sick this morning

But on the mend. 

Tea, toast, and idli down the toilet.

I've never enjoyed vomiting so much.

Jai Guru!

 

Lake Palace sunrise

* * *

Yesterday morning I met the auto-rickshaw driver, Keval, at 6:30 AM, and he showed me the sites of Jaipur. The idea was to beat the heat and the traffic. It worked wonderfully.

 

Lord Ram (or is it Arjuna?) statue at the entrance to the sports stadium.

 Lakshmi Narayana temple (which reminds me a lot of the Hindu Temple of Greater Chicago in Lemont).

 The Albert Museum. The street was closed to traffic, and many people were out taking a morning constitutional, playing cricket, making art, bhangra dancing, and enjoying the beautiful morning.

 Raj Cinema 

 Tw of the Pink Citiy's 11 gates. (The body only has nine gates).

 

 

 

Saturday, part 2

In the afternoon we went for a walk to Gurudev's ashram and found ourselves at a lovely Radha-Govinda temple complex, complete with deities inside and adorable and nonthreatening monkeys and a peacock outside (plus a busload of chatty Gujaratis). 

Jaipur or the Pink City is breathtakingly beautiful; the photos can speak for themselves.

 

    

Jai Guru !

 . 

Yesterday was the kickoff of an astrology festival. The O.M.'s Gurudev was scheduled to appear at the opening ceremony.

There were a lot of overamplified speeches beforehand, all in Hindi. They went on for some time.

(Afterwords I found out they were largely speaking about not killing cows)

I startled to wilt in the heat during these veryloud speeches when suddenly  I felt a surge of energy: Gurudev had arrived.  

Exhaustion & irritation gave way to a calm, focused energy.

Jai Guru!

Good Morning, Jaipur!

Got into Rajas-than last night and saw The OM's guest house, below.

 

Jal Darshan

Views at  Juhu Beach, Mumbai

"Like bubbles in the sea, All the worlds arise in you. Know you are the Self. Know you are one. Let yourself dissolve."

-Ashtavakra Gita

 

 

 

 

  

QUESTION:  “Whichever way one turns, one finds that the mind has to be subdued. We are told it has to be controlled, Can this really be done when on the one  the mind is an entity not easily grasped and on the other one continues to have worldly worries?”

SRI RAMANA MAHARISHI:  "A person who has never seen an ocean must make a trip to it to know about it. Standing there before the huge expanse of water, this person may wish to bathe in the sea. Of what use is it if, seeing the roaring and rolling of the waves, he were to just stand there thinking, ‘I shall wait for all this to subside. When it does, I shall enter it for a quest bath just as in the pond back home? He has to realize either by himself or by being told, that the ocean is restlessness and that it has been so from the moment of creation and will continue likewise till Pralaya (destruction). He will then resolve to learn to bathe in it, as it is. He may wade into it by and by, and perhaps, through prior instruction, learn to duck under a wave and let it pass over him. He would naturally hold his breath, While doing so, soon he would be skilled enough to duck, at a stretch, wave after wave, and thus achieve the purpose of bathing without coming to grief. The ocean may go on and though in it, he is free from its grip”. Bhagavan then added,  after a pause, “So too here”.

Shiva & Ramakrishna

 

 

 

Yesterday morning, we stopped at a Shiva temple on the way home from the beach. It was one of those quieter , unattended temples - my favorite - at least when I was there. The attendent (not a priest) next to the Linga gave me a vessel of water and I was allowed to bathe It. Afterwards we talked about about Lord Shiva and his family and attendants.

"The Guru is not different from pure, unbounded consciousness, the Self. This is the truth. Without a doubt, this is the truth. Knowing this, the wise ceaselessly strive to realize the true nature of the Guru. "

-Lord Shiva to Parvati, in the Shri Guru Gita

In  the evening we went to the hip neighborhood of Badra for dinner at a place where they showed classic silent movies on the front wondow,  which could be viewed from both outside and inside.

 

But beforehand, we stopped at the Ramakrishna Math, where they were in the middle of the evening Aarti. The Bhajans were really lovely, and a little faster than the ones I remember them having at their center in Mysore.  I used to go there quite a bit on my fast few trips, and found it to be one of the most sattvic places in the city.  The one in Mumbai has a similar bhava or feeling. 

"If you must be mad, be it not for the things of the world. Be mad with the love of God."

-Sri Ramakrishna

Siddharameshwar's Mahasamadhi

 

Yesterday we also visited the mahasamadhi of nondualist teacher Siddharameshwar Maharaj, the guru of Nisargdatta Maharaj, next to a cremation ground (Nisargatta wrote the well-known Advaita Vedanta book, I am That).

 

From Siddharameshwar: "Consider yourself lucky if your mind is fed up with wordly objects."

