Brahmacharya: Walking In Our Highest Self

Let's explore the yogic yama: BRAHMACHARYA. "To walk in the path of Brahma". Imagine listening within and choosing your most expansive path. What would this feel like? To live the wisdom you deeply know is true. Let's chat about what's possible. Part 4 of The Yogic Path Series

Transcript

So today we are doing our fourth session of our Yogic Path in the Light series.

And this is all based in the eight limbs of yoga.

And the first limb of yoga are the Yamas and the Yamas are restraints.

And today's Yama,

Today's Yama,

I feel like I'm on Sesame Street.

This show is brought to you by the number two.

Today's all about Brahmacharya.

And Brahmacharya essentially means doing things that bring us closer to Brahma,

Brahman.

And it's often been interpreted as celibacy or chastity.

So people will often say,

Oh,

No,

No,

I don't do that because I'm a Brahmacharian.

And that there are times when this word is used in that way.

But that's not actually the meaning of it in terms of the Yama.

Because the thing about a yogic path,

We've often thought that a yogic path is an ascetic path.

Ascetic,

I'm just going to spell it for because I know not everybody is English isn't everyone's first language.

I still didn't spell it right.

Anyway,

Ascetic means when you cut yourself off from all pleasure,

All sex,

All food,

You just basically just eat rice,

You just do this,

You focus within,

Because the path is within.

And so we don't want to have anything to do with our senses,

All that kind of thing.

There's a lot of training around pratyahara,

The discipline of releasing the senses so that we can focus inside,

Which is a whole other discussion,

A very interesting one.

But to really,

That's not the point.

The yogic path,

Although many famous yogis were ascetics,

And they were celibate,

And they were brahmacharyas,

That is not what the yogic path is.

That's just one way that people have chosen.

It's a great way.

It's not my way,

But it's a great way.

And it is a yogic path.

But if we look at yoga in general,

Yoga is simply a science that helps us become human,

To become fully human,

To become whole,

To yoke together,

To bring together the divine and the physical,

To bring together all of who we are.

Because for whatever reason,

Over the last couple millennia,

It's like this being has been pulled apart.

And then all of our focus goes in a million directions.

And we just sort of clip clop through our days.

And we're just sort of running on adrenal power.

And we're like,

Okay,

Well,

What will I do today?

And we even have words like,

How will I spend my time?

Will that really let the time go by fast?

We're so disconnected from our soul,

From actually the fact that we're alive.

We're on some level trying to make time go faster.

And I understand having a boring job or doing something you don't want to do,

I get it.

But these are still moments we're alive.

In theory,

We may not be alive forever.

Why are we wasting time spending time?

Why are we doing that?

And one of the reasons is one of the reasons is our focus is so split.

It is so all over the place,

Whether it's worry or fear,

Or things from the past,

Things about the future,

Things about ourselves,

We're not even connected to ourselves.

And this is where they'll say,

One of the ways to bring ourselves back together is to release our addiction to our sensory pleasure.

And this doesn't mean to get rid of sensory pleasure.

That means to get rid of the power of its control.

If we are literally drawn to this,

And to this,

And to this,

And to this,

And to this,

And to this,

Without any rhyme or reason,

We're no different than the person working 16 hours a day for the boss.

Because we're a slave to our own sensory desires.

And we still wake up tired.

And we're still not present.

Because as long as we're doing this,

We're thinking about the next fix,

We're thinking about the next thing.

We're just obsessed with it.

And this is really,

Really important to understand that I think someone in there,

Yeah,

Zorba the Buddha.

Zorba the Buddha to me is like the ultimate tantric path.

Tantra and yoga are very different,

Actually,

In a lot of ways.

But for me,

They're the same.

So they're not the same.

But for me,

The truth of them are the same.

The goals are the same.

So Zorba the Buddha,

Zorba the Greek,

Great story of Zorba who whined women in song,

Right,

All about the sensory pleasures.

But Osho used to teach that what we really want in Tantra or spiritual practice is to become Zorba the Buddha.

