The Path of understanding

Yesterday was Markiji's birthday. Our beloved teacher, Mark Dyczkowski.

We met, his community, those people who were close to him and those who loved him. I want to take this occasion to write some words about him and his teachings. For myself, not to forget what I feel, and for you, so that the essence of the teaching he stood for can remain and grow.

The path Markiji stood for, the tantric path of Kashmir Shaivism, is a very elevated path. It doesn't speak about morals, even though it is very moral. It doesn't speak about right actions, even though all its followers engage in right action. It also doesn't tell you what to do in the first place, even though everyone does the right thing.

It speaks instead about the development of the right awareness, the right understanding about the nature of God and the reality that flows out of it. Doing so, it assumes that when we become one with elevated consciousness, all truth will flow out of it.

Why Is Kashmir Shaivism So Important?

Kashmir Shaivism is so important in our times because its understanding is the mula — the root of actual religious or spiritually conducive behaviour. The moment we understand this spirituality deeply, everything we need to do flows out of this understanding, and all actions are one with the higher goal.

Our ways of acting, whether they are done right or not, are without that inner understanding — just actions, empty in spirit and meaningless in their effect. Like a block of wood flowing in the river, carried to some destination.

Shaivism in a Changing World

When the world is changing, however, what we need is the right attitude of perception, the right form of awareness, so that we can determine anew each day where that block of wood has to flow and how it shall find its course.

In this way, the Kashmiri understanding of spirituality is the river itself. Not the wood carried in it. It is the stream of the waters in which we find a course in a changing landscape of technology and greed and endless wanting.

When we taste the nectar of God, the awareness of what we truly are ever expands, and we are fit for the world to arise on the horizon.

Here I allow myself to publish a transcript of one of Markiji's lectures that was transcribed by one of his close students. It reflects his thought, in his own words — read, think, contemplate, and enjoy:

"You see, the sutras are talking about what is taking place for very elevated yogis, but it is of relevance to us because Kashmiri Śaivites model their practice on these higher states of consciousness.

Just as Christians, you might say, imitate Christ, Kashmiri Śaivites imitate in their limited consciousness higher states of consciousness.

We cannot manage to do that so well… but we can try.

It is that attempt which is, as one sutra just says, prayatnaḥ sādhakaḥ; it is that effort that we exert to conform our individual states of consciousness, to configure them, imagine them in any way we can, to the higher states, and then everything follows from that.

Ethics, right behaviour, sound understanding, a good way of living one's life, the development of our spiritual well-being — all of this will take place to the degree in which we conform ourselves, our own limited consciousness, to the higher levels of consciousness.

In order to do that we have to know about them. And at first, we know about them through our thoughts, through our imagination, through what we hear, through what we ourselves can understand, and above all through the teachings of the scriptures.

… We learn about higher states through our scriptures so that we can imitate those states in our limited condition.

There are places where this is discussed, whether this is possible. And the answer to that is that it is quite possible, because there is no discontinuity in any level or state of consciousness, there is no break between the finite and the infinite, because the infinite is the existence of all finite things.

So if there was a discontinuity, things would cease to exist, they would be separated from their existence, as it were — which is an idea, it is not at all really possible.

Each one of us as human beings… has an innate connection with infinite consciousness, and that innate connection with infinite consciousness allows us to participate in its life. And that we do by exerting ourselves in that manner.

This is what religion is about in the real sense, from the Kashmiri Śaiva point of view.

There are some religious paths that like to avoid mysticism because they say, well, first we have to get our things in our house straight and neat and clean, we have to be moral, we have to behave correctly, and so on and so forth. And then what happens after that — well, that's God's business, we will see.

… we find that in all major religions…

But nonetheless this path does exist. This path affirms the reverse. It says if our consciousness is developing, then our moral conduct will be in accord with that development, our so-called sinful behaviour will become more moral, we will become at the mundane level better people in all respects, we will become altruistic, generous, loving, kind, etc.

In fact they affirm that that would not be possible unless there is an expansion or development of consciousness.

I say this because when you read the Śiva Sūtra, and you think, well, what does this have to do with me, when these sutras are expounding the Siddha's experience — a person who is fully accomplished?

So the reason is something like that."

