Shanmugam

Mystical union is a term used in Christian mysticism and it is synonymous with spiritual enlightenment. In fact, the literal meaning of mystical union is the same as the word 'yoga'. Mystical union, to be more precise, is realizing the already existing unity. But people may choose to use these terms to mean different things. If you came across 'mystical union' in Jed Mckenna's book, then try to find out what he means by that word or how he defines that word. It is very common for many people to use the same word to mean different things.

You don't have to have a Kindle You can download the Kindle android app for free from Playstore to read it in android mobile. In PC, you can use the web reader to read in your browser: https://read.amazon.in

Downloaded it and went through the first few pages.. You have articulated things very well and appears to be very impressive. Had a look at your website http://www.uncoveringlife.com/ too and it looks great. Will comment after fully reading it.

yes.. I am doing great. How are you?

Sexual feelings have a very high purpose... The reason is quite obvious. It is sex which sustains life on the earth. It is sex which brings life. You and I are here because of sex. That is the reason why nature has given so much power to sex. When it comes to spirituality, anything can be used as a stepping stone. Sex, pissing, walking, eating or anything for that matter can be made as meditation. But there have been certain practices in left hand tantra in India which used sex in spiritual sadhana. But that is completely different from how Tantra is portrayed in the west. The left hand tantric practitioners that I am talking about used to wander in the cremation ground, smear ash all over the body, roam naked, eat food in human skull, have sex with corpse, smoke weed all day and even eat the flesh of wolves and jackals.. So, it is really not as cool as the western version of Tantra is practiced. Even those days such practices were done in secret. These days, I don't think left hand tantra exists in its original form. But we have people called aghoris in India who retain certain practices of left hand tantrists:

great.. Thank you

8. Then there were forums talking about it, 9. Then there was @Leo Gura

1. God got tired of answering prayers and wanted to give a solution so that no one wants to pray to him anymore. 2. Growing population brought more work to him but he was alone. 3. Sometimes prayers were even conflicting; So one day he said, "let there be spiritual enlightenment and paths to spiritual enlightenment." 4.Then God said, "Let all the holy scriptures that preach about me get filled with nonsense so that people stop believing in them". 5. Then God rested permanently.

My comments on this interview: http://qr.ae/TUIje3

She is saying Yoga itself is bad and a work of Satan. This is not really a criticism of Isha or Sadhguru, but her misunderstanding of what Yoga is. She has got conditioned too much by Christian theology and religion. The same thing happened in this forum as well. There was a person here who was claiming he was very close to spiritual enlightenment. But from his posts, I could do see he was assuming a lot of things about his progress and was trying to convince himself that he was progressing faster. Then suddenly one day he posted that all these non-duality stuff is a work of Satan and only now he realized it. I haven't seen his posts after that. But anyway, as you said, if you look at the comments of the video and the way people respond to it, you will see that everyone uses a default template, like saying things like 'you are getting paid by someone', 'you are an idiot' and a lot of ad hominem attacks etc.. This is what I am talking about as cultish behaviour. If such responses are given for a video where a lady seems to have misunderstood what yoga is, (since she is seeing these things through a Christian glass), it will only create a bad impression about yoga in general.

oh yes..

yes

yes...

Yes.. J.K was totally antiguru and antitradition. There is a discourse of J.K which I believe is titled 'Truth is the pathless land'. It is a very beautiful one.

I am wondering if we are using different terminology.. Probably, the word 'witness' conjures up the image of some entity, like a person... But the witness is a standard term though and it doesn't imply the 'thinker' or the 'ego'...

It is not a 'thinker' watching the thoughts.. But this happens in the beginning and it ends up like one part of the mind with its interpretations etc watching another part of the mind. That is why I suggest shamatha or kriyayoga before trying witnessing meditation. I am aware that J.K used to say 'observer is the observed'.. But he also talked about 'choiceless awareness' which is nothing but witnessing meditation. Many people do not realize how powerful it is.. It can strip your self-concept off completely and destroy all the boundaries between you and the world. Then, in the experience of reality, you always see that observer is the observed. The witnessing meditation is nothing but being a passive witness.. You don't analyze, interpret or judge the thoughts but this could happen a lot in the beginning. As time passes, one will get the knack of it. I did this for about 12 years.... This is also what Eckhart Tolle means by 'listening to the voice in the head'.

That is probably because you already cultivated the focus and stillness by some other means.. It could be anything.. I fell in a crazy crush on a girl when I was 15 and I used to visualize myself merging with her. I did this quite often whenever I found time..my story here: https://t.co/NyIuUIMuiV . This is not the same as the one I have on my blog because this post has some additional content that elaborates my early childhood. You will see how neurotic and crazy I was..

Yes.. @robdl Realizing that the observer and the observed is the same should happen automatically and shouldn't be taken as a mere belief. I am not suggesting anything new when I am talking about this 'witnessing' meditation. Almost every enlightened person has talked about it but the terminology may be different...

The ability to do 'nothing' develops as your focus and mental stillness improves.. In order to improve these, you can try Buddhist Shamatha meditation, kriya yoga etc... Vipassana is supposed to be a do-nothing meditation. But most of the people stop with watching the breath. In the Buddhist canon, it is always recommended to take it to the next level, where you just watch and be a passive observer of your thoughts, emotions etc. That is why Buddha placed Vipassana and Shamatha as the last two in the eightfold path. Because both are complimentary. Read this post for more details: https://nellaishanmugam.wordpress.com/2018/03/01/spiritual-enlightenment-the-groundwork-needed-for-seekers/

Take a break from this forum for 21 days and go attend a meditative retreat. Don't talk to anyone much in the retreat and don't read anything either, just meditate... The temptation to mentally masturbate should go away or reduced after 21 days.. Vipassana retreat is a good option..

Are you still on this forum? .. It has been very long since I saw your posts..