That yes,

We enjoy this absolutely gorgeous world we live in.

We enjoy the sights and the sounds and the amazing tastes and the pleasure.

And we enjoy all these.

But we do it with the presence of the Buddha.

We're centered.

We're not at the whim of those sensory pleasures.

Because as soon as,

As soon as you're at the whim of the pleasure,

Not only are you controlled by it,

Because it's all you think about,

And we obsess about,

We become addicted to.

And this is a real thing,

Which is why we're going to talk about sex in a minute.

Because when it becomes all we think about,

We don't see anything else.

And that is where we aren't living a full human life.

When everything becomes about this one thing.

And then suddenly,

If all you want is this thing,

Yeah,

It just,

What are you doing?

And what's interesting is when we understand what Brahman means,

If it's possible to understand what Brahman means,

This is like saying we're going to understand God,

Or we're going to understand consciousness,

Or we're going to understand galactic presence,

Like it's not actually within our ability to understand.

But the teachings of Brahman,

Very simply,

Very loosely,

Is that it's that omnipotence of God,

That all things are Brahman.

Every single blade of grass,

Every mountain,

Every person,

Every experience,

Every bit of everything is Brahman.

So now all of a sudden,

If you want to merge with something,

If we have this human desire to merge,

This human desire to merge,

We can merge with the sunset,

We can merge with a good book,

We can merge sexually with another human,

We can merge with a walk in the sunshine,

Just completely permeated by nature and beautiful warmth.

This merging with Brahman is possible in all aspects of our life.

But if we become hyper-focused on one aspect,

We're going to miss the other 99.

99% of the human experience.

So this is where Brahmacaryans,

They tend,

The first thing they do considering our society is okay,

If we're going to start controlling our senses,

We should probably start with our sexual desires.

Because as a society,

We are so obsessed with not only sex,

But coupling in general,

Just coupling that I must have a partner or else I'm just single.

I am not whole because I haven't got a couple.

And this pull to do this can be such an obsession.

It can literally be,

If we're single,

We think about where will I find someone?

How come I can't find someone?

What's wrong with me?

How come blah,

Blah,

Blah?

What if I do find someone and they hurt me like the last person?

Or what if I find someone and they don't really like me like I like them?

And like,

Okay,

Well,

If I find,

Maybe I should go to the gym and I should get more pumped and I should get stronger and I should lose some weight and I should dye my hair and I should make sure I look really young.

And I should,

Oh,

Maybe I should get bigger boobs and I wish I had a bigger penis and I wish I had a smaller bum and I wish I was taller.

Like it's this absolute obsession with coupling.

Like all of that is all about just how do I become sexually attractive?

And it is so insidious.

It's in the advertising,

It's in the movies,

It's in the TV shows,

Everything.

Like remember when before I ever watched Moana,

The,

It's a,

I don't know if it's Pixar,

I don't know if it's Disney or what it is.

But one of the first things someone told me is what they loved the most about the movie Moana is there was a woman and there was a guy.

But the end part,

The end,

You know,

The end point wasn't that they got together.

The point was that she found herself and he found himself.

That was the story.

It's a brilliant movie.

I've watched it like eight times.

I love Moana so much.

But it was so strange for a Disney movie not to tell us whatever you do,

Focus on the coupling.

This is your primary role in life.

If you haven't got the person,

You haven't found your prince,

Princess,

Whatever you want to call them.

This is the most important thing.

This is always the end of the movie.

We must focus on this.

So important.

And of course you come from that and so it comes down into this primal desire to connect with another in that way.

This is so much a part of our society for the last,

For as long as we've got maybe recorded history.

It's also the ultimate distraction from being a complete human.

And in no way am I saying that there's something unhealthy about coupling or intimacy or anything like that.

God knows,

I think it's one of the most beautiful ways to experience being human.

But so is hanging out and doing jigsaw puzzles with your kids.

And so is swimming in the ocean.

There are so many amazing ways to experience pleasure and joy in life.

