Teaching Methods: The Essence of Śastra
The Essence of Understanding: Living Your Practice through Śastras
By Acharya Satyam Ehinger
To understand a teaching in the yogic tradition you can’t just read about it, you have to interact with it in your life and your practice. Understanding a teaching from the head is limited, and only serves to bind us. The second Shiva Sutra states clearly, “Jnanam Bhandam”, knowledge is bondage. The knowledge that binds us is limited knowledge, knowledge that is not understood alongside your spiritual practice. It’s similar in school when you ‘cram’ for an exam, we all recognize that as a shortcut that is fruitless in the long run— but in alot of ways we tend to approach understanding our spiritual practice in the same way. As Sri Shambhavananda teaches in his book “Spiritual Practice:”
“Staring at a book, studying, is supposed to bring knowledge, but it may only bring you a headache or stress…When you get congested in your head, feel blocked, or want somebody to fix you, then you have to draw that energy, which is all clogged up in your head, and bring it down and process it. I’ve learned things that I didn’t understand mentally by doing that exact thing. In a sense, after I got all that energy out of my head, then I would get up and think, “Oh! That’s what this means!” However, I wasn’t trying to stuff it all in my brain.”
It is totally common to feel this way as you approach the more abstract foundational teachings, or when you are trying to synthesize your personal experience into a teaching for others. As Shambhavananda instructs, when we feel ‘clogged in the head’ or frustrated, we have to turn to our practice, re-center, find our breath, and proceed with more inner depth. There are a few things we can do as skillful practitioners, though, that can guide us towards a more fluid learning process.
First, we recommended learning/writing about your practice in the same place that you actually do your practice, if that is possible. In this way you will naturally bring the depth of your practice with you to the process of learning and writing. It is also recommended that you take time to do a little practice before working with the learning materials so that you create some momentum in an inner direction— like a mala of mantra or 3-5 minutes of pranayama. It’s also helpful to light a candle, burn some incense, make an offering to a deity, teacher, or the Universe, in order to uplift the learning experience, and help guide it to a place of nourishment, gratitude and receptivity. From there we also must consciously remember to re-connect with our practice at regular intervals throughout the learning process for all the same reasons.
The next step in the process is bringing those teachings into the context of your life. The earliest texts of yoga were called “The Vedas”, which means “The Science”— because yoga is a a process of whole hearted and skillful trial and error. To do this takes discipline, courage, and creativity.
Discipline is the building block of spiritual growth. The Sanskrit word for heat, Tapas, can also be translated as discipline. This is because discipline itself creates heat, the heat of transformation. Simply meditating at the same time everyday, and in the same place, can begin to grow a transformative fire inside, and over time you stoke that fire with more and more regularity. This heat is at the heart of yoga’s premise of transformation, we must burn up the veils of ignorance to reveal the inner light of the Self. The heat of discipline is the foundation of true understanding. Sacred texts and teachings in the yogic tradition are known as “Śastras”, which contains the root “Śasa”, which also means discipline. Understanding a teaching, a Śastra, therefore requires discipline— you can’t just read it once and understand it— it takes effort over time: you read it, contemplate it, and live it to understand it.
Jai Deva Singh, foremost translator of the Shiva Sutras, writes that śastras “expounded the fundamental principles of reality but at the same time laid down certain rules, certain norms of conduct, which had to be observed by those who studied the particular Śastra. A Śastra was not simply a way of thought, but also a way of life.”
Eventually the understanding we are seeking ‘arrives’ like a fruit arrives on a tree. Like a tree, fruits are a combination of drawing up energy from the roots of the teaching, bringing them into the trunk of your life, and then directing that energy towards a self-contained resource that others can pick from your limbs and enjoy.
And just like a tree, it takes alot of energy to produce that fruit. Lineage teacher Swami Rudrananda said that spiritual work costed him “tremendously”, meaning he had to give pay alot with his personal effort to achieve the teachings he was given. As they said in the Marvel movie “Doctor Strange”, ‘that kind of reward comes at a great price, but we’re not talking about money here’. The price is your personal effort in your actual life— what does it really take for you to do more mantra during your day? What does it really take for you to surrender when they’re wrong and you’re right? It takes everything you’ve got, it costs alot! But of course, we are rewarded a thousand fold, and what we are letting go of is nothing more than shackles we have grown accustomed to carrying. So you could say it’s a very worthwhile investment.
Discipline takes Courage, and we are all uniquely capable of generating tremendous courage in the realm of spiritual practice. This courage comes from inside, from the heart, and yields profound growth. As the Spanda Karika’s tell us when describing the effort of a yogi: “that effort must not be artificial (akṛita). It must be absolutely natural, filled with intense desire and fervent longing, and originating from the center of your heart. By that force, this great yogī directs their mind to that point of supreme God consciousness.” Or as Babaji also describes this process in the intro to his book “Spontaneous Recognition”, “you must have a burning wish in your heart to transcend your fear, limitations, and philosophy. In my spiritual work, I had major realizations at the death of a closely held ideal.” Real teaching means real personal transformation, and that’s what this course is here to help you accomplish.
There is no doubt that the path of the teacher requires Discipline and courage, as every great Movie trilogy has shown us— but it also requires tremendous creativity.
When you begin to bring the teachings into your life, you will see that they are never the same twice. Being present, for example, is a moving target— one that requires the ability to surrender to sustain. This dance is represented by the ‘Play of Consciousness’ in Yogic philosophy, the dance of shiva and Shakti that creates all of manifestation. Can you believe it? The Universe exists not because it has to, but because it wants to, and all of it’s movement is it’s play?!
As lineage teacher Swami Muktananda describes it, "The wise regard this universe as a play of Universal Consciousness, a vibration of Chiti. They know that Chiti Herself appears as the world. The universe originating from Chiti is indeed Chiti despite its diverse forms. She underlies all worldly transactions. She Herself takes on myriad forms within Her own being and expands in various ways.”
This play is using the practice in your life. Not only does it make you a more skillful human being, but it literally makes your life a play of consciousness. It’s like having a song playing on earbuds while still being able to hear and see the world around you— having an authentic practice that you use in your life is how you dance through your life. To find this dance, though, requires tireless practice, endless surrender— and so we recommend working within the realm of a sankalpa when possible.
Sankalpas are personal commitments you make to expand your practice beyond your daily seated practice. It could mean doing more seated practice, or it could mean setting a personal goal to do a certain type and amount of practice within the context of your life in the world. Each week you will receive a Lila Sankalpa, a way to play with your practice in the world. When trying to bring the practice into your life, set realistic goals— when are you going to do more practice, don’t just say “i’m going to do more mantra!”, set at a goal for how much more you want to do, and then count you mantra and reach that goal. This is how you really start making big gains in your practice— setting a goal, reaching it, and then setting a little bit larger goal.
Un-binding your knowledge is an essential aspect of becoming an authentic meditation practitioner and teacher. It takes effort over time, courage and creativity, and forms the foundation of our approach to your teacher training program. Take time to establish the space, inside and out, in which you wish to learn. Courageously take those practices into your life regularly, pay for them dearly from the depths of your heart, as Swami Rudrananda taught. And finally, let yourself begin to ‘play’ with them, as we are taught that this whole Universe is at play, in order to find the real meaning and nourishment we seek to share.
We are deeply grateful for the opportunity to share these teachings with you, as they have not just changed our lives, but become the foundation of them.
Namaste!