• ABOUT MUKTI
    ABOUT MUKTI

    ABOUT MUKTI

    Mukti’s name originates in Sanskrit and is most often translated as “liberation,” a term used in Vedanta and Buddhism much the way the term “salvation” is used in Christianity. Mukti has been the Associate Teacher of Open Gate Sangha since 2004 and has been a student of her husband, Adyashanti, since he began teaching in 1996, when they founded Open Gate Sangha together.

    Previously, Mukti was raised and schooled in the Catholic tradition and also studied the teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda for over 20 years—two paths that have greatly informed her journeys into meditation, introspection, and prayer. She holds a master’s degree in Traditional Chinese Medicine, a license in acupuncture, and a Hatha Yoga teaching certification. These backgrounds in body awareness and the healing arts, as well as her years of study with Adyashanti, largely inform her presentation style, her recommended inquiry methods, and her interest in the energetic unfolding of realization and embodiment.

    PRIVATE MEETINGS

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  • EXPLORE TEACHINGS
    EXPLORE TEACHINGS

    THE JOURNEY OF SPIRIT IN HUMANITY

    Our human journey of coming to know Spirit is made complete in the journey of Spirit coming to know and express itself in our human life and in our shared world. I welcome you to the teachings here, which are meant to facilitate these journeys and to further the union of human and Spirit natures, through processes of conscious realization and harmonization. . . .

    ~ Mukti

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  • QI GONG WITH MUKTI
    QI GONG WITH MUKTI

    Qi Gong with Mukti

    Qi gong is a Chinese term often translated as “cultivating energy” or “cultivating skill with energy.” This routine is based on the Five Treasures qi gong series; it has been modified greatly, giving it more of a yoga feel with some lengthening, stretching, and “noodling” around to release tensions. Mukti teaches qi gong at her meditation retreats to offer balance and energy harmonization, amidst sitting several periods of silent meditation and quiet contemplation each day.

    There are two versions of this routine available. The first one has lengthy instruction and brief standing guided meditations. It runs about half an hour and is recommended for new viewers. See the READ MORE link to access. The other one is about 15 minutes and is given in silence, offered for those who know the background instruction. You can find that video HERE. Please enjoy these videos for health of body, mind, and spirit, and to compliment spiritual practices oriented toward self realization and embodying conscious expression.

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FEATURED WRITING

Reharmonization and Realization

When I was a practicing acupuncturist in the ’90s, working in a clinic, I regularly contemplated “What is healing?” In the context of Chinese medicine, I routinely considered how to support energy and its flow, direction, and resilience.

I was new to Adya’s teachings and studying them very actively also at that time. I contemplated the nature of awareness and consciousness and the various states it would flow into and out of . . . flow that also revealed directionality and health or lack thereof. In both the body and mind, when energy and consciousness pulls inwards toward stagnation or contraction, it becomes stuck and blocked. The mental correlation would be concretized and identified.

What I encourage is your own exploration of states of mind as states of conscious energy, energy that can be spacious, fluid, and dynamic as much as it can be contracted, stagnant, and...

When I was a practicing acupuncturist in the ’90s, working in a clinic, I regularly contemplated “What is healing?” In the context of Chinese medicine, I routinely considered how to support energy and its flow, direction, and resilience.

I was new to Adya’s teachings and studying them very actively also at that time. I contemplated the nature of awareness and consciousness and the various states it would flow into and out of . . . flow that also revealed directionality and health or lack thereof. In both the body and mind, when energy and consciousness pulls inwards toward stagnation or contraction, it becomes stuck and blocked. The mental correlation would be concretized and identified.

What I encourage is your own exploration of states of mind as states of conscious energy, energy that can be spacious, fluid, and dynamic as much as it can be contracted, stagnant, and corrosive. This activity of witnessing and exploring states of mind and energy can shift consciousness from a sense of being that’s compulsively personal to a sense of being outside of the conditioned push and pull of desire and aversion.

Now, consider that these pushes and pulls are imbued with a consciousness of their own. A consciousness that insists “Pull!” or “Push!” “Get this!” or “Reject that!” By introducing these directional states to stillness and space, the energies of assertion and denial are supported to entrain and repattern to greater ease, flow, and health  . . a health in which the body thrives and in which the mind clarifies and brightens.

We are conditioned beings. All of life is. Our innate conditioning is patterned to organic rhythms of nature. A primary task of a spiritual practitioner is to steward the conditioning that they experience and express away from ego-identification and toward greater integration with the inherent, organic rhythms and intelligence of life.

One can do so by sensing the space in which patterns arise and take shape and then return to space  . . and through recognizing aware space as the very essence of this life, of this moment.*

In the context of sensing or abiding as aware space, stuck patterns of ego can reharmonize and return to organic rhythms. The release of contracted patterns can even brighten in recognition of aware space. Aware space can be known as the essence forming all patterns and the essence from which all life expressions are never apart.

Meditation is an arena that is conducive to returning to essential being. It can reveal that you are fundamentally aware space appearing as a human being. Over time, meditation can also reveal how aware space can shift from contracting into overly identified, egoic states (of division and separation) to gathering anew in the potency of an incarnation consciously lived. This ever-present opportunity is calling.

*In order to get a sense of aware space, Mukti invites you to read, or reread, a previous teaching that she wrote about meditating on global awareness, called Embodied Awareness.

© Mukti Gray 2023

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