And because we've been so heavily trained,

But this is the most important one.

Like this is the one,

Right?

It's better,

Right?

It's like having sex is better than doing jigsaw puzzles with your kids,

Right?

It's like,

No,

Not if you're paying attention.

Not if you are fully immersed in whatever you're doing and enjoying it 100%.

That is the path of yoga.

That is the path of tantra.

That's why tantra is not just about sex.

Tantra is about literally merging with the world all the time.

I make love like I talk to you guys.

I make love like I hang out with my friends packing my house.

It's all the same.

It's all how we bring ourselves to every single part of our life.

And that's the beauty of brahmacharya.

And of course this is a yama.

So there's two parts of the limbs of yoga.

Well,

There's eight.

There's eight,

Eight.

There's eight limbs.

One is the yamas,

The restraints,

And one are the niyamas,

What we move towards.

So brahmacharya could be something we move towards,

But there's a yama,

There's a niyama that lets us sort of expand into that God space,

Into that infinite space.

This is a restraint.

So brahmacharya says,

When you are drawn excessively to any sensory pleasure,

Be careful.

Just be aware.

What's going on here?

Why am I having the extra piece of pizza when my body isn't hungry?

When we sit on the middle path,

When we walk on the middle path,

The middle path is our truth.

It is our satya.

It is my highest path.

And if I want pizza,

Because I'm going to have pizza later,

Obviously to feed everybody who helps me move later.

If I have one piece of pizza,

It's like,

Oh,

So delicious.

Two pieces of pizza,

That might feel good too.

But what if I'm actually finished?

Because remember,

This is the path to God.

This is the path to our highest self,

Our clearest self.

And this is a weird thing to talk about in terms of pieces of pizza.

But if I have this much,

This is still in line with who I am.

This is still in line with me,

Perhaps on that day.

I might have the third piece,

Because I'm just my eyes are bigger than my mouth or my eyes are bigger than my stomach,

Right?

It's like,

Oh,

That would be good.

I'm not checking in with me anymore.

I'm not checking in with satya.

I'm not checking in with truth.

I just kind of want to eat that pizza.

And then maybe I have a training that says,

Well,

You can't let anything go to waste.

And it's not going to be that good in the morning.

So you should probably eat that one too.

Well now what's happened?

You ate the pizza.

You ate way more than you really wanted.

And now your body has to spend all this extra energy digesting it.

You feel kind of crappy,

You feel kind of tired.

You're not going to read that great book later.

You're not going to do all the things you want to do because you're exhausted.

And your body has to spend all this energy.

That's the problem.

There was nothing wrong with eating pizza.

The problem was I had all these programs that said,

Oh,

I'm going to have another one and I'm going to have another one.

And now I'm a slave to some weird desire for the taste of pizza or I'm a slave to some training that said,

You know,

There's starving kids somewhere in the world.

And it's like,

I'm no longer on my path.

I'm no longer in my highest vibration because I just did something that's taking me out.

And it could be anything.

It could be drinking coffee.

Whether we think coffee is good or bad for us,

That's a whole other question.

But if I wake up and I have a cup of coffee and it's right in line and it just feels like in Dutch,

We would say like,

Gesellek,

You know,

Like it's just like so.

The difference between having that cup of coffee and having five more that day,

It's totally going to take me off my path for me,

Maybe not for you,

But for me,

Because I'm going to be like,

What happens to me is it's almost like it creates so much vata energy in my brain,

So much energetic energy.

It's like I make myself crazy thinking about things.

I just suddenly all this energy is flying up in my brain and I'm just like thinking about things like that don't need to be thought about.

And they certainly don't need to be thought of at that speed.

Not today.

So I'm no longer on my path because all my energy is flying through my neural cortex doing nonsense things.

It's not being joyful.

It's not enjoying life.

It's not doing anything.

Just wasting energy.

And that is the predominant teaching of brahmacharya is the right use of energy.

So you imagine you have a path to take and not like some path you have to take.

This is your most joyful path.

