Artwork by Liv Kamal Kaur Khalsa
“There is an idea of the communion with the ancestors that seems to be analogous on the shamanic front, with the idea of being possessed by the creative spirit that drives mankind essentially … And that is part of that spirit that is in continual conversation, that we are all supposed to be involved in as humanity’s practitioners, as the Golden Chain that exists down the centuries … that is the spirit that animates you when you are creative - and inanimate means to be possessed by Spirit because it relates to Anima. So you are possessed by a benevolent Spirit that produces and utters Truth.”
Dr. Jordan B. Peterson (in Immortality Key)
And that is the path that yogis walk. It is necessary to point out that Peterson is himself has practiced Kundalini Yoga as well as a known Canadian psychologist and philosopher. What is the Golden Chain that we often hear about? What is the teaching and core learning process of this spifritual journey into the soul? What does this unique Indian method say about the sacred relationship between a spiritual guide and an apprentice?
In the next lines I have taken upon my shoulder to interpret how the content of the yogic culture is passed on. Certainly I do not intend to assign a universal significance to something that seems to be so personal, therefore my humble intention is to share an experience that is both personal and, in my estimation impersonal and transpersonal. Along with this I recount some moments of great significance with people that I have had in the past two decades. Beyond all yoga denominations, the spiritual practice of yoga when intended to awaken the Kundaliini or its intrinsic spiritual purpose, it opens a path that is one of the most consciousness-stimulant experience that a person can walk.
The transmission of the experience. How does it work?
My first Hatha Yoga Teacher was a kind-hearted man, with an amazing healing touch that my father frequently experienced before me. Jorge Guthrie became my first spiritual mentor and healing guide in Chile in 2000.
Some people can instruct yoga as a physical practice, others emphasise developing mental abilities. Some people center the attention on yogic philosophy or metaphysics. But rarely the core of the spiritual experience is addressed. There are many reason why this happens. For sure this is not simple topic, but is central. Our own experience should not be elusive or misunderstood.
Truth be said: the crucial value of the yoga culture is not in how it is performed to the outer world, but how it is practiced, instructed and developed from within. The truth that breathes within holds a key in this endeavour. Kundalini Yoga and all the culture of yoga show us a road built on the bedrock of a transmission: the transmission of an inner experience of the truth of the soul. A transmission that happens within the yogi and between him as a student and a teacher or many teachers.
I include Dr. Julio Retamal here, a man of profound faith. He mentored me at the University and embodied a unique model of what a teacher is. Yogis in the West (especially Western) must avoid the ditch of cultural appropriation and learn the depth, richness and spiritual value of the western civilisation in its quest for Truth.
Yoga is a union of a profound significance that has an extensive effect on our inner and outer worlds. And Kundalini Yoga generates a deep impact that transforms life. For its functioning, one does not need to believe in anything or to stop attending church, the mosque, the gurdwaras or synagogue. One is rather required to frequently enter the temple created by God: the human body and consciousness. It is within this temple where the inner guidance, the Kundalini, awakens. This process is not necessarily leading towards a religious conversion, but it does necessarily lead towards inner transformation and towards the Truth within.
The process goes right into the heart
When yoga serves the opening, strengthening and stretching of the energetic heart, existence can take a transformative turn. The same way yoga does with the body and mind, it can do with the center of our being. The timeless linage of yoga has passed on an experience that stretches us into the realm of expanded awareness.
My first Kundalini Yoga experience was with Nam Nidhan Kaur Khalsa, in Santiago (2002). This picture was taken 10 years later in China where we came across in our respective courses for women and men.
I consider Guru Dev Singh a master and mentor in the magics of meditation and healing. I followed him around Europe for 7 years. I know how to heal and how to transmit the art of Meditative Healing thanks to his encouragement.
And the expanded consciousness of love is the most powerful. True love has neither limits nor conditions. True love unites people, nations, and even enemies. Love is the most real substance of life and it is available when people practice and instruct yoga from the heart.
When transmitting any form of yoga or looking for someone that can instruct it, consider this: the vital force in the heart is the engine of the journey! Through the years one learns not to follow appearances and rather listen to those who hold a space of compassion and connection with steadiness. The greatest and the most universal form of union is only achieved in love, whether you do yoga or not.
Yoga is not about a perfect body structure or the capacity of the mind to grasp spiritual knowledge. Yoga is Union and this type of union is one of the deepest experiences known to mankind.
