Beyond Ritual and Dogma: Discovering the Mystical Heart of the Gita

In this episode of A Woman's Gita Podcast, hosts Nischala Joy Devi and Kamala Rose engage in a radical dialogue exploring the mystical dimensions of the Bhagavad Gita. They delve into:

• The transformative and transcendental nature of yoga, beyond material benefits
• The reformist spirit of the Gita in challenging religious authority and hierarchy
• The importance of personal discernment and inner guidance in spiritual practice
• The role of women in accessing the mystical realms of the teachings
• Addressing the issue of spiritual abuse and the need for discernment in choosing teachers
• Empowering women to trust their own inner voice and experience the Gita's wisdom directly

Join Nischala and Kamala as they guide listeners on a journey beyond the rituals and dogmas, uncovering the profound mystical heart at the core of this timeless classic.

Transcript

Lilavati Eberle: 0:02

Namaste. Welcome to a woman's Gita podcast, a modern discussion of the Bhagavad Gita by and for Western women. A women's Gita features discussions on the Bhagavad Gita, the timeless classic of Eastern wisdom, reinterpreted from the perspective of two female teachers, your hosts are nistula Joy, Davey and Kamala Rose, who have dedicated their lives to the yoga tradition at a time when women's voices are finally emerging, a feminine perspective of the wartime treatise could not be more timely.

Kamala Rose: 0:42

Hi, friends, thanks for joining us today in for a woman's Gita podcast. In today's episode, Nishchala Devi and I discuss a portion of the Bhagavad Gita that our dialog goes in the direction of spiritual abuse. And so we wanted to provide a trigger warning for anyone who may be sensitive to those type of stories and this sort of dialog. If you are a survivor of spiritual abuse, know that there are resources available. Namaste. Thank you for joining us on a woman's Gita Podcast. I'm Kamala rose

Nischala Joy Devi: 1:26

and I'm Nischala Joy Devi.

Kamala Rose: 1:29

Today we are continuing in our slow burn through chapter two, the overview of the Bhagavad Gita. We have we've been introduced to some of the first definitions of yoga that Krishna gives us in the Gita, where he says that those who follow this path of an inner awareness and attunement to the Atman, to the higher mind through that most subtle layer of the mind called the buddhi right. When we can find this state of mind, we come to a place of equipoise, of balance, of an interior balance and a knowing. Right. In modern terms, we might call this being in the zone, or feeling very, very present and centered and in in your own being, right? So as we're going through chapter two, we've got sort of some subsections, and so we've been following this nuanced dialog between Krishna and Arjuna, and we've made it here to the beautiful verse 41

Nischala Joy Devi: 2:49

to 41 tells us, those who follow the path of yoga attain singleness of purpose, while the minds of others are filled with endless thoughts and choices. Ah, yes. 242, the uneducated, utter, utter, flowery speech, toting the scriptures in literal form, saying that pleasure and enjoyment are available to us, both here and in heaven. 243, they were full of desire with heaven as their highest goal, only engaging themselves for the purpose of acquiring enjoyment and power. 244, the minds of such people who are drawn to pleasure and power are unlikely to attain Samadhi. Wow, that says a lot, doesn't it? It really does. It really does. And you know, this is something that I've thought about, maybe not in this particular terms, but for many, many years. Because to me, yoga, in the way of practice, is really something that's not only transformative, but mystical, is something that you do something and you're not getting a material advantage, although a lot of yoga today is practiced for that purpose. People want a nice body. People want a better back. People want their neck to stop hurting. But the real purpose of yoga is this transcendental state, this ability to move away from the ordinary into the extraordinary. And what we're saying here is that there's also some that believe that it has only practical it's only something that we study. It's not something that we experience. And experience will outweigh any kind of learning in that way, once you have an experience of the Divine, of your own self, of your compassionate melding with other people, whatever else it is changes us, and that's the transcendental quality, that's the mystical quality that never comes from just studying. Studying is a part, isn't a part of it, the swadhyaya. It's important. But at certain point you have to let go, and you have to transform into something other, even I would use the word beyond the scriptures. The scriptures can only explain so much because it's words. But when we take it beyond words, it's a very different experience.

