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super bright yellow - screaming golden yellow - in spots all throughout the Ashram.
Yehnemsah cut some down for Guruji's altar in the Main House and I copied her for Panini House. I keep seeing stars even during the daytime. I love that.
and the birds are in a riotous cacophany
always in pairs the lovebirds are
the wild geese
the bluejays
the robins
always in twos...such a lovely dance
my heart sings even when my throat doesn't
i ran into the angel again
he took the high road
and I took took the low road
we both held dirty faces
we both had dirty faces
- Jane's Addiction -quoting someone else?
I spoke to Brian C. who told me that I introduced him to yoga by looking at his Nine Inch Nails shirt and saying - "oh Nine Inch Nails, I love Nine Inch Nails." Yup, "Pretty Hate Machine" was right up there on the list with Ministry - angst is part of the human drama, darn it..., a wee teeny tiny part, with all this yoga practice...
And he said, that I said,
"you must step into the darkness to find the light."
And he said he's been sold on yoga ever since.
And as we both battle this little nasty upper respiratory bug - I must quote Brian C. back, who said that while he is in the throes of feeling sick, he asks
"Who is this that feels sick?"
"What is this that feels?"
And then we step outside the realm of this and become the Witness. In-dwelling and infinite.
"Who am I?"
Not this body nor this mind.
Niralambaya Tejase.
"Drop me into hell,
nowhere else is heaven,
to be found, angel...
the devil doesn't exist they said, but I know better,
heaven and hell are intimate with each other,
that's rapture."
- K.L.
Our Master spoke one day to a nobleman about mystical truth. He
said, "In the state you have attained, you have become gold; now you
must transform even more of yourself into gold; you have to come to a
time when you will enter the furnace, begin to boil, and offer
yourself up for hammering on the anvil of mortification by the blows
of the Coiner, so that you can become a ring worthy of Solomon or an
earring that could adorn an Emperor. Most of the seekers you see are
just imitators; they will become authentic when they dare to enter
the hearth of love, and when they endure on the anvil of patience the
blows of misery and suffer impossible situations; then, after many
ordeals, they will find purity, and become the mirror of God."
~ Rumi
from Nirmala Devi's Daily Inspirations
Lots of allusions to stepping into the fire. Amazing grace to become the fire and the one that is burnt in it. And then we see that we do not need our illusions as much as we "think" we do.
Ajahn Sumedho, in 'Teachings of a Buddhist Monk':
"Desire can be compared to fire. If we grasp fire,
what happens? Does it lead to happiness? If we say:
"Oh, look at that beautiful fire! Look at the beautiful
colors! I love red and orange; they're my favorite colors,"
and then grasp it, we would find a certain amount of
suffering entering the body. And then if we were to
contemplate the cause of that suffering we would discover
it was the result of having grasped that fire. On that
information, we would hopefully, then let the fire go.
Once we let fire go then we know that it is something not
to be attached to.
This does not mean we have to hate it, or put it out. We can
enjoy fire, can't we? It's nice having a fire, it keeps the
room warm, but we do not have to burn ourselves in it."
from Nirmala Devi's Daily Inspirations
A quiet mind is all you need. All else will happen rightly,
once your mind is quiet. As the sun on rising makes the
world active, so does self-awareness affect changes
in the mind. In the light of calm and steady self-
awareness inner energies wake up and work miracles
without any effort on your part.
Do understand that your are destined for enlightenment.
Co-operate with your destiny, don’t go against it, don’t
thwart it. Allow it to fulfill itself. All you have to do is
give attention to the obstacles created by the foolish mind.
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj – “I AM THAT” – page 311
from Nirmala Devi's Daily Inspiration e-mails.
om shantih, shantih, shantih
Questioner: Must we suffer to grow?
Maharaj: It is enough to know that there is suffering, that the world suffers. By themselves neither pleasure nor pain enlighten. Only understanding does. Once you have grasped the truth that the world is full of suffering, that to be born is a calamity, you will find the urge and the energy to go beyond it. Pleasure puts you to sleep and pain wakes you up. If you do not want to suffer, don’t go to sleep. You cannot know yourself through bliss alone, for bliss is your very nature. You must face the opposite, what you are not, to find enlightenment.
