lazyyogi

[lazyyogi]

Q: How I can detach myself from someone?

Detaching from anything, be that a person, object, or circumstance, means coming back to yourself. 

Attachment isn’t a real experience; it is a product of confusion.

Generally it means someone has knowingly or unknowingly assumed something to be permanent that by nature cannot be so.

You aren’t physically bound to this person. The experience of attachment is an occurrence in the mind. It has to do with the mind’s thoughts and the body’s reaction to those thoughts. Or, conversely, the body’s emotions and the mind’s reaction/interpretation regarding those emotions. 

When attachment is a force in our life, it is because we have begun to use temporary phenomena as a way to orient and understand who we are and where our happiness resides. It is an indication that we have misattributed some sense of who we are and the joy of that Being to something derivative and external. When that phenomenon’s role in our life changes due to the impermanent nature of this shifting world, it can provoke confusion within us that results in suffering.

Most people “fix” this by going from one attachment to another. Perhaps finding a new boyfriend, pursuing sensory gratification in myriad forms, or fixating on worldly achievement. They play out the same old pattern of delusion but in different ways all while expecting a different result.

I suspect this is why so many of our elders make us sad rather than inspire hope and wisdom—their lives end more with regret than with transformation, peace, and insight. 

To discover real peace means loosening this tendency to grasp at the world for happiness and identity, instead turning within to uncover the real meaning of your aliveness when we talk about “life.”

Daily meditation is an essential part of altering your way of living such that you aren’t so much trying to fill a hole within you but rather you are allowing something to come through you into this world. Instead of trying to get happiness from life, you bring happiness to life.

When your way of life becomes an opportunity to express and share the peace and happiness you are finding within, everything changes. There is less fear, more love. Less attachment, more freedom. Less confusion, more peace. 

On a more immediate level, try this:

Notice the primary form your attachment takes. It could be thoughts, emotions, or both. 

When that attachment begins to express itself, shift your focus from the story you have built in your mind to the feeling of being in your body. 

This feeling of inhabiting the body includes both the sensations in the body but also the space in which those sensations occur. 

For example, when you feel your hand from the inside out, there is the sensation of the energy-consciousness in your hand but there is the internal spaceless space of awareness in which that sensation presents itself. 

By abiding with your attention filling your body in this way, you avoid getting swept up in mental loops of the thoughts that once acted to renew your feelings of pain. 

At the same time, it allows the feelings of pain to be there and to be fully experienced without being overcome or swept away by them.

Make this practice persistent so long as you are suffering from the experience of attachment, or really any form of mental anguish. It always subsides into peace, sooner or later. 

Lastly, a book I would highly recommend is The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. 

Namaste :) Much love

[lazyyogi]

We’ve been watching My Roommate Is A Cat. It’s such a cute, funny, heartening anime. Highly recommend. It will provide feels.

[lazyyogi]

“It is rather more noble to help people purely out of concern for their suffering than it is to help them because you think the Creator of the Universe wants you to do it, or will reward you for doing it, or will punish you for not doing it. The problem with this linkage between religion and morality is that it gives people bad reasons to help other human beings when good reasons are available.”

— Sam Harris

[lazyyogi]

hello! hope you are well. I have a question that I hope you maybe able to shed some light on. For the first time in my 31 years of life (since like 15), I am finally not obsessed with a person outside of myself. I have always been having intense crushes, intense relationships (most of which unhealthy), and obsessions with people and now I've been doing the work and in a state I think of nobody or fantasise of nobody and there's so much peace. Sometimes though, I also feel peace could be boredom? Maybe my nervous system is getting used to this new thing where my heart rate is not constantly racing. How do you accept that peace could sometimes feel like boredom? or is it not supposed to?

On a different note, been following your blog for a long while and I saw you recommended a book 'Go to Places that Scare You' to someone. When I was going through a rough patch I read that book over and over which really did good things to me <3 thanks so much for your work!

Hi friend!

Not many people identify dysfunctions within themselves, find methods with which to address them, and then actually follow through with those methods. It's really, really fantastic to hear how far you've come already.

No one will ever thank us for the work we do on ourselves, so I'll say it. Thank you! You're engaging in something wonderful.

One thing I like to say is: "Boredom is peace that you have rejected."

Peace is very satisfying and fulfilling in itself. So if peace starts to feel boring, it's worth asking WHO is feeling bored by peace?

It's never YOU who is feeling bored in that scenario but rather it's your compulsion to consume, to be entertained, to be distracted. There's a perfect example for this with which I think many of us can relate.

Sometimes we stay up too late instead of going to bed. We resist sleep, preferring to amuse ourselves with TV binging, doomscrolling, gaming, or other forms of diversion.

Yet once we have gone to sleep and morning comes, we resist having to wake up. The peace and comfort of sleep is so lovely and wonderful that we cling to it.

