Although Yoga Science views mankind's unskillful actions as opportunities to learn, rather than as "sin," such mistakes have been the subject of philosophical contemplation, religious criticism and artistic commentary for thousands of years. Hieronymus Bosch (1450-1516) was a prolific Early Netherlandish painter who used images of demons, half-human animals and machines to evoke fear and confusion in his portrayal of human moral failings. His most famous work is "The Garden of Earthly Delights." In the detail above, humanity is depicted as seeking only pleasure. People are shown greedily consuming or reaching for pleasure, represented as fruit. The fish represent licentiousness, the thistles and thorns are warnings of danger, the birds are Satan's emmisaries and the owl is Satan himself. At the bottom right Bosch paints himself as the only clothed man, warning (pointing) of a new Eve, seen through the earthly traps.

Shankara, the 9th century Indian philosopher warned humanity that "To live for the physical, mental and sensual pleasures is like building a home on quicksand, or trying to cross a stream on the back of a crocodile, believing it to be the trunk of a tree." Some 1200 years later, we are still trying to learn this important lesson.

 

Such foolishness, it's interesting to note, does not usually extend to our finances. If you wanted to start a business, you'd probably write a business plan and survey the potential market to determine if people wanted or needed your product or service. You'd probably also interview several banks to arrange for adequate capital.

Right now you want to be happy, healthy, creative, productive, nurtured and loving to the fullest extent possible. You want to be free from the pains, miseries and bondages you experience. Well, how do you propose getting from point A to point B? Buy a lottery ticket? You might get lucky, but there is a more reliable method.

The Compassionate Buddha reminds us that "You are what you think," and Swami Rama instructs that "You are the architect of your life. You determine your destiny." What you are experiencing today is the consequence of your previous thoughts, and what you experience tomorrow will be the result of what you think today.

 

Your thoughts are the most powerful natural resource available to attain the purpose of life. As William Jennings Bryan observed, "Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice." The thoughts you choose to give your attention to, and your choice to withdraw your attention from others, will determine your destiny. But in order to determine which thoughts to pay attention to, you must first understand the nature and consequence of individual thoughts.

The ancient Katha Upanishad explains that every thought falls into one of two basic categories.

 

Perennial joy or passing pleasure?

This is the choice one is to make always.

The wise recognize these two, but not the ignorant.

The first welcome what leads to abiding joy, though painful at the time.

The latter run, goaded by their senses, after what seems to be immediate pleasure.

Katha Upanishad

 

Preya-Short-Term Gratification

The first category of thought is called preya. Preya is defined as any short-term ego or sense gratification that conflicts with our intuitive inner wisdom. Preya promises immediate gratification, and usually delivers, but like the Doppler effect, the pleasure is either coming, coming, coming or going, going, going. The pleasure of preya cannot last, even though it's pleasant, attractive, familiar, comfortable and extremely easy to give our attention to. In fact, our five senses of sight, smell, taste, hearing and touch constantly investigate the objects of the material world in search of the pleasant. Like seventh grade kids, when our senses identify something overwhelmingly attractive, they immediately alert us to the opportunity for pleasure.

Each of us is very familiar with preya. In the realm of food choices, it's the candy bar. Emotionally, the preya might be represented by unnecessary fear, worry, anger or selfishness-directed toward yourself or others. Preya reflects a strong attachment; the ground upon which your personality currently stands. When you give your attention to the preya, you do experience a spike of passing pleasure or satisfaction, but ultimately the preya does not offer long-term benefit. In fact, the passing pleasure of serving the preya is always followed by some form of contraction, pain or dis-ease. Fortunately, Yoga Science provides another alternative.

 

Shreya-Highest and Greatest Good

The second kind of thought that appears in our awareness is the shreya, and its nature is expansive. Initially, the shreya may not be very pleasant, attractive, comfortable or familiar to us, but the choice of shreya (like exercising the body and meditating every day), inevitably becomes deeply satisfying because it always leads toward lasting joy. In the realm of food choices, the shreya might be broccoli with dinner. Emotionally, it might appear as compassion, forgiveness or fearlessness.
 

Learning to Discriminate

Around 370 BC Plato, commenting in his dialogue between Socrates and Phaedrus, observed that, "In every one of us there are two ruling and directing principles, whose guidance we follow wherever they may lead; the one being an innate device of pleasure, the other an acquired judgment which aspires after excellence." In Yoga Science the term preya is used for "the innate device of pleasure," and shreya for that which "aspires after excellence."

