be happy: 8 Days / 8 nights Silent Intensive Yoga Sadhana Co...

be happy: 8 Days / 8 nights Silent Intensive Yoga Sadhana Co...: 8 Days / 8 nights Silent Intensive Yoga Sadhana Course with Meng Foong in Langkawi This is an opportunity for those who already have s...

Highway 108

I first heard of Rishikesh and meditation when I was fifteen, reading about how the Beatles came to Rishikesh to attend a transcendental meditation course given by the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. The Beatles provided the soundtrack of my youth and I was introduced to their music by an uncle who had been a big fan during the nineteen-sixties and had bought all the original albums when they were first released. They were accompanied by Beach Boy Mike Love, actress Mia Farrow and her sister Prudence (yes the song is about her) who all went on to become teachers of the Maharishi’s TM technique. They were also joined by the Scottish musician Donovan, who during their stay taught John Lennon the finger-picking style used on Dear Prudence and Julia. 

The Beatles spent more time composing songs than meditating and eventually fell out with the Maharishi and all left before the end of the course. Even though they didn’t reach Nirvanic planes of enlightenment, their time in Rishikesh had been extremely fruitful musically and they penned more than forty songs during their stay, including most of the songs on the White Album and Abbey Road. 

Almost forty years later, the Maharishi’s ashram was a collection of overgrown abandoned ruins, squatted by monkeys and transients and the Maharishi himself lived in exile in Holland. I half expected to find a theme restaurant or Beatles memorabilia in the shops, but there was no evidence to mark their brief passage.

A huge number of orange-clad men ‘holy-men’ converged on Rishikesh. I recognized a certain look of determination in the eyes of the pilgrims, animated by a resolute inner drive and undoubtedly a large measure of faith. In other eyes there was only washed out resignation and defeat, or heartbreaking desperation. While most of them were passing through on their way to the source of the Ganges, some had come as far as Rishikesh and got no further. Having no old age pensions many of these old men depended on charity to survive, effectively becoming professional beggars living off the generosity of pilgrims and tourists. Depending on their individual karma these old men stayed in one of the many ashrams, or lived on the streets. They were fed at the local ashrams, so in theory, none were actually starving to death, but many of these men were genuinely destitute and miserable. I bought bags of oranges and any time I was approached with an extended hand, I gave fruit instead of coins. There was a street I took everyday, where monkeys sat alongside the sadhus begging for alms and one compassionate sadhu shared his orange with a monkey in a very touching scene. A handful of enterprising sadhus made a little money by dealing cannabis in its various forms and offered passers-by a companionable smoke from a chillum, a sort of straight-necked pipe, which seemed to be particularly popular among young Israelis. 

During the daytime it became increasingly hot and sometimes during the sweltering afternoons I just lay on my bed watching the ceiling fan turning round. Other days, when I was more animated, I bathed in the cool water of the Ganges by the sandy beaches beyond the Lakshman Juhla. I stayed close to the bank, clear of the treacherous currents that had carried away at least three foreign tourists during my weeks there. 

“It must be good karma to drown in the Ganges,” I heard someone say over tea and pastries in the German Bakery. I was unconvinced. 

Eventually the heat became too oppressive and I longed for cool mountain air. I wanted to see Gaumuk, the ‘Cow’s Mouth,’ the sacred source of the Ganges, so I hired a car and a driver through a travel agent at Ram Juhla and arranged for a seven a.m. departure. I had heard many contradictory tales about how long it would take me to get there, whether the road would be open, how much snow there would be and so forth. The travel agent recommended that I take three days. 

It was a beautiful clear morning without a cloud in sight, but seven came and went with no sign of my car. I read a notice taped on the travel agent’s door. If you really feel interested, please most welcome of all the three dimensional world’s friends and have a look some of the world’s best collections of Pashmina and Angora Products. I retired to the nearest chai stall, which afforded views of the Ganges and the travel agency and watched the trail of pilgrims and tourists cross the suspension bridge.

The driver showed up at eight-thirty, unshaven and bleary-eyed.

“I driving all night from Delhi baba. No sleeping. Not go Gangotri today.” 

He brought me to Rishikesh town and stopped at a taxi stand. 

