Airy Advice

Airy Advice Let Loose

About Some Peculiar Troubles and Maladies

Some teachings surrounding yoga methods can easily dwarf or stultify the help that methods give. Better be forewarned. The purpose of this page is to present standards that could help you for a long time.

Conformity pressures hinder nudity at times. See all.

Most persons associate with other persons and pets for good or bad and so on. Walking the dog and serving the animal by picking up its droppings in a plastic bag too is part of it for city dwellers.

Reasonable yoga and Transcendental Meditation takes you inwards somehow by steps and stages. The poorer methods you are given, the greater the need for propaganda, unsocial pep talks, hype, and trickery among those involved, you may figure. Very good methods, on the other hand, "talk for themselves" quite well, for example by research findings. That is a token to measure much by.

But even dear, fine methods may call for some regularity of practice, such discipline. That said, much that is called fit in some cultish yoga circles, are unneeded. Sexual abstinence is one such thing. In a large, large perspective those who adhere to such a teaching instead of being frivolous in their own right, may some day come to realise things like, "Was my blood line and genes not good enough to go on in this world? Or was I too valuable to get married? Or both?" One may come to wonder. The monk may not suit normal enough living, and may not like pinpointing of this kind either. The guru Yogananda was a monk. He severely limits the sex life - or sex burden? - of disciples by decreeing such as "Have sex once a month." That counsel does not suit those who really enjoy having sex about four times a day. And luckily for such virile or lusty ones, there are yoga forms for them too. It is called Tantra, and you don't have to be a pariah to go for it.

By living out your interests you may get educated, may get skilled, may gain a living and develop your character too. It is held in psychoanalytics that the personality is a result of being true to your deep self and its natural interests and inklings. Transcendental Meditation helps that develop, but maybe not in all. There are many factors or influences in a life, and some are detrimental to higher growth. Group mechanisms may either favour or stunt the growth of individuality or uniqueness. The odds are that conformity pressures largely hinder much of it, unless you get into a congenial, decent group somehow along the road. Helpful companions of the same mind as ourselves must be counted as blessings.

There comes a need to be alert to difficult circumstances and shielding a proper balance. Many try to bulwark themselves in various ways. Houses have walls and gardens for it. Fences and some ridges could be OK, and so on. There are social fences, physical fences, and other kinds of fences too. From antiquity and earlier, people have been in dire need of stone walls, ramparts, fences and strong hedges for the sake of safer living. And pleasant garden work, Paradisiac work, is still healthy and much appreciated. [Gen 2:15]

In India some yogis live in remote and secluded places and shielded places called ashrams to benefit from the protective measures offered. When a teacher says "Take care," to you, maybe you should consider shielding yourself better in one or several ways.

Let us say you have ignored some of the basics of the yoga terrain and floundered: Maybe your own development and gliding inside on your own, free terms is set aside for the sake of belonging to someone or something, such as a church of yoga. To the degree your life gets directed by others and also ruled over by prominent others, you are probably bound for troubles, and did not take care well enough.

• Some troubles stem from repressing yourself and your insights.
• Others stem from not being able to or not being given any good opportunity to get deeply felt findings out of your chest.
• Still other troubles stem from those around you, and the troubles and maladies they have and often infect others with.

Troublesome relations and encounters and environment may scar us mentally, and false teachings also. The guru of SRF, for example, repeatedly teaches "get rid of the ego," as if it were possible. However, it is the Self that illumines the ego, tells Ramana [Sib, ch. 2]. The unwelcome effects of marring Yogananda teachings may not be easy to get rid of, and the effects of being bullied may linger on afterwards. Meditation may activate repressed memories of unresolved problems, as part of the self-cleansing process it tends to be, if effective.

Feigning can be a big problem, and so is hypocrisy and corruption. Let the problems of those that are not close to you be their own problems as you help the world by being charitable to yourself and your nearest ones first. As the Tibetan yogi Milarepa is into, don't be too eager to help others; get Enlightened first. "One should not be over-anxious and hasty in setting out to serve others, but have the one resolve to attain Buddhahood. [Tm 271]"

It works better not to impoverish yourself or reduce your well-being for others, but improve yourself in a fine way, just as Buddha says in a great many counsels. It is not any "either-or"; Buddha advocates a sensible "middle path", building up wealth and funds for living all right, to get time and means for developing your mind and wake up too. Such is his Noble Path in a nutshell.

