What is Enlightenment? Many Eastern conventional spiritual traditions see Enlightenment as a stage of awareness, which enables you to merge with the Formless Transcendental reality and escape from the manifested Cosmos and existence itself. This approach is based on the view of material and other forms of manifestation as an insubstantial illusion. In some Western religious traditions, Enlightenment is equated with Salvation attained by rising to Heaven leaving behind Earth and the Universe to spend eternity in the presence of a male God. Such traditions also have an otherworldly focus.

Even in the East, illusionist spirituality (Mayavada) is only one form of spirituality that gained ground with the advent of patriarchal traditions, which suppressed the Divine Feminine and the integral Tantric traditions that revered Earth, Universe and everything as equally Divine and as real as the Transcendental Void and Formless Being. Historically, traditions that focussed on the Masculine aspect of the Divine tend to emphasise a God separate from the Universe, while traditions that consider the Masculine God and the Feminine Goddess as expressions of the same Divine reality, see both the manifested Cosmos and the Transcendental Void as equally Divine.

Evolutionary Enlightenment

The classical Transcendentalist schools of Enlightenment, which see merging into the Void or experience of Formless, timeless Brahmn as the ultimate reality and end, do not recognise the importance of the dynamic aspect of Brahmn, the evolutionary process in Enlightenment. The adepts of the ancient integral Tantric traditions did have the awareness of the evolutionary aspect though they used different terminology for the evolutionary process. In the modern era, it was the Indian sage Sri Aurobindo who first challenged the incomplete view of Transcendentalists. He questioned both the materialist denial of Spirit and the ascetic denial of Matter as incomplete extremes. According to him, “Nirvana in my liberated consciousness turned out to be the beginning of my realisation, a first step towards the complete thing, not the sole true attainment possible or even a culminating finale.”

He pointed out that the Universe encompasses many planes of consciousness that are expressions of the Divine. The Divine consciousness divided itself into infinite forms through a process called involution and became the seeming unconsciousness of matter. Evolution is the re-mergence of this Divine consciousness inherent in matter. According to him, the supreme integral Supramental Truth consciousness integrates the transcendental Formlessness with the infinite dimensions of evolutionary becoming.

His Integral Yoga aimed to go beyond the Formless Enlightenment of conventional spirituality to enable human beings to become a new species through Divinisation of matter resulting in Supramental transformation of the body itself. In his masterpiece Life Divine, Sri Aurobindo asserts, “A divine Life in the manifestation is …the inevitable outcome and consummation of Nature’s evolutionary endeavour.” Many modern spiritual people have developed their own versions of this understanding that Enlightenment can have physical and material effects.

Sri Aurobindo’s spiritual collaborator, Mirra Alfassa, known as the Mother, carried forward his mission and tried to manifest the Supramental consciousness in her own body through her fabulous explorations and experiments in body consciousness. She discovered the “mind of the cells” capable of restructuring the nature of the body and the laws of the species. She declared that “salvation is physical.” Mother discovered the Divine aspect of matter when she experienced “two worlds within each other: a world of Truth and a world of Falsehood. And this world of Truth is PHYSICAL; it isn’t up there – it’s MATERIAL. And this is what is to come to the fore and replace the other - the true physical.” She called it the “transfer of power” leading to the new cellular consciousness, which will form a new physics and the next biology of Earth.

The 21st century spiritual teacher Andrew Cohen developed a unique version of ‘evolutionary enlightenment.’ According to Cohen, since the classical ancients of the East viewed history as cyclical repeating the same process, and weren’t aware of linear evolution in time, it might have made sense to them to see Enlightenment as a means to escape from the incarnate existence and dwell in the eternal Peace of the Formless realm. But that is no longer enough. Cohen feels that even the more recent inclusive definitions that say Enlightenment means becoming one with both the world and the Formless, are inadequate, because to become one with the world, we have to become one with the process of evolution itself at the level of our own consciousness. Andrew Cohen writes, “In this, we human beings find ourselves in the driver’s seat as never before, and the implications are dramatic. In fact, a new definition of enlightenment must express the dawning revelation that from now on, our conscious participation in the evolutionary process has literally become essential to the creative unfolding of the cosmos.”

Integral Gaia Yoga and Planetary Enlightenment

Now I would like to express my understanding of Integral Enlightenment. My great-grandmother had practised a unique integral and multidimensional spiritual path, which had its roots in integral Tantric traditions, Earth spirituality, the Goddess tradition, integral intuition, healing and spiritual channelling. It also integrated elements from the pre-Aryan Dravidian spiritual heritage of South India and the Vedic Aryan tradition. Though she had no formal education or knowledge of the evolutionary context of spirituality, interestingly, the system that she practised through spiritual channelling, was integral in the sense that it accepted the presence of the Divine in the manifested world too.

