Preface

This text is about Life. It answers the basic questions: Who are we? What are we here for? It covers enlightenment, God, compassion, love, unity, being present, and how yoga philosophy and the Bible attempt to explain them.
Writing and reading about these issues can quickly become an intellectual activity. It is important to understand that this is not the purpose of this text. This text is written to encourage us to experience the state of enlightenment. Just talking about it is not experiencing it. People can write a book about love without knowing where to find it, just by listing all the things they have heard from others. The idea is to experience love, unity, etc. The good news is that they are our birthright, so we are all capable.

There is a second word of caution necessary. There are many techniques that can help evoke the experience. However, it is of no use collecting these techniques and walking around with a bag full of knowledge about techniques. The techniques have to be applied to make them effective. Every technique is useless if it is not applied. This text contains many exercises that help us experience the goal of life. We have to make the commitment to ourselves that we will do these exercises. Making this commitment is far more difficult than it seems. Let me share how I found out.

In 1995 I started exploring yoga in the yoga school 'Blikopener' in Tilburg, Holland. I remember vividly how my teacher Hans 't Hart told us students that we would probably not use the techniques he offered us, but only gather them, thinking "Great! A new technique! I am sure I will apply that some time." Spending quite some time and money to take his classes, I rejected that statement as silly. But whatever technique he offered us, I thought it was not useful enough to spend time on. He would for instance urge us to read a book backwards. And I did not do it. I only kept it as an option.
In 2000 I was living in Gurumayi's ashram in South Fallsburg, New York. In the fall of 2000 she started a new initiative: Premotsava. Its importance to the ashram was clear from the beginning. Yet, it was not very clear what it entailed. Premotsava started in the Music department. Her students were encouraged to chant in a new way: focused. We were given many points to focus on: e.g. pitch, breathing, a conductor, and pronunciation. So what was new about it? Wouldn't every member of every choir on this planet learn these things? And what had this to do with yoga? These questions raised my interest.
On top of that, Premotsava was my chance to be closer to my teacher Gurumayi. As an ashram staff member it did not happen often to me that I could be in the same room as Gurumayi. Like all other staff members, I wanted to be with her very much. The only way for me was to be one of her musicians. About 50 musicians were trained intensely to chant in the new way. We would spend every hour available to us to practice. All live chants were cancelled for months in a row, to let us musicians practice. Gurumayi sent us her best teachers: professional conductors, singers, and experts in posture and physical well-being. It was as if the whole ashram community was focusing on one thing for months, and I had the great good fortune to be in the focus point. It was overwhelming.
All Gurumayi asked in return was to pay attention and to give all we had: not to hold back in any way. And that was what I did. Competition has always made me going. And I would do anything to be one of Gurumayi's lead chanters. So whatever her teachers asked me to do, I did it with everything I had. I made sure my body was in good shape so that I could easily concentrate. I practiced whenever I could. And when there were auditions or rehearsals I fully committed myself. This went on for about 10 months, during which I was quite successful in getting close to Gurumayi. During these months I started to notice that I had changed. I slowly but surely became more aware of me living. I started to count the number of times a day I became aware of my existence, and tried to stay in that state of awareness whenever it happened. I came to understand that this was the state I had read about, and even had written about to my family and friends, without having experienced it. Then I realized that I finally had done what it takes to experience this state: I had applied the simple techniques given to me.

I used to let myself become unconscious during a chant. I used to become unconscious (most of the time) during meditation. I used to be unconscious during my daily life. I still need to do that when I am tired. But whenever I can, I want to be alive. I want to know what's happening. I want to wake up in the morning looking forward to the adventures life will present to me. And then I want to live them fully.

Uh-oh

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