Paramparaa

Om Namah Shivaya!

Namaste Dear Friends and Loved Ones

Below you'll find a humble offering on the 2nd part of our exploration "What is Yoga?" I struggled a lot to put this out, and you'll notice it's quite long. The first part I feel is the most important and relevant information while the latter parts are attempts to unmask the history of the yoga we find in our studios.

Jai Amma!

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My dearest heart, I've been exploring deeper this question of "What is Yoga?" knowing that I wanted to honor the answer to this question rightly, because to me Yoga is the most powerful set of tools in the Universe. More than that, it's a complete description of the types of tools available to gain mastery over the Universe! A pure science of religion-- and you must read this word "religion" correctly! There's a saying in Yoga, "those who know are not speaking, and those who are speaking do not know". What you have heard about religion is decidely NOT true religion! Thus it has become that a very seeking an answer to the question "What is Religion?" (the same, actually, as asking "what is yoga?") is ITSELF what the sacred practice of religion is. What Zen is. What the Tao is. What Yoga is. So how do I honor this question with an answer, when as soon as I speak of it I am false?
As I am writing these very words, I am offering up a little piece of my infinite self to the flame of cyberspace, and am voluntarily limiting myself to the finite (e.g. being able to be disagreed with, misunderstood, etc.) in order to express these words. This is the dilemma facing anyone who wishes to share the teachings of Yoga-- even the desire to share the teachings is an obstacle to the state of Yoga. All desire brings karma, and all karma is further bondage.
This doesn't mean we can't choose to take on that karma voluntarily however. We have free will, we can literally choose to be or do anything in the entire Universe and more. But why the heck would someone want to take on karma and propagate their existence in the world of suffering and delusion?? I can tell you why I do fortunately, because my intention is a pure one-- I want to Honor my Guru in the highest way possible.
I think about Her.. Amma IS the infinite, the Supreme!! She has voluntarily taken a physical body in this ugly and disgusting world filled with disease and all manner of misery, and She travels around the world just to offer us, Her children, some measure of comfort! And this is where I break into tears, because NO amount of words could ever possibly do justice those MOST sacred and infinite gifts She has blessed me with! How do I praise You Amma!!?? Embodiment of Yoga, Yoga-Svarupini! Embodiment of HER, Holy Mother, Shri Mata!!! Even what I just wrote can't begin to do these gifts justice, but I know that She is that magnificent as to accept whatever I offer Her from a pure heart, may my heart be open Amma!
Amma shares the teachings freely. There has never in our human history been a Master who has been able to reach so many, so powerfully. This a secret of the guru/disciple relationship I feel free to share with you now: the disciple, with their limited mind, can only think they will never excel their teacher, but the heart knows that they can only truly honor the Guru's greatness by offering something of their own back to humanity.
A true disciple has but one desire because the Guru leaves them with only one feeling-- Supreme Bliss. What happens when you experience Supreme Bliss? You are so overwhelmed and excited and GRATEFUL that all you can do is think "THANK YOU!!! THANK YOU!!! WHO CAN I THANK FOR THIS?? I CAN NEVER THANK THEM ENOUGH BUT I MUST TRY!!!"
This, actually, is a restless and hence 'imperfect' state of desire. The Guru must leave them in that state of imperfection because that's as far as the Guru can take the disciple. Satisfying that last desire, the desire to thank and pay back what we owe, which is truly the most Supreme desire to be experienced, is then the life work of the disciple. Once they have finished that work, they will leave their bodies and re-unite perfectly with Supreme Bliss. That, my heart, is Yoga.
But how can the disciple possibly finish that work! The Guru needs nothing! The Guru IS God! Embodiment of Supreme Bliss, what could you possibly give to your Guru!? There's NOTHING, give up! Don't even try!
"But but but, this BLISS, I must!!"
"Ok, my child, then do something to help others."