❖ You are not asked to lessen or ignore yourself and your long-term needs throughout life, but adhere to the Essential. It is not always easy for gentle souls.

Seeing Millions of Colours in a Changing World

Someone said nothing is black-and-white. But the chessboard and the yin yang symbol are, and the zebra's skin too. It is fine to know and heed there are shades of grey in between black and white, and many colours too. Painters and artists learn to blend some of them with different ends in view.

When a prism breaks white light, the colours of the rainbow are seen. White, grey, and black are not of the spectrum, but come in addition. Some insects and birds can see colours that like outside the range that humans can see; some see infrared and ultraviolet too. Leaving that aside for now, according to some estimates, the human eye can distinguish some ten million colours. In determining a colour, its hue, value (corresponding to reflectance), and chroma (corresponding to purity) are to be accounted for by measurements or perhaps simpler comparisons. There are many colour atlases in use.

Our perception of colours is tricky. The eye and mind accommodate to the "redness" and "blueness" of the daylight in the morning and at noon, for example, for the sake of preserving much colour constancy in a changing, perceived world. Hence, we humans adapt to light of different wave-lengths by use of a set of mental constants. Colour sensitivity can be developed and refined too.

Mental constructs should likewise be allowed to be developed and nuanced. Why? For the sake of fitting in to the world somewhat better. The world does not have to be seen only as black and white. It is at times the same with gurus and their teachings. [Ebu "colour"]

❖ Accommodate as best you can.

Deeper

Ducks may at times serve as symbols of the teachings of others, at other times as symbols of your life. Have sense enough so that you do not heed them over and above your Self that strives to get through to you from inside.

You should be more worth than a bunch of ducks and fragmented teachings. This suggests (a) the one who considers a teaching is more worth than the teaching. He or she encompasses more. (b) Your inner Self is more than one life, and that is good tidings.

Perhaps neighbours and friends are a peculiar mixture too. Maybe they serve to show how much variation there is around, and how many different sorts of life that may work together in a tangled web of life.

Big trouble may be due to this: Earlier we turned outside to the extent of not caring well enough for our deeper nature and its needs. But the moment we are dead our insides (mind and soul) are there, and karma. What else might be found as being of worth enough depends on "how winds are blowing". That is a part of the teaching of Buddha.

Do not ignore your needs to bore into your deeper self and consolidate valuable gains and assets. In a too shallow soap opera fond culture many need to go deeper. Many, many persons risk a slow dwindling of the contact with the near ones as part of the conform strides of their everyday lives, as part of urban patterns. Not a few get so desperate for friends and partners that they get into strange, arranged settings, be it five-second dates or more.

Hoping or begging for friendship and contact and belonging may seem to find glowing fulfilment in other than the real figures - not really natural or one's own father figures, mother figures, brother figures, friends and so on. Catholic and other monastics stands for all those features - of strained relationships, one should gather. For the sect brother is not a real brother, the sect mother is not a mother, the sect sister not a real sister anyway, and so on. They play on words and inadequate feelings of belonging. Put simply: a monastic "brother" is not a real brother, and don't think it either. Beware of estrangement through ensnaring words. Also beware: a marring suspicion is not quite enough to be called valid. And one should avoid causing embarrassment to innocents.

❖ Face the facts. Where they talk and write of divine love and friendship your way without ever having met you, suspect a "wolf of relationship" is loose. And don't adjust to your own loss.

Good Teachers Welcome Budding Uniqueness in Artists and Others

Effective yoga contains methods and customs that make you deviate from the average or common unless you surround yourself with like-minded people in some decent rural community or gets shelter in other nice ways. You may see this happening if you first take up hatha yoga of body postures, and then gets gradually interested in and involved in higher yoga forms, such as meditation. Along with the calming practice, which may restore health to some and fasten it in still others, in a crisis, the interests may grow wider and deeper, and the "thing" called "my way" or "my ways" may take on momentum. In other words, significant individuality may come into the open and want a piece of the action.

