We frequently hear the expression “Spiritual but not
religious.” But what does it mean to be “spiritual?” Someone once asked
Paramhansa Yogananda (whose life story, “Autobiography of a Yogi,” is now a
worldwide spiritual classic), “Will I ever leave the spiritual path?” Yogananda
responded, “How could you? We are all on the spiritual path.”
As it is said that “we are a soul having a human experience
in a human body” we intuitively know that we are good, worthy and part of
something much greater which is goodness itself. We readily excuse our faults
claiming circumstances and outside influences (even if we are not so quick to
dismiss the faults of others).
We hear, or perhaps truly know, that “love is the answer.”
Or, that “God is love.” So, yes indeed, we have an innate sense of goodness and
“God-ness.” We might say of even self-proclaimed atheists that those who love
and care for others are as spiritual as most church-goers, especially the more
judgmental ones.
Without denying any of these statements, it can also be said
that spirituality is a conscious choice. “The road to Hades is paved with good
intentions.” Goodness is simply the opposite of badness and the two alternate
like day and night. Good karma will eventually be used up and we start over
again. Can merely “good people” really say that if they win the lottery they
won’t go to seed; or, if they were to be born into positions of power, fame or
riches they would retain their “goodness”? What if, instead, they were abused,
or born into abject poverty, violence and racial injustice…….would they still
be “good?”
Yogananda taught that the ego, which he defined as “the soul
identified with the body,” has the right to remain separate from God until at
such time as it, like the “Prodigal Son,” chooses to return home to God. We
must consciously make that choice. This is also the meaning behind the story of
the warrior, Bhishma, in India’s great epic, the Mahabharata. Bhishma had the
boon that he could never be killed, even in battle, until he choose to die.
Lying on the battlefield with so many arrows in him that his body did not touch
the ground, he yet gave an inspired discourse on leadership and rulership.
Bhishma symbolizes the ego, just as Moses did. Moses was not permitted by God
to enter the Promised Land. Though he had led his people out of captivity (as
the ego leads us at first on the spiritual path), he, himself, could not enter
therein! (Nonetheless, Yogananda said that Moses was a true master.)
Admittedly, the “dice are loaded” because the ceaseless flux
between pleasure and pain, good and bad all but guarantees that in some future
life, the soul will awaken to the “anguishing monotony” of endless rounds of
rebirth and will cry out for freedom.
Nonetheless, no one achieves soul liberation (called by many
names, including cosmic consciousness, Samadhi, moksha, etc.) by merely being
good or without conscious effort. The goal might be expressed or felt in many
different ways according to temperament, culture, or religious beliefs, but
Oneness has no equal, no partner, no opposite. As taught from ancient times in
India, this state, relishable beyond any other, is “satchidanandam.” Immortal & eternal, conscious and omniscient,
all-pervading and ever-blissful. It is the reason for our existence; it is the
One without a second; it is the essence of creation even while yet untouched by
the illusion of separateness.
How do we get “there?” “There” is “here and now.” It is
always present but yet hidden from our inner sight by our restlessness, but our
desires. “Desire my great enemy” is a chant favored by Yogananda’s guru, Swami
Sri Yukteswar. Krishna, in the Bhagavad
Gita, replying to the question from his famous disciple, Arjuna, “Why do even
the wise succumb to delusion?” explained that it is desire that deludes even
the wise (from time to time). And most people, far from wise, are quite content
to pursue their desires and wouldn’t have it any other way.
It is the nature of this creation to hide the truth; to hide
the Godhead from our sight. For reasons beyond our ken until such time as we
share the divine vision, we must struggle, indeed, “fight the good fight,” to
overcome the qualities (known as the gunas)
of nature that so engagingly occupy our interest in day to day life. Thus it is
that the great scripture of India, the Bhagavad
Gita, takes place on a battlefield where Krishna exhorts the devotee Arjuna
to stand up and fight (his lower nature).
To be spiritual is not to reject the world; nor is it to
reject the help and company of others of like-mind; nor is it to refuse to
share one’s path and spiritual blessings with others. As Ananda’s founder,
Swami Kriyananda put it so well, “It is the nature of bliss to want to want to share.”
No one claiming to be spiritual (but not religious) can
afford to do so alone. We are not this ego and we are part of a greater
reality. To achieve infinity is to expand our hearts natural love to embrace
all beings, all creation.
The worldwide work of Ananda was established to create
communities and fellowship for those on the inner path as given to us in the
form of Kriya Yoga by Paramhansa Yogananda and the line of spiritual giants who
sent him to the West.
If members of Ananda simply practiced in their own homes and
never came together in meditation and in service, we would lose a great
spiritual opportunity. We would find our spiritual progress bogging down.
Swami Kriyananda wisely created two forms of association by
which kriya devotees could advance spiritually together. In 2009 he was
inspired, as a swami of the Giri branch of India’s ancient order of swamis, to
found a new swami order: the Nayaswami Order. “Naya” means “new.” Taking from
what Paramhansa Yogananda called a “new dispensation” for the ancient and
universal divine revelation called, in India, Sanaatan Dharma, Swamiji
established the Nayaswami Order with a new and positive emphasis for spirituality
in a new age. The Order describes the goal of the spiritual path as the
achievement of bliss in God through the inner path of meditation. Rather than
life-rejection, which characterizes spirituality of the past, both east and
west, the time has come to see that seeking God is the “funeral of our
sorrows.”
Quoting from the Ananda Festival of Light (written by Swami
Kriyananda and recited weekly at Ananda Sunday Services), he wrote that
“whereas, in the past, sorrow and suffering were the coin of man’s redemption,
for us now, the payment has been
exchanged for calm acceptance and joy.”
This universal affirmation finds expression in the Order
through the fact that the Nayaswami Order has no organizational association
with Ananda’s worldwide work and is open to anyone who seeks and who has
demonstrated attunement with these goals and who practices meditation in one
form or another.
It thus expresses purely and solely the essence of
spirituality in a new and advancing age of consciousness. It acknowledges the
importance of ego transcendence but affirms that the goal of ego transcendence
is Bliss. There are four levels in the Order: the initial intention of the
Pilgrim; the emerging success of the Tyagi (married) or of the Brahmachari
(single), and the final vows of renunciation of ego (sannyas) of the swami (whether married or single).
To balance this purely spiritual association is the Sevaka
religious order. The Sevaka Order is also worldwide but it is part of Ananda
and forms a vehicle by which devotees of the kriya path can, if they choose,
dedicate their lives in service to the work of Yogananda through Ananda.
Sevakas begin with conditional commitments and after seven years may be invited
to make a life commitment.
A kind of subset of the Sevaka Order is a “lay” order
organized in some of the individual Ananda communities. It is called the
Sadhaka Order. It is strictly local and is open to any kriya devotee who, as
part of their life, wants to support and serve the local work of Ananda.
To be spiritual but not religious is not an excuse to cast
off any visible form of association with others or form of outer renunciation.
Ananda has been blessed to create these forms by which to energize and give
practical, meaningful expression to the spiritual path. By creating these
forms, like building a beautiful meditation temple, others can be inspired even
if only by the example of the dedication of those devotees who have made
sincere and recognizable commitment to the spiritual path.
Blessings and joy to you,
Nayaswami Hriman, life member of the worldwide Sevaka Order