“You staying here,” he said. He approached one of the idle drivers. A brief discussion ensued, money exchanged hands and then they both walked towards me. 

“This man he drive you Gangotri baba. Good driver man.”

I realized that if I had come directly to the taxi-stand I could probably have found a car and a driver for half the price I had paid the travel agent. I followed the new driver, a small stocky man, who barely reached my shoulder. He introduced himself as Pradeep and his head was joined directly upon his shoulders without anything resembling a neck between. His forehead carried a few nasty scars, but his eyes twinkled with good humour. He was a soft-spoken, private individual and though he knew some basic English, he said very little. His car was an older, less comfortable Ambassador than the one that had picked me up at the agency and I sat in the front seat beside him. The seat was quite high, probably to compensate for his diminutive stature, so I had to stoop or slouch to see the landscape. 

Before we left Rishikesh I asked Pradeep to make a detour to ‘Papu Lassi’ which consistently served the best lassis I have ever tasted in my life. As we sipped our drinks he quietly explained that since he was unprepared for a three day trip, he would like to pass by his house to pick up a bag with some overnight necessities and say goodbye to his wife and children. This commission completed, we pulled into a petrol station, filled the tank with diesel and off we went. 

My ears popped as the car rapidly gained altitude, winding around the tight hairpin bends through the forests. When I say rapidly, everything is relative, for not once over the next few days did I see the speedometer go over forty kilometres an hour. Later the Ganges valley opened up and the slopes were covered in terraced fields of wheat. These wheat fields grew in patchwork, each tiny plot, some just a few square metres in size, a slightly different colour as the wheat ripened in different degrees, perhaps reflecting the soil quality or different seed sown on different days. On other terraces grew orderly orchards in bloom with delicate white petals shining in the sun. We passed immaculate schoolchildren in crisply ironed uniforms, the boys’ hair slicked into smart partings, the girls’ hair tied with matching ribbons in neatly plaited pigtails. 

We stopped for breakfast and when I stepped out of the car the altitude was immediately evident in the coolness of the air. Pradeep disappeared into the kitchen while I had a hearty meal of Aloo Ghobi and a couple of chapattis, all washed down with a pot of what was possibly the best tea I had tasted in all my time in India. 

We were driving on the national highway 108 and it was no coincidence that the road bore such an auspicious of number. Making the pilgrimage to Gangotri and Gaumuk improved future karma and mitigated any bad karma that might be carried over into a future life, though I imagine the effects are diminished if you drive rather than walk. All along the road we passed Sadhus, Swamis and Sanyassins, each on their own individual pilgrimage towards or back from the source of the Ganges. Most carried a milk pot or a brass water vessel, some carried blankets or sticks, and one wizened skinny dark-skinned man, a true minimalist, wore only a skimpy orange loincloth. We passed a group of pilgrims all kitted out in matching t-shirts and flat-billed baseball caps. They weren’t carrying any baggage - there was a special vehicle that looked after that.  Pradeep explained that they were walking for charity, having set out from Varanasi and would make it to Gangotri by the time the temple was open. 

The road was badly in need of repair and rockslides had removed parts of the tarred surface in many places. Men employed large pine branches as brooms and swept clear some of the lighter rubble strewn across the surface of the road. Others were hard at work cooking up huge smoking vats of strong smelling tar and worked in pairs shovelling gravel into the black sticky mess. They used an ingenious technique I was to observe several times over the next few days, where two men simultaneously used the same shovel. One man held the shovel in a normal manner, while the other, by means of a strong rope tied around the neck of the shovel, helped lift the weight by tugging on the rope. Timing was important and both men worked as one, moving in unison efficiently maximising their resources. 

Part of the road had been deviated uphill from its original course because of the construction of the enormous Tehri Dam. Pradeep pulled over at a small Shiva shrine with red flags billowing in the breeze and we looked down on the lake that was forming in the valley below. In places, the tops of trees emerged from the water and they still bore leaves in indication of how recently they had been submerged. It was late April and the dam had been filling up since October, but the summer snowmelt had yet to flow and it still wasn’t full yet. Pradeep maintained that it was the biggest dam in Asia. He had never heard of the three Gorges project in neighbouring China. Quite an amount of controversy surrounded the Tehri Dam project which cost over a billion US dollars to complete. There was the inevitable environmental impact and more than one hundred thousand people had been dispossessed of their lands and their homes.