If the shreya always leads to the highest and greatest good, and the preya eventually leads to dis-ease, the choice for the yoga scientist is clear: every thought, word and action must be in service to the shreya. That is the black-and-white ideal, but in a world that appears in endless shades of gray, how, you might ask, can you identify which thoughts are preya and which are shreya?

 

The Buddhi

Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week and three hundred sixty-five days of the year the reliable discrimination between preya and shreya is continuously broadcast, like a radio signal, into your awareness. In Sanskrit this invaluable function of the mind is called buddhi. In the West it is referred to as the conscience or discrimination, and in the early Christian tradition it was known as the Holy Spirit. The buddhi is analogous to a mirror because, when it is used regularly and purified, it faithfully reflects the wisdom and will of the Supreme Reality.

The buddhi allows the conscious mind to gain access to insight from the intuitive library of knowledge within known as the superconscious mind. When such knowledge enters the

conscious mind, no verification of its truthfulness is necessary. When your conscience speaks, you know what it says is true. The only question that remains is, do you have the will power to align every thought, word and action with the divine wisdom of the buddhi?

 

The superconscious mind is not a figment of one's imagination. It is the same portion of the mind from which Albert Einstein saw mathematical equations and Paul McCartney hears beautiful melodies. When you earnestly serve the shreya instead of the attractive and familiar preya, the doorway to the superconscious mind widens, allowing knowledge to flow into your conscious mind. It doesn't mean that you'll become a great mathematician like Einstein or a talented musician like Paul McCartney, but by purifying and exercising the

buddhi, you will be able to access wisdom that will positively impact every single unique relationship you have.

The word conscience comes from the Latin and it means "with wisdom or knowledge." As a meditator, you are simply asked to make all your decisions consciously-based on the science of Yoga and on the reliable advice of buddhi.

 

The buddhi allows the human being to transcend animal instinct in order to attain union with the Divine. When this occurs, humans are able to free themselves from the pains, miseries and bondages created by their learned habits of fear, anger and greed. The ancients tell us that the process of transcendence is the very reason each of us has been born with a human body-mind-sense complex. You have come to this plane of existence to take the next step toward Self-realization. By aligning every thought, word and action with the shreya, as defined intuitively by the discrimination of buddhi, you will transcend the animal, through the human, and realize unity with the Divine.

At first glance, shreya is generally not the more pleasant of the two choices. On the other hand, even though the preya may be more tantalizing to the senses and ego initially, it will, over time, prove to be painful or destructive. Anyone who has ever experienced anger or fear knows they're not pleasant emotions, yet it's often difficult not to give the preya attention. Through repeated attention, even painful thoughts and emotions like worry, fear, anger, sadness and jealousy can become the familiar ground upon which each of us stands.

Very often the suggestions you receive from others blur the line between the passing pleasure and perennial joy. The gurus of our culture-advertising copywriters-are constantly repeating commercial mantras into your awareness. They suggest that if it looks pleasant, smells pleasant, tastes, sounds and feels pleasant, it's virtually guaranteed to be good for you. "Buy it," these commercials entreat. "You will become happy and your pain will be eliminated."

You should understand that these Madison Avenue gurus are not malicious, nor the cause of your troubles. In fact, the advertising industry is actually doing you a favor by acquainting you with available options. Admittedly, there are times when the pleasant and the good are one and the same. Yoga science makes no admonition against the purchase of necessities and items that gratify the senses. You have a body equipped to experience pleasure and life is to be enjoyed. And, let's face it, everyone needs stuff. You need a car, a warm house, clothing, food and recreation. But ultimately you must be responsible for either accepting or rejecting the suggestions of the culture.

If you accept bold promises (from the culture or from your own senses, habits or ego) without exercising your discrimination, you will not always receive what was promised. No matter what your age, you already know that there are choices that yield strictly passing pleasure and others that serve your long-term interest. Your intuition and experience tell you that there is a difference between the preya and the shreya. Clearly, the pleasant does not always equal the good.

The only way to know for certain if a particular thought will lead you for your highest and greatest good is to follow the wisdom of the buddhi. The more you align every thought, word and physical action with the expansive quality of shreya, your life will become healthy, happy, creative, productive and free of the dis-ease of stress, anxiety and pain. If, however, you continue to act exclusively on the contracting nature of ego and short-term sense gratifications by serving the preya, you will inevitably experience physical, mental, emotional or spiritual dis-ease.

