filosofía – Karmuka Yoga

The Mystery of Light & Atma – Yoga & Physics in Conversation

Posted on 24 November 2021 by Michelle Goodrick

So I have a neighbor who lives downstairs from me. He is a physicist. And Sunday afternoon as we sat enjoying enchiladas potosinas and guacamole, he began to explain to me the concept and problem with the speed of light. Here it is summarized below. Imagine you see a train traveling at 50km per hour. Inside that train there is a small cat (because cats make any topic more interesting) running at 20km per hour in the same direction that the train is moving. Looking from the outside of the train, w hat is the actual speed of the cat? If you answered 70km per hour, you are correct…and probably did much better than me in high school math. The speed of the cat is merely her running speed + the speed of the train. Now, lets say there is a conductor on the train trying to find this cat and she is standing there on the train with a flashlight pointed in the direction of the running cat. What is the speed of light coming out of that flashlight? If you answered 50 or 70km per hour, welcome to my world of being a mere mortal and humanities major. If you answered 300,000 km per second, no matter if the train is moving at 50km per hour or 0 km per hour, well done smarty pants, you are well on your way to becoming a physicist yourself. The speed of light on that moving train (or any moving object…like the earth or expanding universe) does not follow the rule of the running cat or the moving train. It is it’s own constant. Why? Well that is the great mystery that puzzles my friend and Einstein alike. And so with a few synaptic connections running around in my head clicking into place with various Yoga Sutras and the philosophical concept of Atma, I asked… ‘Could that mystery be explained if the light isn’t moving at all? What if the train and all of it’s surroundings are just moving around and obstructing the view of a constant light shining?’ And my dear neighbor and friend, the physicist, gave me a big grin and stated, that yes indeed, that could quite possibly explain the speed of light mystery. So now it is three days later and here I am still contemplating that conversation with wonder and awe. Lets say that indeed, light is the constant which never moves. It would align perfectly with the philosophy of mystics around the world and the Yoga sutras that describe Atma as the ultimate reality where all knowledge and truth is known. Where all darkness and ignorance is dispelled by the constant light of pure consciousness. In the Yoga sutras, Patanjali goes further to say that all of our sufferings are merely obstructions to this light, and we have to work out these obstructions to fully experience this light. You might compare it to how one needs to clean a window to fully perceive and enjoy the sunlight outside. The sun, Atma, this light of pure consciousness, is always there, a shining constant. It is our own ignorance and karma (actions) that keep us from enjoying its light and warmth. And so the question is, how do we work out these obstructions, and clean this dirty window of ignorance? Patanjali makes it clear that the discipline of Yoga offers a fast track, a kind of all powerful Windex, to remove this dirt and darkness that keeps us from enjoying this light, from experiencing Atma. It might take many lifetimes, but the hope is that with each life, a little more light shines through the window, granting us greater warmth and joy. With each lifetime, we keep working out how to melt away the heaviness and cold of the darkness that obstructs our perception to our true and timeless nature of being ONE – ONE with consciousness and ONE with light. ONE with Atma. OM

