This logo, like a mandala, is the representation of Reality. The “Creation” is encircled by the serpent Ouroboros, symbolizing time and its eternal, cyclic, spiraling nature, like the wheel of samsara and reincarnation.
It also represents Kundalini, the divine evolutionary life force coiled round upon herself at the base of our spine in its dormant state, holding her tail in her mouth.
On top is a smaller circle, half inside, half outside the Creation: It is the plane of the Godhead, which is both outside and transcendent, and inside and immanent.
I used the Taoist diagram of Lai Zhide to symbolize the Godhead because it is the monist form of the taijitu (Supreme, ultimate state of being), whereas the more common yin/yang (☯) representation is dualist (interaction of opposites).
“Taiji is born from Wuji. It is the mother of Yin and Yang.
In movement, Taiji separates; in stillness Yin and Yang reunite and return to Wuji.”
—Taijiquan Lun (Treatise attributed to Wang Zongyue)
This quote suggests the Big Bang theory: The universe emanates from nothing with movement, with energy (Shakti, the feminine aspect of the Godhead), and then returns to nothing.
The white center is the Wuji (undifferentiated, timeless and spaceless Reality, the Absolute, the infinite potential, the source and Oneness of all, the substance and the essence, both matter/energy and consciousness). It is the equivalent to the Buddhist Shunyata (void) or the Hindu Nirguna (unmanifested) Brahman. It is also Qabalah’s Divine Darkness, or the mysterious void behind the Tree of Life, the pregnant emptiness from which emanated the Spheres, and from which all manifestations spring.
The pink and blue parts are the yin/yang inseparable differentiations of the Godhead into Purusha/Prakriti or Shiva/Shakti that I would prefer to call Adi Shakti (primordial energy) and Chaitanya (pure consciousness, infinite and eternal self-awareness, the real Self, the “Witness”). The interconnection and interconversion of these two primordial realities are now documented by
quantum physics. Together, they are the Saguna (manifested) Brahman, the impersonal Godhead. The attributeless Adi Shakti “took form” as Mahadevi, the personal Godhead, known in the West as “the Great Goddess.” The Dasa Mahavidyas (Ten Wisdom Goddesses) of the Tantric tradition are her main personalities. In the logo, they are represented as the ten stars touching the
taiji because they are emanations from Adi Shakti and personifications of cosmic principles. Mahadevi is the Creatrix of all that is. As Bhuvaneshwari, she is Space; as Kali, she is Time; as Tara, she is Om, the original vibration, the creative Logo; as Lalita Tripura Sundari, she is Love, the electro-magnetic force that holds things together to build the worlds. (The other deities/personalities have a lesser-known function.) Mahadevi created the various gods and goddesses, as pure consciousness encased in different spiritual forms, in particular, in the forms of the Trimurti, the triad of deities: Saraswati, Lakshmi, and Parvati. They in turn, create, maintain and evolve the multiplane universe with their consorts Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.
I chose to represent the deities of the Trimurti with the Vesica Piscis for three reasons. First, at their level of manifestation, the yin/yang analogy cannot apply to Parvati/Shiva as well as to Adi Shakti/Chaitanya: We cannot say that Parvati is energy and Shiva is consciousness. Obviously, the mythology illustrates that they are both energy and consciousness. Saying that Shiva is nothing without his Shakti is not exact.
Secondly, the Vesica Piscis is part of the Flower of Life, i.e., the blueprint of Creation, which is entirely appropriate here. Third, the male and female divine consorts are the archetypes of the human marital relationship. Shiva is especially notorious for his Tantric sex prowess. The Vesica Piscis symbolizes perfectly the Hiero Gamos, the sacred sexual intercourse. This alchemical marriage of the opposites (the two circles) synthesizes a greater, more unified reality, the Golden Child (the christified astral body, represented by their intersection). Also, this almond shape symbolizes the yoni (vulva) of the Great Goddess.
Note 1: The symbolic graphics of deities and chakras have a white dot (color of the Wuji part of the taijitu) at their center that signifies that, at their core, their essence is the ultimate reality of Nirguna Brahman.
Note 2: The Tantric tradition holds that the gods are powerless without their feminine counterparts. So, it is right to give the preeminence to the goddesses.
Note 3: Parvati/Shiva are given the role of “destruction.” As god and goddess of yoga, they represent evolution par excellence. Now, evolution implies the disappearance of a previous state of being. This is not destruction but evolutionary transformation.