 

It's always important to remember that at any moment the shreya can become the preya and vice versa. Suppose you've volunteered your services for a worthwhile organization or a friend. Definitely a shreya. But as you're leaving the house you receive a telephone call from a relative who has become ill and needs a ride to the hospital. In a split second, what was a shreya has become the preya to be surrendered, and a previously unforeseen circumstance suddenly has become the shreya you must serve.

The deeper and more consistent your meditation practice, the easier it becomes to transform the debilitating power of preya into creative reserves that enable you to fulfill the purpose of your life. The laws of physical science state the same truth as Yoga Science: energy cannot be created nor destroyed, but it can be transformed. Viewing Yoga as a sister science, the ancient yogis experimented with conserving and transforming the energy of preya thoughts. Through trial and error they realized that when they renounced a single desire that conflicted with the inner wisdom of the buddhi, the energy of that desire manifested in a different form.

To grasp how this process works, just imagine what would happen if twenty gallons of crude oil directly from the fields of Saudi Arabia were pumped into your car's gas tank. It would wreck your engine. Crude oil is simply of no use in a combustion engine. The oil must first be refined into gasoline in order to become an appropriate fuel for your automobile.

 

Each of us has the capacity to employ a refining process that can transform the raw, inherent power of every preya--regardless of whether it comes to us in the form of thoughts, desires or emotions. When the buddhi intuitively advises that you have a relationship with a debilitating preya, remember that you also have access to a mechanism for

capturing and transforming that power. This refinement process is accomplished by consciously and willingly sacrificing your attachment to the preya.
  

Desire = Energy + Will Power + Creativity

The buddhi will always alert you when you have a relationship with a preya.  The buddhi, reflecting intuitive wisdom from the superconscious mind, will let you know that it is not in your best long-term interest to give the preya your continued attention. When you skillfully surrender the merely pleasant, comfortable, familiar and attractive preya, you really give up nothing of value. The intrinsic power of the preya is not lost to you. Instead, your voluntary act of renunciation and sacrifice (know in Yoga Science as yagna) automatically transforms the debilitating power of preya into internal reserves of energy and will power and creativity. Conversely, when you consciously or unconsciously reject the advice of the buddhi by serving the preya in thought, word and deed, you diminish your reserves of energy, will power and creativity and you will experience some form of physical, mental, emotional or spiritual dis-ease.

 

As you personally experiment with your internal thought processes, you will quickly learn that the transformative power of Yoga Science is a combination of conservation, ecology and banking. When you acknowledge that every relationship and action you take (mental, verbal and physical) is actually a means for fulfilling the purpose of your life, great resources begin to accrue for you in the subtle world.

 

As your practice of Yoga Science deepens you will discover that preya is always a reflection of your feeling separate, alienated, alone and lacking. Shreya, on the other hand, is always a reflection of fullness, contentment and the unity of all life. In every human relationship, when you put yourself first by serving the preya, you are emphasizing your perceived separateness, weakness and neediness. When you serve the shreya--by putting your conscience, your spouse, your children, your friends or principles first--you are recognizing your own inherent unity, strength and fullness.

 

When you skillfully discipline the habitual clamor of your ego, senses, and unconscious mind by following the quiet promptings of the buddhi, you are ensuring your own welfare and spiritual growth. Realizing this eternal truth through his own spiritual quest, Jesus of Nazareth spoke paradoxically, as the Christ, when he said: "He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for My sake shall find it." In other words, if you continue to serve your self-will by going after your own notion of happiness and security they will inevitably become more and more elusive.

 

The tempering of "my will" to "Thy will" may sometimes seem like a Herculean task, but your daily practice of meditation will definitely bless you with the wisdom and strength to choose the perennial joy over passing pleasure. In Hamlet, Shakespeare's character Polonius prepares his son Laertes for travel abroad with a speech that directs the youth to commit a few important precepts to memory so his journey will be safe, pleasant and rewarding. A part of Polonius's advice was the dictum: "This above all: to thine own self be true." And the very same advice applies today for your travels through this worldly plane of existence. The more you view all your relationships as an integral part of your sadhana--skillfully serving the shreya and sacrificing the preya--your long-sought happiness will begin to appear quite effortlessly and concretely in every aspect of your life.

