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Swamiji and the Discovery of Sunyoga |
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Sunyogi Umashankarji
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Sunyogi Umasankar was born into a Hindu family in West Bengal, near Calcutta in 1967. Living next to an ashram throughout his childhood, he developed an early interest in Yoga and religion. By the age of eighteen, having spent a large proportion of his life practicing Yoga, he made the decision to dedicate part of his life to walking through every state of India spreading the message of 'Universal Unity, Peace and Brotherhood'.
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Although his spiritual training is from a Hindu background, Umasankarji's message has always been directed at people of all religions. His ideas are based on a religion of humanity that makes no distinction between colour, race or religion... a path for all mankind with a common goal that is unity, peace and brotherhood.
Umasankarji's journey through India did not start until 1997. For two years prior to his journey Umasankarji stayed in Aurobindo assram in Pondicherry practicing Yoga and making many important discoveries. The most important of his discoveries was 'Sunyoga'. Very little is known about Sunyoga; it is briefly mentioned in some of the ancient Indian scriptures, but at the time of Umasankarji's discovery, only one other person (Hira Ratan Manek) was known to be practicing it in the modern world. Now, five years later, there are an estimated 10,000 people throughout India practicing Sunyoga, taught by Umasankar-ji on his travels.
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Pondicherry is on the coast of south east India, looking over the Bay of Bengal. During his time at the ashram, Umasankarji spent every morning meditating on a rock looking out at the sun's reflection off the sea. His daily meditation upon the reflected sunlight gave him great pleasure, but at this time he did not consider it to be a form of Yoga.
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As he continued though, Umasankarji became aware that, through this method of meditation, he was somehow able to absorb powerful energies from the sun's rays. Umasankarji began to experiment by looking directly at the sun - initially as it was rising, then day by day he began to concentrate on it as it rose higher into the sky. He continued his meditation and after a couple of months the sun started to appear as a "clear hazy ring with soft blue sky inside". The harsh brightness disappeared and he felt it become increasingly soothing. As time went on, he started to see "seven bright colours radiating from the sun, slowly reaching closer to the ground". Three months after starting his concentration on the sun, Umasankarji felt these rays - the sun's cosmic energy - touch his body, creating within him an undescribable feeling of peace and calm.
Shortly after this experience, Umasankarji returned to the ashram to eat his usual food, but he found that he was unable to digest his simple plate of chapatis. His body rejected the food, yet he felt that he was fully nourished. |
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During his three month period of concentrating on the sun, Umasankarji had developed a great interest in the way that trees and plants are able to receive energy directly from sunlight. His discoveries now made him believe that he had found a way of absorbing the sun's energy directly into his body, charging his body's cells with kinetic energy and therefore removing the need to eat food. So, as an experiment, Umasankarji stopped eating breakfast and continued concentrating on the sun. Six months later, he stopped eating his dinner, then six months after that, he stopped eating food at all. From the 17th August until the 7th December 1996, Umasankarji stopped eating and sleeping altogether. His body weight remained the same and he continued his daily routine working in the assram in a perfect state of health. Shortly after this period of his life, he began his journey through India teaching his discoveries to people he met along the way. During his travels, he has become a source of great interest to a number of scientific and medical research centres where he had his claims tested, examined and verified - at least up to the level of sophistication that modern scientific instruments are capable of reaching. |
By one of his students
I have met Umasankarji 31,000 km after he started walking barefoot through India. I have now witnessed him living with no food, water or sleep, spending part of each day staring at the sun as if it was as soft as the moon.
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On a number of occasions I have watched him enter Samadhi (the ultimate state of liberation attained through Yoga) during meditation, and I have felt him stop his pulse through sheer concentration. He does not seem to feel the cold - he sometimes sits barechested at night when I am feeling cold wearing thick woolly clothes and wrapped in a blanket. His personality is patient, gentle and calm and his attitude towards others is like that of a close friend or a brother. He is always true to his philosophies and all his claims - I believe - are 100% true.
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Three and a half years later, having completed his 62,000km barefoot journey through every state of India, Umasankarji and I have met again.
We have added three sections on practical meditation techniques; photograph meditation, eye-to-eye meditation and sun meditation. These can give some guidance, but if you are genuinely interested to learn more about sunyoga, then it is best, if you can, to meet Umasankarji at one of the conferences he organises in India.
Basic Principles for Meditation and Sunyoga
Before starting to practise sunyoga, it is very important to follow certain principles in order to purify your mind, and to develop your power of concentration through regular practise of meditation. These principles can be explained through the first three steps of the eight steps of Yoga; Yama, Nyama and Asana.
Umasankar-ji explains Yama as the foundation of Yoga, the primary stage at which the beginner make's his/her life plan; What do I want and why do I want it? It is the stage at which one turns inward to question the purpose of one's life, to make a plan and start preparing to carry it out. It is the stage at which the 'sadhak' begins to surrender to a higher ideal, to listen to one's heart and decide what one wants.
Once a plan, or the seed of a plan, has been put together, the sadhak must stick to it; I will do it, I must do it, even if I die I will do it.
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The path of Yoga is never without challenges, so one must have confidence and persevere. The time it takes to achieve the goal depends on the sadhak's will-power.
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The second step, Nyama, is the actual implementation of the plan. The two basic principles of Nyama are discipline and punctuality. At this stage, the sadhak knows what he wants, and why he wants it. The challenge now is to carry out the plan, and not to be distracted by challenges along the way and not to waste valuable time. The stronger the foundation, i.e. the plan made in the primary stage, yama, the easier it is to carry out the second step; Nyama.
The third basic step is Asana, the most important principle of which is to develop a correct posture and attitude. The most important aspect of Asana is to keep one's spine straight and relaxed. In this way, the divine force can move freely through the main energy channels that run from the top to the base of the spine. At this stage the sadhak can start his/her practise of meditation. There are three sitting postures that are most effective for meditation; padmasana, sidhyasana and gomukasana.
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