable for cellular activities. Actually metabolism involves two diverse processes – anabolism and catabolism. Anabolism is constructive metabolism. It builds up tissues by the construction of carbohydrates, proteins and fats. Anabolism is destructive metabolism. It causes the chemical breakdown of complex substances to produce energy as well as waste matter. This process of metabolism is present in our whole life system. It holds the key to good health as well as to longevity. The commonly held belief that lack of sufficient nutrients in our food causes malnutrition is absolutely wrong. It hold good only in about 5 % of the cases. In 95 % of the cases, the problem lies not in the insufficient amount of nutrients in our daily food, but in the lack of our capacity to effectively metabolise the food intake. The effectiveness of metabolism depends, among many other things, our love and respect for food and for life in general. Sri Anand Yoga has yogic practices to increase the metabolic effectiveness by many fold. It is founded on thankfulness for all the players in our Universe – our parents, the persons cooking the meal, farmers, the Mother Earth, our House and this beautiful life in general. It is powered by our ‘hunger’ for food. We need to have the same intensity of hunger as the hardworking poor man earning just enough to feed himself and his family. It is made joyful by the blessing of the food we eat. Eating food is a very important part of the life system of Sri Anand Yoga.
Adenosine Triphosphate (ATP) is a key molecule that powers our cellular activities. Cells produce ATP from glucose and glucose is derived from sugar (carbohydrates). Another key hormone is insulin. It influences the glucose used by the cells. It serve s as the key that opens the cell doors to the sugar. Metabolic processes involving glucose and insulin greatly influence life span. It is a paradox that while ATP is absolutely essential for cellular life, the abundance of it is also the cause of cell degeneration. We need to have ATP just in right quantity. The caloric restriction reduces the supply of glucose to the cells. It helps in keeping ATP in check. However, in Sri Anand Yoga, we believe that the culprit is not caloric abundance but our inability to make good of the calories available to us. Any excess amount of calories need to be thrown out of our bodily system. If we are not able to do this, the science wrongly advises us to eat less food. Overeating is certainly bad. But under-eating is equally bad. The ‘right’ quantity and type of food is not decided by any ‘table of nutrients and their calorific values’ and the ‘calorie burning’ activities. It is naturally and spontaneously decided by our body if we treat food as an integral part of our life system.
Here we again come to the black sheep ‘free radicals’. Much of the free radicals are produced by the ATP making machinery of the cells. All this leads us to the absolutely absurd and stupid hypothesis that the food we eat is the culprit. If we have this attitude towards food, how on earth can we improve our life system ? It is certainly true that meat, excessive oils, aerated soft drinks, junk food etc are bad for health. However, there is no point in making a fetish of the ‘nutrition’ theory of food.
It is interesting to learn as to how the calorie restriction is supposed to help us. The reduced amount of the food intake is taken by the body as a signal of famine. The cells then shift their gear to self-preservation mode. Its main focus now is only in cell maintenance and repair. The other major activity of reproduction is neglected. This way the cells are able to make the maximum use of the scarce energy. This hypothesis of ‘virtual famine’ in cell world is confirmed by the production of hormones that protect cells from excess heat and other stresses – similar in real life when actual famine happens. In Sri Anand Yoga, we ask the question – why the hell we have to ‘simulate famine’ in order to live longer ? Are we ‘cursed’ by the abundance of food ? The master key to this paradox lies in looking beyond ‘mathematics’ of ‘calorific values’ and into the ‘life values’ of food and everything else that this life offers us.
Similarly, insulin is essential for the cells to convert glucose into energy. Insufficient insulin will deprive us of the sufficient energy and excessive sugar in the blood. Paradoxically, the same insulin can contribute to heart disease and to undesirable cell proliferation – cancer. It is an interesting topic as to the real role of insulin in our health and life system. It will be covered sometime later. At this stage we just mention that in Sri Anand Yoga, we look beyond physical process of insulin and into the spiritual aspect of it.
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………….. To Continue

Art of Positive Dieing and Rebirth Shrikant Vasudeo

The Art of Positive Dieing and Rebirth Shrikant Soman

Human being is expert in playing mental games. Right from early childhood, we keep on playing variety of games on continuous basis. Every pursuit is taken like a challenge, a win-lose situation. As the age advances, we go on playing more and more complex games. These games are not just ‘intellectual manoeuvres’ like that of the game of chess. The are full of emotional dramas. It is said that ‘we think that is why we are’. I would like to say ‘We play games, that is the way we know that we exist’. If we stop playing games, we feel insecure. Our very existence as we know it gets threatened. Playing games makes us in the midst of ‘activity’ and therefore ‘existence’ – or so we think.

