Lesson 11 – Level 1
Q1: If religion and Yoga are practiced at the lower levels only, what is the result?
In the practice of religion, there are the levels of myth, rituals and mysticism. Within the first two lower levels, the practitioner’s consciousness is still externalized and remains aware of separateness between him/her and the Supreme Being. The third level of mysticism allows for higher consciousness leading to unity with higher self or enlightenment. If only the first two levels are practiced, the aspirant is still entangled in the world of time and space although he or she may have the intellectual understanding about the goal of the teaching as well as how to practice rituals or Yoga. The path toward enlightenment is a movement by which the aspirant is transforming consciousness from perception of realities of the senses as abiding to raise awareness and realize cosmic unity with all-encompassing spirit; a movement that is similar to rotation of the earth facing the Sun during daylight. The first two levels prepare the aspirant to make that shift of consciousness but, it will not be effective without the mystical aspect where the work is being done at the subtlest aspect of the personality.
The practice if remained at the lower levels (rituals and myths), will not yield to enlightenment but instead will result in dogmas and dry intellectualism. At the level of myth, at best, the aspirant may have proper understanding of the goal of the teaching but the effects of past negative Arius still remain at the unconscious level and will continue to drive his/her actions. In that case, the understanding will be speculative and not transformative for the intellect to integrate higher truth. At the level of rituals, the aspirant at best will know the practice of the rituals but will remain attached to them and considered as sources of worldly pleasures instead relating to their transformative aspect to attain higher consciousness.
When wars are done in the name of Religion, it is an indication of spiritual ignorance where emphasis of the practice remains solely at the first two levels with the mysticism aspect often ignored. A similar situation of tension and misunderstanding can be found as well within a particular religion where one may see strong attachment on ritualistic aspect, existence of dogmas and worship of personalities of the church to the expense of fostering aspirant to grow in maturity and integrate gradually the essence of the teaching until self-realization.
The mysticism will help the aspirant to transcend forms and expand his/her consciousness towards the divine, by gradually dissolving the level of ignorance about the true nature of the Self until finally realizing the state of enlightenment. The myth and rituals prepare the aspirant and leave them at the door way of self-realization. The mysticism takes the lead of the process of dissolving the negative Arius to transform the personality in an integral fashion by purifying the ego personality so it can be pure reflection of divine Self.
Q2: The Egyptian book Yoga has been put in a certain fashion as to offer what?
The Egyptian Yoga book series have been written in a certain way to provide for the needs of various personality types as per the structure included in the Kemetic teaching. It is intended to offer to every individual not only a specific discipline according to his or her temperament but, also to make available an integrated method to practice all forms of yoga while at the same time, advancing toward the three stages of religion.
In general, the four main paths of Yoga can be seen metaphorically as four sides of a pyramid with all leading to the ultimate point at the apex which is the all Seeing Eye, symbolizing spiritual enlightenment. In other words, not one particular path leads to enlightenment but a balanced approach is required. Although one may emphasize on a particular path at the beginning but, it is a way to open up for the other paths and not to bypass them. The Egyptian Yoga book series aims at covering all aspects of the teaching as it suits individual personality while also emphasizing about the interconnection and unity between all paths.
For a religious yogic experience as well as devotional path of yoga, the following books can be used: the Asarian resurrection, Egyptian Yoga Vol. 2; worship of divine mother; path of divine love.
In regards to Wisdom Yoga or Intellectual experience of enlightening the mind to dissolve ignorance through reason and reflections for greater and greater spiritual experience and self-realization, the books Egyptian Yoga Vol. 1, Mysteries of Isis, are suggested to be one’s areas of focus.
For those interested in the Path of righteous actions and selfless service, the books Introduction to MAAT philosophy, Egyptian Yoga Vol. 2, Egyptian proverbs will support their studies.
Regarding the path of meditation, the aspirant may use the books Meditation, Initiation into Egyptian Yoga, Egyptian Yoga exercise book and the blooming lotus of divine love.
