The key to yoga is your relationship with your guru. If you are with your guru, then all these will just flow into you automatically, and if you are not, then no amount of teaching can do any good.
There are people who, even after years of interacting with me and getting their experiences, ask me if I could teach them a new practice, a new mantra, a little more gyan or about Ashtang Yog. I wonder, what more can I teach them? Rather, what is there to teach?
You are at point A, you have to go to point B, and the path from A to B was clearly laid down by Rishi Patanjali thousands of years ago. All that is needed is for you to walk that path… yama, niyama, asan, pranayam, pratyahaar, dharna, dhyan, samadhi… and you will reach your destination. Yoga does not call for standing on your head or breathing abnormally; neither does it involve complicated diets and rituals—it is simply integrating the principles of Ashtang Yog in your everyday life. Let us look at just the five yamas and niyamas: satya—to always speak the truth; asteya—not to steal; aparigraha—not to collect; ahimsa—non-violence; brahmacharya—celibacy; swacchh—cleanliness and personal hygiene; santosh—satisfaction with what you have; swadhyaya—self-study; tapas—purification of the body through penance; and ishvar pranidhan—submission to the divine will. How can one teach another not to lie, not to steal or not to have an orgasm? Similarly, how can one teach you to be satisfied? Or if you want to pollute your body with masalas and toxins from synthetic foods and cosmetics, knowing their effects on your body, what can one do about it? The practice of yamas and niyamas help develop a state of vairagya—detachment within you which you may not want. What is that you want, even you do not know.
Yoga is about nature or prakriti; this is what different rishis have been telling us again and again through different ways. Rigveda taught us yoga through interactions with nature. Krishna taught us yoga through the Gita. Patanjali taught us yoga through integration of its various principles in your day-to-day life. Simply merging with nature and being in harmony with its various facets while leading a life free of attachment is yoga. For all the rishis spoke about the destructive and temporary nature of all the aspects of physically manifested creation. Not just the aspects of creation but your own body is constantly going through a process of destruction and like all relations, friends, businesses and more it would also leave you one day. So nothing can be more foolish than looking for harmony and eternal peace in something which is temporary and passing out of your hands like dry sand.
The various yogic techniques given to us by n number of rishis, all point to only one direction that by following the path of yoga, you realise the temporariness and destructive nature of all things manifested and you go over them to eternal reality which is non-destructive and permanent. Realising this reality only can give you eternal bliss or ananda and raise your kundalini. No form of astrology, numerology or the other sciences in vogue today can give this experience and rid you of your problems, the only path out is yoga, which your guru integrates in your life depending on your capacity. That’s why the role of guru becomes foremost. So if you want to get into yoga, then stop searching for practices and techniques, simply find a guru who is himself not tied in maya and does not charge you a fee for courses, for only someone who is away from clutches of maya can release you from your bondages. For only when the bondages open, will you see reality and be in yoga.
The key to yoga is your relationship with your guru. If you are with your guru, then all these will just flow into you automatically, and if you are not, then no amount of teaching can do any good. If Rishi Patanjali could not teach you, what can I teach you?
Originally published in New Indian Express.
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