The town of Tehri and more than a hundred surrounding villages had been submerged and the villages that remained uphill went thirsty, as their precious drinking water was no longer accessible. Though in fairness, the diverted supply will provide more than four million people in Delhi with drinking water. Most of the villagers had been relocated to New Tehri, higher up the slope. How the dam was ever approved is a mystery, shrouded in rumours of corruption and incompetence, as it sits astride a major geological fault line. 

In 1991 a 6.8 magnitude earthquake had its epicentre at the actual site of the dam. According to some experts, a magnitude 8 earthquake would be sufficient to rupture the dam wall. Meanwhile, on the lake below me, someone was obviously adapting quickly to the new situation and I watched as a speedboat carved a white wake across the surface of the blue water. 

We stopped for another break a few hours later in the dusty town of Uttar Kashi. The thin mountain air was blighted with the smell of diesel exhaust fumes from idling buses and filled with the noisy racket of their horns and engines. It was a charmless place with a few grimy dingy eating establishments, but I suspect that if it hadn’t been so pollutated (to use the Indian term) it could have been an appealing little town. Perhaps it was the contrast of the dreary urban microcosm with the majestic scenery that made the place seem so dismal. I treated myself to a shave and later a few cups of tea to wash down the packet of biscuits I had purchased from a belligerent shopkeeper who blatantly and unapologetically tried to short change me. While I sipped my tea I was joined by a tall thin bespectacled German woman in her late thirties. She complained about lecherous Indian men and her altitude headaches, though the fumes and noise of the buses was enough to give anyone a headache. She had just come from Kerala where she had spent four months at Ama’s ashram. She sang her praises, as do all her devotees, and told me about how everything had changed since Ama first came into her life. Now she had come north to the Himalayas to find an old woman who lived in a village nearby and was rumoured to be spiritually enlightened. I wished her good luck and rejoined Pradeep, who belched prodigiously as he started up the car. Not long after Uttar Kashi we passed the Sivananda ashram. I knew there was a TTC course going on and I wanted to visit the place, but decided to wait until I passed on my way back down the valley.

The colourful flowering Jacarandas were left behind at lower altitudes, the trees started to thin out and most of them were pines. Tibetan settlements were evident by the prayer flags strung up over the houses in small villages. As we drove higher, the season changed from late spring to early spring. 

Every second building seemed to be an ashram and every third a temple with colourful flags fluttering in the breeze, red for Shiva, yellow for Vishnu, white for Brahma. Even though the car didn’t have the usual God stickers, I noticed that Pradeep blessed himself every time we passed a temple. There were more road works and new bridges spanned the valley, though none of them were connected to the road yet. In places the river was little more than a mountain stream, which was soon explained by another dam further upstream.

A conjuncture of my affinity for water and the fading daylight brought us to the tiny hamlet of Ganga Nani, famous for its hot springs. There were only a few rooms available, ranging from dismal to basic, so I chose basic. Pradeep said he preferred to sleep in the back of his car. 

Steam rose off the square, tiled pool in the centre of the village. I tested the water with a tentative toe. The hot springs bore their name well - the water was next to scalding. It took me a while to ease myself into total immersion and I couldn’t stay in the water for very long. Whether it was the altitude or the hot water, or a combination of the two I started to feel decidedly light-headed. 

I had something to eat and during my meal felt a sudden sickening shudder throughout my body. A second later, I heard the tremendous blast of an explosion, followed by a clatter of falling rock. Across the valley, the road building crew was using dynamite to cut a new passage through the mountainside. Ganga Nani had a sad bleak feel to it and apart from a handful of Israeli tourists, I didn’t see any women. 

Lonely unkempt men huddled in a corner warming their extended hands in front of a gas fire. It seemed ironic to haul heavy gas canisters up the mountainside when a few lengths of coiled copper pipe connected to the scorching water could have provided every house with environmentally friendly central heating. One curly haired Israeli with a bushy beard told me he had been there for over a month. His bleary blood-shot eyes and his vacant manner led me to believe he had found some other charms to the place. 