Yoga Therapy: The True Self vs. Obedience & Authority

Posted on 14 July 202120 August 2021 by Michelle Goodrick

Observing and releasing the binds of the conditioned mind through Yoga Therapy and Meditation. ´Give me child until age seven and I will show you the man´ – Ignatius of Loyola The whole point and purpose of the art and science of Yoga and Yoga Therapy is to help each individual experience for themselves their own limitless access bliss. The very foundation of experiencing bliss exists first and foremost in the voluntary acceptance and responsibility of personal freedom. Nonetheless, the acceptance and utilization of this freedom is often limited by our social-cultural conditioning. It is hypothesized that until age seven we act like sponges to the world around us. We soak up all the information coming in with little to no filter and store what is recorded into our subconscious and unconscious -a place beyond conscious thought and language. This early unfiltered processing of information enables the human child to learn and adapt quickly to their physical and social environment. It is through this social conditioning that a child learns the necessary, highly complicated and subtle social cues that enable it to become accepted within its tribe. Due to the fact that human beings, especially children, are physically quite fragile, learning how to become socially accepted and supported within ones own tribe is fundamental to survival. As illustrated by the quote above, this early childhood programming goes deep and greatly influences our adult life. Yoga Therapy and psychology recognize that most of the time we are not even aware that this childhood programming is running in the background influencing every decision we make and action we take. On the positive side, thanks to this unconscious programming we are able to connect with other human beings with lighting, intuitive speed as our interactions are not weighed down with the slow and cumbersome processes of conscious thought telling us how to move, change our tone of voice or maneuver between various social settings. All these cues happen automatically. However, these same unconscious cues that we use to ameliorate and ease our way through our daily interactions can be can be manipulated to subvert our sovereignty as human beings and cause great harm and destruction. Experiments into the human psyche: How free are we? The world of behavioral psychology has many interesting and disturbing experiments demonstrating just how easily our perceived freedom can be hijacked by the right unconscious cue such as – authority, peer pressure and self-image. These unconscious cues have great power because they tap into the childhood fear of survival and abandonment. The following experiments demonstrate how fear can override logical thought patterns and without conscious awareness, move an individual to perpetuate inhumane, cruel and objectively incorrect behaviors and decisions. The Authority Cue: The Milgram Experiments Shortly after the trials of War II criminal Adolph Eichmann had begun, Stanley Milgram designed an experiment to explore Eichmann´s defense that he was just following orders. Beyond the walls of Yale University, he had an actor don a white lab coat and pretend like he was running an experiment on learning. Various volunteers came in to participate in the experiment with the promise of $4.50 as compensation for just showing up. The man in the white lab coat told the volunteer participants that their task was to shock another participant on the other side of a wall whenever they answered a question incorrectly. Unbeknownst to the volunteer participant giving the shock, the participant receiving the shock was a confederate in the experiment (they knew the true purpose of the experiment, knew what answers to give and faked their reactions to the administered shocks).You can watch videos of the experiment here: As the volunteer participant administered shocks to the confederate for wrong answers, it seemed innocent enough until the the volts increased bit by bit from 15 volts to 375 volts and the confederate began screaming in pain and protesting and begging for the participant to stop. This would go on until the volunteer participant finished with a shock of 450 volts and was met with silence to his questions – an indication that they had shocked the confederate participant to the point of death. Results: All participants asked the authority figure (the man in the lab coat) if they could stop. There is evidence that many tried to defy the orders in various creative ways. However less than 40% actually stopped before the shocks became fatal and a meta-analysis of the same experiment carried out in the USA and other countries, showed that the majority of participants (61-66%) continued the shocks to fatality. In some experiments it was as high as 91%. The participants who refused to administer the final shocks did not insist that the experiment be terminated and only went to check on the health of the apparent victim after requesting permission to leave. The Peer Pressure Cue: Asch Conformity Experiments “That intelligent, well-meaning, young people are willing to call white black is a matter of concern.” – Solomon Asch The Asch conformity experiments or the Asch paradigm were a series of studies developed in the 1950s. It consisted of groups of eight male college students where all but one of the participants were actors (or confederates) in the experiment. The actors knew the true aim of the experiment, but were introduced to the subject as other participants. Each student viewed a card with a line on it, followed by another with three lines labeled A, B, and C. One of these lines was the same as that on the first card, and the other two lines were clearly longer or shorter. Each participant was then asked to say aloud which line matched the length of that on the first card. The group was seated such that the real participant always responded last. Subjects completed 18 trials. Results: In the control group, with no pressure to conform to confederate actors, the error rate on the critical stimuli was less than 1%. However, when placed within the group of confederates who gave the