Since her passing in 1989, drawing on my intuitively guided explorations and experiments in the evolution of Consciousness, study of various spiritual traditions, and integral intuitive channellings I received, I further evolved the path that emerged from her practice into a multidimensional and integral approach to collective and individual evolution. As per integral intuitive guidance, I later named it Integral Gaia Yoga.

During my adventure of consciousness over the last two decades, while exploring many spiritual paths, I became intensely aware of the importance of a completely integral and multidimensional Enlightenment, both individual and collective. During my initial explorations of spiritual traditions other than the one I was born into, I studied Buddhism and was delighted by the Buddha’s exhortation to follow one’s own light within and question what one was taught about spirituality in the light of one’s own spiritual experience. Though I did see inklings of an integral understanding in the Buddhist concept of ‘interdependent co-arising,’ I was not satisfied with the Buddhist view of Nirvana, which focussed solely on the Transcendental Emptiness. Even the Bodhisattva ideal of coming down from Nirvana for the sake of living beings, implied that true Nirvana is not possible within manifested existence.

I was intrigued and inspired by the unique integral evolutionary methods of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, the modern pioneers who tried to present a more integral approach to Enlightenment in contrast to the illusionist classical views. I have also integrated some aspects of their understanding into Integral Gaia Yoga. However, despite their valuable contribution to the integralisation of spirituality, I realised that there is more to Integral Enlightenment than even what their Integral Yoga aimed to manifest.

Both Sri Aurobindo and the Mother considered the Vedas as supreme and the Vedic Aryan culture as the only culture of India. They did not accept the existence of a unique and non-Aryan Dravidian tradition with integral Tantric roots in South India. They also viewed this Vedic Aryan culture of India as the most refined spiritual system capable of being World Guru, which I found difficult to accept because I have come from a Dravidian Indian tradition, which was obviously different but very much integral. Having explored spiritual traditions from all over the world, I also realise that there are traditions from other parts of the world that follow integral approaches and are not in any way inferior to what India’s Vedic Aryan culture has to offer. Rather than a monolithic culture, India has always been a Communion of several different but interconnected cultures. Sri Aurobindo also considered the human species as the epitome of spiritual evolution and focussed more on the evolution of humanity into immortal Supramental beings rather than recognising Earth itself as a living Superconsciousness on the path to planetary Enlightenment.

Andrew Cohen’s version of Evolutionary Enlightenment rightly asserts the importance of participating in the evolutionary process, in addition to being one with the world and the Formless. But problems arise when he dismisses the cyclical view of evolution as a whole and emphasises the linear evolution alone. An integral understanding requires the awareness that evolution progresses both in linear and non-linear ways, in the form of successive cycles where the knowledge of ancients is forgotten and later revived and evolved further, seamlessly integrating what came before with the completely newly evolving aspects. Integral spiritual evolution is not absolutely linear, but a combination of linear, non-linear and cyclical evolution. Also Andrew Cohen supports the anthropocentric classical spiritualist view that only human beings can attain Enlightenment.

Is the human race, the pinnacle of evolution till now, and the only species on Earth capable of Enlightenment? Many dominant spiritual traditions have held the view that only humanity and no other species can be Enlightened. Anyway, the history of ancient traditions itself shows that the belief in humanity as the crown of creation was not the only perspective. Hindu mythology has the monkey God Hanuman, an immortal Enlightened being. There are stories of saints who were able to speak to birds and animals in Hindu and other religious mythologies. What if these myths cannot be dismissed as mere metaphorical stories? Many shamanic traditions revere animals and birds as spiritual beings and channels of wisdom. Even some scientists admit that animals and birds can tune into the Earth consciousness and foresee natural disasters, but modern humanity has lost that connection to Earth.

Over centuries, there have been stories of highly intelligent and spiritually conscious behaviour by dolphins. Dolphins have saved many human beings in danger. Those who have engaged in swimming with the dolphins have reported miraculous healings and a profound spiritual connection. In spirituality, awareness of breathing is considered a way to Enlightenment. Dolphins breathe consciously because they have to come up to the surface to breathe. They do not sleep in the conventional sense and exist in a sort of aware lucid dream consciousness even while asleep, to ensure that they come up to the surface for inhaling air. Since breathing awareness induces a meditative state, it is possible that dolphins who breathe consciously have a meditative awareness.

The planet is now facing an ecological crisis, due to hubristic human domination of Earth and her beings. Scientific rationalism, fundamentalist versions of religion and some sections of conventional spirituality have tried to assert the superiority of human species over the Earth and other beings that share our biosphere. This sense of superiority has driven humanity to destroy the ecology and other species under the impression that we can either colonise other planets or enter a Heaven or Transcendental Formlessness no matter whether Earth and the other species rot. This superiority complex of humanity appears misguided when we look at it in the Cosmic context also, because the existence of Enlightened extraterrestrial life cannot be ruled out.

