Tapasya as Knowledge
Guided Audio Practice for this Section: In this guided meditation we utilize the teachings of the Shiva Sutras to fan our sparks of awareness into flames of recognition, bringing our mantra from the level of the mouth to the level of the heart while cultivating spiritual focus on our breath in between.
Tapasya As Knowledge:
Discipline is also the bestower of knowledge. According to Patanjali, “devoted practice”, disciplined practice, is the fuel that ignites the radiance of wisdom which eradicates our ignorance (2.28). In fact, discipline is actually synonymous with the very act of understanding itself within the yogic tradition. Sacred texts and teachings in the yogic tradition are known as “Śastras”, which contains the root “Śasa”, which also means discipline. Understanding a Śastra, a yogic teaching, therefore, takes discipline— you can’t just read it and understand it— you gotta live the teachings over time and allow the transformation to arrive. And when you step back to think about it, this makes sense— the sutras are maps that guide us on our path, it is assumed that aren’t just reading the sutras as a book, but as a guide-book, a set of rules that must be followed in order to arrive at the described destination.
Jai Deva Singh goes on to illuminate the nature of Śastras in just that way:
“[A Śastra] expounds the fundamental principles of reality but at the same time lays down certain rules, certain norms of conduct, which have to be observed by those who study the particular Śastra. A Śastra is not simply a way of thought, but also a way of life.”
If you want to understand a high yogic teaching, you can’t just read it, you have to live according to it, you have to let the teaching discipline you. Perhaps this is why Lineage teacher Swami Rudrananda once said that truly understanding a spiritual teaching will cost you “tremendously”— we have to pay deeply with our own personal effort to achieve the teachings we are given. As they told Marvel comic’s “Doctor Strange” in his spiritual pursuit, ‘that kind of reward comes at a great price, but we’re not talking about money here’.
The price of real understanding, real transformation, takes personal effort in your actual life, there is no expense greater, and as Shambhavananda tells us, “major realizations” usually come “at the death of a closely held ideal” (SR, 2). This is the real price of discipline.
For example, 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? In my experience it takes everything I’ve got— I have to empty my wallet to afford that kind of growth!
We’re not talking about money here, we’re talking about paying with sparks of your very awareness. In the Shiva Sutras it is said that the only way to awaken the goddess of Kundalini, the spiritual force of transformation, is by inserting these sparks of awareness one after another in constant succession.
It is assumed that the spark will only burn for a short time, that is the nature of effort, but when you insert that spark continuously, it eventually yields a flame. As it’s written in the Tantrasadbhava:
“This goddess cannot be awakened with force. She can only be awakened by (nāda) supreme I consciousness filled with supreme awareness. To awaken her, the yogī has to churn his point of one-pointedness in the heart, without break, again and again.”
And as Lakshmanjoo comments:
“He must churn it by inserting sparks of awareness, one after another, again and again, in unbroken continuation. The process is to insert one spark of awareness. Let that one spark fade. Again, insert fresh awareness. Let that spark fade. Again, insert fresh awareness. This process must be continued over and over again in continuity.”
These sparks of awareness are the cost of our spiritual practice. We pay for these sparks with surrender— when a thought comes up in meditation, it takes real inner effort to come back to your mantra. That spark, that price you pay by letting go of the tempting thought is what brings you closer and closer to your true nature, the ability to let go of our tensions and attachments that yield the experience of our higher nature. And when we look at this transaction we see just how beneficial it is— we pay with our tensions and what we receive in return is rich inner nourishment, what a deal! We let go of what’s causing us pain and receive that which makes us flourish.