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Bhakti Yoga

The niyamas of Patanjali's Yoga Sutras can be seen as the foundation for the practices of Bhakti and Jnana Yoga. Bhakti eventually leads to Jnana. In this regard I consider the practice of Bhakti and Jnana not as separate paths but as a single path. However, I practice Bhakti more directly and use Jnana as a support.

niyama​

saucha​

Cleanliness of the mind involves:

  • Cleanliness of the Body
  • Cleanliness of the Home
  • Cleanliness of the Garden. I added this one as the changing of the seasons and the growth and decay of plants is a way to reflect the changing of the mind.

santosha​

Wherever there is attachment, the clinging to the things of the world, you must know that it is all physical attraction between sets of particles of matter — something that attracts two bodies nearer and nearer all the time and, if they cannot get near enough, produces pain; but where there is real love, it does not rest on physical attachment at all. Such lovers may be a thousand miles away from one another, but their love will be all the same; it does not die, and will never produce any painful reaction. -Swami Vivekananda. Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda

Sanskrit and prestige go together in India. As soon as you have that, none dares say anything against you. That is the one secret; take that up. The whole universe, to use the ancient Advaitist's simile, is in a state of self-hypnotism. It is will that is the power. It is the man of strong will that throws, as it were, a halo round him and brings all other people to the same state of vibration as he has in his own mind. Such gigantic men do appear. And what is the idea? When a powerful individual appears, his personality infuses his thoughts into us, and many of us come to have the same thoughts, and thus we become powerful. Why is it that organizations are so powerful? Do not say organization is material. Why is it, to take a case in point, that forty millions of Englishmen rule three hundred millions of people here? What is the psychological explanation? These forty millions put their wills together and that means infinite power, and you three hundred millions have a will each separate from the other. Therefore to make a great future India, the whole secret lies in organization, accumulation of power, co-ordination of wills. - Swami Vivekananda. Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda

Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

santosha (Contentment) can be achieved through simplicity and building processes. The problem with modern life is that we are conintuously distracted by new things, new wants, and new experiences. The shastras say we need to do the opposite: reduce our want and needs.

As an entrepreneur this seems counterintuitive and paradoxical that I want to reduce my wants and desires. One of the problems that I have had is that I want to do it all. I was the guy who ended up with 10 different majors in college. In the end I studied History and that was an amazing decision that I was able to dive deep into. I also am the guy that wants to attempt every business idea out there. I attempted futures trading, crypto, real estate, and many other things that I was not equipped to do.

So I have learned to focus on:

  • Ventures. Build asset light, simple to explain businesses that: require minimal capital, can be run with outsourced teams, and are tech infrastructure focused.
  • Investments. Value investing in the style of Warren Buffett.

Further my mornings are completely focused on Karma Yoga and my afternoons and evenings are focused on Bhakti/Jnana Yoga. Throughout the day Raja Yoga is the framework.

tapas​

यत्करोषि यदश्नासि यज्जुहोषि ददासि यत्
यत्तपस्यसि कौन्तेय तत्कुरुष्व मदर्पणम्

Whatever you do,
whatever you eat,
whatever you offer in sacrifice,
whatever you give away,
and whatever austerity you perform,
do that as an offering to Me. -Bhagavad Gita 9.27

There are two paths: the pleasant and the good. Most of us take the path of the pleasant. But the pleasant is a means of bondage. It ties you to the world. For example, coffee is pleasant but it causes anxiety and withdrawal when you stop so it isn’t good. Further, it does not help with the citta-vritti-nirodha.

The tapas that I perform is simply that I lead a very regulated life where I do essentially the same thing at the same time everyday and minimize my freedom to do things that I want. The reason is simple when I do things I want versus the things that are good for my practice I tend to waste the time.

By having a disciplined set of time for me to do things I essentially don’t want to think. I should do the things at the specific time.

Various forms of tapas are:

  • No coffee
  • Strict Routine
  • No alcohol
  • No news
  • No social media
  • Fasting

svadhyaya​

देहबुद्ध्या तु दासोऽस्मि जीवबुद्ध्या त्वदंशकः। आत्मबुद्ध्या त्वमेवाहमिति मे निश्चिता मतिः॥

“Lord, while I identify myself with my body, I am Your servant.
When I consider myself as Jiva, I am a part of You.
But when I look upon myself as the Atma, I am You.”