Kamala Rose: 5:53

It's like the difference between organized religion and spirituality. What we read in our, you know, in text, even like the Bhagavad Gita as a theoretical description of spiritual experience, and as you so appropriately remind us that this is a mystical experience to actually be in, that that, that the scriptures describe, right? Always trying to encourage us to know about something that is beyond all ordinary experience, right? We use the word mystical for that, and in these verses, it's, it's so interesting because, you know, we've Krishna has been leading us through this discussion of the self that is really exemplified in so many of the early Upanishads, a people who literally went beyond the theory, went beyond the ritual of the Veda into the direct experience of knowing this Atman, and knowing this atman to be the same as the spirit of everything, right? The the universal soul, the Universal Spirit, or Brahman, right? So the Gita is coming along at this time, when many are having this exalted experience and communicating it. And it's, you know, it's changing the way people think about religion and think about the priests and the necessity for priests, if, in fact, the Atman is right here. Why do I need someone to mediate that? And, you know, this is a question that is asked here in the Gita, pointing out that there are many people who are, you know, the the priestly class, that are sort of have the job of facilitating that for ordinary people, whether in India or in Rome or in many of the faiths around the world, right? Some patriarch facilitates the spiritual experience for the people. Yes, right? The groundbreaking thing that we've been talking about in the Gita is something that's beyond the priests. It's within us. It does. It's already there. No one has to give it to you. You just need to be quiet and listen and find what's already in you, right? A completely different approach to this religious or spiritual beyondness experience, right? So, in a way, these verses are, we see Krishna almost as a reformist saying. Those priests are kind of talking about the letter of the law. Yeah, right. They're talking about the theory of religion and the rules and the doctrines and the dogmas to follow, but truly the self, as he's been, as he's been teaching, is within all of us, and within all of us means within all of us, of all castes and creeds and genders, right? So I you know this part of the Gita is a little confusing, because he's jumping around subjects, in a way, but I think we can see that this is a reformist spirit and saying the Divine is for all.

Nischala Joy Devi: 9:34

I think that the confusion seems to come, at least for me, as he moves to different parts in the Gita, and he talks about, now he's talking about that you can actually find that divine without all this excess in the rituals, etc. But then later on, he'll say, you can't get to the Divine except through me. So I think. That we it really puts it back on the individual to be able to discern. This is where the discernment comes back into it, to be able to discern which is right for me at this moment, which is the truth now. Because if we take the wrong truth at the wrong time. It's too confusing, and we don't understand it. I think also, what I read in this is the personal responsibility that he's now putting back on us. Or if you see it as Arjuna, I see him as a representation, and I it comes to mind. I just was visiting the main center for Mother Teresa in Calcutta, and reading about her story again, hearing her her own words. She was faced with this at a certain point, she was under obligation of vows. She had taken vows, including the vow of obedience, which most monastics take. And for some of us, I won't mention any particular names, that was the hardest part of the vow, the obedience, because I always believed, and it seemed that others also is that the only person you're really obedient to is your own conscience and your own inner self. If you have not found that yet, then you choose someone on the outside that has those same moral values and spiritual heights to be able to guide you in that way. That's what we call a guru, one who dispels our darkness. So was a case with mother like Mother Teresa. Here, she was being told within that this is a very powerful aspect, and this is now her her way forward to take care of the poorest of the poor. But when she went back to the authorities, the Church authorities, they wouldn't give her permission. So she finally had to just really leave on her own and and go and talk to the Pope at the time. But the story itself really speaks to me, because it says that when that voice comes, that mystical voice, that alcohol voice, that hidden voice, however you want to describe it, that becomes the guide that becomes the guru that becomes the clarity. Now, what I also see in this is that if you go to someone, or you pick up a book, and you're not yet able to understand it, you're going to interpret it that it gives you pleasure, it brings you the pleasure. And it not to say spirituality doesn't give you pleasure, because it's probably the greatest pleasure you could ever experience. But if you compare it to worldly pleasure, it doesn't exist. So it's a very complicated these slokas are very, very profound to me in that it's really telling you here you have to trust yourself, but there's a caveat, you have to be far enough advanced on the spiritual path to be able to understand where you are. And I think that's the issue there's there's a expression in the Zen tradition, tradition when someone experiences some kind of enlightenment, but they they want to let everybody know, and it's not quite as much as they had hoped. And they call it stinking of enlightenment. And I just love that phrase, because I it doesn't say that you're not it just says you don't have the discrimination yet to make that discernment. So I think, to me, this is what this is about to getting getting us ready to move into deep spiritual teachings, knowing that there has to be a sense of purity to be able to understand them, and then the commitment to practice,

