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Spiritual teachings by Shunyamurti, the founder and director of the Sat Yoga Ashram - a wisdom school, ashram, and the home of a vibrant spiritual community based in Costa Rica. Visit us at satyoga.org
Episodes
Thursday Feb 24, 2011
A Safe Investment – 02.24.11
Thursday Feb 24, 2011
Thursday Feb 24, 2011
Excerpt: “The Supreme Reality that we are all seeking is absolutely simple. And all we really need is to abide in that simplicity, which is our true nature,” teaches Shunyamurti, the spiritual director of the Sat Yoga Institute in Costa Rica. “Everyone’s looking for a good investment, a safe investment. And so my suggestion to you all is that you invest in God. It’s the only sure investment. And what is most sure is that the more you invest, the greater are the returns on your investment. So in the ordinary capitalist world, they say get a basket of investments so you hedge your bets. But, actually, because investing in the Supreme Being is a sure thing, it doesn’t pay to hedge your bets; it pays to invest—fully—in the Godself. But what kind of investment are we talking about? It’s not about money. It’s investing your love, your attention, your energy, your time—your focus on realizing the presence of God within you. . . . And so there are many many levels of consciousness through which we can rise if we are willing to let go of the lower. And this is a principle of spiritual progress: if you want to rise, you must let go of what you’re holding onto at the lower level. And this is what people are unwilling to do. They want a guarantee first that they’ll get the higher before they let go of the lower rung, and so they never get there; they get paralyzed. And this is where faith comes in. The faith of taking the risk of jumping into the abyss, the unknowable, the mystery of not knowing who you are. That’s what being fully alive means. That’s the thrill of existence, is the not knowing, when you push the envelope—and even push yourself out of the envelope—to discover the formless, infinite Self.” Recorded on the evening of Thursday, February 24, 2011.
Thursday Feb 17, 2011
East, West, and Lacan – 02.17.11
Thursday Feb 17, 2011
Thursday Feb 17, 2011
Student Question: The wisdom that you offer helps to clarify any confusion I have regarding philosophy. But when I hear you mentioning Lacan or Freud, I encounter a lot of difficulty trying to match this wisdom to the concepts that they use. To me that’s complicated. Nevertheless, I see that there’s an intention to create bridges which give some validity to that knowledge, in Western psychology or philosophy.
Thursday Feb 17, 2011
Abiding in Brahman – 02.17.11
Thursday Feb 17, 2011
Thursday Feb 17, 2011
Excerpt: “Meditation is simply abiding in the Self,” teaches Shunyamurti, the spiritual director of the Sat Yoga Institute in Costa Rica. “Abiding in Brahman means bramacharya, that is the original state of purity. It’s the same as the kaivalya state that we have talked about before where the Purusha has extracted Itself from Prakriti. There’s no more interest in matter, in sensuality; desire falls away naturally. You’re repressing it, or suppressing it, it’s just not there because you are already all that is, what is there to desire? What is there to fear? . . . It is that level of consciousness in which one graduates from this phenomenal plane, this school in which we learn what is right and wrong, what creates suffering and what creates joy and bliss. And the ultimate bliss comes simply from abiding as the formless, eternal Presence.” Recorded on the evening of Thursday, February 17, 2011.
Thursday Feb 10, 2011
Chakra Two Repression? – 02.10.11
Thursday Feb 10, 2011
Thursday Feb 10, 2011
Student Question: Tonight in the study group we were studying chakra two, and that chakra two energies must come into consciousness and not be repressed. So how are these energies brought into consciousness? Does one have to engage in a sexual act in order to bring these energies into consciousness?
Thursday Feb 10, 2011
Chastity – 02.10.11
Thursday Feb 10, 2011
Thursday Feb 10, 2011
Excerpt: “There’s an old joke, I’m sure everyone knows it. . . . It was a joke about an academic scholar in the Vatican who was trying to understand the roots of apostolic celibacy, and he went to the original writings that were then copied by the scribes, and he found that one scribe made a mistake, he dropped out an ‘r,’ it was supposed to be celebrate!” recounts Shunyamurti, the spiritual director of the Sat Yoga Institute in Costa Rica. “And so the celebration was, originally, a coming together of those who were celibate, in solitude, in their inner solitude. . . . And only those who have realized the solitude of Self, and are no longer co-dependent on others, and don’t have voices in their minds that are attacking them, or causing them to have distorted self-images, etc., are truly free to celebrate, because everyone else is suffering and in agony. . . . But in any case, this was the original meaning of it, and the first celebration was of that Liberation from the ego that is co-dependent on others, both externally and internally. And so when we meditate, it is in order to silence all those voices in the mind, and to dwell in the solitude of Pure Consciousness. And that solitude is blissful. And it’s cause for celebration.” Recorded on the evening of Thursday, February 10, 2011.
Thursday Feb 10, 2011
Innocence – 02.10.11
Thursday Feb 10, 2011
Thursday Feb 10, 2011
Student Question: How can one return to innocence?
Wednesday Feb 09, 2011
The Meaning of the Guru – 02.09.11
Wednesday Feb 09, 2011
Wednesday Feb 09, 2011
Student Question: In the book that we have been discussing, Ashram Dharma, the author mentions the importance of the guru for maintaining the energy field of the ashram. In ashrams in which the guru has passed on, or if the guru has several ashrams, how does his energy permeate the ashram, or does it?
Excerpt: “The true guru is within. And each of us must take responsibility for manifesting the guru. The guru is not an external person. The external person, who is often referred to as the guru, is simply the one who has the job to remind you that the guru is within,” explains Shunyamurti, the spiritual guide of the Sat Yoga Institute in Costa Rica. “It’s like the conductor of an orchestra: the conductor doesn’t make any music, but just points to the others who make all the music. So there’s nothing special about the guru, except to hold that space of Emptiness . . .” Recorded on the evening of Thursday, February 9, 2011.
Thursday Feb 03, 2011
Duty, Dharma, and Karma – 02.03.11
Thursday Feb 03, 2011
Thursday Feb 03, 2011
Student Question: Could you speak a little bit about duty? We are given, by the culture, definitions of what a good mother or a good daughter, etc., is. But then we have karma, in which we are karmically indebted to the families that we are born into. How do we ascertain what our true duties are to our family and to God?
Thursday Feb 03, 2011
A Relationship Through the Supreme Being – 02.03.11
Thursday Feb 03, 2011
Thursday Feb 03, 2011
Excerpt: Each of us, at one level, is a separate individual cut off from each other by our own thoughts, in a bubble of our own concerns, phantasies, desires, drives, fears, anxieties, etc. . . . And yet at another level—a more important level—we are all one,” reminds Shunyamurti, the director of the Sat Yoga Institute in Costa Rica. “And the only friend, ally, that will not abandon us in this moment is the Supreme Being. And through that alignment, we can create, on this horizontal plane, relationships that we can also trust because we can see and meet and recognize other beings who are also in that state of unconditional love and integrity. . . . So that’s what we’re doing when we’re meditating. And by meditating together, we’re offering each other the gift of that divine energy.” Recorded on the evening of Thursday, February 3, 2011.