Master Course Recording. Chapter 9. Six steps to Self Realization. Gurudeva describes moving awareness from attention to samadhi. Swimming pool metaphor. Cultivate willpower. Discover willpower. Awareness = Willpower = Energy. Ida, pingala, sushumna defined..

Study Guide:

Continue to keep your appointment faithfully, every day. Have you noticed how each time you listen, you hear something new, and awareness moves deeper? From time to time as you are listening, make it a point to sit up straight and observe the effect of good posture on your thoughts. You are allowing pure life force within your spine to flood your nervous system and bring it into harmony.

Unedited Transcript:

The Grand Old Man of the East who ordained me, Jnanaguru Yoganathan, Yogaswami of Jaffna, used to say time and time again, "It was all finished long ago." It's finished already. The whole mind is finished, all complete, in all stages of manifestation. Man's individual awareness flows through the mind as the traveller trods the globe. Now we come to the real study and this applies right to you and to you personally. The six steps on the path of enlightenment. What are they?

Attention. Concentration. Observation. Meditation. Contemplation. Samadhi. Those are the six steps that awareness has to flow through, almost gaining strength each time, on the path to enlightenment. When we first start, awareness is flowing through any number of areas of the mind. And if it is a mature awareness, we'll say it's a great, big ball of light flowing through the mind and if it's not a mature awareness, it's like a little ping pong ball bouncing around. A little ping pong ball [of] awareness it's not going to go walk the path of enlightenment, so to speak. It's going to bobble around in the instinctive mind incarnation after incarnation 'til it grows to a great, big ball like a great, big beach ball. Then finally it'll have enough experiences flowing through the mind to turn in on itself. When this happens, certain faculties come into being. One of them is willpower and we learn to hold attention, we learn to hold awareness at attention.

Awareness. Attention. What is attention? Attention is the first of the six steps on the path that is holding awareness steady, centralized in only one area of the mind and the area that we choose it to be in, not the area that someone else has chosen it to be in. Our awareness is moved around by other people through the mind at such a fast rate that we think we're moving awareness itself, so to speak. That's a funny way to talk because I'm saying we move awareness as if awareness is something else other than us. But awareness and energy and willpower are all the same thing. So we'll just call it awareness from here on out.

Other people move awareness through one area or another. We call that distractions, or worldly distractions. The mission is to move awareness yourself. How do you learn to do that? Holding it at attention. How does attention work? Attention is awareness poised like a hummingbird over a flower. Doesn't move; the flower doesn't move and awareness becomes aware of the flower, poised. The entire nerve system of the physical body, the functions of breath, have to be at a certain rhythm in order for awareness to remain poised like a hummingbird over a flower. Now since the physical body and our breath has never really been disciplined in any way, we have to begin by breathing rhythmically and diaphragmatically so that we breathe out the same number of counts as we breathe in. After we do this over a long period of time--and you can start now--then the body becomes trained. The nerve- external nerve system becomes trained, responds and awareness becomes at attention. Then we automatically move into the next step: concentration.

The hummingbird poised over the flower, held at attention, begins then to look at the flower, to concentrate on it, to study it, to muse about it, not to be distracted by another flower. That is then awareness moving. Awareness distracted is awareness simply moving to another flower or moving to another area of the mind. Give up the idea that thoughts come in and out of your mind like visitors come in and out of your house. Hold to the idea that it is awareness that moves rather than the thoughts that move. Look at awareness as a yo-yo at the end of a string. The string is hooked to the very core of energy itself and awareness flows out and it flows in. Awareness might flow out toward a tree and in again, and then out toward a flower and then in again and down toward the ground and then in again, this wonderful yo-yo of awareness. That's a good concept to grasp in order to become acquainted more with awareness. Awareness held at attention can then come into the next vibratory rate and concentrate.

Take a flower, place it in front of you, breathe deeply as you sit before it. Simply look at it. Don't stare at it and strain your eyes but simply become aware of it. Each time awareness moves to some other area of the mind, with your willpower, move awareness back and become aware of the flower again. Keep doing this until you are simply aware of the flower and you're not aware of your body, your breath, then begin to concentrate on the flower. That's the second step.

Think about the flower. Move into the area of the mind where all flowers exist in all phases of manifestation and concentrate on the flower. Move from one area to another, to where all stems exist, to the stem of that particular flower, to the root of that particular flower came from, to the seed. Concentrate, concentrate, concentrate on the flower. This is what concentration is: is remaining in the thought area of the particular item that you're aware of and flowing through the different color and sound vibrations of the thoughts. How does it work? The powers of concentration. It is only a name. Actually what is happening: you are flowing awareness through the area of the mind which contain the elements which actually made that particular flower and you're perceiving how all those elements came together.