Kamala Rose: 14:36

which produces that state of equipoise between pleasure and pain, between the dualities where we are able to rest the self is able to rest in its own nature. And as you were saying and looking at verse 45 transcending the three gunas. One is free from the pairs of opposites and centers only on the self, right? Such a foundational yogic teaching, drawing from the language of Sankhya, the three gunas, sattva, rajas and tamas, and being free from the pairs of opposites, the van de VA and centered only on the self, on the Atman, right? So, as you're describing this idea of stinking of enlightenment, right? We can, that's still in the Gunas, right, where you can be so blissful you're almost silly, right? It's kind of an airhead, right? We can, we were still in the goonas, right? There's so many, you know, in the in the spiritual world to, you know, we can have so many experiences that that change us and alter us, but we have to remember that this real experience is beyond the Gunas, right? And that is this moving actually beyond the gunas. We can only do internally, while we're alive, right? We have to move right. We need our rajas to wake up right. We We need our sattva to have clarity, to understand what's going on, right? Sort out what's going on. And we certainly need our Thomas to be able to rest and relax. I taught a restorative class this morning, and right? So all by resourcing that grounding and yeah, learn learning the learned skill of relaxing that's so important that we learn in yoga, but right again, this, this experience that Krishna is defining as yoga, is it transcends the three gunas,

Nischala Joy Devi: 16:51

yes, right,

Kamala Rose: 16:55

beyond mystical, right? It's free from pleasure pain. It's not motivated by anything, and it is centered on the self, the soul, the authentic nature of every person. And now, after we've taken this side trip into or an explanation into motive, right understanding that people are coming from somewhere in their spiritual pursuits, often, right? They're coming from some motive. I want to have peace of mind. I want to have a blissful experience. I want to have a religious experience, right? I want to alleviate my pain, and I want to gain riches. That was a lot of the reason that people approached the priestly caste in that time, the time of the Gita, was, you know, to accrue blessings. We see the same kind of thing happening in the Catholic Church, to accrue blessings, to have that priest pray for you, right? So, going beyond this is a state that is really being described here as being beyond any type of motive, of getting anything out of it, of gaining anything. I think, like you said, it is its own reward, right? Yeah,