Every true teacher says this, because this is, truly, what God says. We can only pay back our beloved Guru by USING what they have given us for the benefit of all.
Paramparaa is a word in Sanskrit that means literally "Beyond the Supreme". What is beyond the Supreme? What is beyond the Master? There is only this-- the LINEAGE of Masters to which they owe their mastery to. And, I want to stress this now so that I hope I may never be mistaken on this point, mastery does not imply perfection. Very very rare souls come to this world perfect, history has shown us only a handful in billions of years, but we can't even know how many masters there are who are who have truly achieved Oneness with that Supreme State, transcended Space and Time and thus have transcended all worldly bondage. It's impossible for us to know how many master here are gracing us with their ability to see imperfection perfectly. It's impossible for us to know, because those who do know aren't speaking.
Just think-- that homeless man who shows up at just the right moment to cheer you up when you're down, even if it's by just making you grateful that you're not him! THAT person could be a master doing God's work!! A dog jumps in front of your car and you think 'stupid idiot dog!' but for all you know your life was just spared from a fatal collision. Are there masters watching us and protecting us even if we never know about them and take their gifts to us 100% for granted?? I can absolutely, positively assure you, YES. Countless. Most people don't even know that the Yoga we have in the West is predominantly the influence of only two great Lineages. Look how much those two masters have given to the world! In fact, it is truly nothing but the Paramparaa that architects our destinies towards the benefit of all. Because seeing imperfection perfectly is not something a perfect Avatara (incarnation of the Supreme) does because they have no need to even see imperfection, they are the embodiment of perfection! However, an Avatara CAN TEACH an imperfect being to see their imperfection perfectly as mere pawns in hands of the Lord doing incomprehensible work through them. These *teachings* are LIVING knowledge that is literally impossible to write down as only dead knowledge can be captured. This is why the Paramparaa is of Supreme importance to Seekers of perfection, because it is only those who are carrying the flame of these teachings, direct from the Supreme Consciousness as our own most Beloved Self, that we can receive the flame of this divine darshan (vision).
This is why in India that so many customs we would regard as 'superstitious' exist. It's not just superstition, you really never know when God could be around your corner! This is the wonderful thing about God too, that the more you look for Him, the more He plays with you. Sometimes you'll look and He'll hide, and you'll be 100% certain that God is just a word idiot unevolved people made up to describe their impotent misunderstanding of the empty universe. Sometimes when you're not looking at all, BAM God puts the juice on full force and your tears can't satisfy the thirst you've suffered to have Her back in your life. So yeah, this stuff makes a person crazy, crazy with love for the Divine, and countless forms of expression evolve in order to channel this energy of pure gratitude that abounds from pure Love relationship. Bowing at the steps of holy places, bowing to someone's feet if you accidentally step on them, bowing to a teacher's feet to receive their most Sacred blessings, offering flowers, light, smells, and sounds to the Divine through establishing a seat for the Lord to take and enjoy! All of these customs seem crazy to us Westerners, yet all the while we never know how much we suffer for thinking that we are the only intelligence, or worse that "science" is supreme intelligence and it says that no intelligence exists! Imagine someone unable to see the living Consciousness all around them and then talk about how It doesn't exist, when THAT very Consciousness is in that moment watching that person's total ignorance of Itself! The most ironic part is that THAT Presence is that person's very own presence! We deny the existence of our very Self, and sound like a tongue saying that there is no tongue! A true scientist, meaning one who wants to know the Truth, will always end up discovering God. I guarantee you that God would not leave someone hanging if they sincerely wanted to know the Truth about Her existence.

