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goal of life but is only the means to that end. When the Yogi is established in these virtues, he gets
some powers such as effectiveness of speech, arrival of unsought wealth, vigour of body and mind,
clear and lucid undertaking of life s events, clarity of thought, steadiness of attention, control of the
senses, immense joy and intuition.
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PRACTICAL LESSONS IN YOGA
Beloved Immortal Self! Observe vow of silence. Keep the mind fully occupied. Sit on your
favourite Asana and do regular meditation. Sing the Name of the Lord. Twirl the beads. Study the
Scriptures. Practise celibacy or be very, very moderate in sexual acts. Take almonds and
sugar-candy every morning.7 Do not consult doctors. Do not think of your disease. Divert the mind
from the body. Be cheerful always. Smile, whistle, laugh, dance in joy and ecstasy. Think of God
and meditate upon Him with true devotion and feeling and merge in Him. This is the goal of life.
You have attained it after a long and continued struggle for some years with zeal and enthusiasm.
You have now become a Jivanmukta (living liberated soul). Hail, hail to thee, a thousand hails, my
child.
Lesson IV
YOGIC DIET
A diet that is wholly conducive to the practice of Yoga and spiritual progress is called Yogic
diet. Diet has intimate connection with the mind. Mind is formed out of the subtlest portion of food.
Sage Uddalaka instructs his son Svetaketu  Food, when consumed becomes threefold: the gross
particles become excrement, the middling ones flesh and the fine ones the mind. My child, when
curd is churned, its fine particles which rise upwards, form butter. Thus, my child, when food is
consumed, the fine particles which rise upwards form the mind. Hence verily the mind is food.
Again you will find in the Chhandogya Upanishad:  By the purity of food one becomes purified in
his inner nature; by the purification of his inner nature he verily gets memory of the Self; and by the
attainment of the memory of the Self, all ties and attachments are severed.
Diet is of three kinds viz., Sattvic diet, Rajasic diet and Tamasic diet. Milk, barely, wheat,
cereals, butter, cheese, tomatoes, honey, dates, fruits, almonds and sugar-candy are all Sattvic
foodstuffs. They render the mind pure and calm. Fish, eggs, meat, salt, chillies and asafoetida are
Rajasic foodstuffs. They excite passion. Beef, wine, garlic, onions and tobacco are Tamasic
foodstuffs. They fill the mind with anger, darkness and inertia.
Lord Krishna says to Arjuna:  The food which is dear to each is threefold. Hear the
distinctions of these. The foods which increase vitality, energy, vigour, health and joy and which
are delicious, bland, substantial and agreeable are dear to the pure. The passionate desire foods that
are bitter, sour, saline, excessively hot, pungent, dry and burning and which produce pain, grief and
disease. The food which is stale, tasteless, putrid and rotten, leavings and impure is dear to the
Tamasic. (Bhagavad-Gita. Ch. VII-8, 9, 10).
Food plays an important part in meditation. Different foods produce different effects on
different compartments of the brain. For purposes of meditation, the food should be light, nutritious
and Sattvic. Milk, fruits, almonds, butter, sugar-candy, green gram, Bengal gram soaked in water
7 Soak ten or twelve almond-seeds overnight in cold water. Peel off the skin the next morning and eat them with
sugar-candy.
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YOGIC DIET
overnight, bread, etc., are all very helpful in meditation. Thed (a kind of root available in abundance
in the Himalayan regions) is very Sattvic. Tea and sugar should be used in moderation. It is better if
you can give them up entirely. Dried ginger-powder can be mixed with milk and taken frequently.
Indian Yogins like this very much. Another health-giving stuff is myrobalan of the yellow variety
which can be chewed now and then. In the Vagbhata it is represented as even superior to a
nourishing mother. It takes care of the body better than a mother does. A mother gets annoyed with
her child sometimes, but myrobalan always keeps an even temperament and is cheerful and
enthusiastic in attending to the well-being of human beings. It preserves semen and stops all
nocturnal emissions. Potato, boiled without salt or baked on fire, is also an excellent food for
practitioners.
A beginner should be careful in choosing food-stuffs of Sattvic nature. Food exercises
tremendously vast influence over the mind. You can see it obviously in everyday-life. It is very
difficult to control mind after a heavy, sumptuous, indigestible, rich meal. The mind runs, wanders
and jumps like an ape all the time. Alcohol causes great excitement of the mind. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]