PERFECTION OF SPIRIT

Articles In This Section:

· YOGIS AND SEX

· SELF REALIZATION AND SELF INDULGENCE

· A GOOD MARRIAGE

· DIFFERENT YOGA POSITIONS

· PERFECTION OF SPIRIT

Aristophanes, in Plato's Symposium, tells how once upon a time all human beings were born like Siamese twins. Each had two heads, two sets of arms and legs and, because each was complete within the self, infinite ability and strength. So powerful did the human race grow that the gods became frightened. So to lessen the threat to themselves they severed each human creature in half. Then they scattered the halves, hopelessly mixed up, far and wide over the earth. And ever since then, each of us must spend his life groping, searching for the lost other half. A few, a very few, succeed. When this happens there is a perfect, an ideal marriage. But more often people merely think they have found their destined mate. Betrayed by primitive longing, they settle for a pedestrian partnership with someone whose temperament is quite incompatible with their own, then both spend the rest of a lifetime in a state of armed neutrality. Then, until death do them part the disenchanted partners bicker, undermine and hurt one another. How much more constructive to learn to search for what may be good and worthwhile in an admittedly imperfect relationship. This is what the pursuit of Yoga enables the student to do.

Learning how to sublimate the sex urge is, then, a way to develop spiritual strength. Directing the emotions toward goals of universal love means reaching out toward everything in this world that is alive and good. Thus many consider Christ a perfect example of the Yoga ideal, for His was an all-embracing love that enveloped all humanity. It was this love that made it possible for Him to say of Mary Magdalen, "Her sins, which are many, are forgiven for she has loved much ..." Love like this of course transcends the limits of sexual emotion and those who are able to experience it come to know an inner happiness denied less understanding and compassionate natures.

In their all-embracing approach the Yogis strive to achieve purification of spirit through four stages: Maitri, or friendliness toward those who are contentedly happy; Marujia, or compassion for those who are not; Mudita, or gladness toward those who are virtuous; and Upeksha, or indifference with regard to the wicked, or rather indifference to wickedness, which nevertheless does not exclude good will and a hope that the erring may be regenerated. Along with this, there is a complete exclusion of the emotion of hate.

The very last thing a Yogi would maintain is that one must rise above sex. On the contrary, Yoga teaches that it is desirable to rise by means of it to greater spiritual heights. Properly used, sex is the greatest of gifts and none may despise its rich potentialities. Both sexes should therefore learn to accept themselves completely, man as man, woman as woman, while at the same time recognizing that each of us carries some of the qualities of the opposite sex within us. Armed with this knowledge and understanding, using sex as an adornment, it is then possible to glory in its possession, not stifle it.