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj – “I AM THAT”
(chapter 64)
from Nirmal Devi's Daily Inspiration e-mails.
this one resonates deeply...
is to make you love life more than you do now.
- Kurt Vonnegut 1922 - 2007
A Handbook of Theory, Practice and Application by Shri Brahmananda Sarasvati, founder Ananda Ashram
www.anandaashram.org
Chapter 2
The Power of Suggestion: Dharana, Dhyana, and Samadhi
"The universe is governed by eternal laws that never fail. These eternal laws are governed by the suggestion of primordial consciousness. This suggestion is operating in every being, living, or nonliving, at all times, in all places, in all experiences, and in all stages of nature, whether it is phenomenon or noumenon, manifested or unmanifested. Therefore, it is extremely necessary that the student of Yoga have an understanding of these laws.
Eight steps or systems of Yoga are mentioned in the first lesson. The last three of them, dharana (fixation of the mind in a particular place, outside or inside the body), dhyana (suggestion), and samadhi (development of will power and intuition) are vitally needed for the attainment of supreme consciousness. Therefore, these three are called the internal instrument of consciousness, and the first five are called the external instrument. When one has obtained the form of supreme consciousness, these three, too, become secondary to consciousness.
Suggestion is the most important of these three. Suggestion is the underlying and fundamental cause of all mental phenomena and is the powerful instrument of samadhi. The whole universe is nothing but suggestion; the world lives by it. The greatest power of nature is the power of suggestion. It is as old as nature and as powerful as nature. We are constantly moving every moment by your suggestion. First we think, then we do. First we plan, then we accomplish that plan. The newborn baby is not able to walk like a young child; it gives constant suggestion to its body through the mind and after one or two years' practice of suggestion and of trial it becomes able to walk like a man.
Knowledge or anything that we know now has to come to us through the power of suggestion. In school, in college, and in universities we learn through the suggestion of our teachers. All newborn babies are ignorant. During their childhood, teens, and adult life they develop themselves according to suggestions they receive through external and internal surroundings. Through constant suggestion, the same child becomes the master of his subject. Any knowledge that we are acquiring at present or that which we expect to acquire in the future will come to us through the power of suggestion.
Even the knowledge that seems to be spontaneous to you is manifested to you by the power of suggestion from the primordial creative energy, Universal Mind, the omniscience, omnipotence, omnipresence, the Universal Intelligence of the supreme. All knowledge was here before you and this universe were born, and it will remain here forever, after you and the universe are gone. And so will the great power of suggestion.
The law of suggestion is infallible and absolute. Everybody, ignorant or wise, rich or poor, high or low, young or old, organic or inorganic, living or nonliving being is subservient to the power and law of suggestion. There is no exception to this law. It is not a respecter of man or monkey, with the sole exception of those who have fortified themselves with the law of suggestion, with divine will power.
All suggestions take effect sooner or later. We develop our good or bad life according to our constant suggestion. Suggestion is the greatest single factor in the practice of Yoga.
Without understanding the science and methods of suggestion, nobody could obtain perfection of consciousness.
The following are the forms of suggestions:
1. Physical Suggestion:
Our body is moved with every thought in a particular way. When someone addresses a meeting, his hands are moving accordingly. By the suggestions of his hands and face, he may express his thoughts in a better way than those who do not show any gesture or physical suggestion to their audience. These and other similar expressions are called physical suggesion.
However, in Yoga physical suggestions are deeper than this. They are different - mudras (movements of limbs and fingers, etc., according to the circulation of kundalini force, magnetic force in the body). Physical suggestions are innumerable and every suggestion is related to a particular type of mental development. You will know them in time by your own experience in the practice of Yoga.
So in the throes of illness and bed-riddenness of the past few decades, I mean days, I was able to catch up on the reading of some of my favorite crack, I mean books. Yes, books are like crack to me. I have to inhale and inhale until one is finished. do people actually inhale crack? gotta look that up... And there are special categories that get me...Harry Potter being a main culprit and then the Philip Pullman books. Oh wow. Lyra is an even better hero(ine) than Harry and a little dreamier, and cuter, and yes, a girl...
so during one of the past few decades, I mean, days of being in a sick-headed stupor, I read Angels & Demons by Dan Brown. Mr. Brown knows how to write so you keep turning the pages. I particularly liked this trick that his sexy, physicist, Italian-Catholic heroine, Vittoria, would use when she was stumped with a problem (hands bound, Hassassin about to kill her, and as the hot Harvard-educated symbologist battles the killer,Vittoria uses her yoga mastery to dislocate her shoulderblades and get out of the mess, LOVE it!) --
Dan Brown explains this as an old Buddhist trick:
"Remember the solution."