Observation is the next step. After we're able to hold awareness, hovering over that which we're concentrating upon, we come into great powers of observation. We're able to look into, and almost through, that which we are concentrating upon and observe its various parts and particles, its action and its reaction because we are not distracted. Even observation in daily life, as a result of regular participation in the practice of concentration, comes naturally. We're able to see more, hear more, feel more. Our senses are more keen and alive. Observation is so necessary to cultivate, to bring awareness fully into the fullness of meditation. This leads us then into our very next step: meditation.

Meditation and concentration are practically the same thing though meditation is simply a more intense state of concentration. The state of meditation is careful, close scrutiny of the individual elements and energies which make up that flower. You're scrutinizing the inner layers of the mind, of how a flower grows, how the seed is formed. You're observing it so keenly that you have forgotten that you are a physical body, that you're an emotional unit, that you're breathing, you're in the area of the mind itself where that flower exists and the bush that it came from and the roots, and the seed, and all phases of manifestation all at the same time. And you're seeing it as it actually is. That area of the mind, that is meditation. It's a very intense, beautiful state to be in. You are in the actual area of the mind, of the inner mind, where the flower that you first put awareness at attention upon, then began to concentrate upon, then you're meditating on the actual inner area of the mind where, in all stages of manifestation, that particular species actually is within the mind.

Out of meditation we come into contemplation. Contemplation is concentrating so deeply in the inner areas of the mind in which that flower and the specie of it and the seed of it, and all exist. We go deeper, deeper, deeper within into the energy and the life within the cells of the flower. And we find the energy and the life within the cells of the flower is the same within the energy, within us, and we're in contemplation on energy itself. We see the energy as light. We might see the light within our head if we have a slight body consciousness. In a state of contemplation you might not be even conscious of light itself for you're only conscious of light if you have a slight consciousness of darkness. Otherwise, it's just your natural state. And you're in a deep reverie, in a state of contemplation, you're so intently alive that you can't move. You can't move that's why you sit so quietly.

Yogaswami once said, "I went in and in and in and so deep within that a bird was sitting on my head." That's the type of teaching he would give to cause people to think that the physical body was so quiet and quiet for so long that a bird was just sitting on his head. Didn't even know it was a- a man sitting there. "Went in and in and in and in that a bird was sitting on my head." Go in and in and in and in so that a bird could sit on your head through the stages of attention, concentration, intense observation, meditation and contemplation of the inner energies of the universe itself. When you are in the mind of energy, in that rarefied consciousness, you are not conscious of the Earth or any planet. You are just conscious of the strata of energy that runs through Earth, space and planets. It's not even really energy. We're only conscious of energy when we're conscious of something that seems to be not-energy. However, this is contemplation, the very source of that which is within and running through form. This then leads to samadhi.

The very deepest, deepest samadhi in where we almost, in a sense, go within one atom of that energy and move into the primal source of all. There's really nothing that you can say about it because you cannot cast that concept of the Self or that depth of samadhi; you cannot cast it out in words. You cannot throw it out in a concept because there're no areas of the mind in which the Self exists and yet, but for the Self, the mind, consciousness would not exist. You have to realize It to know It and after you realize It, you know It. And before you realize It, you want It. And after you realize It, you don't want It. You've lost something. You've lost your goal for Self Realization because you've got It. After I realized, went through that deep samadhi, right through these steps--I was taught these steps at a very young age--attention, concentration, observation, meditation, contemplation and the very deepest, deepest, deepest samadhi. After I went through that, I came out back into contemplation, into meditation, into observation and I thought, "How simple?! Where was I wandering around all this time not to have been able to perceive and be the obvious?" The Self is so simple. You have to be so simple to realize the Self. Not simple-minded but so unattached. Awareness has to move so agile-ly--"Agilely?" is that a word?--so agile through the mind like a- like a beautiful deer going through the- the forest. So beautifully through the mind that none of the sticky substance of the mind, so to speak, can stick onto awareness and hold it steadfast for a period of time. And only with that agility can you move awareness in quickly to the source, in on itself, until you come out having realized the Self. It is experience you come out of more than go into.

