Two Roads to an Awakened
Heart
Buddhistdoor International Sangeeta
Bansal 2015-01-09
“People
take different roads seeking fulfillment and happiness. Just
because they’re not on your road does not mean they are
lost.”
- Dalai Lama (goodreads)
In my personal spiritual journey, I’ve come to understand that the
goal of meditative practice is to arrive at a place in daily life
where one is unperturbed by the vicissitudes of exhilarating or
devastating events, where one is engaged in fulfilling work, and
where one can exist in harmonious relationship with others.
Accompanying this is a fundamental shift in self-identity and a
broadening of perspective, where one no longer sees the self as the
center of the universe and places far less importance on personal
thoughts and feelings. Two of my favorite practices along this
journey, reviewed here, are mindfulness meditation and kundalini
yoga.
Why Practice Either?
Mindfulness meditation, taken directly from the
Buddha’s teachings, and kundalini yoga, with its roots in ancient
Indian tantric practices, can both be regarded as mental training
to raise one’s level of awareness. Notwithstanding considerable
differences in methodology, are these practices fundamentally
distinct?
In the Buddha’s teachings, it is stated that the
essence of being human lies in our incessant craving. This craving
is manifested in holding on to things (including ideas and belief
systems), grasping and clinging, and not letting go—all of which
prevent the aspirant from progressing along the spiritual path. “In
the common sense, duhkha is a kind of thirsty desire: a
sensation of dissatisfaction that always drives you to approach or
avoid something based on greed or hatred. In a deep sense,
duhkha is emptiness: there is nothing to satisfy you”
(Katagiri 2007, 38).
The mindfulness path, then, teaches us how to tap
into our minds and bodies in order to identify this thirsty
desire—as well as the obstructive and debilitating thoughts that
accompany it—and then let it go.
On closer inspection, these destructive emotions that make us grasp
and cling are the same hurdles that kundalini yoga refers to as
“energy blockages” along the pathways that constitute our subtle
body. Our energy matrix comprises conduits that transfer life force
(qi or prana) throughout the body. “Holding fears and
misconceptions in your consciousness impedes, and even reverses,
the flow of energy” (Swami Saradananda 2011, 14).
Grounded in Action
The spiritual warrior is a person of action! Both
practices are practical instructions, grounded in the principle of
doing rather than believing—the idea is to
actively participate in the removal of suffering. Both require
dedicated efforts based on a solid foundation of sustained
attention training.
The quiescence of the meditative mind is
accomplished through many hours of sitting and focusing on a chosen
object of attention. After a foundation of shamatha or
concentration meditation, mindfulness practitioners will go on to
vipashyana meditation, which bestows upon them certain
“insights” related to the nature of their own minds and also the
realities of the universe.
Kundalini practitioners will visualize their chakras
and the mandalas associated with each while chanting mantras,
working with the body’s subtle energy in order purify it. They will
also gain insights into their own mental blockages by observing
“where in the spine do they spend their time” (Selby 1992). Thus,
they too will gain precious insights into the workings of their
minds.
Overcoming Suffering
As mentioned, one of the key teachings of
mindfulness meditation practice is the understanding and management
of desire and craving, since these ultimately lead to addiction and
suffering. When craving arises—be it for alcohol, drugs, power, or
sexual union—one neither judges it, nor indulges in or denies it;
one simply observes the raw quality of the emotion that is arising.
This form of observation, accompanied by labeling the emotion, has
the surprising effect of moderating the impulse to act on the
craving.
The aim of kundalini yoga is also to enable the
practitioner to let go of craving. The Sanskrit word for letting go
is anahata, which is also the name of the heart chakra in
the kundalini yoga teachings. Anahata is to become
unstuck, using the practice to balance out obsessive compulsions.
Do you find yourself worrying about survival, food, and safety, or
do you crave sexual intimacy, intellectual fulfillment, or
spiritual enlightenment? Are you besieged by a fear of public
speaking? Do you fear relationships? Are you hungry for power and
control over your fellow humans? Do you have resentments that stem
from early childhood, when your needs were not met by your
caregivers? These issues begin to surface as the kundalini yoga
practice deepens, just as they might surface at a
vipashyana retreat. All these thoughts, stored in the
seven chakras or energy vortexes that exist in our body, are
painstakingly examined and released.
Thoughts versus Energy
We may think of the human body as an onion with five
layers that go from dense to subtle energy forms. The physical body
is the outermost layer, powered by the second layer, the breath.
The breath is then powered by the third layer, i.e. the qi or
prana—the life force or “inner winds”—while the inner winds are in
turn powered by the fourth layer; that of thoughts. The thoughts
originate in what Geshe Michael Roach calls “world seeds,” or
“vasanas” according to Vedic texts (Roach 2004, 21).
Vasanas (the innermost layer) originate from our own deeds
and experiences and are recorded in the unconscious mind. To awaken
this subconscious, hidden mind and bring it to front stage is the
primary objective of our practice.
Negative vasanas result in negative
thoughts, which work their way down to poor physical health. The
practices of yoga and meditation both work on all five levels,
either from inside out or outside in. We can start with physical
hatha yoga and work our way inwards, or start with the purest
thoughts of compassion (tonglen meditation) and work our
way outwards. It is interesting to note that mindfulness meditation
uses the crucible of thoughts to release negative
tendencies, whereas kundalini yoga works on the energy
system of the body. Both are part of the subtle body, i.e. not
seen by the naked eye, but are different planes on which the
practitioner is focusing, with the ultimate goal of releasing the
hidden tendencies.
Living from an Awakened
Heart
The key to mindfulness meditation is the awakening
of compassion in the heart, which then begins to work at all five
levels of the body. The practice is also intended to help end a
dualistic view of the world, in which “the mind thinks of itself as
separate; [whereas] the heart knows better . . . When we touch
beneath all the busyness of thought, we discover a sweet, healing
silence, an inherent peacefulness in each of us, a goodness of
heart, strength, and wholeness that is our birthright. This basic
goodness is sometimes called our original nature, or Buddha nature”
(Kornfield 1998, 99).
Kundalini practitioners also aim to live from the heart. They seek
to activate the heart chakra and, from there, to regulate the flow
of energy to the lower chakras (which are rooted in the world of
matter, survival, and procreation), as well as to the upper
chakras, wherein lies the world of thought, communication,
intuition, and enlightenment. “With its unique place in the center,
equidistant from the first and seventh chakra, [the heart chakra]
marries the world of matter and spirit, of concrete and abstract,
of knowledge and wisdom, of earth and heaven” (Selby 1992,
147).
In conclusion, both practices use different methods but arrive at
the same place, namely an awakened heart.