Because from the Buddha-mind all is in pure consciousness, so all we have to do when in a pinch, the Vatican is about to blow up, bodies disfigured, centuries of erudition and scholarship blown to smithereens, is to breathe, "like a yoga master," and
remember the solution.
gotta love Dan Brown.
"to love another; that is perhaps the most difficult of our tasks; the ultimate, the last test and proof; the work for which all other work is but preparation."
- Rainier Maria Rilke
And in the dining hall at Ananda Ashram - quoting Guruji:
Dave Washburn asked Guruji about why relationships were difficult and Guruji laughed and said,
"Of course relationships are difficult - try putting two universes together."
Humans have figured out how to split an atom but we still haven't figured out how to put two Hydrogen atoms together to create the next element on the periodic table - Helium. An incredibly wonderful experiment. Relationships are like this, let's try for this and that chemistry, and a million blow-ups later ...fusion, perhaps
It's a divine miracle human beings continually perpetuate themselves. Pretty damn divine.
we see things as we are.
Anais
from Nirmala Devi's Daily Inspiration e-mails.
wow - this one resonates...
such peace in silence
difficult to practice
but since the voice is a little croaking baritone manly one that seems to take everyone aback when it comes out at the moment - and makes me laugh, which makes me cough, and then wheeze - then it's best to practice silence.
oh sweet surrender to silence...it's nice to hear everyone else chanting and singing away around here at Ananda Ashram. so many beautiful voices and hearts.
Caroline Myss taught me this one.
She said you have 3 main guardians
1) the guardian of necessity
2) the guardian of compassion
3) the guardian of choice
Now, I think it's interesting to see necessity and choice in the same light. There are necessities that we cannot live without - water, earth, air, fire, food, shelter, etcetera. And these "necessities" have a guardian inside us. But if you look at the fact that necessities are just as they are, necessities, then we can move on to what the heck in this lifetime do we have choice over?
And Myss would say - as I have asked her this question in person - an even more eloquent asking - as I ask all my teachers...what do we actually have choices over?
And she would say - we choose our attitude. We choose our attitude to any occasion. And then Myss would say, choice is even more powerful than love,
because "to love is a choice."
To act in a loving manner is a choice. To not act in a loving manner is a choice. I think this is interesting in light of "victimhood," and the games victims like to play. And I'm not saying I'm exempt, my victim archetype happens to land in my house of "ego and personality" so hell, I love to play the dark side of the victim to my own disadvantage. But I think this is interesting...Myss says the Victim is the guardian of "Self-esteem." So, knowing this, any time, my victim wants to play the card of "gee, I'm being victimized by this circumstance, person, scenario, illness, wah, wah, wah, whine," I give her something else to feed on...which is to shower her with so much love, music, kisses, sunshine, golden Almond milk, images of beauty, books, poetry, divine messages, Sanskrit, Guruji, Ramana Maharshi and chocolate - with no dairy, wheat or sugar, as Dr. Scott Moss, my new chiropractor/healer has taken the latter 3 delectable demons outta the diet. om shantih...then the Self-Esteem is guarded. Om namah Shivaya Svaha. And we can go on with the work of becoming enlightened. Thank God for Shankaracharya.
And the Dalai Lama would agree with Myss. His Holiness speaks of practicing compassion - and there are so many texts in Tibetan Buddhism that say - "without wisdom, there is no compassion" and "without compassion, there is no wisdom" - same thing. And he says we must practice, practice, practice and again here she comes - CHOOSE - to practice compassion because a lot of the time, it doesn't come naturally.
And what is this compassion? Is it standing by while someone abuses you? Or is it allowing circumstances that do not heal you or uphold you to continue? Absolutely not. Compassion must be married to wisdom and right action, and so much of compassion is in blessing others whom you will never understand and staying the heck away from them. Just as His Holiness is no longer in Tibet, under oppressive Chinese rule, but has taken up residence in Dharamsala in India and continues his work from there, if one is in a circumstance that feels in any way disempowering, flee and bless those who disempower one from afar. Now, if the disempowering force is your boss, or someone you have to see everyday, then confront them and have many talks as to how you can work best together. I've done this, and even if it felt difficult at the time, it was always so good to talk it out with my cantankerous boss.