 

 

When you serve the shreya and sacrifice the preya,

you become One with the metaphoric Father

who is perfect in the subtle world called heaven.

This is the secret of happiness and immortality.

 

Leonard Perlmutter

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That's Robert Browning's advice for those of us getting on in years, distilled in his wonderful poem "Rabbi Ben Ezra."  It's how I used to think about aging when I was young: the best of life, the glorious culmination of our work and wisdom.

 

Time has shaken my sanguine view of getting older. There was nothing

glorious about my mother's fearful surrender to Alzheimer's, or my father's bitterness and paranoia following his stroke. My aunt Ruth suffered such agony from her arthritis, she felt her soul was crucified to her body. My uncle Sverre slowly asphyxiated from emphysema but kept sucking on the cigarettes that were killing him even when he could barely breathe. "My gosh," I ask myself sometimes, "is this what we all have to look forward to?"

The threat doesn't appear imminent.  We live blessed lives in our safe, well lit neighborhoods.  Nearby sits a supermarket with more food than we can possibly eat. Clean water is pumped into our homes; there's no walking miles to pull a jarful of water from the nearest well.  The television beams in dozens of entertainment options; the best music of the past several centuries reverberates from the stereo.  And just down the street you can purchase the quintessence of physical pleasure for four bucks: mocha cappuccinos so divine they might be what the angels serve God in heaven.

 

But don't get too comfortable. We laboriously set up our lives for maximal comfort and convenience, yet in the end we inevitably lose everything.  One day Lord Yama, the king of death, will knock on our door, slip his noose around our neck, and drag us away. In India they say Yama is the only deity who can't be bribed; he does his job conscientiously and absolutely dispassionately.  You can buy your way out of a lot of difficulties in this world, but Yama doesn't take credit cards. He just checks your expiration date and pulls you off the shelf.

Perhaps we should live more like nomads in this world, always ready to leave. We've settled this planet as if it belongs to us, as if it's actually home.  Two thousand years ago the Gnostic masters in Egypt and the Middle East pointed out that we're illegal aliens here.  Our status is extremely tenuous and one day we'll simply have to move on.

The Weight of Dreams

"When our memories outweigh our dreams, we have grown old," the saying goes. Somewhere in my 40s I noticed that I was talking more about the past than the future. "I went to Norway when I was 10, to India when I was 20, to China when I was 30."  Now chronic bursitis and other medical problems make traveling problematic.  My next big trip may be out of this world altogether.  Ironically, in our culture we spend more time planning for a trip to Hawaii than for life after we exit this failing body.

Authentic spiritual life means developing the maturity to face whatever lies ahead.  And that's something that comes from inside, from genuine insight, clarity and courage.  It doesn't come from plastic surgery, Viagra, or even nutritional supplements.  Our yoga practice puts us in touch with the part of us that doesn't age, that is as fresh and young today as it was the day we were born.  In fact, according to the yogis, that immortal inner dweller was just as vibrant thousands of years ago when we may have been inhabiting another body in another part of the world, exploring the universe like a seasoned adventurer and evolving into the person we are today.  Yoga takes the long view.  It focuses on the big picture.  This incarnation is one snapshot in a thick photo album of the soul's experiences.  Too often, we're so preoccupied with what we need to do to sustain this particular body that we forget to nourish the part of us that doesn't die.

As you age, your body betrays you.  It goes its own way, unable to keep up with your ever-resilient spirit. The senses fade, the muscles weaken, the bones become brittle. This isn't necessarily a bad thing; in fact it's a marvelous spiritual opportunity. Aging makes it easier than ever to recognize that you're the rider of the body, not the body itself.  My teacher Swami Rama often said that the most important quality we need on the spiritual path is discrimination, the ability to distinguish the eternal from the non-eternal.  As we get older it's more obvious what's really important in life, what offers lasting value rather than passing pleasure.

 

Twenty-five hundred years ago the Greek master Pythagoras advised his disciples, "When you gather your belongings, don't pack anything you won't need in the next life."   Compassion, generosity, strength of will, ethics, humor: these are good things to carry along with us in this life and the one to come.  Our favorite TV shows, our stock portfolio, sadly even our mocha cappuccinos won't fit in the luggage we carry through the gate of death, though our incessant craving for such things will certainly accompany us.  What a joy the things we desire are during life.  What a burden they are at death!  Our dreams become a deadweight on our soul.

