Heart and Mind Yoga
Yoga in the Deepest Sense

How I came to Yoga.

This article appeared in Yoga and Yealth, June 2000 p24 and 28
By Sarah Lionheart © 2000,


Meditation
‘When the mind and body have been purified,
Through meditation, through Truth,
Through understanding and simplicity,
Then the perfected behold the Self,
Pure and Brilliant.’
Mundaka Upanisad

Meditation is an integral part of our yoga practice.

I have been learning meditation since the age of 6, due to a very lucky encounter with a Catholic nun.  In 1968, she was training me for my First Holy Communion within the Roman Catholic Church and she explained very simply that if I was very still and quiet, I could turn my whole being towards the One who loved me deeply.  If I did this with a sincere and open heart, I would come to know Him.  Even that young, I experienced my heart opening and being filled with peace and love and serenity and I was so glad that she had told me how to do this.  I assumed everyone else knew how to do this too so thought nothing much of it.

Many years later, in my twenties, I was doing a Ph.D. at Durham University, on Spirituality and Consciousness and I was meditating in earnest and things were happening a bit fast.  My tutor advised me to do some formal instruction with Transcendental Meditation which was taught by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.  I did this technique and things continued to happen – rather dramatically – and so I prayed hard for guidance and a teacher who could commit time to teaching and guiding me properly.  I then turned up at a lecture at Durham University on Vedanta and met a Hindu monk called Swami Shivaprananda who taught me full time for a year and then sent me out to India as a bramacharini, to learn from his guru in Moradabad and the other senior disciples.  These disciples included people who worked for the Vivekananda Kendra in Bangalore and they taught me Hatha Yoga one to one, including individual instruction on Bhakti Yoga, Jnana Yoga, Raj Yoga and Karma Yoga.   They saw I needed more balance for my meditation was still opening me up faster than I could handle.  After some time, they suggested that I go back to England and reintegrate with my original Christian up bringing.   Fr Bede Griffiths and Sri Vandana Mataji, (a monk and nun in the Catholic tradition) guided me and continued to teach me and I tried to join various monastic orders, including Carmel, which is a silent contemplative order.  The East/West fusion was still crucial to me and I ended up living with a Catholic teaching order and teaching about Ramakrishna, Vivekananda, Bhakti Yoga and Hatha Yoga in a Catholic Girls Boarding School in Scotland.   I then worked for the Westminster Interfaith Programme in London and gained inspiration and help from Fr Raimon Pannikar (a Jesuit, a Hindu and a Buddhist).  I eventually met my teacher, the Venerable Lama Yeshe Losal, abbot and meditation teacher at Kagyu Samye Ling, a Tibetan Buddhist Monastery under whose guidance and instruction I now am. 

 In about 1989, I was asked to start leading retreats and workshops and that has grown steadily.  At the same time I was asked by my then teacher to start teaching Hatha Yoga regularly.   I teach meditation workshops and retreats for the Christian Meditation Community, for the various counties in the British Wheel of Yoga, for various local churches and in retreat houses around the country.

This last year there were three workshops for the British Wheel:  York, Nottingham and Derbyshire.  I was at first a bit stunned by how little BW trained yoga teachers know about meditation but I was delighted to find such an eager and enthusiastic bunch of students! 

First of all I ask them to do a little bit of breath awareness meditation and then I explain what was happening.  It helps to explain the psychology of meditation and how it works on the mind and the emotions and well as some physiological details about how the body/ brain changes as we meditate.   I use the knowledge I have of three major traditions (Hinduism, Buddhism and Christianity) to explain the process as clearly as I can and I also use ordinary language if I feel that makes people more comfortable and more able to hear what I am saying.  Usually I use whatever approach fits each person. Working out what a person needs, what specific meditation technique they are most suited to, is a very major part of my work as a meditation tutor.  Because I am also interested in the physiological impact of meditation I attend conferences run by the Medical and Scientific Network who bring in scientists from all over the world who are working at the cutting edge of mapping the brain and trying to work out what consciousness is and what is happening when a person meditates.  Big question! 

Obviously the subject of meditation is vast.  In a nutshell – meditation is very very simple.  Simple …….. but not easy.  We complicate the process, which is so delightfully simple, by getting in the way.  Our neurosis, our compulsive thinking patterns, our emotional swings and hooks, our obsessive mental patterns, our busy active and often over stimulated mind, all these get in the way.    So – meditation techniques are about finding a focus, a meditation support that allows our busy mind to rest on something very simple, eventually training the mind to rest there without effort and even eventually not rest there but be resting in perfect awareness itself – a state of great openness, clarity and sensitivity that unfolds its own inherent wisdom.

‘The mind is kept ever active by the senses.
When they have withdrawn
And the mind become still
Then the subtle Self shines forth.’   
Mundaka Upanisad

Meditation supports are numerous – ranging from devotional images and heart opening techniques, mantra repetition, various sense organ awareness, (using hearing, seeing, sensing, touching, walking, breath, painting, writing, tasting, smelling, etc). There are many ways to reinforce the support to help quieten a busy mind such as using mala beads, dance, (eg whirling dervishes and also the Dances of Universal Peace which I use a lot in my work), bhajans, kirtan, (singing and repetition chanting), Taize chanting, visualizations, and prayer of various sorts – some of which can be traditional and learnt or they can be something the meditator has just found to work for them.