God is Love

And the Guru is God.
My precious heart, you must experience a master in order to understand this! But you must not ignore those little red flags going off in your head when you hear something like that either!! Giving your life prematurely to a teacher, that is, without properly testing them to be sure they are in fact a master, can be one of the greatest causes of suffering! How do you know when a master is true? There are only two types of true teachers in this world, either
1. they are perfect, and they never need to praise their Guru because they never come into fault, which means you can test away and have a full on Guru/disciple relationship complete with all your self made dramas (which the Guru will make indirectly apparent are your dramas and not theirs while simultaneously giving you much to be grateful for), or
2. they are imperfect, but praise their Guru always in every breath. You're interactions with this master will be awkward, turning on its on imperfection, but somehow the Guru's grace comes through every time to set everything right.
You never know when a Master is praising God. Some do it blatantly, with beads or out loud in constant repitition. And some do it completely silent and even choose to take the disguise of someone who doesn't know in order to do other work. This is why the saying "when the student is ready, the teacher will come", because there is nothing the student can do to find a teacher but LONG for them in their heart.
However, it is wise to remember the words of Lord Jesus, "you will know a teacher by their fruits". A false guru will always end up having some sour fruits, whereas a Satguru will have only the sweetest nectarian of fruits! In the same way that too many people settle too fast with sex with people that they don't love, and then suffer when that relationship must end, too many people settle too fast with cheap gurus, wanting the teacher to come before they really suffered enough to be ready for the true teacher. *Your skepticism is your only defense against fake teachers, your devotion is the only force that can bring you to the Lotus Feet of the Satguru.*
And I want to reiterate this point in case it hasn't been apparent yet: there is NO yoga without the guru. As a Westerner raised to believe that reason alone is supreme and that no person could possibly outshine the luster of logic, you can bet that I too revelled against this axiom everytime I heard it-- "it's just ridiculous to place your faith in a human being". This is a healthy skepticism that you must listen to and honor, but don't let it stop you from being open to finding a master! When I finally did break down and turn more and more to Amma, and it only took me to do this in my heart!, I realized that the places She took me I never could have possibly gone to on my own. Because the ego can only carry you so far on the journey before it becomes your greatest obstacle, and one absolutely MUST have something to praise that's higher than one's own self in order to move past this rascal called the ego!! Yoga says that YOU YOURSELF are the SUPREME SELF, who is there more worthy of praise than You? Yet how dangerous it is to praise yourself as this is the perfect food for the ego, where to find something more worthy of praise!? Praise is an essential food of the mind, whether or not we like it we become what we mentally praise, and what we praise therefore has the power to liberate us or imprison us-- where to find something worthy of our praise!? A true guru gives you THAT and MORE. No matter what you've heard about the guru, it can never capture the essence of that relationship. Imagine trying to describe what a mother is to someone who's never experienced a mother's love! It's simply not possible.

I would like to offer now a brief history of the yoga we have in the Western world as a celebration of praiseworthy Yogis who I feel have contributed greatly to its magnificence and as an offering of tracing the Paramparaa of Yoga in America.

The yoga in our studios predominantly comes from B.K.S. Iyengar, http://yogaman.com/faqanswers.html, as he was the first great hatha yogi to teach alignment to the Western world, and the Western mind, unable to comprehend the internal and mystical nature of yoga, grabbed on firmly to what could be easily analysed and dissected objectively-- alignment. Mr. Iyengar, in fact, made up almost all the alignment he taught, as he enjoyed only a few precious months in the physical presence of his Guru, the great sage Tirumalai Krishnamacharya, and he took that seed given to him by his Guru to cultivate a daily asana practice that lasted 10 hours a day. Mr. Iyengar, coming to the West under direction of his Guru, found that he could not teach Westerners the same way he would teach an Indian. Relatively easy feats for the average Indian could cause serious injury to a Westerner rushing to perform it. His system he was forced to develop remains the best in the world for safety in opening up the muscle tissue as one moves deeper in asana. Official Iyengar studio classes are meant for the practitioner who has a regular daily practice, as one practices deep exploration of select poses more than complete yoga practice sequences. However, Westerners new to Iyengar practice are prone to believing that alignment IS the practice of yoga, never realizing that it was only something Iyengar made up in order to allow Westerners to even access yoga. Alignment needs to be seen and understood as only something that gets you safely into the asanas so that by *practicing the asanas in a proper sequence* one can PURIFY.

The hottest thing in Western Yoga studios for several years standing now is vinyasa yoga. What is vinyasa yoga? Classical Hatha Yoga teaches to practice the Sun Salutations for warm-up and then to practice one asana at a time, taking corpse pose resting break in between to clear the effects of the previous asana. Vinyasa Yoga attempts to make a complete practice involving continuous movement, and clears the effects of previous asanas by taking a gentle backbend (usually up-dog) followed by a gentle forward bend (usually down-dog). In fact, there is actually only ONE valid vinyasa yoga practice coming to us from the Paramparaa-- the Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga practice cultivated by Sri K. Pattabhi Jois , under direction of his Guru, again the great sage Sri T. Krishnamacharya. Ashtanga Vinyasa yoga is almost universally taught incorrectly because *only an ashtanga vinyasa yoga studio can teach ashtanga vinyasa yoga properly*. The tradition has the student WATCHING usually for the first week at least, and then practicing just the sun series for the first couple of weeks. Gradually the teacher will add one pose on at a time, stopping the student when a pose needs to fully mastered, until the primary series is mastered-- which takes the average healthy student about five years to do. Classes that throw students into a practice of the entire primary series are not only against the tradition, they're simply dangerous. This is because Vinyasa yoga relies on HEAT to make the muscles and ligaments more supple in order to purify them, but this same heat makes them more vulnerable to imbalanced sequences-- or advanced sequences that the body is simply not ready for. The majority of famous yoga teachers in the West teach their own version of vinyasa yoga, and it is important to know that *these sequences do not have the benefit of thousands of years of research into the subtle effects of their practice*. One should feel free to experiment and to contribute to this growing body of research into vinyasa yoga, but one should know that it is RESEARCH and not a firmly established practice. The only guiding light we have into what we incorporate into our own personal practice, for maximizing the likelihood of Realization of the Supreme Self and eternally residing in perfect bliss, are *the teachings of the Paramparaa*.

Following the Paramparaa, who was T. Krishnamacharya? A remarkable master of Ayurveda who was speaking Sanskrit before he turned 5, T. Krishnamacharya received the living flame of Yoga directly from his guru Sri Ramamohan Brahmachari. Sri Brahmachari's ashram is right at the foot of Mt. Kailash, the most sacred mountain of all to the faithtful Hindu, because Mt. Kailash is home to Lord Shiva and His wife Parvati. Lord Shiva is who gave to the world the teachings of Yoga directly through different incarnations on Earth at different times--to give different parts of the teachings as they were needed.

Truly the best tribute, and way to meet and know the greatness of Sri T. Krishnamacharya, is through the book his son made as a tribute to his father and intimate Guru for over 30 years. Sri T.K.V. Desikachar, who is available for consultation, wrote the Heart of Yoga precisely as an offering to the greatness of the Guru, and is simply one of the most fantastic texts on yoga available for this reason. Desikachar is probably the most qualified authority living to talk on Yoga, and it's worth noting that he now refuses to call what he teaches a style but says only that people who come to see him are coming to see him.

So far we have Iyengar, who gave us alignment but no daily basic sequence, and Jois, who gave us a very specific system of vinyasa yoga, so where did the rest of our information come from that's guiding our yoga classes here in the West? Valuable gems like the health benefits of the 12 basic asanas and guidelines for practicing those asanas at one session?
Sri Swami_Sivananda of the Himalayas was a master who defied comprehension. After a successful career as a physician, he took to the practice of yoga and quickly met his Guru, Swami Vishwananda Saraswati, attaining full Self-Realization in a matter of hours. Author of literally hundreds of books, an enormous proponent of karma yoga (the yoga of selfless service), and taught with a zeal unconquerable, Swami Sivananda gave us a system of hatha yoga that was complete for the health and wellbeing of the body, mind, and soul, inherited directly from the Paramparaa, in which 12 main asanas comprise the hatha practice. However, Swami Sivananda taught much more than just asana, His teachings also included :
-the study of Vedanta, known as Jnana Yoga or the Path of Knowledge
-the repitition of the Holy name, aka mantra or Japa Yoga
-practicing the full 8 limbs of meditation as taught by Devarsi Patanjali, the true Ashtanga (eight-limbed) yoga, called Raja, or kingly, Yoga
-the daily constant practice of selfless service to the Lord, or Karma Yoga
-and the Highest of all, said to not only be the fastest Yoga but truly THE Yoga essential to all Yoga-- Bhakti Yoga, or the Yoga of Devotion.

Swami Sivananda's teachings were spread to the West by two main sources, both of which excel at providing safe, healthy, and 100% balanced routines ideal for purification:
Integral Yoga, a term Swami Sivananda Himself described His teachings as, was given to the world by the great Sri Swami Satchidananda who quickly became famous in American culture for speaking at Woodstock and telling the masses gathered there that Yoga says the most powerful force in the Universe is SOUND, and
Swami Vishnu Devananda who was made famous quickly in the West for his remarkable demonstrations of advanced asanas in His book The Complete Illustrated Book of Yoga, was given 10 rupees from his guru, Swami Sivananda, and told to go spread the message of Yoga to the West. His teachings are called Sivananda Yoga as an offering to the Lotus Feet of his Guru.
Both of these yogas are true to the Paramparaa and, though they may seem at times overly zealous or devotional to the average Westerner, they are 100% tested to be safe and to satisfy all the health needs of your body. One can only benefit from studying Integral Yoga!
It is important, however, to remember that Sri Desikachar, as cited above, only teaches His students one on one, because it's how his father Krishnamacharya taught based on the Ayurvedic principle that one medicine needed for one temperament can be poison to another temperament. The beauty of Sivananda based yoga is that, though more specific routines could be better for different individuals, it remains the PERFECT beginning place for any yoga practitioner wishing to be introduced to yoga in a 100% safe and tested fashion. And, unfortunately, those who have never benefited from a thorough exploration of Sivananda practice will be hard pressed to find the same valuable information elsewhere as most Western classes talk more about alignment then the organs of the body that are receiving the benefit of the practice.

