by Yogeshwari Fountain

Rolling Stone magazine ranked “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” as #2 of the 500 greatest songs of all time.  Why?  It puts words to a profound mystical dilemma:  everyone is hungry for more.  Why? Because, well, no thing truly satisfies.

Trying to satisfy yourself with more food, more information, more relationships, more stuff and more distractions is a fruitless endeavor.  It leads to the same dead end over and over again.

Before I found yoga, I did want more in my life:  more peace, less physical pain, and a deeper understanding of myself. It was only yoga that gave me all of that.  It gave me more than I even knew how to ask for.

Yoga teaches that what we’re truly looking for is inner nourishment, a profound spiritual fulfillment. Yoga’s ancient sages promise  you the experience of the still center of your own being.  When you mistake yoga for an exercise system, you might not notice how it works.  Yoga gives you something that exercise does not. It’s an inner process that unfolds, even while you think you’re trying to perfect your pose.

The sages gave us an integrated system of living, by harnessing your body, breath and mind for the ultimate in spiritual upliftment.

Jnaanam annam — Shiva Sutras 2.9

Inner knowing is the only real nourishment, that which gives full satisfaction.

[rendered by Swami Nirmalananda]

This inner knowing is the experience of your own innermost essence, your own Divinity. No amount of food or other things can fill you in the same way.  The continual pursuit of outer experiences isn’t anything like the satisfaction of discovering the “you” that you are, beneath the surface on which you usually live.

While our consumer culture “can’t get no…” yoga frees you from the neediness that the quest for external satisfaction demands.  I had to do “slow yoga” to find it.  It was Svaroopa^® yoga that made that clear to me, giving me poses that are a gateway to the inner knowing of my own Self.

Using well aligned and supported yoga poses to release deep tensions, starting at the tailbone and extending through your whole spine — I’d never felt such blissful peace before.  When your spine decompresses, your mind becomes quiet. But the unexpected surprise was that, the more yoga I do, the more I am interested in studying yogic philosophy, chanting, meditating, and serving others.

The mystical discovery of my own Divinity has fueled a new way of being and of living in the world.  Now I don’t look for satisfaction; I carry it with me everywhere I go.

OM svaroopa svasvabhava namo nama.h

To your Inherent Divinity, again and again I bow.