Xylomelum pyriforme is commonly known as the woody pear tree. A member of the Protea family, it grows in a narrow strip of coastal New South Wales, northwards from the Sydney Basin.
The distinctive fruit of the Woody Pear Tree is an extremely hard, pear-shaped seed case about 9 cm long. Protected deep within lie two winged seeds, prized by Aboriginal people as a food source.
The plants are slow growing and take twenty years to flower from seed - and seeds are few and far between. For it takes the searing heat of a bushfire for the wooden fruit to split open. Then the seeds can fly free and fall to the ground. Slowly spinning their way down they find a patch of sandy soil and enough moisture to aid germination. Then new life begins.
A woody pear tree grew in the front garden of my childhood home in North Balgowlah. Several attempts were made by curious visitors and family friends to cut open the exotic wooden fruits, but the hardwood casing was extremely difficult to crack. We knew the tree to be rare and called it the hard pear tree.
Today I would call it the tapasya tree. Like the winged seeds of the woody pear, our inner seed, the atma, lies protected by layer upon layer of dense coverings. These are the kosas. Safe within we develop and grow – until the time when we outgrow the protective casings and need to leave them behind. This is not an easy process. Only by purification can the layers be cleared and their influence removed.
Swamiji teaches us that purifying the first layer, the annamaya kosa or covering of nourishment, is achieved by eating pure sattvic food. Next comes pranamaya kosa. Through regular practice of pranayama and living in a pure environment, our prana can be purified. The manomaya kosa is the covering of the mind. Use of mantra and attending satsang helps with purification of this layer. The fourth covering is vijnanamaya kosa, the covering of the intellect – that constant voice of doubt. Through svadhyaya and spiritual practice, doubt is removed. The last layer is anandamaya kosa, the covering of bliss. It is through renunciation that this layer can be purified and removed.
What is renunciation? It is the conscious, voluntary abandonment of something that we have a right to. It involves a sense of sacrifice, of surrendering what is prized or valued for the sake of something more pressing , or of a higher claim.
In order to reach the highest goal, reunion with the supreme consciousness, it is necessary to “renounce” the very real but fleeting pleasures that we feel give meaning to our daily existence. These pleasures can be found in states of bliss, in intellectual pursuits, in the mischief of the mind, in the connection we feel to the life force with our every breath, and in the responses of our finely tuned senses to warmth and touch, to food and essential oils, to music and art.
Of course our life will continue to offer us all of these – and we will continue to partake of them. But if one day we find ourselves cold instead of warm, so what? The realisation comes that our inner reality is in no way affected by this, for our core happiness does not depend upon ephemeral pleasures.
So how do we reduce our attachment to these pleasures? With simplicity and self-control, with strictness and determination to stay on the chosen path, using willpower to live up to the knowledge we hold of what truly is Reality.
This is tapas – a discipline, an attitude, a lifestyle.
The fundamental importance of tapas is evident by its appearing twice in Patanjali’s scientific investigation of Raja Yoga, The Yoga Sutras. Tapas constitutes one of the three kriya yoga practices (yoga in action) outlined by Patanjali in the sutra that introduces Chapter 2.
II.1 tapah svadhyaya ‘svara pranidhananam kriya yogah
The kindling of the inner psychic fire, the study both of spiritual texts and of one’s own reactions, moment to moment, and the meaningful, dynamic and devotional surrender to the indwelling omnipresence – these constitute active yoga or the practice of indivisible unity.
The purpose of undertaking these kriya practices is to remove obstacles - the psychological obstacles that impede our natural predisposition to Samadhi. And the greatest obstacle is the sense of ego.
Tapas is also one of the five observances classified by Patanjali as niyamas. It appears together with sauca (cleanliness), santosa (contentment), syadhyaya (study of spiritual texts) and Ishvara Pranidhana (surrender to God) as an essential observance to underlie all of our spiritual development and practice.
Tapas does not only imply austerity and renunciation. It also means burning. So tapas is any practice that burns up our samskaras, the memories and experiences that bind us strongly to ego and create a division between us and Reality.
Burning is a powerful means of purification. The kosas that enshroud the atma can be thought of as windows that are dirty or fogged up. The light of the atma always shines, but depending on the extent of the fog or dirt, little or no light may actually shine through. Layer upon layer of attachment to our mental conditioning is what “fogs up” the windows.
It takes the searing heat of a bushfire for the woody pear to split in two, revealing the seeds within. Likewise it takes the great heat of the practice of tapas to purify the colouring of the mindstuff and split apart the limitations imposed by our misperceptions of reality.
We assume we know what is truth. We take pride in our achievements. We value the beliefs and practices passed down to us by our family and culture. But if it is our time and privilege to learn, we encounter a situation that challenges over and again our sense of truth, that tears down our pride and pulls the rug from under the values and practices we have assumed to be unshakable. Layer upon layer is painfully stripped away leaving a vulnerable interior – yet an interior that is ripe for new growth.
It is not necessary to wait for the wildfire of life’s circumstances to lay bare the inner seed. There is also the choice of controlled burning – of consciously nurturing tapas. Each hurt, each injustice that makes us burn with indignation, is an opportunity for cultivating self-awareness. Under the spotlight of intelligence, intelligence concentrated through the practices of Raja Yoga, energy is harnessed to break through the judgements and evaluations that up until now have constituted our understanding of reality.
Sutra II.1 encourages kindling of the inner psychic fire. This lifetime may or may not deal out to us what we require for our spiritual growth. By kindling the fire we actively participate in the process and take one step closer towards our goal.
II.28 yoga ‘ngan anusthanad asuddhi ksaye jnana diptira viveka khyateh
When the inner psychic impurities that becloud the vision of truth
have been eliminated by the intelligent practice of yoga,
then awareness shines resplendent with the light of intelligence.
Yogeshwari
Raja Yoga Philosophy Module
July 09