These games can be benign or harmful. I am not using the word ‘game’ in a derisive manner. It just signifies that
1 We must win in the process
2 There has to be some excitement
3 There are more than one player
4 There has to be some emotional produce out of the play.

This is not bad by itself. The world was created in a play or ‘leela’ of the Supreme Creator. Playing games is the very essence of learning the lessons of life and enjoying our existence in this birth. The problem starts when we get so much absorbed in the game that we tend to ‘forget’ that after all it is only a game and a small projection of our life. We start thinking that it is our whole life itself. We tend to lose our independent ‘soul awareness’ and take the game situation as the sole reality- our whole existence.

This is the cause of our anxiety and tension-filled life.

In order to get us out of this self-made set of illusory snares, we need to find some radical solutions. The conventional wisdom has advised us believe that this world is a Maya – Illusion – false. This samsara is the cause of our misery. We need to abandon the desire of this samsara and get free. However, this solution does not work. This is like killing the patient is we are not able to cure him. The knot of samsara is not released. It is only cut. This gives the scope for new knots being formed again and again.

Instead of quitting the game, we need to play it from different perspective. This will help us to release the knot as well as prevent the new knots getting formed. And here we are helped by the ‘Art of Positive Dieing and Rebirth’.
Dieing implies total abandonment of our existing possessions – including intangible assets of our emotional network with situations, people and incidences and getting into different world altogether. Generally the dieing process is feared upon by the human being. It is the most dreadful eventuality of our life. Instead of decently and gently getting into the car of life transition, we are literally ‘dragged’ inside it in a very rude and crude manner by the hand of ‘Yama’ the lord of death.

Positive dieing implies getting into the car voluntarily, decently, gentlemanly and ‘in style’. We do not have to be ‘dragged’ inside. We step in a Royal Way. We do not consider death as something sorrowful, miserable, painful etc. We consider death as our life transforming experience. This is the art of positive dieing.

Rebirth implies getting born again to start afresh our life games. We ‘reset’ the ‘score card’ of our life to ‘zero’. This give us chance to chalk our fresh strategies, gather new resources to win the game.

Now here come an important point. I am not talking here of ‘once in a lifetime’ experience of death. In that sense we die only once – or rather we get a ‘chance’ to die only once in our lifetime. Our token of life is wasted when we use it just for once in the slotting machine of our games. We do not get a second chance.

I am talking here of applying this ‘positive dieing’ technique to our everyday living experience. Let us see how to apply this technique of ‘positive dieing’. I need to stress that we are not killing our desire to play games. Playing games is essential to life. We are only taking out the ‘anxiety’ from the process of playing games and make it truly an enjoyable activity. This we do by applying a ‘fuse’ in our ‘emotional circuitry’ and increasing our ‘attentive responsive’ behaviour when this fuse ‘blows out’. The purpose of fuse is cut off the power supply when the voltage increases beyond the capacity of the wires to sustain. The advantage of electrical fuse is that it ‘cuts off’ the power supply and avoids the possibility of the wires getting burned out. In the similar fashion, we apply this ‘fuse’ technique to our emotional circuitry. In the process of any of our life activity, if we start getting anxious about any possible outcome of our action, our fuse should blow off. It means that it gives us an indicator that the ‘voltage’ of our emotional charge is increasing to a dangerous level. With the aid of our ‘attentive responsive’ behaviour, we take a ‘hard look’ at our life situation and decide to apply the next process sequence of ‘positive dieing’. We give up all our ‘emotional’ expectations from the game. We do NOT give up our intellectual expectations. We still continue to play game. We still continue to play the game to win. However, the emotional ‘high voltage’ is now reduced with the application of the technique of ‘positive dieing’.

How this is exactly done ? In the first place we should be watchful about our inner emotional activities. Any first signs of anxiety over any matter is a red signal for us to get into the mode of ‘positive dieing’. When we get this red signal, we put into action our second army of soldiers. The purpose of these soldiers is to ‘shoot at sight’ any enemy movement. What is this enemy movement ? It is the ‘emotional hook-up’ in our mind for the ‘winning’ post of the game. We get obsessively ‘hooked’ to the winning post. This creates the anxiety. We feel that if we do not achieve the desired result out of our activity, we suffer a very heavy loss causing pain. The probability of this eventuality is the cause of our anxiety. Note that the source of anxiety is in the ‘probability’ of our losing the game and NOT in the actual incidence of the losing. When we put into action our second level of defence, we do the act of ‘positive dieing’. Instead of indulging the mental acrobat of ‘probability’ calculations, we actually imagine that the ‘worst’ case scenario – that is we losing the game- has actually happened. It is no more a probability. This is the process of dieing. We die in this particular game. We voluntarily die. We positively die. We are not dragged into the car but we get in ourselves, very gently, decently and gentlemanly. We imagine that we have lost the game, though all this while we should continue playing it intellectually to the best of our capabilities, but without any emotional drama. This is because we have now decided to ‘die’ in this game. It effectively means that after having stopped the mental activity of ‘probability calculation’ of our losing the game, we ‘reset’ our emotional contents in the game. We become like a clean slate emotionally. This is NOT taken as a sad thing – like the one we do when we die form this life at a final stage. Our technique is that of ‘positive dieing’ and not ‘traumatic negative dyeing’. We do not feel sad when we do the act of ‘resetting’ our emotional drama in the game.

