Copyright © 2022 David Long.

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The author of this book does not dispense medical advice or prescribe the use of any technique as a form of treatment for physical, emotional, or medical problems without the advice of a physician, either directly or indirectly. The intent of the author is only to offer information of a general nature to help you in your quest for emotional and spiritual well-being. In the event you use any of the information in this book for yourself, which is your constitutional right, the author and the publisher assume no responsibility for your actions.

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ISBN: 978-1-9822-9437-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9822-9436-6 (e)

Balboa Press rev. date: 05/11/2022

CONTENTS

Introduction

Scope and approach. Suggestions on the best way to read and use the book.

Chapter 1: Grooving in Suchness

Meaning and correct pronunciation of the title.

Chapter 2: Modern Mystics Need Markers

Plug for Dharanas Book Two. The need for mystics. The need for markers.

Chapter 3: X 5 Yoga

Introduction to the Five Yogas. Turning to Yoga several times a day.

Chapter 4: The Eight A’s

Awareness of Awareness. Assessment of Awareness. Adjustment of Awareness. Appropriate Awareness.

Chapter 5: Appropriate Focus

Why so much over-focus? The Effortless Effort. Be Here Now

Chapter 6: Smart or Dumb?

Smartness over-rated. Consequences of this. Quiet modesty under-rated.

Chapter 7: My Soul’s Helmsman

The value of the concept. Your Greatest Friend. You are Your Soul’s Helmsman.

Chapter 8: There’s Nowt so Queer as Folk

Advances today that may bite us tomorrow. ‘It’s just information.’ Information Technology and Wisdom Technology. Galloping Impersonalism.

Chapter 9: The Public Geniality Index

Private and Public Geniality. Public Geniality as an indicator of Societal Mental Health and Quality of Life. Facilitating a rise in one’s own geniality.

Chapter 10: Giving the Blessing

Giving what you already have. A social experiment. Withold the Blessing from no-one.

Chapter 11: There, But for the Grace of God, Go I.

Their position and your position. Their mind/body now, and your mind/body now - two different starting-points. Reality Data and Speculation Data. Dropping the speculation, and leaving room for connection.

Chapter 12: Extroversion and Introversion

The shift towards introversion. Unease with the Here and Now. An exaggerated need for privacy. Psycho-Social Distancing. Finding The Sweet Spot.

Chapter 13: It’s A Mini, Mini, Mini Detailed World

Complexity and detail demand focus. Thou and It. Thing-management and ‘thing-ism’. Drowning in Detail. Migrating from the Right Brain to the Left Brain.

Chapter 14: No - It’s An Infinite, Vibrant Universe!

An exercise allowing everything to have its own being. Finding life everywhere, in every atom. The Vibration of Consciousness.

Chapter 15: The Incredible Lightness of Being

Experiencing The Ilob. Grand thoughts are Light. Egolessness is Light. The yogas move us to Lightness and to The Ilob.

Chapter 16: The Practice of Lightness

The Power of Auto-Suggestion. An exercise in experiencing Lightness from a few moments of a one-word meditation

Chapter 17: The Practice of Wordlessness

An exercise to stop mind-chatter and move towards Pure Consciousness. Remove words by striking yourself dumb. Concepts disappear. Taking the experiment out onto the street. Experience bare perception without conception and commentary.

Chapter 18: The Yoga What is in Comedy

Jnana and Raja Yoga in Comedy. The Incongruity Theory of Comedy. Vanity and Conceit. The Benefits of Teasing. It’s O.K. to fail sometimes. The flexibility to make adjustments.

Chapter 19: Role - Playing

Experiments in Role-Playing. Bodily and mental effects on the role-player. What roles are you playing? Which should you keep and which should you drop?

Chapter 20: The Effortless Effort

The key to easeful living. Noticing the heavy effort and switching to the effortless mode. The Egoless Effort.

Chapter 21: More or Less?

Quantity or quality? Advertising. Finding less in more and finding more in less. Less clutter of things means less clutter of thoughts. Space is needed for mental clarity and openness. A ceiling on desires.

Chapter 22: Don’t Be Dopey with Dopamine

Affluence and availability. Controlling dopamine stimulation. Good stimulation and bad stimulation. Yoga as self-regulation of stimulations and our reactions to them. Dopamine a factor in all learning and habit formation. Self-talk to guide dopamine release. Dopamine for the short-term and for the long-term. Dopamine in the formation of strong character and weak character. The dopamine in Pow and Wow and the dopamine in Gerrooffing een Saaarrchhniss.

Chapter 23: Distracting From What?

Why do we distract from the Now? Better to Be Here Now, but with an improved demeanour.

Chapter 24: Mental Health

Well! Likely factors affecting societal and individual mental health. Behavioural solutions and philosophical/spiritual solutions. Exercises and attitudes to improve perspective and personal mental health.

