Transcript
Speaker: Hi, I'm Alan Finger. Welcome to the Genius of Nothing podcast. Nothing is no particular thing.
Speaker: It's all things at once. Genius.
Speaker: Hello everyone. I'm Katrina Repka and this is the Genius of Nothing podcast. I'm here in London and as usual, i' am joined by Sebastian in Sweden. Good evening.
Speaker: And Alan in Florida. Good morning. ah yay Covering all parts. I'm sort of like late afternoon. So yes, we're covering everything.
Speaker: yeah um Today we thought we would talk about the Yamas and these are the kind of don't do's in yoga. I like the way they're really, they first appeared in the Rig Veda and are ancient ways of living.
Speaker: But I really like the way that Al describes them as the things to un-program your mind of, and then you can re-program them with better habits.
Speaker: um And the focus of today's ah yama is ahimsa, which means non-violence. And in Ishta, we really look at the way that that affects not only our speech, the way we interact with people, also the way we treat ourselves.
Speaker: So Al, maybe you want to go into just a little bit more about the idea of the yamas and then the niyamas, which we'll follow up with, um how they're deprogramming and reprogramming you, because I think that's really helpful.
Speaker: Yeah, so the yamas are things in life which are put there for us because we've been heavily programmed, our brain, and we live completely in this illusion of these programs have been put into our brain.
Speaker: And then we solidly believe that whatever these memories are in our brain, which are constantly changing and fading and being rebuilt, we believe that is our reality.
Speaker: And so the yamas are things that to stop doing, to stop programming ourself in a way that we will have clarity in our mind, viveka,
Speaker: And so the yamas basically, I'll run through them just so we have an idea. There are five of them. Then we'll come back to the ah the first one, ahimsa.
Speaker: So a
Speaker: the ahimsa is the first, and we'll just give it an easy name, non-injury. Satya is the second, which means don't lie.
Speaker: And asteya is the third, which is don't steal. The fourth is brahmacharya, living in tune, in harmony with the quantum forces that are governing us.
Speaker: And the fifth is a parigraha, which is to not hoard. Now, we'll go into this. I'm giving them kind of like a just to an overall name.
Speaker: But now we'll start to look into each one. And we'll each each one will take a week for so you can sort of soak in and get what it really means.
Speaker: But they do all interrelate in developing your one's brain. to be able to see things clearly.
Speaker: Viveka, to be able to see things from the clarity of your soul's eye. rather than this mumbo-jumbo of who we think we are and come from that place.
Speaker: Yeah, and even even in the Vedas they write that Viveka can actually help you to reduce or even prevent the accumulation of bad karma. which we accumulate when we in life when we're hurting.
Speaker: That means we're not living. That's why I mentioned the word ah living with Viveka, with Vidya, with clarity, meaning that you're living from your soul's eye,
Speaker: rather than from the belief structures of your brain. Because the belief structures of your brain are just beliefs.
Speaker: So in the old days, when we read what was in the Vedas, you're really reading also interpretations that people have translated it as.
Speaker: And for most people, religious ways of receiving stuff is almost kind of easier than trying to understand things from a point of we we are born from nothing.
Speaker: We're born from – but all of this stuff is going, why try and do nothing? why try and do nothing Because the nothing is all things at once and it's greater.
Speaker: and if we can live in tune with this greater intelligence which is no thing, things are only of our mind. So just remember that the yamas are things that we need to do really to stop doing, in order deprogram the patterning.
Speaker: that's given our mind the strength to believe what it is. a baby, ah young baby is born.
Speaker: It has no fear, no likes, no dislikes. It's there. It's uncomfortable, or cry. If it's hungry, it'll cry. And from that, we all grow ah from. And we end up with patterns and belief structures and a whole psyche.
Speaker: So to help us live through this correctly, the yamas are things not to do. that will tie you into the belief structures of your mind than the false identity of who you think you are.
Speaker: And the more you tie yourself into that, the more suffering there is. so I think you said something important there, that when we live in tune with the universe or the greater forces, it becomes very hard or really impossible to practice any kind of form of violence to anyone or anything because if you're in harmony with everything, it's you would ultimately be harming yourself.
