Page 249 - Complete Works of Dr. KCV Volume 1

heart, is many times questioned by those who had tried this in meditation. However, this leads to the important point as to whether this can be had out of one's own unaided thought, or whether it requires extraneous help. There is no doubt that the extraneous help required for this experience of the omnipervasive Reality, or light within, should be transcendental and subtle. Sometimes the help of this transcendent Reality itself has to be sought, for this includes the immanent reality of the individual, and it is had through the flow of transcendence into the immanent, bathing it always. This is the experience of Grace, Peace and descent that purifies the heart and makes one feel light and subtle.
In the usual conceptions of Raja Yoga there are available two steps; namely, the physical purifications and disciplines, and the moral regulations and disciplines. The two important physical disciplines are asana and pranayama, the steady sitting posture which has to be cultivated and the control of breath by regulating expiration, inspiration and retention. There are, of course, other schools which expand these sitting postures to include all types of postures which are said to bring under control almost all the muscles, including those of the heart. There are schools which seek to regulate breath in all possible ways by increasing the times of inspiration, or duration of retention, and expiration. There are others who would like to develop the art of prediction by noting the inspiration and expiration by the right or left nostril called the svara-sastra (science of notes or sound).
The other school would insist on the mental control arising from restraint of the senses from running after objects. These are called yama (control) and niyama (regulation). They comprise preparations for moral valuations between truth and untruth, injury and non-injury, stealing and honesty, robbery and charity, continence and incontinence, purity and impurity, godliness and godlessness, and so on. Without moral urge or awakening there is hardly any possibility of spiritual growth. The ancients prescribed certain minimum conditions for undertaking spiritual work; distinguishing of the eternal from he mortal or transient; a seeking for liberation from all bonds and chains; or at least the urge to escape from suffering, bodily, vitally and mentally or, in the language of the ancients, suffering arising from nature, from oneself and from gods, physical, psychological and theological (adhibhautika, adhyatmika, and adhidaivika).