Chapter 25: Adapting your Practice of the Five Yogas

A personal example of how I turn to each type of yoga in one day.

Chapter 26: Overlapping Yogas

How the different yogas overlap and reinforce each other.

Chapter 27: Why Are They So Darn Heavy?

Why carry unnecessary heaviness? Continue your yogas, your efforts will be effortless, your demeanour will be light.

Chapter 28: Mood Management

Using yoga and common-sense to make bad moods rare and short-lived.

Chapter 29: Call On Your Presence

Presence and Connectedness. ‘Be Here Now’ and ‘Be Somewhere Else Now.’ Using distractions to zone out. A very subtle way of zoning-in.

Chapter 30: The Twinkle Test

The Twinkle Test. A simple, five-second check. Don’t forget to twinkle. If the twinkle is missing, check your attitude and correct it.

Chapter 31: To God Alone Be The Glory

Brilliant philosophy and brilliant psychology. Promotion from ‘Me’ to ‘Life’. Dedicating all your actions to the highest that you know.

Chapter 32: So Why Don’t We Do It?

Our main excuses. Encouragement to be different, to find your strength and your truth, and to abide in it.

Chapter 33: Main Themes

Chapter 34: Conclusions

Chapter 35: Personal Prescriptions

Chapter 36: Faith

Glossary Of Terms And Abbreviations

Recommended Further Contacts

N.B. 1

Should the reader find any errors in shpilling, grammur, punctation or sintacks in this work, then kindly do not address them to the geezer what writted it.

N.B. 2

Where a non-specific gender term is required, the common term ‘he’ is used instead of the scrupulously correct he/she/it/one/that geezer/The Entity. This applies to earthly genders and also when referring to The Divine.

Health Warning: This book may not be suitable for serious students of philosophy, psychology, spirituality or yoga. It is recommended that vulnerable persons consult their G.P. before reading.

INTRODUCTION

The scope of this book is large – it’s all of life, really – Totality, Being, Ultimate Reality, God, Consciousness, call it what you will, all the time bearing in mind that, in the words of Deepak Chopra, "The search for God, or Reality, begins where words fail us."

As books have to contain words and images to arouse even a flicker of interest, this one will too, but I suspect that we will end up playing with big, vague, spiritual, subjective and less-defined words, such as those above.

To whom might this book appeal? Who might particularly benefit from reading it?

After the obvious answer of everyone, let’s be specific. It should interest:

1. The intelligent man or woman in the street as many of the topics considered have been prompted by social observations, literally from in the street. The discussions in these chapters lead strongly to solutions and therapies in line with, but not exclusive to, yoga.

2. The book should appeal to those who are concerned about our society’s mental health and where it’s heading.

3. The book should appeal to those inside or outside of yoga who think that Being, Consciousness, modes of awareness, attitude, geniality, and ‘The Now’ are all worthy of consideration. Not to mention Irish jokes and Jack Benny Yoga (see later.)

4. All those who are currently doing some form of yoga practice from any tradition, even if minimal.

5. It should particularly appeal to those who are interested in the philosophical and psychological aspects of yoga – Jnana and Raja Yoga.

6. It should also appeal especially to those who would like to round out their current yoga practice to include all the five paths of Integral Yoga, and to see how the five paths compliment and reinforce each other.

But everyone who reads the book will benefit from taking up some of the practical suggestions offered.

Words will fail us in several places, and this is where things get interesting. On the way there, it will be valuable to try to be a bit objective, to consider real-life situations, hopefully with some psychological insight. Often, we will find, unsurprisingly, that some ancient wisdom will provide splendid and clear insight.

I could start this book with a great philosophical, moral or spiritual statement like:

‘You Just Have to Love’

‘This Moment Is God’

‘Be Here Now’

‘Everything Is Consciousness’

‘Just Get Rid of The Ego’

etc., etc.

All of the above are valid and pertinent, so why pick out one and build a system around it? In that approach the conclusion appears first and the justification and discussion spread out from there! However, I will at least start with a more Western approach, delving a little into happiness and unhappiness, contentment, aliveness, purpose and eudemonia, and seeing what lessons can be learnt from there. Eudemonia is contented alignment with one’s perceived life- purpose. It is something like rightness, balance, appropriateness, ease and so on. An invaluable concept to have hovering in your mind.

There is an ancient saying, ‘A bird does not sing because it has an answer; it sings because it has a song’ (Rumi). But a few answers may help us to find that song. At least they may show us where to cast our nets. They may give us some satisfactory answers in particular areas, within a certain frame of reference. They might point to The God-Zone. They won’t give a G.T.E. (Grand Theory of Everything). That would need a faith statement, a religious statement, an energising and inspiring statement. If, at the end of the book, you do have a song, and some ways to quickly recognise when it’s time to call it up then that will be great!

