Our current disconnect with nature enables its exploitation and destruction. This disconnect truly began with the sky-religions’ placing of our spiritual aspiration first outside of the biosphere into heaven and then into nothingness/emptiness. From there the trajectory went to science, technology and industrialism and more recently into cyberspace and virtual reality …
Category Archives: Ecology
How can we live a life that focuses on spiritual practice?
A student was inspired by us retreating to a live in the bush to focus on our spiritual practice. She would like to take a similar step but, finding the preparation tough, wrote the following:
“I find myself working 8am-6pm to build a strong financial foundation to retreat from this path to spend the majority of our hours on spiritual practice. However, I’m concerned I will be ‘behind’ in my spiritual practice by the time I am truly able to focus on it. In the meantime I am preoccupied with working in order to move towards enlightenment. It feels completely incongruous to what I’m trying to achieve. Grateful for your thoughts on this.”
Finally available: Samadhi The Great Freedom
Finally available: Samadhi The Great Freedom
You can get it here on this site at https://chintamaniyoga.com/shop/ or at your favourite online retailer. Currently available as hardcopy only ebooks formats are coming soon.
Natural and Spiritual Evolution
The currently predominant concept of Western Science regarding our evolution can be succinctly summarized in this way: We are individual flesh-robots powered by selfish genes that are trying to survive in a hostile or at least indifferent universe. We are pitched against similar bio mechanoids of the same and other species who are attempting to survive by outsmarting others in competing for limited resources. […]
Is the World an Illusion, the Body a Prison and Woman a Spiritual Obstacle?
Yoga Sutra 1.2 states: “Yoga is the stilling of the fluctuations of the mind.” But this stanza only defines objectless samadhi, the higher of the two types. Taken out of context and without being supplemented by the other definitions of samadhi, one might think yoga was only about stillness—which it isn’t! Stillness is important for a healthy mind and for spirituality, but it is not everything! If this were the case, yoga would just be an escape from the world and from our busy minds—not unlike taking a pill to treat depression. It also would mean that yoga is only about bringing the entire world to a standstill. It’s more than that.
Bhakti and the Tree of Eternal Life
When Paramahamsa Ramakrishna was asked how he attained samadhi his answer was, “Through total acceptance of the gift of samadhi from the Divine.” This is the most direct way! I am not saying other methods suggested should not be practiced, but they should be supplemented and crowned with this effort of Bhakti Yoga. […]
Are We Turning Earth Into Our Own Graveyard?
A new article has just been posted on the BBC website called “Earth ‘entering new extinction phase’ – US study”. The article describes a study tabled by Stanford, Princeton and Berkeley universities, ringing alarm bells that vertebrate species are becoming extinct at a rate 114 times faster than normal. The last mass extinction event took place 65 years ago and the current 6th mass extinction, so the scientist, will likely claim humanity as a victim even during the early phases of this extinction.