From an early Śiva Sūtra course, available on Anuttara Trika Kula. Audio labelled ŚSū 1.12 (although Mark Dyczkowski is actually speaking on sutra 1.14). Citation begins at around minute 20.

Sources & Further Reading

• Anuttara Trika Kula — Dr. Mark Dyczkowski's official site (lectures, writings, music)
• Shiva Sutras course — full verse-by-verse lecture series referenced above
• Course: Anuttara — Dyczkowski on the meaning of "Anuttara" in the Kashmiri tradition
• About Anuttara Trika Kula — the community and its aims
• The Tantrāloka translation project — Dyczkowski's translation of Abhinavagupta's Tantrāloka
• Mark Dyczkowski — Wikipedia biography

More Tantra & Trika Teachings at Matsya

Markiji's teaching runs directly through Matsya's own approach to Hatha and Kundalini Yoga — you can explore that connection further here:

• Tantra & Mark Dyczkowski at Matsya
• Trika Puja Initiation
• What Is Hatha and Kundalini Yoga?

Explore more free teachings and practice materials.

What makes the classical era a turning point?

Because here, for the first time, yoga ceases to be a loose collection of practices and becomes a system. What had lain scattered for centuries across hymns, asceticism and poetry now receives an order, a structure and a declared goal.

Previously we looked at the pre-classical era with the Śramaṇas and the Bhagavad Gītā.

Building on Sāṃkhya and Buddhist influences, yoga as we know it today began to develop as an independent philosophy. The Sāṃkhya, whose philosophy shared many similarities with yoga, differed primarily in that – like the Buddhists – they were atheistic and rejected the existence of a para-puruṣa, īśvara, that is, God.

Yoga, by contrast, took a distinct path as a theistic philosophy and accepted devotion to a personal God as one way towards samādhi.

What is written in Patañjali's Yoga Sūtras?

Patañjali created what is probably the most significant work for yoga as we know it today – the Yoga Sūtras. These sūtras (meaning "thread") are a guide along the path of Rāja Yoga, mentioned earlier in the Bhagavad Gītā. Broadly, the sūtras describe what yoga is, its path and its practice, and beyond that the mystery of reality.

At the beginning of the second chapter – the most important one for us – Patañjali refers to the yogic discipline of tapas (literally "heat") as the force capable of awakening Kriyāśakti, the power of action. This Kriyāśakti is the precondition for overcoming the causes of suffering (kleśas) and reaching samādhi. Tapas refers back to that spirit of complete sacrifice practised by the Śramaṇas. In a sense, Patañjali Yoga is a refined further development of the ascetic Śramaṇa traditions.

In the chapter Sādhana-Pāda (chapter 2 of the Yoga Sūtras), Patañjali explains eight consecutive stages of self-knowledge as the eight limbs of yoga. Within this system, self-knowledge is attained through the gradual development of discernment (viveka), which can distinguish between the world and its unchanging eternal perceiver.

Because Patañjali's yoga emphasises the eight (aṣṭāṅga) limbs as stages of insight, it is often regarded as Ashtanga Yoga. The Tantras, which arose some 500–800 years later, absorbed these teachings into their corpus and developed them further into what we know today as Hatha Yoga (the yoga of force).

What are the eight limbs of yoga?

The eight limbs (aṣṭāṅga) are Patañjali's answer to the question of how a person arrives, step by step, at self-knowledge: yama (how we meet others), niyama (how we meet ourselves), āsana (seat/posture), prāṇāyāma (breath), pratyāhāra (withdrawal of the senses), dhāraṇā (concentration), dhyāna (meditation) and samādhi (absorption).

What stands out is how little space physical posture occupies: āsana is only one of eight limbs, and Patañjali describes it with remarkable brevity. What is commonly called "yoga" in the West today is, in a sense, one eighth of what he meant. How these eight limbs work together in a contemporary practice is a central theme of our yoga teacher training.

Ignorance can be removed by cultivating an uninterrupted discernment between consciousness and the world.

 

Pātañjala-Yoga-Śāstra (2:26)

What are the Upanishads?

The Upanishads are an essential part of the Vedic tradition and are often described as its conclusion – the Vedānta, as the philosophy of the Upanishads is called. There are 108 significant Upanishads forming the canon Muktikā, the collection of freedom. The term Upaniṣad derives from the word upadeśa, meaning "teacher", indicating that the teachings within them are living and active.