I retired early to bed reading Swami Parahamsa Yogananda’s Autobiography of a Yogi. I had only recently gotten used to sleeping without some sort of covering, as the heat of Indian nights sometimes made even a thin sheet superfluous to comfort. It was nice to breathe cool fresh air again. I slept under two heavy quilts that must have weighed forty kilos between them. I felt secure under the weight and it reminded me of childhood blankets protecting me from the cold Irish winters. The mattress and pillow were firm to my liking and soon I was in a sound slumber. 

I had strange dreams, perhaps fuelled by the altitude and my bedtime reading. I woke up around one in the morning with the metal clanging sound of an unmelodious clock bell. The noise of the earth moving equipment on the opposite side of the valley droned on through the night, the mountain being relentlessly eaten away a bite at a time by the mechanical monsters. I couldn’t get back to sleep so I got up and had another soak in the hot water. The stars were as bright as I had ever seen them and one was so obviously a planet that I could make out its round shape. Despite the coolness of the night air, the water was still barely tolerable and I didn’t stay long submerged, but rather lay on the cool poolside tiling, gazing up at the stars with my feet and lower legs dangling in the water. 

The following morning we were on the road at six and an hour or so later we stopped to eat. A small group of children stood nearby watching me intently; their shyly smiling faces were more Oriental than Indian and their eyes were far older than any child’s eyes should be. I gave them some pens and pencils from the supply in my bag and then went to the small restaurant Pradeep had pointed out. Once again, he disappeared into the kitchen. He had told me that he often travelled this road and I suspected that he had his regular halts, where in exchange for bringing customers he got his own meals for free. I ate a couple of spicy Aloo Parathas, washed down by a few small buckets of tea and met a man from New Zealand on his way to Gangotri. He was in India to represent the United Nations forestry department at a conference for the Asia-Pacific area held at the Forestry Institute in Dehradun. 

“Things are looking up,” he said. “As countries become richer, they dedicate bigger budgets and more resources to forestry management. China is doing particularly well. That said, everyone has a long way to go to catch up with Japan, they’re the leaders in forestry conservation. It’s complicated though. Japan imports cheap timber from poorer countries like Malaysia and Indonesia, who only see the immediate short term benefit of financial gain. Apart from a few national parks, Malaysia has felled almost all of its original rain forest and that’s bad news for everyone. Indonesia clear-cuts huge tracts of land, takes all the useful timber and then burns the rest, polluting the air across the whole region. Most of the logging is illegal and the government doesn’t have the resources to combat it. More often than not, local officials are bribed to turn a blind eye.” 

“And still you say things are looking up?” I asked. 

“Well everything is relative, but there’s definitely more awareness and more action than ten years ago.” 

“What about India?” I asked. He sighed deeply. 

“The population is the problem. Most of them live in villages and gather wood to use for cooking. They cut down the trees and the soil dries up and blows away. Even if they wanted to plant new trees, they can’t because the soil looses its fertility. Then they have to move away, often to the cities and that creates a whole new set of social and economic problems. That’s part of the reason the conference was held in India – to try and highlight the problem.” 

Pradeep emerged from the kitchen, looking suitably sated and we set off on the road again. After a sharp bend, we suddenly came across a dead cow with a distended bloated belly, lying halfway across the road. Pradeep swerved to avoid hitting it and blessed himself muttering something under his breath. Then he haltingly explained that this was not an auspicious omen and asked me if I was sure I wanted to continue. I assured him that we would be fine and he gave me a reproachful sideways look and lapsed back into his customary silence.

All along the road were signposts placed by the BRO, the Border Roads Organisation, with words of warning and advice, ranging from silly to sublime, painted in black on yellow. I jotted down some of my favourites, my pen jerking over the paper on the bumpy road. In homage and acknowledgment to the BRO here is just a small selection of those gems. 

