Metaphysical Principles of Hridaya Yoga, the Yoga of the Spiritual Heart

Hridaya Yoga - Yoga of the Spiritual Heart

Hridaya Yoga or the Yoga of the Spiritual Heart – Definition

The Yoga of the Spiritual Heart is a spiritual path whose purpose is the revelation of our True Self, the atman , or, as it is known in contemplative traditions, the Spiritual Heart.

The Yoga of the Spiritual Heart is based upon traditional spiritual principles and visions from classic yoga based on Patanjali’s Sutras, Advaita Vedanta , Tantra and Shaivism. They are correlated with teachings from Sufism, Christianity , Buddhism and Taoism.

The main methods used in the Yoga of the Spiritual Heart are: hatha yoga, the meditations for the revelation of the Spiritual Heart and techniques for quieting the mind and for developing the capacity for concentration.

The student of Hridaya Yoga should consciously use all momentum, energies, and practical efforts in order to create the inner conditions necessary for the revelation of the Spiritual Heart.
The Spiritual Heart is both the transcendent and the immanent Reality of any and all aspects of the macrocosm. The Spiritual Heart is the ultimate essence of everything there is.

The Yoga of the Spiritual Heart allows us to live in the very “core” of the existence, to feel the heartbeat of every moment of life, to know intuitively the eternal dimension of every moment.
The Yoga of the Spiritual Heart involves the presence of the Witness Consciousness and of the Open Attention.

The Open Attention is radiating from the heart and its radiance is Love.

The student engaged on the path of Hridaya Yoga aspires to live into the Heart, in the Supreme Reality, in God, while God is experienced directly, beyond any conceptual and religious definitions. Thus, the Student of Hridaya Yoga will achieve the identity with the wholeness of life.

Metaphysical Principles of Hridaya Yoga, the Yoga of the Spiritual Heart

The vision of this spiritual path is based on the advaita-vedanta philosophy, which teaches about the essential oneness of all creation1. We are starting from the premise that everything that exists in the universe is a manifestation of the Supreme Consciousness, which reveals itself in each and every individual as the Atman, the Spiritual Heart. The Spiritual Heart represents each and every individual’s source of freedom, spontaneity and profound bliss.

The Yoga of the Spiritual Heart aims at eliminating the contradictions, tensions and conflicts caused by the dualistic vision (dvaita) and also by its inherently conditioned programming. In Hridaya Yoga, the aspiration is the revelation of individual’s ultimate nature, of the Spiritual Heart. This results in understanding and experiencing the Oneness. In Hridaya Yoga, we endeavor to express coherently the oneness of consciousness by using the meditation and hatha yoga as well. Additionally, Hridaya Yoga uses specific methods to assist the students with applying this vision in their every day routine life. In this manner, the consciousness or awareness of the Spiritual Heart can be permanently infused in their life.

The focus on energy wheels - chakras and on energetic phenomena plays a secondary role during the practice of Hatha Yoga, as it is an integral part in the vision of consciousness of oneness. In the incipient stages of the Hatha Yoga practice, the experiences related to energizing the chakras (and also the understanding and transformations which may result thereafter) are important for acquiring an increased awareness of the subtle reality of our being. However, gradually, while we gain spiritual maturity on this Path, it is the process of transcending our attachment to our physical or energy structures that becomes the focus in the spiritual practice.

Therefore, Hridaya Yoga is not a spiritual practice involving any control or forcing into submission our internal or external nature. Instead, Hridaya Yoga is teaching the conscious abandonment of our individual limits. At the same time, it is teaching the students to open to the Supreme Reality. The surrender to the Spiritual Heart is a superior stage; it comes as a result of a practice sustained by personal effort. The asanas (yoga poses) have to be performed with an attitude of profound devotion and inner transfiguration rather than by allowing the ego-based will to attempt controlling the body and the mind. The practice of Hridaya Yoga itself represents an aspiration of recalling to remain permanently focused on the spiritual purpose.

As part of the Hridaya Yoga practice, the ideal goal of hatha yoga, in itself, is to reach the state of harmony with the divine reality, to let go of corporeal consciousness, to achieve freedom, exaltation of beauty, openness towards subtle dimensions. All the foregoing goals form the premises of the revelation of who we are in truth.

In Hridaya Yoga, the yoga techniques, including meditation and Hatha Yoga as well, shall not be performed in order to “achieve” the Supreme Reality, The Spiritual Heart. Instead, the purpose is to turn the body, the soul and the mind into adequate instruments expressing the Heart, the Supreme Consciousness. Therefore, for the students following this path, it is of utmost importance to understand the above guidelines as well as the role played by the body, soul and mind in their relation with the Spiritual Heart.

The Importance of the Principles Governing the Spiritual Practice

It is important to outline the principles underlying the spiritual practice because they define the spiritual practice and they make it coherent and clear.

Premises
From a spiritually minded perspective, there are a few premises in Hridaya Yoga, to start with. These premises are almost the same in all great spiritual traditions.

