Monday, January 10, 2011
Ordo Templi Orientis
Thursday, January 06, 2011
Saint Theresa's Prayer
May today there be peace within.
May you trust God that you are exactly where you are meant to be..
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith.
May you use those gifts that you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you.
May you be content knowing you are a child of God..
Let this presence settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing,
Dance, praise and love.
It is there for each and every one of us.
Tuesday, January 04, 2011
Transformation of energy Satyananda saraswati
Transformation of Sexual Energy
This discussion on sexual energy is classic. We have all heard about the need for controlling our sexuality and about the power derived from transforming sexual energy into spiritual energy. In this frank discourse, Shree Maa and I not only give a new vocabulary with which to talk about the transformation of sexual energy, but moreover we describe the process of that transformation. We detail the Swastik asana and the banda kriya practices which turn shukra into ojas, and ojas into tejas, resulting in the highest meditative energy and out of body experiences.
Click here for Talk on Sexual Energy
Swami Satyananda Saraswati's Talk on Transmuting Sexual Energy
This is the first time I've given this talk in mixed company, so please excuse me if I'am a little hesitant. We wanted to talk about sexual energy. There are two paths, the path of Viagra, and the path of Vairagya; they're very closely associated, just equal and opposite. Of course, the path of Viagra is the path of stimulation and external expression, and the path of Vairagya is the path that goes inside. Vai means without, and raga means passion. And a vairagi is a kind of sanyasi in the Vaishnava lineage. He is one who is free from passion. Also raga means activity. So vairagya means reducing our attachment to activity. So we're interested, presumably, in the path of vairagya, in the path of freeing ourselves from passion, and freeing ourselves from activity. And I wanted to talk about a vocabulary that gives us new words to invite new concepts, so that we can make the journey more efficiently.
Actually the concept of sexual energy has no Sanskrit name. There's just energy. And there isn't sexual energy or spiritual energy or this energy, or that energy. There is just shakti, energy. And wherever we pay attention to that shakti, that's how it manifests in our lives, in our behavior, in our activities. So when we talk in English about sexual energy, we're just saying our minds, our physiology is moving toward sexuality. The energy is the same.
I want to talk about the process of transmuting, transforming, that energy which we're paying attention to in sexual areas, into a spiritual energy which is taking us higher and higher towards our intended goal. Because once we have this understanding, we become empowered to desist from seeking frivolous relationships. We don't have to go outside, and find relationships that don't work for us. We can spend more time bringing that energy in and up towards our intended goal.
That's why I want to talk about this new vocabulary. The first step, of course, are the organs. In the male, it is called the lingam, and in the female it's called the yoni. Now, the yoni has another name; it's also called the chit kunda, the container of consciousness, because no one goes to the yoni without placing full consciousness. It's not something that is done casually.
In our Kali Puja book, we have translated a paddhoti, a system of worship for the puja called garbhadhan. Beyond the yoni is the garbbha, the womb, and that's where the seeds are incubated. What we call garbhadhan is placing the seeds into the incubator, into the womb. We have many mantras that use the term garbha. Hiranyagarbha, the golden womb, is the womb which incubates the seeds.
Actually, here is where the distinctions in the vocabulary between male and female stops. From here on, there is just one vocabulary to describe the process, because both male and female seeds are called shukra. Shukra means the seeds of life, and shukra means bright, and clear, and pure, which means the seeds of life are the purveyors of clarity and purity. In the Kali Sahasranama, there are several names into which the qualities of Shukra are integrated: like, shukra vrishtipradayini and shukra samudranivasini. In one sense, in the gross body, she is the purveyor of the seeds of life. In another sense, she dwells in the ocean of purity or clarity, which begets life. So in whatever way we want to take the understanding, that's how we will apply it in our sadhana, and in our lives.
When I translated the Kali Sahashranam, I used the term, clarity to stand for the seeds of life. But the seeds of life are equally applicable. Now more subtle that the shukra is ojas. Ojas is the subtle body of shukra. Shukra is the gross body, that which comes out, that which unites, that which begets life, another being. Ojas is the subtle body. The objective of our practice will be to take all the shukra that wants to flow out, that wants to take the path to the world, and turn it inside, and turn it into ojas, and bring the ojas up. Almost like an ejaculation of the subtle form, it comes up.
Now in order to make this more efficient, there are a few techniques called "bandhas." A bandha is the contraction of the muscles. In order to practice this, you will want to be sitting in the swastik asana, with your left heel in the muladhara to the extent of your capacity. And if you were to feel yourself in a state of sexual excitement, and paying attention to the sexual energy, then you could sit in the asana, and practice the bandha. The mulabandha is the contraction of the muscles in the anus, and you just close the anus, and tighten the bottom, and bring the energy up, almost as it shoots up. And as the energy comes up in its subtle form, in the form of ojas. it comes through the swadishtana, and into the manipura chakra, where you practice the madyamikabandha, by contracting the abdominal muscles. So you practice first the mulabandha, and bring that energy up into the manipura, and then you practice the madyamikabandh, and contract the abdominal muscles, and keep pulling it up until it comes to the heart. In the heart comes the uttarbandha, where you contract the muscles of the heart just like you are so much in love, just like you're feeling so much power, empowered by the shakti that's coming up. Now it's no longer sexual energy, it's shakti. And this shakti's coming into the heart chakra. It's filling the heart with. the essence of what we're seeking in that expression of energy. We're turning that sexual passion into love, and we will change the ojas into tejas, and tejas means light. If you contract the muscles of the chest, and pull in your heart, and feel the light rising higher and higher, you move into the uttarabandh. Here you bring that tejas shakti to the agnya chakra, and through the sahasrara, and bring it out, and let it go as high as you possibly can, almost like you had an ejaculation of the subtle form of energy that came all the way out through the top of your skull, and reached all the way to the planets.
And that's called making love. So the mulabandha contracts the anal muscles and also those of the thighs, and then you bring up the energy into madhyamikabandha, where it becomes so much empowered, so much more fulfilled, and through practicing madhyamikabandha, you bring it to the anahata chakra. Here it fills your heart with so much love, and you're exuding this energy. You can hardly contain it; your chest pulls in tight because you're feeling so much emotion. Now you've become vairagi, because all the raga, all the passion, has been directed towards your love of God. And from the uttarbandha, we're bringing it higher and higher, and by letting it sit in the agyna chakra, the ojas becomes tejas. The mind becomes filled with light, and now you feel that light, you see that light coming higher and higher. And that's where we can meditate.
Then sexual energy is no longer an obstacle in our path; it's just energy. And it's a tool by which we move, direct, and can focus our attention to where we want to go. It doesn't bring us outside into relationships that we don't really need. It brings us inside into the furtherance of our true objectives.
Swamiji asks, "Are there any questions?"
Shree Maa says:
Patnim manoramam dehi, manovrittanusarinim
tarinim durga samsara, sagarasya kulodbhavam.
This is shiva/shakti.
Swamiji explains, "This is the union between Shiva and Shakti; Shiva in the sahasrara, and shakti resides in the muladhara. She's coming up in the form of shukra, transforming into ojas, becoming tejas, and then uniting. And this is the true union, the verse that Mother is reciting from the Argala Stotram. Give me a wife in harmony with my mind; that wife is Shakti because who's singing the song? Shiva! Consciousness is asking for energy to come and illuminate him. That's just what it is!
From Shree Maa's comment, Swamiji further explains, "That wife, that energy, is uniting with the soul, and taking the soul higher and higher, and higher. Now she's no longer the energy that keeps us bound to worldly interaction. She's the energy that inspires us to come to the highest realization. We have just transformed that energy. So the concept of sexual energy is really a misnomer. It's not understood. There is no sexual energy. there's just energy! And if we don't regulate or direct that energy, it will direct us. But once we grab hold of ourselves, and clarify our goals, and clarify our objectives, and really make the sankalpa, the firm determination and definition of that objective: "What are my values, what is important to me?" then, a verse in the Bhagavad Gita says that all the thoughts flow through the mind of the muni, but the muni never reacts. He is free from reaction. Knock on the door, and there's nobody home. That is the degree of vaiyagra, dispassion, freedom from misdirected passion, that we strive to attain. We want to be passionate, but about the right things.
Swamiji continues, "When we can control our senses, then we can achieve to the wisdom of Brahma, the wisdom of the Supreme Divinity, by understanding this process. From the external, from the stimulation of the lingam and the yoni, and from the production of shukra, we take the shukra and extract the ojas. We let the ojas flow up until it becomes tejas, and let the tejas continue up. We go from the tejamayi kosha to the anandamayi kosha. There's an illumination. Then the higher definition of shukra as bright, clear, illuminating, becomes ever more subtle, and we get to have the union in that way.