Nischala Joy Devi: 18:19

I think one thing that's a little bit probably, if I was rewriting the whole thing, I would have 245, 2.45 a, two point 40 5b put because I think it's a little bit of a rough transition between the minds of such people who are drawn to pleasure and power are unlikely to attain Samadhi. And then we say transcending the three gunas. So where is that in there? Because when you talk about transcending the Gunas, this is a very high level of experience with the spiritual Seeker. So I think it could be a little bit confusing, and I'd like to dial it back a little bit in that for as you beautifully describe the Gunas the three. Gunas the three Guna, the sattva, has to become more dominant the other three have to be there as supportive. But if we stay with Thomas, we will never do practice, because it's, it's inactivity leading to inertia. So, and that's, I think, where a lot of this comes in, and this Thomas, we don't want to do it ourselves, so we go to someone who we think is more elevated than we are, and in actuality, it may or may not be the case, but we put our confidence in that person and believe them, whereas they may not even know themselves. So, so getting that Thomas under control, and using it when we need it, for rest, for rejuvenation, etc, and then the next is moving and calming down the rajas, this is something I've seen for years and years and years. I remember I was asked to teach a meditation retreat at one point, and I went in just expecting to do just that and realize that none of them could sit still. They had been practicing Asana for years and years and years, but they weren't able to sit still. So after the Thomas, after the ability to want to either not do things or to sleep too much, or whatever, we have to calm that rajas down. And that's what I think the asanas do, the hatha yoga and the pranayama, they calm it down, because then we move into sattva. And when we move into sattva, it's so much easier to transcend the Gunas from that point, from the point of everything is in balance. Okay, now we can let go of it. I had a very interesting thing happen. I was just recently in India, and we went into this beautiful, magnificent Radha Krishna temple, and we didn't have enough coins. We small bills or coins to put in to give to each of the priests as they give you. And there was a big sign on the door that said, put in the in the boxes. Don't give it to the priests, right? So it said very clearly there. So we managed to get a small bill ready, and I went up to this small altar on the side, I can't remember, I think was Kali or Durga, and the priest was sitting there getting ready to apply the powders on my head. And I put it in the big box, and he put down his hand, crossed his arms, and wouldn't give me anything because I didn't give it to him directly. This to me, talks exactly to this. Exactly to this. His job is to sit there and give out the prasad from the deity to anyone, whether they give him money or not, but he didn't, he chose to go for the material. So I think we start to see this in the life and how religion has adapted itself to our greed, or has our greed been the place of religion? And I think we have to be very careful to take away there was a book written many years ago. I didn't read the book, but the title was fantastic, and it was called spiritual materialism. And I think we have to be very careful not to confuse the ritual with the actual spirituality. And if you don't give enough in the basket on a Sunday or a Friday or a Saturday or wherever, whatever day you're going, that you won't get that spiritual enlightenment, which, again, is ridiculous because it's, it's, it's spirituality has nothing to do with materialism, the simplest, the simplest people. So I think that these slogans are very, very powerful at this moment. And start again, starting slow, try to do things that are not so tamasic, or eating food that's so tamasic or then move to the rajas, eating things simpler, less spiced, and doing, starting to do things that make other people feel good instead of just yourself,

Kamala Rose: 24:04

you're reminding me of a wonderful film I saw recently I wanted to recommend to our listeners. It's called Fire brand, the life of Catherine Parr the last, the final, sixth and final wife of Henry the Eighth, who is it's a remarkable story. Alicia Vikander plays her. And this is a study of us, a woman who is surviving right after all of her predecessors had their heads cut off, right? So this is right, the new Church of England opposing the Catholic Church. It's the time of the Reformation, and we have this right in the middle of all this, the story of Catherine Parr, who is a deeply spiritual woman, and in fact, is so bold as to write her own thoughts on. The spiritual experience, unmediated by priests, and the this genuine interior experience available to all right, at this time, the big topic was translating the Bible into English so people could actually read and understand the teachings of this Jesus that they are expected to unconditionally follow. So, you know, we see echoes of this same subject through and through history. And I think there is something there about about how women, because of the sphere of life that we deal in, right as mothers and caregivers and end of life officiants, right? We, we, I think we're very we come and go out of these transcendental states very naturally. And we've talked about this a lot that you know, it's the mystical. Is our home realm, right? So I do find something very almost subversively feminist about these verses to challenge religious authority, to allow us to challenge religious authority, and like our you know four sisters before us, like Catherine Parr and you know subsequent women through the you know East and West, who have shown us a very, a very beautiful expression of the spiritual life outside of any religious confines that seems to come to us as a song or a natural rhythm, you know, tapping into the land and a sense of belonging to the earth, that this is one another area where I, you know, have my own, you know, dialog with the Gita on this issue of justice, right? I don't necessarily feel like I need to save the world and, you know, conquer this way. Rather, I feel aligned to care for what's good, and, you know, to help and to support and taking more of a nurturing or caring type of dialog, right? I think, I think when we look at this, I think just what we're talking about here with the Gunas that, you know, we we should understand this, but I think one way that we often think we understand subjects like the Gunas is they have to be subdued and conquered and overcome. And I just I don't. That certainly hasn't worked for me in my path and my interiorization of the spiritual the yoga teachings, right? We can't really free ourselves from the pairs of opposites. We're always there, but we have to have the wisdom and the insight that is able to see beyond, to more, to an inherent unity that is maybe bigger than dualities, rather than the sort of nihilism that often accompanies these, this sort of yoga teachings and a feminine, a feminine taking of the the Gunas would say that, you know, we are in the realm of nature, but at all times, are aware of what's more than the three gunas, and because we're alive, right, that we can't really get beyond it just how you said, sattva has To take the predominance. This is what our yoga practices are about, right? Our practice of Asana, as you said, is going to help us to mediate the rajas, but we have to accompany that with pranayama, and that will help us with the Thomas help us to bring get some of that residual laziness and apathy, and you know, the world is certainly agitating a level of inertia in us, in a way think, you know, choosing clarity and A voluntary peace is a good path to go.