Deep sleep is a pretty decent approximation of deep peace. To the restless consumption-driven mind, deep sleep seems boring and uninteresting. It's useful to contemplate this contrast.

Peace lacks nothing. Your fundamental essence lacks nothing. But right now you are in a process. You are only just discovering what happens when we stop trying to fill that hole inside us and instead allow something not of this world to shine through it. It's a process and at times your old tendencies will come back. They'll be weaker than before but also more subtle and sneaky. When peace starts to feel boring, this is part of that process.

I'm so glad that you found The Places That Scare You to be useful! And again I am impressed. Few people bother to read what I recommend, let alone over and over 😅

So let me recommend another book that may help with this process. Well, more an author than a book. I would suggest you read anything by Judith Blackstone. You can look her up on Amazon and see which of her books appeal most to you. My favorite is The Fullness of the Ground but there are many options. Belonging Here is such a beautiful and helpful one as well.

Thanks so much for being a reader. Feel free to reach out again to let me know how things go for you and to share where the process took you.

Much love!

LY

[lazyyogi]

Spectrum of Emotional Alchemy

Level 1: Your negative emotions no longer overwhelm you. You are the larger space within which emotions play.

Level 2: You no longer cling to negative emotions. Your mind doesn’t tune into the energetic frequency of your emotions, trying to fight or justify or win.

Level 3: You no longer cling to positive emotions. Your ability to rejoice for others increases and your capacity for jealousy decreases.

Level 4: Awareness as the background space of emotion shifts toward the foreground. Emotions lose their state-like quality.

Level 5: Glass-like embodiment of/as awareness shining with uncaused loving-kindness.

[lazyyogi]

Ultimately, prayer is contact with reality.

Prayer is about opening up—psychologically, emotionally, attentively, and intuitively.

When we engage in prayer, we empty our hearts and minds. In doing so, we make the heart-mind available to receive.

It is Vulnerable. But also Venerable.

Knowing that we live in ignorance, prayer becomes a practice in which we touch reality and allow reality to touch us. That reality may be called truth, divinity, awareness, or something else entirely.

Sometimes we ask for help when we pray—healing, blessing, the strength to overcome an obstacle or to endure a hardship.

Sometimes we ask for guidance.

If done correctly—with the right balance of heart sincerity and openness of attention—it doesn’t matter to whom you pray.

What matters is that you know how to listen without preconception or expectation. Then you will receive.

[lazyyogi]

Loving and being loved are two very different things.

If someone loves you but you are somehow shut off, depressed, or unable to receive it, then no matter how much they love you, you will not feel it.

Yet if you love someone, regardless of whether or not they accept it, you will feel filled with love. 

That difference highlights the fact that love is a non-dual phenomenon. Love doesn’t require two people, or a subject and object.

It requires just one heart. 

Whenever it seems like love is disappearing from your life, be that in the form of a breakup or a series of unfortunate events, don’t struggle to impose your preferences onto the situation. Don’t strive to satisfy your insecurity. 

Instead, use the opportunity to uncover the real abode of love, the timeless radiance within your beating heart. 

It’s not easy and it’s not painless, but really there is no other choice.

Love shines from the placeless, timeless, sourceless source within.

So long as you require someone or something external to give you permission to access and commune with the source of love, you will be in unnecessary bondage.

But by learning to bear your heart, to allow it to break open, you can uncover the very abode of consciousness. 

LY

[lazyyogi]

If you read this, do one of these things:

1. Sit for a meditation. 2. Make a cup of tea. 3. Smile at a stranger. 4. Give spare change/food to the next homeless person you see. 5. Put on your current jam and dance. 6. Think of someone you are grateful for and then tell them. 7. Pray. 8. Do a yoga sesh. 9. Light some incense and dedicate its fragrance to making the world more beautiful. 10. Laugh until it’s real. 11. Eat something nourishing. 12. Take a luxurious bath and tell the outside world to fuck off for a little while. 13. Watch a documentary. 14. Read some of a book. 15. Write a poem about this moment. 16. Go for a walk and find a nifty rock. 17. Learn an origami trick you can do with a dollar bill. 18. Practice reiki. 19. Draw a tarot card. 20. Clean your room. 21. Take a thorough exhale and deep inhale. 22. Apologize to yourself for something. 23. Thank yourself for something. 24. Start a journal or write in your journal. 25. Take a nap.

[lazyyogi]

Don’t let the concept of fulfillment obscure your innate fullness.

Not a single thing outside yourself and outside this moment can make you any more whole than you are already.

To discover the truth of this for yourself is where your path lies.

[lazyyogi]

Gotta say, I agree with this 100%.

Solid insight. Very solid.

[lazyyogi]

Me to my non-binary patient the morning after endonasal brain surgery: How would you like to be addressed? I usually greet my patients as Ms or Mister.

My patient: I really don’t care 👀

Somehow this left me even more uncertain 😅

[lazyyogi]

When you know who you are, you don’t look to the world to tell you.

