Why is Cold Water Training part of the LYM

Contemplations from the 6^th Lesson of the Shiva Sutras

Sutra 5:  Udyamao Bhairavah

‘If you wish to experience fullness, give yourself fully’.

The Shiva Sutras are so magnificently direct, practical and down to earth. Shiva fully understands the mechanism that underpins our egos and maintains our separate sense of self. With each sutra he is playfully tugging on the pin of our grenade, challenging our resistance to life and joyfully beckoning us into the unbounded aliveness of egoless awareness.

When do we feel most whole? When we are giving the whole of ourselves to whatever it is we are doing.

When do we feel most alive? When we are giving our life energy 100% to the task before us.

When do we feel most satisfied and content? When we have given everything we have to give.

         Now on the flip-side; 

When do we feel most anxious and tense? When we are focused on the results of our actions.

When do we feel most dissipated and insecure? When we are trying to do two things at once.

When do we feel most confused about who we are? When we are trying to perform two roles simultaneously.

Shiva says, ‘Live a life without regret by giving yourself 100% to whatever you are doing and you will unlock the wonder of life. Remember, your joy is not bound in the outcome of your actions, your joy is inherent in the action itself!’

Shiva is not saying that we have to try and do everything, only, that whatever we do chose to do we should do it with the whole of ourselves.

Too often we are waiting for life to make the first step, yet it is really for us to make that step. Life simply waits for us to engage and then it activates in accordance with our intent. Our intent, with the help of these sutras, is to come into the same frequency of engagement as life itself and life is not living half-heartedly or lukewarmly. Neither is life living with a tense effort to succeed. Life is not worrying about itself or making a cost-benefit analysis before making every small decision. In short, life is in no way inhibiting itself, that is something we do within ourselves.

So now for practical application of this sutra in our everyday life;

We all have multi-dimensional lives with numerous roles, duties and responsibilities to perform. In my case I perform the role of student, yoga teacher, director, administrator, husband, father, son and householder, to name but a few. Now the key is that whenever I am teaching, I am 100% a teacher, Udyamao Bhairavah! When I am a husband, I am 100% a husband, Udyamao Bhairavah! When I am a father to the children, I am 100% a father, Udyamao Bhairavah! You get the point of course. The trouble comes when I am trying to do two at the same time. When I want to answer emails when actually it is time for me to be doing homework with the girls. When I am having dinner with my wife but mentally preparing a satsang for tonight’s yoga class and so on.

Our work is to heal this split in our lives. To make sure we are not doing something whilst dragging our feet and making deep sighs of discontent. And if we can’t bring our full energy to something or someone to be honest about it and say, ‘I need to complete this and as soon as I am done, I will be all yours’. Our noble challenge is to learn to give everything to what we are doing and then, once it’s done, to drop it and move on.

Some things of course are easier to choose than others and so therefor easier to bring all our energy to. Yet the truth remains that whatever we have chosen to do we have a responsibility towards and whatever it is, big or small, it is a doorway to Bhairavah, a doorway to the infinite.

With Udyamao Bhairavah, everything is possible.