Jnana Yoga - Professionals Sadhana

Those working and involved in society are constantly challenged to manage their responses to the successes and failures, their ego gratification and the frustrations of professional life. For some, working life is dull and unful­filling, yet for others it becomes their primary source of meaning and self-worth. It gives them status and a sense that they are contributing to something they value. Working life gives endless opportunities to scrutinize one's own traits and behaviour, reactions to situations, attitudes towards co­workers, and thought patterns related to social status and values. For one who has the desire to know oneself, the co-­workers will become like mirrors reflecting back who one is. Another challenge is to balance family and social life with work and one's own spiritual needs and aspirations.

Needs of professionals

• Ability to create a favourable mental space irrespective of circumstance

• Mental flexibility and openness to the ideas and opinions of others

• Ability to let go of distress and negativities and to connect with positivity

• Knowing one's strengths, weaknesses, ambitions and needs, and the capacity to distinguish between them

• Ability to see the strengths, weakness, ambitions and needs of coworkers and members of society with whom one is connected, and to help them overcome their weaknesses

• Ability to listen to others with humility, patience and tolerance

• To work as a team by supporting and giving encouragement to co-workers

• Balance between self and work

• Qualities for efficient working: motivation, sincerity, clear communication, commitment and a sense of respon­sibility

• Attitude of wanting to improve in everything that one does, coupled with a sense of non-attachment to the outcome of one's actions.

JNANA YOGA SADHANA

Jnana yoga will help professionals use the opportunities given during working hours to improve themselves. Jnana yoga also gives tools to find inner peace and harmony even while the outer world is under digital hypnosis and fixated on name and fame, material gain, competition and success.

General

• Obsere vani sanyama, restraint in speech, in all situations and circumstances to develop viveka, discrimination.

• Give freely of your knowledge and understanding to co­workers to develop vairagya, non-attachment.

• Direct any competitive spirit for your own improvement and expansion instead of harming others.

Morning

Meditation to develop drashta awareness, to create the habit to observe your thoughts, actions and reactions throughout the day.

During working hours

• Maintain the drashta of buddhi and manas, observing your thought patterns and also their source and the intention that guides them in interactions with co-workers and others encountered in your working life.

• Apply pratipaksha bhavana, returning the mind to the opposite positive attitude when negative thoughts and feelings arise.

• Apply of one pair of jnana yoga yamas and niyamas for one month or longer.

Evening, before bed

• Practise the SWAN meditation and the drashta meditation as given in Part 3. Do one meditation for one month and the other for the following month. You may alternate or stay with one mediation for a longer period of time.

• Reflect on the source of any negative thought patterns, and consider how you can improve similar interactions in the future.

• Reflect on the pair of jnana yoga yamas and niyamas you are working with.

On weekends

• Digital fasting, and time spent with family or in solitude.

• Disconnect from the working environment by spending time in a different way, in nature or with a hobby free of any pressure and competitiveness.

• Practise the positivity meditation as given in Part 3.

For your Spiritual Diary answer questions such as:

1.   How present and active was my awareness?

2.   Which jnana yoga yama and niyama did I apply?

3.   Which one did I not apply?

4.   Was I affected by success or failure? How did it express itself?

5.   On a scale of 1 to 10, how strong was my sense of vairagya? 0 it was absent and 10 it was very strong.

6.   Which attitude, opinion, belief do I need to modify or drop altogether to improve my jnana?

Complementary practices from hatha yoga, raja yoga, karma yoga and bhakti yoga

Hatha yoga

• Asana: Tadasana, tiryak tadasana, kati chakrasana, surva namaskara. pawanmuktasana part 3 (selection).

• Pranayama: nadi shodhana pranayama, bhramari pranayama, abdominal breath at various times during the day.

Raja yoga

For your practice of yoga nidra, include a sankalpa such as:

I am content with my life as it is.

I know that success and failure are transitory.

I am in touch with my inner self.

Karma yoga

• Spend some time in an activity which is free of all self-interest or ulterior motive.

• Develop the attitude of akarta bhava, the non-doer. Accept that not everything is in your hands and your control.

Bhakti yoga

• Join a kirtan gathering once a week or once a month.

• Connect to and explore the beauty of nature.

• Practise selfless service and atmabhava.

Individuality is different from personality. Personality is one's own mental creation. It is rajasic. Personality is egoism. However, there is no harm in developing one's individuality. A person of strong individuality is a fit person for the practice of Vedanta or jnana yoga. Aham Asmi – ‘I exist', this is individuality. It is sattwic.

—   Swami Sivananda Saraswati

According to jnana yoga each and every individual has to understand his identity with his real   Self.  A time must come when you have transcended the mind and the barriers that belong to this universe or that belong to this gross plane. It is something like breaking a pitcher of water. The water becomes one with the rest of the water. Through the practices of jnana yoga, the limitations in the personality, the limitations in fundamental concepts and fundamental philosophies have to be eliminated.

-      Swami Satyananda Saraswati

If there is inner balance success and failure of intellect, it is jnana yoga.

_ Swami Niranjanananda Saraswati