Love Only One: Radiance Sutras Verse 39

During this session, we discuss Verse 39 of the Yukti Verses from the 'Radiance Sutras', a translation of the Vijanana Bhairava Tantra by Lorin Loche. A meditation follows our discussion. These sessions are recorded on a weekly basis and all are welcome.

Transcript

So today we are reading from the Radiant Sutras.

It's a beautiful book by Lauren Roche.

And this is a translation of the Vijnana by Rava Tantra.

And Vijnana means many things.

It means wisdom.

That's my favorite interpretation of it.

And it's the wisdom of the soul,

The wisdom of the universe.

It's a deep wisdom.

It's almost that when you close your eyes and that wisdom that you know,

That you can't even explain,

But it informs all your choices.

You know,

You might make a decision and all you know is there's a knowing inside of you that helps you know that this is true.

This is right.

This is the right path.

This is Vijnana.

By Rava,

It has many meanings.

It's the kind of the place where duality and oneness meet.

It's sort of when they come together.

Sometimes it means terrifying,

But it's also this amazing place where us in our physical lives and our duality meet the oneness.

And Tantra actually means book or study.

And so the Vijnana by Rava Tantra is the book of the inherent wisdom within us.

So how we wanna read these sutras is we wanna read them or listen to them from that deep knowing place.

Everybody here has a million things going on in their lives.

We may have all these different irons in the fire,

All these things that we're doing.

And even if we're not doing a lot of things,

Our minds will be very busy thinking about this and thinking about that and wondering about that and hoping about that and worrying about that.

You know,

Our minds are very,

Very busy one way or the other.

But within all of that flurry,

We all have this quiet center.

And that's where we wanna listen from.

And that's really what we're accessing when we're reading these sutras.

And when we listen to them,

We allow ourselves to experience something that kind of weaves itself into our consciousness and then it changes us as we go out into the world.

And that's really interesting.

I've talked before that sometimes when we're hurting,

Sometimes we're hurt because something big happened that we actually were really traumatized.

But sometimes we're hurt by a million paper cuts,

All these tiny little things that harmed us.

And we don't even know what they are anymore.

You were to say,

Well,

How come you don't trust people or how come you don't believe that you'll ever get ahead in life?

You don't really remember.

It might have just been a million little things that happened in your childhood and in school and in work and in relationships.

To me,

Listening to these sutras and talking about them and having meditations about them,

Which is what we'll do,

Is like the opposite.

That these little moments of reweaving us together,

Like the opposite of the paper cut,

Just to reweave some part of our psyche back together and then that has a lovely ripple effect on our minds and our bodies.

And then bit by bit,

Again,

I always recommend buying this book.

I have nothing to do with it.

I'm not an affiliate for Lauren or anything like that.

It's my favorite tantra book.

It's my favorite book to have by your bedside.

And you just read one of the sutras and you let it nourish you.

And every day,

Just a little nourishment that just sort of fills us up and makes us a little bit better.

And what's really cool is it's like when we have this one little bit that makes sense inside of us,

I swear it goes out and it finds other little places and they all start to glue together.

And then over time,

Like this to me is what I believe is a true tantric journey or a true spiritual journey.

It's these little practices,

These little truths,

These little aha moments that slowly glue us back together.

Because lots of you guys are relating in the chat to the paper cuts.

And the hardest thing is,

Is we can't fix the fact that we got the paper cut.

We can't go back and change the past.

That's not how this world's experience was designed.

It's one of my beautiful,

You know,

One of the reasons I love Viktor Frankl who wrote Man's Search for Meaning.

Because here he is coming out of the concentration camps.

Some of the most horrific experiences we could ever fathom.

And of course,

You can't spend your life wondering why it happened.

And you can't undo it.

And for many,

Many people,

This has been their life up until this point.

Not that drastic,

But difficult.

And as long as we keep looking backwards,

I mean,

There's a time and a place for that.

At some point,

We turn our feet around and we start walking forward.

And that's where Tantra really shines.

Because these little things,

It's from a soul place.

This is a soul's journey.

And the soul comes from an infinite,

Perfect place.

It will knit itself back together in perfection.

So that's our goal.

No pressure.

So if you're new today,

I'm gonna read a passage.

I'm reading number 39 today,

Page 74.

If you have the book,

If you don't have the book,

You don't need the book at all.

Sometimes it's better if you don't have the book because you get to really listen from your soul.

Without any visual distraction.

And then we're going to discuss it.

And then we'll do a meditation.

So let's close our eyes for a moment.

Breathe deeply.

Here we go.

Cast aside the 10,

000 things and love only one.

