RE: 4 WAYS, 4 MODES OF CONSCIOUSNESS, 4 STAGES OF
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From: Yahoo D.
Date: Tuesday, March 6, 2007, 9:58 AM
Subject: Re: 4 ways, 4 modes of consciousness, 4 stages of
ID: 256254

Anama...

I felt just the same and only after crossing 50 began to see the "lay 
of the land"

--- In templeuniversal@yahoogroups.com, "Anama"  
wrote:
>
> 
> 
> --- In templeuniversal@yahoogroups.com, "Swami Atmalokananda" 

> wrote:
> >
> > Hello Brahmavid!
> >
> > Have been looking through the collection and especially like your
> > introductions. Those alone could be made into a small book that 
could
> > serve as an introduction to westerners.
> >
> > In "The Way of the Hero", part of the "Introduction to the 4 Ways"
> > mentions how we will, emote, concentrate and reason - thus, of
> > course, the 4 yogas. I wonder if the 4 stages of life can be seen 
to
> > fit with these also, in a general but useful way?
> >
> > Studentship=Karma=Will because here we learn what our bodies and
> > minds and intellects etc. can do. The first stages of life in 
various
> > psychological systems.
> >
> > Family or community=Bhakti=emotion because here we learn how to 
love
> > and unite in different ways with our surroundings, having come to
> > know something about who we are as students. This is the next 
phase
> > of life, integrating the world into ourselves - socialization.
> >
> > Forest life (retirement)=Raja=concentration because here we 
process
> > all that we have learned so far and learn how to focus and work 
with
> > it all in understanding ourselves and the world in a subtler way. 
As
> > has been said, before 50 life lives us, after 50, we live life.
> >
> > Old Age=Sannyas=reason because here we make the great attempt to 
link
> > all into a universal vision of who we are, having done all that 
went
> > before.
> >
> From the first visit to the Vedanta Society in the spring of 1967, I
> allways had the feeling that they were talking about me. Not in a
> paranoid sence
> 
> but in a positive way. The subject of the lectures hit home every 
time.
> And now, with the advantage of hindsight, I know that they were. 
That I
> was and am now living these four stages. But I didn't know it at the
> time, only in hindsight. I always thought that i was in a different
> stage than I truly was. These books are allways good, for no one 
ever
> sees things with the same eye as another. Therefore the more books 
the
> better so that others might see as did the author. The more talk (or
> type) the better, everyone benifits.
> 
> Anama
>