Approach and Detachment
As a teenager I got into bad habits of smoking and drinking. Even though I knew they were not the wisest choices I could make, it was very difficult to move away from those habits. Had I continued longer with them, the grooves of those habits would have become deeper and even more difficult to change. The only thing that brought a quick and permanent change was my choice to start running. Because smoking and drinking were counter-productive to running, and I really loved running, the choice to let go of them then was actually very simple and easy.
It is almost impossible to let go of something unless there is something greater that we are moving towards. It is easy to forget where you were if the goal in front of you has all your attention. Looking back is a choice and keeps the mind locked in the past, which creates grasping and stagnation.
Ascension gives us the ultimate tool to practice approach. It is the essence of Ascension. Every Ascension Attitude takes a direct angle into the Ascendant. We approach the purest essence of what we are by the simple choice to think the Ascension Attitude. As we do that we naturally detach from the limitations of past experience, conditioning, stress, beliefs and habits.
Approach and detachment are built into the fabric of the Ascension practice. Both are natural and happen automatically as we use the Ascension Attitudes. The more we Ascend the more enjoyable it will be thus ensuring that the approach will be more and more enticing to the mind. Whatever may be the stresses or limitations, they will dissolve and come to graceful solutions in higher consciousness.
Praise leads to Gratitude which leads to Love. As we become more intimate with the Love in our own hearts we will automatically detach from the illusion of fear. Fear will disappear like mist in the morning sun. Who remembers the mist when the sun has risen?
Nataraja Ishaya
Yoga sutras of Patanjali
I.12 By approach and detachment, the movements still.
Approach means Ascending, the practice of expanding the mind to the Ascendant. As one moves effortlessly inward to more and ever more expanded levels of awareness, one is also quite naturally withdrawing from the outer world, the more contracted and bound levels of experience. By habituating the mind to this march toward increasing inner stillness and peace, the structure and meaning of life naturally begin to change.
In other words, it is not necessary to renounce with force or effort the destructive behavior patterns of the mind or the outer world. This sutra is not recommending a reclusive life of
renunciation, even though this is how it is typically interpreted. Giving up limited and limiting boundaries of the Waking State is not painful or difficult, as long as this withdrawal is accompanied by approach, by expansion. Without the experience of Ascension, no amount of renunciation will accomplish anything at all. If thought is given up without inward movement to the Ascendant, the individual will experience nothing – which is commonly called sleep – not Ascendant consciousness. On the other hand, by Ascending, one naturally gives up the boundaries of relative experience, just as one naturally removes clothes that have been outgrown, or just as bud is lost when the flower blooms. This is not painful or difficult! This is a movement of purest ecstasy, a joyful movement toward Truth and Beauty. Only if we are looking out
the rear window of the car do we notice where we have been, receding quickly in the distance. But why bother? It is so much more exciting and satisfying to look ahead.
I.13 Of these, approach is the endeavor to reach stability.
What is the ultimate stability? The Self experiencing its own essential nature. There and there only does the flow of change cease. "Stability," Sthitau, can also be translated "steady adherence" or "duration" - the aim of approach is not just to touch the Ascendant once but to stay there permanently.
"Endeavour to reach," yatnah, can also be translated, "seeking union with," or "devoting oneself to." So approach seeks to unite the Waking State of Consciousness with its root in the unchanging Ascendant. How does this occur? By devoting oneself whole-heartedly to the practice, one arrives quickly at the goal.
Ascend a minimum 20 minutes 2 to 3 times every day with your eyes closed. Ascend in the morning before the day’s activities so that your day will be more enjoyable and effective. Ascend before dinner so that your evening will be more enjoyable and effective. Ascend before bed so that your sleep will be deep and restful. Just do it!
Whenever you remember to think the Ascension Attitudes in the midst of your active life with your eyes open it will drive your mind inwards into the Ascendant. You may or may not notice any change in your waking experience, but it is very beneficial at all levels. Remember that true change comes from the inside out.
As long as we are completely simple and natural Ascension will work for us.
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The waking state is characterized by movement, by continuing change – often in the twinkling of an eye love transforms to hate, peace to chaos, happiness to misery, health to sickness. The weary soul seeks calmness and peace everywhere and finds it nowhere. But there is one movement of the mind that leads to permanence, to stability, to duration – and that is the movement which leads to silence. Approach is the essence of Ascension. Without this built-in desire in every human heart, it would be difficult or impossible to move to enlightenment, for there would be no impelling force driving the expansion of consciousness. But because the desire to approach stability is built into everyone as our own nature, it is not only quite possible, it is completely natural and effortless to move into higher consciousness.
I.15 detachment is the mastery of consciousness that cuts asunder the taste for the seen, the heard and the experienced.
How is the ego to be mastered? By praise, devotion and earnest action, action toward the Real, the
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Ascendant. Detachment is not a technique in itself; any who would attempt to grow in Ascendant Consciousness by cutting away the objects of sensual enjoyment and experience will fail, for the taste for them will persist.
Taste here means addictive or compulsive attachment. If one is continually, without ceasing, praising or devoted to the Ascendant, the taste for the relative experience naturally decreases and ceases to bind the mind. What is it that is so very sticky about habitual self-destructive internal programs? They are continually being reinforced by repeated experience. How does one break free from the pull of the past? Only by releasing consciousness from the fetters of the Waking State. By experiencing the Ascendant, the binding influence of the past falls away.
MSI
Greater Happiness
Approach and detachment can be confusing concepts to look at, or at least they have been for me. There are many different ways to see this. The way that has made the most sense to me is the example of a river. When we begin to practice Ascension it is natural for everything in life to change for the better, faster and faster. This is like being swept down the river. We are naturally going with the flow as long as we just let the water carry us ahead. We get ourselves into trouble when we begin to grasp at the shoreline as the current is pulling us forward into bigger more expanded states of consciousness. It is better to let go of all we “think” we need or want along the shore, so we can move towards greater happiness, health and love.
It is for this reason that we practice simply introducing the Ascension Attitude whenever we notice we are thinking ANY other thought. In so doing, we naturally and effortlessly take the avenue of approach and detachment. We needn’t grasp onto any thing or any thought. That will only keep us from our true desire, being stable in the Ascendant permanently. All that is truly ours will always be ours and we will experience them more fully as a result of our continued expansion. All that is not bringing a greater experience of health, happiness and love will naturally and effortlessly fall away as we continue to innocently use our practice.
Sivani Ishaya
Great Sweetness
I hear so many say that they have difficulty “detaching” from something. However, one of the great things with the Ascension Attitudes is that there is no need to try to detach from all those things. As MSI said, “approach and detachment are two sides of the same coin”. He also quoted Joseph Campbell, saying, “Follow your bliss”.
Our mind naturally moves toward greater happiness. As we move toward our bliss, in other words, as we use our Ascension Attitudes, everything else begins to fall away. Every step we take in moving toward New York City automatically takes us one more step away from Los Angeles.
One of my favorite quotes from Maharishi Mahesh Yogi is “When pure honey comes on the tongue, the taste of great sweetness surpasses in degree all the sweet tastes experienced up to then. If the tongue continues to cherish the taste of honey, then there will be no chance for a previous sweet taste to recur. This is what happens when the mind lives permanently in the experience of transcendental bliss in the state of cosmic consciousness; there then remains no chance for impressions of past experiences to capture it. “
Jyoti Ishaya
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