Swamiji asks, "Do you have any questions about it?"
One person asks, "When you move the energy with the bandhas, do you use your breath?"
Swamiji responds, "Yes, you do. When you contract the muscles, you breathe into it, and then you pull up that energy, just as though it were ejaculating up, and you pull it higher, and higher, and don't let it stop below. Let it go higher, and higher, and higher. Encourage it to rise, and pull on it until you get it up to the madhyamikabandha, and then when you have the madhyamikabandha, you're practicing the pranayama, but you're constricting the solar plexus, so you don't have a full purak, or a full rechak, because you've got a bandha. There's a restriction; you're not practicing a full kumbaka.
Instead you are forcing the energy up higher and higher. Bring it to the heart, and feel it in the heart. You know what it feels like when your heart is so full, that your chest cavity can't contain it. You've all had that experience. Your chest is just not big enough to contain your heart; it's bursting. And breathe into that, and that's where the ojas becomes tejas. And now you're not pulling on the subtle force of life, you're pulling on light, radiant light! And you bring up that light with the rising breath, uddhana, just higher and higher and higher until this body is not sufficient to contain it. It just comes right out the top, as though if you were to look down from the highest heavens on that body meditating there, it would seem that that body is just one part of you, because you've pulled the consciousness out of it in the form of light.
Shree Maa comments, "That way you can get levitation."
Swamiji comments, "That's the true meaning of levitation; it's removing your consciousness from the body, and looking down, raising the consciousness up. Not necessarily raising the body.
Swamiji, "Are there other questions?"
One person asks, "Should this just be used when you feel that stimulation; should one use these practices only then?"
Swamiji, "I would recommend using this technique primarily if you feel any sexual stimulation, because you don't want to put yourself into a position of stimulation. But if you were to feel stimulation, then there are two choices, you can let it out, or you can bring it up. Now, if you let it out, you want to let it out with all purity, and all thankfulness, and all gratefulness, and all surrender, as the greatest expression of the seeds of life uniting in the purest,
clearest, most dharmik way possible. But even better is to bring it up, and turn the shukra into ojas, and the ojas into tejas, and the tejas into chit shakti, the energy of consciousness. It becomes filled with the energy of consciousness. So this would be a technique if you feel yourself prone to sexual stimulation, and I guarantee you that within some time of practice, you'll forget all about the sexuality of it, and just look at the transformation of energy. It won't be a sexual stimulation anymore. It will be part of a technique of meditation.
Swamiji, "Are there any other questions?"
One individual asks, "When we are meditating, and we can feel that tejas in our heart, can this come spontaneously during meditation?
Swamiji responds, "Yes, it can, absolutely, and you want it to. It doesn't have to be the result of sexual stimulation. It could be just filling your heart, and not practicing the mulabandha or the madyamikabandha, but going right to the uttarbandha. If you are free from sexual stimulation, then you can just go directly to the uttarbandha. Fill your chest full of that love, that energy, that bhava, and then make your heart so big that your chest can't contain it anymore, and then take that tejas shakti and bring it up. It doesn't have to start from sexuality.
But if you have sexual stimulation, then there are only two choices, let it out, or bring it up. And this is a system by which we can bring it up. So that's why we wanted to share that.
Om Sam Saraswatyai Namah! (http://www.shreemaa.org/drupal/node/1599)
This discussion on sexual energy is classic. We have all heard about the need for controlling our sexuality and about the power derived from transforming sexual energy into spiritual energy. In this frank discourse, Shree Maa and I not only give a new vocabulary with which to talk about the transformation of sexual energy, but moreover we describe the process of that transformation. We detail the Swastik asana and the banda kriya practices which turn shukra into ojas, and ojas into tejas, resulting in the highest meditative energy and out of body experiences.
Click here for Talk on Sexual Energy
Swami Satyananda Saraswati's Talk on Transmuting Sexual Energy
This is the first time I've given this talk in mixed company, so please excuse me if I'am a little hesitant. We wanted to talk about sexual energy. There are two paths, the path of Viagra, and the path of Vairagya; they're very closely associated, just equal and opposite. Of course, the path of Viagra is the path of stimulation and external expression, and the path of Vairagya is the path that goes inside. Vai means without, and raga means passion. And a vairagi is a kind of sanyasi in the Vaishnava lineage. He is one who is free from passion. Also raga means activity. So vairagya means reducing our attachment to activity. So we're interested, presumably, in the path of vairagya, in the path of freeing ourselves from passion, and freeing ourselves from activity. And I wanted to talk about a vocabulary that gives us new words to invite new concepts, so that we can make the journey more efficiently.
Actually the concept of sexual energy has no Sanskrit name. There's just energy. And there isn't sexual energy or spiritual energy or this energy, or that energy. There is just shakti, energy. And wherever we pay attention to that shakti, that's how it manifests in our lives, in our behavior, in our activities. So when we talk in English about sexual energy, we're just saying our minds, our physiology is moving toward sexuality. The energy is the same.
I want to talk about the process of transmuting, transforming, that energy which we're paying attention to in sexual areas, into a spiritual energy which is taking us higher and higher towards our intended goal. Because once we have this understanding, we become empowered to desist from seeking frivolous relationships. We don't have to go outside, and find relationships that don't work for us. We can spend more time bringing that energy in and up towards our intended goal.
That's why I want to talk about this new vocabulary. The first step, of course, are the organs. In the male, it is called the lingam, and in the female it's called the yoni. Now, the yoni has another name; it's also called the chit kunda, the container of consciousness, because no one goes to the yoni without placing full consciousness. It's not something that is done casually.
In our Kali Puja book, we have translated a paddhoti, a system of worship for the puja called garbhadhan. Beyond the yoni is the garbbha, the womb, and that's where the seeds are incubated. What we call garbhadhan is placing the seeds into the incubator, into the womb. We have many mantras that use the term garbha. Hiranyagarbha, the golden womb, is the womb which incubates the seeds.
Actually, here is where the distinctions in the vocabulary between male and female stops. From here on, there is just one vocabulary to describe the process, because both male and female seeds are called shukra. Shukra means the seeds of life, and shukra means bright, and clear, and pure, which means the seeds of life are the purveyors of clarity and purity. In the Kali Sahasranama, there are several names into which the qualities of Shukra are integrated: like, shukra vrishtipradayini and shukra samudranivasini. In one sense, in the gross body, she is the purveyor of the seeds of life. In another sense, she dwells in the ocean of purity or clarity, which begets life. So in whatever way we want to take the understanding, that's how we will apply it in our sadhana, and in our lives.
When I translated the Kali Sahashranam, I used the term, clarity to stand for the seeds of life. But the seeds of life are equally applicable. Now more subtle that the shukra is ojas. Ojas is the subtle body of shukra. Shukra is the gross body, that which comes out, that which unites, that which begets life, another being. Ojas is the subtle body. The objective of our practice will be to take all the shukra that wants to flow out, that wants to take the path to the world, and turn it inside, and turn it into ojas, and bring the ojas up. Almost like an ejaculation of the subtle form, it comes up.
Now in order to make this more efficient, there are a few techniques called "bandhas." A bandha is the contraction of the muscles. In order to practice this, you will want to be sitting in the swastik asana, with your left heel in the muladhara to the extent of your capacity. And if you were to feel yourself in a state of sexual excitement, and paying attention to the sexual energy, then you could sit in the asana, and practice the bandha. The mulabandha is the contraction of the muscles in the anus, and you just close the anus, and tighten the bottom, and bring the energy up, almost as it shoots up. And as the energy comes up in its subtle form, in the form of ojas. it comes through the swadishtana, and into the manipura chakra, where you practice the madyamikabandha, by contracting the abdominal muscles. So you practice first the mulabandha, and bring that energy up into the manipura, and then you practice the madyamikabandh, and contract the abdominal muscles, and keep pulling it up until it comes to the heart. In the heart comes the uttarbandha, where you contract the muscles of the heart just like you are so much in love, just like you're feeling so much power, empowered by the shakti that's coming up. Now it's no longer sexual energy, it's shakti. And this shakti's coming into the heart chakra. It's filling the heart with. the essence of what we're seeking in that expression of energy. We're turning that sexual passion into love, and we will change the ojas into tejas, and tejas means light. If you contract the muscles of the chest, and pull in your heart, and feel the light rising higher and higher, you move into the uttarabandh. Here you bring that tejas shakti to the agnya chakra, and through the sahasrara, and bring it out, and let it go as high as you possibly can, almost like you had an ejaculation of the subtle form of energy that came all the way out through the top of your skull, and reached all the way to the planets.