This is your highest,

Most exalted,

Fun,

Pleasurable light path for you.

And you have this energy to spend to get there.

How are we going to spend it?

This is brahmacharya.

Brahmacharya says if you find yourself funneling all that energy into something that is not taking you closer to Brahman,

Closer to your imagine you feeling close to Brahman means you are feeling connected to the entire universe.

You are experiencing the consciousness of Brahman.

If this obsession is taking you away from this expansive experience,

Beware.

Be careful of that.

Pull back and redirect your path.

So it's the same thing even in terms of sexual intimacy.

So if you imagine the middle path is sometimes I have beautiful,

Nourishing intimacy with others.

Sometimes I have none at all.

And it's fantastic.

There's no attachment one way or the other.

It's just yes,

When it's nourishing and it feeds me and it takes me forward on my path,

Wonderful.

And if that's not there,

Then there's a million other things to enjoy in this world.

The challenge is how much energy do we waste because this is a restraint.

How much energy do we waste maybe even having sex that isn't nourishing?

Thinking about,

So maybe you're in a relationship and we're kind of still we're back to that weird obsession that we have to be in relationship.

I have to stay this.

I have to make this work.

I have to whatever.

Just think of the energy spent in our brains chewing up relationships,

Chewing up the drama,

Chewing up past relationships,

Chewing up the future,

Everything.

How do I do this?

What do I say?

I do that,

Like it's just like talk about a complete waste of energy.

And what does this waste of energy do?

It steals it from actually experiencing our highest path.

So it's really,

Really,

Really interesting that even if you are in a relationship,

If you are sexually active,

What is the intimacy like?

Is it nourishing?

Is it exhausting?

Is it something you don't like?

And again,

It doesn't mean don't do it.

It just means watch,

Observe.

Can you make a change?

Can you make it so that it is nourishing?

Can you do it less often so that it's kind of more joy in one place?

What can you do?

It's just a restraint that says,

Let's get back on path.

Let's get back onto the path that we really want to be on.

I remember reading a book by Thomas Moore.

I don't know what it was called.

It was something about love.

Soulmates.

Yes,

Thank you.

And he talked about how he spent some time living in a monastery.

And in the monastery,

They did have to take a vow of chastity.

He was only in his 20s,

I think,

When he was in the monastery.

And so you imagine,

Like he's got lots of sexual energy and lots of life force flowing through him,

Looking to partner and what have you,

Pretty primal time.

And he said,

It was so interesting to take this vow of chastity,

That to be chaste didn't mean that you weren't alive or that you weren't allowed or all that.

You just simply chose to direct your energy in other ways.

And he said it was so powerful,

Because he said suddenly,

Food tasted different.

It was richer.

He said he would go out and he would paint.

And like all of that energy that was once being focused on the desire to procreate or the desire to couple was now fully merging with the canvas and his paintbrush.

And he said,

The joy he experienced in that time of chastity was epic.

And I love that.

I love redefining the word chastity.

I love understanding it in a way that actually improves our quality of life.

And what was really beautiful is he extended it out.

And he said,

You know,

If you still continue to choose a life of chastity outside of a monastery or outside of a vow or something like that,

Again,

It wouldn't mean that you didn't have sex.

It just meant that you weren't obsessed with it.

If you had it or you didn't have it,

It didn't pull you one way or the other.

Unless something inside you called you and went,

Oh,

Let's do that.

This is a nourishing,

Beautiful experience.

It's funny that we always talk about we always call sex soup on here.

Because in many ways,

It should be nourishing like that.

It should actually leave us nourished and a little bit more whole and a little more connected to the universe.

This is the true power of intimacy.

So it's a very,

Very interesting thing.

So this idea of chastity is right along the line of this brahmacharya to actually live in that middle path.

And if we ever find ourselves being pulled,

Just be aware.

It's really interesting to notice where our energy goes.

So if you imagine that this is,

Yeah,

There's two parts of it,

Actually.

There's one part is actually understanding the right use of energy.

And the other part of it is walking in God consciousness.

