A question from a student
As the end of the year approaches, I am cleaning up my house, going through drawers, files, my closet... And yes, going though my inbox and deleting old emails, as well as (shame!) answering old emails I had forgotten about. I am ready to start the new year with greater clarity.
In doing this, I came upon an email one of my students wrote to me a few months ago, asking a profound question on consciousness and the self. I had written a short answer and told the student I would post her question, as well as my attempt at answering it a little bit further, on the blog.
Here is her question:
Thanks for an awesome class (last week too - I wanted to write to you about how great the class was on Thursday, but didn't have your email) and for being open to talking about philosophy through email 
Okay, a little backstory - I'm writing a screenplay right now that I like to call an "existential comedy"... I've been reading a lot of philosophy and science and artificial intelligence books as I'm writing, and having lots of thoughts about the themes of fate, determinism, chaos, control, etc.
Where I'm at now is that I'm struggling with/thinking about the idea of consciousness. I'm reading various philosophical, biological and psychological perspectives on consciousness, but none of them are very satisfying. And they're particularly not satisfying because everyone seems so obsessed with the where of consciousness (what part of the brain, etc), instead of the why. Why do we have individual consciousness? Why do we have self-consciousness, or any idea of the self?
So, I thought you might have some interesting ideas/insights on consciousness, from a more spiritual perspective, a meditative perspective, a yogi perspective.
Thanks again for any thoughts, and for continually amazing classes.
L."
And here is my response:
Dear L.,
On the second line of our invocation it is written: "Sat chit ananda murtaye" which translates as, "(This one energy) takes the form of Being Consciousness and Bliss." The word for God is often Cit or Consciousness. And because we are a microcosm of the macrocosm we too are conscious beings.
The dictionary defines "consciousness" as "a feeling or knowledge of one's own sensations." Another definition is "awareness." Which is -of course- another word in yoga we use to describe God: Awareness; Consciousness; Presence.
Very simply: God (The Universe, Consciousness, Awareness, God, Goddess, however you understand it) out of its desire to want to KNOW life and EXPERIENCE life, chooses to limit itself. God chooses to limit its vast knowledge, vast power, its vastness itself, to become limited in this relative world. And it is through limitations that God gets to experience life in myriad, infinite forms. The best analogy I've heard about this is that this one light chooses to go through a metaphorical prism, thereby refracting into a rainbow of colors. One light becomes many, but it is still one light.
I also wanted to quote John Friend's "Anusara Yoga Teacher Training Manual,"
"The One becomes the Many simply to enjoy the cosmic dance of creation, sustenance, and reabsorption of all phenomena. The entire creative process is just an ecstatic play of Consciousness without any other underlying motivation..."
"Everything in existence pulsates with joyful, blissful Consciousness, for everything is this divine Consciousness..."
"During this creative dance, God conceals His divine nature and appears as separate finite beings. By concealing His unlimited power, knowledge, and freedom through manifestation, God experiences the supreme ecstasy of revealing His own true nature It's like a big cosmic game of hide-and-seek or peek-a-boo. The Divine enjoys the play of hiding parts of Himself and then finding Himself. By creating apparent separation, differences appear among things and contrasts draw out these distinctions of experience. Thus the Divine can enjoy experiencing and knowing differentiation within Himself and yet simultaneously remain rooted in His own underlying perfection. He is but one soul in an infinite number of forms of His own self-expression." (John Friend, "Anusara Yoga Teacher Training Manual")
So to sum it up: We appear to be separate from each other but we are all made of the same throbbing, pulsating, loving energy. It threads through everyone and all things. The yogis' journey is to find the union in the differences, while still celebrating the differences. Seeing the oneness is every asana that you do in a yoga class; seeing the oneness in the driver who just cut you off on the 101; seeing the oneness when you see a picture of yourself at 5 years old. Cutting through the veil that separates us and then coming back to this relative embodied life and enjoying the play of consciousness as it manifests through the roles we play on our up and down, day to day life.
Thanks for asking!
Hope this helps.
Love,
MC
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