Hatha Yoga: The Union towards Liberation

Posted on 2 April 20213 April 2021 by Michelle Goodrick

All search is in vain until we begin to perceive that knowledge is within ourselves, that no one can help us, that we must help ourselves. – (Patanjali-Vivekananda 2: 27) I started to write this blog a few weeks ago. With the quarantine for COVID-19, I am even more convinced of the wisdom and liberating power of the ancient discipline of Hatha Yoga. With the isolation and solitude of the quarantine, more than ever before, there are pieces of me everyday that I find broken. Wobbly. Stuck. Unhinged. With more time at home and less classes, I practice more. I spend more time observing each detail of each posture. I spend more time receiving classes (albeit online) observing deeply the purpose and efficacy of each Yoga Asana. The more I practice, the more I understand that the work of Yoga Asana has very little to do with Yoga asana. I understand now more than ever that the practice of Hatha Yoga Asana has been developed so that I, and no one else, from the the inside out, can figure out how to mend, strengthen and heal these aforementioned broken pieces. It is my work and my work alone to feel and watch how these pieces manifest in my body, the rhythm of my heart and in the speed of my breath. That is your work. And your work alone. The system and structure of Hatha Yoga provides guides, teachers and books to point the way. It provides these little classrooms called Asana to teach, develop and fine tune the art and skill of observation. Of living presently. Of living freely. And there is no possibility of cheating. The only one who can enter and fully take advantage of each classroom lesson each Asana offers, is you, is me. The real work of Hatha Yoga Asana begins when we stop talking, comparing, judging, interpreting and simply begin listening. What is Hatha Yoga? When your mind has become controlled you will have control over the whole body instead of being a slave to the machine, the machine will be your slave. Instead of this machine (the body) being able to drag the soul down, it will be its greatest helpmate. -Patanjali – Vivekananda (2: 41) Hatha Yoga is any kind of Yoga that uses the physical body (annamaya kosha) to influence and gain control over the mind (manomaya kosha). In the western world, the mind and body have often been separated. The body has been viewed as the enemy to the logical mind. This perception of disconnection between mind and body started to change with philosophers like Fredrick Nietzsche and psychologists like Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. Freud had many faults, but his lifelong work of psychoanalysis recognized that anxiety and stress hidden in the unconscious mind often manifested itself in destructive behaviors and physical ailments. The physical body being influenced by mind stuff is nothing new to Yoga philosophy. A brief study of the Koshas will make that clear. The difference between Freudian psychology and Hatha Yoga is simply the point of entrance. The mind is difficult to control. It is an abstract thing that even today, no scientist can say with certainty where it exists or where it came from. It is for this reason, instead of using a mental tool like psychoanalysis, the practice of Hatha Yoga uses the physical and very tangible door of the body to change, transform and heal the intangible and unconscious mind. The great system of Hatha Yoga has been developed and taught for over four thousand years to help human beings let go of unconscious stress and trauma hidden in the body. Trauma and stress held in the body can be related directly to our own personal history, or it may have its origin in the genetic and conditioned history of our family and culture. Scientists, psychologists and western medical doctors like Dr. Van der Kolk, Dr. Peter Levine, and Dr. Gabor Maté are now confirming the efficacy of entering the door of the body to heal the trauma that torments the mind. Statistically, studies are now showing that therapeutic body work has been proven to be even more effective than pharmaceuticals or talking therapy alone. Through physical postures (Asana), breath awareness (Pranayama), ethical practices (Yamas y Niyamas) and the concentrated observation of all of the above (Dharana, Diana and Samahdi), Hatha Yoga provides a system that educates a student how to be FREE. It provides steps and practices for students to gain balance and control over their physical body as well as their nervous system so that they are no longer slaves to negative and destructive unconscious behaviors or thoughts. What does HATHA mean? Hatha literally means Sun (Ha) and Moon (Tha). Yoga means the union between these two. When we reflect over what the Sun and Moon represent in Hindu mythology (and many others) it becomes clear why the union and balance of these two energies grant us liberty. In most world mythologies the symbol of the sun is related with masculine energy while the energy of the moon is related to feminine energy. The concept of energy is not the same as gender or sex. Masculine and feminine energies simply represent different characteristics in the human experience. The two energies exist together in order to create and maintain the delicate balance of life on our Earth. For example, without the sun all of life on earth would die from the cold and lack of nutrition provided by its faraway rays. However, did you realize that without the moon and her gravitational pull, life as we know it would not exist either? Primordial life started in the small tide pools, the small Petri dishes of creation, left behind by the cyclical push and pull of moons gravity on ocean waters. If it were not for the rising and falling tides produced by the moon and its gravitational pull, there would not be the necessary movement within the waters of the ocean to help

Tree of Eden : Karmuka Yoga (Unity) Poems

Posted on 4 March 20215 March 2021 by Michelle Goodrick

Tree of Eden All branches of philosophies, mystics and religiousities All stemming from the same, unified, trunk of being Systems and disciplines reduced and expanded Created and modeled Written and Spoken To guide into experience and see that we have never been seperate from you, from me From the beginning to the ending, connected, Intricately To the soil, the sea The birds, seeds, busy buzzing working bees One identity mixed in deeply with the flowers and the weeds. As filthy as the germs, the rot and vermin As deadly as illness, disease and virus Suffering Blindly Fearful and grasping, Only, as we forget repeatedly To let go To Breathe in and flow Surrendering into the Eternally spinning persistent existence Of you Of me Climbing and expanding out along Eden ´s tree. Adho, meaning “downward,” mukha, meaning “facing,” and vrksasana, meaning “tree pose.” Adho mukha vrksasana is commonly referred to as handstand in English. Balancing in this pose begins in the location of the pelvis and strength in the legs. Press down and expand out through the hands to then shoot that energy up through the back armpit, side ribs, activating the core by lengthening the sacrum and pressing firmly up through the heels and inner big toe. Maintain a spiral action from the back armpit to the hands to create space and width through the shoulder girdle. This width creates greater stability in the pose and space for the spine to lengthen and all the internal organs to relax from the pull of gravity. Due to its upside down nature, Adho mukha vrksasana correctly can improve balance and circulation, promotes digestion, aids in heart health. When action is maintained from hands all the way up through the feet it also strengthens the spine, the core, shoulders, hands, wrists and bones. Practicing this energizing Yoga pose helps to: Clear Brain Fog Increase Energy Relieves stress and anxiety Improves emotional balance and stability Supports mental strength Relieves fear Promotes energy flow to the head Improves clarity of thought Adho mukha vrksasana also activates sahasrara (crown chakra), located on top of the head where it is also associated with the pituitary and pineal glands. The two master glands of the endocrine system.

