By Swami Shrutananda
I admit I am a Trekkie. “Trekkie” is found in the dictionary. So, clearly, lots of people are fans of the science fiction TV program “Star Trek.”
As the show begins, Spock (Leonard Nimoy) says, “To boldly go where no one has gone before!” When I hear those words, there is a yearning that arises within me.
Before yoga, my yearning was to know more, to do more, to see more, to be more. I trekked all over the world. I had wanderlust. I thought seeing and knowing more about the world would take care of my yearning. I didn’t know what I was truly yearning for until I found yoga.
This yearning drives humankind to look outward, and even to reach out into the cosmos. Voyager 1, a space probe launched by NASA, is now 14.6 billion miles from earth. For what purpose? The goal is to explore the solar system beyond the outer planets, to the outer limits of the sun’s sphere of influence, and possibly beyond. There is this yearning to go beyond the beyond.
Ultimately, it is the yearning to experience your own infinity. It is a yearning to know your own Self. Everyone has this yearning, but very few act on it. It is a spiritual yearning.
For yogis this is an inner exploration, for it is all found within you:
citi-sa.mkocaatmaa cetano’pi sa.mkucita-vi”sva-maya.h
— Pratyabhij~nah.rdayam 4
Even while contracted, Consciousness is the essence of the individual, who embodies the entire universe.
[rendered by Swami Nirmalananda]
Consciousness, the One Divine Reality, has contracted in order to be everything, including you. Even though Consciousness is contracted, the whole of consciousness is found inside your own body.
The ancient sages did explore “where no man had gone before.” But they looked inward. They sat in meditation and deepened within. What did they find? They found the whole universe within their own body.
From seeing the whole universe within, they came to understand the solar system and the galaxy. And they even understood that space was expanding. Into what? The yogis would say it is expanding into the Self. All of this is described in the ancient yoga texts. Their knowledge came from exploring inward.
In meditation I had the experience of the universe being within me while I was being in the universe. I saw planets, the stars and the space between the planets and the stars. Not only was the universe outside me, but the universe was within me as well. Moreover, I was more than the universe.
Baba Muktananda said, “The inner universe is much greater than the outer universe; it is so vast that the entire outer cosmos can be kept in just one comer of it.” Right now, astrophysicists estimate that there are two trillion galaxies, and their estimate just keeps increasing. But, as Baba Muktananda says, the two trillion galaxies can be kept in just one corner of your inner universe. Wow! There is so much more to explore within.
My mind cannot even fathom that. That is because your mind can only take you so far. To go beyond your mind and explore the innermost realms of your own being, you must meditate. The vehicle you use to explore inward is mantra. By repeating mantra, you place yourself in the mantra mobile — your rocket ship.
Yet, if you want your rocket ship to take off for your inner exploration, you must fill your tank with special fuel — Guru’s Grace. You cannot get there on your own. Receiving Shaktipat from a Shaktipat Guru ignites your inner energy and it climbs your spine. Now you are being propelled beyond the beyond into the inner infinity of your own Self.
Wonder after wonder of yogic realizations will unfold. Now you are exploring what you have yearned for all your life — to know and to experience your own greatness, your own Self. This is the gift of the Guru. This is why I have a Guru: Swami Nirmalananda Saraswati.