• India will shine if you drive without wine
• Life is short, don’t make it shorter
• No race no rally enjoy the beauty of the valley
• Be Mister late not late mister
• Be gentle on my curves
• If you are married, divorce speed
• On the bend, go slow friend
• On my curve, check your nerve
• Safety on road, safe tea at home
• A cat has nine lives, you only have one
• If you sleep your family will weep
• After whiskey driving risky
• Mountains are a pleasure when you drive with leisure
• Peep, peep do(n)’t sleep
• Do not be harsh on my curves
• Speed thrills but kills
• The more you hurry, the more worry.
• Life is God’s greatest gift. 
• The difficult will be done immediately; the impossible will take some time.

Gangotri was more a village than a town, spread across the two banks of the river and most of the shops and restaurants were boarded up or being painted ready for the oncoming pilgrimage season. As I walked towards the trail that led to Gaumuk, I noticed once again that apart from obvious visitors, there wasn’t a woman in sight. Though it was only just past nine in the morning the sun was already hot and got hotter as I made my way uphill. I paid my fees at the entrance of the national park and gave my passport details. Perhaps the authorities were worried that I would disappear over the border into China or Tibet.

I planned to walk to an ashram run by a character named Lal Baba and from there set off early the following morning to reach Gaumuk, where the Ganges emerges from the glacier. It was nice to be hiking again. It was a familiar routine my body knew. My feet instinctively sought safe foothold on broken ground and the rhythm of my breathing automatically adjusted to the slope of the terrain. The dusty trail soon levelled out into an even, gentle climb. The scenery was magnificent. Snow capped peaks rose up to touch the sky, giant avalanche corridors were strewn with rocks and broken tree trunks mixed with the melting snow. Where it was calm, the water that would become the Ganges, glittered in shades of blue and turquoise. Elsewhere it rushed over the rocks in frothing foaming rapids. Lizards lay sunning themselves on granite rocks. I startled a couple of Ibexes and they clattered their way up a steep slope. The sun was beating down and I regretted not having a sunhat. Within a few hours I had a pounding headache and was feeling dizzy. I estimated that I was at around three thousand five hundred metres, the highest I had ever been. I stubbornly continued on. Perhaps it wasn’t altitude sickness and just a touch of sunstroke. 

Clouds bunched up on the horizon, the wind blowing them in my direction and I discovered that I had inadvertently left my raincoat in my hotel room in Rishikesh. The temperature was dropping fast. I chided myself for venturing into the mountains so unprepared. I had enough hiking experience to know better. If I could just plod on for another hour, I would probably reach the ashram, but I felt queasy and had hot flushes and shaky knees. I assured myself that I would feel better after a night’s rest, but my body protested vehemently and I retched and vomited by the trailside. I sat on a rock, took stock of the situation and decided to go back down, perhaps stay the night in Gangotri, purchase a raincoat and try again the next day. I stumbled and shivered as I made my way downhill, passing provision-laden porters carrying, boxes, gas canisters, and mattresses. After an hour or so, the sky had completely clouded over and it started to snow, just a few free-floating flakes blown on the breeze, but snow all the same. It was bitterly cold. I passed a handful of hardened orange-robed pilgrims who were so close to their goal that they were not about to be put off by a spot of bad weather. By the time I reached Gangotri, the snow had turned to light rain. 

I bought a pair of woollen gloves from a Nepali shopkeeper, but even wearing them, the tips of my fingers were numb. I sat in a breezy restaurant, the only place that seemed to be open, and watched the drizzle turn into a heavy downpour, as lightening flashed and thunder rumbled ominously. My head ached as if caught in a vice. After some tea and hot food I started to feel a little better and looked for a room, but the only one I found had no water, no electricity and no heating. I thought to myself that I would feel a whole lot better and warmer if I went back down the valley to the hot springs at Ganga Nani. I waited in the restaurant for the rain to ease off before trying to locate Pradeep and a group of hikers who had passed me earlier, stumbled in. They were all shivering and sodden as they sat down at an adjacent table.

 “We thought we were close to the ashram, but it started to snow so heavily we could hardly see the path. Rocks came tumbling down the mountainside all around us. It was really scary. We couldn’t see them, only hear them.” 

