For the Love of Yoga with Nish the Fish

Last week, we had a profound and poignant discussion on the heart of Kālī sādhana in What Does Kālī Want From You? | The Yoga of Grief & Fullness where we explored what Swami Vivekananda called "The Worship of the Terrible"! Notice that the imagery around Mā Kālī doesn't just focus on terror, chaos and death in an amorphous or abstract way; it presents some very concrete motifs of intoxication, arousal and madness. The idea that Mā dwells in the jungles or in the cremation grounds (i.e in a realm of the chaotic unknown beyond all law, reason and order, perhaps a symbol for the wild and untrammeled Subconscious) surrounded by bloodthirsty female spirits (dākinīs), ghosts and jackals (perhaps symbols for the dark, violent and often repressed dimensions of the human psyche) is very important and deserving of a courageous, careful, considered, serious and earnest inquiry. What does all of this mean? And why are such (to some people) disturbing images so insisted upon when it comes to Mā Kālī's iconography? I want to discuss some of this tonight, playing off some ideas we first encountered in the Why Is Kālī Drunk? & Mā Kālī's Non Dual Aspect & Tantrik Sādhanās to Attain Itlectures. And so at tonight's 7pm PST zoom satsangh, I want to take up this inquiry with you in the context of a discussion on the different shades of insanity, i.e discerning between the fun kind that we saw in Sri Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda vs. the not-so-fun and often, debilitating kind that can sometimes come about as a result of ungrounded, unsupervised śakti sādhana like we did in the Why is Kālī Crazy? lecture to answer these questions:Is there a difference between  Dakṣiṇa Kālī and Smaśāna Kālī?Is one for householders and the other for ascetics?What will happen if I start worshipping the former, and what if I worship the latter? Etc. Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

On the last Monday of śrāvana is an especially sacred day for contemplating the Absolute because it is a culmination four or six weeks of very intense Sādhanā (spiritual practice). As such, as a celebration and consummation, I'd like to discuss something quite poignant: the yoga of grief & fullness.I want to compare some transcendalist schools of Advaita to the Tāntrik approach which emphasizes fullness, especially with regard the full spectrum of flavors (rasa) that arise in Consciousness! We'll offer some a touching and telling stories of Lord Śiva's grief, Matsyendranātha's fall, and the pain and grief of Sarada Devi, Sri Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda!Often I feel there can be nothing more important than presenting this profoundly humanizing portraits of our heroes because rather than subtracting from their spirituality , they only add to it. Essentially, I want to talk about an all embracing kind of spirituality that leaves no experience unexplored, no facet untasted: in short, the Advaita of Kālī!. Naturally, we'll explore the 5 phases of the 12 Krama deities too and Abhinava Gupta's nava-rasa theory to point to the philosophical complexity and poetry of this position!Many of you will find this lecture someone reminiscent of some our community favorites like: 1. Mā Kāli's Bowl of Blood | Turning Suffering Into Ecstasy2. Mā Kālī's Non Dual Aspect & Tantrik Sādhanās to Attain It3. What Does Kālī Really Want?4. and most especially How To Succeed At Tantra & The Worship of The TerribleYou'll notice that in a sense, this is the key teaching or rather the uttama-vāda, highest revelation of our Kālī tradition! This talk also contains elements from another one of my favorites: What Makes Art Spiritual? | Kashmir ShaivismAt the end we offer a very refined spiritual practice for transforming all our pain and grief into an experience of aesthetic rapture or poetic delight! On this auspicious Tuesday, on Mā's sacred day, I lay all of these words as so many flowers at your feet, you who are Mā incarnate! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

One of the most exalted, refined and mysterious aspects of the Tāntrik non-dual tradition is the veneration of the devītraya, the Three Wisdom Goddesses who are linked to three dynamic expressions of Consciousness: Knower (Parā), Knowing (Parāparā) and Known (Aparā). More mysterious than this is the idea that Consciousness, the central Goddess (Samvit Devī) expresses Herself simultaneously (akrama) and sequentially (Krama) as 12 phases within those three aforementioned Goddesses.As such, having taken a first swipe at this topic in the The Knower, The Knowing & The Known As Tāntrik Goddesses | Vijñāna-Bhairava Tantra, Verse 106 lecture from our Vijñāna-Bhairava Tantra class and having explored them in a ritual context in Worshipping the Trika Goddesses we now take up the topic of the One Goddess, the Three Goddesses (devītraya), the Twelve Goddesses (kālī-krama) and the Fifteen Goddesses (pañca-daśa-yoginī) to show how they are in truth, the dynamic aspect of the One Consciousness which you yourself are! Jai Samvit Devī Ki Jai! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

As part our our How To Do Tāntrik Pūjā lecture series, we've recently been exploring the topic of mānasa pūjā, or Mental Worship vs External Worship by looking at theMantra for Mental Worship | Mānasa Pūjā which if you recall, is the mantra we used in this talk How To Worship Mā Kālī Mentally (Mānasa Pūjā)! Now, I often argue that cultivating of our inner world through techniques such as mānasā pūjā (which is part of a broader practice in the Tāntrik tradition called bhāvanā orcreative, dynamic visualization) is The Most Important Spiritual Resource. The quality of our so-called "external reality" is wholly determined by our inner state since the world is nothing but an appearance within Consciousness! As such, interiorized practices like this are so wonderful for refining our inner state and aligning it with the Absolute. But Mānasa-pūjā is also very helpful in the context of Kālī sādhana for doing things like Substituting the Pañcamakāras, Forbidden Offerings & also for  Substituting Animal Sacrifice & Other Transgressive Offerings in Kālī Worship for those whose temperament might not lean this way and who might still want to participate somehow in these more vīra-bhāva-esque practices that come with the territory. So having given so many lectures now on the beauty and importance of mānasa-pūjā, I wanted to spend a little time in this talk reminding us why external rituals are also so important! After all, Tantra is essentially, ritualism! Often, when we understand something of interior worship, we might become very quick to dismiss external forms! And in truth, this is also a valid approach and this what the Samaya-marga or "right hand path" in Tantra tries to do. And in one sense, the Kaula marga is more likely to emphasize externals since in the Kaula view, the "external" is nothing but God embodied! And since we tend to lean towards the latter approach in our community, I first present some arguments for the importance of externals before presenting two very important techniques in tantra that complement external worship: substitution and interiorization!Jai Mā!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Almost all of us have so man hang-ups lurking in our psyche. Whether through religious indoctrination or societal conditioning of any sort, most of us carry around a strong sense of duality that distinguishes between pure & impure, holy & unholy, right & wrong, good & bad etc. Often we feel like we are dirty or sinful or broken and in need of growth, healing and liberation which we often think we can get through spirituality. And correspondingly, most spiritual traditions take up a kind dualistic vision of the universe which distinguishes the Transcendent principle (i.e God) from the Immanent principle (the world). According to these transcendentalist traditions, the former is the goal that we are practicing towards and the latter is often seen as a debased obstacle to be scorned, avoided and ultimately overcome.In stark contrast to this is the non-dual Tāntrik view which embraces everything as Divine. God is the world and the world is God for only God is. As such, there is no sense of pure or impure, right or wrong, holy or unholy, good or bad or any other kind of dichotomy in this view since everything is through and through God, or śiva (i.e a blessing). But this idea (what to say of the realization of this idea in your own experience) can often wreak havoc with our cherished notions of duality. Although many of us are fascinated by non-dual traditions, in truth, many of us are still scared of non-duality. And who could blame us? If we really understand what is being claimed here and if we were reality to follow through with our realization, we would naturally feel a bit reserved since all our familiar prisons of dualistic thought are destroyed! For a mind attached to judging others, for a mind hell-bent on duality and on abstract standards of purity, for a mind attached to rules and structures and institutions, non-duality is terrifying. And what mind isn't to some extent colored by judgement, duality and notions of purity? What mind doesn't crave structure? When Mā Kālī's sword flashes, aimed at our neck, we would be right to tremble at first, even if we ultimately know that it entails non-dual realization! It is only natural that we tremble. As such, here is a talk about that. Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

The one indubitable fact about my life is that I AM. Or rather, I am essentially consciousness because to be is to be aware and to be aware is to be. But what is the nature of that Consciousness? We argue in our tradition that this Conscious Self which I feel myself to be is really one and the same with God, Śiva and thatI am not at all merely localized to this contraction of limited body-mind-personality but that I am, in truth, all-pervasively present in all things as all things. And more than that, I am not only immanent in all things, I also transcend them all! I am full and empty, everything and nothing.What then do we make of insentience? If I, the sentient Self am all, then are all things sharing in my sentience? Are jugs and pieces of cloth sentient? Is the AI sentient? In fact, are cats and other people even sentient?! (i.e the problem of the philosophical zombie). And if I am all things, then why do I feel like only this one thing (namely this body and this mind)? How do you explain my jīva-tva (my littleness) when in fact I am śiva (the all-pervasive transcendent-immanent Absolute.) This is a really profound and beautiful question to ask because it takes us to the very heart of non-dual Śaivism! As such, on this third Monday of the sacred month of śrāvana, I present you with this discussion on the lofiest and most refined ideas of the Śaiva non-dual transmission, as part of our Paramārthasāra, Abhinava Gupta series. Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Who or What is Kali?According to Abhinava Gupta , Kālī is: क्षेपो ज्ञानं च संख्यां गतिनाद इति क्रमात्। कल्लनां कुर्वती काली कर्षिणीत्यभिधीयते। She who projects, She who knows, She who delimits, She who vibrates, She who is resonance and She who is process She who imagines, She who acts, She who devours (i.e reabsorbs)....this is verily Kālī In other words, Kālī is that resonant, dynamic One from Whom the world is projected outward, articulated and known and into Whom it is reabsorbed in a constant simultaneity of unfolding! But what does that mean? And what does Kālī have to do with Śakti and what is Śakti to Śiva? Is there such a thing as a Śākta (worshipper of Devī) distinct from Śaivism? In trying to approach some of these questions, we discuss one of my favorite topics: yoginīs, mātrikās & cremation ground deities! As our śrāvana festivities and practices intensify with the passing weeks, there is a rising fervor and I am feeling rather inspired to explore the cremation ground roots of our Śaiva heritage, to make a few historical points about Ati Margins and about Kāpālikās and about what they discovered, understanding it all within the wider philosophical context of Somānanda's presentation of Śiva as primordial dynamic Consciousness, inseparable from Śakti, the pentadof powers! (cit, ānanda, icchā, jñāna, kriyā etc.) This union of Śiva + Powers (i.e puissance or latency or agency or dyanmism) is what we call Kālī and this is what I hope to explore with you a little bit today in class!According to Shiti Kanttha in Mahānāya Prakāśa: एवं आधौ एव शक्तिः स्पन्दनशीला बहिर्विषयोन्मुखी व्यापिनीभावेन सृष्ट्युपदेशभाजनम्...। एकैव चिन्नीलाधवाभासरूपा अस्थिरहठगवती कुलैव पश्चात्प्रतिसंहतस्वभावा अग्राग्रागमिप्रसरत्सहजरूपा लक्ष्यते, सोऽयं निरुपाधौ चित्स्फायादुपाधिकृतो भेदः। Verily is She is the Primordial Pulsation, inclined towards externality, the all-pervasive receptacle of emission and wisdom. She alone is the Pure Awareness in which shines experiences like the colour blue etc. Dyanmic and forcefully flowing into externality, She is verily "Kula" (the embodied universe) and yet afterwards, she withdraws it back into her nature. Her spotaneous nature is found at the very edge of arising experience. Duality arises in Her when there are limiting adjuncts but in truth She shines non-differently!Shiva = Kali, as in Shiti Kanttha:शिवस्वभावैव शक्तिः न वस्त्वन्तरम्,इत्येकम् एव शिवव्यपदेश्यं शक्तिव्यपदेश्यं च वस्तुतत्त्वं नापूर्वं किञ्चित्। The essential nature of Shiva is Shakti; they are is no seperate reality! That which is called "Shiva" and that which is called "Shakti" is the same thing! And this essential reality is wholly ordinary and not something bizzare! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Last week, on the first Monday of Śrāvana, the sacred month of Lord Śiva, we gave this exhaustive account of Śaiva Tantra in both theory and practice. It was indeed an exceedingly auspicious day for the worship and contemplation of that Absolute Consciousness which is our very own essence nature in which all things shine forth blissfully!As such, I present you with this discussion on c 3 Ways to Practice With The Pañcākshari (The 5 Syllable Mantra)! Since we've been discussing a lot of theory and philosophy recently in our gatherings, I felt it might be good to ground it all in some practice. And what better practice than this central practice of the tradition using the central mantra that appears in the middle of the Śrī Rudram of the Yajur Veda, arguable the central Veda of the Tāntrik tradition! ciddṛśātmani dṛṣṭveśaṁ tyaktvā vṛttimarīcikām |labdhvā śivapadacchāyāṁ dhyāyet pañcākṣarīṁ sudhīḥ (9)Having seen the Lord as one's own self through the eyes of Consciousness,Having abandoned all other modifications of the mirage-like mind &Having reflected upon the state of śiva (i.e having taken refuge in the cooling shade of śiva, i.e having received His grace)The wise one should meditate on the 5-syllable Mantra!Jai Shambho!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

As you approach Mā Kālī, you will likely encounter many transgressive (and for some people of a certain temperament, even disturbing) practices. Things like animal sacrifice (Bali) and offerings of meat, fish, liquor, intoxicants and sex (pañca-makāras) are featured quite strongly in some of the primary sources on Mā Kālī & Her worship and this has created a mixture of fascination and aversion, superstition and misunderstanding and in some cases, an obstacle to approaching Mā and ultimately realizing Her. As such, in this short exposition, we say a few things about these Kaula/Vāma mārga-type offerings, picking up the thread for our last two conversations on the subject from last week: Substituting the Pañcamakāras, Forbidden Offerings & Kaula Elements in the Vijñāna-Bhairava TantraJai Vāme! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Right now in our How To Do Tāntrik Pūjā lecture series, we're exploring the topic of Mānasa-pūjā, mental worship, the process of internalizing everything that we would otherwise be doing outwardly. This approach is of course very, very helpful when it comes to things like pañca-makāras or even bali (animal sacrifice) because although these things are very much part of Kālī pūjā, the external observance of these things might not be appropriate in some contexts and certainly won't suit the temperament of many practitioners! The solution for such practitioners? Omit it/substitute it or internalize it! In this talk, we discuss what the pañca-makāras (the 5 forbidden offerings) are and make a points about for whom this practice could be beneficial and for whom it could, perhaps potentially be ruinous! Given all the fascination (as well as superstition) around this topic and of course, given its centrality in the Kaula marga and the worship of deities like Mā Kālī, it's worth taking a swipe at in a mature and grounded way! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Today on the very sacred and auspicious day of Nāga Pañcami, the day when we honor serpents in the holy month of śrāvana, the sacred month of Lord Śiva, I felt it would be wonderful to contemplate Mā (śakti) as the all-pervasive enlivening/animating energy that is in all things and IS all things. This energy or life-force is inseparable from Consciousness, the all-pervasive reality that in this tradition we call Śiva. But what does it mean to say that? In this lecture, we point to how Śiva is not just quiescent, formless, impersonal Reality but that He is always endowed with ever-free and ever-blissful self-reflection (vimarśa) which in this tradition we call Śakti (i.e Mā Kālī) and that this self-reflection manifests as the eternal triad of the powers of willing (icchā-śakti), knowing (jñāna-śakti) and doing (kriyā-śakti) which is in effect what this entire universe is! This universe is God reflecting on Herself; it is the blazing forth of God's enlivened energy! For God IS Herself nothing but enlivened and enlivening Energy! We get this very radical Śakta view that everything is alive from Somānanda, the great Tāntrik master who might have been the first to articulate, in philosophical terms, this pantheistic pan-animism of Consciousness-Energy. In this lecture I argue that Somānanda's revelation in Śiva-drshti is the foundational philosophy of Śaktism, the view that everything is Mā, living, pulsating, throbbing Power! Also, in this talk, I share some insights from a conversation I had with Pujya Swami Bhajanananda Saraswati at the Kali Mandir in Laguna Beach regarding Animism and its link to Śakta theory and practice. Pujya Swamiji proposed a diachronic approach to understanding these traditions and in this view, Śaktism might be most universal of all traditions! So we attempt to argue for this also. Anyway since Nāga-pañcami is also a day to contemplate Kundalinī Śakti (or the "Serpent Power" as Arthur Avalonji beautifully called Her), this discussion on Power, Vitality and Śakti in the context of Śaiva Non-Duality seemed very fitting! Jai Nageśvarī Devī Ki Jai! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

