2003-05-31

Yoga: Hatha Yoga and The War on Terror

By Lori Tompkins

Hatha Yoga has risen to great heights of popularity at the same time that our War on Terror was being incubated and finally erupted in the United States. It is surprising to see how much Hatha Yoga and the War on Terror actually have in common.

        Both are a forceful attempt to bring various disharmonious and troublesome parts of our self, our world, into alignment. Both strive to forge an axis of light, rather than an axis of darkness in our self or world. Both are the result of a desire to be less vulnerable to the stresses of the world. Both are an effort to root out sources of our suffering, fear, sickness and death. Yet neither address the central issue of our fears and ills. Neither directly address the central Ignorance that informs our sickness and self-collapse - our Ignorance of the One Self.

        Hatha yoga is a now a multi-billion dollar industry, which with all its videos, magazines, advertisements, franchises, scandals, law-suits and in-fighting, resembles less an adventure in consciousness and more an adventure of the ego and an adventure in capitalism. The War on Terror, also a multi-billion dollar industry, also occurs as an adventure of the (nationalistic) ego and an adventure in capitalism, more so than an adventure of some great spirit of freedom and democracy.

        Hatha Yoga and our government are certainly not the only limited attempts at alignment and security ignoring the original cause of self-collapse and our terror of collapsing. Our entire civilization is build upon a loss of contact with what we are, a loss of direct knowing.

        Yoga, in full form, is the epic work of recovering knowledge and vision of the One Self. It is the journey of becoming fearless in the face of the One Self. Arjuna, the hero of Bhagavad Gita is struck with terror when Krishna reveals the One Self in its entire mind-boggling, emotionally-disturbing multiplicity. He can not bear the vision and asks Krishna to resume the form of a person. Krishna prepares Arjuna to be victorious in battle with the knowledge that nothing is other than Him Self. He is armed with this eternal Truth. It occurs that there is no victory possible without this knowledge. It occurs that embodying this knowledge IS the victory.

        Where is the victory in one unconscious fragment of a being dominating over other unconscious fragments of its self? The Rig Veda describes the journey of discovering or recovering the Lost Sun -- the Lost consciousness of the One Being that we are. Maybe we will start to scratch our heads and say, “Hey that is our journey!”

        St. John’s Revelation refers to a conqueror who comes amongst all sorts of darkness and calamity and liberates at least a segment of mankind from its bondage and suffering. We interpret the prophecies as referring to one person, and do not consider the prophecy is also calling forth a new consciousness. We do not consider that the apocalypse and all its fire and brimstone is referring to what happens as the consciousness of unity rises up in a world built on the assumption of duality (ignorance of reality). It is not surprising that there would be some significant “hell to pay” as we go through the contractions of the birth of a new consciousness.

        Integral yogi Sri Aurobindo (1872-1950), taught that the revelation of the One, is not just a spiritual goal removed from practical life on earth, but that it is the basis for an actual evolutionary leap. He wrote that just as life evolved in matter, and mind evolved in life forms, that there is more yet to come - a higher order of our Being emerging from mind. It should be a relief to us in many ways that the seed of what we are has not yet fully flowered, that this is not as good as it gets.

        “This infinite and eternal Self of things is an omnipresent Reality, one existence everywhere; it is a single unifying presence and not different in different creatures; it can be met seen or felt in its completeness in each soul or each form in the universe.”            

“[The supermind] knows the self and reality of things by identity, by experience of oneness or contact of oneness and a vision ...
        It is only when mentality is overpassed and drops away into a passive silence that there can be the full disclosure and the sovereign integral action of the supramental gnosis.”
                                        --The Synthesis of Yoga.

        Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet (1938 - ), continues the Integral Yoga begun by Sri Aurobindo and sheds much light on the process by which our civilization is undergoing the rigors of this shift in consciousness, which is of course apocalyptic for the dualistic mentality due to be overpassed. In her book, The Hidden Manna, she details how St. John’s Revelation prophesies the new consciousness of unity and the birth of the Hidden One (who is destined to put an end to war). She writes that with the recovery of the Hidden One (the Lost Sun) we will recognize even the most disenfranchised/evil parts of our world as our own self.

“[The secret power hidden in the core of matter] shall be released, so that the sun which it is can reveal the truth of itself. The beast [from the bottomless pit] is to be transformed. Yet for this, it is necessary that he be allowed to rise from his hiding place, and in this process he must show his deformed face. The people will learn through this exposure that the ‘beast’ is not something other than themselves; Satan is not the regent of some far-off and buried Hell. He is rather the secret energy in matter, and he is evil because the human race knows only his Shadow. Satan is actually the shade of the Hidden Sun . . . There is no question of getting rid of the power, of annihilating it, or destroying it; there is only the question of a transforming of that which eternally is.” (p. 227)

        Within our bodies, each individual cell, tissue, and organ operates “in the dark”, sub-consciously; participating in a mostly harmonious effort towards maintaining the body of the individual. It is not so difficult to consider that, within our larger Self, each human being is a “cell” operating in darkness and that from within the cell or shell of our ego, we have not been able to perceive the fullness of what we are.

