Yoga of the Heart
Ten Ethical Guidelines for Gaining Limitless Growth, Confidence, and Achievement
by Alice Christensen
Chapter 5: Ethic #2 - Truthfulness: Don't Lie to Yourself
You probably are aware when you are telling a lie, but can you recognize truth when you hear it?
Most of us find it easy to make promises, but we are often lax about following through. Are you able to keep your word, no matter how trivial your promise?
If I were to ask you to describe yourself, you would probably make many statements that are based on what has been told to you by others. Do you know how to tell what is true about yourself?
The results of practicing the ethic of Truthfulness (Sanskrit: Satya) will begin to show immediately: As your awareness of the importance of keeping your word grows, you will experience a growing pride in yourself. You will notice a greater stability in your relationships as your friends learn that they can depend on you. As you learn to recognize what is true about yourself, you will gain great confidence in your abilities and appreciation for your strengths.
The ethic of Truthfulness has many levels, and in this chapter I will be discussing several aspects of the questions above. I will show you how to begin to recognize truth and how to stop accepting lies about yourself that may contribute to self-destructive behavior. I have designed a fantasy technique that can help you instantly know whether or not a statement about yourself is true. In addition, I will discuss how truth relates to Nonviolence, and the role of differing perceptions in truth.
Truth is more subtle and hidden than some of the other ethics. For instance, you know right away when you have stolen something (see Chapter 6), but it is more difficult to recognize truth. Everyone tries to interpret truth in their own way, and so truth appears to change in different circumstances when actually it remains the same. As a mundane example, consider the claims made on television for new products, such as household cleansers. The promoter might tell you that this product will clean everything in your house, but you won’t know whether or not that is really true unless you try it yourself. This type of consistent observation is necessary to find truth in all things.
The heart should have fed upon the truth, as insects on a leaf, till it be tinged with the color, and show its food in every . . . minutest fiber. (Samuel Taylor Coleridge)
THE PROBLEM OF LYING TO YOURSELF
When I first started to teach on the subject of truth, I asked students to send me examples of lies that had caused problems in their lives. We enjoyed some hilarious examples. One woman wrote about how, as a teenager, she had developed a mad crush on a boy whose only love appeared to be cars. Pretending to enjoy the same interest, she memorized a small amount of information about engines and caught his interest immediately. Love seemed in the offing, but everything fell apart when he invited her to work on his car with him and she had to confess she knew nothing about cars at all. She never heard from him again.
Sometimes lies seem to become the truth. A student told this story about his experience with truth and lying:
When I was in college I decided to try telling a big lie in order to watch the results. The opportunity came quickly. I had just traded my car for another one, so I decided that I would tell my college roommate that my previous car had been stolen.
My roommate was skeptical at first, but I had enlisted the help of a close friend to back up my lie, and because two people told it, the lie then seemed more plausible. Eventually, my big lie became a total success. After several days I noticed a surprising result of this experiment. I found that I was having a difficult time separating the lie from reality. I myself was beginning to believe it. It really frightened me how quickly I lost sight of the truth. Equally frightening is that years later I sometimes wondered what had happened to my car and the thief who had stolen it.
Another student sent me a newspaper clipping relating an apocryphal story that, some say, has circulated for years. The story concerns a woman who one day looked out of her kitchen window and saw, to her horror, her dog holding a dead rabbit in its mouth. The rabbit looked exactly like her neighbor’s pet rabbit. The woman ran outside and succeeded in separating the rabbit from her dog, took it inside, washed it off, and even used her hair dryer to fluff up its fur. After ascertaining that her neighbor was not home, she then put the rabbit carefully back into the neighbor’s cage, hoping that the poor woman would think that the animal had died from natural causes.
When the neighbor returned home, she screamed and ran tearfully next door to her friend, crying that her rabbit, which had died that morning and which she had carefully buried in her back yard, had mysteriously come back to haunt her and was lying in its cage in perfect condition.