Speaker: What it is, is the and what you're saying and what we're all trying to put through, the three of us, is that when you're living in tune with the quantum force that gave birth to everything here this plane,
Speaker: And that's what's guiding us. it It'll guide us to do things which are sattvic, which are pure in nature. I think the etymology of the word is really interesting in Sanskrit too, because the idea when you put an A in front of something, so ahimsa, non-harming, there's this kind of dualism that there's harming and non-harming. And Because they could just say gentleness or living in tune. But I really like the way you talk about it as a deprogramming of the mind, which is what I think the Sanskrit terminology is trying to embody.
Speaker: It is, and as I said, Katrina, you know, unfortunately, everyone describes these things different in English and where they're emotionally and where they are.
Speaker: So, you know, religiously has been such a big thing in our life, in this era that we're in for the last 2,000 years. Religion has been huge, and but it's man-made.
Speaker: And it's trying to give structures to life. And what the beauty is of the tantric perspective, not the Hindu perspective, is that we're quantum.
Speaker: That each cell in our body has consciousness and consciousness is quantum.
Speaker: It's only when consciousness takes form that we lose this incredible ability to live in life inspired by something greater than us, quantum.
Speaker: So before on this podcast, we have spoken about that there is really no right or wrong. So how does a hymnsa really fit into that if there is no right or wrong? Could you shed some light on that? Because I think that can confuse people easily.
Speaker: Yeah. So a hymnsa fits in like this. don't It says that if you injure and anyone, and harm anyone that will create in your own psyche a position of power if you're killing or harming anything else.
Speaker: So the goal is if you don't harm, well, you're not going to, that's why I just would say what Katrina said, it's ahimsa, it's like don't harm.
Speaker: don tom Because harming will create you to become more egotistical and attached. It will create the false identity in your mind that you think is you,
Speaker: to become a thousand times stronger. But we also broaden this out a lot in Ishta because we talk about not harming others and obviously the obvious is we hit somebody or we throw a bomb at them, but then there's the way we can harm others with speech or a look or neglect.
Speaker: But then there's an element of not harming ourselves. And that is interesting from the yogic perspective where a lot of traditions are vegetarian and say that you shouldn't harm animals and like the Jayans are so extreme that they don't step on bugs because they really believe not harming in the most literal sense.
Speaker: Um, But in Ishta, we also have this sense of self and you, you know, consume what you need to consume to non-harm. So if you're anemic and you need to eat meat, that's okay. And I think it's a relatively controversial position within the yoga community, actually. It's very fun for contradict ah contradictory in the kind in yoga. Yeah.
Speaker: community because most of the yoga community started yoga from asana and then got into a more hind ah Hindu approach because when you go to India, that's what you learn.
Speaker: But we're a tantric pace we In tantrica, one of the five M's in the practices are to eat meat as a particular thing, and not all the time, but as a, um what's it called? As a um Sacrifice.
Speaker: Sacrifice, thank you. Really, non non-harming... will come into you to where you need it because yeah, you've got to survive.
Speaker: A lion in Africa only survives on meat and water. doesn't eat vegetables ever, just on the kill. Does it have bad karma as a result? Is its karma, is it going to come back as some hideous creature in a future life? No, it's doing what it's doing within the evolutionary process.
Speaker: So within evolution, all these things are there. And as Sebastian said, is there good or bad? There's no good or bad. You're doing what you're doing yeah at this level of consciousness.
Speaker: Kind of amazing. I had a girlfriend many, many years ago that I was crazy about her. i thought she was amazing. And she dumped me and she dumped me hard. And for three, four years, I thought she was you pure evil. She was really, really mean. i thought it was like horrible. and But when I look back in retrospect now, I don't think that I would move on from that in the way I did and, you know, meet the next girl and then eventually my wife if that wouldn't have...
Speaker: manifested in the way it did because I was so attached to her at that point. I was quite young also. but May I ask you what dumping hard means? Well, dumping hard. Well, it means that she demoralized my very soul.