What is the most important spiritual resource? Since spirituality is the process of going inward, of checking the natural inclination towards externalization, naturally, the most important thing we can learn how to do is to take responsibility for our inner world! This is essentially what spirituality is. When our inner world is taken care of, when our mental state is cultivated and established in the highest frequency, the outer world (which is really nothing more than an experience arising in the mind) will follow suit. The moment we sort our mind out, it seems that the whole picture changes, the outer world transforms and suddenly we understand what it means to "be the change we want to see in the world" since the world in nothing but a reflection of my own mind and to change the mind is to change the world-image that appears! But having understood this, the next question must be: how do I take responsibility for my inner state? What tools can I use for creating an oasis of peace, joy and blessedness within which is not at all conditioned by "external" events? Of course there is a whole slew of practices and techniques for achieving this end since is the most important thing we can do I spiritual life. However, one particular practice that I wanted to highlight that is so good for just this sort of thing is mānasa pūjā, the Inner Worship of the Deity.As such, here is another class in our How To Do Tantrik Ritual series exploring the sacred science of inner/mental worship. Here's the mantra we used:hṛtpadmamāsanaṁ dadyāt sahasrāracyutāmṛtaiḥ।pādyaṁ caraṇayordadyāt manastvarghyaṁ nivedayet॥tenāmṛtenācamanīyaṁ snānīyaṁ tena ca smṛtam।ākāśatattvaṁ vastraṁ syāt gandhaḥ syāt gandhatattvakam॥cittaṁ prakalpayet puṣpaṁ dhūpaṁ prāṇān prakalpayet।tejastattvaṁ ca dīpārthaṁ naivedyaṁ syāt sudhāmbudhiḥ॥anāhatadhvanirghaṇṭā vāyutattvaṁ ca cāmaram।sahasrāraṁ bhavecchatraṁ śabdatattvaṁ ca gītakam॥nṛtyamindriyakarmāṇi cāñcalyaṁ manasastathā।sumekhalāṁ padmamālāṁ puṣpaṁ nānāvidhaṁ tathā॥amāyādyairbhāvapuṣpairarcayet bhāvagocaram।amāyamanahaṅkāramarāgamamadaṁ tathā॥amohakamadambhaṁ ca adveṣākṣobhakau tathā।amātsaryamalobhaṁ ca daśapuṣpaṁ vidurbudhāḥ॥ahiṁsā paramaṁ puṣpaṁ puṣpamindriyanigrahaḥ।dayāpuṣpaṁ kṣamāpuṣpaṁ jñānapuṣpaṁ ca pañcamam॥iti pañcadaśairbhāvapuṣpaiḥ sampūjayet śivām॥Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

In this talk, we continue to unpack the Somānanda's Radical Non-Dual Revelation to show how Consciousness, the Absolute Reality which you yourself are is endowed desire, innately creative and always active. Also, we discover the profound implications of such a view on our spiritual lives and on our day to day interactions with the world!You'll recall that in  our last conversation we compared a few different approach to non-duality to show how many non-dual traditions prefer a more quietistic approach where the Absolute is conceived of as perfectly silent and perfectly still without any desire or dynamism whatsoever. And that's perfectly valid! Notice however that this idealistic, world-negating approach might work for some people (especially monastics) but not necessarily for everyone and certainly not for those who desire to engage with the world and act on their inspirations and desires for creative expression! As such, as an alternative to the more popular and mainstream non-dual presentations of Classical Advaita Vedanta and Classical Buddhism, we present the Tāntrik approach which argues for the innate dynamism of the Absolute such that the world is re-affirmed, desires are divinized and life is given a positive spin! On this view, the world is no longer seen as an illusion to be dispelled or as an error to be corrected; life is no longer seen as suffering but rather as innately blissful since all this is verily the shining forth of ever-free, ever-blissful Consciousness! PS: much of this conversation is also in dialogue with some of the observations we were making here in our What is the Sound of Absolute Silence? | Bagalā Jayanti talk where I argued that speech is always inherent even in silence! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Non-duality is the profound view that only one Reality exists and that you are essentially That! This unitive vision of one-ness, this harmony of all things resonates so deeply in the human psyche, perhaps because we all of us sense the underlying unity beneath and beyond all seeming diversity! But as you know, there are many different kinds of Non-Dual traditions all around the world, each articulating this revelation of one-ness in different ways owing to the unique experiences of the sages to whom such revelations occurred. And because we are all different and because we all respond to different things at different times of our spiritual journey, its nice to compare some of the different non-dual traditions that have emerged in the Indian subcontinent so see what they each have to offer. We have something to learn from every tradition, after all! In this talk, after comparing a few different schools of Advaita, I make a case for Somānanda's vision: an Advaita of radical agency, a kind of theistic monism that seeks to be as inclusive as possible of everything without reducing anything to void or illusion! This kind of Tāntrik non-duality, which we will unpack together over the course of the next few lectures, uniquely offers a world-affirming, life-affirming, action-oriented one-ness! This talk is part of a series on Somānanda and includes talks like Somānanda's Radical Non-Dual RevelationRace, Gender, Environment & Ethics in Non-Duality | Vijñāna-Bhairava Tantra, Verse 105 Is My Coffee Mug Conscious? | Paramārthasāra, Verse 37 andPanpsychism in Tantra | Vijñāna-Bhairava Tantra, Verse 105Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

And now, our main project is to study Somānanda's radical non-dual philosophy, which is the foundation for Shākta non-duality. Somānanda might be one of the most radical and God-intoxicated of the Shaiva Non-Dual masters. He is Abhinava Gupta's guru's guru's guru. Essentially, the idea here is that nothing is insentient: every thing, even seemingly inanimate objects, are actually none other than Shiva, who is pure non-dual Consciousness reposing blissfully in His own fullness endowed with unceasing powers of Willing, Knowing and Doing. Somānanda argues that every pot, every wall, every chair wills to be what it is and knows that it is that thing and acts as that thing all as an expression of Shiva's desire to play! And what's more? You are none other than this one Shiva who is playfully manifesting a world and embodied Himself in that world as everyone and everything, just for fun. What a beautiful and stunning conception and realization! This talk Race, Gender, Environment & Ethics in Non-Duality | Vijñāna-Bhairava Tantra, Verse 105 was our first swipe at study Somānanda and Is My Coffee Mug Conscious? | Paramārthasāra, Verse 37 was our second. In fact, we're now at that verse in our Vijñāna-Bhairava Tantra (verse 105) which might have inspired Somānanda or at least captures the heart of what Somānanda is teaching and we're also studying a verse in Paramārthasāra (verse 37) which is more or less about the same thing. So brace yourself! The barrage of content that is now about to come your way, from Monday night discussions, Thursday night Vijñāna-Bhairava study and Friday morning Paramārthasāra commentary will all be oriented around this theme of "everything, including my coffee mug, cat and AI, is Consciousness AND also Conscious as the infinite expansion of Lord Shiva's playful being! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Naturally, naturalists and physicalists (i.e materialists) are exceedingly challenged by the "hard problem of Consciousness" as David Chalmers put it which is the challenge to explain, in physical terms, this somewhat transcendent reality called Consciousness which cannot at all be said to be caused by any brain activity. One solution then is to posit "panpsychism", which is more or less the idea that Consciousness is as real as matter and energy and actually inheres in all matter and energy. At any rate, we are currently studying a verse in the Paramārthasāra of Abhinava Gupta exploring the distinction between a "conscious" and seemingly "unconscious" or "inert" entities. After all, this is one of the most radical claims of the Shaiva non dual tradition: all things are verily Śiva but Śiva, as you will recall, is not a mere principle of Existence with no sense of self; Śiva is self-reflexive Awareness, the kind of Reality that knows Itself (i.e God) and as such, everything must be Conscious as Śiva is conscious!How then can we drive at a distinction between "cid" vs "jada", "conscious" vs "inert"? We take a first swipe at this idea in this talk and we will slowly unpack the view in the course of the next few videos through a close study of Somānanda, the great Tantrik master in whose work, Śivadrshti is present in full force this idea that all things, even pots, pieces of cloth, coffee mugs and Artificial Intelligence, are conscious, willing, knowing, doing things! TLDR: The world is God. Let's start to explore how! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

As you know, over the past few months we've been trying to articulate our ideals and values as a community so that we can maintain the highest degree of integrity as possible, according to the ideals of our lineage, as exemplified by our Parameshti Guru, Paramahansa Sri Ramakrishna. As such, we've been using Swami Vivekananda's 1896 "My Master" (a compilation of two lectures Swamiji gave on Sri Ramakrishna, published in Volume IV of the Complete Works) as a sort of charter or mission statement for our community! We've given about 4 talks based on Swamiji's "My Master": Advice to Spiritual Teachers & AspirantsSex, Drugs & Choosing A Guru | Q&AOur Mission | A ManifestoThe Most Important Spiritual Idea &Guru as Transmission of PowerAnd now this is the 6th, completing the sequence. In this short talk, we simply read out the rest of the speech, which we've been reading and reflecting upon together in the course of the past 4 talks listed above. This acts as a kind of finale or overture to this profound and moving piece about the highest spirituality exemplified in a human life! May all aspire to that very highest ideal! Jai Sri Ramakrishna!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

