shamanic yoga

[dendro]

As mentioned in Bush's thread on the spiritual path, breath is an ancient tek that allows access to pure consciousness.

The Hindu model is what I was exposed to when I began psychedelics in 1966. Yoga was the system that resonated with OM, the creative vibration. In this cosmology, Shiva the original cause gave yoga to man.

There are surely many other valid models for consciousness exploration, but yoga is ancient, and yet widely known and practiced to this day. With study, the system is learnable and practical. There is a vast lit and many fine teachers. I personally find it is more accessible to me than native American or other shamanism (maybe a past life connection?). YMMV.

So Dr. Leary, drawing on Hindu traditions, presented breath as a vehicle to access egoless states that facilitated psychedelic voyaging and understanding. After experiencing the results of breathlessness, I was convinced that lsd plus breath control resulted in high states of cosmic consciousness.

I don't mean to imply that breathlessness is necessary for successful psychedelic voyaging, as many people have valuable experiences without stopping the breath. As I said above, there are many means, and everyone is different.

As I observed my teachers, I realized that they were able to stop the breath at will. They didn't need the drug to do it, as they had learned the skill. They could take a dose of pot and go far into the Mind, thru breathlessness. They could eat a tab, and lay down in breathlessness, rising 5 min later fully spaced.

Over my lifetime, I have casually practiced to learn this tek, so I could access inner states w/o drugs (Drugs could be a problem in the sixties, as quality and supply often fell short of our needs, and LE, money trips and the need to deal complicated the picture). The very-sporadic use of cannabis and fungi helped slowly move me in the right direction. I just played with breath, freestyle prananyama, leading to stillness. Sometimes it would happen, sometimes not.

Altho I had no human teacher or system I gained some success, but I never practiced yoga consistently, due to distraction of life activities and a conflicting cosmology and value system that went in a different direction.

Since coming to this forum about 12 years ago as part of a spiritual search, I have gradually returned fully to the yoga model. The ingestion of plant sacraments taught much, and I learned a lot participating here. And I  finally got serious enuff to make a daily practice of yoga teks.

Thru cannabis and sungazing, I received a large download of spiritual data, which inspired further search for advanced yeks. I discovered spinal breathing and khechari and other mudras, bandhas and asanas, and began practicing advanced yoga. Eventually I found my path in Hamsa yoga, a form of kundalini kriya yoga.

This yoga is a guru-shishya lineage, in which the esoteric teachings and initiations are transmitted thru a satguru. A year ago I received initiation from Yogiraj Gurunath Siddhanath, and entered the Hamsa net of Babaji's ShivShakti kriya.

As a result, I am able to enter the breathless state at will. Psychedelics are not needed to merge with OM. In my acid days, I would hold the breath once at the onset and flip into cosmic awareness, carried by the dose to fuel the depth of the experience. But I soon learned that a mid-voyage toke of hash could be held to reconnect with the void. As would group breathless meditations. But I assumed the drugs were the needed keys.

Now with yoga tek, I can enter the breathless void and sustain it for as long as desired, with innate spiritual essence powering the experience higher. The result is a state of consciousness much like clean psychedelics, with chakras open and energies flowing, pure awareness, a sense of the divine, visions and bliss. Identification with the INdweller, the primal Self.

Twice a day I perform an hour or more of ShivShakti kriya, mahamudra and emptiness meditation. Kundalini circulates. It is fun to feel the heart energies uniting with the brain energies.

Thru this yoga, it is possible to decouple awareness from the body fully, and merge with blissful energies, adrift in the void. With practice and nervous purification, adepts will sit with stilled breath and heart, and know nirvikalpa samadhi, and turiya.

IMO this yoga is shamanic because it leads the practitioner to accept the responsibility to participate in reality creation. It leads one to evaluate thoughts and behaviors for their practical value in facilitating high states. And it directly and rapidly evolves the nervous system as a vehicle for the circulation of liquid light.

I haven't ingested any psychedelics for almost three years, aside from daily cannabis. And as I progress in yoga, I need less cannabis. One or two vapes of Nepalese a night is enuff now, and gets me high. But I do plan to continue with plant sacraments in future.

My health has improved in every way, I sleep much better, and have made many positive changes in my life. I still have emotional issues at times, but this practice holds promise that all such things will be resolved in time.

Hamsa yoga works well as a standalone, but also synergizes well with psychedelics, and I believe will enhance any psychonaut's shamanic experience.

"I just wanna know about the rooms behind your minds.
Do I see a vacuum there, or am I goin' blind?"

Jimi

[dendro]

dam, icy!

better crank up the tum-mo!  :wink: