Learn, Unlearn, and Relearn

In the previous installment of “Meditation on Swami Muktananda’s Words,” I wrote about how the saint in Baba’s story admits to the duress he put his body under and thanks his body for supporting him nonetheless, especially in his sadhana. I also explained that on the Siddha Yoga path, our Gurus teach an approach of moderation, wherein we work with our bodies, rather than against them, to come to know God.

It’s a topic I have been contemplating a lot since the satsang in honor of Easter, and I believe it merits even further elaboration. We can look at the example that Gurumayi has often given us—of nature. Nature is always true to itself; everything it does is in service of its being what it needs to be, going where it needs to go. Take the so-called “homing” or “carrier” pigeon. Its navigational ability—and specifically, its ability to return home—is so precise that, for centuries, these birds were used to carry messages between people, including between military forces. The pigeons have actual internal compasses, thought to be activated by their exposure to the earth’s magnetic fields. And they’re not the only animals to have such capabilities. Certain species of trout, salmon, and sea turtles, for example—as well as several kinds of migratory birds—have similar internal compasses.

As human beings, we function a little differently. If the “home” we are seeking is the Self within, our journey back to it is not so automatic. Generally speaking, the person we become is some combination of biology and the accumulated experiences we’ve had—the things we’ve been taught and the consequent understandings we’ve come to about ourselves and our world. And this amalgam of influences changes us. Science says it alters our brain chemistry. The scriptures of India speak of samskaras, or impressions left on the mind and accrued over lifetimes as a result of past thoughts, actions, and experiences. These impressions do not dissolve on their own. Without our conscious effort, we cannot return to the person who exists beneath them.

This is why we do sadhana. This is why we endeavor to develop self-awareness. I have learned from Gurumayi that sadhana is a continual process of learning, unlearning, and relearning. We must do, undo, and redo. Certain faculties must be sharpened. Certain tendencies must be uprooted. And certain ways of being must be resurrected. Fortunately, on the Siddha Yoga path, we have the Guru’s teachings as our guide. We have the Guru’s grace empowering our efforts. With the invaluable support of the awakened Kundalini Shakti, we can hone our discernment, so that we know what to keep, what to release, and what to restore.

Being in a human body—this exceedingly complex physical and mental apparatus—is work. There’s no getting around this fact. Yet the sophistication of the human body is also what makes it such a gift. It is because we are in a human body that we can recognize all that it is and does—that we can value the body, that we can do as the saint does and express gratitude for the body. We can understand that it is through the body that we transcend the body, that we experience the nature of God.

Gurumayi has told the story of when Baba Muktananda visited the city of Philadelphia in September of 1979, during his Third World Tour. Speaking in a theater at full capacity—to a thousand-plus people, some of them seated outside, some of them on the stage—Baba spoke about the true meaning of the iconic phrase that he, and later Gurumayi, would use at the start of every satsang: “With great respect and love, I welcome you all with all my heart.” Baba explained that, when he said these words, he was speaking not just to the individual forms of the people he saw before him, but to the Blue Dot, the nila-bindu, the light of Consciousness that exists in each person. He was speaking to the divinity in them.

How might you consider calibrating your own internal compass so that it becomes easier for you to find this same divinity in yourself? How will you keep making time to breathe in the spirit of spring, to hear its song on the air and let it guide you home?