Independent Personality
In order for a person to be independent, he must be able to distinguish between right requests and wrong requests and thus accept the former and reject the latter. The power of discrimination and rejection lies at the root of independent personality development.
Thus one can preach: reject the demands made by the senses and by attitudes and desires.
But the question is whether simply preaching cannot achieve the desired results. Can students really develop the strength to resist simply by being preached to do so? Here it is important to note that theoretical knowledge and understanding alone are incapable of giving a person the power necessary to translate them into action. Teachers of spirituality have placed the greatest emphasis on developing the vital energy or life force. When this energy, this force is developed, all the other forces become active automatically.
Ecological pollution literally poisons the atmosphere and humans often don’t get enough oxygen to sustain life. Furthermore, to awaken the vitality we need a deep breath. Inadequate breathing and this will further reduce the amount of oxygen inhaled by the lungs. The result is that we cannot get rid of all the toxicity that has accumulated in the system.
In the early stages a person can experiment with just breathing, but then one has to learn how to draw the life force from every part of the body. One should lie down in a relaxed posture and start breathing intently. One must then begin to draw life-force from the rest of the body by actually experiencing that every cell of the body takes part in the process of breathing. Thus, sensitivity will be awakened in every pore of the body and the whole organism will be flooded with life force.
There are three important centers from the point of view of such spiritual practice and experimentation:
- Prana Kendra (life force center), which is the nasagra, or tip of the nose.
- Darshan Kendra (center of intuition), which is the midpoint between the eyebrows.
- Jyoti Kendra (center for controlling and disciplining one’s character) which is in the middle of the forehead.
The first thing is the development of the vital energy or life force. It is necessary to concentrate for a long time on Prana Kendra, the tip of the nose.
Finally, let us discuss disciplinary development. As mentioned earlier, the control chair is located in the middle of the forehead – which is called the Jyoti Kendra. Of all the things, this needs to be concentrated the most. Even physiology recognizes the importance of the pituitary, pineal and hypothalamus in controlling and regulating the entire personality. Darshan Kendra developed intuition, Jyoti Kendra developed all behavioral traits, and the forebrain controls body temperature. The main controller or regulator is the hypothalamus which controls even the pineal, which in turn controls the pituitary.
Only after these three developments – vital energy or life force, intuition, and discipline – are the independent personality developed. A person who is attached to a biological drive can never be independent. Only the practice of spirituality and meditation in the sense described above leads to the awakening of intuition and once that happens, all attachments to animal lust will be released automatically.