There is one Supreme Reality, which represents the universal, unique and ultimate substratum of the whole existence.
The Nature of the Supreme Reality is Consciousness.
This Supreme Reality exists as the ultimate essence of one’s being. It is called “atman”, the Supreme Self. ( We frequently refer to “Atman” by hridaya – the Spiritual Heart , the synonymous word used in Hridaya Yoga)
The necessary conditions for the revelation of our ultimate essence can be generated by yoga techniques or other spiritual practices.
The revelation of the ultimate essence of who we are has caused the great Indian sages to recognize that there is a relationship of identity between Brahman, the Supreme Reality and atman , the Spiritual Heart. (Three out of great four vedic and upanishadic statements, Mahavakhyas, refer to this identity of Atman with Brahman .)
There is a primordial vibration, the spanda, which is expressed in our being as the Sacred Tremor of the Heart. This Sacred Tremor of the Heart acts like a bridge between energy and consciousness. It can serve as a way for an emotion or a spiritual experience to transcend the personal individual level and, then, reveal the freedom of the spirit.
The Sacred Tremor of the Heart, the spanda , is an infallible inner guide. It always exists, as the fundamental dimension of the existence, to guide us from personal level to transpersonal level and beyond it, from temporary existence to eternity.
In accordance with the traditional tantric vision and the contemporaneous holistic vision trends, the starting point in Hridaya Yoga is that everything is interconnected. The Whole in itself is a vibrant living relationship. The Life per se is a cosmic game of infinite interactions. The consciousness of the Spiritual Heart causes that every second lived according to this holistic vision may become an opportunity for inspiration, revelation, sacred celebration of interconnectedness, between all the separate individual parts, on the one hand and between each individual part and the Whole, on the other hand.

Corollary

As a consequence of the intuitive knowledge of the One universal background of the existence, as students of Hridaya Yoga, we start to develop the awareness that all aspects of our beings are ultimately divine.

We also become intuitively aware that our ultimate nature is not limited to the physical body or to the subtle mind-soul or energy structures.

This way, in Hridaya Yoga, using meditation combined with Hatha Yoga, we make gradual progress into experiencing a state of expansion in which we become like the space and we embrace everything. We can perceive the one and universal background of the existence as being the transcendent dimension of our being.

The Purpose of the Practice

The aim of the various technical approaches is not to cause a state of mind or an experience, but to develop and refine the structures which adequately support the revelation of our divine nature:

The clear and quiet mind, able to generate the premises for the transcendence of the mind itself.
The Spiritual Heart – we are aware of it as being an “organ” for direct knowledge. The Spiritual Heart is a subtle “organ” that can simultaneously include our fundamental aim, the very nature of the spiritual endeavor and aspiration and, at the same time, the effort inherent to the practice.

The Awareness of the Spiritual Heart

In the spiritual practice, we shall not make a goal out of the level of perfection of the physical postures. The practice of asanas is not a goal per se in Hridaya Yoga. However, the profound transformations taking place during the execution of an asana , make the asana a tool meant to help us to open towards our ultimate nature, towards the Atman, the Spiritual Heart.

Therefore, the asana is not a goal in itself, but a modality to express the oneness of our being, a tool used to cause the consciousness to expand, a dance of energies, a dance of Shakti and Shiva, or a dance of the energy with the consciousness.

The awakening of latent energies and getting them balanced and centered in the Spiritual Heart represents a way for us to open towards the infinite and to become cosmic beings.

Instead of “practicing” or “doing” yoga or an asana, our aspiration is of ‘being” in yoga and of consciously living, in that asana, the miracle of “be-ing”. The asana is used as a tool to help us to develop the sharpness of the Witness Consciousness, to immerse into the Heart’s profound levels, and to reveal who we really are.

This is how we get to be in an attitude which is rather meditative and where the mental concentration is accompanied by the Witness Consciousness and by an Open Attention to energetic phenomena which might appear. The Hatha Yoga session is not an imposed practice, but a creative activity called for by the tendencies and energies associated with the present moment. Thus, the practice of Hatha Yoga is more than an ascetic practice or a strictly physical individual workout. It becomes mainly a practice of awareness and of openness full of joy.

In this manner, we avoid the danger of a rigid and most often useless practice, based on egoic will power. Instead, our practice is oriented inwards. It becomes increasingly intimate in its nature, freely expressed, dynamic, continuously refreshed by inner echoes, by feedback responses from the very flow of energies which are used.

In order to harmonize the energies and various aspects of our being such as body, sensations, mind, we have to go through a process of unification and integration of this “Conscious Totality” which is our very being. While practicing yoga we become the yoga; the oneness is reflected in and between the internal and external aspects of the being. By practicing Hridaya Yoga, we celebrate and honor the very power of life.

In this manner, we establish contact with the infinite and eternal potential of our true nature. As a result, we stop being preoccupied with routine problems, dramas and fears and we can freely access the extraordinary treasure which is offered by the Present moment.

The centering into the Spiritual Heart induces a feeling of a sacred interconnection within the Totality. This is the true Home where we find ourselves together in the same radiation of the Pure Presence, of the Sacred Tremor, the spanda.