And peace reigned...at least between she and I. She still yelled at everyone else around us. But heck, I was safe until she was let go. And then here I am, my own boss. It's nice to work for me, she's quite forgiving so many times and gives me space and quiet. And when I'm sick, she takes care of me takes me to the proper authorities who give her all sorts of wonderful herbs that fill her up with so much prana that she's up working on her computer when she's supposed to be sleeping because she's still not feeling completely 100 percent. But then again, I'm not doing a triathalon like Karmananda at the Ashram.
so perhaps we'll start training for that tomorrow :-)
I am so grateful for my wonderful Dr. Mommy - who killed the vermin in my lungs in one fell swoop with her calling in of a prescription at the local Rite Aid here in Monroe. Amoxicillin, thank you. Haven't needed to take you in 4 years - wow.
and for wonderful Karuna - at Ananda Ashram, my mentor. Lovely woman massaging my chest and taking me to Rite Aid.
so much love in the universe.
om shantih, shantih, shantih
Jeanna Bryner Staff Writer SPACE.com Thu Apr 19, 11:30 AM ET
Astronomers have recorded heavenly music bellowed out by the Sun's atmosphere. Snagging orchestra seats for this solar symphony would be fruitless, however, as the frequency of the sound waves is below the human hearing threshold. While humans can make out sounds between 20 and 20,000 hertz, the solar sound waves are on the order of milli-hertz--a thousandth of a hertz. The study, presented this week at the Royal Astronomical Society's National Astronomy Meeting in Lancashire, England, reveals that the looping magnetic fields along the Sun's outer regions, called the corona, carry magnetic sound waves in a similar manner to musical instruments such as guitars or pipe organs.
Making music Robertus von Fay-Siebenburgen of the Solar Physics and Space Plasma Research Center at the University of Sheffield and his colleagues combined information gleaned from sun-orbiting satellites with theoretical models of solar processes, such as coronal mass ejections. They found that explosive events at the Sun's surface appear to trigger acoustic waves that bounce back and forth between both ends of the loops, a phenomenon known as a standing wave. "These magnetic loops are analogous to a simple guitar string," von Fay-Siebenburgen explained. "If you pluck a guitar string, you will hear the music."
In the cosmic equivalent of a guitar pick, so-called microflares at the base of loops could be plucking the magnetic loops and setting the sound waves in motion, the researchers speculate. While solar flares are the largest explosions in the solar system, microflares are a million times smaller but much more frequent; both phenomena are now thought to funnel heat into the Sun's outer atmosphere. The acoustic waves can be extremely energetic, reaching heights of tens of miles, and can travel at rapid speeds of 45,000 to 90,000 miles per hour. "These [explosions] release energy equivalent to millions of hydrogen bombs," von Fay-Siebenburgen said. "These energies are plucking these magnetic strings or standing pipes, which set up standing waves--exactly the same waves you see on a guitar string," von Fay-Siebenburgen told SPACE.com.
The "sound booms" decay to silence in less than an hour, dissipating in the hot solar corona. Solar physics The musical finding could help explain why the Sun's corona is so hot. While the Sun's surface is a steamy 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit (5,538 degrees Celsius), plasma gas in the corona soars to more than 100 times hotter. "How can the atmosphere above the surface of the Sun be hotter if nuclear fusion happens inside the Sun?" von Fay-Siebenburgen said. If astronomers can get a clearer picture of what's going on inside these magnetic loops in the Sun's atmosphere, they have a better chance of finding the answer.
Another recent study using images from Hinode's telescope revealed twisted magnetic fields along the Sun's surface, which store huge amounts of energy. The magnetic fields can snap like a rubber band; when they do, they might release energy that could heat up the corona or power solar eruptions and coronal mass ejections, the researchers say.