On the very auspicious day for Guru Purnima this year, we reflected on the role of the Guru and the process of approaching one in humility and surrender. We reflect upon the opening scene of the Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna and we offer a running commentary on these profound and moving verses of the Guru Gītā, the Song of the Teacher:oṁ brahmānandaṁ paramasukhadaṁ kevalaṁ jñānamūrtiṁ dvandvātītaṁ gaganadadṛśaṁ tattvamasyādilakṣyamekaṁ nityaṁ vimalamacalaṁ sarvadhīsākṣibhūtaṁbhāvātītaṁ triguṇarahitaṁ sadguruṁ taṁ namāmi"I bow to that true guru, who alone is the bliss of Brahman and the giver of supreme happiness, the very embodiment of knowledge, beyond all duality, as vast the sky, the very definition of Reality (i.e that which is indicated by the mahāvākyas of the Upanishads), non-dual, eternal, stainless, the Indwelling Witness in all beings beyond the mind, untouched by the three guṇas (sattva, rajas and tamas)." This lecture is part of our series on the role Guru in the Tāntrik tradition, which you can watch here. Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

We suggest about 5 different practices you can do to celebrate Śrāvaṇa, the month of Śiva:1. Vratam. Many people will observing vows like abstaining from a particular kind of food (salt, sugar, pickles etc.) or observing sunrise-sunset fasts or keeping vigils etc. Generally, these vows are observed on all the Mondays of this śrāvana period and so it is often called the Śrāvaṇa Somavara Vrātam (The Monday Observance of Śrāvaṇa) since Mondays are sacred to Lord Śiva. You can decide just what kind of thing to offer or to abstain from as part of your vrāta, vow, just whatever that is do-able and reasonable and makes spiritual sense and is spiritually nourishing to you. This is a bit like the Christian concept of lent, I suppose. 2. Japa (Puraścarana). You can pledge to chant a certain number of repetitions of your dīkshā mantra or any śiva mantra that you like (we often suggest the pancakshara mantra) every day during this period or just on the Mondays. When we systematically chant a certain number of mantras daily for a fixed period of time, we call that "puraścarana". Generally, we recommend that we sit in the same place, at the same time when we do our chanting and generally we suggests that you chant on a rudrāksha-mālā since those beads are sacred to Śiva. You get to decide what number you'd like to pledge, whatever number that is do-able and reasonable and spiritually nourishing for you. 3. Pūjā. Every Monday (or if you want, every day) during this period you can perform a pañcāmrita pūjā and/or a pañcopacāra-pūjā to your Shiva lingam or murti. We demonstrate this simple and elegant pūjā towards the end of this video but you can find all the mantras in Sanskrit with transliteration and translation as well as the ritual procedure in the description of this video. 4. Kirtana/Bhajana. A chanting practice is very beautiful and nourishing since it is essentially, like pūjā, a celebration! Perhaps you might decide to chant some hymns to Shiva on the Mondays or every day; you might simply commit to learning (and memorizing) a specific hymn that you like. (l) Nirvāna-śatakam 5. Karma Yoga. And our favorite practice of all as part of the Ramakrishna-Vivekananda lineage: worshipping Shiva in the form of the jīva, the embodied soul. As Christ said "that which you do unto the least of ye, you do unto me", the best possible pūjā is to actually serve everyone (including plants & animals & spirits & what not) in a spirit of worship. Never think you are helping anyone. Instead, feel that everyone is giving you an opportunity to worship God by coming to you for help. Don't feel that they owe you any gratitude for your having helped them. Rather, you be grateful to them for giving you the opportunity to worship God through them. In this way, your work, your daily tasks, all become transformed into Śiva-pūjā. This is the acme of non-duality, to recognize each movement of life as an encounter with the divine!May all beings, who are none other than Shiva, worship Shiva! Hara Hara Mahadeva! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Back in the day, the guru was very necessary because without one, we could not access the Tantras at all (that is, the ritual manuals in which we encounter the practices and philosophies of the tradition) because they were all physical manuscripts that were actually kept in the Guru's abode or even as part of the Guru's memory. As such, without dīkshā (spiritual initiation), it would be nearly impossible to get access to the tradition! Now, many of these texts are available online, in many different translations. One can encounter them and study them and practice out of them without ever having contacted a living teacher. And as such, a very important question comes up: is a living guru even needed anymore? Couldn't one just study from books and from videos on the internet? Perhaps! However, the role of the guru is far more than just one who gives us access to concepts, theories & techniques. The guru is far more than a role model who demonstrates with their lives the proof of the practice and the path. The guru is far more than a personal mentor in whom we can confide and find solace, which are very important things for a real life human who is attempting to practice spirituality intensely! Although these things are all very important and are included in the role of the guru, the main function of the guru is the transmission of spiritual power, what Swami Vivekananda called the "quickening impulse" in his talk called "The Need of a Guru" (Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, Volume III). But what exactly is this "quickening impulse"? Because this is the most mysterious dimension of Guru-Yoga, we explore it in this lecture by referring to some events in the life of Sri Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda. This is one of the lectures in our series on Swami Vivekananda's "My Master" along with Advice to Spiritual Teachers & Aspirants Sex, Drugs & Choosing A Guru | Q&A Our Mission | A Manifesto & Guru as Transmission of Power! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Because last week's Capricorn Full Moon was the celebration of the Guru (it was actually the birthday of Veda Vyāsa, the OG Guru), in our Friday evening restorative yoga class (which you can watch here), we explored the idea of "Guru as Consciousness", as a principle rather than a person which seems to be the emphasis of so many texts and verses describing the Guru! This conception identifies the Guru with Śiva or rather, Brahman which is Pure Existence-Consciousness-Bliss, the One Reality and the Ground of All Being. It is a quietistic sort of expression. Then, we explored the concept of the "Guru as Transmitter of Power" (which I will upload next) right after this class, and here we see a more dynamic conception, that of the Guru as guru-śakti, "spiritualizing force" or "the quickening impulse", as Swami Vivekananda called it. Together, these conceptions of Guru as quietistic Consciousness and as transforming Power taken together form the idea of Śiva AND Śakti as the Guru, with the third aspect in the triad being the human teacher, the body in which the above two conceptions are harmonized and actualized. The Guru as such is the trika, the resolved trinity of God-Power-Individual, i.e Śiva-Śakti-Nara. Enjoy!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Recently, we've been giving a series of talks on our values and ideals, based on what Swami Vivekananda said about his Master, Sri Ramakrishna. Having discussed our heritage in Where Did Kālī Come From? | A Brief Herstory we express how wonderful what we inherited is and how important it is for us to aspire to the very highest of ideals in order to maintain and transmit that heritage for future generations. In articulating those values, we first took up the subject in Advice to Spiritual Teachers & Aspirants and expanded inSex, Drugs & Choosing A Guru | Q&A. Finally, in Our Mission | A Manifesto our discussion reached somewhat of a crescendo. In this class, we continue our reading of Swami Vivekananda's "My Master" (a compilation of two talks he gave in 1896 on Sri Ramakrishna) to emphasize the central value that is at the very heart of our lineage; we point out its metaphysical foundations and its implications in our spiritual lives. Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

In our recent lectures like Advice to Spiritual Teachers & Aspirants & Sex, Drugs & Choosing A Guru | Q&A we've been going over our ideals and values as a community, using Swami Vivekananda's reflections on Sri Ramakrishna as our guiding principles. Recently also we took a look at our lineage and heritage to see where we've been! Now, we can look into the future and ask, "well, where are we going?" I want to discuss "our mission" as per Myra Mā's excellent inquiry in class the other day. What's our purpose? What's the manifesto? What's to be expected from me and from our community in the years to come? Mainly, with regard to our "mission", I want to say "we have none!" I'd like to talk a little bit about the risks of having "a mission" and the kind of grandiosity that it can bring. Importantly, I want to show how Swami Vivekananda's mission was not at all "his", but God's. Mā alone is doing everything through us and if we were to all simply surrender to the expression that arises naturally from moment to moment, Her līlā will unfold without us having ever to plan or to think about it or force outcomes. Really, in a deeper sense, this class is about how to stay calm and compassionate in trying times, during political instability, personal tragedy etc.and how to act in a way that is aligned with God's will!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Recently, we as a community have been having some very important discussions around integrity and our values so that we may be a genuine place of spiritual learning and a safe and inclusive space for practitioners of all sorts, with all types of dispositions who belong to all sorts of spiritual traditions and backgrounds! Naturally, we need to talk about issues of sex, money and power which are most often the downfall of spiritual leaders and spiritual communities. Having clear ideals and having the courage to hold one another to them is perhaps the most important thing we can do so that we don't make the obvious (and very natural) mistakes that spiritual communities have been making for not only centuries, but millennia! In this Q&A discussion following our Free Will vs. Determinism/Self Effort vs. Grace in Tantra discussion, we picked up on some of the themes from the Advice to Spiritual Teachers & Aspirants talk and expanded on them to present a strategy for staying safe in and getting the most out of spiritual learning communities. Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

