Yoga and Religion

A guided Meditation on Spaciousness, followed by a Discourse on Yoga and Religion, together with an Explanation of Spaciousness.

We start with a guided meditation, getting in touch with the feeling of ‘Spaciousness’. Practice in this is most useful not only in our sitting practice, but in moments through our day, to tune in to Spaciousness without necessarily withdrawing and closing the eyes, and finding a different perspective that it can bring to that moment.

In fact, finding Spaciousness is the key
to bringing Yoga into everyday life.

And the key to finding Spaciousness is to realise that it is our nature anyway; we don’t create a feeling but tune our perception to what is already a natural state of being. It may be hard at first, we may feel we are just imagining something. But that’s ok. If inner space really is closer to our ground state, then we are opening up the possibility for it to become more apparent; just the act of trying to put focus there can be enough. Also coming from a spacious place will probably have an effect on the external situation around us, bringing calm instead of just noise.  

In fact, Spaciousness lies behind, or is the basis of, the physical level, the mental, emotional and feelings levels. It is a representation of the fundamental in our existence. Yoga encourages us first to recognize that, then to live it.

The satsang starts at 19 minutes in, after the guided reflection, and is prompted by Questions.

‘The beauty of Yoga is that it doesn’t ask you to believe anything’

First a question about the relationship between Yoga and religion. Swamiji explains that the roots of Yoga do lie in Hinduism, though he prefers to use the term ‘Sanatan Dharma’, (translated as ‘eternal path’), conveyed in the Vedas from which Hinduism arose. But over time there is no doubt that Yoga has evolved to where it is now; ‘The beauty of Yoga is that it doesn’t ask you to believe anything’. Yoga is rooted in Science, you could say, but the reason it doesn’t matter what you believe or don’t believe, is that Yoga invites an exploration into ‘What Is’, as the underlying truth of existence, regardless of the world of intellect or theory.

The satsang gives a most beautiful, clear explanation of this. Listen to Swamiji’s words, they are the essence of clarity here.

  A further question asks ‘what is Spaciousness?’.  Again the answer is delightfully simple and profound at the same time.  Everything is taking place within some kind of space, actions, thoughts, emotions, even ‘psychic’ phenomena.

Please enjoy the recording below