Notes from class on Ishvara Pranidhana
Niyama #5 – Ishvara Pranidhana / surrender to the divine
From devotion to the Lord, one is given perfect absorption in Spirit (samadhi).
Yoga Sutras, II:46
In samadhi there is no longer distinction between the person who sees and what is being seen. In samadhi, the separation between ourselves and the universe dissolves. This is what it means to surrender to God... If you are alienated by the God of your childhood, try coming up with another God.
Rolf Gates
The spiritual impulse that compels us to seek enlightenment is that same original intention that has been driving the evolutionary process from the very beginning of the universe.
Andrew Cohen
For [early yogis], the whole world was seen as a vast net woven together in space and time – not unlike our notion of the quantum field. This was called Indra's Net, and at the intersection of each warp strand and woof strand of this net is a jewel. This jewel represents an individual human soul. And it is that soul's duty... to hold together its particular part of the web by being its own unique jewel-like self. In this way, the whole universe holds together as one great interlocking field.
Stephen Cope
As long as we are engrossed in our own needs, in “I” and “mine” we will remain insecure... Cultivating surrender and devotion replaces such self-preoccupation with a sense of our connection that sustains this entire universe. A sense of devotion and surrender opens us to experiences of being nurtured. We also learn that we have the capacity to become instruments of higher consciousness, serving and giving what we can to help others in their own awakening.
Swami Ajaya (Alan Weinstock)
Allow yourself to yield, and you can stay centered.
Allow yourself to bend, and you will stay straight.
Allow yourself to be empty, and you'll get filled up.
Allow yourself to be exhausted, and you'll be renewed.
Having little, you can receive much.
Having much, you'll just become confused.
“Yield and you can stay centered” --
Is this saying meaningless?
Stay whole, and all things return to you.
The Tao te Ching of Lao Tzu, verse 22, translation by Brian Browne Walker
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