Why Bother With Spiritual Practice?

"It is not the end of the physical body that should worry us. Rather, our concern must be to live while we're alive - to release our inner selves from the spiritual death that comes with living behind a facade designed to conform to external definitions of who and what we are."
- Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

Sadhana means setting the mind right so the light of God is seen directly.

– Paramhamsa Satyananda Saraswati

I just had my 59^th birthday.  Big deal, I know.  However, I agree with the position that the purpose of this life is to awaken to our true identity, to experience a unified consciousness – “The” Unified Consciousness, aka “God.”  The reason is that I have had some “tastes” of that experience and I know that it makes all of our worldly concerns seem absolutely trivial.  I’m not talking about world hunger, war, poverty, disease, human trafficking or any of the other darkness in the world.  I’m talking about our ordinary ego-centric concerns for security, pleasure, personal control, romance, even “righteousness.” 

Aging can be used as a means of gaining some perspective on one’s body and one’s life.  Everything, even what we identify with as ourselves, is a temporary manifestation of something “greater.”  This body that I enjoy through the senses is a transient phenomenon.  In fact it is constantly changing.  We grow, develop, reach our prime and then decay.  But “that” is not really who we are.  Underlying the surface of phenomena is the timeless, non-spatial essence of our being; the inner witness.  Who this inner witness is, is not a question that can be answered through the ordinary workings of our minds.  It is not material, not mental or emotional but it is always here, right now. It is always present as the locus of experience.  This is the true essence of our being(s).

Sadhana, or “spiritual practice” is any means that works to help us enter into our deeper identity.  I practice and teach hatha yoga asana and pranayama, various meditation techniques and devotional song, kirtan.  Reading and contemplating spiritual texts can also be a form of sadhana.  These all work well, especially in combination.  But as I remind students, one’s practice must be regular and consistent.  Regular ongoing sadhana enables us to de-condition ourselves, release toxic emotional energy and false beliefs that we have accumulated as to who and what we are.  It is work that we must do on ourselves and there are no real shortcuts.  However, the work is not really all that painful or arduous; in fact it can and should be joyous, at least more often than not.

With ongoing practice the inner peace which is cultivated begins to grow.  However, it must be nurtured to some extent.  I have found myself withdrawing from “normal” situations and relationships because they do not serve it.  Why stay attached to people and things that distract me from bliss?  Of course the attachment is within me, the reaction is my own and no one and nothing is to blame.  However, loud music, violent media, judgmental conversations, one-upmanship, gossip, etc. simply do not serve spiritual practice; at least not for me.  Any and all situations and relationships reflect where I am attached or not.  As Ram Das wisely puts it, “What you meet in another being is the projection of your own level of evolution.”  When we recognize and release our attachments we can evolve further.

In the Dhammapada, Buddha states, “Experiences are preceded by mind, led by mind, and produced by mind.”  Sadhana is a means of purifying one’s mind.  It is a means of bringing negative mental patterns to light and letting them go, as well as cultivating and reinforcing positive ones.  When we let go of our mental baggage we open space for the light of God.  It is not a matter of judging whether something is “good” or “bad,” but of letting go and trusting the “goodness” of our own essential nature.  When we truly surrender in our practice we give up any and all expectations, desires, fantasies, ideologies in order to enter into “reality.” 

Growing older allows me to let go of attachments, although I am hardly “liberated.”  It also reminds that life is short and that it is necessary to focus on what is essential.  Sadhana connects me with that even if I can’t truly define what that is.