Podcast: What Should the Beginner Yogi Know About Spiritual Experience and Abilities?–Part 3
“Have I learned anything? Has this spiritual experience changed my awareness, my meditation?” Abbot George contrasts the effect of real spiritual experience with examples of people who were deluded by visions and dreams.
Dreams: What Are They and How Should We Relate to Them?
Dreams are the subconscious mind talking to itself and usually reflect moments of the previous day that for some reason caught its attention. Authentic meditation affects the entire life of the yogi including his dreams.
Podcast: Spiritual Experience and Abilities–What Should the Beginning Yogi Know?–Part 2
The state of perfected beings like Buddha, Krishna, and Jesus is far greater than most people’s concept of God. Abbot George tells the story of Catholic stigmatist and visionary Therese Neumann’s response to Christian who were overwhelmed with Christ’s miracles, as an example of how … Continue reading
Podcast: What Should the Beginner Yogi Know About Spiritual Experience and Abilities?
In this four-part podcast Abbot George expounds on the attraction and many dangers of these kind of practices and the experiences they produce, and most importantly, presents the important questions the meditator needs to ask himself in assessing his spiritual practice and its effects.
The Dark Night of the Soul: What It Means and How to Deal With It
The dark night of the soul is a very simple thing. It is a stage in the evolution of a highly evolved human being when he is at a pivotal point in his development. All that has gone before, although it was of value in earlier times, is to be recognized as limited and something to be laid aside in order to enter into a higher segment of the aspirant’s life.
Four Ways to Improve Meditation When the Mind Wanders
“Patiently, little by little, a man must free himself from all mental distractions, with the aid of the intelligent will.… No matter where the restless and the unquiet mind wanders, it must be drawn back and made to submit to the Atman only” (Bhagavad Gita 6:25-26).