About the Book

YOGA

Humans are like a lamp that has five lampshades over a light. Each of the lampshades is a different color and density. As light shines through the lampshades, it is progressively changed color and nature. It is a bitter-sweet coloring. On the other hand, the shades provide the individualized beauty of each lamp. Yet, the lampshades also obscure the pure light.

The Yoga path of Self - realization is one of progressively moving inward, through each of those lampshades, so as to experience the purity at the eternal center of consciousness, while at the same time allowing that purity to animate through our individuality. These five levels are called koshas, which literally means sheaths. Kosha means sheath, like the lampshades covering the light, or like the series of wooden dolls pictured below. Maya means appearance, as if

something appears to be one way, but is really another. Advaita Vedanta suggests that you imagine a dark night in which you think you see a man, only to find that it was an old fence post that was hard to see at first; that is Maya. Here, it means that each of the sheathes or koshas is only an appearance. In truth, all of the levels, layers, koshas, or sheaths of our reality are only appearance or Maya (while also very real in the sense of dealing with the external world), and underneath all of those appearances, we are pure, divine, eternal consciousness, or whatever name you prefer to call it. This is one of the fundamental principles of Advaita Vedanta meditation. While some view Maya as meaning that nothing is real, and turn this into a cold-hearted intellectual practice, others view the illusion of Maya as being shakti, the creative force of the universe. In this way, the Maya of the koshas is experienced both as unreal and, at the same time, as the beautiful manifestations of universal oneness.

CRICKET

Cricket is a sport in which fitness is traditionally not thought of as very important. However, the success in the 1990s and 2000s of the world beating Australian team has been attributed to their professionalism, and in part to the way they address their fitness. The other test playing nations have rightfully put more emphasis on fitness recently and are reaping the benefits. With the introduction of one day Cricket and more recently Twenty20, the game has gone through major changes, and the physical demands made on a Cricketer's body have also increased dramatically. Depending on the version of the game being played and the role of the player in the team, the importance of fitness will vary: the fitness requirements of a fast bowler will be greater and also different than that of an opening batsman, and one-day Cricket will be more demanding than a test match.