Note 4: Shiva is often paired with Durga or Kali, dismissing Parvati for the role of transformation, and relegating her to a secondary goddess status that Hindu women pray to get a good husband! In my view of Hindu cosmogony, I prefer to keep Parvati in the Trimurti created by Mahadevi. Kali, as part of the ten Mahavidyas, is situated at the more abstract level of the principle of time that also causes transformation and even dissolution. Durga, the protectress and demon slayer, is a later creation by all the other deities, including Parvati, who took part in her creation. I do not mean that Ma Durga is a lesser goddess; on the contrary, she is imbued by the combined powers of all the other gods, and is therefore a reconstitution, a mirror of the omnipotent Mahadevi.
The circles separating the different planes are drawn in a way to show a possible communication: the entanglement of all the planes explaining the famous hermetic maxim: “As Above, So Below.”
The Om symbol, almost as large as the background, represents the omnipresent immanent presence of the Godhead in the Creation, as both the consciousness and the evolutionary energy of Brahman.
The silhouette represents the realized adept who has perfectly balanced his yin/yang polarities: ida/pingala, anima/animus, female/male, etc. So, the adept is depicted as half man and half woman, like Ardhanareshvari, the form of the Goddess as half man, half woman (usually called Ardhanarishwara, Shiva's androgynous form outside the Shakta Tradition, the Goddess-based Hindu theology that underpins Atyantica Yoga Bliss). She is also blue like Nilakantha, Shiva with a blue throat, because he has drunk the deadly poison oozing from the churning of the cosmic ocean in order to save the other gods and the Creation. The realized adept, like Shiva and the bodhisattvas, is always willing to sacrifice himself out of love.
Even if the adept, as a Self-realized being, is deified, I resisted the temptation to sit the silhouette in the lotus flower that is placed traditionally under deities. I did not want the adept to be an ethereal being, but rather a well grounded, here and now, cosmic agent in the play of life, Mahadevi’s lila, which brings us to the last, but most important point.
On the Web, we can find hundreds of images of yoga silhouettes with the chakras series. It is, unfortunately, not an original graphic to evoke yoga, but I would like to give it a special meaning. Thomas Ashley-Farrand, in his book Chakra Mantras, reported a teaching of H. P. Blavatsky.
As stated in the Stanzas of Dyzan, the earth, being located far from the center of the galaxy, complained to the sun that she was not receiving enough spiritual energy. The sun carried her plea to the higher realms. In response, a spiritual council decided to create a new race of beings that would help the Earth to evolve: mankind. Their plan was that human beings would act as step-transformers.
“According to the Stanzas of Dyzan, the finest spiritual energy comes into the crown chakra and is stepped down, chakra to chakra, until it reaches our base chakra, ruled by the earth principle. Here, that energy that started in our crown chakra is now in a form that the earth can use for her own evolutionary progress.”
Mankind was also granted self-awareness, making it more than a tool used at the service of the planet.
“It was further decided that this race of beings would be given the opportunity to become that for which it was the vehicle, if it should so choose.”
Being able to reach the highest plane of consciousness, our glorious nature make the envy of even de devas. The priceless gift of being born as human being, is not only a birth right but also a responsibility. Through yoga, we should learn to channel nothing but positive spiritual energy to Mother Earth. This is the message of this logo, and the mission statement of Ātyantica Yoga Bliss.
In the page “About the Tutelary Deity,” the description of goddess Lalita Tripura Sundari will explain why Ātyantica Yoga Bliss, originally conceived as “the bliss of universal yoga,” can actually be translated as “the supreme bliss of yoga,” the Sanskrit word ātyantica meaning both universal or supreme, infinite, endless, absolute.
Bibliography
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaitanya_(consciousness)
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lai_Zhide
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouroboros
4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wuji_(philosophy)
5. https://www.universal-path.org/Sunyata
6. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taijitu
7. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesica_piscis
8. [AT] Ashley-Farrand, Thomas. Chakra Mantras. Weiser Books. 2006.
9. [AS] Aun Weor, Samael. The Perfect Matrimony. Gnostic Editions. 1996
10. [FD] Frawley, David. Inner Tantric Yoga and the Wisdom Goddesses. Lotus Press, 2008.
11. [KS] Kempton, Sally. Awakening Shakti: The Transformative Power of the Goddesses
of Yoga. Sound True Inc. 2013.
12. [KD] Kinsley, David. Tantric Visions of the Divine Feminine: The Ten Mahavidyas.
Motilal Banarsidass Publisher. 1997
13. [MD] Melchizedek, Drunvalo. The Ancient Secret of The Flower of Life, Vol. 1.
Light Technology Publishing. 2000.
14. [VS] Vanamali, Sri Devi Lila.Shakti:The Realm of the Divine Mother. Inner Tradition. 2008.
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