To put it different way, when we start feeling anxious over any activity, we get alert and ‘empty’ out our negative emotions. Take an example of catching a next connecting flight. If you are coming from New York to Mumbai via Paris after changing the aircraft and the flight at Paris. If your plane gets delayed at New York putting you at the risk of losing on the connecting flight from Paris. This is a bothersome and annoying situation. It is surely a cause of anxiety. There is very little you can do to influence the positive outcome. It is beyond your capacity to do anything. But you still do the best thing available to you. You start getting anxious. You start getting worried. This is certainly in your hand – to worry. And you do it to the best of your ability. You start worrying. In our newly learned technique, we immediately get alerted the moment we are getting anxious about this eventuality. Then we apply the technique of ‘positive dyeing’. We still continue to wait for the aircraft at New York. However, we mentally decide that even if the worst scenario happens, we can do nothing about it to prevent it from happening. Therefore, we decide to ‘stop worrying’ and ‘stop getting anxious’ about it. We do the art of positive dyeing in this game.

What is the rebirth ? We reset the our score card to zero and start enjoying the game with full zeal and enthusiasm. This is the process of rebirth. In our above example of air journey, after having decided to accept the likely eventuality of missing the flight, we start giving attention to our surroundings, the interesting events happening around us, we start enjoying our waiting period at the airport. We find out some interesting and enjoying thing to do while we are waiting. This may even give us some bright idea about some brilliant solution to our problems. When we are in our best of the moods, the solutions to our problems appear more effortlessly. Even if this does not happen, we still enjoy our every moment in this ‘waiting period’. This is the rebirth.

We need to apply this technique of the ‘art of positive dieing and rebirth’ in all of our life situations which start giving us the ‘anxiety’. Actually we need to apply this technique every day, several times every day. We are continuously ‘dyeing’ and ‘re-birthing’.

Seven Laws of Being Happy Shrikant Vasudeo

7 (Human and Spiritual) Laws of Being Happy Shrikant Soman
Success, Effectiveness, Abundance and Love are natural by- products of being Happy
Let us keep some basic understanding straight.
For being happy you need not believe in God or religion. You need not go to temples or do prayers.
You need not do charity or do ‘good deeds’ to earn some ‘credit’ points in heaven.
Earning lots of money, fame and popularity is neither craved for nor abhorred by a happy person. He may or may not pursue it. This may depend on the call of his heart. In any case, he does not attach any spiritual, religious or moral dictates to these things. Every persons mission in life is to be happy.

1 Do NOT Try Hard but do your best to get what you want.
Trying hard is not the same thing as putting in your best efforts. Trying hard requires you to push and pull yourself to the maximum. This creates the situation of your inner being getting driven by your outer being. This creates a dichotomy in your personality. Remember that your inner being does not like to be pushed and pulled. As the centre of power in your personality is at the outer being in ordinary cases, the inner being will not be able to resist the pressure of outer being. However, it will not remain passive to this whole affair thereby depriving the outer being of the wisdom and pure energy which only your inner being can supply.

2 Accept Reality without Emotional Judgement while at the same time trying to mould your environment the way you want.
Accepting reality does not mean accepting the present reality to continue in future. Accepting reality only means that the reality as it exists is accepted for the present. Please note that the reality ‘out there’ is not waiting to be accepted by you to become the ‘actual’ (?) reality. It is exists by itself. It does not need your acceptance for its existence. Your accepting the reality only means that you have full range of data to be used in your planning for the future. And your future lies not in next year or next month or next week or next day or next hour but from the next moment onwards ! The question of your liking or not liking the reality as it really (!) exists is irrelevant from the point of view of your getting the picture clear in your mind. This reality has to be accepted without any emotional judgement. Do not get instinctively excited or dejected, attracted or repulsed, loved or hated by the contents of the reality while taking stock of it. Any emotional judgement will put false colours on the actual picture as per your emotional palette. Please note that emotions do have a very important and extremely useful role to play in our life. However, they should not have any role to play while taking stock of the reality.

