Saturday, February 4, 2017

TRANSFORMING TO THE OTHER WHOLLY ENRICHING WORLD IN US.

Jaggi Vasudev's latest book:

INNER ENGINEERING - Yogi's Guide to Joy by Sadhguru. Penguin, 2016, Pp.271, Rs.299.


This is a fascinating work, full of insights and practices for a personal growth towards highest human endeavour.

 Sri Jaggi Vasudev calls himself Sadhguru, an eight letter word as he would not want to use a four letter word, guru, he says! He hails from Mysore, graduated in English Literature from Mysore University. His early guru was Malladihalli Swamy, as Swamy is popularly known, his name being Raghavendra Rao, pen name being tiruka. Later guru was Palini Swamy in Tamilnadu. Sadhguru has a very long practice of Yoga,( nearly 35 years, although he was having intense spiritual experiences since childhood) and in fact to perfect his speciality Yoga, Shambhavi Mahamudra Kriya he took 21 years to suit it to propagate for the benefit of others. He built the Isha Yogic Centre and in it the magnificent Dhyanalinga Yogic Temple housing a 13 feet and 9 inches Linga under a 76 ft. high dome in Velliangiri Hills near Coimbatore. Now his ashrama is a throbbing centre of yogic practice as well as a huge environmental initiatives along with variety of Community Services not only in the state of Tamilnadu but also all over the world. Recently, in 2017, he was conferred Padma Vibhushan Award by the Government of India.

There are people who would do intense spiritual practice, sadhana, for the attainment, and there are people who on its own have intense and series of spiritual experiences that turn them to spiritual practices to stabilise such experiences. Sri. Jaggi Vasudev belong to the latter category. Since childhood he used to have experiences of being one with the cosmos without the  boundary between himself and the world, being limitless. The book is an exquisite expression of what all he underwent and what transformed eventually resulting in what he is and what he is doing today.

Everyone can get into such an existential state where he/she is being one with all the beings-living and nonliving- in the world in a heightened frequency of responding and accomplishing in peace and joy. The book is replete with his personal experiences, encounters with the people around with umpteen number of anecdotes that hits you with fresh insights and understanding. Once, he had a deep cut till the bone in the calf muscle, went to a village medical centre that has run out anaesthetic facility, underwent 52 sutures at length, chatting all along with the doctor, and when the doctor asked him is he not having any pain for which Sadguru remarks that pain is natural and it is good as it warns and protects organisms but suffering is a self creation. Another time in Mount Kailash how he recharged himself with the vibrations of mystique knowledge surrounding the mountain atop, in front of 200 people, and resounded himself with robust health and joy is heart warming. He had been seeing a mountain in his eyes since he was young, an urge made him search for it where he finally got the Velliangiri Hill which is situated in such a geographical condition ideally suitable for spiritual practice. The story of four idiots - jnana, bhakti, karma and kriya yogas - who always condemn each other but got realisation only when they came together is illuminative.

The song of the book is that there is a world beyond what our Body (Senses) and Mind (Intellect and Emotions) have fetched us and that world is the home of all creation from which we all came and are sustained, a source of immense and boundless energy. Everyone can access that world and reap immeasurable benefits in terms of peace, joy and limitless attainments, a limitless, boundless, joyful beings we all can become. Our senses and mind are outer bound cannot experience the inner world and what is more they override us. Being should take charge of them, be a master of them and use them as tools, rise them higher to be sensitive to the inner world as well. As such, the book is not a mere narration of the life and works but a practical cookbook to help access that energy. Every section under Body, Mind, Energy and Joy is replete with tiny, simple and yet powerful mental exercises to introduces us to that world beyond, a world which is not transcendental but homecoming. The way out for the
mess we are in is way in. He presents a technology to go in.

The book is written in an easy style with full of wits and humours, stories and anecdotes and evidences from Science.  Production of the book is also creative with different types and shades for stories, anecdotes and exercises. We are grateful to the author for giving us such a book of wisdom and practice. Publisher, Penguin, should be congratulated for their creative designing and production of the book.

A Quote:

"I am often told by people that I seem to be a "modern" guru. My response to that observation is that I am neither modern nor ancient, neither new age or old age. I am contemporary, and that is how every guru has always been. Only scholars, pundits, and theologians are capable of being ancient or modern. A philosophy or belief system can be old or new. But gurus are always contemporary."