Learning to Be

Your duty is to Be, and not to be this or that.

- Ramana Maharshi

Yoga is not therapy; yoga is not trying in any way to make you adjusted to the society. If you want to define yoga in terms of adjustment, then it is not adjustment with the society, but it is adjustment with existence itself. It is adjustment with the divine!

- Osho

We have been conditioned by our society, culture, circumstances and karma to “not be,” but to live in an imaginary world of fear and desire. It is a world of striving for achievements which are ever elusive, seeking the comforts of past securities and longing for some indefinable something that we call “happiness.” It is a world in which we have falsely identified ourselves with the characters we play in an increasingly absurd tragicomedy. It is a world in which we are afraid to love and afraid to be loved.

And it is a world we are willing to defend with our very lives. We cling to it because we are afraid of being obliterated; afraid of the abyss we sense deep within ourselves. Society is structured to keep us locked into our imaginary world. There is no sense in protesting it. It is a mutual agreement we all make. “I won’t blow your cover if you don’t blow mine.” What would be happen if we dropped all the props and encountered the naked emptiness of the stage? As Marianne Williamson stated in a quote that has now become quite famous,

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

It is important to remember that on awakening to our true nature we also recognize that we are “nobody special.” The ego longs to be special; the soul doesn’t give a damn. Being isn’t special. It is so ordinary that it is ridiculous and it is absolutely wonderful. It doesn’t need to pretend anything.

Yoga is a discipline developed to help us learn to be; or rather unlearn how to “not be.” It is about bringing all of the frantic imaginings of our minds to rest. It is discipline of mind and body that enables to drop mind and body. The awareness which seems to reside within them is unbounded by time and space. It is the ever-present luminosity of Being.

Why then have so many of us practiced this or that discipline for years and still remain neurotic wrecks? It’s because we haven’t yet let go. We haven’t yet surrendered. Use your meditation to vigilantly observe the ego. Realize that you are not that and let it go.

When you are ready.