In one sense, Śiva means the impersonal absolute Consciousness which is the very essence of the Self (as we pointed out in this video What Is "Shiva"? and also in The Secret Teaching of Bhairava) but in another sense, that which is the formless impersonal Godhead is also, by virtue of His vimarśa-śakti (i.e God's reflexive ability), the personal God who creates, maintains and destroys the universe and who can, at will, manifest as many different forms to suit different occasions and bhāvas (moods). In other words, as the Personal God (Saguna Brahman), Shiva can both be seen as Formless (Saguna Nirākara) and also as having Form (Saguna Sākara) and in the latter sense, as many different forms! In our pūjā-paddhati which we are studying as part of our How To Do Tantrik Ritual series, we encounter some of these different forms and their worship. We discuss some of these in this talk!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

To celebrate today's occasion, we took the opportunity to look at the importance of divine immanence as well as the power and pervasiveness and superstition: first, we discussed the Norse and Biblical origins of the Western fear of the number 13, and the fear of Friday as being Venus' day, a day of decadence, sense indulgence and beauty, which are things that all feared and avoided by transcendelist "father sky only" type traditions.We discuss the two types of reclamation: first, by practitioners in the Goddess tradition who are reframing this day at the celebration of the Divine Mother and Femininity since there are 13 lunar cycles & usually 13 or so menstruation cycles as well Friday being associated to Freya, that is, Laxmī/Aphrodite/Venus etc. and second, by the horror movie buffs who want to celebrate the macabre elements of life! This was a wonderful time for me! Thank you all who came live!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Today is a very auspicious day for us since this full moon in the month of Jyeshta is the Snāna Yatra, the day when Lord Jagannath in Puri is brought out for a bath: on this occassion, in 1855, Mā Bhavatārinī Kālī (Jagadishwari Thakur Rani) was ritually awakened through prāna-pratishta! at the Dakshineshwar temple, where Sri Ramakrishna lived and taught.Like the Phalahārinī Kālī Pūjā when Sri Ramakrishna worshipped Ma Sarada, this event too is a singularity in the ministry of the Motherhood of God. In one sense, all that is happening here now can be traced back to that moment in 1855 when Ma Bhavatarini opened her eyes and made her presence known in this world so directly! We gave this talk some time ago discussing the significance of this day: Ramakrishna & Ma Bhavatārini Kālī at Dakshineshwar To honor today's full moon, here's another little chat about its significance followed by some light postural yoga practice which you can practice here. Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

These past few weeks, we've been reflecting a lot on where we've been as a lineage, on our roots and origins. We discussed all of this in talks like Where Did Kālī Come From? | A Brief Herstory, What's Our Lineage? and Our Tantrik Lineage. And of course, while it is important to discuss where we're going (which we'll cover in the next talk), it is equally important to ask where we are now!As such, I want to reflect a little bit on our ideals and values as a spiritual community. To do this, I thought it would be good to read from Swami Vivekananda's reflections on his guru, Sri Ramakrishna (which appear in Volume IV of the Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda under the title "My Master") since our lineage (and necessarily also our community) is founded upon the life and teachings of Sri Ramakrishna and because we aspire to live up to the ideals we saw embodied in his example! In reading this reflection, we can come to understand a lot about the perils of spiritual communities not just in the new age context but throughout time. These perils mainly revolve around sex, money and power and in this talk, we explain why that should be so.This talk was first given on Monday night but since the internet gave out towards the end, I wasn't able to complete the last bit of the reading I wanted to share or to make some concluding remarks. So I picked up the thread from where we left off at our Friday evening satsangh and then just tagged that unto the back of the first recording. The result is a rather long video! Forgive me! And thank you for your patience while I develop some of these ideas throughout the talk! May we always inspire one another to live up to the highest ideals of spiritual life always. Jai Swamiji! Jai Thakur! Jai Ma!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Recently, we've been reflecting a lot on Is There Free Will? and also How To Really Worship Kālī | Free Will vs Determinism to explain Sri Ramakrishna's very subtle position on the issue: God alone is the Doer ("not even a leaf moves but by the will of God") and yet there arises in us by God's will the "feeling" of free will which makes our decisions meaningful! But ultimately, we realize (a) God only has been doing everything and playing all the roles (absolute determinism on the level of the individual) but also(b) you are God (absolute free-will and voluntarism on the level of the true identity) But while the "free will vs determinism" discussion is a supremely important theme in our personal spiritual lives, another equally important and very related theme is that of "self-effort vs grace"! In this talk, we explain why(a) grace is the only factor in spiritual life and (b) grace can never be caused by anything since that would contradict God's freedom of which grace is an expression and yet (c) we should still do intense spiritual practices anyway since c.i. the very fact that we want to do spiritual practices (and that we have a guru to show us how) is itself a function of grace andc.ii. spiritual practices are worth doing in and of themselves, just for fun and without any desire for outcome! Of course, since we gave this talk as part of our Paramārthasāra of Abhinava Gupta series (which meets on zoom every Friday at 11am PST via the house link here), we use three verses from our text to substantiate our claims on grace:आदर्शे मलरहिते यद्वद्वदनं विभाति तद्वदयम्।शिवशक्तिपातविमले धीतत्त्वे भाति भारूपः॥९॥Just like a face  shines in a mirror free of impurities, exactly like this, this Shining One (śiva/Self) shines resplendently in that intellect which has been made spotless by Lord Shiva's grace.परमं यत् स्वातन्त्र्यं दुर्घटसम्पादनं महेशस्य।देवी मायाशक्तिः स्वात्मावरणं शिवस्यैतत्॥१५॥The Goddess Māyāśakti is the Supreme Freedom of the Great Lord  to accomplish (sampādanam) that which is impossible/inconceivable (durghata): the covering (āvarana) of his very own self (svātma).एकस्मिन्घटगगने रजसा व्याप्ते भवन्ति नान्यानि।मलिनानि तद्वदेते जीवाः सुखदुःखभेदजुषः॥३७॥If the space within one pot is filled with dust, the space within other pots is not stained. Just like that are these individual beings who experience the duality of pleasure and pain/happiness and sorrow.We also gave these two talks on grace some time ago:Śaktipāta & The Role of Grace In Tantra | Vijñāna-Bhairava Tantra and alsoHow To Receive God's Grace | Śaktipāta in Kashmir ShaivismSupport the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Last year, on this auspicious occasion of Dhūmāvatī Devī Jayanti (which is the 8th day after the New Moon of Vaiśakh) we gave a series on talks on this very mysterious and often feared phase of Mā's personality (Who is Mā Dhūmāvatī? & Worshipping Mā Dhūmāvatī) where we explored Her origin story, Her symbology and Her significance in theory and practice. This year, we decided to go further and ask: "given that Dhūmāvatī Devī is associated to alaxmī, inauspiciousness and given that she favors widows, widowers, the lonely, outcastes, mendicants and those who live in cremation grounds, why would a householder in a happy marriage or a person interested in success and auspicious (which is arguably most of us) ever want to approach her?! Wouldn't doing so only invite calamity?! In response to this important question, we present about 4 reasons why everyone should consider worshipping this often misunderstood and under-represented form of Mā! You'll find a playlist of all our videos on the Mahāvidyās here. Here is the dhyāna-śloka (meditation mantra) we used in the talk: vivarṇā cañcalā ruṣṭā dirghā ca malināmbarā ।vivarṇakuntalā rūkṣā vidhavā viraladvijā ॥kākadhvajarathārūḍhā vilambitapayodharā।śūrpahastātirūkṣākṣī dhṛtahastā varānvitā॥pravṛddhaghoṇā tu bhṛśaṃ kuṭilā kuṭilekṣaṇā ।kṣutpipāsārditā nityaṃ bhayadā kalahapriyā ॥Pale and restless, irritable and oldClad in soiled garmentsPale-haired, dry-skinnedA widow with few teeth|Mounted atop a chariot whose flag is a crowWith drooping breasts and surpassingly cruel eyesWho holds a winnowing basketWho shows the boon bestowing gestureA crone with crooked nose and crooked eyesWho is always hungry and thirsty, quarrelsome and fearsome.Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

First, we present a rendition of Swami Vivekananda's profound and stirring song in Sanskrit to Shiva, the Great God along with an English translation by Swami Prabhavananda. I am especially fond of this song! We then make a few comments about why the days of the week are so significant and how to do a daily chanting practice based on the deity that is exalted on each day. Then, after a brief commentary on the Shiva Stotram and its origins and meaning, I make a case for music as a spiritual practice!Here is a playlist of all the kirtanas, bhajanas and musical performances in our community over the years!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