K.L. note = the sun is also said to pulsate like a drum. what a heavenly instrument. pulsating me. today she is out in all her glory here at the Ashram. magnificent landscape.
back in university I studied the classics and how so many creations of literature since the creation story in the Bible is a derivation of the Adam & Eve story...for instance Milton's Paradise Lost and Shelley's Frankenstein. Creation myths are superbly fascinating for the mind to make some sense of this journey.
so there's no pure creation...even the words that go into this blog were not invented by me...all is a derivation of something else created. so I love this marriage of e.e. cummings and Bjork's voice and her producers on the album Vespertine. which I played in class years ago now over and over, but the lyrics are outta this world and still, remain, relevant.
I will wade out
till my thighs
are steeped
in burning flowers
I will take the sun in my mouth
and leap into
the ripe air
alive : with closed eyes
To dash
against darkness
In the sleeping curves
of my body
I shall enter
fingers
of smooth mastery
With chasteness
of sea-girls
will I complete the mystery
of my flesh
will I
complete
the mystery
of my flesh
my flesh
La la la la la la la la la la la la la
and then because my voice is lost right now muddled in a heart that is pulsing with all sorts of pain, uninvited, but there any way...I go to this song and it makes me feel so much better. Also handstands. It's amazing how a handstand can make me feel better. And deer. staring into the eyes of deer. and Bhagavan Das. Thank God for Neem Karoli Baba.
I have a recurrent dream
every time I lose my voice
I swallow little glowing lights
my mother and son baked for me
During the night
they do a trapeze walk
until they're in the sky
right above my bed
While i'm asleep
my mother and son pour into me
warm glowing oil
into my wide open throat
I have a recurrent dream
every time I feel a hoarseness
I swallow warm glowing lights
my mother and son baked for me
They make me feel so much better
They make me feel better
We have a recurrent dream
everytime we lose our voices
we dream we swallow little lights
our mother and sons bake for us
During the night
they do a little trapeze walk
until they're in the sky
right above our heads
right above our heads
While we're asleep
my mother and son pour into us
warm glowing oil
into our wide open throats
I have a recurrent dream...
They make me feel better
They make me feel better
and two of my favorites below:
It's not meant to be a strife
it's not meant to be a struggle uphill
You're trying too hard
surrender
give yourself in
you're trying too hard
you're trying too hard
It's not meant to be a strife
it's not meant to be a struggle uphill
sweetly
to enjoy
it's not meant to be a strife
it's not meant to be a struggle uphill
It's warmer now : lean into it
unfold in a generous way
surrender
surrender
undo
It's not meant to be a strife
it's not meant to be a struggle uphill
I'm praying
to be
in a generous mode
the kindness kind
the kindness kind
to share me
quietly ecstatic
It's not meant to be a strife
it's not meant to be a struggle uphill
Undo
Undo : if you're bleeding
Undo : if you're sweating
Undo : if you're crying
Undo
( u n r a v e l )
and my sister and I love this one. although my hermit is a little weaker than her strong hermit archetype. I've developed solitude in such a great way though, in comparison to when we were kids and I would sit near my sis while she worked and peel paint off her dried paint boards and watch an artist create.
One hand
loves the other
so much on me
Born stubborn, me
will always be
before you count 123
I will have grown my own private branch
of this tree
You : gardener
You : discipliner
domestically
I can obey all of your rules
and still be : be
I never thought I would compromise
I never thought I would compromise
I never thought I would compromise
Let's unite tonight
we shouldn't fight
embrace you tight
let's unite tonight
I thrive best
hermit style
with a beard and a pipe
and a parrot on each side
but now I can't do this without you
I never thought I would compromise
I never thought I would compromise
I never thought I would compromise
Let's unite tonight
we shouldn't fight
embrace you tight
let's unite tonight
One hand
loves the other
so much on me
Let's unite tonight
we shouldn't fight
embrace you tight
let's unite tonight
Let's unite tonight
we shouldn't fight
embrace you tight
let's
ahhh...
Unison
. The version found written on the wall in Mother Teresa's home for children in Calcutta:
People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies. Succeed anyway.
If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you. Be honest and sincere anyway.
What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. Create anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous. Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, will often be forgotten. Do good anyway.
Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. Give your best anyway.
In the final analysis, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.
-this version is credited to Mother Teresa
in order to learn, one must participate...this is key. so we have to synthesize from all the teachings that are given to us.
