The surprising and continuing influence of Swami Vivekananda (2012)
online.wsj.com
online.wsj.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gopi_Krishna_(yogi)
He was a pretty normal guy living a pretty normal life in the 1900's, and in his 30's through meditation he had a textbook enlightenment experience which resulted in a metamorphosis of sorts that he ultimately came to believe was biological / physiological in nature and could be repeated in others. He's one of the first if not the first person to suggest that what we think of as enlightenment is actually a biological event that the human body can perform given the right triggers, rather than simply a different state of mind or frame of thought. This is a revolutionary idea if you think about it; talk about "hacking the brain". The great thing about him is he's very relatable and not aloof, he kept his job as a government clerk and aside from selling a small handful of books, was clearly not interested in making money off his ideas.
He tried for years to raise interest in the scientific community to study the phenomenon, but of course grant money is hard to come by, and doubly hard if you're doing anything remotely unconventional, so his research foundation never took off and he passed away in I think it was 1981.
A lot of people don't know about him, but they've started putting his books on Kindle so you can go check them out. All of them are extraordinary reads, although I'd start with his prose, and then move to his poetry if you're interested in that.
http://www.amazon.com/Gopi-Krishna/e/B00IPU7XD4/ref=sr_ntt_s...
Duality is when you unconsciously make a distinction between you and your thoughts and perceptions. "I think therefore I am" is the subject observing his thoughts, this is duality.
When you silence your mind, you just are and then there is no opportunity for you to define yourself, to make distinction between what you are and what you're not. "I am all that is" is the subject realizing there is no separation between him and his perceptions, this is unity.
Yoga is one systematic way of cultivating this silence that is required to access those mystical states of mind.
As for enlightenment, I could not say because I'm not ;).
I could talk at length on the subject but I couldn't do it any better than Gopi already has; you should check out "The Real Nature of Mystical Experience"
http://www.amazon.com/Real-Nature-Mystical-Experience-ebook/...
>> Faith, he wrote, must be based upon direct experience, not religious platitudes.
>>More presciently, he warned that India would remain a vanquished, impoverished land until it "elevated" the status of women.
So apt with current state of affairs in india!In fact (am from india) , every time any female from family (female) has to go out , a male always accompanies them!Sadly even kids are not spared from this!Hope the everyone learns to respect them in india rather than look at them as on object or thing!
>>'If there is a God, we must see him. And if there is a soul, we must perceive it.'
If one can objectively establish something by their own experience doesn't that just become a fact? Why do we need faith in the first place.
But to me it looks like a lot of personal experience is just personal; it is subjective and it is hard to establish a particular experience as "fact" without widespread consensus. So faith might be necessary in the meantime.
Here for example is RSS leader Mohan Bhagwat speaking in front of a big Vivekananda picture:
http://samvada.org/files/Independence-Day-Bangalore-Aug-15-2...
Maybe they claim him wrongly? IDK.
But yeah, expect downvotes because many people believe that crap. More true among Indians outside of India and in particular regions within, perhaps fuelled by the urge to connect with their roots. That is a perfectly legitimate emotion, just spoiled by the presence of these people who try to make some quick religio-political capital out of it.
An evil soul producing holy witness
Is like a villain with a smiling cheek,
A goodly apple rotten at the heart.
O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath!”
Yoga, at least according to the yoga sutra of Patanjali is *unity with the whole (That)", through unity of mind and body via breath as a preliminary practice, without which any further "realizations" are impossible (training routine).
Vedanta, which is rather mediocre "systematization" of Upanishads has been profoundly summarized by Ramakrishna - "Wanna see God? Look between two thoughts." (at the source/origin of thoughts). This is enough for realizing one's "true nature" (which is popular culture associated with a ray of light - pure energy).
The essence of Buddha's teaching is "life is shaped by our mind, we become what we think", which directly points to the mind as the ultimate source of all "suffering". (Problems doesn't exist outside one's head. Just physical processes).
There is also Rumi, who had the same realizations, but put them in different words.
The problem with all these fine and subtle teachings is, like Sartre pointed out, "the other people" with their stupid ambitions and flawed actions.
Instead of yoga we have gymnastics (in some cases even acrobatics) and whole industry of yoga pants and joints when they are sited for $30/h. Instead of Vedanta we have the same mysticism, where all the deities are morphed into the one. Instead of Buddhims - tons of narcissistic graphomany published by Snow Lion and the others.
So, no, so-called piece of mind comes not from yoga courses or a crowded retreat, but form realization of being an inseparable part of the whole, of That (or being in accordance with Tao, or "letting God/Love in", etc, etc.) It is in being "in balance" (in Eastern terms), non-contradicting with the whole.
I am guide for Himalaya and Tibet region for a few years now - and I could tell that all the magic and miracles, mantras, mandalas, sacred rituals or any form of shamanism "working" only in the realm of one's mind, and does not exist outside it.)