The body is made up of the five elements—earth, water, fire, air and ether combined with the ego and other gross senses. They form the basis of the major chakras that govern the body; earth for Mooladhar, water for Swadhisthan, fire for Manipoorak, air for Anahad and ether for Vishuddhi. The controls for the various elements in our body lie at our fingertips. The little, ring, middle and index fingers represent earth, water, ether and air respectively while the thumb represents fire.
Things expand on heating and contract on cooling. If any element touches the tip of the thumb, it expands and at the base it reduces. We can very easily increase or decrease the various bodily elements, depending on the situation, using mudras. For example, in extreme tension and anxiety, like when appearing for an interview, exam or an important meeting, the vayu tattva increases leading to uneasiness in the chest. Place your index finger at the base of the thumb (where you get a pulsating feeling), the air element will normalise and you will feel better. The gyan mudra, which involves touching the index finger to the tip of the thumb, has the diametrically opposite effect. If the body is unprepared for the increase in the vayu tattva, tension increases and nervous disorders happen. Hence it is inadvisable to sit in gyan mudra in the initial stages of dhyan. It is introduced by one’s Guru at a later stage, after the body has attained a specific balance. Mudras are a perfect and precise science, however, not taught en masse. It is given by the Guru to the shishya, as per individual needs and capacity. If used incorrectly, it can do more harm than good. The purpose of mudras is to bring the body in a state of balance. An incorrect mudra would create imbalance because an element which is not supposed to increase might do so.
As one moves up, lower elements merge with the higher. Ether contains air, fire, water and earth; air holds fire, water and earth; fire contains water and earth, and water contains the earth element. To effect a change, these can be easily controlled and modified by accessing the element that is above the five elements—the par-tattva or Shiva, governed by the agya chakra, in the sanidhya of Guru. ‘Omkar bindu samyuktam…’ means everything is present in the Omkar bindu, the point where everything is present; ‘Nityam dhayanti yoginam’, meaning the yogi’s dhyan is always on the par-tattva. A yogi has an association with the lower elements, too, but he controls them through the agya.
But how to experience the Shiv tattva, the basis of all elements?
The par-tattva is not experienced by an ordinary person because he does not need it. He spends his life in the pursuit of the five senses which pertain to the five basic elements and the five basic chakras. Sense of smell is controlled by Mooladhar, taste by Swadhishthan, sight by Manipoorak, touch by Anahad and sound by Vishuddhi. When there is no need, then there is little incentive to look further, and hence, an ordinary person remains unaware of the Shiv tattva. Shiv is beyond the five tattvas, the par-tattva, in which all the tattvas reside. Experience of Shiv requires the awakening of agya through yog and Sanatan Kriya under a Guru, and the pleasure associated with the experience of Shiv is limitless.
Yogi Ashwini is the spiritual head of Dhyan Ashram.
Shiv is the doer and may be likened to a vehicle. If you remove ‘i’ from Shiv, it becomes ‘shav’ (corpse). The ‘i’ represents Shakti, which is the fuel that energises this vehicle to perform action. Shakti is the force of the physical world. Shivratri is the night of merger of Shiv and Shakti making a complete whole. Shiv and Shakti pertain to manifest creation and arise from the unmanifest. The journey back to the unmanifest can be carved only through their complete merger which is the ultimate purpose of yoga and Sanatan Kriya . A practical example of merger of Shiv and Shakti is the institution of marriage where the merger of male and female leads to manifestation of a new life. If there is a mismatch in this merger of male and female, or Shiv and Shakti, the marriage remains incomplete. This imbalance is evident in the progeny who will exhibit anti-social and undesirable behaviour and traits. The rishis of yesteryear explained how incompleteness sets into the child in t...
The day after holi: pink, green and blue faces, rashes everywhere, body aches, cold, cough and pains occurs - thanks to catching a chill in the wet clothes or an allergic reaction to the using chemical-laced colours and other numbers of particulates that float in during holi air. To keep away harsh chemicals dampening your spirits, all you have to do is to perform simple yogic techniques and raid your kitchen, kitchen garden or your granny’s spice rack to celebrate Holi naturally & organically. The best part, at the end of all the merriment your skin will glow. Yogic Techniques 1. JAL NETI: (Nasal cleansing) Take 500ml bearably warm water in a neti pot, add ½ tsp black/rock salt and a pinch of turmeric. Stand evenly and bending slightly forward tilt the head at a 45degrees angle towards left. Insert the nozzle of the pot into the right nostril. While breathing normally from the mouth, tilt the pot so that the water runs into the right nostril and flo...
Yog is not about twisting and turning yourself into knots and complicated postures, yog taps into the power of consciousness. As you practice yog in totality, as prescribed, you start glowing and the immunity of the body heightens, slowly you begin to exude the glow of the sun. The body that we greet in the mirror everyday is run by a higher force, which is invisible to the naked eye but very clearly visible to a clairvoyant in the form of colours and to a clairaudient in the form of specific sounds. These colours and sounds correspond to certain energy centers in the body, which control and govern various body parts and functions. Much before you identify symptoms of a disease or ailment and decide to visit a doctor, these symptoms are perceived by a yogic practitioner in the form of change in colour, texture, size and sound of various chakras. Sanatan Kriya prescribes various techniques under the topic of self-healing to access this invisible sheath of the body and through...
Comments
Post a Comment