Practical Sufism: A Guide to the Spiritual Path Based on the Teachings of Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan
210
Practical Sufism: A Guide to the Spiritual Path Based on the Teachings of Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan
210eBookThird Edition (Third Edition)
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Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780835630108 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Quest Books |
| Publication date: | 12/19/2012 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 210 |
| File size: | 522 KB |
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Practical Sufism
A Guide to the Spiritual Path Based on the Teachings of Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan
By Phillip Gowins
Theosophical Publishing House
Copyright © 2010 Phillip GowinsAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8356-3010-8
CHAPTER 1
Happiness
The other night I was watching the movie Ghostbusters II for perhaps the tenth time—you know, the one where ghosts and evil spirits wreak havoc on Manhattan. And as usual I had a good laugh at the mayor's line, "Being miserable and treating people like dirt is every New Yorker's God-given right!"
Since I had lived in New York City for thirty years, I could fully appreciate the comment. New Yorkers even tend to take pride in this image. But being miserable and unhappy would be lots of fun if only it did not hurt so much. Living in the city, I saw, felt, experienced, and sometimes participated in deep unhappiness. I often experienced the pain a perfect stranger was feeling—not its source, but its intensity. This was always hard on me; it got me right in the gut, almost as if it were happening to me—which, in a way, it was, when you consider that all of us are a single entity in the state the Sufis call Wahdat Al Wujud, or the Unity of Existence.
Unhappiness is universal. We all experience it, and we all work at alleviating it. Or we get so used to it that it becomes our natural state, and we get confused by moments of happiness and tend to reject them. Or we become accustomed to what we use to alleviate unhappiness—drugs and alcohol, for instance—and get stuck with waging that particular battle in ourselves. Apparently, this is all part of the human condition; unhappiness is the rule—or so we think. The best thing we can say about unhappiness is that when we experience it, we come to understand what happiness is.
THE NATURAL STATE OF THE SOUL
But what do we mean by happiness? As I explain later on, when we use a word in the mystical sense—which is what I am doing here—we often mean something different from the ordinary sense. With this in mind, let's begin our definition of happiness by saying what happiness is not. It is not pleasure, sexual, gastronomic, or intellectual. It is not euphoria or ecstasy, although these may be involved. It is not satisfaction—at a job well done, for instance—though again this may also play a role.
The best definition I know of happiness, and one Hazrat Inayat Khan used frequently, is that it is the natural state of the soul.
By the natural state of the soul, I mean that state of being in which we see all events and conditions as a part of the being of God.
Hazrat Inayat Khan writes:
Earthly pleasures are the shadows of happiness because of their transitory character. True happiness is in love, which is the stream that springs from one's soul; and he who will allow this stream to run continually in all conditions of life, in all situations however difficult, will have happiness which truly belongs to him, the source of which is not without, but within. If there is a constant outpouring of love one becomes a divine fountain, for from the depth of the fountain rises the stream and, on its return, it pours upon the fountain, bathing it continually. It is a divine bath, the true bath in the Ganges, the sacred river. When once one has got the key of this fountain, one is always purified, every moment of one's life; nothing can stay in the mind causing man unhappiness! For happiness alone is natural, and it is attained by knowing and by living naturally.
If this is true—if happiness is the natural state of the soul—why is it so difficult to achieve? One reason is that we are usually in a poor state of communication with our soul. Usually we do not even know that our soul exists. We tend to confuse our personality with the soul. But it is something quite separate and different. We need to work hard at opening a channel to the soul. This is the path of meditation, of Sufism.
I have no idea why God made it so hard for us to be in touch with our soul. Certainly, being immured in the physical body does not help. Our physicalness has persuaded our personality that we need to be bombarded by external stimuli in order to enjoy the worldly pleasures of which Hazrat Inayat Khan speaks above. Our soul, however, knows that true happiness comes from within.
Let's suppose that we have been able to open a channel to our soul. Let's even suppose that we live in constant communion with our soul; that is quite possible. The problem, then, is that to the extent we live in constant communion with our soul, we are never quite able to get very much done of value on the earth plane.
Cleaning house, for example, is out (guys like that one): "Sorry, honey, can't do the dishes right now. I'm communing." Driving a car is definitely out. Talking to people is completely out—actually, not completely out, but the other person has to be in the same place you are or communication will be difficult.