And you can reinterpret that however,

Whatever makes sense to you.

But so you imagine,

My desire is to walk in God consciousness.

And again,

This is not aloof or pious,

Or cold or anything.

This is literally being aware of the absolute bliss before us in all aspects of life.

So in order to do that,

We're also aware of where our energy is going.

So where does our energy go?

Forgetting about the sex piece.

But does it go to worry?

Am I worrying about that person?

Am I worrying about something in the future?

Worry is a massive thing.

Someone once described worry as sitting on a rocking chair.

And you're rocking and you're rocking and you think you're doing something,

But you're not going anywhere.

It's a waste of energy.

So it's very,

And this is Brahmacharya would say,

Observe when your mind starts to worry.

Observe when your mind is having arguments with people in your brain.

Watch that,

Because you are spending energy outside of that.

And you're taking this huge experience,

Funneling it into something that is actually completely useless.

Like it's completely useless.

It's really interesting to know that this helps.

In a very modern sense,

The things that funnel our energy.

It's so curious.

I like to scan Facebook.

I like to look on TikTok every so often.

But imagine saying to yourself,

What if I just check Facebook once a day?

Kind of sat down with a cup of tea,

Scrolled through some stuff,

And then closed it and didn't open it up again.

What if I got a kick out of dog videos on TikTok?

And like my son,

He loves D&D Dungeons and Dragons on TikTok.

Close it.

There's a big difference between sitting down and spending 20 minutes watching some fun videos on TikTok,

As opposed to if anyone hears on TikTok,

That's not how it goes.

Because the algorithm is designed in the opposite of Brahmacharya to say,

Whatever we do,

We want to keep you here even though you're doing nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

And so suddenly,

You look up and two hours have gone by and it's just something to note,

Just to go,

Hmm,

I don't really want to do that.

And again,

This is why it's important to have not only just the Yama,

But to say,

Because I really want to experience all of life.

What if I didn't do that and I gave myself a foot massage instead?

What if I didn't do that and I went for a walk instead?

Or I read a book to find something else that actually brings us further on our path.

It could be checking email.

I don't have email on my phone intentionally,

Because I don't want it dinging all day long.

And it's normally work.

So I want it on my computer that I can close it and open it,

Maybe once,

Twice a day,

Max.

Because it just will,

I can almost feel my energy getting frittered away.

And then I completely lose track of me.

Well,

Not just Katrina,

But this whole self,

This whole divine self,

The physical self,

Everything,

I lose track of all of it.

So brahmacharya is a really beautiful application in life.

Like it's a real way to feel happy and be energized in life.

And that's why it's a restraint to just sort of say,

Because why does Facebook and TikTok and Instagram draw so deeply?

It's all sensory stimulation.

That's all it is.

It's a fun song.

Oh,

Look what they're doing to that fun song.

Oh,

Look what that dog did.

Oh,

Look,

Look,

Look,

Look,

Look,

Look,

Look,

Look.

It's all sensory stimulation.

And this is where brahmacharyas say,

Withdraw those senses,

Not forever,

But in order to release the domination it has over us so that we choose.

I mean,

I'm a tantric.

The last thing in the world I would ever want is to not enjoy these amazing senses that we have.

But it's easy to this,

That scale can tip and suddenly they rule us.

The food rules us,

The coffee rules us,

Everything rules us,

The sex rules us,

The Instagram rules us,

The comfort of I have to have comfort,

That rules me,

Everything rules me.

And they no longer rule us,

We kind of feel like we're walking straight down our path.

It's a whole other world.

And suddenly we're able to have God consciousness because we're actually upright.

We're actually aligned vertically.

And we get to look around and go,

What an amazing world we live in.

But we're not pulled off balance by anything.

One great tool for brahmacharya is fasting.

And it can be anything.

It could be a social media fast.

It could be celibacy.

It could literally be not eating one day a week.

And it is an amazing thing if you fast one day a week,

How you notice how addicted you are to the pleasure of food.