And that's called making love. So the mulabandha contracts the anal muscles and also those of the thighs, and then you bring up the energy into madhyamikabandha, where it becomes so much empowered, so much more fulfilled, and through practicing madhyamikabandha, you bring it to the anahata chakra. Here it fills your heart with so much love, and you're exuding this energy. You can hardly contain it; your chest pulls in tight because you're feeling so much emotion. Now you've become vairagi, because all the raga, all the passion, has been directed towards your love of God. And from the uttarbandha, we're bringing it higher and higher, and by letting it sit in the agyna chakra, the ojas becomes tejas. The mind becomes filled with light, and now you feel that light, you see that light coming higher and higher. And that's where we can meditate.
Then sexual energy is no longer an obstacle in our path; it's just energy. And it's a tool by which we move, direct, and can focus our attention to where we want to go. It doesn't bring us outside into relationships that we don't really need. It brings us inside into the furtherance of our true objectives.
Swamiji asks, "Are there any questions?"
Shree Maa says:
Patnim manoramam dehi, manovrittanusarinim
tarinim durga samsara, sagarasya kulodbhavam.
This is shiva/shakti.
Swamiji explains, "This is the union between Shiva and Shakti; Shiva in the sahasrara, and shakti resides in the muladhara. She's coming up in the form of shukra, transforming into ojas, becoming tejas, and then uniting. And this is the true union, the verse that Mother is reciting from the Argala Stotram. Give me a wife in harmony with my mind; that wife is Shakti because who's singing the song? Shiva! Consciousness is asking for energy to come and illuminate him. That's just what it is!
From Shree Maa's comment, Swamiji further explains, "That wife, that energy, is uniting with the soul, and taking the soul higher and higher, and higher. Now she's no longer the energy that keeps us bound to worldly interaction. She's the energy that inspires us to come to the highest realization. We have just transformed that energy. So the concept of sexual energy is really a misnomer. It's not understood. There is no sexual energy. there's just energy! And if we don't regulate or direct that energy, it will direct us. But once we grab hold of ourselves, and clarify our goals, and clarify our objectives, and really make the sankalpa, the firm determination and definition of that objective: "What are my values, what is important to me?" then, a verse in the Bhagavad Gita says that all the thoughts flow through the mind of the muni, but the muni never reacts. He is free from reaction. Knock on the door, and there's nobody home. That is the degree of vaiyagra, dispassion, freedom from misdirected passion, that we strive to attain. We want to be passionate, but about the right things.
Swamiji continues, "When we can control our senses, then we can achieve to the wisdom of Brahma, the wisdom of the Supreme Divinity, by understanding this process. From the external, from the stimulation of the lingam and the yoni, and from the production of shukra, we take the shukra and extract the ojas. We let the ojas flow up until it becomes tejas, and let the tejas continue up. We go from the tejamayi kosha to the anandamayi kosha. There's an illumination. Then the higher definition of shukra as bright, clear, illuminating, becomes ever more subtle, and we get to have the union in that way.
Swamiji asks, "Do you have any questions about it?"
One person asks, "When you move the energy with the bandhas, do you use your breath?"
Swamiji responds, "Yes, you do. When you contract the muscles, you breathe into it, and then you pull up that energy, just as though it were ejaculating up, and you pull it higher, and higher, and don't let it stop below. Let it go higher, and higher, and higher. Encourage it to rise, and pull on it until you get it up to the madhyamikabandha, and then when you have the madhyamikabandha, you're practicing the pranayama, but you're constricting the solar plexus, so you don't have a full purak, or a full rechak, because you've got a bandha. There's a restriction; you're not practicing a full kumbaka.
Instead you are forcing the energy up higher and higher. Bring it to the heart, and feel it in the heart. You know what it feels like when your heart is so full, that your chest cavity can't contain it. You've all had that experience. Your chest is just not big enough to contain your heart; it's bursting. And breathe into that, and that's where the ojas becomes tejas. And now you're not pulling on the subtle force of life, you're pulling on light, radiant light! And you bring up that light with the rising breath, uddhana, just higher and higher and higher until this body is not sufficient to contain it. It just comes right out the top, as though if you were to look down from the highest heavens on that body meditating there, it would seem that that body is just one part of you, because you've pulled the consciousness out of it in the form of light.
Shree Maa comments, "That way you can get levitation."
Swamiji comments, "That's the true meaning of levitation; it's removing your consciousness from the body, and looking down, raising the consciousness up. Not necessarily raising the body.
Swamiji, "Are there other questions?"
One person asks, "Should this just be used when you feel that stimulation; should one use these practices only then?"
Swamiji, "I would recommend using this technique primarily if you feel any sexual stimulation, because you don't want to put yourself into a position of stimulation. But if you were to feel stimulation, then there are two choices, you can let it out, or you can bring it up. Now, if you let it out, you want to let it out with all purity, and all thankfulness, and all gratefulness, and all surrender, as the greatest expression of the seeds of life uniting in the purest,
clearest, most dharmik way possible. But even better is to bring it up, and turn the shukra into ojas, and the ojas into tejas, and the tejas into chit shakti, the energy of consciousness. It becomes filled with the energy of consciousness. So this would be a technique if you feel yourself prone to sexual stimulation, and I guarantee you that within some time of practice, you'll forget all about the sexuality of it, and just look at the transformation of energy. It won't be a sexual stimulation anymore. It will be part of a technique of meditation.
Swamiji, "Are there any other questions?"
One individual asks, "When we are meditating, and we can feel that tejas in our heart, can this come spontaneously during meditation?
Swamiji responds, "Yes, it can, absolutely, and you want it to. It doesn't have to be the result of sexual stimulation. It could be just filling your heart, and not practicing the mulabandha or the madyamikabandha, but going right to the uttarbandha. If you are free from sexual stimulation, then you can just go directly to the uttarbandha. Fill your chest full of that love, that energy, that bhava, and then make your heart so big that your chest can't contain it anymore, and then take that tejas shakti and bring it up. It doesn't have to start from sexuality.
But if you have sexual stimulation, then there are only two choices, let it out, or bring it up. And this is a system by which we can bring it up. So that's why we wanted to share that.
Om Sam Saraswatyai Namah! (http://www.shreemaa.org/drupal/node/1599)
Sunday, January 02, 2011
List of Books on Tantra
In Agam Tatva Vilas following names of Tantra books are mentioned.