 

As the day of our departure draws closer, we struggle with aging, horrified to find we are losing our physical attractiveness and capacity for sexual enjoyment.  But nature is teaching us something, leading us somewhere.  Sexuality is no longer the driving force it was when we were younger and nature required many of us to reproduce.   As we mature our focus is supposed to shift from the body to the soul.  Western culture resists this movement with all its might.  Witness the continual stream of commercials on television promising restored sexual vigor. Our culture offers age-defying facial cream, but when it comes to age-defying wisdom, you're on your own.  The qualities that make you spiritually vigorous can't be marketed.  If no one's making money on it, it has no value.

 

Like Pythagoras, the yoga masters remind us that short term gains can be long term losses.  We need to look beyond what makes us comfortable now to what will serve us not just over the next few years, but forever.

Yoga Program for Healthy Aging
The sages offer a program that will help us face the process of aging and whatever lies beyond it with grace and assurance.  The program doesn't cost anything which is why it's not advertised on TV like wrinkle removers.  But it's not free:  it requires commitment and attention.
 

Hatha Yoga
The yogis say you remain young as long as your spine is supple.  When the body becomes hard and brittle and the mind ossifies, old age squeezes the life out of you.  Simple stretches, twists and poses help keep the body flexible.  The emphasis in the West is on cardiovascular workouts and weight lifting.  These are important, but yoga also tones the inner organs and even your glands. Performed in a relaxed state with full attention, it balances your brain and nervous system too.  Even fifteen minutes of hatha practice every day will have a positive effect you will definitely notice.
 

Nutrition

As you get older you want to keep feeding your body the things it's enjoyed your whole life: coffee, colas, fatty foods, sugary treats.  Unfortunately you can't get away with it anymore: your body finally rebels.  Heartburn, indigestion, arteriosclerosis, and allergies are some of the body's ways of saying, "No more!"

 

The sages teach us how we should eat, how in fact we should have been eating all along: a balanced diet of whole grains and legumes, lots of vegetables, some fruit and nuts and perhaps some dairy, carefully tailored to our individual constitution.  For thousands of years the Indian tradition has warned that waste products clogging the intestines, the arteries and even the brain are the source of numerous diseases.  If we want the body to remain a viable instrument for the soul, we need to feed it fresh whole foods in moderate amounts, and keep the body clean inside and out.  But the most important parts of the Yoga Program for Healthy Aging aren't external; they're internal.

Non-attachment
In the West we're afraid of a word the yogis really like to use a lot: "non-attachment."  We confuse it with a callous lack of concern for others.  But in the Yoga tradition, non-attachment means to love with equanimity.  We're not concerned with what we will get out of a relationship; we simply give for the sheer joy of giving.  Also, we don't need to hang on to the objects we own; we can pass them along to others as freely as if today were our last day on Earth.  When we're truly non-attached, nothing holds us back from total commitment to spiritual life. The backpack filled with worries and resentments that we lug around with us on the increasingly rough road of life becomes blessedly lighter. We continue to behave responsibly but we no longer make selfish demands. We accept whatever life offer us, for good or ill, with calmness and equipoise. Authentic non-attachment beautified by loving service to
others is a sure sign of spiritual maturity.
 

Discrimination

A reliable indication that we're maturing mentally and emotionally as well as physically is that our judgment improves.  Abusing drugs and alcohol, which seems like a rite of passage to many young people, starts looking like an unhealthy lifestyle choice.  Carelessly running up our credit cards begins to seem less convenient than foolish.  As we develop spiritual discrimination we find many of the things which offer temporary gratification ultimately lead to frustration or even to serious trouble.  Things that initially may seem unappealing, like disciplining ourselves to sit for meditation twice every day, turn out in the long run to be the very skills and habits that give us strength and a sense of perspective during the inevitable crises that come with aging.

Spiritual masters counsel that the ability to discriminate between things of passing interest versus those of permanent value is an absolute necessity for spiritual growth.  As we age we begin to take pleasure in activities that are genuinely good for us, and reap the benefits of our mature judgment.

Gratitude

 In the Yoga Sutras, the last and greatest of human virtues is Ishvara pranidhana, surrender to the will of God.  When we respond to all of life's experiences with trust and gratitude, we accept the maturing process called aging with sincere appreciation for the important lessons it teaches us.  I asked a dear friend of mine, a paraplegic confined to a wheel chair for over 30 years, how he manages to remain so genuinely cheerful.  "Everything that happens," he told me, "I accept as a gift and say, 'Thank you, God.'"