And not just in a,

Of course,

We love the pleasure of food.

But it's almost like a dependency that,

Wow,

It's not just the food,

It's the comfort,

It's the,

I don't know,

When I wake up in a bad mood,

Or when I'm bored,

Or like you work at home,

It's so easy to keep going to the fridge.

What if you were fasting that day?

You would have to confront yourself.

All of a sudden,

We have to look within and go,

Okay,

It's not that big a deal.

You're not even hungry.

What is the obsession with going and grabbing a snack?

And then what's going to happen?

You're going to have to go for a walk.

Or you're going to have to meditate.

Or you're going to have to do something.

And then you learn something interesting about some obsession.

It's one of the reasons that,

You know,

If you quit smoking,

Or we quit anything,

Cold turkey tends to be the best way.

Because it helps us actually feel what it is.

It helps us feel our obsession.

And we go and then all of a sudden,

We have consciousness of the obsession,

Which before we would have told people,

Oh,

No,

I could quit anytime.

It's not an addiction.

It's not a problem.

I can quit anytime.

Until you fast and you realize,

Okay,

It's got some hooks in me.

Son of a gun.

I've got to look at that.

It's not some weird character flaw.

It's like,

Literally,

This is why there's a yogic path to help us get back on path.

So fasting is a huge,

Huge part of the brahmacharya path in all ways,

Whatever it is.

There's so many cool things like there's all these sensory deprivation tanks now,

Where you can float in water,

And just allow all the senses to not be there.

And I've not done them,

But my sister does them.

And she absolutely loves them.

And she's super chatty and super into everything.

And she said the peace and the joy she feels inside.

And this is the interesting thing about brahmacharya is that when we restrain ourselves from these obsessions,

It's real joy.

It's not some weird guru joy or some weird yogic joy because they don't have any other joys.

It's real bliss inside.

And then imagine that you have all this bliss inside because you've released yourself of the obsession.

And then you get to spend time with someone,

Or then you go and have a beautiful meal.

Think how much differently that tastes.

It's an amazing,

Amazing teaching.

The other thing I wanted to mention was that sometimes it feels like when we are taking all these things away,

That we're not what are we left with?

If I take away all these sensory pleasures,

What am I left with?

And kind of back to the story of the of the sensory deprivation tank.

Our true nature is joy.

Our true nature is Brahman.

Our true nature is lying on the grass and smelling the lilacs and watching the bumblebees.

That's our nature.

So when we release all the excessive distractions,

That's when we actually come into joy.

We don't need to add joy into our life.

We don't need to have that thing.

We don't need to have the chocolate or the sex to be joyful.

We're already joyful beyond measure.

And this is the whole point of Brahman,

Advaita Vedanta,

All these great teachings that say it's right here.

It's everywhere.

It's everywhere we look.

We just have to merge with it.

So it's kind of cool to be able to strip everything away and be left with pure bliss.

Thank you so much for being here.

I hope you have a wonderful day.

Reviews

I keep coming back to this and it always has something for me.

Excellent commentary on bramacharia! I'm studying for my teacher certification and your talks on the 8 limbs of yoga have really helped me! Thank you! ❤️ 🙏

You speak to me. I’m ready to confront my obsessions.
I am Joy - obsessions are a distraction. Thank you, Namaste

Great series,teachings,insights &more❣️
Thsnk you so kindly❣️✨️⚛️⚘️☄️☮️✨️🙏🏼🖤🌸

Randomly came across this first thing this morning and soooo needed the reminder. 🙏🏼☀️🥰

Brahmacharya and Tantra explained as pizza slices and TikTok hours… (!) Your talks are always the most insightful, funny, and eminently listenable…. thank you.
Could you please recommend some further reading on Tantric thought but presented in a similar kind of modern vein?

So wonderful to have found you Katrina. I have listened to just about everything you have posted both here and on YouTube. You are wonderful and insightful and I love hearing what you share. Thank you so much for bringing lightness to my being. Paula x

Very helpful, especially for someone in a 12-step program.