To be individual is to be unique, not like anyone else. Therefore be warned. Not everybody is welcoming and friendly towards those who get unique - much like artists - unique, and thereby different - yes, deviant. Sound protective measures may be called for. But be as discreet as you can, and make full use of the side of life that is called the right to privacy. It pertains to both thoughts and practices.

❖ Deviants may grow too - some for good, others for bad. Besides: "You learnt all that is to be learnt, but have you learnt (to know) yourself?" [Ramana, Sib, ch 1]

Learn to prepare well

Loose, very general warnings may not help you or young ones. But all-round training on top of such warnings could help.

Learn to prepare yourself well for what may come and lie ahead. It is no as easy as it sounds. To prepare well is not just to prepare for a rainy day or three, but a full-fledged hurricane and a snowstorm that last for long, for example. Most often these things don't happen, but when and if they do, your building (character) has to be calibrated to withstand and resist the harmful influences.

Murphy's Law comes in handy: "If anything can go wrong, someone will sooner or later see to it that it does." But if you learn to bulwark well, take fit precautions and be on and up in time for great things to come your way, maybe - maybe you then have learnt to expect the worst and bulwark against it so that alarming things don't happen to yourself or your next of kin, no matter how the storms may rage.

In some cases it is possible to do. In others not. So it is not always enough to live out "prevention is better than cure". Rather, stick to "expect the worst and bulwark against it in good times". That may slowly work if put to work by steps and stages.

To be well rehearsed is fine too. It often makes a difference, even in president candidate debates on TV.

In preparing and safeguarding, don't get depleted or emptied. A little eaglet doesn't have to practice flying till its wings have grown to size and the skeleton and rest of the organism are matured. Thus, it stands to reason not to rush things. Training or prevention has to rest on both readiness (including physical maturity) and interests, perhaps.

If soundness is not jeopardised, preparing for life and its encounters, dangers and things to resist may assist personal strength. If not, one may be tamed, which is not cultivated.

To create something of worth, you can let high skills assist general soundness and well-being. And observe the rules of conduct which a yoga aspirant (sadhaka) should follow. They are sound moderation in food, sound, welcome moderation in sleep and sound moderation in speech. [cf. Ramana, Sib, ch. 2].

❖ To be richly prepared, learn to bulwark in ample time against the worst things that could happen, so that they probably won't happen anyhow. Lots of practices ought to be derived from that basic norm.

Unfulfilled Lives Go Punished That Way

Sects and cults often give their members problems. Some problems are severe. There is a danger of reducing your self-esteem and self-worth. Remain alert to: While good yoga methods may help and foster inner growth as suggested, conformity measures - in yoga circles and other flocks - may hinder that. There are many low mechanisms sects may put to use.

It may help to get into significant ideas of the psychologist Abraham Maslow, as they carry weight and relevance. He fronts the view that average-looking and conform people may not be much worth as norm-givers of what is sane or of great worth. Those who deviate in positive ways from the average could be rewarding to get influenced by. Such plus-deviants are generally saner than the average, and with sane outlook on things. According to Maslow such people show standards in many ways and walks of life. However, useful as his lists of properties may be in some cases, they do not seem complete. [see Pusb, Rvl, Zun].

Living unfulfilled lives instead of going on works like a punishment - and going on - progressing in a good way - is the thing to do. The Gentle Middle Way is designed for it, for example, and you don't have to be a Buddhist or call yourself a Buddhist to derive benefit from it either.

❖ Method of practice: The Self of a person who tries to attain Self-realization is not different from him. There is nothing other than or superior to him to be attained by him. Self-realization is the realization of one's own nature. [Spiritual Instruction [Sib] by Ramana Maharsi, ch. 2]

Learn to Assuage Well

A typical thing about good advice is that those who need it the most, may welcome it the least. In consequence, adequate forewarnings are typically quite masked and figurative. It helps. Some parables forewarn in that they tell in metaphors about important things that could happen so that these things may not happen. That is, those who have ears to listen or take heed may be warned, and thereby escape much pain and suffering in the long run. Much depends on that, including happiness of life.

Skilled storytelling combines some sorts of distance making with entertaining, structured layout of the tale, so that young and old ones derive benefit and understand basic ideas that make sense after some time.

❖ Avoid and minimise pains in life through good stories - old narrative ways have regained even academic prestige in our time, and are "hot" discourse takes.