The great fallacy about meditation is that it is about not thinking.  If we were able to completely stop thinking – we would be dead.  Nor is it about ‘blanking’ the mind.    There are of course meditational states – advanced ones - where the body can appear to have stopped functioning and the brain to have gone into a kind of deep deep coma –but these are not to be confused with where most of us are at.  Meditation is also not about imagining that you are on a beautiful Caribbean Island.  That is a relaxation visualization not meditation.  In meditation we are attempting to learn how to focus the mind is such a way that it can be used as a powerful searchlight upon itself and find what it truly is. Finding the true nature of mind.  This journey can happen very precisely and with great pragmatic awareness – such as in Jnana Yoga – or with almost reckless gay abandon – as with Bhakti Yoga.  The Bhakta encourages the heart opening of devotion and love for that which it is seeking and the Jnana methodically deconstructs the nature of Reality – the end is the same.  Most of us use some Karma (service to others) Yoga as well to balance the sadhana (spiritual practice) in our daily life.

At a basic level for the average yoga student – I teach them to use a method such as watching the breath go in and out, or to repeat a phrase, sometimes called a mantra (Peace, love, Om, Lord, or whatever they feel to be suitable) or to sit quietly and just ‘hear’ the sounds around them.  After some months of practice, they begin to get a sense of what we are trying to do.  I emphasis over and over again that we never judge or criticize our meditation session – we acknowledge what happens and learn from it – but each attempt is valuable and each time we try to meditate there is progress even if at first we are not aware of it.  To create a negative judgment at this stage (such as ‘Drat, there I go thinking again!’) only creates more ripples in the mind.  Best to note, as a Texan student once remarked ‘Thinking, good buddy, just thinking’.   With gentleness awareness then simply return to the meditation support.  Doing this over and over again strengthens the minds awareness of itself and trains it to notice what is happening, when it is happening, whatever it is.   I also emphasize the importance of committing to a daily practice and sticking to that come hell or high water!   I list the benefits of meditation and what to look for in oneself to know whether one is heading in the right direction or not.  At its simplest :f one is becoming tense and irritable – then obviously something is not right in the practice.  If one is feeling more peaceful and increasing in clarity and joy – then one is definitely heading in the right direction. 

Obviously most yoga students and teachers know how to sit to meditate but it is always worth stressing that the back must be straight and that the shoulders and belly tend to tense up as we relax into deeper meditation.  So check the body now and again and relax any tense areas.  A workshop I run which is about how to cope with the obstacles to meditation is proving very popular.  I mainly use the training I have received from the Tibetan Buddhist meditation tradition for this particular workshop– as they have been studying this intensively over a very long time and have some very helpful teachings about the hindrances and how to tackle them. 

I have just returned from teaching a meditation retreat at a Catholic retreat center and yet again find people are desperate for good tuition about real contemplative prayer.  Meditation exists in the Christian tradition:- the Russian Orthodox ‘Jesus prayer’, the ‘Practice of the Present Moment’ of Brother Lawrence (very similar to the practice that present day Vietnamese Buddhist master Thich Nhat Hanh teaches) and the prayer of the Desert Fathers but apart from the Christian Meditation Community for whom I do workshops, there is very little teaching in the Christian churches on meditation and it is very hard to find experienced teachers.  So far, the Christians I have taught are so grateful for the teaching that I can give them and I feel so grateful too to be able to take part in this interchange of spiritual wisdom from East to West.   I was very privileged to attend a five-day conference on meditation for Christians led by the Dalai Lama, with 600 Christians attending.  It was truly a wonderful experience and I was honoured to receive his personal blessing twice.  This is a man who very much embodies what meditation is all about. 

All the traditions state that that which we are seeking, wherever we are coming from, is that which is already in us.  It is the same in all of us.  It is the source of Being, and the true nature of Reality and the mind.  There is only that one.  Call it what you will, but we are truly all trying to access the same thing.  And it exists.  It is a reality.  Not a belief or a hope – but a truth. 

‘It is known only through becoming it.
It is the end of all activity,
Silent and unchanging,
The supreme good,
One without a second.
It is the real Self.
It, above all, should be known.’
Mandukya Upanisad

Meditation is an exercise like a science experiment – you do it and see what the results are.  You turn to someone who knows more in the subject than you do, for advice and guidance – and you keep going.    Then you begin to understand.