Two Ways to Go About
One way to walk the path is to focus on the forms and strive to mimic other yogis, to look like yogis and to absorb the construct made by modern yogic figures or trends. The core is here the moral teaching of yoga where the ancient and perennial transformational teaching is rooted. The perennial nature of the Yogic Ethics, as discussed earlier, is a real platform of moral and easily shared common sense. And in my view, the true base for success. There is no real progress without solid Yogic Ethics. Specially when it is reinforced by yogic psycho-somatic practices of pranayama and mantra repetition.
And this is the other focus: the inner unfolding process and the dedication of awareness to walk an invisible path. That is the most challenging aspect of the road, that nevertheless, connects us with the guidance of all the greatest saints, gurus and yoga masters that have ever lived.
For the most, the learning happens in the intimate space of one’s practice through the self-initiatory, self-exploratory and self-fulfilling map once described by Patañjali, the greatest philosopher of yoga. This is how we are led into an authentic inner experience of connection, transformation and deep healing that belongs to mankind. What truly matters is consistency of practice plus an instructor, teacher or master of yoga ready to serve the heart opening of the students, in order to deliver them to the conscious experience of love within. This is golden and ultimately really mystical.
Maintain the flame of spiritual hunger burning inside
Shiv Charan Singh took me me through the interpersonal and institutional yogic process. He kindly showed me the dedication that it takes to crystallise the teacher trainer of Kundalini Yoga.
The process begins when you truly engage yourself, when you take responsibility and commit to discipline. When you give yourself the chance to explore your mind and heart and when you finally start to listen to your own deepest emotions, body and latent wisdom.
Our world is challenging enough. It conditions us from early childhood to pursue external goals. And it ends up disconnecting us from ourselves. If modern humanity wants to find a collective root of pain and suffering that is the pain of disconnection to our own roots. Leading to ignoring our inner compass and true identity.
We live in a world in which artificial intelligence is increasingly managing and controlling more aspects of life. We are becoming less intelligent and sensitive within our own skin. Artificial intelligence is sensing our pulse, checking our sleep, counting our steps and all in all calculating our daily experience. It is organising and automising our time, schedules, and digitalising our interactions.
A few good miles Taran Tarn Singh Khalsa shared with me through the years. His integrity and humility was always so inspiring. Kundalini Yoga brings spiritual light to the planet, and he is one of the stars building a global community or Sangat.
In these times, remaining and remembering what it is to be a sensory human is of vital importance. While this happens, and our sensitivity is jeopardised, we must be careful. Our connection with ourselves and with each other can otherwise weaken day by day. And ancient yogis knew this long ago - tranquility of the senses sparks inner perception of what is real.
How deeply elevating is the profound silence of the soul? Can someone say? Compared to the magnetism of words about reality? About the soul journey? How touching it is to hear the melody of silence coming from the fountain within? Have you ever been struck by silence?
Be sure about this: in the yogic culture, the future belongs to those who can listen and transmit the inaudible. Even more, peace will be possible when peace within is heard and shared. That is the kind of experience we expect from those who can pass on the torch of the yogic culture.
All is One
Guru Dharam Singh Khalsa came to show a pragmatic frame on how to see the coherence of the teaching and demonstrated more virtues of healing.
We must learn to see. At our reach there is an ocean of energy ever present. In the macro and micro level of all beings and things. In the quantum, in the cells, in the organs, in the planets and galaxies… all unto infinity and beyond. The greatness of life stems from the fact that there is not a single atom of reality where that presence we often call God is not present.
Our human existence unfolds as a path because it was never meant to be static. You might feel stuck, but that is your perception of a moment. Despite that the path of each person is unique, all paths converge as they take place within. The conceptual representation of religions often differ and the scriptural narratives mostly show a pale and partial glimpses of the Truth. But nothing ever written by any human compares to the golden treasure of the truth realised within. Lucky are those who bow to the Truth wherever they found it. And luckier are those who, following a religion or no-religion, a Guru or no-Guru, a scripture or many of them, find their purpose written within their heart. Blessed are those who dare to live their truths, and with profound integrity embrace the opportunity to live authentically.
We are becoming and traversing a myriad of experiences of humanity through hills of joy and light along with valleys of sorrow and despair. The journey is long and the path is difficult, but within you is the secret of it all.
The Mind that Tunes into the Heart Finds a Deeper Meaning
The wisdom of Yoga and the Self is so ancient and profound. I had the privilege to meet Swami Dayananda Sarasvati in his Ashram, in India in 2012. He embodied a first hand experience of the Vedantic roots of yoga. In that same occasion I also visited the Asharam of Sadh Guru, Jagadish "Jaggi" Vasudev in Coimbatore.