For the path of tantrism involving discovery and development of inner life force energies in order to direct them towards expansion of consciousness for spiritual enlightenment, the books Serpent power, Sacred sexuality, Egyptian yoga postures of the Gods and goddesses can be used.
Q3: How should an aspirant think about their prospects to follow an integral path of Sema Tawi – Kemetic Yoga?
There is at first the concept of the Arius that the aspirant needs to reflect on. The Soul in its evolution process, creates the context including events, places of birth and cultural environment to attain the next step. Therefore, the aspirant needs to think about that prospect as something related to the Arius and as well as the next step for the evolution of his/her Soul. Seeing the sensibility and the internal drive toward practicing Sema Tawi as pure coincidence may negatively impact spiritual growth. Aligning oneself with the predicament of the Soul as identifying a genuine path for spiritual enlightenment as per the personality type constitutes a serious step towards allowing the divine Self to find pure expression in our life.
In another context, the aspirant should think about his/her prospects to follow an integral path of Semai Tawi as a determinative step for engagement in the spiritual life. In order to reach enlightenment, efficiency and balance are required and that is why, an integral approach is considered the most effective method to attain the goal of self-realization. In some other philosophical context, the teaching is presented without a methodology to apply them and the aspirant needs to related to Sema Tawi as the proposed methodology to realize the essence of the Kemetic teaching. Without the integral Yoga, learning about the teachings themselves with the intellect or/and performing the rituals in a worldly fashion will not lead to transformations of negative Arius that is necessary to attain higher level of consciousness. The kemetic teaching refers to the concept of Arius as the impressions or vibrations at the level of our subconscious mind driving the action patterns of life in time and space. When entangled in ignorance of the true self, there are development of negative Arius that support and enhance the emergence of Ego personality. The Ab as the container of Arius does the link between higher self and lower self. If the Ab is full of negative Arius, awareness of subtlest aspect of oneself is clouded. The practice of Sema Tawi affects the unconscious mind in a way to neutralize past negative ones and allow for expansion of consciousness in time and space.
The aspirant needs to think about spirituality as a movement leading to awareness of one’s unity with the Supreme Being through Sema Tawi. If there is no movement, there can’t be transformation of consciousness and, the aspirant remains entangled in the state of ignorance of the Self with no real ability to progress. An important point to remember is that most of the work to dissolve negative Arius happen at the causing plane because that is the source of actions and without purification of lower aspect of ourselves, our actions in time and space continue to reflect ignorance of our true nature.
One final aspect I would like also to bring is the concept that the Sema Tawi should not be thought as something we do on a formal basis only, at a particular time of the day. It may start that way but, in the course of our progression in spiritual practices, we need to strive to integrate the practices in all aspects of our life so it becomes essentially a way of living. The ultimate goal of the Sema Tawi is not to bestow attachment to the disciplines themselves but to lead the aspirant to such stages where he can transcend them in order to realize his or hr higher essence, which is the divine Self.
Q4 – The four aspects of the personality are: emotion, reason, action, will.
The will is what transforms thoughts into action. Due to ignorance, most people work in automated consciousness and are not in a position to exercise consciously their will. That is why, when it comes to stop bad habits derived from negative Arius, it becomes very difficult because we have not been able up to this point to consciously use our will. It is a very important aspect for a spiritual aspirant to develop when it comes to stop the flow of automated actions based on negative Arius.
The reason is the aspect of the mind with the capacity to derive relations between events in time and space in a sequential manner or identification of cause and effects of events. Ultimately, for the aspirant, a higher utilization of reasons resides in eradicating ignorance about the true Self that will lead to intuitional knowledge.