Some sections of humanity think of the liberation of a chosen few who will ascend to Heaven or to parallel dimensions, leaving behind the rest of humanity, other species and Earth. However, in an integral Enlightenment, no being, human or non-human, can be left behind. The kind of Integral Spiritual Enlightenment, which humanity now needs requires that we acknowledge that the claims of spiritual or rational superiority of the human species are unwise. Any particular human culture or ideology claiming to be World Guru or the human species claiming to be World Dictator will prevent us from integrating into our collective consciousness, the valuable aspects of the wisdom of other human cultures and other species. Not just humanity, but all living beings of Earth are important for integral collective planetary Enlightenment. If we mess too much with the delicate ecological balance of Earth, the rebalancing process of Earth trying to preserve the whole could lead to the extinction of humanity. To prevent this catastrophe and find our place in the scheme of the Divine evolutionary play, we must respect diversity and realise our inseparable interdependence with different cultures within humanity and the non-human species that share the collective consciousness of the living planet Earth.

An Integral Enlightenment can manifest a sense of We, a Communion, among human beings where each individual or culture is seen as a unique dimension of the collective consciousness. This is different from the conventional attempts to manufacture a coercive collective of community that imposes an artificial unity through suppressing the uniqueness of individual aspects. The human collective consciousness evolving as a Communion, can unconditionally accept individual differences as unique dimensions that add value to the collective consciousness, rather than seeing them as sources of conflict. Such a revolutionary transformation in the evolution of human collective consciousness will alter the current reality of conflict and separation to pave the way for peace, love, compassion and joy. Such an integral transformation will help us re-integrate the Goddess aspect back into our spiritual consciousness and realise both the Masculine Divine and Feminine Divine as the unique expressions of the same Integral Divine by harmonising the inner Goddess and inner God in our psyche. It will eventually enable humanity to relinquish its delusional sense of superiority and integrate itself with other living beings and the Earth consciousness in a harmonious and integral multidimensional oneness.

Integral Gaia Yoga, which I am evolving, is an ever-evolving pathless path where many paths can merge and co-exist in Communion for manifesting Integral Enlightenment. Important methods Integral Gaia Yoga applies on the path to Integral Enlightenment include Integral Dimensions Meditation, Mudras (sacred hand gestures), Integral Intuition, Innernet Navigation and Integral Dreaming, Integral Intuitive Art and Integral Gaiaesthetics.

The Earth is a living organism with psychic and spiritual dimensions. Many ancient integral traditions celebrated Earth as a Goddess. The Gaia Hypothesis of the scientist James Lovelock, which presents Earth as a superorganism, derived its name from the Greek Earth Goddess Gaia. Though the Gaia Hypothesis, due to the limitations of the scientific rationalist framework, did not see Earth as a superconscious being, it did help to trigger the recall of the lost ancient awareness of Earth as a superconscious Goddess. There were many dawns during the planetary evolution, when this awareness of the living Earth blossomed, only to get covered up eventually by the periodic domination of materialist or otherworldly spiritualist outlooks. When we understand that we are all aspects of the superconsciousness of Gaia, we can participate in this co-creative dance of Enlightened evolution irrespective of surface differences of religion, ideology and culture.

Integral Gaia Yoga endeavours to integrate the best aspects of all that has evolved on Earth so far and also transcend them to create new aspects of individual and collective evolution. The purpose is the simultaneous integral heightening, deepening and widening of individual and collective consciousness for an integral individual and collective Enlightenment that can manifest the unconditional Life, Love and Bliss of the Divine. For such an integral realisation, the ethereal heavenly summits of spiritual consciousness must merge with the ocean trenches of self-awareness in the depths of Earth consciousness and also widen expansively to encompass infinite dimensions of reality. This Integral Enlightenment can encompass even science and technology because they are also aspects of the evolving collective consciousness. The parameters of science itself can be broadened to manifest a more integral science and technology in tune with the Enlightened consciousness of Gaia.

Integral Gaia Yoga aims for even a body transformation leading to the evolution of humanity into an immortal post-human species. Anyway, Integral Gaia Yoga does not stop with the individual Enlightenment or the transformation of humanity alone because humanity is an integral part of the collective consciousness of Gaia that encompasses other Earthly species also. The core purpose of Integral Gaia Yoga is to facilitate integral individual and collective Enlightenment through the emergence of a planetary Gaia Consciousness of Earth consciously uniting the whole of humanity, all forms of Life on Earth and the planet itself with the Solar Spirit, the Universal Cosmic Consciousness, God/Goddess, infinite dimensions and Transcendental Being in Integral Communion, for manifesting Heaven on Earth.