Don't go on to another.

Engage your lively awareness with this one focus,

One object,

One thought,

One symbol.

Now go inside.

Find the center,

The soul,

The heart.

Right here in the middle of the feeling.

Attend the blossoming.

Attention,

Vast as the sky.

What does that make you feel?

Or what thoughts do you have when you hear that?

Let go of all distraction and go within.

Attending to me to achieve more.

I hear love myself.

Focus the energy to find the soul within and then let it expand.

Own your life.

Live your true self.

Wow,

That resonates so deeply.

I was just saying yesterday that I want to narrow down the things I'm involved in and have my work be one thing I focus on.

Centering.

I've been rolling five to six different projects in my head with a gotta do attitude.

This just made me realize just one and make it great.

Permission to want what I want.

Clarity.

Loving in the present moment.

The 10,

000 things shows up in the Tao Te Ching in a similar vibration.

It's very interesting.

So in the eight limbs of yoga,

You know,

We often hear about this and we hear about the eight limbs are the yamas and the niyamas,

Which I did talks about here on Insight Timer,

All about those.

Pranayama,

Asana,

But then one of them is dharana.

Dharana is single pointed focus and that's what this is all about.

And why is it an eight limb?

Why is it one of the limbs of yoga?

Because not only when we can be 100% focused in life,

This is where we're happy.

There is nothing more blissful than being 100% focused on something you love doing and nobody interrupts you.

Because what happens?

What happens when you get to fully focus on something?

You lose yourself in it.

When you get to sit with a great book,

Just you and the book,

Nothing else,

Not even a cup of tea,

Just you and the book,

What happens?

Your soul practically dives into the book and you float in eternity.

You float in this beautiful,

Deep space.

So on a really practical level,

Because I believe the eight limbs of yoga are very practical.

I do not believe they are airy fairy things you only do on the mat.

When we can live our life,

When we can practice single pointed focus and not allow our mind to get pulled off all the time,

We'll feel very accomplished because everything we do,

We will do 100%.

Osho used to define karma as unfinished business.

And so anything you do in your life,

If you only do it 50%,

You will have to do it again.

Maybe that time you'll do it up to 60% of your attention.

It's like if you were married and you really only put a portion of yourself into it.

Maybe you really only showed up 30%.

I don't mean just showing up,

Paying attention.

I mean,

Maybe you only gave 30% of yourself.

Well,

What's gonna happen?

You're going to repeat that pattern until one day you give 100%.

And again,

This isn't like some weird judgment of your current marriage.

I'm just saying,

Because sometimes you can only do so much because that's the partner you've chose to be with.

We can only give 40%,

We can only give 10% because that's who we are with.

And this is what's really interesting.

And so no matter,

It's like even if you,

Let's say you're renovating your house and you're painting the living room.

If you do your absolutely best job,

Like you put 100% in,

You will paint that living room and never look back.

You'll never look back.

And even if something happens,

Even if it gets scratched or even whatever,

You kind of go,

Well,

I gave my all,

It's all good.

There's no weird clip-clop karma after you.

But if you kind of only did a half-assed job,

Every time you walk through,

You're like,

Oh,

I should have done that.

On the one hand,

This total focus makes life happy.

It makes life joyful.

This sutra takes it one step further.

When you can have this singular focus,

That singular focus on the one thing,

Not only will you be blissful,

That one thing will expand.

That one thing will suddenly reveal its depth.

If we are always skipping from one thing to the next and one thing to the next,

We only go so deep.

But what's wild,

If you just stay still,

You really get to plumb the depths.

You really get to find out what's there.

In the back of his book,

He always has a beautiful commentary on each sutra.

And Lauren's commentary on this one,

He likened this to loving someone.

And now,

I am not making a statement here about monogamy versus polyamory or anything like that.

So,

Let's just state that first as last.

But let's say you find someone and you love them.

You love them and you just are all in.

And again,

I don't wanna bring in if I've fallen in love with a narcissist or a sociopath or anything like that.

Let's assume it's a healthy love.

And here's this one person and you love them.

The Tantric path says to see the divine in that person.

What does that mean?

What does it mean to see the divine in another person?

Do I see them as Shiva?

Do I see them as Aphrodite?

Do I create some caricature of a divine entity?

What does it mean?

What does divine mean?

Divinity is the infinite space we come out of.

This is the infinite quantum field.

This is the infinite God.

It's however you understand this.

But understand that it's infinite.

To look into your partner's eyes and see the infinite nature of them.

This is the depth.

This is where if you desire this kind of Tantric connection with someone,

You look deeply into them.