1. Swatantra Tantra
2. Theth Karini Tantra
3. Uttar Tantra
4. Neel Tantra
5. Veer Tantra
6. Kumari Tantra
7. Kali Tantra
8. Narayani Tantra
9. Tarani Tantra
10. Bala Tantra
11. Matrika Tantra
12. Sant Kumar Tantra
13. Samayachar Tantra
14. Bhairav Tantra
15. Bhairavi Tantra
16. Tripura Tantra
17. Vamkishwar Tantra
18. Kutkuteshwar Tantra
19. Vishudh Deveshawar Tantra
20. Sammohan Tantra
21. Gopiniay Tantra
22. Brihaddautami Tantra
23. Bhoot Bhairav Tantra
24. Chamunda Tantra
25. Pingla Tantra
26. Parahi Tantra
27. Mund Mala Tantra
28. Yogini Tantra
29. Malini Vijay Tantra
30. Swachand Bhairav Tantra
31. Maha Tantra
32. Shakti Tantra
33. Chintamani Tantra
34. Unmat Bhairav Tantra
35. Trilok Saar Tantra
36. Vishwa Saar Tantra
37. Tantra Mrit
38. Maha Khetkarini Tantra
39. Baraviy Tantra
40. Todal Tantra
41. Malani Tantra
42. Lalita Tantra
43. Shri Shakti Tantra
44. Raj Rajeshwari Tantra
45. Maha Maheshwari Tantra
46. Gavakshy Tantra
47. Gandharv Tantra
48. Trilok Mohan Tantra
49. Hans Paar Maheshwar Tantra
50. Hans Maheshwar Tantra
51. Kaamdhenu Tantra
52. Varn Vilas Tantra
53. Maya Tantra
54. Mantra Raj
55. Kuvichka Tantra
56. Vigyan Lalitka Tantra
57. Lingagam Tantra
58. Kalotarr Tantra
59. Brahm Yamal Tantra
60. Aadi Yamal Tantra
61. Rudra Yamal Tantra
62. Brihdhamal Tantra
63. Siddh Yamal Tantra
64. Kalp Sutrah Tantra
Apart from these real Tantra books there are few more books which are treated as important books in Tantra. These books have been compiled by the sadhak’s and tantriks after they have attained spiritual enlightening. There are 84 such books available.Those are:
1. Matsya Sukt Tantra
2. Kul Sukt Tantra
3. Kaam Raj Tantra
4. Shivagam Tantra
5. Uddish Tantra
6. Kuluddish Tantra
7. Virbhadrodish Tantra
8. Bhoot Damar Tantra
9. Damar Tantra
10. Yaksh Damar Tantra
11. Kul Sharvashy Tantra
12. Kalika Kul Sharvashy Tantra
13. Kul Chooramani Tantra
14. Divya Tantra
15. Kul Saar Tantra
16. Kulavarand Tantra
17. Kulamitr Tantra
18. Kulavati Tantra
19. Kali Kulavaan Tantra
20. Kul Prakash Tantra
21. Vashisht Tantra
22. Siddh Saraswat Tantra
23. Yogini Hriday Tantra
24. Karli Hriday Tantra
25. Matri Karno Tantra
26. Yogini Jaalpoorak Tantra
27. Lakshmi Kulavaran Tantra
28. Taaravaran Tantra
29. Chandra Pith Tantra
30. Meru Tantra
31. Chatu sati Tantra
32. Tatvya Bodh Tantra
33. Mahograh Tantra
34. Swachand Saar Sangrah Tantra
35. Taara Pradeep Tantra
36. Sanket Chandra Uday Tantra
37. Shastra Trish Tatvak Tantra
38. Lakshya Nirnay Tantra
39. Tripura Narva Tantra
40. Vishnu Dharmotar Tantra
41. Mantra Paran Tantra
42. Vaishnavamitr Tantra
43. Maan Solaahs Tantra
44. Pooja pradeep Tantra
45. Bhakti Manjari Tantra
46. Bhuvaneshwari Tantra
47. Parijaad Tantra
48. Prayogsaar Tantra
49. Kaamrat Tantra
50. Kriya Saar Tantra
51. Agam Deepika Tantra
52. Bhav Choodamani Tantra
53. Tantra Choodamani Tantra
54. Brihast Shrikram Tantra
55. Shrikram Shidant Shekar Tantra
56. Shidant Shekar Tantra
57. Ganeshavi Mashchani Tantra
58. Mantra Mookavali Tantra
59. Tatva Kaumadi Tantra
60. Tantra Kaumadi Tantra
61. Mantra Tantra Prakash Tantra
62. Ramacharan Chandrika Tantra
63. Sharda Tilak Tantra
64. Gyan Varn Tantra
65. Saar Samuchay Tantra
66. Kalp Droom Tantra
67. Gyan Maala Tantra
68. Pooras Charan Chandrika Tantra
69. Agamoktar Tantra
70. Tatv Saar Tantra
71. Saar Sangrah Tantra
72. Dev Prakashini Tantra
73. Tantranav Tantra
74. Karam deepika Tantra
75. Paara Rahasya Tantra
76. Shyama Rahasya Tantra
77. Tantra Ratna
78. Tantra Pradeep
79. Taara Vilas
80. Vishwa Matrika Tantra
81. Prapanch Saar Tantra
82. Tantra Saar
83. Ratnavali Tantra
84. Sanjay Tantram
(http://www.vamtantrasamrat.com)
Sri Yantra again
1st Avarana the outer square with three lines and 4 gates is brown. The outer line is white (though the colour of the 10 deities here is like molten gold), the middle line is orange red like the rising sun and the inner line is yellow like the colour of butter.
2nd Avarana the 16 petal lotus is pink like lotus flower.
3rd Avarana the 8 petal lotus is red – the colour of Bandhuka flowers.
4th Avarana the 14 cornered triangle is colour green like the colour of glow worms.
5th Avarana the outer 10 corners triangle is red like Japakusuma flowers.
6th Avarana the inner 10 corners triangle is colour blue (though the deities here have the lusture of 1000 rising suns).
7th Avarana the 8 corners triangle is colour red like Dadini flowers.
8.The innermosst triangle is white.
9.The Bindu the central point is red like Sindoor.
(http://www.astrojyoti.com/sriyantracolours.htm)
Saturday, January 01, 2011
Seal of solomon
We therefore, through God's help, intending to follow the steps and precepts of Solomon, therefore to your receiving of such a high mystery, we profess to be one chief principal or beginning. Note therefore that the first and chief principal or beginning is the Divine Majesty, and the true invocation must come from the very faith of the heart, the which faith the works shall declare. For Solomon said there is one only God, one might or power, one faith, of whom one work, one principal or beginning, and of whom the perfection and effect of every work comes, although this be divided into many parts. For like as all the whole parts do savour and smell of the body, even so likewise of these things come all perfection and effect.
In the name therefore of the true and living God, who is Alpha and Omega the beginning and the ending, which is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, three persons and one God, the giver of life, and the destroyer of death. For he destroyed our death and through his resurrection restored us again to life.
Of the making of the Seal of God, for the knowledge of the first part, of the knowledge of the diety, for the knowledge of the second part, in the third part of the vision of angels, the fourth of the constrinkesyon, the fifth part of the bonds of dead men.2
Of angels there are three kinds. Some are celestial, some are of the air, and some are of the earth. Of the celestial, there are also two kinds. Some of them serve God only, and those are the nine orders of angels, that is to say, cherubin, seraphin, thrones, dominations, virtues, principates, potestates, archangels, and angels. Of whom it is to be spoken among mortal men, for they will not be constrained by any artificial power. And therefore they ought not be invocated, for they always stand before the Divine Majesty, and are never separated from His presence. Yet because the soul of man was created with them, and to there likeness, looking to be rewarded with them may through the gift and grace of God, his body yet living behold the Divine Majesty, and with them to praise and to know God the creator, and this knowledge is not to know God in his majesty and power, but ever as Adam and the prophets did know him.
Therefore, the Christian man only works truely to come to the vision of the Deity, and in all other works. And although three sorts of men do work by this art magic, yet it is not to be thought that there is any evil in this name Magian, for this same name Magian signifies in the Greek tongue a philosopher, and in the Hebrew tongue a scribe, and in the Latin tongue it signifies wise. And so this name of art magic is compounded of this word magos which is as much to say as 'wise,' and of ycos which by interpretation is 'knowledge.' For by it a man is made wise. For by this art a man may know things present, past, and to come
IV.] Here follows the making of the Seal of the true and living God
Then, below that circle make another circle, distant from the first by two barley grains (on account of the two Tablets of Moses), else the distance from the first can be three grains (on account of the three persons in the Trinity.)
Then below those two circles in the uppermost part, which is called the southern angle, make a single cross, the leg of which may slightly enter the innermost circle.
Then, from the right side of the cross, write .h. (the "exalation"), then .t., then .o. then .e. x . o. r. a. b. a. l. a. y. q. c. i. y. s. t. a. l. g. a. a. o. n. o. s. v. l. a. r [t]. y. t. c. e. k. s. p. f. y. o. m. e. m. a. n. a. r. e. l. a. c. e. d. a. t. o. n. o. n. a. o. y. l. e. [y]. o. t. m. a. and these letters may be made an equal distance apart, and may surround the circle. And with that series of letters which was previously named the circle will thus be filled with the great name of the Lord, Schemhamphoras, of 72 letters.
This done, in the middle of the circles, namely in the center, make a pentagram thus:
![[Pentagram]](file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/intel/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/msohtmlclip1/01/clip_image001.gif){kind=small}
![[.T.]](file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/intel/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/msohtmlclip1/01/clip_image002.gif){kind=small}
, and above that sign, write the name of God El, and underneath this another name of God, namely, Ely, in this fashion: 
.And below the other in the right angle, these two: .a.l.
and in the next after those, these two: .l.a.
and in the next after that: .l.c.
and in that following: .u.m.
Then, around the pentagram make a heptagon; it may touch the uppermost side of the pentagram,
And in the same side of the heptagon write this name of the holy angel, which is Casziel.
And in the next side from the right-most, the name of the holy angel, which is Satquiel.
Then in the next Samael, and in the next Raphael, afterwards Anael, afterwards Michael, followed by Gabriel. And thus the seven sides of the heptagon will be completed.
Then, around that preceding heptagon, make another heptagon, not made like the first, but in such a manner that the one side of it will intersect the previous side of the same.
Then make another such heptagon, like the first, whose seven angles touch the seven angles of the second heptagon, and the which should be shown doubled.
Then, in each of the angles of the second heptagon make a cross.