I relate these stories to get you to think about your own experience with truth and lying, and how these experiences make you feel about yourself. How many of you are basing your entire self-image — such as your looks, abilities, accomplishments, and self-worth — on lies told to you by others or by yourself? The self-hate, discontent, and loneliness that I see in so many people is often caused by acceptance of lies told to them by themselves and others.
If you accept lies as true, negative attitudes will grow on your heart like a mold. You will have your own "little shop of horrors" living with you. Many debilitating feelings such as fear, insecurity, and anxiety are based on lies: lies that you tell yourself and lies that you accept from others as true, never having learned how to find out if they are really true. This pattern begins early in childhood; a child doesn’t know how to tell what is true and what is not. And so you simply accept what others tell you; you begin to accept lies without question. Eventually, those lies seem to become the truth.
Many people continue accepting lies into adulthood, developing an entire secret inner life that no one ever knows about because it is contrary to what they have been told as children. Thurber’s famous story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" is a good example. Mitty was raised to live a certain kind of life which he hated; he had a completely different, much more exciting life in fantasy. His tragedy was that he could not bring his fantasy into form. He was stuck in the life he had developed during childhood, a life that did not allow him to portray his true feelings.
External life becomes a superb acting job for people such as Walter Mitty as they try to become someone they are not in order to fulfill the picture of themselves that a lifetime of lies has created; meanwhile, their true nature remains hidden. So many people suffer tremendous loneliness because of this pattern. In hiding, they become separate from their real self, the spiritual body.
If people told you, as a child, that you were bad, stupid, ugly, or incompetent, does that make it true? When you place labels on yourself based on lies, you are caught identifying with the physical body and judging yourself according to another person’s opinions.
To correctly practice the Yogic ethic of truth, you must learn to recognize truth in yourself. What am I doing? What am I saying? What am I seeing? Do I want to be here? Am I saying what I really feel? Finding the truthful answers to these types of questions, and then acting on them, requires courage. Try to remain aware of your inner conversation constantly, Then use the fantasy exercise described in the next section to test whether or not your statements to yourself are true. As you become proficient in this technique, you will find yourself gaining in strength and confidence because you are building a picture of yourself based upon truth rather than lies.
He who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it a second and third time, till at length it becomes habitual; he tells lies without attending to it, and truths without the worlds believing him. This falsehood of the tongue leads to that of the heart, and in time depraves all its good dispositions. (Thomas Jefferson)
HOW TO START PRACTICING TRUTHFULNESS
1. Keep your word to yourself and others. This will strengthen your willpower and makes you proud of yourself. It will also help you build a reputation of honor in your relationships. If you give your word, no matter how insignificant the issue may be, keep it. Make sure others can count on your word. Start with small exercises for yourself: If you promise that you will clean the refrigerator this weekend, do it.
2. Try to become what you want to be. Do not become a Walter Mitty; try to make your outer life match your inner fantasy. Refuse to accept lies about yourself, whether told to you by others or told to you by yourself. Appreciate your own strength of being. Try to find out who you really are.
There is an old story that Rama told me about a lion cub whose mother had died and who had been adopted and raised by a flock of sheep. He ate grass, he "baaah"ed like a sheep, and he considered himself a sheep just like the rest of the flock. One night a lioness crept up and attacked the herd. She killed a sheep and was dragging the body away when she spied the young cub, trembling with fear.
She stopped in her tracks and said, "What are you doing here? You’re not a sheep. You’re a lion."
And she led the cub to a stream where they gazed at their reflections together. The cub saw that he was indeed a lion, not a sheep after all, and he let out a great roar.
3. Welcome the spontaneity of intuition. Intuition, the spontaneous, creative voice of your spiritual body, cannot speak unless you are listening. Every time you accept a negative statement as true, you are closing the pathway to your spiritual voice. This is because you have allowed your physical body to form a judgment about the truth of the statement on its own. When you invite the spiritual body to speak, you instantly have another option.
4. Use a fantasy exercise to recognize truth. When I told Lakshmanjoo that I was having difficulty in recognizing what was true about myself, he gave me an answer that always works for me: He explained to me that truth can be tasted. It is sweet. I have used this test for many years now with unfailing results.