The only people who experience old age are the ones who survived youth.  We have so much to be grateful for.  I am especially thankful for the path of yoga, which shows us how to move through the world not like fearful, grasping mortals but as spiritual beings sent here to love and serve.  As we mature we grow into who we really are, souls emanating from light, ageless spirits beyond the grip of time.

 

        Our times are in his hand

        Who saith, "A whole I planned,

        Youth shows but half;

        trust God: see all, nor be afraid!

Rabbi Ben Ezra, the speaker in Robert Browning's immortal poem, urges us to trust the process of aging.  India's yoga masters also counsel us to discover the ageless center of consciousness in ourselves through meditation, contemplation, and selfless service.  When we approach the process of maturation with awareness, aging is no longer defined by an increasingly rapid decline toward death.  It becomes instead an accelerating adventure in the age-old quest for spiritual insight.

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Know the Self as lord of the chariot, the body as the chariot itself, the discriminating conscience as charioteer, and the mind as reins. The senses, say the wise, are the horses; selfish desires are the roads they travel. When the Self is confused with the body, mind, and senses, a person seems to enjoy pleasure and suffer sorrow. When one lacks discrimination and his or her mind is undisciplined, the senses run hither and thither like wild horses. But they obey the rein like trained horses when one has discrimination and has made the mind one-pointed. Those who lack discrimination, with little control over their thoughts and far from pure, reach not the pure state of immortality but wander from death to death. But those who have discrimination, with a still mind and a pure heart, reach journey's end, never again to fall into the jaws of death. With a discriminating conscience as charioteer and a trained mind as reins, they attain the supreme goal of life to be united with the Lord of love.

Katha Upanishad

       

Even when we understand that we are always making conscious or unconscious choices between the perennial joy of shreya and the passing pleasure of preya, we often choose a direction that takes us where we don't really want to go.

In the Katha Upanishad, Lord Yama explains to the earnest spiritual seeker Natchiketa that "Shreya and preya are roads that run in opposite directions, great highways that carry all human traffic. Every moment is a fork in life where two roads lead away before you. The first leads to the light of wisdom; the second, into the dark of ignorance. Preya looks promising at the beginning, but no one likes its destination. Shreya seems uninviting, but it takes us where we want to go."

 

Let us look at the vehicles that travel these roads. Anyone who remembers Ben-Hur knows the chariots they had in the ancient world. "Nachiketa," says Yama, "that is you. Your body is the chariot, drawn by five powerful horses, the senses. These horses travel not so much through space as time. They gallop, let us say, from birth towards death, pursuing the objects of their desire. The discriminating conscience (buddhi or Holy Spirit) is the driver, whose job it is not to drive you over a cliff. His reins are the mind, your selfish desires are the roads you travel. And you are the rider, the Self."

 

It is an image packed with implications. For one, there is a purpose to the mind. There is a reason why we have a conscience. The job of the conscience is to see clearly, and the job of the mind is to act as reins. When everything is working in harmony, we--the Self--make all the decisions. The conscience conveys these decisions to the mind. A desire is formed to serve the suggestion of the conscience, will power is unleashed and all the senses obey. But when the senses are uncontrolled, they immediately take to the road they like best: personal satisfactions, mostly pleasure. Then we are not making the decisions; the horses are.   To judge by what the media tell us, this is just the way things should be. Not only have most of us dropped the reins, our sense-horses have never even had a bit in their mouths. Instead of being trained, they have always been encouraged to do whatever they like. Should we wonder that they are wild? What is surprising is the power they have. I have seen a tiny palate, just a lot of microscopic taste buds, gallop into a bakery dragging a mountain of a man helplessly behind.

On the other hand, once these powerful horses are trained, they are as responsive as show horses. Imagine having strong, sensitive senses with a clear, discriminating conscience holding the reins. If the taste buds start to drag you away, you just give a tug on the will and all the senses understand. This is expert driving, and perfect living too. When the senses are trained, you can go anywhere and never lose your capacity to choose.

But there is much more to the chariot image than this. When someone asks how tall we are, don't we all respond with something like "Five foot seven"? If we have to describe ourselves we say, "I have blue eyes, brown hair, and a mole on my right cheek." Yama says, "Nonsense! Your chariot is five foot seven. Your chariot has blue eyes, brown hair, and a mole. You are not your chariot."