Then, in that side (of the second heptagon) which goes from the last angle to the second angle of the same, in that part which is above the first syllable of Casziel, this syllable from a sacred name of God should be written: la, and above the last syllable of the same (Casziel) should be written this syllable: ya, and in the space [between] the intersection and the second cross should be written the syllable ly.
Then, in that side which extends from the first angle of the second heptagon, and continues to the third angle of the same, this holy name of God should be written: Narath, and the first syllable, Na should be written in that space of the same side which is above the first syllable of Satquiel, and the syllable Ra in the space which is above the last syllable of the same, and the two letters 't,' 'h' made in that place which is in the same side between the side intersecting itself and the third cross.
Then, in that side (of the same second heptagon) which extends from the third angle of the same to the fifth of the same, should be written this holy name of the Creator, which is called Libarre, such that the syllable Ly is written above the first syllable of Raphael, and the syllable bar is over the last syllable of the same, and the syllable re in that space of the same side which is between the side intersecting itself and the fifth angle of the same second heptagon.
Then, in that side (of the same second heptagon) which is farthest from the fifth cross, this other sacred name of the Creator should be written: Libares, such that the syllable Ly is written in that space of the side which is above the first syllable of Michael, and the syllable ba in that space of the side which is above the last syllable of the same (Michael), and the syllable res in that space of the same side which is between the side intersecting itself and the last cross.
Then, in that side (of the same second heptagon) which goes from the second angle (of the same second heptagon) to the fourth, this other holy name should be written: Lialg cum coniunctiua ita quod coniunctiua in illo loco eiusdem lateris scribatur which is above the first syllable of Samael and this syllable ly in that space of the same side which is above the last syllable of the same (Samael), and this syllable alg in that place of the same side which is between the side intersecting itself and the fourth cross.
But beware that the coniunctiua (connective) should be written thus: [figure] with the inscription intersecting, because of the fear of God malum volitum dividentem.
Then, on that side (of the same heptagon) that goes from the fourth cross to the sixth, write this other sacred name of God: Ueham, such that the syllable ve is written above the first syllable of Anael, and the letter h is above the last syllable of the same, and the syllable am is in the space of the same side which is [inter]secting the side itself and the sixth cross.
Then on that side which goes from the sixth angle (of the same second heptagon) to the first angle, this other sacred name of God should be written: yalgal, such that the letter y is written in the space of the same side which is above the first syllable of Gabriel, and the syllable al is above the last, and the syllable gal should be written in the space of the same side which is between the intersection and the first cross.
Then, in the middle of the first side and the third heptagon, to the right, should be written vos, and in the next place Duymas, and in the next Gyram, and in the next Gram, andin the next Aysaram, and in the next Alpha, and in the next
![[omega]](file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/intel/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/msohtmlclip1/01/clip_image004.gif){kind=small}
. Then, in that small space which is under the second and the third angle of the first heptagon, should be written this name of God: el,
and in that small space which is to the right under the second and third angles of the heptagons under the second cross, this name: ON,
and in the next space under the third cross, again this name: el,
and in the next under the fourth cross, again: ON,
and in the next under the fifth cross, again: el,
and in the next under the sixth cross, again: ON,
and in the next under the seventh cross:
. Then in that small space which is enclosed between the first angle of the second heptagon and the second angle of the same, and the first side of the third heptagon, and the part touching those angles of the circle, draw a single cross in the middle, namely in that space. And in the top-left space of the cross, write the letter: a,
and in the top-right space of the cross this letter: g,
and in the lower-right space write another letter: a,
and in the fourth lower space this other letter: l.
Then in the middle of the next small space to the right, write this name of God: Ely,
and in the next, this name: Eloy,
and in the next: Christos,
and in the next: Sother,
and in the next: ADONAI,
and in the next: Saday.
After this you shall know that commonly in the exemplars the five-cornered star or amulet is made of red, with the space within dyed saffron [yellow], and the first seven-cornered star of azure, the second of saffron, the third of purple, and the round circle of Black.
And the space between the circles where the name Schemhamphoras is, is died with saffron. At other spaces are to be coloured with green.
But in operations it must otherwise be done. For it is made with the blood either of a mole or of a turtledove, or a lapwing, or of a bat, or of them all, and in virgin parchment of a calf, or of foal, or a hind calf [i.e. deer]. And so is the Seal of God perfect.
And by this holy and consecrated seal after it is consecrated, you may work operations which shall be declared afterwards in this book. The manner of consecrating of this holy seal ought thus to be as followeth.
After this you shall know that commonly in the exemplars the five-cornered star or amulet is made of red, with the space within dyed saffron [yellow], and the first seven-cornered star of azure, the second of saffron, the third of purple, and the round circle of Black.
And the space between the circles where the name Schemhamphoras is, is died with saffron. At other spaces are to be coloured with green.
But in operations it must otherwise be done. For it is made with the blood either of a mole or of a turtledove, or a lapwing, or of a bat, or of them all, and in virgin parchment of a calf, or of foal, or a hind calf [i.e. deer]. And so is the Seal of God perfect.
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Upside down
भोगा न भुक्ता वयमेव भुक्ताः
कालो न यातो वयमेव याताःतपो न तप्तं वयमेव तप्ताः
तृष्णा न जीर्णा वयमेव जीर्णाः
(नीतिशतक)
Man thinks that he enjoys pleasures, but in fact the pleasures enjoy him. Time does not move but man does (in time). Heat does not get hot, man does. Desire does not grow old or diminish, man does.
(Neetishatak)
Friday, December 24, 2010
Answers again
"The Possibility lies between an urge to know AND not know the answer" - Michel Salzmann
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
The Answer is not the Answer
“The answer is never the answer. What's really interesting is the mystery. If you seek the mystery instead of the answer, you'll always be seeking. I've never seen anybody really find the answer -- they think they have, so they stop thinking. But the job is to seek mystery, evoke mystery, plant a garden in which strange plants grow and mysteries bloom. The need for mystery is greater than the need for an answer.”
Monday, November 22, 2010
Rumi - Subtle Degrees
Subtle Degrees
Rumi
subtle degrees
of domination and servitude
are what you know as love
but love is different
it arrives complete
just there
like the moon in the window
like the sun
of neither east nor west
nor of anyplace
when that sun arrives
east and west arrive
desire only that
of which you have no hope
seek only that
of which you have no clue
love is the sea of not-being
and there intellect drowns
this is not the Oxus River
or some little creek
this is the shoreless sea;
here swimming ends
always in drowning
a journey to the sea
is horses and fodder
and contrivance
but at land’s end
the footsteps vanish
you lift up your robe
so as not to wet the hem;
come! drown in this sea
a thousand times
the moon passes over the
ocean of non-being
droplets of spray tear loose
and fall back
on the cresting waves
a million galaxies
are a little scum
on that shoreless sea
Rumi
subtle degrees
of domination and servitude
are what you know as love
but love is different
it arrives complete
just there
like the moon in the window
like the sun
of neither east nor west
nor of anyplace
when that sun arrives
east and west arrive
desire only that
of which you have no hope
seek only that
of which you have no clue
love is the sea of not-being
and there intellect drowns
this is not the Oxus River
or some little creek
this is the shoreless sea;
here swimming ends
always in drowning
a journey to the sea
is horses and fodder
and contrivance
but at land’s end
the footsteps vanish
you lift up your robe
so as not to wet the hem;
come! drown in this sea
a thousand times
the moon passes over the
ocean of non-being
droplets of spray tear loose
and fall back
on the cresting waves
a million galaxies
are a little scum
on that shoreless sea
Sunday, November 14, 2010
Jean De Salzmann
We say we are "in the Work." What does it mean? The Work is a special current sustained by a source of energy that can only be touched by a person who is Whole.
The teaching is the guide and only he who questions more deeply can be responsible to serve.
The Movements are a way of living the idea of Presence.
The work with others is a condition for living this teaching.
-- jeanne de salzmann
The teaching is the guide and only he who questions more deeply can be responsible to serve.
The Movements are a way of living the idea of Presence.
The work with others is a condition for living this teaching.
-- jeanne de salzmann
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
David Young on Mrs. Welch
Louise Welch — Essence Friend
by David A. Young
“There is nothing as precious to me as the support of the work of people in the Work—nothing!”“So often when people discover a ruling passion, they want only to get rid of it—to be more comfortable.”“I have never felt or seen an effort of work that did not change the atmosphere.”“It is a big step to come to the understanding that we need to learn to think.”“My search is your search. We each have a common wish to find out—to find who we are and the direction in which we can grow.”“Real faith is not the opposite of doubt. It is an affirmation of being.”“The stronger the group, the stronger the personalities.”