3 Consider enjoyment of life as a continuous and natural living process without critically depending on some event or status.
Shift the focus from ‘event’ dependent joy to the ‘process’ of living in Joy
Milestones and targets are very essential in charting out the life plan. Without milestones one would only drift without any definite course. However, their role should not be over emphasized. The moment they assume the character of ‘critical or crucial’ we lose in the net. The critical milestones may at times help us to have achievement of the goal. However, in the bargain we have to suffer ‘burn out’ at the level of our inner being. The amount of burn out is directly proportional to the ‘criticality’ of the target. More the achievement of the target is critical for us, more will be the amount of burn out of our inner being. At the core level, life should be treated as a continuous process. Every moment in our life is as precious as any other. Critical target puts a shadow on our present moment. Critical target can be anything like getting minimum percentage of marks in the exams, getting particular amount of salary and perks, getting a particular positions in the hierarchy of management, getting the love of our sweet hearts, winning an election, getting popularity and most importantly having a certain amount of bank balance. When we do achieve the so called critical target, the joy of achievement lasts only for a very short period when we are the peak. The ‘high’ we have gets to a ‘low’ by the law of emotional gravity. The law of emotional gravity states that we can not continue to remain in a state of joyful excitement if the cause of this excitement is any event external to us. It is like the tension applied to a rubber string. The moment the tension is releases, the string will get reset to its original length. In fact it will lose some amount of its strength as a direct consequence of the tension.

Consider enjoyment of life not as a special event depending on some event or status but as a continuous and natural living process.


4 Always strive for more, better, vaster of the riches of life without craving for these riches
Our religion has taught us to be satisfied with little. From childhood we have been brainwashed by the spiritual doctrines that money is the bane of our sorrows. Nothing can be farther from the truth. Money does buy comforts of life. It helps us to get free of the physical necessities and spend time and resources in pursuit of our desires. Money is good to us. And more money the better. This is not only a practical principle but also a great Spiritual Truth ! Money is a narrow term representing the vast riches of life. All that is there in this Universe is divine and its enjoyment is the divine foundation of our life.
However, we should not get hooked to any desire. The moment we are hooked to any desire, we get dragged by it. Our desire is like a powerful horse. As we learn to ride and master the horse, it will take us to places and we can at the same time enjoy the ride. If we do not know how to ride the horse and still make attempts to ride it, we will fall from the horse with our feet entangled in the padle. This will cause us to be dragged by the horse. There is no point in blaming the horse for our predicament. It is foolish if we shun the use of horse because we do not know how to ride it and instead prefer to walk the road. We should therefore learn to ride the horse in correct manner and enjoy the ride. Similarly, we should treat desires as our horses.

5 Do not depend on or even expect the spiritual justice for wrongs done to you or rewards for good deeds. Life is a natural process benevolent to every being.
People who cause you hurt reap the fruits of their Karma as per their life process and NOT as a result of justice for some wrong done to you
One of the biggest cause of misery in this world is our deep rooted belief in so called ‘divine justice’. Whenever we see any wrongdoing happening to us, we are told to believe that God is watching and he will punish the sinner. This make us depend on God for justice to be done. We comfortably shift our responsibility in the situation to God. This sense of justice also prompts us to do ‘good’ things so that we will be rewarded at future time. If we do not see justice done, we are told that it will happen at right time. This right time can even be in ‘after-life’ or in our ‘next life’. There is a subtle sense of helplessness in the hands of God in this belief system. We get dependent on an external agency – God to set right our affairs. The control centre of our life gets shifted from our inner being to somebody external to us. This will not work. We are not denying the existence of divine justice. However, this divine justice works by it’s own laws and not ours. In fact the word justice is not there in God’s vocabulary. It is a word invented by man. What we call divine justice is in fact divine plan of the cosmos. There is also an autonomous system of cause and effect called Karma in spiritual language. Again this system works in some mysterious ways not properly understood by man in ordinary course of life. We are better off in acting in life as if all this system of divine justice and Karma did not exist. It frees us from being bothered by any system of divine rules handed down to us by our religious teachers.
Let us start from the premise that ‘Life is a natural process benevolent to every being’. Life is benevolent to a virtuous man as well as to a sinner. Each one of us is a divine spark and have our origin in the Ultimate Source of Life – call it by any name. We are all equal citizens of this Universe. The reason we share the resources in unequal manner is due to our own choice and not due to the system of reward and punishment by God.