Emotion relates to affectability of situations, events in life upon ourselves and can be said to be a measure of our attachment to objects of creation as abiding realities. To the extent that we are considering objects of creation as permanent realities, we come to develop strong emotions about them and have great resentments in case of loss or great joy when we perceive that we realize our desires. It is also an appreciation of our spiritual evolution in regards to how they can be controlled and expressed. Purification of the emotions will lead to a state of Wisdom indifference toward particular set of events paving the way for expressions of universal love.
Action is the manifestation of our thoughts in time and space; usually, we act in an automated manner without conscious thinking. There are common reflexes acquired from ignorance of our true self that determine the course of actions we would take. Someone yells at us and we tend to yell back. Cleansing of actions based on application of Maat philosophy leads to generation of positive Arius that will change our action patterns in time and space and gradually help dissolving the clouds of the ego personality that blocks the shining of our true Self.
Overall, when there is ignorance, the fours aspect of our personality are under sole control of the negative Arius that engineer their mode of expressions. When we are on the spiritual path, the aim is to have control of the personality in a way that is reflective of our higher self. When the soul is enlightened, these instruments are used to express higher realities and to reach aspect of ourselves that were inconceivable in the past. The four aspects of personality represent different manifestation of energy that need to be mastered in order to attain Nehast or spiritual enlightenment.
Q5 – The yoga of devotional love enhances and harnesses the devotional aspect of the personality.
Due to ignorance about the true Nature of oneself, the aspirant is making effort to find peace and harmony in time and space from external objects that are considered as sources of all mental affects. In that state of ignorance, there is an endless pursuit of bliss through the many aspects of the external life. The pursuit is endless because once satisfaction is found in time and space, the mind falsely believes due to ignorance, that the satisfaction comes from the external objects hence becomes attached to it whereas the object is transitory by nature. It results from that attachment a cycle of disillusions and disappointments that lead to suffering. In most cases, the source of suffering is not understood, and the individual tends to project dissatisfaction on others and external events in seeing them as obstacles to the realization of own emotional desires, reinforcing the state of body consciousness. That pursuit can take many life times with intermittent attainment of relative happiness until the realization that true happiness resides inside and that one needs to realize it. It ensues the beginning of consciousness transformation that requires purification of the emotions so they no longer be turned toward external objects but rather gradually directed toward the higher Self. The yoga of devotional love helps the aspirant to realize that process of transformation and advance on the path.
Q6- Integral Yoga gives you opportunity to practice yoga all the times. True/False.
It is true and it is the most secure method to achieve spiritual enlightenment. The integral yoga is based on the concept that every aspect of life contains the seed of learning for the soul to grow toward enlightenment. Therefore, it does not promote physical withdrawal from the world but rather to use the events in time and space as transformation elements to advance in the path. What is required is non attachment to the world in time and space as abiding and the knowledge that the abiding Self is our Spirit, a consciousness that needs to be realized. From that context, in our day to day living, life is no longer perceived as a burden but rather as a field of learning so that, if we learn what needs to be learned properly, it will lead to resolving impact of negative Arius paving the way to attain higher consciousness.
During our day to day activities, there is the possibility to practice Maat by purifying all our actions and dedicate them toward the divine. In dealing with our emotions, we need to practice the devotional yoga in directing our loving energy toward the divinity that is present in everything and not be entangled in notion of separateness hence reinforcing our ego. In dealing with understanding and thinking, we need to practice the Yoga of Wisdom and develop proper discrimination on the relative nature of objects and events in time and space in order to be able to distinguish the real from the unreal. In regards to our will as it relates to being able to act righteously and not be affected by egoistic desires of the mind, the yoga of meditation will help us grow in that sense and develop inner qualities allowing to control the desires of our mind.
With the integral approach, it becomes possible to enhance any aspect of life being including emotions, our way of thinking, our day to day actions and our state of will. From that mindset, there is no more entanglement in the illusory of time and space but a resolute determination to practice integral yoga using the facts and events of practical life from everywhere and in any circumstance. In that case, with persistent and genuine self-effort, yoga becomes our way of living and we become one with it.