To try this fantasy exercise, first imagine that the sensation of sweetness is not limited to your mouth, but that you can experience sweetness with your other senses as well. Ask yourself how it might feel to experience the sensation of sweetness with something you hear or see. In this fantasy exercise, you will be testing everything you say to yourself by asking if it tastes sweet. Here is an example:
Imagine yourself getting dressed in the morning in front of the mirror. It’s not your best day. You look at your reflection and begin to hear yourself talking to yourself in your head. When you become aware of this conversation, give each sentence the test for sweetness:
"I look awful"— ask yourself, Is this sweet?
"I can’t possibly get everything done today"— does this taste sweet?
"If I don’t get this project done today, I will certainly be a failure" — and so on.
If a statement does not taste sweet, according to Lakshmanjoo’s theory, you can immediately know that it is not true and that this outlook is harmful to you. When thought and behavior are guided by this test for truth, you can be sure that it will not become self-destructive.
Not all conversation is negative. Once in a while some of us are lucky enough to look in the mirror and hear, "I look like a million bucks today!" Test this positive thought along with the rest of your inner conversation. Is it sweet? If so, then you know it is true. As you continue to practice this technique throughout the day, your outlook on yourself will slowly but surely become more positive and constructive because you are telling yourself the truth.
You can play this fantasy game in your relationships, also. When you are involved in a conversation and someone says something to you that makes you feel uncomfortable, test the statement: is it sweet? This game will help you avoid pain, because if the person says something to you that causes pain, this test will immediately tell you that it is not true, and so you will be able to protect yourself from harmful reactions.
If you refuse to believe any statement or observation that does not pass the sweet test, you will not be trapped into any position of failure. For instance, a love affair ends, and your former partner tells you that it is all your fault. If you believe this, it will solidify the failure in your own mind. If you use this fantasy sweet test, you will not be trapped; instead, you have a choice because you know whether or not it is true.
When we think about what is true or not true, we usually try to make decisions with the intellect, which operates from the physical body. Truth cannot be owned by the intellect. The only way the physical body can clearly perceive truth is by completing a connection with the spiritual body. That connection is encouraged by approaching thoughts and feelings with the fantasy game I have described above. Move beyond your physical limitation. Test everything with your fantasy exercise by asking, "Does it taste sweet?" If the sweet sensation is not there, do not accept it as true.
THE PERCEPTION OF TRUTH
Most people equate truth with fact. However, the facts given to us are not always true. For instance, when I was a child, it was considered a fact that the atom could not be split. We now know that this is not true. The many studies involving eyewitnesses show that even people who supposedly see the same thing perceive it differently. This is because the false ego, which, as I pointed out in Chapter 1, is limited by its connection with the physical body, sees only its own interpretation of events colored by past experience and hasty conclusions.
The false ego believes, "Everyone else thinks as I do." But several people agreeing on an idea does not necessarily make that idea true. There is a famous psychological test in which ten people are put into a room and asked to identify something in the room — let’s say, the color green painted on the wall. Nine of the people are secretly instructed to identify the color as blue; the only person being tested is the tenth, who usually begins to doubt his or her own perception and agrees with the other nine people. The subject of the experiment is willing to accept a lie as truth.
If that tenth person were practicing the Truth ethic, that person would probably not change his or her perception even if it felt embarrassing to stand firm. There would be no need to explain or try to convince anyone that one answer is right and another is wrong, because you would be relying on the support of your spiritual body, not on outside approval, to tell you what is true. There is no need to proselytize. The proof is for yourself alone.
Jewels and Truth
Jewels have been worshipped throughout the ages for beauty and legendary powers. Emeralds, for instance, when they were placed under the tongue, supposedly forced the person to tell the truth. It was said that celibates can use an emerald to become invisible if they know the trick. Supposedly, sorcerers’ magic becomes ineffective when emeralds are worn for protection.
