The Holiest of Seasons
True Christmas, according to Yogananda is celebrated in your own spine, which is the altar of God.
Here is how the Kriya Christmas-celebration happens: as you practice your Kriyas, imagine the spine as a mystical Christmas tree, which shines with the divine inner lights of the chakras. They radiate a lovely heavenly glow. Soft bliss emanates from them.
Indeed Yogananda teaches us:
“To enjoy a real Christmas you should celebrate the birth of Christ Consciousness in the spiritual centers of divine perception [chakras] in the brain and spine.”
So continue to turn your gaze deep within. Try to perceive or visualise your astral spine, the true and divine Christmas tree. As you practice Kriya, chant AUM now in each chakra, feeling each one lightening up even more, one by one. This is your glorious “Christmas tree lighting” ceremony. Feel that it is Christ-Consciousness which is touching you through these lights. During that sacred ceremony reflect on Yogananda’s words:
“In deep meditation you behold all the astral lights of the spinal centers, and there is an exchange of the Christ Consciousness and your consciousness. That is the real Christmas festivity. “
As you practice the AUM-technique, try to intuit that behind these holy Christmas lights lives the sacred sound of AUM, which is the Holy Ghost, or Holy Spirit, or Holy Vibration. Enjoy your best Christmas ever, with the Holy Ghost revealing himself within you, right within your mystical Christmas tree. You are truly celebrating the original mystical Christmas. Yogananda guides you:
“That cosmic sound [AUM] manifested as the seven lighted stars or centers of the spine, which is the tree of life. This is where the symbol of the Christmas tree with its light comes in, as part of the Christ birthday celebration.”
What joy during this mystical Christmas season. The senses, often heavily stimulated during the Christmas season, in truth lead us away from Christ. Sense-withdrawal, on the other hand, leads us toward him. Imagine now, after your techniques, that your Christmas tree is turning all its branches within, toward its trunk. There they touch the deepest Christ-joy. Yogananda tells us to do so:
“Let us behold the soft twigs of our temporary joy-loving senses, not projected away from, but joined together to, the everlasting Christmas tree of divine joy.”
Now practice true Christmas with Yogananda, with these instructions from “The Second Coming of Christ”:
“Concentrate at the point between the eyebrows, and go up the spine mentally chanting ‘Aum’ at each of the centers: coccyx, sacral, lumbar, dorsal, cervical, medulla, Christ center. Now mentally go down the spine chanting ‘Aum’ at each of these centers. Go deeper and deeper in concentration, up and down the spine, mentally feeling the centers and mentally chanting ‘Aum’. As you do this, you see that your consciousness is no longer locked in the external awareness of the body, but becomes centered in higher spiritual perceptions in the spine. Relax in God [within]. Don’t be tied to the consciousness of the body. Let your mind go deeper and deeper in the thought of God.”
Then Yogananda takes us even more deeply into the true mystical Christmas celebrations:
“Close your eyes. Tense the whole body slowly. Now relax the life energy from the muscles; let go and let the body feel totally relaxed. Inhale deeply, then throw the breath out; forget it. Switch off the energy from the senses and the heart. Let your consciousness retire into the Tree of Life, the spine. Now bring your attention slowly up the spine to the medulla, to the Christ Center. And now let your consciousness flow out through the Christ Center into the infinite bliss of God.
Now again bring your consciousness back through the Christ Center, the medulla, down the spine into the heart, into the lungs and breath, and into the muscles of the body. Once again tense your muscles; feel the energy and consciousness infusing the little body…. Now concentrate at the point between the eyebrows and practice Kriya Yoga, very slowly. Feel the life currents and consciousness ascending and descending in the spine, whose centers of light are the altar of God. While the opportunity is at hand, make the effort.”
Rejoicing in that inner Christmas tree, sing with Yogananda and Christ: “Glory hallelujah”