If you were to explain Self Realization in another way, look at it in this way: Right out here we have a swimming pool. We'll call- beneath the surface of the water, we'll call that the Self. The surface of the water, just the surface of it, we will call that the depths of contemplation, that pure consciousness, that most super, rarefied area of the mind, the most refined area of the mind, that pure consciousness. And we're going to dive through pure consciousness into the Self. We'll call the physical body, awareness. And it's a body of light. And it's going to dive into the Self, into the depths of samadhi. But to do that, it has to break the surface, it has to break pure consciousness. So then we make a preparation: attention. We take all our clothes off, we put a bathing suit on. We're getting all ready for this great dive. Concentration. Pull our forces together. We don't know what quite's happening to us, or going to happen to us. Observation. We look over the swimming pool, we look over the whole thing. We're studying out the whole philosophy of just what we're going to do. We even try to measure the depth of the Self. We talk to people about it and we say, "Have you jumped in there?" Some people say, "Nooo... but I intend to one day." And other people say, "Uh yes." "Well can you tell me something about it?" They say, "Uh uh. No." Then you- you go into contemplation. You just stand and you're completely aware of just standing there right on the brink of the Absolute and you're standing so, so- so much conscious that you're there. You- You're just aware of being aware. And then, then you laugh. And then you jump in.

As your hands and head go into the water, disappears, as the body breaks its surface, it disappears, as the legs go in, it disappears. And we're all looking at the surface of the swimming pool, we don't see you there any more, you just disappeared, the whole body. And as you come out of that samadhi, first the hands and head come up, begin to appear again, then the chest, then the entire torso then, as you climb out, the legs and finally the feet. You appear again. And you're just the same as you were before. But you're all clean on the inside. Awareness has a new center. The center is way down in the bottom of there, some place that you can't even talk about. You have realized, when you come out, that you've realized the Self. Before you went in, you knew all sorts of things about It. You could quote a thousand different things about the Self, you knew so much. And when you come out, you don't know anything about It at all. You know that you've had a tremendous experience, you've had an inner bath. Then you go back into just enjoying the experience, contemplation. Then you begin to meditate coming out again on the experience. And there's a vastness in you that, that awareness can no longer penetrate. It's a tremendous vastness it-, you just can't penetrate it any more.

You go in and in and in and all of a sudden you realize that you've realized the Self again. And you go in and in and in, you realize that you've realized the Self again. And everything is different. You look at the world from the inside out. You look at people from the inside out. You look at a person and immediately you see how they came along through life. You look at their face and you see what their mum looks like. You look into their subconscious mind, you see what their home looked like, you see what they were like when they were 10 years old, 14, 20, 25 years old. Now they're 30 and at the same time you're seeing what they're going to look like when they're 40 years old and so forth. You see the whole thing all now. Then you really know, after that deep samadhi, that the mind, in all phases of manifestation, was all finished long ago, already complete. Before that you try to believe in that concept and it's a vast concept to believe in 'cause at certain times, when awareness is flowing in the external area of the mind, it certainly doesn't look that way at all. Our perspective is limited.

After that deep samadhi of Self Realization, our perspective couldn't really be called vast. We simply see things the way the are. And it's as simple as that. See things as the way they are and that is the way they are. From the inside out. You look at a tree, you see the energies of the tree all working within the tree then, after that, you see the leaves and the bark and yet you see it all at the same time, all working together. That is Self Realization. Those are the six steps on the path of enlightenment. Six steps that you have to work with.

First one could be the most difficult: attention. It's making a strong, brave soldier that's going on a great mission out of awareness. And by calling awareness to attention, awareness immediately has to detach itself from that which it was previously aware of. For when awareness is attached to that which it is aware of, it thinks it is that thing--it doesn't think it is that thing but seemingly so. When we detach awareness from that which it is aware of, we can move freely through the mind. First, in a limited area of the mind then in a more and more vast area of the mind. Then we learn to concentrate. And we learn observation. We don't learn observation. Actually, I think the only thing you really learn is attention and if you have attention and concentration, the other stages come automatically. But for Self Realization, you have to really want it. More than your life. For that deep samadhi that's what it is: more than your life. The realization of the Self, beyond the rarefied areas of pure consciousness, is more than your life. You have to want it more than your life.

Memorize these six steps: attention, concentration, observation, meditation, contemplation, samadhi. Now there are various stages of samadhi; savikalpa samadhi, nirvikalpa samadhi. But when I use the word, "samadhi," I refer to Self Realization, the totality, the Ultimate which I just described. It's worth seeking for, worth striving for, it's worth making it the mission of existence on this planet for. We're not on this planet to become educated, to get things, to make money, to dress up the physical body, to acquire property, to feed ourselves. We're on this planet for the realization of the Self. For that one thing, to go within ourselves. That's why we've come to this planet. And we'll keep coming back through the process of reincarnation time and time and time again until that awareness grows up into a great, big ball where it is strong enough to move through the rarefied areas of the mind--if we're comparing awareness to a ball; from a ping pong ball, to a volleyball, to a beach ball--and finally we're just there.

