Yoga in the Schools
India has recently announced they intend to teach Yoga in schools to celebrate their heritage. That is a beautiful thing. Yoga is one of the 6 darshanas or systems of knowledge. Broadly, they can each …
Category: Psychology
The Prison of Knowledge
Any teaching can be a prison – for the teacher or the student. Teachings are meant to be pointers, ways to guide the attention so that what it lands on flowers. A teacher may use …
The Blessing of Grief
Grief is a natural response to loss, particularly the death of a loved one. While primarily an emotional experience, it affects all layers of our being. Grief is “the total response of the organism to …
The Common Enemies
Recently, there was a death in the family and a friend and Jyotishi, Phyllis Chubb, did a punya or death chart for her. This brought the unexpected realization that my relationship with the departed had …
Shankara – Before and After
Adi Shankara was a renowned Indian sage who consolidated Advaita Vedanta or non-dualism. He lived from roughly 788 to 820, travelling throughout India and re-establishing non-dualism and the value of monasticism. He wrote extensive commentary …
Happiness Matters
You’ve undoubtedly seen and heard the Pharrell Williams song Happy. Here’s some quotes from a recent article of his in the NY Times. “Happiness is a human right. It’s neither a luxury nor a triviality. …
On Bliss
I’ve spoken here before about how Life is literally Bliss – the very flow of life itself is profoundly blissful if we’re open to that. The Upanishads tell us we’re born of bliss. I’ve also …
Clarity
Sometimes you have a light-bulb moment. Perhaps as an aha! Or a forehead-slapping duh! And then quickly it seems obvious – why didn’t I notice this before? It was staring me in the face! Even …
Karma and the Awake
A few weeks ago, I posted an article on Karma Post-Enlightenment. Since then, it’s become a very popular article but also the subject has come up several times in life events. I thought it worth …
Healing the Past without Being the Past
When looking at healing modalities there’s an important distinction to be made between practices that help you become conscious of unresolved emotions and those that take you into them. Becoming conscious of them helps you …
The Gunas and Emotions
There are a number of ways the sages of old describe the three-way structure of consciousness and creation. Creation, maintenance, and destruction. Observed object, process of observing, and observer. Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva. But by the …
Dance of the Mystery
This Sunday, I heard a talk that put a lot of emphasis on “The Mystery”. This, out of the rising tide of interest in mysticism in New Age and New Thought circles – even in …