Run-On Complaints

Life is profound only in its simplicity — Swami Rudrananda

In direct contrast to Rudi’s words, I hear statements like this on a regular basis from students: I am living through a psychic purification, karmic purging, ancestral release, mind-bending emotional cleansing. . . I’m doing the best I can in this totally debilitating time, and I am going to babble-talk endlessly about it, so don’t expect me to remain simple and full of clarity of intent right now.

If Rudi had heard any variation of this perpetually-repeated sentiment, he would have forcefully suggested that the individual “Stop talking like a horse’s ass!” Unfortunately, we often want to project all the reasons why we cannot simply live in an open heart.

The Fire of Transformation

Sādhana can be described as the fire of transformation. That transformation happens in the suṣumṇa (the central channel), also known as the śmaśāna, or cremation ground. Ours in not the only tradition that speaks of the fire of transformation; Christian and Muslim scriptures also discuss it. What is happening in this process is that God is trying to open us, but we should not think that all our drama is because of that inner shift.

In order to effect a profound change within, we must learn to be very quiet, and to be very aware of when we are projecting our energy out from the central channel. Mastery of this transformation entails remaining in stillness and surrender — of residing in the simple joy of being alive. This is the foundation of our daily practice, and our spiritual growth.

In the course of our practice, many things happen due to the intense fire of transformation. Change might include psychic purification, ancestral release, and so forth. But we do not need to dramatize or dwell on any of it. The drama is us relating the change that we are going through from the part of us that does not really want to change. That dimension of us is the ego, and it always provides us with a lot of babble-talk as an excuse to avoid simple stillness and surrender.  

You can view the endless babble-talk as an alert. When you hear yourself launching into a forty-two-minute sentence about why you are not open, why your life is more difficult than that of the next person, and why it is hard for you to change, just stop! Take a breath and pull your energy back inside.

Let the Energy Do Its Work

All the talk and projection is creating a release valve. The energy that is internalizing in us is trying to rise up the suṣumṇa where it can purify the cakras and our entire psychic body, thereby freeing us from our karmic bonds. If we don’t keep that energy internalized in the central channel, it is unable to do its work. As we do our sādhana, if the fire gets too hot, we must be grateful and remain quiet, allowing the change that is projecting all the drama to instead change us. We need to police our own drama. We just say, “Wait a minute,” go inside, take a breath, and channel the energy deeper within.

If you want to be spiritually changed, you must allow the fire to transform you — and it will do so in all the dimensions of the past, future, and certainly the present. This is the simplest way to burn through the ego. Remember Rudi’s words, “Life is profound only in its simplicity.” Do not wait fifty years to come to that place in your spiritual work.

Rudi once told a story about a meeting with his first teacher in India, the Śaṅkarācārya of Puri. Rudi described what happened when he visited him: The energy and the radiance of love was so strong that Rudi had to pull himself through the doorway just to enter the room. Once he was receiving the energy, Rudi stated, “I really want to be free, and I don’t care how hard it is.” The Śaṅkarācārya smiled at him and said, “Don’t worry you will be free.” Rudi described letting out a huge sigh of relief. And then his teacher continued and said, with a twinkle in his eyes, “But you are going to suffer like hell to get it.”

The message for you is this: make sure that the intensity is that of internal combustion, of the transformation of being changed. Allow yourself to be freed from the bounds of limitation, drama, and karma, all of which resides in your psychic body. Don’t put out the fire by projecting it outward and creating drama around it.

There is a tendency to say, “Look at me and how spiritual I am. I’m going through a big change.” The very need to say that contradicts the truth of your claim. If you are truly going through a major change, you do not need to tell anybody, and the end result will be evident

So don’t get caught up in all the psychodrama. Recognize that this is the ego’s flare for attention. Just take a breath, close your eyes, and repeat, “Life is profound only in its simplicity.”