Intellectually, we have to compare awareness to some thing in order to get the idea. Once we have the idea and have caught the vibration and have released awareness from that which it is aware of, we're on our way. And we're on our way in our inner search for the ultimate goal, inwardly.

We're not always sitting down, concentrating on a flower in the search for the Self. You go on living your normal life once you have decided that Self Realization is the ultimate goal for you. Go on living your normal life. Everything that you do in life can collectively be channeled toward the ultimate goal for what you need is a dynamic will. You need a strong willpower. Willpower is the channeling of all energies toward one given point for a given length of time. This will can be brought out from within in everything that we do through the day. It's a powerful will, it's available to everyone, it's channeling the rarefied energies of the body, of awareness itself, into attention and concentration upon everything that we do through the day.

How do we cultivate that willpower? What do we mean by will? Will means that if you're going to complete something, you complete it. Finish that which you begin, finish it well beyond your expectations no matter how long it takes. If you're going to do something, do it well no matter if it is a simple task or a complicated task. If you're going to read a book and intend to finish the book, then read the book and finish the book and understand what it had to offer you for that was the purpose for you reading it. It is not developing a strong will by having a lot of half-finished jobs. It is not developing a strong will by starting out with a bang on a project and then fizzling out. These only attach awareness to that which it is aware of and lead us into the distractions of thinking the external mind is real. Then we forget our goal of Self Realization because the subconscious mind becomes too ramified with, basically, our being disappointed in ourselves. Or the willpower being so diversified, or awareness being so divided in so many different ways, that whatever we want to do never works out because there's not enough will, or shove, or centralization of energy, or awareness is not at attention over the project enough, to make it come into completion. A tremendous will is needed on the path of Self Realization, of drawing the forces of energy together, of the drawing awareness away from that which it is aware of constantly, of finishing each job that we begin in the material world and doing it well so that we are content within ourselves. Make everything that you do satisfy the inner scrutiny of your inner being. Do a little bit more than you think that you are able to do; that brings forth just a little bit more will.

You need a tremendous, indomitable will to make your quest a reality of realizing the Being within. Unfoldment doesn't take a lot of time, it just takes a lot of willpower. Someone can go along and sit at attention and concentrate and meditate for years and years and years and, with a minimal amount of willpower, constantly be distracted, constantly be complaining and constantly be unsuccessful. Another person can have the exact same approach and, over a short period of time, be extremely successful because he has will. The previous way he lived his life, the previous things that he did, he handled them in such a way that that willpower was there, or his awareness is a manifestation of willpower, and he goes soaring within on this will. Will is the fuel which carries awareness through all areas of the mind, that spirit, that spiritual quality, which makes all inner goals a reality. Unfoldment does not take time, it takes a tremendous will. That will has to be cultivated just like you cultivate a garden. It has to be cultivated, those energies have to all be flowing through, in a sense, one channel so that everything that you do is satisfying, is complete, beautiful.

Discover the will. Back to the spine. Feel the energy in the spine, there's no lack of it, is there? The more you use of it, the more you have to use of it. It's tuned right into the central source. When you become aware of the energy within your spine and within your head, you have separated awareness from that which it is aware of for that is awareness itself and that is will. We're playing with words a little; awareness, energy and will are one and the same thing. After a while, we'll gain a new vocabulary for this kind of talk but right now we're using our old words- way of looking at it because our subconscious mind is more familiar with these words. Energy, awareness, willpower are all one and the same. When we are subconsciously conscious that we are a superconscious being, and the subconscious mind has accepted the new programming that energy, willpower and awareness--one and the same thing--when the subconscious mind accepts the fact that the mind was all finished, in all phases of manifestation, from the refined to the gross, then the subconscious begins working and is a pure channel, so to speak, for the superconsciousness. Awareness can then flow in a very positive, in a very direct way. You want awareness to be renewed? The first step is: Don't try to go to the Self; you haven't realized it yet. Go to the spine, feel the spine. After you realize the Self, you go deeper than the spine; you go into the Self and come back. Before, you realize the Self and have that samadhi, attention, concentration, concentrate on the energy within the spine. Go in. Awareness, energy, will are all one. Come slowly out again and you have all the willpower you need to finish any job that you've ever started; to make decisions, to do and handle your external life in a very positive way so that it doesn't capture awareness and hold it steadfast for a period of time, deter you on the path of enlightenment.

Work with willpower and awareness and energy as three separate items first. Feel awareness and discover what that is. Use willpower and discover what that is. Feel energy and analyze energy and discover what that is and separate the three of them in your intellectual mind and experiential pattern. Then, after you've gotten that done, you'll begin to see inside yourself that the three are one and the same. And it is actually the beautiful, pure intelligence of the immortal soul body, that body of light of you, on its path inward and to its last phase of maturity on this planet. This inner body of light has been maturing through many, many different lives. If you like to know how it came along--For instance, if you've had 90 lives on this planet, each life the body of light matured one year so your body of light would be 90 years old, so to speak. You can sort of look at it that way; that's not quite the way it actually is but look at it that way, gives you an idea of the maturing of this body of light. The pure intelligence of it is your awareness, which is energy, and which is willpower that, life after life, it becomes stronger, more steadfast and finally in your last incarnation on the Earth, you merge into its final experience, that great samadhi, the Self beyond a complete, still area of pure consciousness. You go in not knowing what you're getting into and you come out wise. Complete perspective is changed and you only talk about it to those that are on the path of enlightenment. And that's- they're the only ones that are steady enough, or free enough, to understand the depth of this realization.

Here are the ingredients: attention, concentration, observation, meditation, contemplation, samadhi. Willpower, the fuel. It doesn't take time. Someone asked me, "Do you think I can have this samadhi, realize the Self in 10 years?" I said, "I certainly don't." Said, "I don't think you have enough willpower to realize it in a hundred years. Because it doesn't take time, it takes will. If you had the will you wouldn't add ten years on it. You would simply be telling me, 'I'm going to have this realization.' Period. And I'd be believing you because I feel your will moving out of every atom of your body. But the mere fact you take an intellectual approach," I mention to them and say, "'do you think in ten years?' I have to say 'No' because whatever I did think wouldn't make any difference one way or the other. You're not going to get it with an attitude like that." Because it's not something you go out and buy. It's not another getting like, "I have a car." "I have clothes." "I have a little money and now, after I get my television paid for, I think I'll get the Self because that's the next thing to get." "It's- It's really great. I read about it, I heard about it, I heard a speaker speak about it, I'm all fired up to get the Self and it's the next line of gettin'. So I'm going to get it."

Doesn't work like that. You don't get that which you have. You can't get that which you have, it's there. You have to give up the consciousness of the television, the money, the clothes, the people that you know, the personality that you thought that you were, the physical body. You have to go into the elements of the physical body, into the elements of that, and into the energy of that, and into the vast, inner space of that, and into the core of that, and into the that of that, and into the that of that and finally you realize that you realize the Self and you've lost something. You lost your goal for Self Realization and you come back into the fullness of everything and you're no longer looking, and you're no longer asking, and you're no longer wanting. You just are. When you get tired of the external area of the mind that you're flowing through, you simply dive in again.

[15:20] [Aum Chanting] [16:30]

We're going to go into some of the esoterics of unfoldment on the path of enlightenment; some of the mechanics, what happens inside of a man's body, his nerve system. There are two basic forces working within the body. And I've explained the instinctive area of the mind and the intellectual area of the mind but the force behind this again flows out from the central source of energy but it flows through one of two currents. In Sanskrit, they're called the "ida" and the "pingala." In the Shum language, the ida current is "karehana," and the pingala current is "vumtyeudi" but we'll talk about it in the Sanskrit for a while.

The ida current is pink in color. It is the vibration of the physical body. It is the earth current. When the energy is flowing through that current, we're conscious more of the physical body, we're in a physical consciousness. We're not in the world of thought, we're in the world of feeling. We feel very strongly, we have very strong emotions when the energy's flowing through the ida current. Some people, it flows through the ida current constantly. They have very strong emotions, very deep sentiments, they live in their emotions--most of the time they're living in their emotion, emoting over one thing or another--they feel deeply how other people feel. Through this ida current, they take on other people's feelings unto themselves. This is commonly knows as the feminine current of the body. It's the Earth current, it's the current that can produce another human being. When the vibratory force of energy flows through this ida current, the entire physical body responds, it's physically active. We like to work, we like to move, we like to exercise, we like to do things, we enjoy the movements of the physical body as well as we enjoy the base emotions. Also, when the energy flows through the ida current, we actually enjoy suffering. There are people deep in this current who, if they didn't have something to suffer over, it would- They wouldn't be whole, they wouldn't feel like they were living on this planet, they wouldn't feel human for the ida current is the current of being human. It's very base, it's very earthy, it's very close to the Earth and those living in this current are intuitive. They do have intuition but the intuition conflicts with their heavy emotion so intuition comes through periodically in intuitive flashes. It flows through basically the left side of the physical body.