And if you stay singularly focused like they're saying in this sutra,

Their depths will continue to reveal themselves to you.

And you'll go deeper and deeper and deeper.

And you will forever be exploring this other person.

This is why like we talk about Tantric intimacy.

Tantric intimacy isn't a set of postures or positions.

It's not a set of tricks to give someone pleasure.

It's the act of being intimate with someone in a way that you are always exploring the infinite nature of this other being.

Every time you're together,

It's what else is possible in this amazing being that I get to be with?

Who is this person?

Why do we eye gaze?

Why do we do that?

Because this is an infinite person sitting in front of you.

This is a divine being,

Incarnate,

Just like you.

Can you imagine that kind of focus?

And sometimes we even have all these programs that rise.

It's like,

I can't be that focused.

I can't lose myself in them.

Well,

Why not?

And I'm not talking about codependency and all that.

Like we have to get rid of all of our relationship baggage.

I'm talking about,

I am a healthy person on a spiritual path.

This person is a healthy person on a spiritual path.

These things don't apply to mad dysfunction.

And if we can picture the truth,

If we can picture a possibility,

Then our soul can gently move towards it.

And as we move towards it,

What doesn't fit will fall away.

You know,

We don't have to get rid of things.

We just have to move towards truth.

We have to move towards our soul's potential.

So as I imagine this 100% focus on this other person,

You think to yourself,

Well,

But what about everybody else?

Aren't you limiting yourself?

Aren't you limiting yourself just focusing on this one person?

But what if within this one person is the entire universe?

This is one of the central teachings of Tantra is that you can find the macrocosm in the microcosm.

You can find the whole universe in a rose.

You can find the whole universe in a beautiful yantra or in a candle flame.

The whole universe is in there if you just focus on it.

Well,

What in the world is within another human being?

If the whole universe is in a candle flame,

What's inside of you?

Forget about someone else.

What's inside of you?

How infinite are your thoughts and your feelings and your potential and your imagination?

But if you really go inside,

How infinite are we?

But this is one of the challenges that in life,

We seldom even allow ourselves to go that deep within ourselves.

Well,

I'm so-and-so's wife.

I'm so-and-so's husband.

I'm so-and-so's daughter.

I,

This is my job.

This is how much money I make.

This is this,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah.

And it's almost like we only ever get a quarter inch into our own self,

And then there's all the fears,

And then there's all the issues,

And then there's all the codependencies,

And all the programming,

And oh,

La,

La,

La,

La.

So this is why we practice this meditation.

This particular sutra has so many applications.

In one of the interpretations in Satyananga Saraswati's interpretation here,

He actually interprets it as,

Here,

I'll actually,

I'll read his translation to you.

So this is a direct translation.

When the mind is restrained to one object of awareness,

Casting all others aside,

And not allowing movement to take place from one to another,

Then inside that perception,

Awareness blossoms.

I'm gonna read that again.

When the mind is restrained to one object of awareness,

Casting all others aside,

And not allowing movement to take place from one to another,

Inside that perception,

Awareness blossoms.

So he's interpreting this.

Later,

He interprets this as,

If you had a guru who was very,

Very insightful,

The guru would give you a symbol,

And you would gaze upon that symbol in meditation forever.

And I don't mean you wouldn't live,

But this would become your symbol for meditation always.

And what would happen is you would gaze at the symbol for X number of minutes or hours a day.

Until you could see the whole world in that symbol.

And then that symbol becomes part of you.

It almost becomes your reference point.

As you walk through the world,

As soon as you need to be present,

Bam,

That symbol is there.

And like Pavlov's dog,

You now remember the essence of the universe.

And what's interesting is one of the things he said,

Because not all of us have that kind of guru who can give you a yantra or a symbol like that to look at.

But he did mention candlelight,

Like a candle flame.

And this is very interesting.

If you've ever tried traticum,

And traticum,

This is when you gaze upon a single object that object could be a candle flame.

It could be a rose.

It could be the clouds.

It could be the face of a guru.

It could be whatever brings you into that infinite space.

And traticum is really beautiful because essentially the way you do it is you sit with your eyes closed and you have a candle sitting and arms like the way from your head at your eye level.

And you allow your eyes to focus at your third eye point.

And when you're ready,

You open your eyes and you gaze at the candle flame.

The discipline,

The practice is exactly this.

You do not allow your mind to wander.

You come back to the candle,

Come back to the candle,

Come back to the candle,

Just like a puppy.

You know,

You're trying to train a puppy and it goes over here,

You just gently bring it back.

It's just training.

We train our mind to be single focused.