Nischala Joy Devi: 29:44

The next thing that comes up, which is very interesting for me, is these Gunas that we are now being asked to transcend. We need to. Look for this in our teachers and our leaders too. Where are they in this? Because what has to come up in this natural day and age is this whole abuse cycle that you put your faith in someone or an institution, and then you find out at some point that there was major abuses of different kinds of nature, financial nature, sexual nature, physical nature, etc. What do we do with that, and how do we reconcile that with the religion that's, I think we're drives people into the mysticism of it, because if we continue to allow this level of abuse without stopping it, it will take over, and it will poison even the spiritual aspect of any known religion. And I see this over and over again, people, especially women, also giving an excuse. Oh, well, it's because of this. It's because they're celibate. Is because they're asked to do this. It's because that see, what it says to me is the person has not tuned in to this mystical aspect, whether it's in yoga, whether it's in Catholicism, Christianity, Judaism, Bucha, people going anywhere. If we don't get to that mystical aspect which all the traditions have, then the confusion comes, why am I doing this? And why am I doing this comes, and then they start doing things that are inappropriate, without that backing, without that the understanding of who we are. This keeps getting perpetuated over and over, and what people are doing, instead of drawing away from the religion into spirituality, they're letting go of the whole baby with the bath water. And I think this is to me, the sadness of what's happening. If people come to me and they say, my teacher has done this, my rabbi has done this, my priest has done this, and I say, then let them go, but don't let go of the sacred teachings that comes from 1000s of years ago, not from these people. Because what people are doing is they're branding now these ancient teachings to be like their own. And it's not all these have come from 1000s and 1000s of years. Do we put a little personality on it? Yes, but not to change it. And I think this is what we're trying to do Kamala, is really explain it from a different way, not change anything, but say, okay, you can look at it this way, but mystically. If you go in and really meditate on this, you're going to find something completely different. So I think that this has to be looked at also this. Who? Who are we getting the knowledge from which gun are they in, and have they transcended

Kamala Rose: 33:30

issues with who our teachers are, and developing the discernment to tell a good teacher is very sagely advice, something I think needs to be heard as often as possible in the spiritual landscape today. I you know you're such a forerunner in this. You have heard stories of spiritual abuse for decades. Yeah, right. You, you're the one of the forerunners of this, right? There's a lot of dialogs going on where, where people are discovering that things have happened to them physically, right? Maybe they even blocked it out and they couldn't even remember that something happened. I just saw another film that was show it was a story of a local guru in India who had had the whole town, all of the young women, uh, ritually, came and did sex puja with him. Sex sex seva with him. Every, every day, all day. And then there were places to watch, from a gallery where the men would come and watch seva. It was unbelievable, true story. And you know, was, was he eventually, uh, dealt with, not harshly enough. Yeah, right. But these kinds of stories and these sort of things that. Go on under the cloak of religion. And I think there's a part of taking the mystical and kind of shrouding in mystery, anything that deals with spirituality that says to people you're too common to understand, right? So there's Oh, there's a there's a reason for this. There's a reason for this. And you know, as the you know, 1000s of Catholic priests have, you know, have shown Oh no, no, they they clearly have something, some way that they've framed this, that they all share, all of these abusers share, and this is the spiritual climate that we live in and what modern women are dealing with in reading the Bhagavad Gita and other spiritual texts, right? The texts on on yoga are very you know, all of the teachers are men. It was handed down by men to men, copied by men. All of the examples were given to men, and we now as Western women who have been been brought up or been part of the women's movement east and west, we find ourselves finding these very ancient teachings filled with the very patriarchy that we are rebelling against, right? And so I think it's very appropriate to note this in this part of chapter two that I think we're we have so much. We've got a lot to work with just to question that and and I think that's our attitude towards the Bhagavad Gita, is that it's an ancient Sanskrit work that's handed down to us today. But I don't think we want to bring those morals with no with it. We're not trying to emulate the lifestyle. We're trying to take the mystical teachings that apply to us as modern women, inheritors of a movement of empowerment that like Catherine Parr and Queen Elizabeth after her right these women of power and intelligence who really said, you know, and so many others who really tried to show that you don't need a media women, you have the direct spiritual experience happening yourself, my gurus and teachers, so many Women who have taught me over the years that you are entitled to your experience. You are entitled to yourself the way everyone else is. And I think the more we empower each other and support each other in our awakening, the diversity of voices of what it sounds like for female embodied people you know, and even you know all all of our gender identities, having the freedom to speak openly about what it feels Like to be awakening without the rigidity of patriarchy?

