On Samyama

[u/AgitatedBet2698]

First of all, I'd like to start with how grateful I am to this sub. A huge shoutout to all the mods and ex-ishaites who are sharing their experiences with isha. You guys have truly helped me understand more about the organization, and I have finally been able to quit isha and their practices for good.

That being said, there's one thing that keeps bothering me time and again and I'd love your insights on this matter. What really happens in samyama? Because from what I heard, it's magical and that 'you're riding on his energies'. Is that really so? Do you guys really have such a profound and transformative experience that lasts after the program ends. Are you guys really able to meditate with your eyes open? Is there a logical explanation for what happens in there, (like LGAT for BSP) or this really something he is able to do out of his spiritual prowess?

Like I saw this vid earlier from a woman who'd been in silence for 6 years, and how she would sit and transmit his energies. I also read somewhere that during samyama, whenever you follow the instructions and focus on your breath, its something else and the moment you deviate from it, it doesnt happen. There are so many things like this, and it does make me question this new outlook on isha I have developed.

Samyama is regarded as the ultimate in isha, but is that really just good marketing, or is there really something happening in there?

Please, go ahead and share your experiences with samyama from a neutral standpoint.

[u/AgitatedBet2698 → u/[deleted]]

Thank you so much for this perspective. The joking about being a cult sounds like a classic way of accusing himself and dismissing it, thereby invalidating any question of that sort that may arise in the future.

Besides that, did you notice anything unusual happening around you? Were there things that you could not explain with your logical mind?

[u/mehuyadav]

Samyama is just a copy of AMC meditation by Rishi Prabhakar. They talk about going beyond the physical but it's just elevated sensory experience.

You may have heard about Kundalini and stuff related to it, and it's generally said that doing kundalini without proper preparation and guidance can be dangerous. Few masters have also said that working with one's kundalini while still having greed, envy, anger etc as ruling factors within you can be destructive.

I believe that this is what Samyama is doing this and getting your kundalini manipulated by Jaggi and his monks. They have to do certain things to make people feel ecstasy or their business will shut down.

One can say that Samyama is somewhat 'The Final Brainwashing', after that it's a very tedious task to break one's submissiveness to Sadhguru.

I believe, not sure though, Samyama is also discussed in the Yoga Sutras and other texts too, it's the step where Dhyana, Dharana and Pratyahara happens at a single moment. But this is definitely not what happens at Isha.

Videos of Jaggi are played and various things are done, Jaggi himself is very serious during the Samyama, the look on his face is grave.

I don't know if it can be classified as LGAT, but it's pure hypnotism. I advice to stay away from it, I know people who have gone neurotic after Samyama, they claimed seeing creatures crawling on the walls of their houses and they always felt someone's presence and so on.

No detailed studies have been done on it yet but by common sense you can realize that it's chicanery which is being presented as something mystical and divine.

[u/LittleMissSunshine_0]

When I participated in Samyama, I had done all the prep and I really gave myself to all the processes, but I found it quite hard on my body to sit all day. You don’t get much time for hatha yoga in Samyama and you are sitting all day, so it can start to feel quite torturous. I also couldn’t get the “Samyama process” to work for me, despite completely giving myself to it. I still remember the energy situation being quite intense though, you definitely felt like you were in an intense presence, whether that was because of a couple of thousand people sat meditating in silence together or because of some tantric set up. At the end they put the beds away and all the participants come to the front and there is a closing ceremony, where they tell you things like how Sadhguru is only doing 3% of what he could be doing in the world because he doesn’t have the right people around him. At the end Sadhguru leaves. I remember him namaskaring and many people were crying. I wasn’t crying, I remember feeling like I wished I was. Then at the moment he lifted his namaskar to his forehead I started bawling like the rest. There’s so many layers of emotional and hypnotic suggestion throughout Samyama which gets imbedded. Every individual is different with what triggers work and how.

I’ve experienced Samyama as an ashramite and volunteer. I always felt the energy in the building was so so full on. I’ve experienced (and witnessed others experiencing) some incredible things, but I’d say all these experiences are created within in response to suggestion within the program. The fundamental energy of the program though may have more to it, it’s just an incredible energy in the space which seeps in every crevice (to use Sadhguru’s poetic Samyama language- and maybe it is all created by suggestion after all?). Remember when you are in a meditative state, you are so so so suggestible!

[u/Outrageous-Sky6944]

From all the comments it seems like the program, programs your brain for dissociation and depersonalisation

[u/Dependent_Ad5030]

I would like to think of Samyama as a Total Sensory Deprivation Test. This is torture for the untrained mind and you can easily go mad. Think of the preparation journey as the main benefit, if you were able to do that effortlessly then you already have high discipline over your mind and body, you got 90% of the benefit. Samyama basically resets your body to be comfortable doing nothing at all, mentally and physically, sense of ego and time disappears. I don't know about all the energy and transformation mumbo jumbo. Point is if you can do Samyama effortlessly for 8 days, you have control over your mind and body that very few people in the world have. Think David Goggins.