Readers of Antiquity

Ever heard, 'It's all in your mind!'? If so, then this book is for you. It's The Four Yogas of Enlightenment by Edward Plotkin. Is it rare? Well, I downloaded it from www.fouryogas.com, so it's probably not on Oprah's Book of the Month Club. The copyright is 1992, but the teachings are ancient and eternal.

Mr. Plotkin's resources are so comprehensive that it's hard to find a spiritual leader that he didn't quote. His work covers everything from Adam to Einstein. The mystic school of Kashmir, shaivism, the western Avatar Adi Da, Don Juan's Nagualism, Chinese and Tibetan Buddhism are all represented here.

Before exploring the 'Four Yogas', let's take a look at what we call 'Ourselves,' Mr.Plotkin states,

Let's begin to examine the proposition of a 'Self' at the apparent beginning of our physical presence: the sperm and the egg. All organic matter is apparently composed of chemical constituents. Chemicals are derived from atomic matter. Atomic matter arises as 'time-space fields' within the universe. We are a construct of a 'time-space field.' Time-space fields have never been observed. Time-space fields are constructs in consciousness…our mind creates elaborate descriptions in consciousness in an attempt to describe and make known to itself a perceived exterior reality.

The first yoga is called 'One-Pointed.' It's designated as a 'single pointed awareness' of the minds essential nature. You must become detached from transitory thoughts, or 'Stop the World.' This experience will show that the mind is completely empty and 'space-like.'

That's not a knock against your intelligence. At this level, the mind is observing pure consciousness, with no past, present, or future. The un-enlightened mind thinks that it is viewing the world detached from the 'Self.' The enlightened mind knows that there is really no world or self, just hallucinations.

Don Juan said,

that human awareness was like an immense haunted house. The awareness of everyday life was like being sealed in one room of that immense house for life. We entered the room through one magical opening: birth. And we exited through another such magical opening: death. Sorcerers, however, were capable of finding still another opening and could leave that sealed room while still alive. A superb attainment, but their astounding accomplishment was that when they escaped from that sealed room they chose freedom. They chose to leave that immense, haunted house entirely instead of getting lost in other parts of it.

The second yoga is called 'non-discriminatory.' The meditator becomes free from clinging to false 'perceptions' and the 'emptiness'. They no longer put a nametag on 'Appearances' or 'nothingness.' Savari explains,

If the mind were real, all other phenomena would be real. Since the mind is unreal, who can understand that the real thing exists? Neither the mind and the appearances nor the investigator can be found. Being unreal they are unborn and unceasing throughout the three periods of time. The intrinsic nature of mind is immutable, abiding great bliss.

The third yoga is called 'Of One Flavor.' At this point, the meditator will realize that good and bad, up and down, inside and out, do not really exist. This is destroying the root of duality. There are no opposite realities, just a singular emptiness. Jesus explains in the Gospel of Thomas,

When you make the two into one, when you make the inner the outer and the outer like the inner, and the upper like the lower, when you make male into female into a single one, so that the male will not be male and female will not be female, when you make eyes replacing an eye, a hand replacing a hand, and an image replacing an image, then you will enter the kingdom.

The fourth yoga is called 'Non-Meditation.' This is the ultimate experience while still in the body. This is the transformation of consciousness into the fully awakened state. The meditator will be free of all clinging and realize a perfect state throughout the days and nights.

The Lankavatara Sutra illuminates,

The transition from mortal-body to transcendental-body has nothing to do with mortal death, for the old body continues to function and the old mind serves the needs of the old body, but now it is free from the control of mortal mind. There has been a inconceivable transformation-death in which the false-imagination…has been transcended by a realization of his oneness with the universalized mind…just as the good earth is the support of all beings in the world of desire, so the Tathagatas become the support of all beings in the 'Transcendental World of No-form.