Nischala Joy Devi: 38:24

Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. The question that comes to my mind is, how, if we are indoctrinated from small children, how do we grow that discernment to be able to know who is leading us on the right way and who isn't. I've heard countless case histories of abuse from spiritual teachers, from the disciples of spiritual teachers who were convinced, at least initially, that the things that were being done to them was for their spiritual growth and development. And even though there was a voice inside of them that said, No, this is not true. This is not right. The the continuation from the voice at the external voice saying, No, this is the way it should be. Become stronger than your inner voice, and that's how the people are taken advantage of. Because we all know, even small children know when something is not right, but they don't have the power to do anything about it. So I think, along with this transcendence of the Gunas, we have to be very careful to place the spiritual teachers that we have not on a pedestal, but instead, in the eyes of the Gunas, where are they? And is this someone that you may need to learn? Something from for a period of time, and then move on, because there's, there's different kinds of gurus. There's something that we call the Sat Guru, which is the guru beyond any kind of these issues that we're talking about, sat the truth, the absolute, the primary that will take us as far as we need to go, maybe in form, most of the time, not in form. And then there's the upagurus, the gurus of the everyday life that we can find to help us. Can you teach me how to do mantra? Can you teach me how to change a flat tire. Can you do that? There are upper gurus, and there's somebody, if there's somebody to emulate. We do otherwise. We just learn that, and then we pull back this giving of our complete power to another human being has to stop. It has to stop, whether it's a guru, whether it's a sports hero. Very interesting. I went in to get some supplies the other day to a food store right here, and it was the day before the Super Bowl, and they they were two young men behind the counter, and they said to me, Oh, you're going to watch the big game. You know, they were kind of perky like that. And I just shook my head, no. I didn't want to get into it. And they pushed and they said, Not a fan. And I said, No, not exactly. I said, I just, I don't approve of that, the way that they act. And I said, and you know, it's the biggest day for domestic violence of the year. And one of the young men said, Oh, I guess if the team loses. I said, No, either way, they're so pumped up on testosterone that they go home and they beat their wife and children. So he was shocked, and what I realized is I could see at that moment, his whole world took a quarter of a turn, and he started to look at this a little bit different. I wasn't angry, I wasn't pushy, I just stated a fact, and I said, you can look it up if you don't under if you don't believe me. And he said, Wow, I never even thought of that. I think I'll just watch the commercials, he said. And off I went. But I feel like it's the Gita, the Scriptures, the Bible, all these books give us a spiritual blueprint, but not just for our spiritual growth. It's all for also for our human growth and to become better people. Not just follow the crowd, not just do something because someone says, this is the big game of the year, but everything, because if you follow in one thing, will you follow in the next? When will you start empowering yourself to make your own decisions? And this is the caveat when it's not popular.

Unknown: 43:15

That's the hard part.