I remember hearing that in elementary school. so I should be grateful for some great teachers at Will Rogers Elementary and secondly for being smart enough to listen.
so here's one that I'm going to write about and see what comes. I've studied with Caroline Myss at Omega. Talk about shaktih. I went up to her to say, "you're not short," when she told the group about being 5 foot 2 and short. So I went up to her with all 4 feet 11 of me and laughed at how relative everything is. And she looked straight at me after I said this and through me into the 7 chakras and said to me, "Is that all there is to you?"
love it. of course the body is not all there is to it. but we like to sometimes forget.
Caroline tells the story of one of the "nunsies" from her school who said,
"Wanna make God laugh? Tell him your plans."
This is after she told the nun that she planned on being an award-winning author. Now, this statement is humbling. totally humbling for strategists and planners like myself. But yet, here Caroline Myss is, a NY Times best-selling author over and over again. God laughed with her. Thank God. Because we are truly blessed with Caroline's teachings.
So my mind wanders over to Bob Proctor - who wrote Born Rich and is one of the teachers featured in The Secret - with whom I have also studied. Talk about Shaktih. The man was reverberating when I met him in 1998 or 1999 in Maryland - like this white light aura that was magnetic. to say the least. I was with darling Amy Ippoliti, lovely Anusara teacher, at a sales seminar for network marketing and Nikken. And Bob came up to our table and put a mike on me - and asked my name. So I said my name, Kristina. And he asked if I knew what it meant. And I said yes, "Christ's little one."
And he asked me what my dreams were and if I believed in them. And in his presence, sure, everything is possible. and I laugh at all my doubts. do we really think God is laughing at us or with us? I believe God is laughing at the small self, the self of doubt and fear and negativity. And we can either choose to laugh with her or cry that we even have a dark side to contend with.
And so we go into the wonderful way the brain can't wrap itself around charisma, shaktih, big energy, God - because the thinking mind can't handle it.
"Drop the thinking mind."
as Guruji says.
"The fastest step is to forget everything, whatever you know."
another great line from Guruji
and then we can suggest to the subconscious mind what the hell it is we are really going for in this universe. I got the feeling that Bob Proctor was telling me that it wasn't necessarily through selling magnets that I would earn money and such. And I got that. But to feel that I already have everything that "I think" I'm missing. everything. everything. everything. And it all just comes into place when time and space nod yes.
"All these modern things have always existed. They've just been waiting on a mountain for the right moment." - Bjork sang this.
So I was pleasantly surprised to see this great teacher on The Secret. And when I saw Amy down in Arizona, I told her how cool it was to see him and to remember that day and how it's all transpiring. All the dreams on the Vision Board. They come and they unfold and it just takes a Seer of gratitude to not attach to anything. What a wonderful dream within a dream within a dream life truly is.
things are not as they seem.
on the level on which it was created. "
einstein said this. I love geniuses and mystics.
so we have to change the mind.
"pray for more problems" so that we can crack open the mind and it's lovely little box.
I keep hearing the line,
"the heart is meant to be broken,
open, open, open."
was that Jack Kornfield? it's good to be surrounded by wisdom and love. I'm grateful for that.
Here at Ananda Ashram, it can be difficult to sleep - it's just too damn beautiful to sleep. So instead of scrunching up around my heart in sleep, I've been practicing the Anusara principles of alignment while lying on my back in Savasana. And it's nice because even though the lungs want to cough, cough something up - it feels better to keep the heart chakra totally open and watch it all expel, rather than curling into the feeling in the chest. Interesting.
It's really both physical and spiritual - the heart-opening gesture. And the heart being the center of all emotions.
So to sleep with heart open, one must keep the palms pointing straight up
in a gesture of receiving
the arms out at the sides - like Da Vinci's anatomical man
the shoulders looping in
the back open
by inner spiraling the legs
and then total receptivity
much opening to grace
and I heard some wonderful advice about relaxing so deeply in the divine so that every moment - of this awakened consciousness can really be seen as precious. even the difficult ones.
Guruji says, "pray for more problems."
as it is what has us down on our knees praying and meditating and going inward.
At fire ceremony tonight at the Ashram, I meditated on the flames themselves and took Rumi's and Swami Shantananda's advice,
"become the fire."
"Yajna"
so appropriate for a firey Leo to become who she is and not fight the fire that loves to consume her.