In this talk, we develop some the ideas from the Is There Free Will? lecture: if there is no free will, then, what's the point exactly? Isn't spiritual life all about freedom? If freedom is the goal, can such a freedom ever be articulated on the level of the embodied individual if after all, as we claimed last week, there is no freedom in a real sense for the embodied individual since Mother alone is doing everything? What then is "moksha", liberation, exactly? To answer all of these important questions, we take up Thakur Sri Ramakrishna's definition of jīvanmukti. embodied liberation while in the body and mind (i.e anytime we are not in nirvikalpa samādhi) and also consider what this mukti, liberation looks like in a "videha" sense, when we are fully identified with Mā who is not only Free but is Freedom Itself. In this talk, we especially focus on God's freedom and why it is an absolute given. We argue for how God's freedom implies Her absolute non-duality. And if I am God, (as indeed I must be since no second reality exists apart from that) then, am I not also free, as God? What then to make of the hard deterministic position we were arguing for in Is There Free Will?But mainly, this is a talk about surrendering totally to Kālī, having understood her Absolute Freedom. Mā always gets Her way, so like Shiva, one can only smile and watch Her dance!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

After giving two talks establishing God (Proof for God & What is God in Tantra?) a in response to various objections from non-theistic traditions like scientific materialism, Buddhism, Sāmkhya & Advaita Vedanta, we are now left with an interesting question: what about the Problem of Evil? The usual response to this dilemma from the theistic position is to assert free-will. God is indeed all-powerful and all-good and because of that goodness, God cannot be a tyrant and so affords each individual the dignity of free-will; the reason there is any evil in the world at all then is because individuals abuse this free will to harm one and another and God, tragically, will not intervene since to do so would be to rob each individual soul of its most basic dignity, its freedom to choose.  In his 1893 world-famous "Paper on Hinduism", which he delivered at the Parliament of World Religions in Chicago, Swami Vivekananda also points out that without the theory of karma, God would be quite despicable. Why are some people born cripples and others healthy? If there are no past lives, then God is the cause for one person being born poor and another rich. Would this not be a capricious God who arbitrarily decides what each embodied soul's starting point will be, putting some further ahead on the track and others further back? No, a better explanation is that God is not inflicting these things upon us but that we ourselves, with our actions good and bad in past lives have ourselves created the chain of cause and effect that have led to our current predicament, for better or for worse. It is up to us to take responsibility for our karmic predicament, without blaming the all-good, all-powerful God and to seize upon our free will to make better choices, in thought, word and deed that don't only create better karmic situations for us in the future but ideally, that take us beyond the wheel of karma entirely! However, here is a complexity: there is no free will (as I will try to show in the talk).Yes, there might be the illusory feeling of free will that God creates in the soul but ultimately, if God is to be all powerful then she is also Absolute, and absolutely non-dual. She it is who plays the role of the individual, she is the world in which the individual has its being, She it is who is pulling the strings the whole time! Not even a leaf moves but by the will of God! But philosophically, look what has happened! If we say ultimately souls don't have free will and that Mother is doing everything, then, free will is no longer available to us a defense against the problem of evil! Now, we have to accept that God is all-good but also...all-bad and somehow, beyond both good and bad! In short, we have to accept the theology of Kali, the Worship of the Terrible, the highest calling of the non-dual theist. Enter only those who dare misery love. TLDR: in this talk I present my favorite view which is Absolute Theism leading to determinism on the individual level to maintain Absolute Freedom on the Divine level which invites a whole new kind of challenging theodicy! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

In Verse 104, of the Vijñāna-Bhairava Tantra, we come across a profound teaching:विहाय निजदेहस्थं सर्वत्रास्मीति भावयन्।दृढेन मनसा दृष्ट्या नान्येक्षिण्या सुखी भवेत्॥ १०४॥vihāya nijadehasthaṁ sarvatrāsmīti bhāvayan |dṛḍhena manasā dṛṣṭyā nānyekṣiṇyā sukhī bhavet || 104 ||"By abandoning the sense that the self abides only in one's own body, and by contemplating with a firm mind that “I am everywhere”, without any other kind of seeing (through a-paroksha-anubhūti, direct mystic experience), one becomes happy (i.e enlightened)!"I felt that this verse captured the very essence of spiritual life and spelled out the whole journey from start to finish which is a journey from limitation to absolute freedom, from jīva (limited individuality) to śīva (all inclusive one-ness), from selfishness to selflessness. We explore this idea using the Tantrik & Hatha Yoga languaging around Kula Kundalinī, our own power of identification and how she moves from the mūlādhāra (where she identifies only with the limited mind-body complex) to the sahasrāra (where she unites with śiva in super-sensuous bliss!) through the various chakras in the sushumnā nādi. I was especially moved by emphasis on direct, immediate spiritual experience (aparokshanubhūti) as the necessary condition of realization that appears in the second half of the verse! As Swami Vivekananda defined it, "religion is realization", not frothy talk or belief!This is indeed the goal, but how do we get there?This verse not only tells us the mechanism of spiritual life, and the final outcome but also presents the means: dṛḍhena manasā , through unrelenting, firm, consistent and constant practice! We talk about what practice really means and discuss the role of grace and make a case for the importance of prayer, which Sri Ramakrishna very much emphasized. This lecture is part of our weekly Vijñāna-Bhairava Tantra class series which meets live every Thursday at 7:30pm (ish) here. You'll find our lecture directory for the course here. Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

When we say this Universe is internal to consciousness, as we do in Non-Dual Philosophy, are we making a solipsistic claim? In this Q&A discussion after our Friday morning discussion on Turning Non-Dual Teachings into Non-Dual Practices | Paramārthasāra, Verse 37 we discuss so many wonderful things!Sri Devi asks beautiful questions about idealism and in response, we show why Advaita, Non-Duality is not solipsism! From this, we come to understand the role of śakti on Non-Dual Tantra as the raw potential that actualizes all possibilities from moment to moment! We then present a yardstick for figuring out whether or not we've really understood Advaita, Non-Duality.Then Gretchen Devi tells us about the Holographic Universe and we present the non-dual claim that you are Shiva, Pure Consciousness and also Shakti, the dynamic dance of the Universe that shines in Consciousness as an expression of radical freedom and joy!Paola Devi makes a case for the dynamic aspect of Awareness, Shakti which is Becoming grounded in the static aspect, Shiva, which is Being. As such, we can say Shiva-Shakti is Being-Becoming! As an aside, I make a rebuttal to Buddhism to establish Time, Kālī as the Absolute Reality!Then, Jaimie Devi makes a defense of the new Matrix movie and opens up a beautiful discussion about the Problem of Evil and coming to terms with both macrocosmic and microcosmic suffering through the worship of Kālī!Finally, Allistairji shares his Mother's reflections on how Kālī worship is the panacea for the dualities of Good vs Evil/Spirit vs Matter which has haunted religion and the human psyche for far too long! Here is a playlist of our Q&A discussions over the years!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Perhaps one of the reasons all the various religions in the world are fighting and killing each other is because they never took the time to clarify to one another what, precisely, they meant by the term "God"? Often when atheists criticize religion, they only conceive of God along Abrahamic lines, and poorly at that. But the Abrahamic notions of God (while also being more diverse than many realize), are but a small part of the discourse. In India, during the course of our 9000 year (or so, by conservation estimates) civilization in which we have focused the main efforts of cultural life on spirituality, many very subtle and refined notions of God were realized! For example:1. Nirguna Nirākara, God who is Impersonal and Formless like what the Buddhist and the Advaita Vedantin proposes2. Saguna Nirākara, God who is Personal but Formless like we find in Abrahamic religion 3. Saguna Sākara, God who is both Personal and with Form (like Kālī, Krishna etc.) 4. The Avatāra, God as an incarnation on earth (Rāma, Krishna, Buddha, Jesus, Chaitanya, Ramakrishna)To name a few! Some traditions on the subcontinent favor one of these over the others. Some take an exclusive view, some prefer a more hierarchical, inclusive approach and yet others, like our tradition, maintain a pluralistic position: all these conceptions (and in fact all conceptions of God) are all equally valid since God, the Absolute Reality, can never be limited! There is no end to what we can discover in Her, no end to what She can reveal to us! Having said that, what is the Tāntrik view on God? Since Tantra is largely a theistic tradition (oriented around the idea of God), in this lecture, we track some of the various concepts of God that have emerged over the years. This is part of an introductory series of lectures on the foundational ideas of Tantra. You can watch the other videos in this series here.Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