Kamala Rose: 43:19

Learning discernment is one of the most important lessons that yoga teaches us. And recurring theme in the Bhagavad Gita being able to discern those very things, what, where? Where do I need to learn from someone else? What do I need to learn from someone someone else? When have I learned enough, and the ability to discern the quality of teacher that we have encountered? You know, I think this is a huge area in the yoga world today, and I feel like there's a there's a part of many Westerners who are encountering the sort of exotic Eastern tradition of yoga and spirituality and come to the guru question with quite a romanticism, right, right? When you know, when you're in love like that, you are not on your A game of discernment, right? How many have walked into some stupid situations on that? Right? So we have to, we've have to give ourselves permission to trust ourselves and what we know. And when it's time to change, it's time to change, right? Right? Something we've both learned it's time to change. And there was a period that it was very important to have the specific guidance and the monastic training and all of this. So I think our words are coming from, you know, certain kind of experience of. Living with our gurus, and, you know, being very involved in Ashram life and having to make the difficult decision to step away and begin to make those decisions independently about our spiritual future and development. And I hope that our words and experience can empower other women to give yourself permission to you know, to trust yourself and believe that you have the capacity to learn and grow, sometimes with the help of others, but also by practice. And this is what we love so much about yoga, as it gives us practices and things that we can do with the body and mind to to literally change and to grow ourselves and to someone who has a different level of emotional maturity. And it that's very real and very tangible. And I'd like to add that, you know, we did go into a lot in this episode today. So if you have experienced any spiritual abuse, there are resources that you can reach out to and connect with. I know they're doing a lot of work on this at so as in London, and they could connect you with some of the researchers who are working in that. I think one thing that academia gives us is a sort of objective, neutral place that's not pro religious right? It's not, it's sort of neutral, does tries not to feel one way or the other about these sort of things. And you know, we hope that you'll feel supported. And you know, as as the as the yoga community evolves, and we start to hear these threads and these narratives emerging, and we and our, you know, and we want to help and support each other. I think nishtel is so right that coming to a reckoning over, let's say some of the ways that we, you know, we fell head over heels in love with yoga and, you know jumped in head first, and maybe, you know, just giving ourselves permission to adapt and grow and change and to trust yourself and your conscience as that inner guru to

Nischala Joy Devi: 47:38

think One of the difficulties is the Sangha, at least in my experience, because if you have that clarity, that's that you've been graced with. And then you start talking to other people and they say, Oh no, no, that's not true, that's not right, that's not the way it's supposed to be, or way it is. And then you start to have doubt. That's that's where we have to go back to the practices. You have to really go in and listen, as we talked about with Mother Teresa, to that voice within. And you have to start trusting it when it says, This isn't right. This isn't right because it will pull you down too. It's not just the teacher, it's it's those that condone what the teacher is doing. And we saw this, there was a group going to a particular ashram in India, and I said, I'm sorry. I won't go because that teacher has been abusive to women, and I don't go places where I knowingly know that. And people said, Oh, we don't care. He's a good teacher. And that kind of thing, that kind of experience always stops me in my tracks, because to me, the first thing is the moral the moral aptitude. From there, the spirituality grows. It's like the soil with which you're planting the spiritual seeds. If you plant them in bad soil, you're not going to get good plants. So it's this kind of thing that I think we all have to look at. And if someone in your community who has a little bit more of that light to be able to see clearly, listen to them, talk to them before you make any kind of decision. And ask yourself, Is this something that most yoga teachers will teach you? Most gurus will do? Where does it say this in the Scripture? Yeah, where is that? So be careful, because it's, it seems to be growing in popularity, this abuse, and it's being shoved to the side. And I think this is one of the biggest mistakes, because you can't possibly get to that point of knowing yourself as a yogi and condone physical, sexual or mental abuse. So be careful. Be careful when you choose someone, don't give everything. Just hold back a little bit. See who that person is. Watch them. What did they do? How did they act? It says it right here in the Bhagavad Gita. How does someone of steady wisdom Act? Read it. Do they act like that? Yeah.

Kamala Rose: 50:57

So well. Thank you so much for joining us today on a woman's Gita podcast, we've covered a lot today on some important verses in the Gita. We thank you so much for listening, and hope that you will share our podcast with others who might enjoy this, this radical dialog and and hit subscribe and maybe leave us a review. We would love it. We'd love to hear from you. And anything you'd love for us to talk about, we'd love to hear from you. Thank you so much for listening. Namaste. Namaste.

Lilavati Eberle: 51:38

Thank you for joining us for a women's Gita with nistula Joy Devi and Kamala rose, we would like to express our gratitude for the ongoing support for a women's Gita podcast and book from yoga gives back a non profit organization dedicated to the underserved women and children of India. Please join us again for our next episode coming soon. Namaste. You.