In the yogic culture the appearances are nothing but an illusion to overcome. It is called Maya. It is only the foolish who attach importance to the impermanency of the body, the colour of the skin or the robes. Every mind that awakens focuses and searches inside. Hence the protocols of self-contemplation helps us to tap into the subject who walks the path. Because there is no object outside, only a mysterious subject awaiting to be discovered and seen inside. The systematic practice of Kundalini Yoga not only gives you health and mental clarity, but it gradually shows your own life purpose, and your creative gift to shape your existence. Yoga was designed by many people to go beyond the illusion of the world and the mental conditioning that our unconscious ego creates.
I cannot ignore the figures of western wise men, like Dr. René Gothóni, who was nothing like a yogi. However, in his presence and guidance I learnt how to write a doctoral thesis about Kundalini Yoga. Here I am with him after I defended my thesis (2016).
When your mental power is not strong and consistent, you can get caught in the thoughts of others, as if you could sense what they think or project onto you. And you can get caught in your own shadow self, if you don’t meditate regularly. We must purify our minds from our own dark thoughts or the thoughts of others misconstructed by us in us. This can be deeply confusing to our unique life plan. It makes us mentally vulnerable and it could also expose us to others’ mental games and issues. Our halo is the special energy that our head emits when we are in deep states of meditation or prayer. Meditation and prayer build our halos, also known as “Arclines”. This also happens in the presence of heart-centred and heart-focused beings: our arcline connects to spiritually charged energy. Our halo is at the service of our life plan, it is our golden guiding star to Truth and light.
Learn to train your psyche and link your mind to a high spiritual frequency or people. Not as a matter of concepts, but as a matter of psychic experience. Amongst other great people, yogis are specialists in developing this core skill. And it is done patiently. This progressively hits the right cord of fortune and keeps the psyche tuned with the frequency of true joy and ultimate meaning.
The halo is what wires the mental space with a subtle link —a “hyperlink” for superconsciousness. Creating an organic bond between the inner and outer path to wisdom. A personal, impersonal and transpersonal bond between those who walk or have walked the inner path to the soul and yoga.
The golden glow of Truth is revealed through different profound states of prayer and devoted sessions of meditation. This is the paradoxical path to true freedom: to be chained to the invisible and pure light within (transparent, Dev). A chain connecting us all to the Truth of the soul and that our humanity desperately seeks without always knowing it.
Spiritual Longing can Lead the Most Transcendent and Authentic form of Relationships
I belong to an invisible linage of spiritual adventurers. A tribe who call themselves yogis, healers, meditators, yoga teacher, Sikhs, Aquarian teachers and more.
The micro cosmos that every yogi must explore, is not less complex than the macro cosmos around us. Astrology master and author, Erkki Lehtiranta, delivered me the grammar and the insight how to read that “as above so below” and that there is a mirror to the Self in every star, planet and constellation of the firmament.
I bow to the teachers, specially to those who I have had the honour to learn from and serve directly. And those who I have met in spirit, those whose legacy was transmitted to me through contemplation, Dhyana and inner experience.
Yoga is a path and a system to shake off the blinders and karma that humanity carries. If you embrace it, it will develop you as a soul-sensitive person that will feel connected to an ancient, divine, human mystery that we all carry within.
And there is a good reason: there is no better gift or higher human position than the freedom of spirit. True success is spiritual, because it is an internal state in which grace within is at work.
And the success we can experience, is not solely an individual event happening to a Self. It is not isolated to one’s person experience: while being personal, is impersonal, interpersonal and transpersonal at the same time. This human experience of spiritual success is intrinsically a collective effort of humanity.
The Freedom of spirit is the fruit of an intergenerational conversation driven by intuitions of the plan of the Creator. As much as this plan leads to the liberation of ‘one soul at the time’, it rests on a spiritual pact of many souls that gathered prior to their birth. Yogic concept of liberation or Moksha is an event within an inter-relational context, and even though not many experience this mode of spiritual success, in the culture of yoga freedom of spirit is meant as something that is to spread…
Hence a strong chain of serving souls exist since thousands of years. Souls that act unified, as a network that serves human transformation to experience Truth within the heart. This is the work of an invisible Golden Chain. Brought to life in the encounter with the Kundalini and with the culture of yoga. Yoga is an ancient tool to unify and liberate humanity. So one can tap into the “benevolent Spirit that produces and utters Truth” and enjoy the flow of existence.
Jivan Mukta
*Written in dedication to my father, Juan Emilio Lafontaine, who recently left his body, and whose soul guided me to my first mentor and teacher of yoga in Chile.