There are, of course, many other branches of the beautiful yoga tree that we have in America. I leave these to future offerings that I may give the masters I have already invoked a proper and respectful space.

Precious soul, I bow deeply to offer this to you and She who is All
Namaste

Purification

Over 18 million Americans are practicing yoga according to a recent survey, and while the benefits are certainly reaching many, a failure to understand the true nature of Yoga has prevented us from seeing a fully realized American Yoga culture to date. This is largely because the Yoga tradition is mysterious in nature-- in ancient times only the rarest of disciples would be given initiation into the practice of Yoga because mastery of Yoga is said to give mastery over all the elements and indeed the very forces of the Universe itself. In the West, we're inclined to believe such purports to be myth and based on exxagerated accounts of the abilities of Eastern Mystics and so we're satisfied to take the lowest level of the teachings of yoga, the practice of asana (postures), to be sufficient for our needs. But even this is almost universally being practiced with an improper, Western based, understanding of the body and exercise. To understand how to approach a yoga practice, one needs to truly understand what Yoga is and why it was developed.
All of Yoga can be summarized in one word, actually. It's not breath, unless by breath you mean praana which is obviously true because praana is everything, and it's not strength or flexibility or focus of concentration. These are all RESULTS of practicing yoga. The word Yoga in English is actually best translated as simply PURIFICATION.
Why purification? Sri Swami Satchidananda used to say, "There is nothing you can do to make yourself happy, but if you calm your mind and empty your thoughts, you will realize that Happiness is Your very nature."
Yoga says that everything is, comes from, and dissolves into One limitless consciousness. This consciousness is nothing less than perfect SatchidAnanda (Truth-Knowledge-Bliss). Stop to contemplate this: if you're happy, you have everything. Do this experiment: imagine you're happy and then imagine what else you could possibly need. If we can firmly accept this as Truth, then the goal of all life becomes a simple quest: to find LASTING happiness. How wonderful if our very own nature IS what we're seeking! But if it is, why aren't we happy? Yoga has a very simple explanation to give us hope: there are toxins in our body and mind that prevent this True nature from being consciously experienced. Thus, eliminate the toxins, eliminate all unhappiness. PURIFY and receive the grace of the Highest Eternal Happiness!
This is isn't such a hard concept to buy into; think about how many of the things that used to bring you joy now seem gross and immature. For example, most of us, at least, don't pick our noses anymore and the concept of bathing once a week is positively revolting! We've *grown* away from these things as our understanding and appreciation of life grew.
There's a famous story of how once Lord Indra, the King of the Gods in Heaven, once came to Earth in the form of a pig in order to help liberate those souls stuck in pig-incarnations. Growing up in the mud and other pleasures sensual to a pig's senses, Indra quickly lost site of His purpose in being there and haven taken a pig form. He found a sow with which to mate and enjoy sex with, and they had several little piglets. Indra was enjoying a lazy life sunning himself in the mud most of the day. The other Gods were terrified and aghast!! How revolting!! They came to Indra and explained that its best they usher Him back to Heaven now and forget this ever happened, only Indra refused to leave! The Gods then took the lives of His piglets in order to make His existence as a pig less bearable. Indra wailed on the ground, but then took solace with His sow with whom He started to mate in order to produce more piglets. The Gods, really getting disgusted now, took His sow's life also. Indra wailed on the ground, but then took solace flailing his pig body in the mud. Finally, the Gods took Indra's life. Back in Heaven, Indra reviewed His actions with shame, "I can't believe I fell prey to the illusion in the world", He said. The Gods replied, It was pretty bad, Sir.
This story is poignant to our predicament as 'dirty humans' who have forgotten our Pure state. It's precisely because we don't believe the tradition of Yoga that we tend to fall short in what we hope to get from yoga. We stop at physical fitness, muscle tone and flexibility, and never think that Yoga can actually free us from our addictions as well! If Indra was only fortunate enough to have a Guru to pick Him out of the mud and clean Him off, He might have paused to think, "wow, it actually DOES feel good to be clean!!" He still might have gone back into the mud, in fact most of us will many times with our die-hard vices, but every time we CLEAN ourselves, we give ourselves a taste of the bliss of PURE consciousness. This bliss IS, in fact, higher than any joy we could possibly derive from the world, but this is very hard to believe until it is experienced first hand!!
