A SERIES OF LESSONS
IN RAJA YOGA
By YOGI RAMACHARAKA
Author of "Fourteen Lessons in Yogi Philosophy and Oriental Occultism" "Advanced Course in Yogi Philosophy, etc."; "Hatha Yoga"; "Psychic Healing"; "Science of Breath." etc.
1906
"_When the soul sees itself as a Center surrounded by its circumference--when the Sun knows that it is a Sun, surrounded by its whirling planets-then is it ready for the Wisdom and Power of the Masters_."
PUBLISHERS' NOTICE
The lessons which compose this volume, originally appeared in the shape of monthly lessons, the first of which was issued in October, 1905, and the twelfth in September, 1906. These lessons met with a hearty and generous response from the public, and the present volume is issued in response to the demand for the lessons in a permanent and durable form. There have been no changes made in the text.
The publishers take the liberty to call the attention of the reader to the great amount of information condensed within the space given to each lesson. Students have told us that they have found it necessary to read and study each lesson carefully, in order to absorb the varied information contained within its pages. They have also stated that they have found it advisable to re-read the lessons several times, allowing an interval between each reading and that at each re-reading they would discover information that had escaped them during the course of the previous study. This has been repeated to us so often that we feel justified in mentioning it, that other readers might avail themselves of the same course and plan of study.
Following his usual custom, the writer of the lessons has declined to write a preface for this book, claiming that the lessons speak for themselves, and that those for whom they are intended will receive the message contained within them, without any prefatory talk.
THE YOGI PUBLICATION SOCIETY.
INDEX
LESSON I. The "I"
LESSON II. The Ego's Mental Tools
LESSON III. The Expansion of the Self
LESSON IV. Mental Control
LESSON V. The Cultivation of Attention
LESSON VI. Cultivation of Perception
LESSON VII. The Unfoldment of Consciousness
LESSON VIII. The Highlands and Lowlands of Mind
LESSON IX. The Mental Planes
LESSON X. Sub-Consciousing
LESSON XI. Sub-Conscious Character Building
LESSON XII. Sub-Conscious Influences
THE FIRST LESSON.
THE "I."
In India, the Candidates for Initiation into the science of "Raja Yoga," when they apply to the Yogi Masters for instruction, are given a series of lessons designed to enlighten them regarding the nature of the Real Self, and to instruct them in the secret knowledge whereby they may develop the consciousness and realization of the real "I" within them. They are shown how they may cast aside the erroneous or imperfect knowledge regarding their real identity.
Table of contents (by pages)
- 1: A Series of Lessons in Raja Yoga by Atkinson
- 2: Which power underlies the entire teachings of Raja Yoga
- 3: Then it returns to the discarded appendages
- 4: The gratification of the passions
- 5: Pessimism belongs to this plane
- 6: The Candidate is taught to relax his body
- 7: And are unworthy of the advanced Ego
- 8: The Candidate must meditate upon the I
- 9: Realizing the immortality and invincibility of the ego
- 10: It passes unharmed through the fire
- 11: Its invincibility and invulnerability
- 12: Belong to the Instinctive Mind
- 13: Have come to him through his slowly unfolding Spiritual Mind
- 14: And have learned to set aside these sensations
- 15: After the Mental Drill is over
- 16: The sheaths are ready for dropping
- 17: Simply setting aside and considering things
- 18: And once so proven you cannot be robbed of it
- 19: As already said this is one of the principles of Raja Yoga
- 20: And declaring it to be all an illusion or Maya
- 21: We hold no such mental attitude
- 22: But absorbing the suggestions of nothingness
- 23: This Ether or Akasa is the finest
- 24: Vibrating and pulsating with life and energy and motion
- 25: May be resolved into their original elements
- 26: Which is at the disposal of the Ego
- 27: But the highest region of the Spiritual Mind
- 28: Intellectual teaching of Gnani Yoga
- 29: Development is the keynote of Raja Yoga