They decided that it was safer to retreat and try again some other time and this eased my disappointment at not having reached my goal. Once again I heard the story that was circulating among travellers around Rishikesh. A few weeks earlier, a German woman had reached the glacier and ventured out to the edge where the already powerful Ganges gushed forth from its icy cavern. The ice capsized and she was instantly lost to the tumultuous torrent. Her boulder battered body was only found days later. Everyone agreed that it was a very symbolic way to die. She must have burned off all her past karma to die at the source of the Ganges.

Back in Ganga Nani, the air was decidedly cooler than the previous day, though it was still a lot warmer than Gangotri. The temperature of the water had dropped to a more comfortable level and I soaked in the pool for a long time until even my bones were warm again. I was tired from my hike and retired early to the same bed as the previous night, but this time slept a deep dreamless sleep. 

I arrived at the Sivananda Ashram the next day, just in time for tea. The whole setting was very beautiful, nestled in an elbow of the Ganges, with fresh clean mountain air and birds chirping in the flowering trees. The grounds were meticulously kept and the flowerbeds were a riot of colour. Swami S had come north from Kerala for a month to teach the TTC and there were a few other familiar faces I knew from Neyyar Dam. We chatted and exchanged news and I talked with a few of the students in their yellow t-shirts. Kailesh, who had worked with me in the Health Hut in Neyyar Dam, gave me a guided tour of the ashram and we took a short walk along the riverbank to the final resting place of Swami Vishnu Devananda. 

A couple of hours later I was back to the sweltering heat of Rishikesh, but I only stayed a few days more. I caught a train that arrived in Pathankot in the small hours of the morning, from there a series of buses to McLeod Ganj via Dharamsala and finally a rickshaw that brought me to the familiar scene of Bhagsu. I spent the last few weeks before my departure between reading and rambling in the neighbouring hills. The weather was cooler and it rained most days, which seemed a novelty at first, but quickly became tiresome and sometimes hailstones the size of golf balls fell from the sky. Then a combination of my already fragile digestive system and a dubious meal sent me staggering to the toilet and left me writhing on my bed in gut wrenching agony. I had had enough of India. I just wanted to go home. Then I remembered I didn’t have one.

The practice of letting go and free ourselves from continue being hurt by past unhappy experiences...

There is no doubt that when somebody does something through speech or action that is hurtful to our feelings, we will feel hurt, upset and angry...
 
We have the rights to feel hurt, upset and angry in this very moment when somebody does or says something that is hurtful in this present moment... As that painful feeling of being hurt is a normal reaction towards some speech and action that our mind/ego recognizes as something "hurtful", or it is a consequence derives from somebody's "hurtful" speech and action.

In this very moment when the hurtful speech or action is happening, it is the responsible of that person for his or her "hurtful" speech and action that is causing us to feel hurt in this present moment... But, this is only valid in this very moment when it is happening. Afterwards, if we still continue to feel hurt, upset and angry, then it will be our own responsibility for allowing ourselves continue to be hurt and feel hurt, even though that "hurtful" incident has already gone, it doesn't exist in the reality of the present moment now, but it only exists as part of our memories...

We are the one who is responsible for allowing ourselves continue to be hurt repeatedly over and over again by our own attachment towards our past unhappy memories... This hurt is no longer the responsibility or consequences of other people's hurtful speech and action, but it is our own responsibility...
 
To love ourselves, to be kind and compassionate towards ourselves, it is our own choice and freedom to free ourselves from continue being hurt by past unhappy happenings or past painful experiences by forgive other people's hurtful speech and action or wrong doings, by letting go of the past instantly...

Memories will still be there, either it will get stronger or gradually fade away, depending on how much energy we feed to them, but they are just a bunch of happy and unhappy memories... We cannot erase all the unhappy memories that we don't like... But for sure, we can practice letting go of the past instantly by letting go of the attachment towards the past experiences whether they are good or bad experiences... Memories will be there coming and going in our mind, but they have no more power to influence us for how we feel in the present moment now...

And in order for us to be able to let go of the past unhappy experiences, we need to know the truth about how come we feel hurt and who is responsible for it?