~ • ~
When I first met Mrs. Welch in 1960, she was fifty-five years of age, and I was twenty-one. Until she died forty years later, she was my teacher. Nevertheless, she remains a mystery to me. I cannot say that I knew her. If it is true that we cannot see above the level of our own being, then I could see only a fraction of who she really was. In preparing this article, I reviewed videotapes and notes of many meetings with her. It is clear now that we understood only part of what she said then. We were helped, and felt grateful, but we took in only what our little cups could hold—and they were filled to overflowing. But it was often only much later, when we had more experience, that we could understand what she was giving us. I am still learning from her.Mrs. Welch told us:
We need to know our subjectivity if we want to become available to another kind of experience. My observation is one thing, but to begin to recognize myself as a cosmic unit is more important. Usually there is a block. My relationship to others is cut.Mrs. Welch brought out the best in us. In her presence we would find that someone we thought of as arrogant, thoughtless, and insensitive would sometimes open up and bring the most moving and sensitive observations. We could not help but be touched, and to begin to look at our peers in a completely new way—full of wonder … until we forgot.
The primary question is ‘What do I serve?’ I need to be hungry for a right connection with what is highest in me and what is highest in the Universe; so I have to see what the connections are. My inner sensations are a hint.
How are we to realize that work is not for what is most delightful, but for being. The change is not a change in dream states, but in being—a change in the harmonious balance which will affect the whole being.
I am dual, and it is true that sometimes I am one, and sometimes another. One part wishes to work and the other does not, but sometimes there is a sharp recognition that these two parts operate with their backs to one another. How to look and make an effort of presence to the existence of both?
If I function in the ordinary way, at the same rate of vibration, nothing will change. As long as my body is agitated I cannot experience the quiet that makes me aware of something deeper in myself. That is, I cannot receive higher impressions.
It seemed during periods of intensive work that she held us all, individually and collectively, in her attention. It was as if we were all imbued with a finer substance and began to vibrate at a quicker tempo. In those conditions, all aspects of our human nature were magnified.
What she said seemed to be very important, and it was not only in her words, but also in her tone of voice. She spoke with authority and compassion, and what she said had the ring of truth. All of her outward manifestations seemed to emanate from a central core of being—of presence.
Mrs. Welch told us:
Under the instruction of someone who knows, we try to remember ourselves by learning how to collect attention. We try to still any outer movements, we quiet the body. We begin to study where our attention has been caught in order to free it—free it from where it is caught in physical tension, in anxiety, in the constant flow of random thoughts. We try to draw together this fragmented substance we need for our work. Our work is in the direction of self-remembering—remembering the self as a whole. What I am going toward is the central feeling of myself: I am. I exist.Although it is possible to record many of the things she said, that is very different from her direct, oral communication. Dr. William J. Welch, Mrs. Welch’s husband, once said that if books alone could convey understanding, all the bookcases would be enlightened!
Without attention I do not exist. Always my attention is taken—by anything, by everything. It is taken. But it can be free. Collect attention, work for attention, learn to place your attention. When I make a serious effort to place my attention somewhere, relaxation begins, energies begin to take their correct place. The way begins to be opened for something other to appear.
Both she and Dr. Welch were full of good humour, and there was always much laughter at our meetings. The Welches were serious, but not solemn or heavy, and when anyone spoke they turned the full light of their attention on that person. In replying to a question someone raised, Dr. Welch said the following:
It is necessary to be in touch with the preoccupations that prevent one from seeing. When I look at you, what is it that stands in the way of my seeing you? I am not there, I am preoccupied. While you are talking, I’m thinking of my answers—all that material—and I’m not listening, and I’m not aware that my attention is everywhere but on you. As a beginning, it’s an exercise in bringing my attention on you—really on you—right now. If I have a question about this, as I do now, and if you have a question, and if I stay with it, and you stay with it, we have an exchange that is almost permanent. That experience is almost eternal. If I can attend to you, and you can attend to me, something takes place that is joyful, and new, and nourishing, and alive.Until Dr. Welch retired, we did not see him often in Toronto. It was Mrs. Welch who came almost every month from 1955 through to the late 1980s. We were her group. It was as if she planted seeds here and nurtured them for a long time, hoping that something would grow and begin to have its own life.
Mrs. Welch told us:
We all have moments of being awake, but we lose them quickly because we don’t value them. Something takes place, but it is out of my control. Something does pierce this shell. How can I know my way to it? If you want to know what this piercing effort is—it is my wish. There are moments when my wish can cut right through the protective armour and touch something real and authentic. Why are we not here—right now? It can happen in the twinkling of an eye.When Dr. Welch started to come to Toronto, we began to appreciate how beautifully he and Mrs. Welch complemented one another, and so now it is not possible for me to write about Mrs. Welch without also writing about Dr. Welch. Speaking to our group in Toronto, Dr. Welch said:
We are always looking in the wrong place for purpose, for meaning. We are heavy-laden with this big, blind automaton. Only in moments when our functioning is slowed down does the unengaged purpose appear. What is our life for? What in hell are we doing here?One weekend when they were unable to come to Toronto, I was speaking to them both on the telephone. Mrs. Welch made me promise to give her love to everyone. She repeated this injunction. Then Dr. Welch’s deep voice full of humour said, “In my case, you can be more discriminating.”
Mrs. Welch gently added, “What in heaven’s name are we doing here?”
Dr. Welch had a wonderful sense of humour, and a rapier wit. He and Mrs. Welch were being driven to our Group house in Toronto, via Bay Street, a route we had never taken before. At a certain point Mrs. Welch said, “Oh look, Bill. They have a Temperance Street in Toronto.” Dr. Welch looked about and said, “Yes, but you’ll notice they keep it at Bay!”
Most of us felt that Dr. Welch challenged us, and Mrs. Welch affirmed us, but they had both been through all the grindstones. Often it was Mrs. Welch who challenged. Yet there was from both of them an affirmation of what was best in us.
When Mrs. Welch first invited me to take responsibility for a group, she said, “This is work for you. You cannot help anyone. Try to see your lying.” Later I told her that I felt I was not able to carry this responsibility, but she told me this feeling was, in fact, almost a requirement of anyone who leads groups! “But, I feel entirely inadequate! What is my work here?”
Listen to the group. Practise listening. Listen to yourself, and suffer how you are. It is your work. When you begin to awaken, the first thing you will see is your sleep. As you begin to see your mechanicality, your reactions, they begin to have less power. Seeing is our work.Mrs. Welch told us:
“But the people in the group also see my reactions, my faults, and this cannot be helpful to them.” She then said, “Mr. Gurdjieff never hid his faults.” I continue to ponder this response.
In order to be useful to anyone, I have to be. Otherwise I am just a reacting mechanism, a played instrument.Dr. Welch never hesitated to let the air out of our inflated expressions. A very serious and relatively senior member of our group said, “All my life I have given to others!” Dr. Welch said, “You have never given anyone anything. Always others have taken from you.” It was a piercing insight, and the person who had spoken immediately saw that it was true.
Before you can be more, you must be what you are. Being is how I am, the relation of the different parts held together by my awareness. Completed man is ‘in the image of God.’ We are incomplete. In us the centres are either mixed or confused, not blended. If we wish to go in the direction of being completely human, we must begin to see why we are not.
I do not know the life of my body … nor do I know the life of my feelings, nor my intellect, and I know even less about something much higher that also exists in me—although we have all had tastes of it. I am here to live not only in heaven, but also in my earthly part. Work first to see these two natures.
The ego has strength. It has acted as a lookout for a long time, and has looked after me well. It is self-preservation personified, but self-preservation of the small self. Now the ego begins to interfere with the growth of the Self.
If I try to control, I succeed only in repression. All my life I react. I must not try to suppress my reactions, not pretend they don’t exist, not cover them with hypocrisy. I must know myself at that moment, and not run away. The first step is to pay attention to the reaction. When we see, something changes because of this light.
We are all stronger than we think we are, but not stronger than we imagine we are. I pretend that I am strong, which isn’t true, but the feeling that I cannot, is not true either. Where is my area of choice? It is in the effort of being more attentive, more interested—of giving an objective look at what is going on, while it is going on. This is what I wish—it is a moment of awareness while I am experiencing. The experience is not separate, but it is difficult to talk about it in any other way. It is so simple. It is just being here. Just being.
For a long time, I measure everything I see in myself against an image of what I think I should be. It is impossible to see from there. If I do see something, I immediately want to change it. I do not want to be like that, and so I do not stay with what I have seen. I must develop the courage to stay with that. Do I really wish to be free, or only to avoid glimpses of my slavery?