The pingala current is quite different on the other hand. It's blue in color, the current of the intellectual mind. When the energies, base energies, are flowing through the pingala current, we are not conscious that we have a physical body, we are all mind. We're inquisitive, we like to talk a lot, we like to argue, we like to reason. It is the intellectual current. We like to read, we like to memorize the opinions of other people, we like to memorize our own opinions and tell them to other people, we like to do business. When the energy's flowing through the pingala current, we're not conscious that we have a physical body. We don't emote a lot, we think over our emotions, we analyze ourselves. It is the aggressive, human current. People living in this current--and their awareness is flowing through it--don't pay much attention to the physical body. They let it take care of itself and they let other people do the emoting. They get so powerfully strong in the- that heady type of intellectual force, that aggressive area of man's nature. It is commonly called the masculine current. When we're in the pingala current, we are headstrong, we're pushy, we'll push our ideas across to other people. Again, we're argumentative, we have strong facility in the reasoning faculties. It's a very positive and a very powerful current.

It is difficult to flow awareness out of the pingala current as it is difficult to flow awareness out of the ida current. There are some people who are predominantly pingala, aggressive in nature and masculine and strong in their human elements in that area. There are some people that are predominantly ida, feminine, human and earthy and full of feeling. And there are some who switch from one to another. These are more well-rounded, well-adjusted type of person who can move awareness through the pingala current and move awareness through the ida current and adjust the energies almost at will.

We have another basic, strong current and in Sanskrit it's called "sushumna." In the Shum language it's called "simshumbisi." Within this current, the sushumna current, are 14 other currents which govern the instinctive, intellectual and sub-superconscious, sub of the subconscious and superconscious areas of the mind. The ida and the pingala are only two. This leaves 12 more within the sushumna.

When we start on the inner search and we awareness to dive deep within, we have to bring the energy of the vibrating ida, or the vibrating pingala current, back into the sushumna. Now this is quite a chore for when the energy is flowing, and has flown for a number of years through the ida current, say, to actually re-channel that energy and re-channel our entire circumference of awareness into the sushumna current takes a lot of practice. Breathing, of course, is a major function. Hatha yoga is a major function. Sitting in the lotus position conquers a great deal of this ida current. The practices of concentration and observation conquer a great deal of the ida current. Some good, solid study that disciplines awareness such as math, music, a skill such as research into science moves awareness into the pingala and helps balance these two currents. If we can get awareness out of the ida current and into the pingala current, if it's not accustomed to being in the pingala, then we can bring it into simshumbisi, or into the sushumna current. We can bring awareness right into the sushumna current in that way.

However, if awareness is flowing through the pingala current and is extremely aggressive that means the entire nature of the individual is extremely aggressive, intellectual. It is extremely difficult for him to withdraw those energies into the sushumna current. Why? He'll argue with himself mentally and talk himself out of it. He'll simply go to another book, or have a different look at it, or go to another teacher, or watch television instead, or go to another lecture. He'll never quite get around to bringing in this aggressive energy from the intellect back to its source, sushumna, so that he can then go within and experience superconscious realms of the inner mind, consciously.

The ida, the pingala are the big challenges, what makes a person so-called, human. The degree of energy in the areas through the pingala and the ida forms a person's nature, his action and reaction and response. Areas of his external personality are governed by these two currents. How do we bring a balance? Well that's- that's what you're going to learn. And it's very simple. Regular practice: 6, 12, 6 and 12. Choose a time to sit down and deliberately withdraw the energies from both ida and pingala current. Move awareness into sushumna in a very positive way. Breathe regularly. Same number of counts in, the same number of counts out. Sit in the lotus posture. When we sit in the lotus posture, we're actually short-circuiting the ida current to a certain extent. When we are breathing regularly, and it's a controlled breath, we're short-circuiting the pingala current to a certain extent. When we flow awareness into the core of energy within the spine, we're becoming consciously conscious of the sushumna current. When we become consciously conscious of the sushumna current, then awareness is within and it begins to draw all of the externalized energies of the body and these two psychic currents back to the source.