By understanding the connection between the past memories and our emotions and feelings, and knowing what is going on when we felt hurt in the past and why we continue to feel hurt by the past unhappy experiences in the present moment now, and knowing what is being kind and compassionate towards all being including ourselves is also one of the beings, we need to be kind and compassionate towards ourselves, and love ourselves, we will know that the only way to heal ourselves from painful experiences is by letting go of the past instantly, by practicing forgiveness and letting go...

To forgive other people's wrong and hurtful actions and speech, is being kind and compassionate towards ourselves... Let go of anger and hatred... 

Free ourselves from continue being hurt by past unhappy experiences which don't exist in the reality of the present moment now, but only exist as a phantom that lives in our memories playing tricks onto our feelings in the present moment now, which is meaningless and wasting our energy to entertain it...

It is not about denying or ignoring our feelings. It is about to feel or be aware of what we are feeling now in the present moment, allow all these feelings to arise and pass away, and let them go.... It doesn't matter if they are good feelings or bad feelings, happy feelings or unhappy feelings, pleasant feelings or unpleasant feelings, feel or be aware of their presence in this very moment, and let them go...

Be happy.

Serve, love, give, purify, meditate, realize

This motto is the essence of the teachings of Swami Sivananda.

If we want to know what is yoga and what is the practice of yoga, then this motto is a simple way to find out what they are.

Serve, love, give, purify, meditate, realize

Selfless service, non-attachment, unconditional love, renounce the fruit of actions, Yama, Niyama, Asana, Pranayama, Pratyahara, Dharana and Dhyana are the basic practice for us to purify the mind to realize the Truth.

The entire yoga practice is about realizing compassion and wisdom... Or in another terms, to be free from egoism and ignorance.

All our yoga practice is for purifying the mind, to remove ignorance and to eliminate the ego.

If our mind is not purified, ignorance is not removed and the ego is not eliminated, then no matter how many hours or years we have been "practicing yoga", and how much "physical and mental benefits" that we have attained from performing the "yoga practice", it doesn't determine anything. We are still not free.

It doesn't matter if we have an external Guru or teacher, or it doesn't matter if our Guru or teacher is enlightened or famous, it is our own effort and practice that will determine whether we are practicing yoga or not, and whether we will realize the Truth or not, and whether we will be liberated from ignorance, and be free from sufferings that derive from being ignorant...

Perform all our yoga practice, duties and responsibilities without attachment, identification, intention, judgment or expectation, and be free.

Do our best and let go.

Om shanti.

Niyamas

Saucha means purity or cleanliness on both a physical and mental level. Yoga is a system of purification for both the mind and the body. Pure thoughts produce pure actions. Being bodily clean helps keep us healthy and free from disease. Saucha can be purity in the company we keep. It can also be extended to include purity in anything we take in through the sense doors - pure images, sounds, smells, tastes.

Santosha conveys a sense of contentment, serenity, happiness. We owe it to ourselves to be happy. When we are happy people around us are happier. We strive to be content with what life offers us, to be equanimous in face of the trials and tribulations that life sends us, to remain unaffected by the external influences.

Tapas is the practice of austerity. Living an austere existence enables us to be able to face hardship when it comes to us or equally to appreciate good things when they come along. There are many different practices, such as fasting once a week, or sleeping on the floor from time to time, sitting on the floor or voluntarily enduring some kind of hardship that may not be necessary. This helps us to train the mind and bring it under control. However, tapas must not be interpreted as punishment and should not be practiced with any sort of negative thoughts about oneself or one's practice.Being disciplined to practice asana and pranayama is one form of tapas.

Swadhyaya literally means 'self-study' and entails the study of scriptures - traditionally the Vedas and the Puranas which represent an incredible storehouse of knowledge of the human condition and our true potential as human beings. Practically, swadhyaya can mean studying any uplifting books or texts. The advent of the printing press and internet means that we have a greater possibility of finding suitable reading material than ever before in the history of humanity.Through studying these texts we learn that we are not alone on the path and any questions we can ask pertaining to our existence have been asked since the existence of mankind and often answered with great lucidity and inspiration by many writers, both ancient and modern.