Q7: Describe the four main paths of Yoga
The four main paths of yoga have been developed in relation to the philosophy of mind transformation for enlightenment or self-realization. Any personality is expressed using four main aspects including reason, emotion, action and will. It is through theses aspects that a person’s desires, ideas in the world of time and space are manifested. Based on ignorance, these aspects have been dedicated to serve Apep instead of Aset. The individual consciousness remains in the lower planes of existence and is in a state of suffering that can be ended through a process of internal purification. The purpose of integral yoga is to provide an integral approach to cleanse the personality in a balanced way so that no aspect is left behind as this is the primary requirement to realize our higher Self.
The emotional aspect of our personality is purified through the practice of the Yoga of devotion. Here, the practitioner learns at first to exercise control over the expression of emotions, understanding that they are not originated from external objects but reside on the state of our consciousness. Knowing the source of our emotions put us in a better position to manage and control them. The next step is to understand how our attachment to time and space leads to development of negative Arius in our subconscious mind leading to the reproduction of cycle of desires and emotions. In that context, the negative emotions are gradually directed to higher goals, higher principles and not to particular persons or events until the aspirant is matured enough to dissolve attachment that lead to those negative emotions. There becomes a stage where positive emotions such as love, compassion are gradually pointed toward the universal self instead of events and individuals and we say at that level that the emotions are enlightened.
Our actions in time and space for most of us, are based on ignorance about our true nature and therefore, the reflections of our past and current negative Arius. Yoga of Actions also named the path of righteous living is aiming at purifying the way we act in a way that it is not motivated by egoistic goals. There is the first level of being able to understand the source of our attachment that will give the understanding about the need to provide selfless service with purity of heart. Doing selfless service is a practical way of gradually dissolving the importance of the ego personality or the consciousness of it as an abiding reality. It is a way of neutralizing negative Arius by developing positive ones. Particular emphasis is done to the need to have a righteous living as unrighteous actions are based on identification to the ego personality. Practicing MAAT actions will gradually allow for lightning the heart and removes the burden of attachment and desires. Ultimately, the aim is to enlighten our actions in way to realize or be an expression of the precepts of MAAT in time and space.
In the context of current civilization, the reason and intellect are used in what we may call an objective way that reinforces the identification to the ego personality. There is the issue of competition between individuals, civilization and our thinking capacity is being used to support or foster a culture of domination based on the perception of the world as being essentially materialistic. The imaginative aspect of the mind is being utilized to a great extent neglecting the development of the intuitional aspect. Knowledge is purely speculative, imaginative and not megerd with experience. The Yoga of Wisdom aims at utilizing the capacity of the intellect and reason to instill information gradually about what is real and non-real. Once the process is on its course, it results a new way of using our intellect which is not to reinforce attachment to our thoughts but to exercise that capacity in a discriminative way to distinguish what is real from what is not. Gradually, the aspirant is informed not only that true knowledge is intuitional and not intellectual but that there is only one knowledge that is abiding which is the realization of one self. Other knowledge are transitory and effective in a sense that they lead to ultimate truth and from that point, they will be transcended. In that sense, the inquiry of the mind is no longer pointed to Set and its related qualities of externality but, to realize the qualities of Aset, the embodiment of spiritual Wisdom and intuitional knowledge.
In the state of ignorance, the will is not used in a conscious way: its exercise is done through impulsions of the Arius. The Yoga of Meditation is dedicated to purify the will and develop inner powers that are latent in the personality. It represents the discipline by which the mind is trained to be thinking about God. In the early stage of the process, meditation will help developing the concentration power of the mind hence dissolving gradually its inherent tendency to wonder from subjects to subjects, like a monkey jumping from tree to tree. Concentration is the door way to enable the mind to reach the state of calmness necessary to reflect the higher self. Once the mind is able to point to particular subject in a conscious manner then, that capacity can be used o develop positive aspects and improve the personality so that one can live by MAAT and understand the teaching. The ultimate stage of the Yoga of Meditaion is to allow the mind to constantly concentrate on the higher Self until finally merging with it. In that state, there is transcendence of objects in time and space, and the individual is dwelling in the plane of Anrutef, which is a region in the Netherworld, free of the influence of the mind.
