Sahaja Yoga is different from the other types of Yoga because it begins with Self Realization instead of this being the unobtainable dream of a distant goal.

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Traditionally, a guru used to have only a handful of disciples and look after their growth for a lifetime, guiding their inner cleansing day by day. Few souls were able to achieve Self Realization after many years of passing through various stages (yama, niyama, breathing techniques, postures, etc.). For those few souls, it was like trying to cleanse a completely obscure room without having any light.

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H.H  Shri Mataji says:

" Now all other Yogas, which go along with it are part and parcel of Sahaja-Yoga. They cannot be separated from this yoga. I think the people have misunderstood that there are four limbs of Yoga.

That would be a misunderstanding as to think that they are separate or different. When we say that we have eaten this food, it does not mean that like a bolt it has gone inside the body and passed out of the body like a bolt coming out. Does it ? It means that you tasted the food in your mouth; it means that it has secreted some saliva in the mouth, later on, it has passed through the trachea, esophagus, going down into the stomach part and then to the intestines and then to the larger intestines. All this movement along this passage is done through the other kind of the movement which is existing in the organs itself like the stomach itself pushing it down, coming from your brain. The sympathetic and parasympathetic coming into play and working it out. It is a big system and the organization that is working it out.

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Now if you want to separate it; that the digestive system is different, the respiratory system is different, and your heart system is different, other brain system or nervous system is different, I mean you can’t take it out like that, your brain hanging on one side and your digestive system hanging on the other. It is one integrated form of organization which is a living organization, which understands each other, which reacts to the demands. You cannot separate the system, but as it is, our brains are so disintegrated or they are good at that disintegrating everything within us and without that we want to disintegrate the living thing which is Yoga. 

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Yoga is not a dead organization. It is a living process. Absolutely a living process. When it is a living process, you cannot do anything about it. So it is Sahaja. At the most you can shift it a little bit and push it here or there, push it around and all that. If a tree is coming up, like in Japan, and they will like to give it a shape, then they will cut branch first and bend it a little more another one and bend it this way, that way and give it a shape. But whatever is living is working out spontaneously within us with many complicated organizations which are living themselves and are aware of what they are doing."

 

For complete lecture on Meaning of Yoga Click Here

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