Speaking of cross-planted guru lore

Before you bleed to death or do better than that, take a look and find out the difference between the plants and learn to deal in handy ways with whatever you have to deal with to make juice.

Good wine (that tricky, figurative term) can be made of both, and "in wine lies a lot of verity swimming around". Compare the Latin "In vino veritas." It may not be as easy as that, however - Hold on to your own Fertility Garden: Make your own life prosper - that's what it means, basically.

❖ Good old ways with words can work like music on a family.

Some Roundabout Takes on Figures of Speech and so on

Greater teachings - or fun teachings - are not for everyone; great teachings often look bizarre to many commoners.

Lend ear to Lao-tzu in the Tao Te Ching:

When the highest of men hear of Tao [the Way] and truth they put it into practice quite diligently.

When the common types hear of Tao, they seem to be in two minds about it, half believing, aware and unaware of some.

When the lowest types hear of Tao, they ridicule or laugh loudly - but if they did not laugh, it would be no Tao. [Tao Te Ching, Ch. 41 LINK]

There are parables of Buddha around. [LINK]. Parables are teaching stories that can have many pregnant and relevant messages, depending on what you put into them. and there is also reason to allow for that Buddha tells delicate "stuff" and saw no way that was more fit at the time. We let those hints suffice at this place.

Matthew (chapter 13) tells that Jesus always told important stuff in metaphoric ways, and likened other Christs with hungry wolves -

❖ Peals of loud laughter suggest "No Way!" in some way or other.

Farm Animals May not Have a Bad Time at First

There is an entertaining story about a revered but false, fiendish guru - [Narada].

Millions of young individuals have become cult members and sect members [LINK].

What about farm animals, such as cattle? Victims of hoaxes - What substantial that has been denied to old farm animals may make them little fit for freedom later. And yet, both pets and farm animals may evoke a sense of uncomplicated contentment.

A stupendous old teaching is: One had better refrain from men and circumstances that take freedom degrees away. Becoming one of the goddess Circe's magically converted pigs instead of remaining as a man, was unbecoming to Ulysses.

❖ If figurative mentions carry lots of meaning, they may serve higher mental functions.

Literature  

Ak: Yogananda, Paramahansa. Man's Eternal Quest. Los Angeles: SRF, 1975.

Ap: Mieder, Wolfgang (main ed.), Stewart A. Kingsbury, and Kelsie E. Harder: A Dictionary of American Proverbs. (Paperback) New York: Oxford University Press, 1996.

Ay: Yogananda, Paramahansa. Autobiography of a Yogi. 1st ed. New York: Philosophical Library, 1946. Online. [oaks.nvg.org/pv6bk12.html]

Co: Watson, Burton tr: The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu. New York: Columbia University Press, 1968.

Fu: Lund, Hjalmar, og Gunnar Lid, redr. Norges fugleliv. 3. utg. Oslo: Det Beste, 1979.

Ha: Yogananda, Paramahansa. Autobiography of a Yogi. 12th ed. Los Angeles: Self-Realization Fellowship (SRF), 1981.

Pa: Yogananda, Paramahansa. Autobiography of a Yogi. 11th ed. Los Angeles: Self-Realization Fellowship (SRF), 1971.

Pusb: Maslow, Abraham: Motivation and Personality. 3rd ed. New York: HarperCollins, 1987.

Rvl: Maslow, Abraham: Religions, Values, and Peak Experiences. Columbus: Ohio State University, 1964.

Say: Yogananda, Paramahansa. Sayings of Yogananda. Los Angeles: Self-Realization Fellowship, 1958.

Sib: Ramanan, V. S. tr. Spiritual Instruction of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi. 8th ed. Tiruvannamalai: Sri Ramanashramam, 1974.

Tas: Ramakrishna: Tales and Parables of Sri Ramakrishna. 5th ed. Madras: Ramakrishna Math, 1974.

Tb: Osborne, Arthur ed: The Teachings of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi in His Own Words. New ed. London: Rider, 1971.

Tm: Evans-Wentz, Walter Yeeling, ed. Tibet's Great Yogi Milarepa. 2nd ed. London: Oxford University Press, 1969. Partial view of the 2000 edition at Google Books.

Zun: Maslow, Abraham: Toward a Psychology of Being. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1968.



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