6 Get yourself free from ‘conventional’ spiritual commandments of living an ascetic life as a way to attain godhood. Accept this new commandment : To enjoy life is a greatest service to God and Humanity.
while at the same time, enlarge the scope of your ‘enjoyment’ to encompass the whole of humanity and other living world

We are indoctrinated by our religious upbringing in practically all the religions of the World to believe that God loves poor people. Poverty is a blessing. Poor are more human and loving and more nearer to God. This belief scuttles our clear enthusiasm for striving for the riches. Even if we do work hard, the guilt feeling at the background of our mind results in sub-optimum results. It also tends to make us live in double standards. One spiritual and other the practical. This double standard brings the element of ‘sin’ in our striving for the riches. In reality, spirituality and practical life are harmonized. The spiritual aim and the focus of our practical life should integrate. This will eliminate the idea of sin from our minds and will enable us to get the best possible results from our endeavour while at the same time the intensity of our enjoyment will be heightened considerably.

7 Be Self Centric in whatever you do while expanding your vision and horizon.
but do not be selfish
We always confuse between ‘self centric’ and being ‘selfish’. Being self centric is absolutely essential for the growth of our Self. We should not starve our Self for the cause of humanity at large. In this process, we neither serve humanity nor make our self satisfied. We are able to fulfill our mission in life only when the twin objectives of nourishing our inner Self and being of service to humanity integrate into one and cease to be ‘contrary’ objectives. Being Self Centric does NOT mean having excessive ego. It means that we get dictated by our inner voice and not by the books. We do what WE feel is right and not necessarily what is ‘told’ to us as being right by any OUTSIDER. Our primary purpose in life is to enjoy OUR OWN life. If we are clear about our focus, then only we will be able to plan our life in the divine wisdom of SELF. In this condition, our capacity and inclination to make humanity happier is increased manifold. On the other hand, if we starve our inner self by living an ascetic life without any inner spiritual inclination, we lost the most important source of our energy – from our inner SELF. And without energy, no work can be done – irrespective of our good and noble intentions. When we nourish our inner self by being Self Centric, we have twin consequences of opening the floodgates of Energy and of having a natural propensity to be of help to humanity and share our joy with larger humanity and thereby INCREASE our JOY as further nourishment of our SELF. This is a WIN-WIN situation.

Winding Path to Heaven - Yoga of White Shonkh Shrikant Vasudeo

Yoga of the White Shonkh Shrikant Soman
Winding Path to Heaven

If you see the shonkh from the front side, you will see seven parallel lines or seven horizontal strips. This gives the illusion that these strips are independent of each other. Now if you have a look at the shonkh from top, you will notice that these strips are actually a winding path. There are not seven independent strips but one single strip winding its way up till the pinnacle of the shonkh. It is like a winding road in the mountain. Thus what appears to be separate regions are in fact a long unbroken path upward. This is the secret of our existence. What we call seven levels of existence – with material world at the bottom starting point of first level and the One Source of All at the Top seventh level (does not matter from which you start counting – from top or from bottom) – are infact one single existence. It appears to be seven independent levels because we are accustomed to perceive our reality from limited perspective.

The science of White Shonkh shows us the way to reach higher levels of our existence without losing our material level of existence.

Secondly, shonkh represents the living reality of the original creation of the world. When this world was created, the primordial sound OM was vibrated. This sound created the vortex of Shonkh. This process of Creation was not at a particular point in time. It is happening all the time and at all the places on a continuous basis. It follows that the vortex of white shonkh is even existing at present and can be seen at the location near to the original source of creation. It is a fast swirling vortex of multiple colour hues giving the impression of white colour by approximation.

Every point of existence in this world is basically a white shonkh. Its appearance gets to the shape what we see is due to its representation in a particular way. This leads us towards a ‘unified theory’ of existence – which the scientists right from Albert Einstein till present day are desperate to arrive at. The Shonkh has the characteristics of colour, speed, depth, height, sound, shape, smell, vibration, magneticism, light property and some other occult phenomena. It is like the ‘genetics’ of our Reality. If we master this technique of altering these properties, we get the real power of creation.

Out Mantras are precisely based on this secret knowledge. The Brahminical Rites are also founded on this shastra. This shastra has also been contained in an occult way in our Vedas. I can not elaborate on this matter further.

The Spiritual Horoscope of a person is also based on this knowledge. During our lifetime in this world, we alter the characteristics of this shonkh genetics of our individuality. This we do with all the emotional element of our experiences. Any experience is measured only in terms of its emotional value. There is not strictly bad or good or holy or evil Karma. There is only Emotional Mass of our Action. The emotions can be sad, happy, hateful, resentful, pleasant etc. We are made up of the memory of these emotions. We take birth again and again till we ‘un-wind’ the spin caused due to our Emotional Mass. The process of ‘em-flowerment’ and ‘releasing the knots’ of emotions is based on this theory. The intensity of emotions is also an essential characteristic to be considered.

