All the problems in the world are due to the fact that people are not okay inside...
If you keep stuff in there it is going to ruin your life ...it is going to block your energy flow and you are going to suffer...
Michael A. Singer
Yes! I am quoting Michael Singer again lol. I just like the way he explains things that already make so much sense to me. His teachings are right where I am at in my learning. So, it really hits home.
He often says that we are not okay inside because we supress -stuffed and stored -painful emotional energy related to events we had a hard time dealing with. We have therefore blocked the energy flow of shakti. We do not feel the joy that comes from inside (on the other side of this blockage) because we blocked it. The greatest life goal we can undertake then...the greatest yogic goal...is to purify, get rid of those blockages. Hmm!
Is this idea new to Singer's teaching?
No! It comes from ancient yogic teachings as Singer explains again and again.
Sanskrit Words Related to Purification
I am going to introduce you to some cool sounding words related to this idea of stuffing and storing, blocking our energy. These words are in the ancient language of yoga: Sanskrit. I have learned these words from studying "The Yoga Sutures of Patanjali" translated and interpreted by Swami Satchidananda. I loved this book when I first read it. I loved the message. Satchidananda, I discovered later, despite his eloquent name which comes from 'Sat Chit Ananada' given to him by his guru Sivananda Saraswati, might not have been the perfect messenger for the beautiful, life enhancing message. He had several counts of allegations against him for sexual abuse and many state that his ashrams had cult-like tendencies. Sigh! Discovering this has reinforced my rational or irrational (not sure which) caution when it comes to gurus and my obsession with cults.
Anyway, despite that, I love the way he used words and explained the meaning of Sanskrit words in context to yogic philosophy...which includes purification from samskaras.
Please note I do not get teh sanskrit alphabet on this computer so it will appear that the words are lacking accents and other symbols.
Purification
Let's start with purification and what it does for us.
Mana eva manusyanam karanam bandha moksayoh.
This beautiful Sanskrit expression translates into "As the mind so the person; bondage or liberation are in your own mind." page 5
Purification sets us free from the prisons we are in. What are we imprisoned by? The disturbances we add to our minds.
Yogas citti vritti nirodhah.
Yoga is restraint of modifications of the mind-stuff. page 3
What exactly is in our mind? Citta- the mind or mind field which is innately undisturbed and peaceful...like a clear lake. Vrittis- modifications of the mind's peaceful state (ripples on the lake) including ahamkara which is the ego or "I" feeling; the buddhi which is the intellectual mind and the manas which is the desiring part of the mind. Citta vrttis then means modifications of the mind-stuff that disturbs peace. Yoga is all about stilling that lake, returning it to peace by restraining (nirodhah)the modifications that stir up the mind.
These vrittis are desire, the need for and attachment to conceptual knowledge, and an ego focus (pulling the mind into the "little me" focus).
Purification, then, is getting rid of these disturbances...cleansing the mind of them.
Let's look more into these disturbances, these blockages that cause so many ripples; that prevent the mind from being still in its purest form.
Samskaras and what we tend to do with them
Samskaras are stored mental impressions and memories that we have stuffed inside. In Book 1-16 Satchidananda refers to them as unhealthy habits we may desire returning to. From there he describes what we tend to do with the rising of samskaras.
We supress and repress which in Sanskrit is narodha parinamah.
"The impressions which normally arise are made to disappear by the appearance of suppressive efforts, which in turn creates new modifications. The conmoment of conjunction of mind and new modification is narodha parinamah."
" The flow of nirodha parinamah becomes steady thought habit." pg 169
Say what crazy lady?
The more we push down, the more we create "problems" for the mind. We create more mental modifications and ripples on what should be still, clear, and peaceful. The concentration, the thinking component of the mind (of consciousness) gets drawn down into these disturbances we created. Our focus, "the steady thought stream", goes to not disturbing the samskaras inside. We get so distracted by the mess we made, we do not see the clear mind beneath it. We do not feel what Singer calls shakti flow and what Satchidananda refers to as prana and Kundalini (which are both manifestations of the divine creative force of shakti).
Prana is the cosmic force without which nothing moves of functions, page 149
God is even more sensible and has given us a reserve tank that is hundreds of times greater than what we use normally. This is called Kundalini or the "coiled force."
He goes on to warn us about trying to rouse the Kundalini prematurely when we are not yet prepared to handle that energy flow. He assures that it will open on its own at the proper time. " At the proper time, this reserve is released automatically. One shouldn't awaken it prematurely by practicing difficult or violent breathing exercises."...149
So, we have samskaras, stored mental impressions, because we suppressed and repressed at the bidding of our mental modifications: ego, desire, and intellect. Then this samskara protection creates even bigger problems and that becomes our focus. We made a mess inside. How do we avoid adding to this mess and how do we clean up= purify?
Abhyasa vairagyabhyam tannirodhah...page 18 These mental modifications are restrained by practice and non-attachment.
Vairagya is non-attachment. This word actually means "colorless". This is where Singer's idea of "preference" being the cause of all our problems and Buddhas Second Noble Truth comes into play. If something is colorless it is neutral, it doesn't create desire.
Most of are bound by our mayas: desires... always craving and seeking, grasping and clinging for things we desire from the outside world. Satchidananda tells us as practicing yogis...learning to detach from these things is more important than our sadhanas. "Every desire binds you and brings restlessness. " He goes on to say that we cannot be free from desire all together, but we can be free from personal and selfish desire.
Unlike Singer, he talks a lot about the joy of renouncing everything. I get tripped up by Satchidananda's words here: 'The more you serve, the more happiness you enjoy.' knowing full well that if those allegations are true, he didn't really renounce anything, did he? He made others renounce and "serve" him in unwholesome ways. Anyway, Singer teaches that renouncing everything is often equivalent to supressing and repressing in an unhealthy way. Maybe, at one point in his spiritual life, Satchidananda truly set out to authentically renounce his participation in certain acts but he "supressed" instead which led to a whole lot of problems in the long run. IDK how these leaders with such life enhancing messages can get lost in such deviant acts.
Anyway, this is what came out of me today. It is good to know, though, regardless of what language it comes to you in, that we really do not need to do much to purify except be willing to let it happen.
The world is perfect. It will unfold in just the right order.
The stuff will be brought up just in accordance of what you are capable of letting go of
Keep letting go...
Michael Singer
All is well.
Michael Singer/ Contemplative Minds (June, 2025) Spirituality-Releasing the Root Cause of Inner Disturbance. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88tL7vUgocs
Satchidananda (2011) The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. Yogaville: Integral Publications
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