Create a sacred playground for your child

This year, I have begun yet another new expansion called Parents-Kids-Home Yoga. The genesis of this project came about when I decided to commission a very talented friend of mine from Hong Kong to draw a set of Beginners series of 10 yoga postures (yogasanas) for children last year. One thing led to another, this small project turned out to be a global platform for bringing Yoga to parents and children at the comfort of the home.

Through this platform, I hope to empower parents to start spending quality time with their children using Yoga as a platform for them to explore, to connect and also to bond at a deeper level. That is the main purpose of this project – Parents Kids Home Yoga. Basically the moment the parents are able to inspire their children into practicing yoga which is an independent intelligence, not only it awakens the muscle memory and bio memory in terms of awakening the body intelligence, it also works on many different systems of the body – physiology, psychology and neurology. So yoga is not just confined to the physical level of workout, it is a complete system by itself. When parents start working with children at this fundamental level, they will experience a new space – the space of yoga, that space is only accessible when they are able to bring the child into the space of purity and awareness.

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Your problems aren’t big as you think

Are you struggling with problems in life?
Do you feel overwhelmed or depressed by your problems?

The first thing I learned about problems in life from my Guru, Paramahamsa Nithyananda (fondly known as Swamiji) is that our mind is not logical as such every moment our idea of pain, suffering, pleasure, joy, love and hate is constantly changing. Each problem is like a new wave which dissolves after sometime. The problem is we’ve been taught to think the mind is logical but the truth is the mind is more like an ocean. It is not a solid ground as we may like to believe, all ideas we carry about ourselves, ideas about love, pain, worries, fears, pleasure and God – these ideas are floating and not rooted.

One example in my life.
There was a time which I felt troubled in my marriage. I would imagine the different permutations of response I would give and the outcomes from my imagination. When I was diagnosed with Stage 3 cervix cancer in June 2005, suddenly the game of the mind shifted gear to the most basic survival need. The conflict in the relationship didn’t bother me after all, the issue of my basic survival became the main concern. This clearly showed that all my ideas of so-called problems in my life were just not solid. They existed based on my perception of suffering at that moment.

The second truth is that problem can wash away other problems, waves can dissolve waves. When one big survival-need type of problem hits me, it just washed away all my other problems. Other problems such as conflict in relationships and stress from job are no longer a concern. Suddenly all the problems I thought could never be resolved, just disappeared at that moment. Nothing really matters!

The third secret you should know is that whenever we undergo death-related fear, a huge energy is being released in the second energy center (Swadhistana chakra) – it is an automatic mechanism to bring us out of fear. Same way for pain experience, there is an automatic anaesthesia to protect us from pain. Beyond certain limit, we fall into the unconscious layer and we don’t feel the pain anymore. If we internalize this truth, we lose respect for the perceived problems and they no longer have power over us.  It is by making the problem seems big that our mind feels big and important. But the mind is wavering, constantly it creates waves, hence Patanjali says Sutra Verse #2 ‘Mind is an action, you can stop it.’ The first step to get out of this mind game is to become aware that your understanding of problems is not right.

In Patanjali Yoga Sutra Verse 13, it states that ‘The effort to remain constantly in that elevated state of awareness is abhyasa: Tatra sthitau yatno abhyasa.’ Abhyasa means again and again bringng yourself back to the center, elevating yourself to the higher state of consciousness, centering yourself in that truth. By melting the incompletions or hangovers you created unconsciously and living the right truths will bring you back to the center again and again.  This Sutra not only gave me one of the AHA! moments which shifted my perception about problems in life, but it also helped me to strengthen my spiritual practice so that I am able to find my center again and again.

Abhyasa (practice) is deeply connected to the muscles in our body. Whatever we repeat consciously become unconscious because it penetrates into the unconscious layers; that memory creates our body. Any conscious action you do again and again will strengthen you whereas any unconscious action you do repeatedly weakens your body.

Remember this truth – the problems we face are neither permanent nor impermanent as we perceive. We create problems from our unconscious practice or habits (negative abhyasa). When we are able to cognise this fundamental truth about problems, we can simply walk out of any problem and get back to our center of restful awareness. Namaste 😀

Aligning to the Source of Yoga

On Tuesday, 21st June happened to be the International Day of Yoga, Paramahamsa Nithyananda (fondly known as Swamiji), a living Yogi and an enlightened master, gave three important revelations about the Source of Yoga that the world should know.