Speaker: broke his heart. Yeah, she did break my heart. So she didn't anything. He broke his own heart. um Yeah, Sebastian. yeah He broke his own heart. She didn't want to be with him.
Speaker: And he broke his own heart because he didn't know Al at that point. She definitely didn't help though. I'll say that much. Because I would have shared with him right at that point, Sebastian, this is happening for a reason. You're making space for something else to come in.
Speaker: Be grateful for the hard dumping. the hard dumping Yeah, but that's an important lesson then to understand that even if we think sometimes that something might be you know evil or like very wrong or this is harming harming me, um that there is something beyond this. like There's a meaning to all these kind of things.
Speaker: You see, if you were in a relationship with someone and your feelings had changed and you needed to move on, breaking up with that person would need to be done.
Speaker: Not the way she did it, though, but that's not what you mean. Now, if you're meditator and do what we do at Ishtar and what we have prescribed, you will find the most graceful way of moving on, which is not dumping.
Speaker: evolving. It's evolving.
Speaker: But how do you feel then about relationships that are, say, 50 years in duration or even 10 or, quite frankly, even two, that you that presupposes that you both have the same feelings and the equal amount of feelings that you both want to be in the relationship for themselves?
Speaker: that extended period of time. And I think we romanticize relationships to think, oh, there should only be one person in your life, and that is the ideal.
Speaker: And we make commitments and vows and things. But people do grow apart. Maybe they feel differently. And then we vilify those people who end the relationship differently.
Speaker: like we were just talking about, like that person is mean or they break hearts or, but actually, i mean, it's very difficult to stay in relationships for many, many years and not change and grow and evolve. And sometimes you grow and evolve in the same way and sometimes in a different way.
Speaker: um i mean, it was helpful for me, Al, when I, when I ended my first marriage and to think about it like this. was just trying to say, Katrina, you are a perfect example of getting out of the relationship gracefully and moving on gracefully. Please carry on and explain how you did that.
Speaker: Well, I mean, I think I did it as gracefully as possible, but I did end my first marriage and then ended it for another relationship.
Speaker: And No, you didn't, Katrina. You ended it because it was ending. and had the if If you were still at the point of loving and you were in it, you would never have gone for another relationship.
Speaker: Well, that's true, but it didn't make me look very good at the time. I thought it made you look amazing because you did it correctly. Fair enough. But I guess, you know, if you get married to somebody, you want to believe it's going to be forever and that you're really going to love that person. And it's, some I mean, i yeah. People think like that, but I'm i'm actually, me and my wife has...
Speaker: been talking about that a lot. And we are, and I think it's really important that we both know that one person will leave, you know, plus most possibly one will leave before the other one.
Speaker: And, you know, then one might be alone. And We know that we have ah certain amount of time together. And when you know that this is not a forever thing. Well, are you talking that one of you is going to die, which is obvious? But if are you talking that you sit there with Danielle and say, yeah, one day I might walk out or or but one day you might walk out. That might happen. But but mostly likely so one of us will die. But but, you know, both things can happen.
Speaker: And yeah being aware of that. it's just what it comes down to is to cherish you really start to understand that the moment you have now and the time you have now becomes very important because if you think like i'm gonna live with this person forever and ever then you're not really you're not living in the now you're living in the future planning things 10 15 years in the future and that's you know and then then something happens and you're like oh my god i was gonna take that trip with her or we're gonna do those things and That's so true. just makes our relationship a little bit more now and more urgent.
Speaker: It seems sad in a way almost, but it's actually much more. You feel the whole moment and you're not expecting anything to come or be something else. It just is what is right now. And there's there's a presence in that moment that is really amazing that I love.
Speaker: That's quite beautiful. All you have is the moment and the goal of stilling your mind. and sitting in nothing, and stopping this crazy mind from getting into all of these um points of view of all of these things which make things right or wrong and good or bad.
Speaker: There is no good or bad, as you said earlier. and if you know that and you're living in truth, you'll never hurt someone. You'll help to evolve out of it.
Speaker: yeah But most people in these days don't know they don't know that because they're just walking from their lower chakras, usually sexually oriented.
