8 - Posture: The Alignment of Our Body During Chanting

Chanting the Holy Names involves our physical presence. In this episode, Hari examines the principle of alignment, emphasizing the importance of proper posture. He reflects on how our body affects not only our mind and heart but also our ability to connect with Krishna. Drawing on insights from the teachings of Sacinandana Swami, he shares how aligning our body in the Mode of Goodness allows us to chant with greater absorption and devotion.

Quotes

• "The mind is affected by the body, and the heart is also affected by the body." 
• "When you are preparing to meditate, you want to sit straight."    
• "Chanting in the Mode of Goodness is sitting straight, aligned, and really being ready."

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Our heartfelt thanks to Jahnavi Harrison for graciously allowing us to feature her recording, "Divine Maha Mantra," in our intro and outro. Learn more about her divine music: https://www.jahnavimusic.com/. 

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In short, Morning Rounds is: How to make the most of our most important practice.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Krishna. Welcome to Morning Rounds. These are short 5 to 15 minute episodes from our weekly Jeppa meditation program with the Upbuild community, offering guidance and inspiration for your chanting practice. Rooted in years of monastic training, the study and teaching of the Phagavad Gita, coaching, and our own spiritual practices, these teachings are meant to support you in the most important journey there is: the journey from the ego to the true self. You can also join us for the live version of this program by visiting upbuild.com forward slash morning-rounds. So we want to give a little thought today to the body. How should our body be when we're chanting the holy names? There is a section of Sachinandana Swami's book, The Living Name, which uh some of you must be familiar with. I highly, highly recommend. It's really like a Bible for how to chant. He calls it the subtitle is a guide for chanting with absorption. It's very, very powerful. And the opening section is a principle called yojana, which means alignment. So alignment is very important on different levels: the body, the mind, and the heart. But we start with the easiest access point, the grossest, the physical body. And so that means first of all, posture. There is a tape of Srila Prabhupada, my guru's guru, Sachinandan Swami's guru, saying that you must sit properly and correcting his disciple. And it became very famous, it would it spread around the world amongst the disciples because it became clear that we don't usually sit properly, and this is an important instruction. So, of course, japa is meditation, and when you are preparing to meditate naturally, you kind of get into a certain position, you want to sit straight. Um, so let us not forget that the mind is affected by the body, and the heart is also affected by the body, and our ability to be present and to reach out to Krishna is affected even by the body. There is one uh little story that I've heard many times of uh a professor saying, you know, hearing a complaint from a student that um I'm always feeling so down and depressed. I'm always so down and depressed. And he said, Give me one moment. And he said, Oh, you know what? It works, it works. I'm also feeling really down and depressed when I am sitting like or I'm standing like this, my posture is like this. So there is such an effect on the consciousness, and when we sit up straight, we align ourselves, there's consciousness, there's intentionality, and also oxygen can flow nicely. So we can breathe better, breathe easier, be more relaxed and more present. The last thing on this point is in the Bhagavad Gita, there are three modes of material nature that are given the mode of goodness, the mode of passion, and the mode of ignorance. And there's a hierarchy to them. We want to be chanting in the mode of goodness, we want to be doing everything in the mode of goodness. The mode of goodness gives us the easiest access to transcendence. So if we lie down and chant, that's in the mode of ignorance. We do that only when we're sick or we're physically incapacitated. There's some uh necessity to do that, whereas otherwise we wouldn't be able to chant, and chanting is too important, and it's not ignorant when we're doing everything we possibly can. But if we do it, you know, ah, I'm just gonna chant. That's there's laziness, right? Self-indulgence in the mode of passion, it's walking, pacing, and we do that to be alert, we do that to get rid of any restlessness or frustration, and that's all right. Passion is better than ignorance, and many times I must revert to that, but um, it's not ideal. I don't love to chant like that, it's not it's not my favorite for sure. Um, chanting in the mode of goodness is sitting straight, aligned, and really being ready. So, with that, we will chant in that mode of goodness alignment, yojana. Thank you so much for listening to Morning Rounds. Upbuild is a leadership and spiritual development organization that offers courses, workshops, coaching, and other services to help you on the path toward being your best self. Free from the shackles of the ego. Please join us for the live version of this program by visiting upbuild.com forward slash morning dash rounds.