The very first Upanishad to name yoga as we use the word today was the Kaṭhopaniṣad, written around 300 BCE. Like the earlier Vedas it uses the image of the chariot to represent the person striving for liberation. In this image, the person standing in the chariot is the ātman, the soul. The buddhi, or intellect, is the charioteer, and the mind (mānas) is represented by the reins. This mind controls the senses (indriya), which are the horses, and the object of the senses is the very road they travel.

The Kaṭhopaniṣad explains that it is yoga itself which tames this mind, so that the reins are held in the interest of the soul and the right path can be found.

Why does the image of the chariot keep returning?

Because it may be the clearest description of what yoga actually does. We already met it in the very first article of this series, where the word yuj denoted the yoking of chariot and horses – and here, centuries later, the same image reappears, now as a complete teaching.

This recurrence is no accident. The image holds fast to the fact that yoga suppresses nothing, but guides. The horses are not killed, the senses not abolished. They are given a direction. This is precisely where the yogic path differs from the pure asceticism of the Śramaṇas.

Through this uninterrupted practice the Parichaya state is attained. Vāyu, through tireless practice together with the power of fire, awakens the Kuṇḍalinī and then enters the Suṣumnā without interruption. When the Citta flows together with Prāṇa into the Suṣumnā, consciousness reaches the high throne through the power of Prāṇa.

 

Yoga-Tattva Upanishad (81–83)

In the next article the classical era continues – with the Tantras (Āgamas) and the worship of the divine.

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What makes the pre-classical era so decisive?

Because it is here that the tension first arises which shapes yoga to this day: the opposition between radical withdrawal from the world and loving turning towards it. On one side the Śramaṇas, who drove the body to its limit and beyond. On the other the Bhagavad Gītā, which finds the divine in the midst of action.

Both currents still echo today – and both reappear, transformed, in what we practise now. Previously we looked at the oldest roots of the word yoga.

Around 500 BCE a radical ascetic movement developed in the region of present-day Allahabad – and shortly afterwards a single poetic text would change the direction of yoga forever.

Who were the Śramaṇas?

These ascetics, known as Śramaṇas (meaning "strivers/seekers"), emerged around 500 BCE. Although they developed independently of the Brahmanical traditions, they were most likely influenced by Vedic thought.

Their principal concern was to develop meditation techniques (dhyānas) in order to escape the cycle of death and rebirth and to attain enlightenment (nirvāṇa) or liberation (mokṣa).

Their techniques were designed to achieve a complete "destruction of individual being". Although these techniques were not themselves called yoga, their goal of liberation through total self-sacrifice planted the seed for later yogic techniques.

Despite their rejection of Vedic authority, their ideas found their way back into the Vedas. Indeed, the Mahābhārata of the 3rd century BCE speaks of dhyāna yoga (the yoga of meditation), which had developed out of the Śramaṇa tradition.

Notable (and harrowing) practices of the Śramaṇas include:

• Standing throughout one's entire life and never sitting down.
• Directing the gaze towards the sky and never looking down.
• Placing the hands on the chest and never opening them again.
• Hanging the body upside down from a tree above a fire.
• Raising both arms to the sky and never lowering them again.
• Remaining forever in a seated posture, never lying down or standing up.

This is a small selection of the 18 ascetic devotions to Brahma. Many of them are rather terrifying and, if practised successfully, even lead to death. Nevertheless, the willpower underlying them forms the foundation for "tapas", yogic discipline or asceticism. Even today one can still find sadhus practising these techniques in their original form.

What remains today of the Śramaṇas' asceticism?

Not the extreme practices – but their core. What has survived from the Śramaṇas is the term tapas, literally "heat": that inner glow which arises when one endures something against one's own resistance.

In this tempered form, tapas has remained a load-bearing concept. Patañjali later places it at the beginning of his second chapter, and it is a recurring theme in our own yoga teacher training as well. The question is never how much one can endure – but what awakens in a person through the enduring.

Why does the Gītā matter so much for yoga?

Yes, the Bhagavad Gītā is of fundamental importance for yoga – for a reason easily overlooked: it is the first text to describe yoga not as a withdrawal from life, but as a way of standing in the midst of it.