Ishwara-pranidhana is surrendering oneself to the divine will, having faith that we are all part of a greater picture and that the interconnectedness of everything shows that there is a higher reality. Some people will put labels on this, calling it God or Gaia or Tao or Universal Conciousness or any number of things, but by trying to express an infinite concept with mere words we automatically limit our experience. Not everything can, nor should, be explained in rational terms. Ishwara-pranidhana is about accepting that we are part of something much greater than we can ever understand and surrendering to that.

Yamas

Yamas and Niyamas make up the moral and ethical basis for the practice of yoga. In simple terms they are the do's and don'ts of yoga. As in anything in life, the foundation has to be solid in order to support the structure.

Yamas 

Ahimsa means non-harmfulness or non-injury, both in deed and thought, as every action is the fruit of a thought. One should not harm, injure, maim or kill any being, including oneself. Vegetarianism is an extension of this respect for life.

Satya means truthfulness. Truthfulness in speech, thought and action.Truthfulness in dealing with others, but also truthfulness to ourselves. When we are really truthful about ourselves we don't always necessarily like what we see. It is at this point we must be very careful. Accept yourself as you are. If there are changes to be made, then make them, but don't develop a negative self-image. When we learn how to accept ourselves with all our imperfections we can be more understanding and compassionate towards others and accept what we percieve to be their imperfections. In being truthful about ourselves we must learn to accept the reality as it is and not as we would like it to be. Every human being contains darkness and light, a potential for good or bad, but if we react with negativity towards ourselves we only reinforce our misery. Being truthful brings about a clear conscience, which in turn gives us more peace of mind.There is no peace to be found in self-delusion.

Asteya means non-stealing, but can also extend to the concept of non-acquisitiveness. One should not envy anything that belongs to another or seek to own something that is not rightfully one's own. Similarly possessing a thing merely for the possession of it is a futile exercise. The unnecessary hoarding of material possessions is of no help to us as they only serve to create attachment. Where there is attachment there will ultimately be suffering. Asteya is a principal of minimalism, living simply without excess.

Aparigraha is the non-acceptance of gifts or bribes. Once again we must not be swayed by the lure of "gold". Corruption and dishonesty can ultimately only lead to misery.

Bramacharya is the exercise of restraint over the libido. This is always a touchy topic, but the practice of celibacy can be found in any spiritual practice or religion. Yoga advises us to maintain restraint and control over our sexual impulses to avoid depleting our store of vital energy. The energy that is at the base of mankind's sex drive is a powerful one. It has the potential to create life. Without this inherent drive to reproduce our species would be long extinct. Through the practice of yoga this base energy can be transformed and purified into a spiritually elevating energy called Ojas. Total celibacy demands tremendous strength and courage and requires that the energy be channeled in a higher form. Practicing celibacy just for celibacy can create frustration and neurotic behavioural problems. Gautama the Buddha himself said that if there was any other obstacle as great as the total observance of bramacharya he didn't think that he would have achieved enlightenment.

Different paths of yoga

Karma yoga - the yoga of action. This is based on the idea of selfless service to humanity, subordinating the ego to do what needs to be done, rather than doing what one wants to do. All actions are performed without expectation of praise or acknowledgement and without any attachment to the fruit of one's actions.

Jnana yoga - the yoga of reason. This is an intellectual and philosophical pursuit for knowledge and involves studying the Vedas, the Puranas and other philosophical dissertations compiled by the sages. A Jnana Yogi always asks why, and never accepts things blindly without explanation. It is the rational, analytical, cerebral approach. Jnana yoga uses the mind to go to the limits of reason then step beyond the intellect into the boundless realm of intuition.

Bhakti yoga - the yoga of devotion. This is said to be the easiest and simplest path to follow. It merely demands surrendering to the divine will and often involves the practice of rites and rituals. Any kind of devotion to a god of any name or form and the smells and bells of many religions are manifestations of Bhakti yoga. The mind is stilled by the intensity and immediacy of the experience and the atmosphere of devotion.

Raja yoga is literally the royal path and is the system of yoga to which the practice of asanas belongs and the one which we will proceed to describe in more detail. Patanjali also called is ashtanga yoga form the Sanskrit ashta meaning eight and tanga meaning a branch or a limb. (This is not to be confused with the teachings of Patthabi Jois of Mysore who took the term ashtanga and applied it as a label to his own particular interpretation of asana practice.)