Jnana Yoga is the path of knowledge and I find that it fits in with the svadhyaya limb of Patanjali's Yoga Sutras. The study is said to be done in three parts:

  • sravana, Hearing
  • manana, Reflection
  • nididhyasana, Meditation and Contemplation

sravana​

It is easy to jump from teaching to teaching not getting deep into either the practice or the philosophy. There are so many books by such prominent gurus as Swami Sivananda, Swami Vivekananda, Sri Ramakrishna, Swami Chinmayananda and Swami Dayananda Saraswati. Not to mention the many shastras and the commentaries of Sankara, Ramanuja, and others. You add in the many books on Yoga and the Vedantic texts and you have a mountain of literature.

The problem is that Yoga and Vedanta are not meant to be just studied, they are meant to be internalized and practiced. As part of the Sadhana that I am going through with a basis in Raja Yoga, I find that the best way to approach this is to slow down and read a single text. Start with the practices of samyama and work backwards. My focus in more on the practice of Raja Yoga and stilling the mind then I can focus on the Vedantic texts afterwards. So I am reading in a manner that is

By focusing on a single text I can go deep into that text and build the understanding and practices of that text. I am not continuously jumping around from one text to another allowing me to get deeper into the undertanding of a single text.

Initially, there will be a lot of secondary texts as I try to understand the core of the practice. As I get deeper into the practice I can shift to just reading the core text and then reflecting on them. These texts are:

  • Bhagavad Gita
  • Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras
  • Atma Bodha
  • Upanishads
  • Brahma Sutras
  • Yoga Vaishista

manana​

How to Learn a Subject

Based on this knowledge when you want to learn something and learn it deep you should do the following:

  1. Pick the subject
  2. Get a cursory understanding of the subject
  3. Books
  4. Podcasts
  5. YouTube
  6. Message Famous People and Talk to Them
  7. Pick the next layers. Ask a series of questions that you want to answer from the previous layer. This could be the 2-4 topics that interest you about that subject but mostly I’d say use Pareto’s Principle and pick the 20% that will give 80% of the benefit right away.
  8. Learn each layer by books, media, papers, etc. but have specific deadlines for each since knowledge builds on existing knowledge it may be readily forgotten if the existing knowledge isn’t reaccessed.
  9. Break each thing into individual chunks. If you are learning a new movement example for Krav Maga move to individual pieces: the feet, hips, hands, the movement of the hips, the movement of the legs, where you are on the floor and where you should be. I learn systems for how they fit together.
  10. Note the Following:
  11. Fears (i.e Like the Fear of Formulas)
  12. Need to do this because certain aspect of learning is expanding your comfort level and to do that you need to understand that you may get overwhelmed and have to note the fear of the unknown so that you can work through it.
  13. Mental Models of Similar / Adjacent Subjects
  14. Practice with b in mind.
  15. Apply the new knowledge immediately to a small project. Make it immediately usable and test this with your own hypothesis.
  16. This helps you solidify your understanding
  17. Take what you learned and what you applied and systematize it. Since you applied the learning you have made it your own and that much more influential to yourself.
  18. Write it down as a checklist
  19. Create programs that execute what you learn
  20. Goto 3 – Remember what layer you are in when reading or learning something. If you read a book similar to what someone has already written then you are not going to learn anything.– Most business books all have similar topics and cover an aspect but think layers. Example of how something could be broken down:

ishvarapranidhana​

It is funny as someone who was raised in the West, I have always thought of Bhakti with a negative association. Advaita appeals to my Western, Englightenment-infused philosophical bent. But likely due to my childhood samskaras I orient towards Bhakti in a more natural way.

Bhakti is a way to redirect all emotions towards the Divine.

The nine forms of devotion (Navadha Bhakti) are and the practices associated with them:

  • śravaṇa: Hearing
    • Stories, scriptures, and teachings.
  • kīrtana: Chanting/singing
    • Japa, mantras, prayers
  • smaraṇa: Remembering
    • Meditation
  • pāda-sevana: Serving the Feet
    • Serving the community.
  • archana: Worship
    • Worship at home or in the temple.
    • Making the home itself a temple.
  • vandana: Prostration/Offering Obeisance
    • Prayers
  • dāsya: Servitude
    • Selfless work
  • sākhyatva: Friendship
    • Prayer in the form of conversation
  • ātma-nivedana: Self-surrender

What is interesting in the context of Bhakti is that I also find the Desert Fathers of Christianity and the Sufis of Islam to be very similar in their approach to devotion and there is much to learn from them.

Bibliography​