The study of spiritual horoscope is based on studying this Shonkh Genetics of the person. He may have any astronomical horoscope. However, with his life experiences, he alters it as per the above characteristics. We have to measure the speed at which the vortex is swirling alongwith other characteristics. The speed determines the real zest for life of a person. If all other things are favourable but the zest of life is diminished then very little can be achieved. A ‘holy’ person with ‘’holy’ character but with little zest for life has little power. The person who has ‘im-balanced’ his vortex goes down the scale and has again to start much from the earlier stages – again traversing the life journey in his next birth cycle. At the time of birth, the spiritual horoscope and the astronomical horoscope are identical. In other words, we get the shonkh genetics as per our astronomical environment. We may follow the astronomical path throughout our life. In this case the Shonkh Genetics follows the pattern as defined by the astronomical environment. This happens in case of most of the persons who do not make any particular effort (from the spiritual point of view) to alter the course of their life (for better or for worse). Therefore, the astrological predictions may come true in the case of these persons. However, they have to follow a very long and slow winding path of evolution alongwith the general population. They may have to take several lifetimes to progress on the winding path. In order to correctly predict the future of a person and guide his more accurately, we need to take measurements of his current state of the vortex – shonkh. There is considerable amount of mathematics involved in it as well. With the application of this shastra, we may get manipulated in the hands of lesser gods, knowingly or unknowingly if we ‘open’ ourselves to these entities. This often results in situation detrimental to our interests. We may get ‘milked’ by these entities just like we milk the cattle by becoming a shepherd to them.

Sri Anand Yoga is secretly based on this shastra. The effect of Joyfully Creating the World of our Dreams in this very lifetime is precisely to alter this vortex in such a way that we reach the top level while being in this material body. JOY is the KEY. Continuous striving for manifesting our inner reality is the essential ingredient. All the physical, mental and spiritual exercises of Sri Anand Yoga apply one or the other principle of this White Shonkh shastra.

Interestingly, the ‘Pie’ mathematical constant (22/7) is very much used in this Shonkh calculations. Similarly the theory of Golden Means is also at the central theory of Vortex – but with some different manner. The properties of light are also used as a reference point – a sort of constant. To this extent, the Vortex Shastra comes near to the science of physics.

At the sub-atomic level, we observe that the electron rotates around the nucleus in ‘whole’ numbers’ When it is heated, it gets agitated and jumps to the higher orbit. Scientists are puzzled with one particular observation in this process. The electron appears to ‘disappear’ momentarily in its existing orbit and ‘reappear’ at the higher orbit. It does not move to the next orbit in a continuous manner. It behaves like a ‘digital’ way and not ‘analogue’ way. We get the clue in this Shonkh theory. Actually the electron does not ‘disappear’ in the existing orbit. It just goes behind the vortex in a continuous winding path like that of the white shonkh. When it again comes to the front of the shonkh, it appears in the higher orbit. Actually, there are no independent orbits – just like there are no independent levels in a shonkh. Now the question is ‘what is the going behind the vortex’ of the electron. It is obviously going into a reality, which is very much a part of our reality, but of which we have not so far been able to ‘live’ in. In order to perceive this reality, we need to have different ‘instrument of observations’. At present we are ‘stuck’ with a limited range of instruments. We have then a ‘stupid’ theory of ‘location vs mass’ of the electrons. We can either have with certainty the location or the mass of the electron at any given point, but not both at the same time. This theory is no theory at all. It is a very feeble attempt to nicely put into some package a phenomena which honestly we are puzzled and have no answers. In reality, the problem is totally different. The factor of ‘any given time’ is itself having a very limited relevance. It is having relevance in our ‘suptra-atomic’ world of Newtonian physics. At the sub-atomic level, we are actually perceiving some different time dimensions – which is totally unlike ours. We are also stuck with the concept of the ‘linearity’ of the time. At all levels other than our physical ‘supra-atomic’ levels, the time is non-linear. The White Shonkh system can provide some valuable insights (though you do not expect ‘straight’ answers) in this respect. Similarly, the issue of the ‘dark matter’ in the cosmos can be solved. Dark matter is the reality behind the shonkh.
Now I have presented this theory in a very simple manner. I have to ‘compromise’ accuracy in favour of simplicity. Otherwise the whole matter will be beyond your comprehension.

The Vortex Shonkh theory can also answer other phenomena like ‘gravity’, magnetic field etc. The spiritual experience and the ‘supra-material’ phenomenon like magnetic field, human aura, telepathy etc can be easily linked with this vortex white shonkh theory.

Actually, White Shonkh’ is not a ‘theory’ at all. To look at it from the ‘theoretical’ angle is gross approximation of the reality. White Shonkh is an experience.

In Sri Anand Yoga we do have some yogic practices with the actual physical object of White Shonkh. This is done in a ‘representative’ way. The object is to create harmonic tuning with spiritual reality and gain some kind of power to realise our dreams.