And what about the other statements we use so often? "I'm in a hurry." "I'm in a bad mood today." "I enjoy eating chocolate eclairs." Yama would retort, "You're still talking about your vehicle. Your chariot is in a hurry, your chauffeur overreacts, your horses love eclairs. All this 'I, I, I' is just confusion. You think you are the chariot and horses, that is all. You have forgotten who you really are, and all you can think about is, 'Is my feedbag full?' Your horses are happy when they get their eclair, so you think you are happy. They feel depressed when they can't get one, so you think you are depressed."

In a daring mood, he goes even further. "Just imagine: you can't be depressed. You can't really be insecure. Why? Because depression takes place in the mind; it is part of the chariot. You are the fellow who is paying for the trip--the one who stands in back and tells the driver where to go."

But there is a rub. When our horses want something not particularly beneficial--say, a martini--which of us can exercise our authority and say, "How about some ginger ale instead?" The horses will smile to themselves and drop us off at the Happy Hour. "I've got an alcohol problem," we explain. "Not at all," Yama would reply. "Your horses have an alcohol problem. You have a horse problem. You'd better get them trained."

Some years ago, to celebrate his birthday, I rashly took a young friend to a double bill of John Wayne Westerns. I had never seen a Western before, and I thought I was seeing the same film twice. Each, for example, had a long scene with a runaway stagecoach. "Sure," said my friend, who had obviously seen a lot of Westerns. "They all have a scene with a runaway stagecoach." And each had a lovely lady sitting inside, terrified out of her wits because her driver had been, shall we say, rendered incapable of further service by a band of robbers, and the horses were dragging the stage wherever they liked.

That, says Yama, is how most of us go through life. Our five horses are in the best of condition, full of spirit. In fact, we even give them pep pills from the media to keep them stirred up and restless. Unfortunately, however, nobody is holding the reins. The conscience is taking a nap at the driver's seat, and the horses drag us at a breakneck pace wherever they like, wherever a little money is waiting to be made or something exciting is going on. Inside--pure, unsullied, sequestered out of sight--is the lovely lady from Philadelphia, our real Self. If she could rouse the driver so that he could get hold of the reins and bring those horses under control, she would have an enjoyable ride. But as long as the horses are going where they like, the Self keeps the curtains drawn and simply prays for better days.

Doesn't this agree with the experience of most of us? Here, let us say, it is time for lunch, so the Self opens her curtain ever so slightly. "Driver," she calls out in her still, small voice, "it is time to eat. Please take my carriage to Old Healthy's Cafe, where we can get whole-grain bread and some homemade soup."

"Right, lady," the conscience agrees. He is willing enough, and he is quite polite. But he has been tipping the elbow since breakfast; his eyes can't see clearly and his judgment feels fuzzy.

 

The coach takes off in a cloud of dust. After a while the Self gets apprehensive and takes a peek through her window. "Driver, driver! This is not the way to Old Healthy's! Where are you taking me?"

"Relax, lady," the conscience says. His speech is a little blurred. "Fact is, I sort of dropped the reins soon as we turned the corner."

Of course, the senses go straight where they always go--Giovanni's. Only after we have finished our beer and pizza do we remember we were on a diet. "I really do want to lose weight," we say. "Why did I go and do that?"

 

Nachiketa must be nodding as he hears all this. Now he can see why life as it is ordinarily lived seems so backwards. We all want happiness, security, love, the satisfaction of a life worth living. Why do we go in the other direction? Because nobody has the reins.

 

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Tell a Friend about AMI

If you know someone who might benefit from our American Meditation class, let them know about the AMI program or call us with their name and address and we'll send them a brochure with our current class schedule.

Karma Yoga --- the practice of selfless and skillful action

If, as part of your practice, you have a few extra hours during the week and are interested in helping grow the American Meditation Institute, we need your dedicated, volunteer energy. As a student of yoga science, you are already familiar with the kinds of practical services the Institute provides. Each month we write, edit and publish this newsletter, teach an average of thirty new meditation students and present stress-reduction seminars to various businesses and organizations. We also invite visiting speakers of interest to our area, organize seminars on yoga science and do continuing personal counseling.

Our immediate needs include press relations, seminar management, clerical assistance and general delivery work. Remember, whatever time or talents you possess will be put to meaningful, productive use.

If you have the time, please call the Institute at (518) 674-8714.

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