- 30: That the sense of Reality that is inherent in the I
- 31: And the Mind substance or Chitta
- 32: Whereas Chitta is mind in repose
- 33: Many great inventors are practical Yogis
- 34: We have the whole menagerie within us the tiger
- 35: And the result a most powerful focusing of thought inward
- 36: The Yogis can concentrate at will
- 37: And this focusing of the mind requires a focusing
- 38: The Yogis clearly understand this point
- 39: He was like a man behind a great searchlight
- 40: Focusing its entire energy upon it
- 41: Voluntary Attention requires effort
- 42: Is by practice in Voluntary Attention
- 43: By giving a concentrated Voluntary Attention to an object
- 44: Attention is a prerequisite of good memory
- 45: Says Imbeciles and idiots see badly
- 46: He was asked for a recipe for bashfulness
- 47: Inasmuch as it requires little or no voluntary attention
- 48: Not only was he able to add dominoes instantaneously
- 49: But all Hindu youths are not chelas
- 50: Once having asserted the mastery
- 51: And the attainment of powers and the unfoldment of faculties
- 52: The Yogis teach that there are higher senses
- 53: Manufacturing and using these instruments
- 54: The sense of Touch is the simplest and primal sense
- 55: In developing the sense of Touch
- 56: The lowest light vibration is about 450
- 57: The development of the physical senses
- 58: And wished he had never come to Agassiz
- 59: The unfoldment of consciousness
- 60: Is of a much greater extent than that of conscious mentation
- 61: Evidencing an increased sensitiveness
- 62: We call this higher consciousness Mental Consciousness
- 63: Mental Consciousness is a growth
- 64: Some men worship Intellect as a God
- 65: There are two planes of Consciousness
- 66: It has been called Cosmic Consciousness
- 67: But the Yogis know better than this
- 68: The highlands and lowlands of mind
- 69: The subconscious processes were at work
- 70: Which is now an important law in mathematics
- 71: There are supernormal and transcendental powers of which
- 72: Schofield is an English writer on Psychology
- 73: Began to feel a vague uneasiness coming into consciousness
- 74: But only potentially for consciousness
- 75: Maudsley says It would go hard with mankind indeed
- 76: This acts unconsciously on their unconscious centers
- 77: And the below conscious planes
- 78: These cells are built up of countless molecules
- 79: The nourishment in the mother's blood
- 80: Are manifestations of Instinct that great plane of the mind
- 81: In so far as mentality is concerned
- 82: In order to distinguish it from the Instinctive Plane
- 83: Following the leadings of the habit mind
- 84: Intuition is above the field of consciousness
- 85: The oracle also informed him that every man had his daemon
- 86: And others are on the borderland of this plane
- 87: By referring to our Eighth Lesson
- 88: And then bid the subconscious mind assort
- 89: But the Yogis go much further than this
- 90: And threshed out by the sub conscious mind
- 91: Gained favor with the brownies or good fairies
- 92: According to the Sub consciousing plan
- 93: The sub conscious mind works very rapidly
- 94: And let the sub conscious work go on
- 95: While his sub conscious mind does the work for him
- 96: The Yogis have long taught that a man's character was
- 97: The Yogi student is trained gradually
- 98: Is that the Ego is Master of the mind
- 99: If one fights off a low inclination or Desire
- 100: Imaging yourself in imagination as possessing them
- 101: It is true that Habits originate in the conscious mind
- 102: Which plan is his mental image
- 103: He may supplant it with Fearlessness
- 104: Do not confine your practice to mere private rehearsal
- 105: We mean mastery over your own lower nature
- 106: Will of itself erect such an aura
- 107: And destroyers of our personal thought world
- 108: And they are consequently living on both planes
- 109: Before allowing them to manifest in your sub conscious mind
- 110: And facts tending to promote the objects thought of
- 111: And this idea of the Mental Attitude
- 112: The race feels the pain and perpetual unrest
- 113: Is not the highest phase of the great Yoga teachings