The swirling dervishes incorporate this shastra to some extent. Abnormal weather conditions like Sunami can also be caused due to the imbalance of this Vortex at the reality of our Earth. We are very much part of this reality and affect it in either way.

The chanting of Om, which is an essential part of Sri Anand Yoga has higher grades of techniques. At higher level, we use this vortex principle.

With the ‘emotional’ experiences gained in our earthly life, the
White Shonkh at our core level gets ‘coats’ of different stuff. With the positive experiences arising out of our joyous emotions, we progress faster towards our goal. On the other hand, every kind of negative experience arising out of emotions of the kind of hatred, suffering, pain, jealousy, sadness etc, puts different kind of coat on the White Shonkh. Our evolutionary journey does not get complete unless and until we ‘burn out’ this stuff. This is done through the life experience of these emotions ‘re-lived’ but with the ‘transformative’ process in the light of Joy. This world was created in JOY by the One Source. We need to reach that level. At the last stage of our evolution, we need to even leave this last and final coat of JOY and become PURE. This is the state beyond Joy. It is the stage of LIGHT. It is pure ‘Buddha’ state of enlightenment. Earlier we used to say – I am Joy. Now we just say ‘ I AM’. However, this is only the final map of our journey. We need not much bother about it at this stage of our evolution. We have to pass many stations before we can even think of these final stages. At our current stage, all this is pure ‘academic’ discussion.

Sri Anand Yoga is based on the above philosophy. That is why we lay great stress on the process of ‘creative participation’ in this earthly life by stretching our capacity beyond our ‘comfort’ level, bringing out positive change in our world – in whatever small or big way we can, while at the same time ‘enjoying’ the whole process, irrespective of the final outcome of our endeavour. Even the physical exercises of Sri Anand Yoga have this inner principle embodied in them. I have to stress that there is no sense of ‘sacrifice’ or ‘duty’ or ‘obligation’ or ‘holy act’ etc behind any of our actions. All whatever we do is in the sense of this ‘joyful play’. This understanding is absolutely essential in view of the higher level spiritual principles as explained above. This is totally different from the current religious teaching (of all religions) in which we are brought up. This may even appear to be ‘shocking’ to some religious minded people. Actually, it is all very simple. What we are doing is following the original plan of the Creator. It is ‘Sat-Chit-Ananda’ – Sadchidananda. The Truth in Consciousness founded on Bliss.

Fountain of Youth - Part One

My Experiments with Life
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10th February 2006

Shrikant Vasudeo
Sri Anand Yoga

Fountain of Youth
Part One

All of us want to stay naturally young and healthy for a long life. At the same time, with the digitization of life, we are more and more going away from the ‘natural’ element of our life. Cosmetic Surgery, Cosmetics, Youth enhancing drug therapy etc are hollow attempts to stay young. We tend to overlook the difference between staying young and just looking young. The cosmetics, hormone therapy etc have the effect of masking age changes, but they do not slow, stop or reverse aging. It has been accepted, but not much publicized for obvious reasons, by the scientists that the antiaging medicine in the form of specific drugs, vitamin cocktails or esoteric hormone mixtures are not supported by scientific evidence.
The recent scientific discovery into the cellular life opens up new vistas of knowledge. More than 90 % cells of our body are less than 100 days old. This is evident from the following life chart of the cells :
Cell Approximate Life Span
Red blood cells 120 to 130 days
White blood cells > 1 year
Platelets (blood) 10 days
Bone (skeleton) 3 months
Brain 90 + years (an entire lifetime)
Colon 4 days
Liver 6 weeks
Skin 1 month
Stomach 5 days
Spermatozoa 3 days

The above fact is true for a 1 year old baby as well as for a 100 year old man. If this is so, then the question is
· How come the 100 old man, with his body cells of less than 100 days old, looks a very old man ?
· Why can’t the diseased liver get automatically and naturally cured after 6 weeks when its sick cells get replaced with new healthy ones

The scientists answer this question with some jugglery of words. They say that the cells of a 100 year old man are indeed very young. What is old is the ‘cell expression’. The young cells ‘express’ old age like an artiste on drama stage ! It is all ‘drama’. This is certainly a true representation of the actual life process. However, it does not answer as to ‘why’ should the young cells ‘express’ the old age.

Let us also consider some other interesting facts. There are around 50 to 75 trillion cells in the body. It means 10,000 times the population of this entire world today. Each second there are about 6 trillion reactions taking place within each cell. It means that the total reactions in the single cell in one second is equivalent to the sum of 1000 reactions of each person of this planet. The cell is like an institution in itself. It performs a very complex set of actions based on intelligent processing of the information in its environment. All this wonder is ‘fitted’ in an extremely tiny space unimaginable in our normal sense perceptions. Most of the cells are so tiny that nearly one million cells can fit on the tip of a pin head. Our attempts to tinker with the functioning of the cells, will all our sophisticated techniques and tools and drugs, are absolutely ‘crude’.