Rubies are said to glow and shine through clothing. Legend says that if rubies are thrown into cold water by the right person, the water will come to a boil immediately. I have never seen this done.
In legend, the sapphire is the jewel that is most closely associated with truth. If you wear sapphires, eat sapphire dust, or use sapphires in worship, all obstacles between you and truth are supposedly removed.
When I practiced my discipline of silence in the jungle with Rama, he used to grind up emeralds, pearls, and other gems and feed them to me with deer musk.
THE POWER OF TRUTH
I have discussed how the acceptance of lies in our past can harm us in the present. Now consider what happens when you extend the practice of Truthfulness to your relationships with others. When you begin to recognize truth, it is important to be careful not to use this powerful force to cause harm. Remember to apply all ten of the ethical principles to all your actions; this will help to prevent behavior that is self-destructive or that will cause violence to others.
Many people feel it is their duty to tell the truth even if it causes pain. Truth then becomes a weapon. The ethic of Nonviolence can be applied to help you avoid causing injury. If you appeal to both your physical and your spiritual bodies before you speak, you can be sure that your expression of truth will be nonviolent. Your physical body makes a judgment based on false ego. Intuition speaks for the spiritual body.
Here is a simple example: You come across an acquaintance you have not seen in many years. Your physical body looks at him and notices that he has gained a lot of weight. Your physical body’s false ego says, "It is my responsibility to solve this problem and help this man by telling him my secret to losing weight fast." If you wait for your spiritual body to speak, however, intuition may tell you that commenting on the man’s weight would be a violent and unnecessary act.
The Power of Language
The power of language is illustrated clearly in the wide prevalence of rumor. Many people seem to believe that if a so-called "fact" appears in print or on the Internet, then it must be true. Indeed, the proliferation of untruth has a frightening commercial quality: it makes money, and so it becomes self-perpetuating. Information that is taken as true when it is not is often harmful to the people involved; an example is the extensive sensationalistic news coverage of the man suspected — and later cleared — of the bombing in Atlanta during the Olympic games in 1996. His reputation and way of life were irreparably damaged by it.
By appealing to both bodies, you can create a clear channel between the physical and spiritual so that the spiritual body can help you speak without violence. Try this fantasy technique: imagine a tunnel connecting your physical and spiritual bodies. Try to imagine what happens when that tunnel is blocked. I think you will realize that neither body can perform competently because one half of its power source is cut off. If you can visualize this, you will become aware that this blockage causes pain to both bodies. When you open the channel, you will experience immediate relief.
The story of Cassandra illustrates how truth can be destructive if it is blocked. As a child in the great city of Troy, she slept in the temple of Apollo, the sun god. Every morning she was found wound about with snakes, which, by licking her ears, gave her the gift of prophecy and the understanding of the languages of animals.
When Cassandra grew to young womanhood, Apollo became so thrilled with her beauty that he took form and tried to make love to her. Because she had been trained as a celibate priestess, she fought him off. Enraged, and unable to revoke her gift of prophecy, Apollo cursed her by causing her prophecies to go unheard. It was Cassandra who recognized the Greeks’ wooden horse for what it was, but no one believed her. Cassandra was a channel for truth. When truth was not able to function, its path was blocked, and this caused catastrophe.
The Power of Truth
Many people would agree that "a little truth goes a long way." How many times have you heard people say, for example, "I didn’t want to tell the whole truth because it would have been too much for them." The classical outlook is that Truth, in its purest form, is so powerful that it could injure people. Stories such as "The Rose-colored Glasses" (see Chapter 14) illustrate this point.
Lakshmanjoo told me that when the great sage Patanjali was teaching and lecturing on Yoga, he would sit behind a copper screen to shield his audience from the power of his teaching. Patanjali would actually take the form of kundalini (the spinal nervous system of the spiritual body that is represented by a serpent) while he was speaking. It was said that without protection, seeing that powerful form would burn the listener to ashes, as if one were standing in the way of a lightning bolt.