Nisargdatta said, "My Guru ordered me to attend to the sense 'I am'  and to give attention to nothing else. I just obeyed. I did not follow any particular course of breathing, or meditation, or study of scriptures. Whatever happened, I would turn away my attention from it and remain with the sense 'I am'. It may look too simple, even crude. My only reason for doing it was that my Guru told me so. Yet it worked!"

 

and

'My Guru told me: "...Go back to that state of pure being, where the ‘I am’ is still in its purity before it got contaminated with ‘I am this’ or ‘I am that.’ Your burden is of false self-identifications—abandon them all." My guru told me, "Trust me, I tell you: you are Divine. Take it as the absolute truth. Your joy is divine, your suffering is divine too. All comes from God. Remember it always. You are God, your will alone is done." I did believe him and soon realized how wonderfully true and accurate were his words. I did not condition my mind by thinking, "I am God, I am wonderful, I am beyond." I simply followed his instruction, which was to focus the mind on pure being, "I am," and stay in it. I used to sit for hours together, with nothing but the "I am" in my mind and soon the peace and joy and deep all-embracing love became my normal state. In it all disappeared—myself, my guru, the life I lived, the world around me. Only peace remained, and unfathomable silence. (I Am That, Dialogue 51, April 16, 1971)."''

Jai Guru❣️

Banganga Tank

In the Ramayana, Lord Ram became thirsty on the way to Lanka to rescue Sita. There was no water, so he shot an arrow into the ground, and the Ganga River sprang up from it.  Mumbai's Banganga Tank means "Arrow Tank," and that is its source.  (You can see it in the bottom left corner).

 

The tank is surrounded by temples, including a Shiva Temple.  It is at the site where Lord Ram wished to pray to Lord Shiva before heading to Lanka.  A linga wasn't available, so Lord Ram made one out of sand.

 

 

There is also a Kali Temple, partway up a steep hill.

 

 

Jai Ma!

Here Itself

 

This is my first trip to India in  nine years,  and my first visit the north. The last was to Mysore in 2008, to visit Sri K. Pattabhi Jois one final  time (he passed the following year). 

As I was leaving the plane i  was immediately struck by the warm, welcoming humid-smoke scent I associate with India, and began to tear up; why had I been away from home so long?

I was able to sleep in today until about 9:30, and was thrilled to awaken in India. The palms, the birds, the scent, the feeling of being in the arms of the mother (no joke since we are staying with the OM's own Mum).  The feeling of being home.

After a leisurely breakfast watching (well, one of us was watching)  the final day of the  India-Australia cricket match, we took darshan of the sea, 

 

had an excellent capuccino at a delightful AC cafe, and then headed to ISKCON for a sumptuous vegetarian buffet meal at Govinda's. Jai Shri Krishna!

...

Later we had a walk along the sea on the first day of spring (vasanti). Many others were out, taking the air.

 

Landed!

 Left the house @ 11 AM Saturday, and arrived in the beautiful new Mumbai airport Sunday night after 10 PM. The OM was there with a mango lassi in hand. Jai Guru! 

Photos: Newark (top) & O'Hare.  Will plan to snap some of Mumbai airport - which really *is* photogenic - on the return trip.

Departure Day

Had a wonderful chat with Miss Y yesterday (she was my primary "India coach" for my first trip to the Motherland, back in 2002). She'd literally just returned from 2.5 weeks at the Govardhan Eco Village north of Mumbai. It had also been her first trip back since 2008, and she kept marveling at how much easier things are now.

We shall see.

Miss Y is also the one who gave me my first India advice, which my first yoga teacher, Suddha Weixler, had given to her:

"Expect the unexpected.”



And now, back to packing....





PHOTOS:
Miss Y and Miss Om with Geetha's Mum (top) in Mysore in 2004, with Bindifry (middle) halfway up Chamundi Hill in 2004, and at the predecessor to Yoga Now (Yogawerks) near Cabrini Green in 2002.

Almost...

...ready.

Of course you are never ready or not ready to go to India, as Dena Kingsberg told me back in 1999....."You just go."

Last night I finally went through the things in my "India box," from 2008, below. Some of them still fit. 

 

And some do not. 

Earlier in the day I went to the lake after teaching, and saw this:

It's 93 in Mumbai.




.

Snow!

1. Snow!

2. Punchline

3. Coda

FLOORED

Yam overwhelmed at the moment with awe and gratitude towards everything that yoga and its gurus have given me over the past two decades.* The people, the practices, the purpose, the meaning - everything.

Jai Guru!



* * *



*I was a little lost when my mother passed in April of 1997. Then an idea crept into my head from the back of my mind; why not try that yoga? It was on my list of things to try (which also included playing bass in a band and learning to surf) and a fellow waitress friend (another Amy) encouraged me to give it a shot, giving me my first sticky mat (in those days they came in a single color - royal blue). I ignored my first experience with yoga -- watching a friend do sun salutations in Central Park in 1990 *really* turned me off to the whole thing -- and signed up for my first, life-changing session at the Lincoln-Belmont YMCA. During the first class I forgot all of my problems - clearing out my mother's house and serving as executor of her estate, fighting with my sibling, losing my best friend and cheerleader [my mother], watching my two closest remaining friends go AWOL, and dealing with all of the accompanying emotions -- and felt peaceful for the first time in my life. I was in - hook, line and sinker. There was no question that I had found what I was looking for. I was home.

