What is the Uwaysi System?
(and what is the meaning of the prayer?)
The purpose here, in this life is that you learn to know yourself.
The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said: who knows himself, knows His Lord. And this is how it works. So knowing God is the highest pleasure you can experience. It will take all your doubts away, it will take all your sadness away, it will take all the angers -because you are angry with existence, you are angry with God- it will take all these angers away.
Once you experience the divine perfection, the divine majesty, you have only the wish to bow down, it is a natural reaction. Because you cannot stand up in His presence, at least not for long, it’s like a need you have.
The movement of the prayer is an answer towards the divine presence. It’s what happen to you naturally: first you close your drama and standing you fold your arms, you close everything and you are there, present, then you bow down, but at the same time you want to see again, and you bow again and the second bow is a prostration: there you find a happiness and also you find yourself in the correct position. When a child is born takes that position, and the first thing we do, we put him on the chest of the mom where he finds peace.
The breast is the representation of Safa and Marwa, the two hills in Mecca, you have to run between the two, it is the first thing you experience. You want to get food, knowledge, and you run between these two hills.
And you throw yourself again down, in a rhythm. The prayer is like a process, a natural answer, the way you will feel in the divine presence. Because you want to see, but you can’t look long and you throw yourself down again.
The prayer is the dance of the servant.
There is so much in it. And if you practice it, it will give you a lot of satisfaction, a lot of answers, because in the beginning you imitate, you do not really know what you are doing and why. But the more you go higher, the more you are invited in the divine existence. The existence itself is the Divine, all what exists is included in his divinity, so it is difficult to say: ‘in His divine presence’, but it is really not possible to explain it.
However there is a divine presence that can be experienced. And in that divine presence we feel there is a beingness, there is an isness, it is not a person. There you find all the answers, all the meanings, all the knowledge, because all the knowledge is assembled in His presence. There is nothing you cannot know there, nothing you cannot experience there. As well the highest ecstasy you can experience, is there.
It’s ecstatic to witness His ecstasy, His perfection, His beauty, His generosity, His love. You cannot forget it any more.
Then your mind cannot create any more fear symptoms, depressions, confusions, it cannot happen to you anymore, it is once and finished.
God is the healer.
The ego is a kind of sickness, and fear and anger are the symptoms of that sickness. Envy, jealousy, pride, lust, greed, gluttony, are all symptoms, and they will come down when you will start to know yourself; that is the beginning of knowing yourself. This is how our method works.
There is an observer inside of us, that is always present. With that observer you can always notice what you think, or what you feel. That is your higher self. Usually we are identified with what we observe and that is a trouble. By observing, you take a distance from the ego; you need to have a distance otherwise you cannot observe.
In the Uwaysi System we start practicing with certain themes, usually with complain.
Let’s say the complains are the fundament of your life, because whatever has been offered to us we say ‘no’. Nothing can give you peace, nothing fulfills you. It does not matter if you are rich or poor, young or old, it does not count, you are never in peace.
There is a constant ‘no’ you give to existence, there is an all the time saying no, no towards existence. And you identify these no with people, with the other players of the divine game we call life; it may be your partner, or your boss, or your country, or the weather. Whatever it is there will be always your no projected somewhere. This is what we call: the ‘multiplayer mode’. In this modality you live in the no, all the time, that’s your dhikr, your mantra, day and night.
And then you try to justify it, because the ego is in a permanent discussion, justification. “Of course, if the boss is ugly, why should I smile at him?” You find always reason why you yourself become ugly, angry, envy. You is always justifying.
When you start to move to the ‘single player mode’, you do not justify anymore. You look at yourself and you understand that you are in this ‘no’ mode. Like this you work through different themes, and step by step you learn to see yourself as the only cause of your states, moods, situations.
Sheikh Burhanuddin Herrmann, SUFI INTENSIVE, 22 September 2018, Amelia, Italy
Youtube: Burhanuddin Herrmann Channel, Ep. 58