I would like to address the biggest misconceptions about Yoga in the West by stating a few things that we can derive from this understanding:
* Yoga is NOT primarily for the muscles. Yoga is purifying the NERVES, the very link between body and mind, and for the ORGANS in order to bring the chemical/neuroligical hormone systems into optimal harmony.
* Breath alone is the only way to purify the nerves, and therefore poses need to be HELD for at least five breaths (according to Sri. T. Krishnamacharya) before any benefit is derived from the practice of an asana.
* Alignment in practice should only be taken into consideration SECOND to how to best eliminate toxins from the body using a yoga practice. Map the optimal daily practice first.
* A LITTLE YOGA EVERY DAY IS INFINITELY BETTER THAN A LOT OF YOGA ONCE IN A WHILE. You don't shower a lot once a week, you shower a little everyday to stay clean. The traditional Hatha Sun series are very rarely taught in classes today, but this is a perfect COMPLETE yoga routine that takes only 10 minutes and can be easily practiced daily. It's best to be initiated into the Sun Series by a master, however, this is what it looks like:
http://www.yogashakti.org/surya-namaskar/
* Of course it goes without saying that your practice will remain limited until you devote more time to it, but most of us only need to be able to sit on the ground comfortably and this can be achieved with a 30 min. daily asana practice! Once this goal is reached, sitting on the ground is the only asana one needs to practice; though one should continue to perform some sort of Surya Namaskar at the auspicious twilight hour such as Gayatri performed with ablations to Saavitri.
* Strength in yoga is derived from improving the nerves' ability to conduct signals to the muscles, NOT from the Western model of tear down muscle in order to build it up. Thus, IT IS POSSIBLE TO BUILD STRENGTH BY MEDITATION ALONE. (I have witnessed this in several of my students as well.)
* Unbalanced asana routines that strain the muscle groups CREATE toxins in the nervous system and are actually hindering your Yoga practice! Maharshi Patanjali says, "an asana is light and steady and is mastered by lessening restlessness through meditating on the infinite"
* Our nerves work on a clock in tune with the Earth's rhythms. Therefore, practice is best done at the Sandhya (twilight) times of dawn and dusk. Practice at noon is not recommended because the nervous system is already peaked energetically, and other practice during the day should be done on an empty stomach-- at least two hours after eating (Swami Satchidananda used to say four hours). Solar Yoga practice done after 9pm DESTABILIZES the nervous system and CREATES toxins. Only lunar yoga practice can successfully be practiced in night hours and there are very few qualified teachers of lunar practice.
* Addressing a New York Times article this past weekend, "Yoga and Wine" do NOT mix. Yoga says alcohol is cursed to make you forget yourself and cannot be integrated with anything related to yoga.
When we practice Yoga daily, with a mind full of reverential gratitude, and we enjoy the practice slowly taking care to feel our breath deepening the experience of an asana, THEN we are doing real work towards Self-improvement and freedom from misery. If we take to Yoga as work and something that we should be exhausted from afterwards, then we will never be able to relax the deep rooted toxins in our nervous system. If we take to yoga with fear of injury, and stress about every little muscle's position, we will never be able to smile at our true blissful Self. If we practice yoga properly and pay attention to how we feel after cleaning our systems, our journey into re-toxification will be less and less frequent.
*One should never attempt an asana practice without initiation from a qualified teacher, unless one has a guru under whose blessings may take initiation from someone else. Because work on the nerves, work on the mind means the really hard work of rooting out the bad karmas, or cycles of negative behavior, in our lives. Without such protection, we risk many adverse effects such as excessive lust without the ability to raise the energy cultivated into higher consciousness centers, enhanced power in our power of word and the potentially disastrous consequences of losing control under anger, cultivating energy for the acquisition of wreckless selfish desires which only serves to further extend the karmic chain of misery, indeed the list is infinite and potential for pitfall is great! The Satguru, the One Only True Satguru, is limitless beyond time and space. That is why we need the Satguru's blessings, even if just the inner dialogue with the One Universal Love that is the Satguru! When you're ready to see the Satguru in a human form, the Satguru will come! Only devotion will bring us to the other shore... JAI GURUDEV!!! JAI SRI GURUDEVI!!!