In the state of deep meditation in which we are one with the soul, our personality has to step aside; it must not interfere. This is another one of those mysteries God has laid on us, but that's the way it is. A state of communion with the soul feels wonderful, and is achievable, but it does not help us with the rent or the mortgage payments. I am not saying that going into deep meditation has no usefulness in the world. It is, after all, what a meditator is ultimately aiming for, and its value is incalculable. But as the depth of the reality that lies within us is revealed, how we react to the external world changes, and a shift takes place in the way our personality sees itself. There is always this problem, then, that on the one hand we have a soul whose natural state we aspire to experience and even become, and on the other hand we have a personality that constantly seeks to turn us away from this communion toward the outer world.
How do we reconcile the two? In the above quotation, Hazrat Inayat Khan is saying that the key is to allow the love stream to flow. We must bring our feelings of resentment, of guilt, of inadequacy under control. Perhaps you can think of these feelings as valves or choke points you control, even though you are vague about operating procedures. A good deal of spiritual discipline consists in locating these valves in ourselves and turning them to the proper positions—then remembering the locations so we can go back and do it again, as often as is necessary, until the valves dissolve and the love stream flows unimpeded.
You cannot achieve conscious control of these valves and choke points until you find out who you really are, as opposed to who you think you are. Who you think you are—your image of yourself—is constructed from what you do during the day and the extent to which your actions serve your ego; it is molded by the directions in which your self-pity drives you; it is defined by whether you are victim or victimizer, whether you are domineering or submissive, and by how much you expect from those around you.
The self-image that has been formed in us by our parents, by society, by religion, and so on, may not conform at all to who we really are. If, for example, we think we are really quite loving, while the truth is that we are actually rather nasty, then we will not be able to neutralize our nastiness valve because we will not know that that nastiness valve is there to be neutralized. We must first of all take control of our self- image, by recognizing what is true and what is false about that self-image; only then can we adjust our valves and choke points so that the love stream can flow. We are so much bigger than the forces that made us who we think we are; in learning to access that bigness, we find out who we really are and gain the capability of properly adjusting the valves. To be in balance is one attribute of happiness. How do you achieve that balance? By doing your meditations and your practices. By watching your breath.
You will be amazed by how many questions I answer by saying: "Do your practices, watch your breath." It is not enough just to be a good person; if it were, everyone who was kind to dogs or children would be a mystic. The states described by Hazrat Inayat Khan and Pir Vilayat are interrelated; you could almost say that working on one of them is like working on them all (this is not quite true, but it is true enough). If you are doing the work, the happiness that is your birthright will come.
Hazrat Inayat Khan writes:
One does not take initiation for the sake of attaining happiness. It is true that one cannot attain wisdom without deriving a certain advantage from it, as it is more advantageous to be wise than ignorant. But it is not for this that the journey is entered upon. However, as he progresses on the spiritual path the Sufi becomes aware of a wonderful peace, which inevitably comes from the constant presence of God.
Many people of various beliefs and faiths have written about the practice of the presence of God, and all speak of the happiness they receive from being in His presence. So it is no wonder that the Sufi also, should he wish to speak of it, should testify to similar happiness. He does not claim to a greater happiness than his fellowmen, because he is a human being and subject to all the shortcomings of mankind. But at the same time others can decide about his happiness better even than his words can tell it. The happiness which is experienced in God has no equal in anything in the world, however precious that may be, and everyone who experiences it will realize the same.
You will notice that Hazrat Inayat Khan says we embark on the meditative journey to become wise and that happiness is merely a byproduct of that journey. Hazrat Inayat Khan speaks of the sense of the presence of God that inevitably comes upon us when we advance along the path. When he speaks of this "constant presence of God," he means, I think, that we increasingly come to recognize that all things are a part of the being of God. This sounds nifty, and it is nice to think about—but it is also rather daunting, don't you think?
So you will not be intimidated by the prospect of coming more and more intimately in contact with ultimate reality as you pursue the path of meditation, I suggest you start with smaller thoughts. Hazrat Inayat Khan writes, "Happiness lies in thinking or doing that which one considers beautiful."
Now, that is easier, don't you think? I will give you an example of what I mean. A student came to me once, very down on himself. I will not go into the details, but he thought he was the pits, the dregs of humanity. I gave him practices and meditations, but every time he came back, he told me he had not been able to get into them.