Swami Shantananda also said that one should become the fire of "Om Namah Shivaya" and then everything that comes - thoughts, feelings, emotions, people, energies - just gets thrown into the flames. I like that one a lot. It seems to work very well to just be this "tiny flame burning in a big space."
while eating cooling foods :-)
Continue reading "on the subject of breaking open the heart" »
by e.e. cummings
since feeling is first
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world
my blood approves,
and kisses are a better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don't cry
—the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids' flutter which says
we are for each other: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life's not a paragraph
And death i think is no parenthesis
- I must be in an Amy Jordan mood because she was the one who gave me this poem in high school. was that when we were 16 and brooding? so good to be 33 and brooding on "I-AM."
The yellow walls are lined with portraits
And I've got my new red fetching leather jacket
All these poses such beautiful poses
Makes any boy feel like picking up roses
There's never been such grave a matter
As comparing our new brand name black sunglasses
All these poses such beautiful poses
Makes any boy feel as pretty as princes
The green autumnal parks conducting
All the city streets a wondrous chorus singing
All these poses oh how can you blame me
Life is a game and true love is a trophy
And you said
Watch my head about it
Baby you said watch my head about it
My head about it
Oh no oh no oh no
Oh no oh no no kidding
Reclined amongst these packs of reasons
For to smoke the days away into the evenings
All these poses of classical torture
Ruined my mind like a snake in the orchard
I did go from wanting to be someone now
I'm drunk and wearing flip-flops on fifth avenue
Once you've fallen from classical virtue
Won't have a soul for to wake up and hold you
In the green autumnal parks conducting
All the city streets a wondrous chorus
Singing all these poses now no longer boyish
Made me a man ah but who cares what that is
And you said watch my head about it
Baby you said watch my head about it
My head about it
Oh no oh no oh no
Oh no oh no well you said
Watch my head about it
Baby you said watch my head about it
My head about it
Oh no oh no oh no
Oh no oh no no kidding
Thanks to Amy Jordan, my long-time, heart buddy for introducing me to Rufus and taking me to Carnegie Hall last year to see him.
By Shri Brahmananda Sarasvati
Our goal is physical, mental and spiritual health, so that each individual becomes a center of health and peace and, thus, a unit of East-West unity.
To achieve this, we need a meditative attitude, contact with the inner guiding light. For this purpose the Ashram exists, where each person is to discover that inner, radiant light
Ashram is a center of unity. Every institution, every man and woman talks about this unity – unity among Christians, among Hindus, among Muslims, Jews, blacks, whites, and browns – but they do not practice it, because they do not live together. Here in the Ashram, we live together and practice unity and togetherness at all times.
Therefore the Ashram faces more manifestation of problems. This is a very healthy sign.
What is the treatment, the healing, for our problems? The first treatment is to know the problems. When we do not know our problems, how can we know their treatment? Our main problem is that we do not know our problem, because we do not know our Self. In a dark room, we cannot see without bringing a light. In the same way, in the darkness of ignorance, without the inner light of “I-Am,” we cannot know what is what and who is who. When we know our Self, then we know everything.
The Ashram teaches us that the real university is the universe itself, where you discover the discoverer. When you discover your Self, then you discover that the whole universe is your body and mind, in which your own life is pulsating eternally, day and night.
Excerpts from the essay “Convocation,” written in 1985. Baba Bhagavandas Publication Trust, Monroe, NY
from Nirmala Devi's Daily Inspirations:
"There's no courage," the Prophet said, "before the
battle has begun.
Drunkards vaunt their bravery when you speak of war
But in the blaze of battle they scatter like mice.
When it makes its plans, the heart's avid for wounds
But the first pinprick empties its sack of air.
I'm astonished by the man who says he wants purity
And yet trembles when the harshness of polishing begins.
Love's like a court case; to undergo fierce treatment
Is like a proof; no proof and you'll lose your case.
Don't be disturbed if the Judge demands proof:
Give the serpent a kiss to obtain the treasure.
This hardness is not directed at you, my son,
But at the many defects that hide within you.
When a man beats a carpet again and again with a stick,
It's not the carpet he's attacking, but the dirt in it.
If a man whips a horse, it isn't from rage or hatred -
He wants it to stop stumbling and go forward cleanly.
Unfermented wine is placed in a cold, dark cellar
So after awhile it can become real wine at last.
from "The Teachings of Rumi" ed Andrew Harvey