As part our How To Do Tantrik Pūjā, we now start discussing the next moment in our puja-krama, sequence of worship: Gaṇeśa puja! This a bit like a talk we gave some time back calledWe'll go over the necessary nyāsa, dhyāna, pūjā and pranāmah mantras in the next class for a more detailed worship but in this talk, I just wanted to say a few things about Pauranic vs Vedic Gaṇeśa and discuss Tantrik Gaṇeśawith reference to Mūlādhāra Chakra and our embodied being to contextualize why its so important to get his blessing before beginning any Tāntrik sādhanās. Mainly, we go over the importance of the body in spiritual life, and the symbology of Gaṇeśa's meditation mantra: oṁ kharvaṁ sthūlatanuṁ gajendra-vadanaṁ lambodaraṁ sundaraṁprasyandan-mada-gandha-lubdha-madhupa-vyālola-gaṇḍa-sthalam।dantāghāta-vidāritāri-rudhiraiḥ sindūra-śobhākaraṁvande śailasutāsutaṁ gaṇapatiṁ siddhipradaṁ kāmadam॥OM, I pray to Gaṇapati, Lord of the Gaṇas, Pārvatī's son, the giver of all perfecton and fulfiller of all desires, who is short and stout of build with a large belly, the beautiful elephant-faced king of the elephants surrounded by bess intoxicated by his fragrance (streaming fluids), whose cheeks are quivering with the blood of enemies torn asunder by the striking of his tusks, making him beautiful (as if) annointed with vermillion!After chanting this mantra, you can worship Gaṇeśa internally, in your heart using your imagination (māsana-pūjā) and/or you can offer a simple red flower at the feet of your picture, statue or lamp with the following mantra: oṁ gaṁ ētē gandhapuṣpē gaṇeśāya namaḥAnd then, you can conclude by chanting these prayer mantras:oṁ devendramaulimandāramakarandakaṇāruṇāḥvighnaṁ harantu heramba-caraṇāmbuja-reṇavaḥMay the red dust of the lotus like feet of Heramba Gaṇeśa, the Lord of the Gods, whose crown is adorned with the red nectar of the mandāra flower remove all obstacles!oṁ ekadantaṁ mahākāyaṁ lambodaraṁ gajānanamvighnanāśakaraṁ devaṁ herambaṁ praṇamāmyahamI bow to the divine elephant-faced, single-tusked Heramba Gaṇeśa with a large body and big belly who destroys all obstacle!oṁ sarvavighnavināśāya sarvakalyāṇahetavepārvatīpriyaputrāya gaṇeśāya namo NamahI salute that Gaṇeśa the beloved son of Pārvatī, the destroyer of all obstacles and the cause of all auspiciousness.Jai Śrī Heramba Gaṇeśa Ki Jai!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

The krishna-ekadaśi (11th day of the waning moon) right before Phalahārinī Pūjā is known as the Apara-ekadaśi and it coincides with Bhadrakālī Jayanti, the celebration of Mā in her "auspicious" form. While the word "Bhadra" (which can be both a noun and an adjective) means something like "auspicious", "noble", "protectress" etc. we have to ask: what does that really mean? Is this a gentle (saumya) form of Kālī as contrasted with how She is usually depicted in Her smaśāna/ghora (cremation ground/fierce) form? Or do we just have to update our understanding of the word "auspicious" to include even those aspects of life that the mind rejects? In this talk, we read excerpts from Swami Vivekananda's Bengali poem to Kālĩ "And Let Shyāma Dance There" we we learn about the Worship of the Terrible and Mā's Non-Dual, All-Inclusive Form which will radically change the way we understand "auspicious"-ness in the context of spiritual life. Also, we tell some stories from the Puranas to make the case that Vīra-bhadra, in the well-known immolation of Sati/destrcution of Daksha's sacrifice story can be seen as synonymous with Bhadrakālī. Of course, I make a case as to why the latter, female version is better, theologically. This will help us understand why Mā in many of her sahasranāmas stotravalis (thousand names hymns) is called "Daksha-yajña-vināśinī", the one who destroys Daksha's sacrifice. May this be an offering to Her, the auspicious one, who destroys all false ideas and tears down all pretense!PS: here is a playlist (our signature series, our flagship course), all of our talks on Mā.Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

I wanted to explore the relationship between spiritual wellbeing and physical health to make the somewhat surprising claim: intense spiritual practice can sometimes compromise health! This is because, in the course of intense sādhana, Kula Kundalinī, our personal Shakti, progressively loosens its hold on the physical body. As such, in this talk I argue for the importance of Hatha Yoga practice to purify the prāna, to purify the blood and to fortify the nerves to account for this strain on the system sketched out above. Many "spiritual emergencies" might come down to just this: experiences have occured in a body ill equipped to whitstand the electrical shock of realization So we must prepare the body! I want to share with you our Kaula heritage of Hatha Yoga as articulated by the Nath Sampradāya and I want to tell you the story of Kukuripa and the black dog, arguing for the power of mantra and the allyship of Kula Kundalini. We read a little bit from the "Life of Swami Vivekananda by His Eastern and Western Disciples" towards the end!I pray this conversation inspires you to take up the study and practice of Hatha Yoga in a systematic and dedicated way! Here is our full playlist of our Hatha Yoga classes over the years. We meet live on zoom for practice every Wednesday at 11am PST and again on Friday at 5pm PST via the house link here: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/7028380815And Kuleśvarī Mā teaches Mondays at 5pm PST, Tuesdays at 3pmPST and Thursdays at 5pm PST, before the evening talks. Image from https://mydattatreya.com/matsyendranath/Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

This was a fire Questions & Answers discussion! After our Monday evening talk earlier this week, we explore some of the ecological, economical, political & sociological implications of Kālī sādhana. I make a case for overcoming all guilt and shame in the quest of personal self-expression, especially for women who are so often socialized to feel that their every impulse and desire is morally and culturally problematic. We discuss what it would be like to remove all barriers to a woman's being and, for lack of a better word, wild-ness and how Kālī sādhana demands just this. Along the same lines, we discuss the "taboo of menses": can I woman enter a temple and do sādhana during the time of her month? is there any reason behind this idea? We explore the reverence that Kaula Marga has for menses as the most potent and magical substances, with a reference to Mā' yoni in Kamakhya, Assam and Ambuvachi, when Mā bleeds. And then we compare this to the Dakshina marga or Brahmanical orthodox view that blood of all kinds is an impure and polluting substances to have a more well-rounded view of the issue across the entire spectrum of the tradition! Such wonderful questions and rich reflections. Thank you all for coming and participating! Jai Mā Kālī!And here is a playlist (our signature series, our flagship course), all of our talks on Mā.Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Here is a brief and exultant sketch of Mā Kālī's journey from ancient pre-history into the most esoteric and elite Tantrik circles and into the mainstream Bhakti movement of Bengal and from there into the hearts and homes of people all over the world! Without all of those who have come before us (and I was only able to mention so few of them in this talk), who have each given their entire lives to the work of making Mā accessible to all sincere devotees, we quite literally would not be here all together, enjoying each other's holy company and talking Tantra for hours on end week after week, year after year. I am so grateful to all of them. I am so grateful to all of you. I am so happy. Here's to many more years together playing in Mā's playground! May all of this be an offering to Mā Kālī who comes to me in the form of all of you. May I have no God but you, O Mā who appears as all of these people! May I worship you in them with all of these words, which are offered as so many flowers to you in the form of this sangha! I love you, I love you, I love you. I am mad with love for you! I give you my life! Jai Mā! Jai Mā! Jai Mā Kālī! Jai Thakur! Jai SwamijI! Jai Gurudeva! Relevant References:And here is a playlist (our signature series, our flagship course), all of our talks on Mā.Some of the material from this talk is fleshed out a little more in talks like Ramprasad Sen, Mā Kālī's Mystic Poet, Ramakrishna & Ma Bhavatārini Kālī at Dakshineshwar and What Does Kali Actually Look Like? which is all about the dhyāna-mantra (visualization chant) that we offered in beginning. Usha Harding's pivotal book which I mentioned in the video is called "Kali: The Black Goddess of Dakshineshwar." Do check out Usha Mā's documentary "A Day at the Dakshineswar Temple" which you can watch here.Here is all the music and pūjā recordings from the early Kali Mandir Laguna Beach pūjās which I mentioned in the talk. You can hear Sri Haradhanji's unique chanting voice! And importantly, I only briefly mentioned it, but here is Uma Sanasrayan's important documentary about our Hollywood Kali Puja tradition. Uma is the one who has been making the murtis for Mā for our annual Hollywood temple Shyama Kali Puja. Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Yesterday, on the new moon in the Vedic month of Vaishakh (Jyeshtha by Purnimanta calendar), we celebrated a most auspicious occasion: the Phalaharini Kali Puja. It is an especially significant day for our lineage and so in this short talk, we discuss why. We tell the story of Sri Ramakrishna's culminating puja which punctuates his 12-year period of intense of spiritual practice! Here is a short pūjā that we did for the online community to mark the occasion! And here is a playlist on all of our talks on Mā. Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