Mrs. Welch especially encouraged us to see the positive side of things. For example, if we began to see our lack of gratitude, we would be full of regret, but she helped us to see that, paradoxically, we were never so close to feeling real gratitude as when we saw our ingratitude. She also shepherded us away from taking ourselves too seriously. As always, Dr. Welch used other means to help us to see our crocodile tears. One woman who almost always wept whenever she made some observation was described by Dr. Welch as being “too damned damp.”
Whenever we called Mrs. Welch our teacher, she said:
No. Do not call me ‘teacher.’ Mr. Gurdjieff was a teacher. We are all in the same boat. Those who have been working longer may have experienced more, and so may be able to act as a guide for those with less experience, but we are not teachers.A number of us who had been in the Work long enough to begin to take on minor leadership roles as team leaders were invited to the Gurdjieff Foundation’s country house in Armonk, New York. There was a large number of people there who had just recently entered the Work. In his introduction on the morning of the first day, Lord Pentland said, “We have all come here because we are asleep, and wish to awaken.” I remember thinking at the time that the head of the Work in New York should not be telling all these new people that he also is asleep! However, he was expressing the same idea that Mrs. Welch had brought to us.
Dr. Welch said that the Work was not intended to create angels, but real human beings. We needed to see all sides of our being. In my very first meeting with Mrs. Welch, one of the other newcomers said that when she was singing in her church choir, she sometimes saw angels. Mrs. Welch said, “You also have to see the devils.”
On another occasion she said:
We are not interested in psychic phenomena, though many of us have experienced them. We are not interested merely in the experience of beautiful emotional fireworks. Our effort is in the direction of trying to be. Work on myself has to do with the relation of inner and outer. Sometimes one goes so deeply inside that one forgets the outer. My work is related to both. Our aim is not to dwell in Nirvana. It is to live and work in life.After I had been part of her group for a few years, I remember telling Mrs. Welch that I was no longer afraid of her. She said only the word, “Oh,” but her tone was such that I quickly reconsidered my remark! In the early years, she often took us to task. She said later that it was necessary to test people, before giving them responsibility. She encouraged us to question her, not to accept what she said without verifying for ourselves. After many years, she began to let us make our own mistakes, and trusted us to learn from them. There was never any sentimentality, but there was an undercurrent that we came to recognize, in part, as love. She sometimes said, “Love never faileth.” She used this word rarely, and we could sense that it was full of many levels of meaning that were far above what we usually meant whenever we used the word. She gave us the impression that love was the highest energy of all—that all of us, and all of the created world sprang from this source.
She often encouraged us to work whole-heartedly, emphasizing the importance of compassion. Nevertheless, she did not disparage the mind, but rather encouraged us to give our “best thought” to the ideas of the Gurdjieff teaching. One of Gurdjieff’s central ideas is “being-Partkdolg-duty,” that is to say, “conscious-labours and intentional sufferings.” One summer at Armonk, in an evening discussion, she asked me to say how I understood the idea of conscious labour. I felt it was too easy to say simply, “I don’t know”—even though this would be the most accurate response—so I offered an answer which came from I know not where. Mrs. Welch did not question my comment. Instead, she went on to ask, “What is intentional suffering?” Before I could answer, Dr. Welch said, “You’d better quit while you’re ahead!” I did.
I recall on another occasion speaking to Dr. Welch about the ideas. Trying to make the point that what I was speaking about was not my own experience, I said, “Of course these ideas are only theoretical.” Dr. Welch quickly stopped me in my tracks. “It is you who are theoretical. The ideas are real.”
Mrs. Welch was the chief editor of the “Guide and Index to G. I. Gurdjieff’s All and Everything.” Those of us who worked with her on this project found that it became a central vehicle for our work. In her preface to this book, she wrote:
Gurdjieff speaks to the whole of a man at once, and we are unaccustomed to that call. This guide and index to All and Everything is the effort of a small group of people to move towards meeting this demand… We began with the realization that the meaning of Gurdjieff’s book will not open to conceptual attack, but requires thought and feeling of quite another kind... We discovered that one word would become a thread to the whole teaching as it wove through explanations, parables and humorous anecdotes attaching to itself more and more clusters of meaning. One of us would declare that the clue to the book was the word ‘being’; another pursued ‘conscience’ and a third, Mullah Nassr Eddin, who sometimes appeared to all of us as the key to the character of Beelzebub himself.She also wrote the script of a musical play based on the legend of The Juggler of Notre Dame.1 It was performed under that title in Toronto, and under the title of The Clown of God 2 in Halifax. A poster from the 1976 production in Toronto says, in part, “Spend a magical four hours in the Middle Ages. Wander and shop among the craft-laden stalls of a medieval street market and sample the authentic fare of the town inn. Mingle with minstrels, monks and mummers as the miracle of The Juggler of Notre Dame unfolds around you.”
Most of us from Mrs. Welch’s groups in New York, Halifax, and Toronto took part. We produced the craft goods, cooked the food, built the sets, made the costumes, learned music, practiced juggling and tumbling, and learned our lines. In both Halifax and Toronto, we worked almost around the clock for several days leading up to, during and after the performance. Mrs. Welch always insisted that we leave any place in better condition than it had been when we arrived; so actors and musicians and all, we finished with brooms, and dust cloths and mops in our hands after the crowds had dispersed. When we sometimes hinted that there was not enough time in our busy lives for all the demands of the group activities, she would remind us that one always seemed to be able to find time for a love affair…
Although the play was a great “success,” it was for all of us, primarily, a vehicle for the Work. The emphasis was not on the destination, but on the journey. Sometimes it did feel like a love affair… sometimes!
It was during these times of great intensity of Work that she passed on special material that we needed. She understood that only in these conditions of Work would it be possible for us to take in such material.
Mrs. Welch told us:
There is something we need to learn about effort: effort is not strain. Maybe I could realize this if my relaxation were deeper. I wish there were a word other than ‘relaxation.’ The closest I can come to is ‘letting go’ of the ego; so that I can touch another layer, a much truer one. Our search is not for miraculous results—not to achieve a result, but to learn a process.Although she was generous in providing us with clues that would help us in our struggles, she understood that we had to do the work ourselves, and also that there was no point in providing us with a direction until we had come to that point in our journey where a particular direction was needed, and where we were asking for help. Sometimes in a meeting, she would say, after someone asked a question, “Ah! I have been waiting a long time for this question.”
There is a struggle between my wish to gather my attention and my body’s habit of going on with its associations. I cannot fight directly, but I can draw my attention back to my work.
When touching a deeper level, I do not try to do, I watch. There is nothing I can do, I can only try to be. ‘I am here,’ very quietly alert. I try to follow this. It moves in a very quiet inner way, something is touched. It takes place, it has come.
Mrs. Welch told us:
What is this combination of ‘I’s’ which inhabit me? There are many of them. One is a bore, one tries to impress, one has profound opinions—but underneath, something knows all this is a lie. We have to recognize as a fact that we are put into motion by whatever, or whoever, presses the button. We are continually the prey of influences. This is the human situation. Influences impinge upon me and my organism reacts. My reactions are always passive, but if there is something active in me to meet them, I have a chance. Ordinarily, I am attacked by a thousand ‘I’s.’ When I try even just to pick up this cup with intention, it is almost as if the thousand ‘I’s’ are reduced to two—yes, and no. The effort to undertake something intentionally is an enormous help.On one occasion Dr. and Mrs. Welch were unable to come to a period of intensive work in Halifax. For years they had been there every summer with their two Canadian groups from Halifax and Toronto, plus several people from their groups in New York. This was the first time they were not able to come. In fact they were never to come to either Toronto or Halifax after this because of the state of Mrs. Welch’s health. Several of us were in communication with Dr. Welch by phone during this Work period. Once I told him that we felt they were there with us. On impulse, I then asked facetiously, if he and Mrs. Welch felt that all of us at the Work period in Halifax were with them in their apartment in New York! His serious answer took me by surprise. “Yes” he said, “Much has been deposited in both directions.” Over the years since then, many of us have felt that this is truly so, and hence although they are no longer able to advise us directly, what they have deposited in us is still there for us to call upon.
Where is my centre of gravity? It shifts, now here, now there, but it is not related to the central fact of my existence. I need to find that relationship. I need to find ways of returning to it so that it circulates to all my functioning parts. What I wish for is my essential root—to be living in myself and related to the whole of me.