A final point to mention regarding this topic is that the integral way also means that one path of Yoga is acting on the other. That means for example, practicing the Yoga of devotion will also help in developing the Yoga of Wisdom and others. That informs about the common source of the teaching and how the different paths will merge ultimately and lead to enlightenment.
Q8: the yoga of meditation controls the feeling directed towards the divine. True/false.
Yoga of devotion controls the feelings and directs them toward the divine. The Yoga of meditation purifies the will so that we have the capacity to act in righteous way. So, at first it is false to say yoga of meditation directly allow for control of feeling and directing them toward the divine. However, there can be an indirect impact in a sense that, if we have a strong will so that we are able to control ourselves, this will definitely help our devotional yoga.
Q9: What critical factor every aspirant should understand?
The critical factor every aspirant needs to understand is the important or essential need to know how to balance day to day activity with the teaching and the practices. While the teaching is about transcending the world, it does not imply we need to stop attending our duties in practical life. Our current life is the resultant of past and current Arius positive or negative and therefore, they need to be dissolved or concluded in a way that they do not leave attachment in the subconscious mind otherwise, it will lead to unfinished business hence to the need to die again in the cemetery.
Inner life and daily activities need to harmonize and work to support each other as we are evolving in our understanding of the teaching. Ultimately, both become one. You should see daily activities as elements to work on spiritual life and develop spiritual qualities that are needed for enlightenment. They represent ways of practicing the Shedy disciplines which are to become inherent ways of living. One needs particular attention in order to avoid cynical involvement in the world of time and space as aspirant may develop wrong understanding and develop rational indifference toward the world without any compassion and love. Compassion is required and not condescendence to develop proper understanding that people are at different stages in their spiritual evolution as we have been also in “lower” stages if we can speak that way. Universal love is required because ultimately all living entities have the spark of the divine within them and as we are progressing spiritually, being able to see the divine in all things is a materialization of that evolution.
Developing simplicity in all aspects of our life is the key to allow inner gifts and knowledge leading to self-discovery to unfold. From a material standpoint, one needs to act like the bird which despite the vastness of the ocean or the river, only takes what is needed to satisfy its thirst. It does not assume there will be lack of water and therefore resolves in exceeding accumulation and depriving the rest of the creation with water. Within that context, one needs to evaluate own possessions to see if they are really needed asking oneself why trying to become rich, famous, etc. These questions and other related aspects need to be examined carefully to determine if the driving factor is based on egoism or to foster development of the community and humanity in general. While the current economic system and the supporting sub system are based on a perspective that resources will be lacking leading to a course toward accumulation and deprivation of others, the ultimate reality is that we can only consume what we really need to fulfill our life’s work. The accumulated portion in more than exceeded value will only serve to deprive others of needed resources for their survival and will also create a burden for the person in possession of them. Once in the conscious path spirituality, we should strive to simplify our life in regards to material accumulation otherwise, that will represent a source of negative Arius that will fill our Ab. Once should act in a way so that we can fulfill life’s work and sustain our spiritual practices. More and more possessions will only lead to additional agitations in the mind meaning more negative Arius, deepening the ego cloud that impact our awareness of our true Self. More possessions in time and space result in heavy heart (Ab), mind agitation that obstructs our understanding of the teaching. The mind needs to be like a resting lake to reflect the shining of the Soul. By resolving to simplify our life, we will be able to remove burden in our Ab in order to make gradually enlightenment the primary pursuit of our living. Doing so, we will be aware of how troubles, anxieties will fade by themselves simply because there are no more negative Arius to support them
HTP
Dua Sebai MAA / Dua Seba Dja