We recorded this some time back and its not as comprehensive as I would have liked it to be (lineage is such a rich and sprawling conversation, after all) so I never posted it but inspired by the conversations in the Discord this morning, I felt that this reflection would be good to have!There is some debate as to whether Macchanda, the founder of the Kaula lineage (who along with his consort and 12 children probably taught around 6-8th CE) is the same as the legendary Matsyendranatha who founded the Hatha Yoga tradition and who taught around the 12th or 13th CE. These are siddhas so they can live forever and materialize any body at any time for any reason, so dating can be a little complex! But there is no doubt that even if they are two different lineage founders that the Nath Sampradaya is included in the Kaula marga! Sri Ramakrishna inherits this lineage from both Kedarama Bhattacharyaji, who initiated him into the Kali mantra and also from Bhairavi Brahmani, who iniated him into the Kaula marga. Both Bhairavi Brahmani and also the legendary Macchanda, are said to have come from Assam. Whereas Konkanamba, by her name must have come from Maharasthra and Matsyendranath but especially Gorakshanath are perhaps from South India. By some accounts, Abhinava Gupta's guru Sambhunatha came from South India and Jnanetra Natha who founds the the Krama/Kali-Kula might have come from Jalandhara and been initiated by Kali herself in the form of the Yogini Mangala Devi in Oddiyana, in the swat valley! So what we get is a sort of Pan-Indian Kaula movement!You might enjoy Śani Deva's beautiful lineage tree which is part of the "community cheat sheet" he's working on!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Last year we gave this talk on Mā Bagalā, on the auspicious occasion of her Jayanti: Bagalā and Black Magick in Tantraand this year, we gave two talks to celebrate the same occasion. The first one is: How To Worship Mā Bagalāmukhī where we went over one of the tantras for Her worship (which you can find here. It's a work in progress!) and this is the second one, approaching Mā Bagalā in a slightly more oblique and thematic way, by discussing the nature of Absolute Silence. I make a claim that even in silence there is articulation "I am", which is called Parā-Vāc, supreme speech which always inheres in the Absolute and is never attenuated! Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Because Buddha Purnima (the full moon celebrating the birth, death and enlightenment of the Shakyamuni Buddha) is so close to Chinnamastā Jayanti, when we celebrate the self-decapitating form of Mā, this year I decided to combine the two themes into one lecture. Having already explained the symbology of Mā Chinnamastā in last year's talk to some extent, this year I want to focus on the theme of "decapitation" that we often see with forms of Mā. What does it really mean to be "decapitated"? But first, to lead up into our idea of decapitation, we present a few radical and thrilling ideas from the most idealistic, non-dual traditions of India: Vasubandhu's Yogācara Buddhism and Gaudapada's Ajāta Vāda as a kind of nod to the dizzying flights of Buddhist and Advaitic metaphysics! May this be an offering at the lotus feet of the Buddha, the sanest man who ever lived.May this be an offering to Mā Chinnamastā!Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

In this Q&A discussion right after our Buddha Purnima lecture, we first discuss the art of letting go with Rajeevji. What spiritual practices can I do to help let go of attachment and learn to surrender to the situation? Then we inquire the way spiritual practices can cheer us up and strengthen us with an appeal the the three gunas of Sāmkhya. Then, we compare Tantrik Buddhism to Tantrik Hinduism: can they both be practiced together? We discuss a syncretic approach to Buddhism and Hinduism with Adiji who was tuning in from Dharamsala. We discuss the Candi a little bit with Lekha Ma and take up the question of: should I worship one deity with one mantra or many deities with many mantras echoing the sentiments from this lecture. Then we discuss something very, very important: how to stay inspired in spiritual life to have a sustainable, life-long practice! You can watch the video version of this Q&A discussion here.This one is for Jaanam Devī! Here is a playlist of all our Q&A sessions over the years. Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

One of my favorite questions & answers discussions so far!After our God, World and the Self | A Comparative Approach class, we pluge into this wonderful discussion! Carl opens our discussion with a profound inquiry into the true teaching of Buddhism and the value of philosophy in spiritual life. And then we think about wholesome philosophy vs unwholesome philosophical wrangling and what makes the difference between the two. Then, Carl asks and even more important question: what does it mean for God to accept "hate" and "evil" as a valid offering of devotion? Also, how do people overcome "bad" actions by not considering them as bad and thus overcoming shame and guilt? Then, we discuss the inner workings of japa practice with Natalie: is quantity the main priority in japa? Should I chant quickly to say the mantra more or slowly to say the mantra more meaningfully? Then, we have a delightful discussion with Natalie regarding evil: How Do You Know What You're Doing Is Good? What if you think you're good but you are actually evil? Using this idea, we can understand how to forgive everyone and how to still protect your boundaries while forgiving everyone. Finally, we discuss ethics and absolute morality with Lāllā! We close with a reading of some of Tim's comments about Buddhism.00:00:00 Why Do Philosophy00:13:46 Can Philosophy be Unwholesome?00:20:08 Why Does God Accept Evil?00:29:14 Should I Do My Mantra Quickly or Slowly?00:35:00 How Do You Know You Aren't Evil?00:52:58 How To Forgive Everyone 01:07:16 Is there A Universal Good? "Pagan" Ethics. 01:16:19 Is There An Absolute Ethics?01:29:37 Some reflections on Buddhism. Here is a playlist of all our Q&A sessions over the years.Support the showLectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrM

Today, on the auspicious occasion of Swami Lakshman Joo's birth anniversary, we say a few things about why Kashmir and its philosophers are so important in the Non-Dual Tantrik tradition.Here is a playlist of lectures on Abhinava Gupta's Paramārthasāra, which is a wonderful introduction to the metaphysical and theological system of Tantra known as "Kashmir Shaivism"Lectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrMSupport the show

Perhaps one of our finest discussions so far! We cover quite a lot of ground here: "If there is a God, I must see him. If I have a soul, I must feel myself as that." This was Swami Vivekananda's intuition about spirituality: it is about direct, personal experience and not belief! While tangible experience of God is the best proof for God, there are some other proofs offered by our Tantra to(a) define God and (b) prove God's existence on logical grounds!We take up some responses from the materialist an evolutionary biologists and make a defense for theism in light of those!Lectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrMSupport the show

Recently we've been giving a series of talks on some foundational Tantrik concepts starting with the concept of the "self". Is there such a thing and if so, what is its nature? We asked What is the Self in Tantra? and then we looked at the The 6 Layers of the Self in Tantra of the virūpāska-pancāśika, a foundational Tantrik model for nested embodiment. Now, we continue the discussion, recapping some of the stuff we uncovered in those previous classes and concluding with a verse from the Vijñāna-Bhairava Tantra:चिद्धर्मा सर्वदेहेषु विशेषो नास्ति कुत्रचित्।अतश्च तन्मयं सर्वम् भावयन् भवजिज् जनः॥ १००॥ciddharmā sarvadeheṣu viśeṣo nāsti kutracit|ataśca tanmayaṁ sarvam bhāvayan bhavajij janaḥ || 100 ||“There is [One Reality] whose essential nature is Consciousness and this is in every body; there is no special consciousness anywhere!” And thus, a person who contemplates that the entire world is pervaded [by that Reality, consciousness] conquers the world!"Lectures happen live every Monday at 7pm PST and Friday 10am PST and again Friday at 6pm PST.Use this link and I will see you there:https://www.zoom.us/j/7028380815For more videos, guided meditations and instruction and for access to our lecture library, visit me at:https://www.patreon.com/yogawithnishTo get in on the discussion and access various spiritual materials, join our Discord here: https://discord.gg/U8zKP8yMrMSupport the show

Today is the holy day of Bagalāmukhī Jayanti, celebrating one of the fierce forms of Mā! We've been discussing the Mahāvidyās quite a lot over the years (here's a playlist of talks on them) but we haven't yet looked at the tantras together that prescribe their method of worship. As such, in this class, we look over the Bagalā Tantra from the Bengali compilation, Shaktapramodah (The Delight of Shaktas). But first, since this talk was given on May 1st, the anniversary day when Belur Math was founded at Balaram Bose's house in 1897, we first say a few things about that and talk about our mission to make that which is only known to a few available to all for the upliftment of all humanity! Here is the document we referenced in the class. It's a work in progress! Much editing and proof-reading awaits!Support the show