Concordantly, you do not fear what others may see when they gaze upon you.

The knowledge of yourself as you truly are is your liberation.

[lazyyogi]

The mind unconsciously loves problems because they give you an identity of sorts. This is normal, and it is insane.

“Problem” means that you are dwelling on a situation mentally without there being a true intention or possibility of taking action now and that you are unconsciously making it part of your sense of self.

You become so overwhelmed by your life situation that you lose your sense of life, of Being. Or you are carrying in your mind the insane burden of a hundred things that you will or may have to do in the future instead of focusing your attention on the one thing that you can do now.

Eckhart Tolle

[lazyyogi]

Getting to wear scrubs to work every day is amazing. It’s like living in monk robes or karate gi. On the few occasions I have to wear a suit, my body feels so stiff by the end of the day.

The range of motion in scrubs is so ninja 🥷

[lazyyogi]

The mind unconsciously loves problems because they give you an identity of sorts. This is normal, and it is insane.

“Problem” means that you are dwelling on a situation mentally without there being a true intention or possibility of taking action now and that you are unconsciously making it part of your sense of self.

You become so overwhelmed by your life situation that you lose your sense of life, of Being. Or you are carrying in your mind the insane burden of a hundred things that you will or may have to do in the future instead of focusing your attention on the one thing that you can do now.

Eckhart Tolle

[lazyyogi]

Hey LY, do you have anything else thoughts/feelings about transcendental meditation?

I've never tried it and I am not familiar with the technique, so I can't really comment on it. The one thing I will say is that the people who do like the practice seem to do a good job at sticking to it over time.

I'd love to hear anyone's experiences with it though!

LY

[lazyyogi]

How do you justify the usage of western medicine for yourself as a spiritual person?

Well firstly, I am not a spiritual person. So I am in no way obligated to hold the beliefs and perspectives shared by the people who call themselves such.

I have not turned spirituality into a personal identity. That is a new age western phenomenon, where certain material beliefs are enfolded into the notion of being a spiritual person.

I am a spiritual practitioner. I practice meditation and engage in spiritual practices with the intent of enlightenment/self-realization. Such a path focuses on uprooting the illusions created by misidentification (ego identity) in order to realize the reality that is the very basis of your, and all, existence.

Secondly, I am a surgeon who practices evidence-based medicine. If you or a loved one is gravely ill, has cancer, or has been subjected to serious physical injuries, would you rather have medical treatment guided by beliefs or by the best available evidence? You have the personal autonomy to decide your own medical care for yourself. I know which route I would choose.

In India, western medicine lives alongside Ayurveda and other alternative/complimentary medicine systems just fine. My guru Shri Shiva Ruda Balayogi, an enlightened human, highly regards the practice of medical sciences and when his body requires it he accepts medical treatment.

It's always been funny to me that rejection of western medicine is a point of overlap in the US between Alt Right and spiritual subcultures.

Having studied these sciences for over a decade now, what I can tell you is that they are immensely complex and can often surprise you. We look back at what was standard practice 100 years ago and think "My god, how could they have done that? What were they thinking?". And 40-50 years from now, someone will be saying the same thing about us.

The practice of medicine evolves with our scientific understanding and capabilities. Which is why now we place emphasis on evidence-based medicine. Beginning in medical school and continuing through residency and beyond, we are trained to read up on the latest studies, to identify their limitations, biases, and flaws, and to elicit the significant findings that may improve the way we treat our patients.

The public outside of the medical field believes that all studies are super expensive and the only ones who can fund them are big pharma. I am currently conducting a study about the treatment of chronic rhinosinusitis, an inflammatory disease typically treated with intranasal steroid sprays. We are studying the use of a humming yogic breathing technique for patients with this disease. So far big pharma has not tried to off me 😂

The idea for the study came when I read about a scientific discovery regarding the release of nitric oxide from the paranasal sinuses during humming. I recalled yogic breathing techniques that utilize humming and I wanted to study this further. Since I know how to design and conduct studies, I proceeded to do just that.

Funding? Don't need any. Therefore if the evidence supports it, I will include yogic breathing techniques in my medical practice for my patients. I will recommend the best and safest available methods to provide healing for my patients and together we will enact a plan that most aligns with their preferences and needs.

A wonderful thing about evidence-based medicine is that it will support the use of alternative and complimentary medical practices if there is sufficient evidence. We have already begun to incorporate things like Manuka honey, dietary supplements, and acupuncture into our practice of western medicine.

So I guess this was a roundabout way of saying I don't need to justify the use of western medicine, I just need to explain what it actually means and it will speak for itself.

Approaching your medical treatment with a healthy dose of skepticism is a good thing--medical practices should be able to stand up to critical evaluation. But the abundance of misinformation that lead some to outright rejection of modern medicine is always disappointing.

Much love.

LY