Eckankar offers simple spiritual exercises that can move us into greater states of awareness. People of any faith can use these exercises to find the answers to their questions about this life and the after life.
A spiritual exercise can be as simple as relaxing and singing the word HU, an ancient name for God. As we practice these spiritual exercises, we learn to recognize the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives.
How to Sing HU
With eyes opened or closed, take a few deep breaths to relax. Then begin to sing HU (pronounced like the word hue) in a long drawn out sound: HU-U-U-U.
Take another breath, and sing HU again. Continue for up to twenty minutes. Sing HU with a feeling of love, and it will gradually open your heart to God.
Do this exercise every day. Spend about twenty minutes on it. This builds your spiritual
stamina gently over time. Regular daily practice is the key to success. Always when your day is hard, remember to sing HU. It puts you back in line with the Holy Spirit.
When you sing HU, you are saying to Divine Spirit, “I’ve opened myself to you. Give me the understanding and the wisdom to meet the waves of life, and the problems, troubles, and whatever else. Give me the strength to meet life.”This is basically what we do when we do a Spiritual Exercise of ECK.
A short session where we meet with the Divine: that is a Spiritual Exercise of ECK.
– Harold Klemp, Spiritual Experiences Guidebook, p.8
Golden Musical Notes
Sit or lie down, close your eyes and place your attention on the Spiritual Eye. Chant HU. As you chant, listen carefully in a gentle way. Use the creative imagination: Try to visualize the Sound as golden musical notes flowing down from a place above you.
As you see them, know that each golden note has an accompanying sound. Listen for the melodies as they pass in and through you in a continuous stream.
Visualize something connected with music that strikes a definite image on your mind, perhaps a stringed instrument, a flute, the woodwinds. First try to see, then try to hear the golden notes flowing down from this musical instrument. Know that you are listening to the melody of God.
-Harold Klemp, The Spiritual Exercises of ECK, p.141
Watching Yourself Fall Asleep
Every night upon retiring, relax on the bed. Watch the process of going to asleep. Keep your attention on the point between the eyebrows, the Spiritual Eye.
As the body relaxes and your mind settles down, that change in viewpoint takes place which we call sleep. Maintain the attitude of awareness. You will note your body getting quiet and your thoughts settling down. Hearing is often the last to leave the human consciousness. You will be detached on the borderline state, as though in a dream.
Then you will come into another state of beingness. This is characterized by a clarity of mental vision. It is not an unconscious state like a mental fog, but a level of awareness beyond the limits of normal human expression.
This viewpoint may last a moment or for several hours. With practice, it may last 
through the whole night.
To hold on to this lucidity, you need to maintain a delicate balance between not becoming too emotional and not forgetting that you are dreaming.
What has happened? As the body rests, you awaken in the Atma Sarup, the Soul body. You find yourself in eternity, overcoming death. This is the freedom which is so often spoken about in Eckankar.
-Harold Klemp, The Spiritual Exercises of ECK, p. 49
Law of Reversed Effort
If you feel you are trying too hard to accomplish something, consider the Law of Reversed Effort. This law is a practical law of nature concerned with the use of the imaginative powers.
It goes like this: The more you concentrate on putting your imaginative powers on something, the less you are able to do it. Or, the harder one struggles to avoid something the more it will be attracted to him.
For example, when one is trying to ride a bicycle and avoid hitting any rocks on the road, he is so conscious of hitting the rocks, he’ll probably do so. Or if a person tries to walk across a small plank form one building to another at the tenth floor, his mind will be on falling, not walking.
This law is concerned with imagining and feeling. The negative thoughts are apt to be more effective that the positive, because the negative usually has more feeling with it.
Take your goal into contemplation and focus on relaxing, letting go of the negative feeling associated with not achieving the goal. Set up a positive image about the goal, then put feelings with it. It’s that simple.
– Harold Klemp, The Spiritual Exercises of ECK, p 11
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