When a human being die and his heart stops beating and his brain stops functioning, most of the cells in his body are still alive. We can say that the whole body is still alive at the cellular level. If we keep the body at normal temperature, it takes days before all the cells in our body die and in a true biological sense we can then only declare a person as dead and not when his heart stops beating ! Scientists have now stopped their frustrating endeavour to define ‘life’.

The normal age of a human being under normal living conditions and under normal health without any disease or stress or deprivation is about 120 to 150 years. The scientists call this ‘probable maximum human life’. Any person without the aid of any ‘modern longevity drug therapy’ can achieve the old age of 120 years. In Sri Anand Yoga, we call it current normal life – not just the probable maximum. The reason why people are reluctant to accept the ‘normalcy’ of human living conditions mentioned above is that the normal conditions of good health and cheerful attitude are very rarely found. But still they are normal indeed. What I want to stress is that in order to live healthy and cheerful life, you do not need high technology inaccessible to common man, you do not need specially prepared high-nutritious and expensive food, you do not need be a rich man, you need not live in a palace nor is it necessary to do any new age alternative therapy of pranic healing, reiki etc. A village man living his life in a simple manner can aspire to live up to 120 years. Therefore, though it is a rarity, this condition of normal life is normal indeed.
Biologically, the important factor responsible for aging is the gradual buildup of toxic junk which does not get ‘flushed out’ of our cellular system. In the organ of eye, junk stuff of dead cells gets accumulated in the back of the retina. It is called ‘age-related macular degeneration’. In similar manner, this junk material causes ‘arteriosclerosis’ in the arteries. In other words, the malfunctioning of the ‘drainage system’ of the cells causes us to age. Imagine what will happen when a very big swanky and sophisticated office building gets lousy drainage system or when we do not get call of the nature for just 3 days in row !

Sri Anand Yoga addresses this issue in a novel and interesting manner. The emotional buildup in a person is the main cause for the toxic buildup at the cellular level. The various yogic practices of Sri Anand Yoga do the job of flushing out the negative emotions in a continuous manner in the same way that the flowing river does not let the dirt get accumulated in it. This is a subject of a separate and detailed study and it will be covered in a separate note.

The various emotions which are generated in us get accumulated in various places in our physical body. If we do not keep this ‘emotional matter’ freely flowing in our body, it clogs the drainage system. The solution is NOT in stopping the emotions but in letting the emotions flow and not let them get stagnated.
Another factor responsible for cell degeneration and death is the role played by free-radicals. To control the ‘nuisance’ of free radicals, the therapy of anit-oxidents is used as a master card. However, in the process we under-estimate the important role the free radicals play in our physiological processes. Free radicals help in the immune response and cell communication. It is no doubt that the antioxidants contained in fruits and vegetables can reduce the risk of having various age-associated diseases, such as cancer, heart disease, macular degeneration and cataracts. However, taking external supplements of free radicals in the form of drugs is not much of a help. This aspect is not much publicized due to the vested interests of our pharmaceutical industry. Beta-carotene, an anti-oxidant, taken as external supplement, has been shown to have some adverse effects. The reason for the failure of external supplements of drugs to have the same effectiveness as the natural food like fruits and vegetables is very simple. Our cells are NOT the machinery and we can not replace the pare parts of the machinery. Our cells are living system and very much an integral part of our body and our body is also an integral part of ourself – our Self. Free radicals are like free and radical ideas of creative expression of our Self. When these ideas do not get their expression and the energy contained in these ideas does not get ‘channeled’ properly, it rebounds from the wall of our mental block and causes ‘disturbance’ in the equilibrium of our psyche. This disturbance is the root cause of dis-ease.
In our organised society, the failure of the system to effectively tackle the problem of terrorists and militants is mainly due to the failure of our system to properly understand the ‘free radical’ theory of our Society. We are accustomed to associate terrorists and militants with robbers and dacoits. Terrorist play with their own life. Any person who is ready to give up his own life for any cause, whether right or wrong as per our perspective, indicate the failure of our social and political system to ‘handle the free radicalism’ of the person terms as a terrorist. In fact, we all have in our own self, the subtle under-currents of terrorism and militancy.
Sr Anand Yoga effectively handles the ‘free radicals’ of our mind, the cells in our body and the terrorists in our society. This is done by the process of loving and joyful integration of the whole span of our life with the Universe. Integration of the One with the Many. The process of staying and looking young is effected in playing the game of life. ____________________________________________________________
…….. to continue