I started off with this episodic kind of approach, because I did not have any overall logical, impressive theory in mind, and we will see what emerges from there. We will consider various short topics, in no particular order, in the light of ancient wisdom, modern wisdom, basic psychology, yoga philosophy, instinct, intuition and plain common sense. Towards the end of the book, we can see if any particular common themes keep coming up. What lessons can we learn? What prescriptions for living do they suggest?

Marcus Aurelius asks, ‘How is my soul’s helmsman going about his task? For in that lies everything.’ What a brilliant quote for anyone who is fascinated by psychology (the study of human happiness, contentment and behaviour). In my own experience I have taken yoga as my soul’s helmsman, and I believe that it does a great job of that in a cohesive sort of way, its philosophical and psychological wisdom working splendidly. Marcus Aurelius was not a card-carrying yogi, but he was certainly a very great one! I usually find, when looking at the ‘non-yoga wisdom’, that it is often yoga wisdom in different wording.

This book takes a fairly popularised, catchy and jokey approach with mnemonics, catchy abbreviations and attempts at wit and humour, to sugar-coat the philosophy, psychology and spiritual wisdom. Why come at it from this angle?

Well, take some gem of wisdom that has been around for two thousand years. Perhaps only one person in a hundred is aware of it and perhaps only one per cent of them deliberately incorporate it in their daily living. That’s not a very good penetration rate! To be sure, some good influences from ancient and modern wisdom have filtered through into our contemporary day-to-day culture, but not nearly enough. And they have to compete with millions of messages and distractions. If we are drowning in the over-supply of these latter, or if any weakness of character tells us to ignore that great teaching, then we will!

Wisdom does not cease to be wisdom if it is sugar-coated and popularised. A certain stimulus is needed in the first place to attract attention, then some repetition to allow it to be contemplated and to sink in. Then some catchy mnemonic will make the idea easy to recall and refer to. What’s wrong with that?

It will help if we stray down the popularised road and away from a purist, classical approach. We should not leave the jewels – the thoughts, the ideas and the feelings - just for the very few who are drawn to them and who make space for them. We should make them more accessible.

So please tolerate the jokes along the way.

HOW TO GET THE MOST OUT OF THIS BOOK:

SUGGESTIONS:

First Reading: Go through page by page, and as slow as you like, with no skimming and jumping, and only when you are alert. Five or ten minutes would be plenty. You need rumination time, time to have a reaction, somewhere along the scale from Mm, interesting to Rubbish!

Break: Have a break for a few weeks or a month. Allow the inner mind or subconscious to ruminate over what you have read, if it wants to.

Second Reading: Go through again, but this time with skimming if you want to, and dipping in and out, as desired. The synopsis of contents is a tool to help you find what you want. Also, as unfoldment of the book is unstructured and episodic, any aid in making sense of it should be welcome.

Do have a notebook handy, and be sure to jot down a page number for any idea or behaviour that seems promising. If there are many such, say thirty, you might like to make a few small collections, rather than one big collection. The last chapter, ‘Prescriptions’ does list, very briefly, sixty-two suggestions that you might want to take up, but your own ideas may differ.

Testing: Now - and definitely one at a time - for each item on your list, carefully consider how you would apply it. Put that item near the top of your mind, and it should ideally be an ever-present background informing your actions. Test each item out for two or three days, quite deliberately, in various situations, in interactions with loved ones, friends and strangers. Also test it out at work and at various busy, demanding times, and at various relaxing, leisurely times. Proceed in this way through all promising items. Build a collection of things that work.

If you like to be systematic and methodical, you may want to start arranging your items in a fairly logical sequence, but there is no need to, and I don’t recommend trying too hard to be sequential or logical! I tried to group the ideas in the ‘Prescriptions’ chapter by some sort of logic, but soon gave up. The ideas and behaviours suggested come from all manner of sources and apply to all manner of situations, with all sorts of overlaps. I was making things less, not more, clear. It’s probably better to keep your collection just as a bag-full.

In churning through the 62 ideas in the Prescriptions chapter, I did not find either a G.T.E. (Grand Theory of Everything) or a G.T.A.E. (Grand Theory of Almost Everything) or a G.T.H.B. (Grand Theory of Human Behaviour). Surprise, Surprise!

Absorbing, Churning and Testing: If interested, continue to skim, pick and choose, list, and churn (ruminate upon) the items in your mind. But the most important thing is to do the testing out.

Have you built a useful collection of tested ideas and behaviours, that make life natural, meaningful, purposeful, mentally easeful and light? Even just three or four, if they are broad in scope, can have a life-changing effect.

Chapter One

GROOVING IN SUCHNESS

Health Warning: