Yoga and Maditation

Yoga is all about freedom. Only a fraction of the world’s population is formally imprisoned,but the entire human race is imprisoned in the body and the earth itself. None are free from the inevitability of sickness, age, and death, however free of them they may be at the moment. The human condition is subject to innumerable limitations. Who really controls his life fully, attains all his goals, and knows no setbacks of any kind? No one.

Our real self, the spirit, is ever perfect and free. But we have forgotten that. So we identify with our present experience of bondage and consequently suffer in countless ways. Our situation is like someone who is asleep and dreaming that he is being tortured and beaten. In reality he is not being touched at all; yet he is experiencing very real pain and fear. He need not placate, overpower, or escape his torturers. He needs only to wake up. Yoga is the procedure of self-awakening.

Om–the Word for yoga

This sacred syllable is spelled out either as Om or Aum, but It is usually written in the ideogrammatic forms:
ø or It is most important in repeating Om to pronounce the O correctly. It should be pronounced like the long o in the Italian or common American manner–as in home and lone. In England, Canada, and parts of the American South, the long o is sometimes pronounced as a diphthong, like two vowels jammed together: either like “ay-oh” or “eh-oh.” This is not the correct manner of pronouncing the O, which should be a single, pure vowel sound.

Om the mantra, tantric yoga, naked yaga

Om is the original Word of Power, a mantra. A mantra is a series of verbal sounds whose effect lies not in an assigned intellectual meaning, but in an inherent sound-power that can produce a specific effect, physically or psychologically. The word mantra itself comes from the Sanskrit expression manat trayate which means “a transforming thought;” literally, “that which when thought carries across”–which produces an objective, perceptible change. It also literally means “a liberating thought.”

In the Yoga tradition, Om is the supreme mantra, the most sacred of holy words. Although it is first found in the spiritual writings of Hinduism, Om is used by Buddhists and Jains in their rituals and meditation, and has also passed over into the Jewish, Christian, and Moslem religions in the form of Amin (Amen), which is intoned at the end of all prayers, and in Christianity is even a title of Christ. “These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God.”

yoga position: The Foundations of Yoga

Toward the end of his comments on the Yoga Sutras, Shankara makes a valuable remark:
“There can be no lamplight unless the oil, wick and a flame are brought together.” The idea is
that the successful practice of yoga is not a haphazard or capricious matter. All the elements
must be brought together. When united and complete, success is the result.
Since the classical Indian texts on Yoga are the basis of this chapter, the word “yoga” is
used throughout. But it should be realized that the word “meditation” is equally applicable, for
in ancient India yoga and meditation were synonymous.