First, he declared that Yoga does not originate from Patanjali (a great sage and siddha) as taught by many secular Gurus and Yogis. Patanjali is a great organiser of Yoga Sutras but at least 15,000 years before Patanjali, a being walked on this earth, he is AdiGuru Sadashiva. He is the originator of Yoga and there had been sufficient evidence to show that Sadashiva had clearly outlined detailed manual of yoga postures, Pranayama, Kriya as science of enlightenment. The complete works of Sadashiva are called Agamas. The source of Yoga is Sadashiva himself. Patanjali is a great devotee of Sadashiva who lived in Chidambaram and organized this science and presented it in a very systematic way as the Yoga Sutras. As a living representative of Sadashiva, Swamiji reminded that knowing the original source and the scriptures revealed by the original author is needed to keep the purity of any knowledge branch. In Vedic tradition, any sacred knowledge branch will be complete only if the founder’s intentions are revealed “as it is” to the person studying the knowledge.

Swamiji is not only an enlightened Guru, he is also a Shiva Yogi – one who has attained the state of Shivatva (Oneness with Lord Shiva). The moment he came into my life, he had been guiding me towards the authentic source of Yoga. Prior to meeting him, I had learned from several yoga teachers and attended a few Yoga teachers training from India and New Zealand but I struggled to practise Yoga Sutras because the sacred knowledge had to be heard from an enlightened Guru. I remembered in Sept 2005, I was in Christchurch, New Zealand attending a 7-day Yoga teachers training and I asked my room-mate: Gerry, I know Yoga originated from India, but I have yet to find my connection back to India.” Five months later in early 2006, the Universe sent an enlightened Yogi in the form of Swamiji to me who fundamentally was set to change my entire Yoga journey. The moment he started the discourse on Patanjali Yoga Sutras in 2009, I was absorbing like a sponge. Everything he uttered simply fed my thirst for this knowledge. At that time I knew he is the one who will guide me in deepening the knowledge of Yoga, so it was natural for me to align my understanding and practice to Nithya Yoga. Then Yoga Sutras started to become an experience in me with the sacred secrets revealed by him and his initiation. One great thing happened to me – with the blessing of Swamiji, I become a living teacher – I live what I teach and teach what I live. He is slowly moulding me into a perfect teacher as Sadashiva wanted.

The second revelation is: Always ask for the original source, Yoga is not something to be developed. When you practise from the original source, the atma pramana – personal experience always matches with apta pramana – the earlier Rishi’s experience. Atma pramana should be in tune with apta pramana. The individual experience should always be in tune with the original source – the great enlightened masters, the founding fathers of Yoga. Sadashiva very clearly defined the qualification of a Yoga Guru – He should have atma pramana and he should be completely in tune with apta pramana. Through his own personal enlightenment experience and in tune with the revealed scriptures he should be able to make the science into sakshi pramana – witnessing of the truth, only that person is authorized to teach.

Swamiji had opened up a whole new world of possibilities in me in terms of deeper exploration of Yoga through various scriptures from the source. Now, I am ready to embrace the Yogapada from Agamas once it is available in English. Swamiji has taken the responsibility to collect and archive all these ancient scriptures and make this knowledge accessible to everyone absolutely free without copyright at the website hinduismnow.org. Soon we will be able to read everything from the source. From my own experience so far, if you listen  to his insightful commentaries, take his guidance and initiation, he can simply transmit the experience to anyone if you are open to dive to the depth of Yoga in its purest form.

The third important truth he revealed is: Yoga is not just the science of keeping you healthy, it is the science of radiating enlightenment. Yoga gives you the power to manifest what you want, making you a superman. Yoga is a powerful alchemy system that gives result as soon as you start. So many yoga practitioners are struck with just learning the precision of body postures as a physical workout and some techniques of  blowing nose. To experience the depth of yoga, one has to have the courage to throw out his/her belief system and vested interest because Yoga is an independent intelligence which can lead us to the self-realisation. Sadashiva will reveal himself to you when you are guided by an enlightened Guru.

After having been initiated by Swamiji from several Inner Awakening programs and the recent Suddhadvaitam program in Kumbh Mela at Ujjain, I am now starting to play with a new dimension of Yoga – manifesting powers in creating a reality I want. Just a couple days ago, in the Wednesday samyama practice which I facilitated taken from original source of Patanjali Yoga Sutra with Swamiji’s blessing, I witnessed the first miracle in front of my eyes. A lady who had a blocked ear for 3 weeks, was healed from the Sound samyama practice itself. Another fascinating thing is my body is capable of living without solid food after Nirahara Samyama – the science of going beyond food patterns and living with pure cosmic energy gifted by Swamiji to the world. Since December 2012 after the initiation, the body is constantly in such a high energy level with no tiredness and boredom. With a powerful inner space like hiranya garbha (cosmic womb), I am living a life with constant new possibilities and miracles! I just know the knowledge revealed by Swamiji is coming from the authentic source!

In essence, I may not have started my path to Yoga from the authentic source but I know through my self-effort of practice and pure intention to learn from the very the Source of Yoga, Swamiji happened in my life as my Guru. Having found the right Guru means 99.9% of my job is done, now it is just a matter of aligning myself to the Source of Yoga and letting him do the necessary alchemy process for the ultimate flowering! Namaste! 😀