And then as soon as that,

You can almost see it in your mind's eye,

You can see the candle flame in your mind's eye,

You close your eyes and you see the candle in your third eye.

And then as soon as that starts to wane,

You open your eyes and you gaze at the candle again.

And you keep playing with this.

And you keep playing with this until this vision of the candle is in your third eye.

This does amazing things to you.

Not only have you practiced and honed the ability to have singular focus,

You have singular focus in your third eye.

Imagine what that would do as you walk through your life.

And again,

This isn't like an intellectual question.

It's like you have to feel it inside of you.

What would it feel like inside of your being to always have this candle flame in your third eye?

What does that feel like?

It's some ineffable peace,

Some indescribable awareness of the real world,

No matter what's going on around you.

So it's very interesting.

So there's a lot of different ways to look at this.

Very wild,

You mentioned this.

I was doing something similar two days ago at the beach with the waves without a candle,

But it's similar.

Just the waves as a focus when I open.

It can be anything.

It could be a painting.

It could be Michelangelo's David.

It could be anything.

It's a beautiful practice.

It could be a mountain.

I've experienced dimensions of what you speak of.

I've seen my lover's face morph into the face of a deceased ex-loved one who passed away many years ago.

I never had a chance to say goodbye.

Seeing his face was so surreal,

But joy poured into me with curiosity and comfort.

It's very interesting.

So let's say you practice this with a friend.

The next time you sit down with a friend and you have a cup of coffee and you actually sit and observe this being that you are with,

And you imagine that they have the depth that you have,

The infinite depth,

The infinite expansiveness inside of us,

It's overwhelming.

This is the Bhairava,

The terrifying aspect of life.

It's overwhelming to try to integrate the oneness and the duality.

But how good is that?

Like if there's anything we're gonna do here while we're alive,

Why not do that?

What else is worth doing?

The wild thing is while we do that,

Life just gets more interesting and more interesting because we keep expanding.

And every time we see someone new,

There's this visceral knowing they are much more interesting than we think.

They are much more interesting than they are presenting.

As we do these things and incorporate this kind of awareness,

How do we then still fit in the physical world and other people who don't do this?

Sometimes I feel like I'm slipping into this world you speak of,

But finding it so difficult to connect with other people,

They think I'm weird.

Yeah,

Me too.

That was me dating.

I love meeting people on Tinder.

And so then I would always meet them at the local coffee shop when I lived in Toronto.

And I would sit there and I'm like staring at them because I do look right into your eyes.

If I talk to you,

That is what I do.

And if I'm considering dating you,

Then I really wanna know who you are.

And I'll tell you the number of men that were just like,

Do you ever break eye contact?

Do you even blink?

You're kind of freaking me out right now.

But then I always just knew that,

Okay,

We're not exactly on the same wavelength.

Awesome.

So it is a thing.

But again,

We're doing it for our own interest.

Like what if you even looked at the people who don't see the world like this?

And even they are deep and interesting people.

They may have lived a path that brought them to a place where they are afraid to go deep.

They're afraid to connect.

What a story they must have.

Everybody is interesting.

It doesn't mean we wanna hang out with them.

And it doesn't even mean we can have deep conversations with them.

But they're all interesting if you look deeply enough.

One of my teachers in the past taught this practice,

But with a mirror instead.

And to just pay attention to our own face and how our face morphs.

Totally.

Eye gazing with yourself,

It's a really good practice.

And I know the first time I did it,

I found it very confronting and I didn't want to do it.

How do you feel about our partner accepting this is us,

But they can't or won't dive as deep?

Well,

This is where we're very honest and sober about our relationship.

That's all.

And we can still choose to be married or have a partner who doesn't want to go into these depths.

But we just know that about them.

And we love them for it.

We still love them because we see their infinite souls.

I remember,

I mean,

This was one of the big reasons that I divorced my husband.

I love him.

I think he is a great man.

And I am so glad I was married to him for 20 years.

He is,

And he still is,

Like,

He's coming up north with us for Thanksgiving,

You know,

He and his girlfriend,

Like,

He's a great guy.

But he didn't want to go into the depths I wanted to go into.

He didn't want to climb the heights He didn't want to climb the heights and the exploration that I wanted to go into.

And so I realized that I really did want to go into these places.

And it wouldn't even work if I tried to make him do it.

And I was actually harming him by making him feel like he wasn't good enough.

Nobody wants to feel like they aren't good enough.

And he is a good man,

A lovely man.

And there's nothing wrong with him.

We just no longer were paired for that because that's what I desired.

We could have stayed married for the rest of our lives.

We could have easily,

And there would have been nothing wrong with that.

And so it's very interesting when there's people in our lives whom we love very deeply,

But they're just not interested in it.

And that's when we just in all consciousness and sobriety say,

Hmm,

Well,

I choose you anyway.

I'm not going to force you to do things you don't want to do but I choose you anyway.

Or perhaps we need to have some conversations about shifting things around or whatever.

We're not children anymore.

And we can make really conscious loving choices about people without making them wrong.

Okay.

It's a very,

Very,

Very important question that many,

Many,

Many of us encounter.

All right.

Let's close our eyes.

If you're lying down,

Be comfortable.

Make sure your ribs are open so that you can breathe deeply.

If you're sitting upright,

Allow your shoulders to relax down your back.

Let your chin tuck in,

Crown of the head,

Reaching up to the heavens,

Straightening the back.

Let's breathe deeply,

Expanding the belly as we inhale,

Contracting as we exhale.

And I'd like you to imagine yourself sitting on a chair and there's a chair in front of you.

It's empty right now.

And I'd like you to think of someone who you deeply love.

It could be a friend.

It could be a famous person.

It could be a lover.

It could be a parent,

A grandparent,

A neighbor,

A childhood friend.

I'd like you to imagine them sitting on the chair in front of you.

And as they sit down,

They look at you and they smile.

And you smile back.

And maybe you hold hands if that feels right.

Or maybe you just let your hands rest on your lap.

And I'd like you to look into their eyes.

And we don't have to look at their eyeballs.

But your eyes are focused in the area of the eyes.

But you're actually taking in the whole person.

Your eyes are seeing their face,

Their skin,

Their hair,

Their body.

You're perceiving their aura.

Even if you don't see auras,

You feel their energy.

And I want you to imagine the depth that this person is as you gaze into their eyes.

Imagine them as a child,

As a baby.

Even if you didn't know them then,

Imagine them growing up.

Imagine the things they love to do.

Imagine the things they thought,

The ideas they had.

Imagine the challenging times they've had and how they overcame them.

And really allow your consciousness to kind of merge with theirs.

We can experience much more with our feelings and our emotional body than we can with our intellect.

Allow yourself to feel them.

Then imagine perhaps they've had many lifetimes.

That this being that you're gazing upon is one chapter in their soul's journey.

Knowing who they are,

What other lives could they have lived?

What other lives could have colored in their current experiences?

What other lives brought them wisdom to prepare them for this lifetime?

And then I'd like you to smile at them and thank them for coming.

And as they slowly leave the chair,

To notice that the chair has been replaced with a mirror.

A big wall-hanging mirror that allows you to see your own face in your upper body.

And to now gaze upon your own face and wonder all the same questions.

To see you as a little child.

To watch the experiences growing up.

To notice the things you've learned.

The things you've overcome,

The things that challenged you.

To really feel love for this being that you're observing.

To allow yourself to totally focus on your reflection.

And to allow your wise self,

Your soul,

To see beyond even this current lifetime.

Maybe it's multiple lives.

Maybe it's just generational inheritance that flows through your body.

And see yourself as this whole world,

An entire universe to explore an entire universe to explore within.

Imagine that there may be parts you've never looked at or imagined.

And to ask the question,

How can I go there?

I'd like to open that door and see what's in that.

I'd like to see what's behind door number two.

And then I'd like you to close your eyes and your vision.

And the mirror magically disappears.

And you just breathe deeply.

And perhaps you see a rose appear in your mind's eye.

This amazing creation.

And you see all the petals and the color and the stem.

You allow all of your attention to go into the rose to see the miracle that it is.

Let's just breathe here for a moment.

Tadah tyakti niruda citna eva bhava antaram vrajit tadah tatmadhyah bhavena vikasya tyati bhavana Cast aside the 10,

000 things and love only one.

Don't go on to another.

Engage your lively awareness with this one focus,

One object,

One thought,

One symbol.

Now go inside.

Find the center,

The soul,

The heart,

Right here in the middle of the feeling.

Attend the blossoming.

Attention,

Vast as the sky.

Feel this beautiful vastness within all the possibilities.

Let every cell be filled with this energy.

Let's imagine us all sitting in a circle in a big room.

Without opening our eyes,

We reach to each side and hold the hand of the person beside us.

We feel that life force flowing through their hands and we breathe deeply.

Let's take one deep breath together.

Exhale,

Let's gently open our eyes.

Thank you so much for being here.

Hope you have a wonderful day.

Reviews

i love your talks. at age 67 i love learning and growing still 🙏❤️

Thank you for sharing the wisdom . We really appreciated