Obviously a large body of my meditation training has come from the Hindu tradition, taught to me by Swami Shivapranananda, Swami Prabuddhananda, Prof Shastri of Bangalore, Sri Vandana Mataji, Fr. Bede Griffiths and Raimon Pannikar.  This has led to a total of 14 years of training in this tradition alone.  During that time I have learnt about the different stages in the journey – the false truths, the way the ego is so powerful and how much of a warrior one needs to be to tread this journey at all.  It is indeed the narrow path, the path less traveled, needing great courage and great humility.  It is the path of the hero/heroine, for those who can face all their demons and even all their joys and remain steady and aware, emptied of everything but full beyond all measure. 


‘It cannot be attained by the weak,
Nor by the half hearted,
Nor by a mere show of detachment.
But as strength, stability, and inner freedom grow,
So does Self –awareness grow’.
Mundaka Upanisad

Not a stone will be left unturned.  Not a corner of the mind and being left in darkness.  It is an incredible journey. And infinite are the number of ways towards the One.  We wish to become one with that which we truly are – and the pull and longing for this guides us in the dark nights and the teachers we study and learn from lend us their strength and their experience.  Deep within us there exists a real awareness that there is more to our life than meets the eye!  Eventually, because one is tasting the truth, doubt goes and one feels a certain inevitability of going forward, a watershed has been passed and there is no real going back.  Then the practice becomes less of a struggle and more and more part of daily life.  The whole being is now beginning to be dyed in the dye of meditation, like a cloth dipped into dye on a regular basis – eventually it takes the colour permanently.
‘This Self cannot be realized by studying the scriptures,
Nor through the use of reason,
Nor from the words of others – no matter what they say. 
By the grace of the Self is the Self known,
The Self reveals itself.’
 Mundaka Upanisad

The great paradox is that the asanas and the pranayama and the dhyana (mind flowing effortlessly toward the focus) are all purifying the self – yet to make them an object of too much veneration is to miss the point.  That which we are seeking is beyond the efforts of our deliberate doing and striving.  Ultimately we have to let go.
‘Into blinding darkness go they who worship action alone.
Into an even greater darkness go they who worship meditation. 
For it is other than meditation,
It is other than action.
This we have heard from the enlightened ones who teach us.’
Isha Upanisad

The biggest confusion that I encounter in teaching meditation is the perplexity about the One as a Form, as a Beloved or as a Lord.  Ultimately, the One is beyond Form, for in Oneness, there is no perceiver to perceive, there is only one.  ‘Form is emptiness and emptiness is form’  Heart Sutra.  On the way to this supreme state, the deeper awareness of the mind encounters more of itself within and this is often described as Other, the Lord, the Beloved, the Mother.  Those great souls who have gone deeper, have embodied this part of our deeper awareness and by concentrating on them – their qualities and their awareness/Realisation are found within. This is emphasized in the practice of Guru Yoga and Bhakti Yoga.   From the  part of awareness which feels like ‘the other’, Love pours forth.  It feels like an encounter with another.  It feels as though the small self is being overwhelmed/met/touched/ graced by another.  And indeed, it is an encounter with another.  One we have not been fully aware of.  It is like falling in love.  There is ecstasy there and great joy and opening.  It is all very true and wonderful and very very helpful on the journey.  If one surrenders to this, the ‘Other’ and the smaller concept of ego-self begin to merge and the Union takes place of the lover and the Beloved.  A major part of consciousness, of being, has now integrated and this produces radical changes, great healing and a clarity and sureness and solidity that were not there before.  Many a meditator with inadequate guidance has stopped at this point feeling that the end is reached.  The end is not reached until the full merger is attained.  When there is no more sense of duality at all and Reality becomes known for what it really is.  This is a difficult stage of the journey requiring great skill on the part of the guide/teacher and necessitating greater confidence on the part of the student both in the teacher and in themselves. 

Wake up!
Seek the Truth!
Rise above ignorance!
Search out the best teachers,
And through them find the Truth.
But beware!
“The path is narrow,” the sages warn,
“sharp as a razor’s edge,
most difficult to tread.” ‘
Katha Upanisad

It is love that leads us from here.  A love so powerful that we forget ourselves and surrender more and more.  Forgetting our desires and wants, forgetting our aims, giving up everything, even giving up the bliss of knowing the deeper depths, even giving up wanting to know the Beloved, giving up the desire for Realization,- when at last all is totally surrendered – then the knowledge of the Self comes and there is Peace at last.
‘By knowing Him as Love,
We find eternal Peace.’
Shvetashvatataru Upanisad

Eventually we will come to the stage where we to can join in and also say :
And the sages proclaim,
‘I am He!’,
Know this,
‘I am He!’  
III 6-8 Kaushitaki Upanisad

and
Tat Vam Asi  - I am That.

May we all be blessed to start this journey and all be blessed to finish it.


I  would like to thank all my teachers for their great love, kindness and wisdom and dedicate this article to the Venerable Lama Yeshe Losal whose great light guides me and without whom the journey would be dark indeed.

Sarah Lionheart is running a week end meditation retreat for yoga teachers and yoga students near Manchester in December 2002..  She will also be running a yoga and meditation retreat in North Yorkshire early summer 2003. 
Her web site is www.heartandmind.org and her e-mail address is sarah@heartandmind.org.

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