Speaker: And that's not going to that's not going to work. So when they get together and their sex and their root chakras balance and a bit of the present moment egos, those always are the first things that that connect the three lower chakras.
Speaker: then after those chakras have connected, that lasts for a good couple of years maybe. Then when the emotions don't meet and the communications and spirit don't meet,
Speaker: Time to move on So I hope that as yogis, as ishta yogis, tantrikas, you do the practice and you come into it from the most pure point of spirit.
Speaker: So I said earlier, these are things so you can live from spirit, the yamas and yamas.
Speaker: As I taught this week in my class, there's one thing that you can know. It's just a feeling. the no The feeling of no thing is the feeling of unconditional loving.
Speaker: There's no lover, there's no lover. It's just your loving. So to be able to reach into an unconditional loving,
Speaker: What would happen in life? The yamas and the niyamas become obvious. You live them. You don't try and do them. I automatically, I can't do things which would hurt others.
Speaker: I can't do things. I can't lie. so hard if I've got to tell something a little lie sometimes I can't do it it it bugs me I can't do it that's the preview of forthcoming attractions though and if any of them hoarding any of these future future things you'll hear when you sit in the now and you meditate and you do it daily whether it's good or bad right or wrong nice or not you do it
Speaker: You just sit there and quiet your brain down. Look at it scientifically. It's much better than emotionally or or religiously. I don't meditate for those reasons.
Speaker: I meditate two to slower my mind and expand it to a greater intelligence, to feel unconditional love, which means there's no lover or lover involved.
Speaker: It's just loving.
Speaker: So I think we would do this podcast or history really wrong if we actually didn't mention the one, the most famous practitioner of Ahimsa really in the world, which is Gandhi.
Speaker: So Gandhi really preached and really used Ahimsa as a force and he really formed it as Ahimsa to be ah like a political force. And he called it Satyagraha, actually, which roughly translated to holding on to truth. um And he used it to defeat the British or to drive the British out of South Africa or India, sorry.
Speaker: India, yeah. But he started in South Africa and met my father on his trip. Oh, he met your father. Did he really? My was a boy, Manny and my grandfather had a farm in a place called Danauza, which was between Durban, where all the huge Indian community is, and Johannesburg.
Speaker: And they did a march from Durban to Johannesburg. big like non-violence march and to Johannesburg.
Speaker: And they stopped at the farm, which was in the middle of the trip. ah They must have stopped quite a few times. And that my grandfather and all welcomed them.
Speaker: And they he apparently, my dad said, ah Gandhi patted him on the head and said, you're going to be a very spiritual being. Oh, wow. You've never told me that. I've never heard that before. I've been sitting on that one.
Speaker: Yes. I've never heard that either. I got some stories for you guys. You're saving some for later. That's great. so So yeah, so Gandhi locked into those and used those to free India. Ahimsa and Satya.
Speaker: So anyway, so yeah, and he he he used that for the masses to try and change a country and it was successful.
Speaker: but i I don't want you to use them. I want you to live them. Gandhi did practice Kriya Yoga. So... Yeah, he even opened up an ashram, actually, which I did not know before.
Speaker: And taught, taught to actually, just aim at the the Yamas and the Niyamas, mostly. I had to live them. both Yeah, but that's for the masses. He dealt with the masses.
Speaker: We are dealing today... We're kind of going to the masses, but from a very tantric point of view, which is more about an individual tuning to a greater intelligence and then coming back You cannot do any of the things that the Yamas are telling you not to do.
Speaker: When you meditate and you live from that point, it just doesn't happen. You become compassionate, understanding, loving, graceful. and life I think that's a good place to cut it.
Speaker: Sounds like we've given a lot. I don't think so. want to give them more. Yeah.
Speaker: Next week. tweet yeah So have a super wonderful week. Feeling, observe yourself and see.
Speaker: do you harm others in any way, emotionally, mentally? physically and if you do sit still and meditate more make sure you do your daily practice because within three years that will change namaste have a wonderful week see i must stay with i must stay thanks so much you next week and don't forget to like and subscribe
Speaker: thank you for joining us today and have a super wonderful week namaste
