- It was nearly 5 a.m. The east was aglow with dawn. The birds were awake. The Aus t ral ian bi rd Kookaburra laughed, perhaps at those still in bed. The magpie sang to wake these lazy ones. The bell rang at 5:30 and all of us walked up to the meditation room where after some prayers and kirtan-singing the practice of meditation commenced. Thus began the first day at the Yoga Camp in Perth. The ten-day Yoga Camp had been organised jointly by the Yoga School of Perth, the University Yoga Club and the Integral Yoga Association. The St. Mary’s Church of England Girls’ School building had been hired for this: and the facilities were excellent. Prof. Eric Atkinson, a well-known psychologist of Perth, inaugurated the Camp. The need for such camps is felt by more and more students of Yoga all over the world. I have felt myself participated in several of them; and each organiser imparts to the camp the character of his own personality.
For instance: at one Camp the participants do not talk to one another at all for the whole period, at another camp attendance at the various lectures and other classes is compulsory and truants are fined, and at another the participants are so free that it looks as if their first intention is to enjoy a holiday and the Yoga seminar is an after-thought. The duration of the seminar also varies: somewhere it is just for the weekend, and elsewhere it is held for two weeks. There are masters of Yoga who insist that unless there is total freedom from externally imposed discipline, there is no spiritual growth, and others who insist that such freedom can only lead to disaster, and that it is imperative that the young plant be disciplined and trained.
Too much of discipline makes for tension, too little of it makes no impression at all. How much tension is needed for attention is not easy to decide. The same problem exists in the decision of the duration of the seminar. A three day seminar comes to an end just when the spirit of Yoga rises in the hearts of the participants. Three weeks may often be long enough for the problems you left behind to catch up with you at the Camp.
Often people think that if only they could live in an Ashram for an indefinitely long period, they would attain God-realisation: this is uncertain, for once they are athome in the Ashram, they create those problems there which they had previously created at home. As with everything in life, no system is entirely satisfactory and every advantage has at least an equal disadvantage. One’s own sensitivity should decide what is desirable. I n s o me B u d d h i s t monasteries there exists a healthy t radi t ion which i s wor th consideration. Any Buddhist is encouraged to enter the monastery and live there for a pre-determined period (approximately three months). He enters the monastery as a monk (leaving his social identity at the gate) and is treated as a monk even if he was a Cabinet Minister or a business tycoon. And, during this period of limited monastic life he acquires a new vision, a new perspective, a new attitude to life.
This is what Swami Sivananda taught us. Whereas it is possible to do all work as worship, unselfishly, that spirit is not easy to cultivate while in the thick of the battle of life, and hence one goes to the monastery or Ashram. While there, the false sense of responsibility and indispensability that haunted him is weakened, he realises that the family, the business and world outside are able to look after themselves very well indeed, without him. When he returns home and to work, he now has a different attitude, a different relationship.
The work is worship. And, the family and social relationship is free from the poison of expectation and selfishness – such relationship is love. Even so, while living in the monastery, one discovers a very great and significant truth. The world with its taunts and challenges was only partly responsible for his woes; his own reaction was the major contributor. While in the world outside, he wondered why a friend insulted him, while in the monastery, he asks himself “But why should I be upset about it after all?” If a satisfactory answer is found to this question and if one comes to term with oneself, one sees that whilst it is not possible nor is it necessary to change the world, it is possible, wise and necessary to change one’s attitude to it, one’s reaction to its behaviour, in such a way as not to be hurt by it at all.
This is what an Ashram is for; this is the role of spiritual institutions in the world. And, in a very small way all these Yoga Camps and Seminars contribute to this vital inner revolution in the very heart and mind of Man.
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