Prana: the duality and non-duality of existence.

Posted on 29 January 202129 January 2021 by Michelle Goodrick

Prana and Yoga Asana Yoga asana is not an external form created to get you more likes on Instagram. They are a set of various shapes designed to activate powerful internal actions that create more space and alignment throughout the skeletal, muscular and nervous system. Each form is designed so that the practitioner may increase their perception and experience of Prana, or life energy. Often times Prana is mistaken for the breath. However, Prana is not the breath, the breath is merely a vehicle for Prana. Prana, life energy, exists in everything – including and especially in the spaces between things. From the rocks, to the trees to the ocean and mountain tops. There is even Prana in the skyscrapers that block out the sunlight and the asphalt that soaks it up. In quantum physics it is both the wave and the particle – interchangeable as both physical matter and unseen energy. It is the universal and mysterious energy that interconnects and underlies everything. Prana is not good or bad and it makes no judgement calls. However, like electricity, there are materials and forms that are more conducive to the flow of Prana and materials that are less conducive. The work of Yoga asana is to make the physical form of the body more conducive to the flow and perception of this life energy. This then affects all the other layers (Koshas) of existence as well. This is why I tell my students the science of Yoga Asana is Magic. In observing the intricate internal actions of Yoga asana you transform your body into a Pranic alchemy machine that creates internal combustible reactions throughout the various layers of existence. The Purpose of Yoga Asana In every Yoga Asana exists every other Yoga Asana. Correct and true principals of movement and form are repeated again and again through Asana practice to help the student experience greater life energy and remember, on a visceral level, rather than a mental one, the nature of existence. All of the pain relief, increased strength, flexibility and reduction in stress are the side effects of a consciously executed Asana practice, not its purpose. The Duality and Non-Duality of Existence We live in a world of time and duality. Even our brains function in opposition. Of up and down. In and out. Back and forth. Yet, according to Yogic philosophy at the root of all existence there is no time and therefore no duality. This goes back to the concept of Prana as merely being a force of energy, electricity, that exists in everything. It is not up or down, in or out, back or forth. It just flows towards and fills material and space. In Yoga Asana, this flow and expansion of Prana is created by internal forces of opposition. These 5 basic forces as discussed in the Upanishads and illustrated below are: Udana: Movement Upwards Vyana: Movement Ouwards Samana: Movement Inwards Apana: Movement Downwards Prana: Has no direction: Exists everywhere The duality of these aforementioned forces in opposition create a space of non-duality where Prana expands. In Yoga Asana as we increase our observation of duality within our own bodies, we can perceive that beyond it there is a canvas of non-duality upon which these various opposing energies paint pictures and scenes. The energy itself is non-directional. Non-dual. Not good or bad. The various forces around it decide the path it will go. Think of a piece of music. There are notes that move in all sorts of directions with all sorts of rhythms and speeds. These opposing notes, rhythms and speeds is what moves the energy and mood of a person, a group, a room. It is what breaks up the misery of monotony and makes music so moving. Nonetheless, it is the silence between the notes that makes the music possible. And this is the alchemy of Yoga. In working with the body through the tool of Yoga Asana we perceive on a visceral level the opposition that is a necessary part of growth. Of expansion and movement. Without it there is no transformation. Yet if we deepen our perception, listen and observe we can experience for ourselves that behind the ups and downs, the ins and outs, and the back and forth, there is stillness, silence, a state of pure potentiality, bliss and non-dual existence. Covid 19: A force of opposition It has almost been a year since the world was turned upside down by the restrictions surrounding Covid 19. Many people have suffered from the virus itself and arguably many more have suffered from the resulting restrictions of isolation and confinement. Many people, including myself, have lost loved ones, their businesses and homes. There are various perceptions concerning the virus and the measures taken. For many of us, it appears to be a matter out of our hands. Yet, nothing is ever out of our hands. How we choose to react to a situation is always within our power and our responsibility – our ability to respond. Just like in Yoga Asana. We can choose to give up the moment we feel restrictions and difficulty in a pose. That is a legitimate response. Who wants to be in pain? However, if we allow ourselves to feel into the restriction and explore the difficulty of the pose, adapt the pose and find the modification that allows us to best observe those forces in opposition actively working to create more space, we can begin to experience the expansion of prana, of blissful life energy. We can begin to observe and even enjoy the various directions and sensations of expansion that each Yoga Asana offers. So it is in life. We have the choice to simply give up and crawl under the covers as difficult and uncomfortable circumstances come our way. Circumstances that seem to pull us apart in all sorts of directions. It is a legitimate response, but it is not one that will transform you or get you closer to bliss.