Living in the Light – Yoga for Self-Realisation book review: Change for the better is possible
When my brother died, Deepak Chopra’s wisdom – and the practice of yoga – were two of the tools I used to put myself back together in a functional way.
My 32-year-old brother’s suicide came out of nowhere. On receiving the telephone call, I remember feeling as if the world, like a pane of glass, had shattered. There were pieces of me everywhere – my past, my present, my future. Nothing would ever be the same again.
Such dissociation is the handmaiden of trauma, and the traumatised need help in re-assembling their fragmented selves lest they remain trapped in a cycle of pain and futile attempts to escape the pain, as Deepak Chopra knows.
When he was chief of staff at the former New England Memorial Hospital, Chopra, who’d emigrated to America from New Delhi with his young family in 1970, coped with the stress by heavily drinking and smoking. His work, too, became a form of dissociation – meaningless, mechanical, and antithetical to healing. For the most part, the 100 or so patients he saw each day were docile; believing there was no alternative, they simply gave up.
Like him, they were overwhelmed by a sense of impotence and despair.
Chopra realised that there was only one person who could change the reflexive life he had grown to hate: himself.
Now a world-renowned Indian-American endocrinologist, integrative medicine guru and a publishing phenomenon with over 91 books in his bibliography, the 76-year-old Chopra has made a fortune on the back of this very principle: that change for the better is not only possible but always within our control.
His latest thoughtful and thought-provoking guide to integration, Living in the Light: Yoga for Self-Realisation, is divided into two sections – the first, philosophical; the second, practical, illustrating and explaining the dynamics of the yoga asanas (postures).
For those who dismiss the 3000-year-old practice on spiritual grounds or because of its associations with new age guff: yoga is now part of all pro-athlete training. Football and basketball players in particular benefit from the practice as it has been shown to alleviate strain, build endurance, strength and suppleness, develop neglected muscles, improve sleep, and lessen stress, reducing the likelihood of cancer, cardiac disease, stroke, and other diseases.
As I found after my brother’s death, consistent yoga practice also creates dramatic increases in the level of serotonin, a key player in the mediation of happiness, optimism and satisfaction.
In the book, Chopra outlines a 30-day plan beginning with an assessment of mindset. The areas he covers include emotional intelligence, vital energy, the power of attention, core beliefs, self-defeating behaviours, and emotional authenticity. Yoga, as he points out, isn’t about perfection but, rather, “upgrading your story” – namely, approaching life with a clear mind and self acceptance (“every day is a new beginning and innocence can always be reborn”).
“Yoga is so radical, it overturns everything you and I have accepted since we were children,” Chopra writes. “We’ve been chugging along year after year based on completely hollow beliefs and assumptions.” These beliefs, he adds, “undermine everyone’s life. They are ingrained in us early on, and they have sunk so deeply into our sense of self that they hardly deserve a second glance.” To accept yoga, “you must affirm your own infinite standing in creation.”
This idea – existing within the flow of infinity and of being, in oneself, a facet of infinity – can be challenging when addressed through the prism of 21st century individualism. And to those who understand the economy as the true church, the concept of spiritual parity is both incomprehensible and dangerous, for competition cannot exist within such a context.
The theme of attunement is a constant in Chopra’s oeuvre – in relation to infinity, other people, the environment, and to the true self. This true self, however, can only be accessed in stillness, a state impossible to achieve in what Chopra calls the “whirlpools” of attentional disturbance that define our culture: “When the mind settles down into a quiet state, free from every kind of mental activity, the true self is revealed. This is straightforward as a path to the ideal life.”
He’s less convincing in his take on anger. Like the Buddhists, Chopra believes that ideally, anger should be overtaken by forgiveness (“your true self, which is never wounded, cares nothing about criticism”). While the latter may well be true, forgiveness can, in certain cases, be self-negating and its absence, healing. Conscious anger can serve a critically important function in relation to the establishment of boundaries and to the assertion of self-value – for example, abused children who, out of fear, fail to “act out” not infrequently develop behavioural, emotional and substance use disorders – or complete suicide – later in life.
Anger, then, can also be a path to the ideal life, or even just a life.
Having conversed with Chopra at length after one of his seminars, I found him to be tough, resolute and unusually insightful. In certain respects, he was spectacularly ordinary but his work is no less significant for this. When my brother died, Chopra’s wisdom – and the practice of yoga – were two of the tools I used to put myself back together in a functional way.
Living in the Light: Yoga for Self-Realisation is as good as anything Chopra has written – effective, engrossing, and transformative. While his primary aim is to facilitate integration, it has ultimately always been up to the reader. As he advises, “Make conscious choices.”
Antonella Gambotto-Burke is a writer and recording artist who has completed a new single. Follow her on Instagram. If this story has raised issues for you, contact Lifeline on 131 114.
Living in the Light: Yoga for Self-Realisation
By Deepak Chopra and Sarah Platt-Finger
Rider
304pp, $35