Its setting is a battlefield; its conversation takes place between a doubting warrior and his charioteer. In doing so it takes up precisely the image already contained in the word root of yoga – the chariot, the reins, the horses. What was still metaphor in the Vedas becomes a question here: how does one act rightly when one no longer knows what is right?

Which four paths of yoga does the Bhagavad Gītā describe?

About 100 years after the emergence of the Śramaṇas, the Bhagavad Gītā explored the paths of union with the divine. The Bhagavad Gītā is a profound journey into the nature of the soul and a poetic exploration of the meaning of existence. It described the four principal paths of yoga:

• Karma Yoga – the yoga of action.
• Bhakti Yoga – the yoga of devotion.
• Jñāna Yoga – the yoga of knowledge.
• Rāja Yoga – the royal path (meditation and prāṇāyāma).

Today, because it is a classically dualistic text, its significance for the spirit of yoga is often overlooked. The Gītā is not only breathtakingly beautiful and dramatic; above all it lays the ethical foundation for the path of yoga and for the path of Patañjali Yoga. It also possesses a particular quality of heart, rare among the other scriptures of yoga. It is warm and aflame.

I am the ritual and the worship, the medicine and the mantra, the butter burnt in the fire, and at once also the flames that consume it.

I am beginning and end, origin and dissolution, refuge, home, true lover, womb and imperishable seed.

Bhagavad Gītā (9:16,18)

What did Buddhism contribute to yoga?

Two centuries before Patañjali's Yoga Sūtras, Buddhist schools began practising meditation techniques which they called 'yoga'. These schools were known as Yogācāra. Their body of knowledge and texts is said to have been more extensive than that of Patañjali Yoga. Yogācāra reached its fullest maturity in Buddhist Tantra and forms the foundation of today's Buddhist-tantric yoga.

In the next article we enter the classical era – with Patañjali's Yoga Sūtras and the Upanishads.

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Why is it worth looking at the word itself?

Anyone who wants to understand what yoga is cannot avoid its name. Unlike many modern terms, the Sanskrit word still carries its meaning openly within it: it does not name a form of exercise, but a process – the act of joining itself.

Before we come to techniques, schools and scriptures, it is worth looking at that one word from which everything else has grown. This article is part of our series on the history of yoga; you can explore how these roots live on in our practice on our page about Hatha and Kundalini Yoga.

'Yoga' literally means union and derives from the Sanskrit root yuj, meaning "to tie, to join or to yoke".

The original use of this word refers to the union between the war chariot and its horses, which were bound to one another by the "yoke". This so-called yoga chariot was meant to carry fallen warriors to heaven.

What does the yoke join – soul and passion?

Yoga is not only the yoke – the connecting link itself – but also the rein that guides. Just as the yoke connects the chariot with the horse, yoga (the reins) connects the soul (the charioteer) with the passions (the horses).

When the wisdom of the soul can guide the passions through yoga, the goal can be reached. This image corresponds exactly to how we understand yoga today – the power that enables the individual to unite with the greater goal.

Where does the word "yoga" first appear?

The term 'yoga' first appears in hymn 5.81.1 of the Ṛgveda, where it refers to the magical power awakened through asceticism. While these early Vedic texts contain no yoga techniques as such, a strong ascetic tradition existed alongside them, using physical practices and meditation, developing in parallel with Buddhism and Jainism around 600 BCE.

An early indication of this ascetic culture (around 1000 BCE) is found in hymn 10:136 of the Ṛgveda, which describes a long-haired ascetic using visionary meditation practices.

How old is yoga really?

Yes, yoga is genuinely several thousand years old – but not in the form you see in a studio today. The Ṛgveda, from which the hymns above are taken, is among the oldest continuously transmitted texts of humankind: its verses were passed on orally for millennia, long before they were ever written down.

The distinction matters: the word yoga is ancient. The practice as we know it today is considerably younger, assembled over many centuries from very different currents – ascetic movements, the Upaniṣads, and later Tantra. Our series traces that path step by step.

Why does yoga begin with the breath of all things?

Because breath is the one bodily function that happens by itself and can be consciously directed. It stands precisely at the threshold between the involuntary and the willed – and is therefore, in yogic terms, the nearest gateway between body and consciousness.