Writing again....?

I recently bought a plane ticket to India; the plan is to leave March 18 and return April 6.

It's been nine years since I visited the Motherland; in the interim, Sri K. Pattabhi Jois passed, I received guru mantra, completed many more teacher trainings, legally changed my name, made it through menopause, gave up my journalism career, bought a new computer, led many, many retreats, and nearly stopped writing (except for my Yoga Chicago columns and spiritual diary).

I have the sense that that is all beginning to change, as I read this, written by a longtime Chicago ashtangi and dear friend, and re-consider where my gifts are and how they may best be used to serve others.




* * *


*the photo above shows me wearing the shorts Miss Amy KR gave to me the day before, shortly after she'd gone into hospice. She asked me to send her a picture of me wearing them, and this is what I sent.

She had originally loaned those same shorts to me in the early 2000's, at Sri K. Pattabhi Jois's workshop at the Puck Building in NYC. I'd shown up bleary-eyed in jeans, and without yoga pants; within a few minutes Amy - whom I barely knew - offered me her extra shorts. Long story short, over the years (although I was ostensibly the one in the role of "teacher"), she taught be a whole lot about love, selflessness, inclusiveness, joy and generosity. Jai Ma!

Update

Find inspirational quotes and more on our Facebook page. Om shanti.

Thursday Quote

"Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth."

-Muhammad Ali

Monday Music

Thursday Quote

“In good company your thoughts run, in solitude your thought is still; it goes deeper and makes for itself a deeper groove, delves. Delve means 'dig with a spade'; it means hard work. In talk your mind can be stretched, widened, exhilarated to heights but it cannot be deepened; you have to deepen it yourself.

"It needs sturdiness. You will be lonely, you will be depressed; you must expect it; if you were training your body it would ache and be tired. It is worth it. There is a Hindu proverb which says: 'You only grow when you are alone'.”


― Rumer Godden, from Thus Far and No Further

Thursday Quotes

"Life is a song - sing it. Life is a game - play it. Life is a challenge - meet it. Life is a dream - realize it. Life is a sacrifice - offer it. Life is love - enjoy it."

"Love one another and help others to rise to the higher levels, simply by pouring out love. Love is infectious and the greatest healing energy."

"The life ahead can only be glorious if you learn to live in total harmony with the Lord.

"You must pass your days in song. Let your whole life be a song."


-Sai Baba of Shirdi

Monday Music

Thursday Quote

"Do not hate those who are evil-hearted, jealous and selfish. It is they who promote your salvation."

-Swami Sivananda

Monday Music

A new Ganesh temple opened on Devon Avenue on Friday. It has not "officially" opened - there will be many renovations and updates as time goes on - but it's already functioning and the sponsor told me that it should be open daily from 11-8. It's at 2545 W. Devon (across from Mysore Woodlands). If you go, please tell them I sent you. Jai Ganesh!

Monday Music

Thursday Quote

"Remember, Yama [the ethical roots] is the foundation. Without it, there will be no enthusiasm for achieving Self-realization and no appetite for spiritual matters. The goal may be achieved without Asana and Pranayama, but, without good health and some mental control (concentration), the process will be more painful and will take much longer."

-Sri Dharma Mittra

Monday Music

Thursday Quote

"Thought is Karma. Thinking is the real Karma. Thought molds your character. Thought materializes and becomes an action. If you allow the mind to dwell on good, elevating thoughts, you will develop a noble character; you will do naturally good and laudable actions."

-Swami Sivananda

Monday Music

Thursday Quote

"Asanas and pranayama are part of Yoga sadhana. They can confer their spiritual benefits upon you only if they are based on the foundations of yama-niyama, a strong character; and if they get the help of auxiliaries like diet, and pure sattvic daily life. Otherwise they will be merely physical exercises. Of course you will enjoy good health and freedom from disease, but what use is health and strength, if the mind within is rotting, and the canker of evil is eating into your very vitals?"

-Swami Vishnudevananda, Teachings on Yogic Life

Monday Music

Thursday Quote

"When you have a little Self Knowledge, you are a king among men. This is very rare. The rest are all lost in duality, lost in their ego. I have many disciples that are still lost. They still don’t understand about higher things."

-Sri Dharma Mittra (whose body turns 77 on Saturday)

Monday Music

Thursday Quote

"The pure-hearted man fulfills the supreme purpose of life through the instructions of his Guru, even though they may be casually imparted. The worldly-minded man studies and inquires throughout his life, yet remains unenlightened."

-Astavakara Gita

Monday Music