        Our cancers and sicknesses can largely be seen as the effect of various cells, tissues and organs forgetting what they are a part of, forgetting their proper role, and forgetting how to participate in the whole health of the being. Our wars and societal ills can be seen in the same light. Individual cells, people or nations who have forgotten what they are, are naturally at odds with others within the Self.

        Yoga is ultimately the work of finding the lost Sun, the lost One ... the forgotten Song of our One Being. It is the work of re-membering the One Self and preparing oneself, all the cells, tissues, organs, and senses to be open to the full knowledge or light the One.

        Without this key of Oneness, as individuals we keep “hoarding the light” as is described in the Rig Veda, operating in the dark cells or caves of our egos on the principle of “divide and conquer.” We keep misinterpreting the truth of our Being, thinking the victory is in possessing, conquering, or having more than the Other, which we do not recognize as our own Self. We keep forgetting how very true the saying is “United we stand, divided we fall.” The true victory is not in unitingagainst anything, but flat out in Uniting.

        The Vedic Rishis wrote that as soon as we experience something, someone as Other than our own Self, we have fallen from the Truth, fallen from “Heaven”, and in a very real sense have become mortally wounded. This is the original Sin, the loss of the Sun, the loss of Gnosis or the direct knowledge of the One that we are in all our parts. This loss is the source of our vulnerability, our fear, terror, suffering, sickness and death. This is the Force of Evil/Darkness with which we battle ...  none other than our own individual and collective ignorance of the essential Oneness of Being.
        At “Ground Zero” soon after 9-11, President Bush yelled through his bull horn instigating a loud, sad and embarrassing display of massive ignorance, “We’re number One! We’re number One! We’re number One!”
        That is certainly One way to remind people that our current consciousness is due for a serious upgrade. There will most likely be no shortage of such reminders. If all goes well, our Ignorance will continue to become more and more obvious, exposed, painful, and intolerable.
        How soon might we recognize a world leader who has the All-Healing Knowledge, and can help remind the world, “We are One! We are One! We are One!”?

        A true War on Terror would mean a complete will to Re-Educate ourselves, or rather to allow ourselves to be Re-Educated by the full force of our Being that will not rest until the One is realized. A true War on Terror would mean a complete will to see past our false constructions and egotistic agendas towards an integral understanding of What Has Been and What Is. It would look a lot more like Yoga and a lot less like chasing a shadow enemyout there somewhere . . . less like corruption, greed, deception, conspiracy, self-interest, imperialism, exploitation, murderous capitalism, torture, and perversion.

        An all-out War on Terror would mean an all-out attempt to understand/know that everyone -  and everything -  is an envoy of the One Self, an envoy of Our Self accomplishing, however consciously or unconsciously, some necessary function of our unfolding. This would entail an all-out will to see what is happening behind the apparent dualities, the apparent atrocities . . . an all-out will to trust and eventually come to see that our Self knows exactly what it is doing by the second, regardless of the mind’s limitations and its truly frightening perspective, and that there is No Other to fear. This also entails an all-out will to recognize the birth of the Hidden One, and to identify with that unified consciousness rather than the consciousness of duality that is collapsing.

        Our bodies, minds, nervous systems, senses and sensitivities are currently ill prepared for the vision of Oneness and the energy that comes with this experience (i.e. ill-prepared for the Truth/Reality behind dualistic appearances). Many yoga teachers warn against a forced or premature uncoiling of the infinite energy that lies dormant at the base of our spine, the Kundalini. Perhaps we might recognize that through all means, whatever shocks and losses (and gains) necessary, we are being prepared towards being able to contain the full current of the energy that is  awakened and released upon the vision of the Unified Whole. Perhaps we might recognize that the structure is being built, the lines being laid in us and through us and that one day, the master switch will be FOUND in us, flicked and then we will be irrevocably turned ON - a functional One Being operating on full power, fully connected to all parts of Our Self, in full consciousness. Then where would be the urge to disrespect, disdain, discount and hack at ourselves as we currently do? Where would be the urge to capitalize gains or derive pleasure at the expense of some precious part of our self?

        Perhaps upon the Recovery of the Lost One, we will find the essential urge of Our Being is not to divide and conquer but to Love Our Self, completely, without pause, without reservation, without condition. Then our War on Terror will have been successful.

Lori Tompkins, received a BA English Literature from the University of Virginia and an MA in Education & Curriculum Development at the University of Colorado at Boulder. She is a certified hatha yoga instructor and an ex-yoga studio owner, wondering how to make a living not selling-out. See her Website: www.quantumyoga.org

For information on Integral Yoga see http://www.sriaurobindosociety.org.in/ or Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet website www.aeongroup.com