That the earliest described yoga technique should be prāṇāyāma is therefore no coincidence, but entirely consistent. In our own practice the breath still holds this place – more about that on our page on Hatha and Kundalini Yoga. If you would like to explore the techniques yourself, our Downloads area holds freely available guides, including a detailed pranayama overview.

Which was the first yoga technique?

The first description of yoga techniques as we understand them today appears in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad (from 900 BCE) and refers to prāṇāyāma.

The gods acknowledge this one law, that the sun rises and that it sets. It is true today and will be true tomorrow as well. The sun indeed rises out of the life force and sets within it too.

What those gods recognised is still true today. Therefore a person should acknowledge this one law as well – the functions of prāṇa and apāna; in this way the evil of death will not overcome them. And having recognised it, they should also fulfil it.

Through this they attain union with God, or dwell in the same world as He.

 

Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad (I:23)

Some three thousand years ago it was already recognised that breath is not merely a biological process, but a bridge between the everyday and something that points beyond it. In the next article we travel on into the pre-classical era – to the Śramaṇas, the Bhagavad Gītā and Yogācāra Buddhism.

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SAHASRĀRA Chakra

Within it lies the eternal realm known as the abode of Śiva, which is beyond time and space, free from māyā (illusion), accessible only to yogis, and known as Nityananda (ever in bliss). He is filled with every form of bliss and is pure knowledge.

Some call it Brahman; others call it Haṃsa. Sages describe it as the abode of Viṣṇu, and righteous men speak of it as the ineffable place of knowledge of the Ātman or the place of liberation.

Ṣaṭ-Cakra-Nirūpaṇa

THE PLACE OF FREEDOM

Just as every beginning has an end, every journey has a destination. Sahasrāra is the place where all longing for fulfillment comes to an end. It is the place of peace and the state of oneness with the ultimate goal.

The ability to focus the mind for the purpose of meditation (dhāraṇā) and to control it is the power of viśuddha. However, unity with the object of meditation (dhyāna)—that is, absorption in it—is the power of ājñā. There, the limited self dissolves.

According to Patañjali, samādhi is the mystical state of being that follows this complete unity with the object of meditation. It is an insight into the nature of things, a step into the mystery of God.

Concentration focuses the mind on a single object. This is called dhāraṇā. When the entire stream of perception is one with this object, this is dhyāna.

When only the essential nature of the object shines forth, as if it were formless, samādhi has arisen.

Yoga Sutras (3:1–3)

Samādhi is the final of the eight limbs of yoga and thus the highest stage of yogic evolution. Sahasrāra also refers to this highest spiritual state. Therefore, the awakening of sahasrāra is nothing other than entering the state of samādhi.

Contemplation on true being is a journey, just like life itself. Whether conscious or unconscious, this journey is also a search for the mystery of existence. The chakras are precisely that journey through the self.

Each chakra is a place where one can perceive a part of the world’s power and the nature of reality. At the end of this journey through the vertical axis of the self—where consciousness slumbers and the chakras are strung like pearls on a thread—arises the mystical experience of unity with God, the Source, the Path, and the Goal.

In yogic philosophy, the world arises from the void, which creates all forms through māyā (illusion or Śakti). This energy (Śakti) lies dormant in mūlādhāra, in the material realm, and, once awakened, returns to its source in the formless.

Sahasrāra, which lies beyond time and space (and is thus both empty and full at the same time), is the state of consciousness that is the source of being. As such, Śakti finds her resting place in sahasrāra, the site of the ultimate union between energy and its greatest expansion, consciousness.

Sahasrāra can also be understood as the complementary or transformed energy of mūlādhāra. Mūlādhāra expresses the nature of human beings as matter. One of the most distinct characteristics of matter is its limitation in the dimensions of space and time.

Through this matrix of the material world, mūlādhāra is the gateway to life and thus to birth and form.
Sahasrāra, as the form of its transformed energy, is its eternal counterpart and therefore that which is timeless and spaceless, that which is without limitations and without form.

Therefore, sahasrāra is death and the unborn state of being, the state of transcendence.

FEATURES

Active: Silence

Meaning: A thousandfold

Mantra: Oṃ śrī ma, Oṃ Mahāsarasvatī namaḥ

Bīja Element: Śrī, Oṃ—Consciousness/Emptiness

Aspect of icchā Śakti: Eternal Earth—Mahā Sarasvatī

Age: 42–48 years

Anatomy: Above the crown of the head.