Truth Can Take Form
An important aspect of the Truth ethic is to practice being very careful about what you say. According to Yogic texts, when you are established in truth, your words have the power to take shape. It is difficult to maintain this type of constant attention in casual speech. Lakshmanjoo and I talked about this phenomenon:
Lakshmanjoo: The result of the discipline of Satya [Truthfulness] is, whatever you say it comes true. I saw that, many times. Whatever you speak, even if you speak just casually, it comes true. It is the power of observing Truthfulness. When the master is the embodiment of truth, and he tells his disciple, "Oh, you'll be all right, you will realize God," it comes true.
Alice: Truth itself is so powerful that it takes form, doesn’t it? You couldn’t impulsively say to someone, "Go to hell" — that would be very irresponsible, wouldn’t it?
Lakshmanjoo: That is not truth. It is violent truth. It is attack.
Alice: If you say something like that, would it disturb your own basis of truth?
Lakshmanjoo: Yes, that is quite true. Also, if you insult truth by joking, that way you are not in a real sense observing the ethic of truth.
The extensive use of euphemisms in our language reflects an unconscious awareness that naming a thing will call it into being. In some religions, the name of God is never written or spoken, because when that name is uttered, God will take form, and the physical body cannot endure the sight without protection. In the same way, any word that can bring your spiritual body into form must be used with great respect.
One of the great depictions of the effect of the force of truth is in the film Satyricon, in the scene where a hermaphrodite child lies in a dark, quiet cave, resting in a cradle where the special attendants who guard it constantly pour water over the child to keep it comfortable. (The hermaphrodite, half man and half woman, represents the state of God consciousness, or the Universal Body. The child in this story represents the not-yet-fully-developed state of this spiritual force.)
Two thieves discover the child. They realize that it is the source of great power, and so they steal it. They drag it out of the cave into the sunlight, where, without the protection of the water, the silence, and the constant nurturing care, the brilliant, hot light of the sun kills it. The sun in this story represents the full light of truth, which the child cannot stand because it is not yet fully developed.
TRUTH AND NONVIOLENCE
You have learned how recognizing truth in yourself can help you avoid self-destructive thought and behavior. We have also discussed how powerful truth can be, and how easy it might be to use truth to cause harm unless you remember to consult both your physical and spiritual bodies before you speak. Lakshmanjoo elaborated on the connection between Truthfulness and Nonviolence in our conversation:
Lakshmanjoo: Truth is that truth which will never hurt anybody’s feelings. That is the real truth. He is the embodiment of humility. As Gandhiji said, "the world crushes the dust under its feet, but the speaker of truth should be humbler than the dust."
Alice: Swamiji, in the Western world, people say, "How can I ever know God? I’m not good enough." And then they say that's humility.
Lakshmanjoo: That is not humility. That is ignorance. Humility is there, you have to develop it. You have to invoke that humility. This whole universe is not created by God. This universe is actually the commentary of God. So you cannot say, "I am not fit for attaining truth, attaining nearness of God." You are yourself God. You are already there. You have kept yourself away from that by your own choice. By your own ignorance.
Try to recognize when truth is expressed with violence. Lakshmanjoo expertly described this when he said, "Be sure the truth you speak is soothing truth. You should see that in that truth the violence must not come." He told me a story about a sage who was living deep in the forest. One day he observed a fawn running fast down the path, and a little later a hunter. The hunter approached the Yogi and asked if he had seen a fawn pass by, and which way it had gone.
The sage answered, "My eyes have seen, but my eyes cannot speak. My tongue can speak, but my tongue has not seen."
In this way, he avoided telling the truth that the hunter was demanding, which would have caused harm to the fawn. This would have been truth with violence.
Alice: The truth depends on the nonviolence?
Lakshmanjoo: They cannot go away from each other.
From Yoga of the Heart: Ten Ethical Guidelines for Gaining Limitless Confidence, Growth, and Achievement, by Alice Christensen (Daybreak/Rodale Books, 1998).
Copyright 2002 by The American Yoga Association. All Rights Reserved.