After this had gone on for several months, I told him to go to a museum and look at the beautiful paintings, go to a zoo and enjoy the animals, seek out a natural setting and enjoy it. This worked. His condition improved. He had needed to get used to the idea that beauty exists in the world. If your mind is focused on beauty and you are suddenly confronted with an ugly situation or an unpleasant person, you can choose between ugliness and beauty because your mind has once been serene in the contemplation of beauty.
THE PRESENCE OF GOD
Now we come to the tricky part—a part I am not sure I am competent to talk about. Reject what I say if you wish. An awareness of the presence of God is not a given in our lives. Physical reality can seem to be quite "other" than the presence of God; circumstances both internal and external can virtually block out our experience of that presence, even though all of reality is a part of the essence of God. Being in the presence of God really means being a lens through which God looks at the physical universe. You have always possessed the quality of being a lens, but you may not have been aware of the presence of God before because the optical quality of your lens was not so good. Once you have become aware of God's presence in your life—once you have acknowledged that presence—then that state of mind polishes the cloudy lens that is you, and you become aware, if only for a moment, that God is looking through your eyes. It is at this moment that the higher and lower aspects of your being meld into a single essence.
In the first quotation, Hazrat Inayat Khan is saying, I believe, that the more we do the work of the spiritual school we have chosen, the better we become at refining and polishing the lens that is ourselves. As we do the work, an innocence grows within us that replaces the learned or assumed cynicism with which most of us face the world. Innocence is an essential component of our experiencing the natural state of the soul. That experiencing is happiness.
How do we achieve this state? We do our meditations!
And we watch our breath.
You need to avoid performing what Pir Vilayat called a Spiritual Bypass Operation, that is, assuming you are in a state of spiritual advancement you are not—and in fact cannot be, since you have not done the work required to be in that advanced state. If, for example, you do a few spiritual exercises and then run around telling everyone how incredibly happy you feel, you have missed the point. You may even have a brief experience of the soul's sovereignty and begin to assume you have arrived. But you will have to get comfortable with the fact that you are just beginning. Happiness actually depends on a certain level of spiritual maturity, on a calm knowledge of purpose and potential that you can access at will. That, in turn, depends on the control of the breath. Hazrat Inayat Khan says, "As a horse can be controlled and directed by getting the reins in hand, so life can be controlled and directed by gaining control over breath. Every school of mystics has, as its most important and sacred teaching in the way of attainment, the control and understanding of the mystery of breath."
When I meet students from different paths, like Buddhism or Christian mysticism, I note that if they have been doing their exercises regularly for a period of years, there is a certain affinity between them and me, one that transcends any differences we may have in theological outlook. It almost does not seem to matter what discipline you follow as long as you actually follow it. You find the path you personally resonate to, and you follow that path. It is a waste of time to swear allegiance to a teacher or discipline and then not follow through. When you do not follow through, all you do is swell the ranks of some organization and give yourself something to talk about at parties. Happiness is not attained by joining; it is attained by doing.
A student once confided to me she could no longer make herself do her prayers and practices as often as she thought she should. She was a Muslim, and regularity in prayers is important to Islam; the prescription is five times a day. She had been doing her Islamic prayers five times a day for twenty years, but now she found them hard to do. Every time she tried, she felt inadequate. This made her very depressed. We decided she was experiencing the normal reluctance of the personality to change its ideas about itself. She had taken initiation in the Sufi Order and had added to her normal regimen of Muslim exercises the spiritual exercises I was now assigning her. These exercises were beginning to affect her. She thought of herself as religious. But these new spiritual exercises were changing her inner being and therefore changing her surface ideas of what it meant to be religious. All this change was making her grumpy. I told her to continue doing the practices and prayers regardless of how they made her feel. This made her happy; it reinforced what she had already been thinking.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Practical Sufism by Phillip Gowins. Copyright © 2010 Phillip Gowins. Excerpted by permission of Theosophical Publishing House.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Table of Contents
Contents
Foreword,Acknowledgments,
Introduction,
1. Happiness,
2. Commitment,
3. Personal Problems,
4. The Path of Embarrassment,
5. Surrender,
6. Getting on the Path,
7. Back to the Future,
8. Authenticity and Watchfulness,
9. Creativity: Walk Like a King,
10. The Retreat,
11. A Passion for the Unattainable,
12. Love,
13. The Light of Knighthood,
14. Sacrifice,
15. Death,
16. So What Do I Do Now?,
Web Sites,
Selected Bibliography,
About the Author,