Symbolism: A lotus with 1,000 petals, a radiant white liṅga.

Any questions? Just write to us!

VIŚUDDHA Chakra

Whoever meditates on this is truly the lord of the yogis and deserves to be called wise; through meditation on this Viśuddha lotus, the yogi immediately comprehends the four Vedas with their mysteries (...).

Even if the yogi's mind happens to be absorbed in the Self at that moment, it withdraws from the external world and certainly enjoys the inner world.

Śiva Saṃhitā (5:92–93)

THE CROWN OF THE WORLD

Viśuddha is located in the heaven beyond human individuality and represents the first seat of our cosmic identity, which is governed by the power of will, icchā Śakti.

Icchā Śakti is like the dove that hovers high in the dome of the church and embodies the final aspect of the Trinity: will, knowledge, and action. This cosmic will (icchā) unfolds into an inner Trinity consisting of three further aspects.

Much like in a kaleidoscope, the holographic nature of reality unfolds, and whatever possesses a trinity below the heart also possesses another one above it— viśuddha, ājñā, sahasrāra.

Viśuddha symbolizes the aspect of cosmic fire and the space in which the mind is transformed. When the mind is purified by the power of fire, it can ascend to the heaven of pure understanding, where silence reigns and the clouds of thought have dissipated. Here, in the space of stillness, truth unfolds. This cosmic fire, which radiates from the throat when the maṇipūra chakra is purified, is Mahā Kālī, the supreme and eternal Kālī.

Viśuddha is governed by the fifth element, which encompasses the powers of the other four elements. To live in viśuddha, therefore, means to possess power over the elements and, consequently, over the entire world.

While maṇipūra embodies power over the material aspect of the world, viśuddha represents mastery over the mind and, thereby, over the Self. Once the Self has been mastered and one can rest in one’s own stillness, there are no longer any obstacles on the path to self-realization. The only enemy that must be defeated is oneself. Once this is achieved, the final barrier to the heaven of knowledge opens .

Consciousness at the level of viśuddha makes it possible to transform what was once considered toxic into nourishing nectar. Obstacles become opportunities. The power of wisdom makes it possible to transform life’s challenges into a new beginning and greater vitality. This power of wisdom, which is foreign to the ordinary mind, underscores the superior, even cosmic, nature of viśuddha. Śiva, sometimes known as Nīlakaṇṭha, the Blue-Necked One, symbolizes the ability to transform the greatest poison into personal wisdom.

Viśuddha means “purity” and is the seat of the realized Self, which can be experienced when the mind is transformed by the power of the heart. It is the place where one’s true nature unfolds completely and without compromise, like a master on his throne. This nature is boundless bliss, a presence that fills space, just as space permeates everything.

When viśuddha permeates life, our true nature manifests as the vibration with which we permeate the world. On an individual level, this vibration is the tone of one’s own voice. The sound of your self is therefore an indicator of how deeply you rest in your true essence; it is the music of the dance around your own center.

And yet, just as the essence of viśuddha sound is space, so too is the essence of every word ultimately the silent space in which it is embedded. The power of words lies in their silence, not in the word itself. This silence is the essence of the meaning of words, which expresses the space beyond conception.

It is there, in silence, beyond words, that understanding takes place.

The word alone is spirit, concept, form, but the silence between them is insight beyond the conceptual; it is the word’s inner meaning. Just as a word is powerless without its meaning, so too is language powerless without the silence that accompanies it.

So when you speak, choose your words as if they were nestled in silence, and in this way honor the great viśuddha, the seat of wordless, profound inner understanding.

FEATURES

Active: Words with meaning. Insight beyond words. Character, strength, integrity, intelligence, responsibility, and consistency in thought, speech, and action. Honesty and a well-established life. A stable metabolism, a stable mind, a calm mind.

Meaning: Purity

Mantra: Oṃ ākāśai namaḥ

Bīja Element: Haṃ, Space

An aspect of icchā Śakti: Eternal Fire—Mahā Kālī

Age: 28–35 years

Anatomy: On the central vertical axis behind the neck groove. The Bihar School illustrates its location at the top of the neck groove.

Symbolism: A golden or purple lotus with 16 petals, a silver disc, a white elephant.

Any questions? Just write to us!