Traditionally they say, when you walk the path of becoming a yogi, when you’re trying to become a yogi, the first and foremost is understanding yourself. The first step to becoming a yogi is not a practice; you can’t go for meditation or kriya; all those things come later, but it has to begin with you. It has to start with you. Everything has to start with understanding yourself.
How will you start that process?
You have to watch your inclinations, tendencies. Tendencies will also become habits.
Tendencies or inclinations means – sometimes habits, sometimes fears, sometimes how we respond to life in certain situations. We run away from certain things; we are attracted to certain things. This is all individualistic. All these things are not the same for everybody. Some people get attracted to some person or some situation, someplace, some time, and some materials. Some people do not like any of this because all this is individualistic.
Know yourself
This individualistic nature is the first step in the path of becoming a yogi. That means you need to know yourself, then only you can know the universe. So, by watching, witnessing, not censoring, not rejecting, appreciating, accepting. You can’t reject, and you can’t censor. Because if you do that, you’re fighting something, fighting with your basic nature. When you fight with your basic nature, please remember that will stay longer. It will not leave; it will get reinforced.
Acceptance
What you are fighting with – that will be your biggest memory, highest, deepest memory; it will keep coming back. So, acceptance. Through acceptance, and through observation, through assimilation, you know yourself. Try to get into yourself; feel yourself. Don’t ever think you are good, bad, or ugly; we are all good, bad, and ugly; don’t worry about it. But you need to accept yourself as a pure incarnation, a unique incarnation, with everything in you. This is the beginning of becoming a yogi. Then you start settling down.
Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt
Proofread by Shyama Jeyaseelan