There is a real difference between knowing and believing. This Work is not based on believing, but on working toward being open to what is higher. The higher possibilities are already in us, waiting, but we have not found the connection.
On that same occasion, in response to a question concerning the necessity for group work, Dr. Welch said something that has since become an aphorism for us: “The Work is my independent participation in an interdependent process.”
Mrs. Welch said that Dr. Welch had a long-lasting love affair with the English language. As he spoke, he seemed to be searching for just the right word, the exactly turned phrase. What he said was often alive, and fresh, and memorable. In contrast, although I might be expressing the same ideas, I usually felt my words were careless cliches, and I aspired to speak as he did.
Mrs. Welch also loved language, and seemed to have the kind of mind that retained everything she read. She often quoted poetry, psalms, and passages from literature. One of her favourite poems was “God’s Grandeur” by Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–1889):
- The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
- It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
- And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
- There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
- Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
- World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.
Why is it that when I look at my daily life, I almost never see that it is extraordinary; that I have a life and that I am living in an extraordinary body. Being alive is a miracle, and I am unaware of it most of the time.Later she said:
Shakespeare’s description of the seven ages of man provides a good picture of the descending octave of the physical body. The body will die… What in us can continue?She often taught us without words. The care she took in laying the table for a meal affected us, and we would find ourselves later taking the same care when sweeping a floor, or washing dishes. When she watched us as we worked on crafts, or cooking, or construction, it sometimes seemed that she lent us her attention. Seeing that it was possible to work in that way, with care, helped us later to find that quality on our own. She said:
There is a direct relationship between care and the attention I give. I see that when I care very much, I gain attention.She sometimes told us what she called “secrets,” and I remember thinking, “Surely, if she tells us, they will no longer be secrets.” Later, I saw that what she told us was a secret, and it might take a long time before we understood what she had said.
Mrs. Welch told us:
If I could really remember myself, much of me would be affected. Anger would take its proper place. Unknown territory exists in me, it is real. If I try to be open to its influence, the Work works in me. Certainly with my little self I cannot change. I will start each day with preparation, opening myself to help. We cannot complain when we do not receive, because it is we who hinder.One of the weekends when she was in Toronto after all the scheduled meetings and activities were over, on a Sunday evening, Mrs. Welch invited me to spend some time with her alone. It was a rare privilege. I had been feeling disheartened, and perhaps she had noticed my state. We met just for an hour or so. Our exchange was quite light. We touched on no weighty topics that I can remember. Nevertheless, her words and her attention seemed to embrace, and penetrate, and heal.
Do not try to change. Study. When you work, something drops away of itself.
When you see anxiety, acknowledge to yourself in your own way how you are, and try not to run away, but to be in it more. Sense it more, see how you are inside, and try to see the distribution of your tensions. Then make a strong effort of relaxation, and try to come to some affirmation of yourself at the end of this.
Better one five-minute effort that is true and intense, and real, than a whole day of ‘porridgy’ dreaming that you are remembering yourself. Only that which you have earned and verified many, many times, through effort, can be yours.
The next morning she returned to New York, and I went off to my office. After a long and difficult day, I was walking home and noticed that my posture was slumped; there was a frown on my face; my mind was churning over the events of the day; there was no spring in my step. Then quite miraculously, I became aware of a feeling in my chest that did not at all correspond to my outer state. It was something joyful, completely carefree, untouched and unconcerned with the petty cares of my day. The thought flashed through my mind that Mrs. Welch had deposited this something in me the night before.
Mrs. Welch told us:
Mr. Gurdjieff brought this knowledge to us in a very direct way. It will take us a long time to assimilate. His rate was so much faster and deeper than ours. But his pupils are gradually understanding more and more—trying to live his teaching. He brought us the need to understand and to search as deeply as we can—never to accept too easily even our own experience, but to try to understand that the way to the source of our own energy, our own truth, is a process. We will change very much in that process, and only by trying to understand it will we begin to return to it—to grow and develop in a many-sided way.Less than a decade ago, we bought a country place just outside of Toronto so that we could have a place for our summer work periods. The Welches at this time were no longer coming to visit their Canadian groups. On the first day of our first period, both Dr. and Mrs. Welch asked, “Why are you doing this?” My automatic answer was that we valued these periods of intensive work. I telephoned them every day to tell them what was taking place, and to get their advice. They continued to ask me why we were having an intensive work period in Toronto. Gradually, it began to occur to me that we had no idea what we were doing. There was no doubt that Dr. and Mrs. Welch could conduct a work period, but who were we to attempt such an undertaking?
How to make an effort of attention? For a very long time, all our efforts are full of tension and strain. We need to learn gradually to let go.
Trying to divide our attention is an experiment. It is not a state of self-remembering. Self-remembering is a blended attention—the attention of the real mind, the true feeling, and the cooperation of the instinctive/moving parts. There is a division between what represents ‘I’ and what represents my organism and functions. In order to study that, we try to divide our attention, but that is just one step. I am searching for something more inclusive, more whole. If I am in touch with my essential passion for truth, this helps me to call upon that effort of attention which includes thought, feeling and sensation. When for a moment that fusion takes place, I experience myself as a whole.
Begin to feel the relation between inner and outer life. It is necessary to see the reality of the inner life and have contact with it, but we must be present to both inner and outer.
In one state, we lie and are not aware of it. In another state, we lie and know it, but cannot stop. In still another state we struggle with the impulse. See how in all these states the disposition of the parts is different in us. When one is aware, one notices much sooner. It is interesting that on a higher level the quickness is such that one notices before there is any manifestation of action, thought, or emotion.
A strong state of attention is joy. One feels wholly engaged, and that is what the human heart desperately wishes.
We live within a very small emotional range. We think we are experiencing a strong emotion when we become angry, but there is a whole range of emotions that we never touch. We read of compassion, faith, hope, but these are just words to us. We don’t live on that level. All of our experiments are for the purpose of making valid contacts with the higher centres, not something we experience now and then, or read about in books, but something permanent that is our own.
This question worked on me, mercilessly. Gradually it became painfully clear that I did not understand any of the knowledge I had accumulated over the years. I understood nothing! It was a devastating realization. I began to feel the weight of responsibility and to approach a state of despair. I felt very deeply—as never before or since—that I needed help. Then in the midst of this state, I felt that help came—not just to me, but to all of us. I felt real gratitude to Dr. and Mrs. Welch for guiding us, and goading us, and putting our feet to the fire.
Mrs. Welch told us:
The more I see my helplessness, the more I feel the need to be in touch with the source of energy. I begin, thinking I can do the Work. It takes time to see my helplessness. A real cry for help does not fail, but it has to be real at the moment, not in retrospect.I was not able to attend Mrs. Welch’s funeral. Patty Welch Llosa, Mrs. Welch’s daughter, asked me if I would write a eulogy to be read on that occasion. I wrote the following passage which represents, perhaps, the essence of this article:
The times when we do receive something must not be underestimated. They are real. When we reach a state of deep quiet, when we touch another level of energy, it is very difficult, impossible, to move into our daily activities with that full circulation of energy. Yet it is possible to have some link with that state.
Somewhere I know that if I can be open enough, another force of a higher vibration rate can begin to enter that changes everything—my understanding of my presence here, my relationship to others and to the different parts of myself. How can I help to make myself more available for this energy, more open to this energy? It does not depend solely on my wish. It is not so much that I bring an influence, but that an influence comes.
Early in my life I met Mrs. Welch, and that has made all the difference.
I have often called Patty my sister and she has called me her brother because we are both children of Mrs. Welch. She had a large family, a whole tribe in fact. What is written here may therefore sound quite familiar. Many of us had the same experiences. Nevertheless each one of us felt we had a special place in her heart: that she saw me, knew me, cared about my potential, spoke to me. And so each of us wished to try with our best effort to follow her direction with a passion. She often quoted Orage’s description: “Man is in essence a passion for understanding the meaning and aim of existence.”
We have been so lucky, so fortunate to have been part of her circle.
She inspired us; she called forth talents we didn’t know we had; she dared to trust us with precious burdens that buckled our knees, bent our backs, and strengthened us. Big projects such as the Guide and Index, A Journal of Our Time, The Juggler of Notre Dame in Toronto, The Clown of God in Halifax, called us to super-efforts. It wasn’t just the daring ideas she had. It was not even the wisdom of her words when she responded to our questions. It was her being that shone through and fed us directly. It sparkled in her eyes, it emanated from her posture, her movements, her voice, and it fed us directly—without our even knowing it at the time.
We shall miss her.
At the same time I know that she has deposited in me something of her own being which is not inert. It is alive and essential.
She is our essence friend.
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