You can study God through everything and everyone in the universe, because God is not confined in a mosque, synagogue or church. But if you are still in need of knowing where exactly His abode is, there is only one place to look for Him: in the Heart of a true lover.
~ Shams al-Din Tabrizi
The Path of the Heart is not an escape route into transcendence to leave sensory experience or the world behind – which in so many spiritual traditions is negated as illusion. This is not the path of avoidance. Instead, our hearts are opened to behold the rawness and depth of every facet of life, the dance of Shakti – we are called upon to heal the deep gap between spirit and matter, the masculine and the feminine, the transcendence and the embodiment. We are invited to claim our birthright to fully partake in the glorious play of life, and become One with the creative potential of Consciousness Itself – to live life from the ground of our Being, in happiness and bliss.
“So when I said at the beginning, I don’t belong to any tradition, I want to make one little adjustment to that. I do belong to a tradition and that is the tradition which could be called simply, “the Heart.” And don’t try to decipher it again through any “isms” or spiritual traditions, because the experience of the Heart transcends all traditions. And the time has come when we have to transcend those traditions that calcify to themselves...”
The Self is Universal
Walking this path means to awaken to the essence of what we truly are, — pure Consciousness ‒ expressed through the uniqueness of our individuality. The Self is universal. It is the core of Awareness within the Heart of each of us, the ground of our Being, ever-present, ever-conscious, ever-blissful.
“There’s no such thing like Pure Awareness outside of your awareness. I AM — the face of Awareness looking in recognition of my own Self. Let these words resonate in your Heart — and it will bring you home. This is an integral spirituality — it’s not spirituality of the mind or the senses. It’s spirituality which does not leave one stone unturned. It includes absolutely everything and excludes nothing. It’s not my teaching. This Teaching is the only Teaching out there that has ever existed. Because this Teaching is older than Time. And those who drank from the Source are drunk on the Source...”
The Path of the Heart embraces the universal teaching of brother and sisterhood, of deep respect for one another. It teaches us to look beyond outer appearances, to see the vibrant, luminous Divinity that we are, to see God in each other and all manifestation. It invites us to celebrate differences as the manifold expression of God's creative play, and to birth the shared vision of life lived from the throbbing, fluid, ecstatic wisdom of the Heart.
The Means to Self-realization
"The means and the goal are one and the same when seen from the ultimate perspective; however, they are distinct at respective stages of human evolution. In the process of Self-realization the goal is pure Awareness. The means are to harness and activate the field of energy, the spiritual power behind all transformative processes. The dynamic relationship between this field of energy (Shakti) and its Source (Shiva) is the tour de force of all spiritual practices and realizations."
The process of interiorization and continuous purification of our awareness is beautifully and elaborately described in the Tantric doctrines of Kashmir Shaivism as the "Four-fold Knowledge" or the "four means” (upayas). These means are universal in nature and even the greatest Masters and Siddhas of the past have come to realize their fullest potential through these approaches to spiritual practice. As these paths to Self-realization are important in this work, we introduce them here in greater detail.
Igor’s approaches are not limited to a certain system and remain spontaneous in the way he delivers the teaching. However sporadic the discourses may seem, for those who have been attentive, there are distinctive ways of how he, as the Master, employs these means in the work with his students. He decides which of these upayas is appropriate for a particular person, which depends largely on the degree of spiritual evolution, and the student's readiness to respond to the different pathways to realization.
The Role of the Teacher
The teacher in western culture stands for someone who imparts and “teaches” something. Of course, spiritual teaching is not very much different; there are certain skills which we acquire, which allow us to get in touch with the very core of our own being. However, the role of the teacher per se — a teacher of mathematics, a teacher of arts, a teacher of any other discipline — ends as soon as the disciple or student walks out of the classroom. That is not so with the spiritual teacher; the connection that is being made, is beyond this physical, mental or emotional realm; and it creates a possibility for what is known in various traditions as the transmission of Grace. Through the direct transmission of that divine energy the teacher initiates the journey of awakening.
It is very important to distinguish that spiritual awakening, profound experiences, mystical experiences, even one could say Self-realization itself — is not necessarily a visa to teach or a legitimate entrance into the domain of teaching; something else has to happen. The requirement to teach is a certain inner calling, that can only happen in the post-awakening phase.
However, the main prerequisite for being a spiritual teacher is being fully and permanently awakened to the glory of the Self; one has to be utterly rooted in that. This is the main prerequisite. The spiritual teacher is the one who is that flow of Consciousness, who is that flow of wakefulness, who is that uninterrupted flow of Spirit — it is only from here that the teacher can allow the teaching to carry him or her into the work that needs to be done.
Reverence for the Divine Mother
“As we stand on the threshold of making or breaking it as far as human consciousness, and perhaps conscious life on the Planet is concerned, what it means to be a teacher is also to see beyond… This is no longer about realization of my existential quest for fulfilment, but a recognized necessity for a shared vision. And unless my heart beats in union with yours, unless my brainwaves fire in synchronized velocity with your own, all this teaching is of little value at this moment in time.
It is to conceive and recognize the shapes of things to come, before they manifest into existence, and to make sure they formed to contain harmony and grace at the heart of it all… To see, is to behold all creation as this moment in all its incomprehensible simplicity, so as to bathe newborn reality in waters of invincibility before it gains strength in flowing wakefulness and bliss..."
This teaching is deeply rooted in the Tantric perspective and awareness that a subtle vibratory energy is the substratum of everything we know. Unlike quantum physicists, yogic sages do not experience this energy as an abstract vibration, but as the expression of the Divine Feminine, called Shakti, the Goddess. The word Shakti means energy or power. Another name for her is Kundalini. She is the Self and dwells in the form of supreme bliss in the heart of yogis. Shakti is the underlying matrix of reality.
