The end of all illusion :)

My ending comment in the last blog, 'are you getting anywhere' is a bit of a 'red herring' really because essentially there is no where to get to is there?

Boring as it may seem we are always 'here' and it is always 'now'.

When you go on holiday you change the scenery but not much else. Another way of getting away from yourself is to keep going on holiday.

If we invested half the energy we spend on escaping from ourselves we could change allot of things inside permanently and then not need to escape anymore.

Hmmmm, bristling and mutterings of outrage can be heard from here to Goa. (A) "What no holiday's are you kidding, I would die." (B) "Oh really why is that then? Aren't you living the life you want?" (A) "Well yes but I need a break now and then!" (B) "Ahhhh poor sausage".

If you invested a little more time on thinking consciously about the way you live your life and the way you spend your time and apply it to your practise you may change something permanently.

Yoga is not a way out it is a way in, a way into yourself so you can see who you are and who you have become. See what it 'feels' like to be you and be honest with yourself. This may be very upsetting or it could be very uplifting. Probably the worst thing for it to be is neither, where you may have got to the point of 'not caring' anymore about your life, or anything at all!

Turning everything to our advantage is one of the biggest things to realise. We do live in incredible times, in spite of what the doom and gloom merchants are saying, we have allot to be grateful for. Especially the fact that we are sitting at the forefront of a long line of wisdom and philosophies which stretch back thousands of years all more or less accessible on-line, the great google god is here to enlighten us and educates us.

'We have no excuses!'

Of all of the disciplines to survive the past fully intact, yoga is the most complete and comprehensive system of consciousness transformation available today.

I know there are herbs and drugs which apparently open up doorways to these so-called higher realms of consciousness. But yoga seems to be totally internal in it's modus-operandi, absolutely nothing is required, all you need is your God-given birthright of a human body and the wherewithal to endure the journey to freedom, simple but not easy.

'The maps are there all we have to do is use them'.

Anyway we have an incredible pharmacy right inside of our own body. Our nervous system is a series of minute electrical impulses leading to hormonal/chemical responses.

Quite simply put if you think negatively you will be sending those chemicals into yourself, and vice-versa, if you think positively you will send those signals into yourself.

Although I have to admit that this has been easier said then done for me. If you have been conditioned since birth to be a miserable git like me you may have your work cut out for you!! But nevertheless it will work if you work it!

When you do pranayama you are changing your consciousness, you are moving into higher levels of awareness and consciousness. So when you get into this state of being don't waste it by jabbering about nothing just to fill the void, shut up and meditate on it all. Then as you gradually drop back into so-called ordinary consciousness meditate again but from this state of awareness on what you were like in the other state. You are now looking at awareness with awareness, you are looking at intelligence with intelligence. You have now discovered at least two separate levels of consciousness and you can look at them and experience them from different levels.

'It's very subjective'.

If you read John Lilly's book; centre of the cyclone. He has mapped out at least 8 levels of higher consciousness and 8 levels of lower consciousness. This is based on idea that paramount reality, i.e, the place where we spend most of our time is in the middle.

Once we move through Asana to Pranayama we then meet the internalised focus of Pratyahara - Dharana - Dhyana. These are all the same thing for longer periods of time! Internal focus for extended periods of time, leading eventually to total immersion where subject and object are no longer separate - Samadhi. Do you want to wait any longer for this, or maybe you are too busy, too miserable or too happy to be bothered, which is it?

OM :)