or striving for what I really

want to be?

Am I meandering,

or steadily treading the path?

Am I turning down the good life

for one which is great,

or am I simply settling for less?

America, a land of bounty

and wasted possibility.

India, a barren wasteland

but filled with beauty unseen.

Oh tinda, how I love thee.

Your creaminess reminds me of cheeseballs

but I can digest you with ease.

Your texture, so smooth,

you are the ultimate in cool.

No matter how many times we meet,

you never cease to amaze.

I never get bored in your company,

a feat given the dearth of competitors.

Oh tinda, the best veg in town,

so light and sweet,

you keep me pleased.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

It’s slim pickings in this season in Jaipur. The variety of vegetables available is limited to about seven. But no matter how ofter I eat tinda, I never get bored!

See the article in The Independent Urban gardener section, Currying Flavour, for a more prosaical explanation of the merits of tinda. Seems she’s won over many hearts!

If I was only allowed to grow one vegetable at the allotment this year it would be tinda, a small round gourd some 5-8cm in diameter and a native to India.

I’m not quite obsessed with it, but if the Kastoori in Tooting, south London (my favourite Indian restaurant in the cosmos) ever has it on the menu I will buy extra portions to take home and freeze.

between self and thought

lies the sweetest expanse

of life and nothingness.

Light and pure,

soothing and sure.

The cascading breath

carries me there,

to the space beyond time,

reason and rhyme.

No battles, no crises,

no wrong or right:

a place of seeing

without sight.

(written after my Isha yoga practice this morning)

of cars, thoughts and rats.

Continuous comparison,

city life of crowds and competition

no space to hear yourself think

others breathing down your neck

the heat grit smoke dust

choking all life around.

The seat of government and diplomacy,

madness and no mercy.

To thrive: a miraculous task;

most just barely survive.

The dream and drive of making it big,

the unbeatable will to stay alive.

Against all odds the craze continues

rewarding few

crippling many.

Delhi, do you have any idea

of where you’re leading the country?

You are an unsettled head

in an aching body.

You are trying too hard to keep up,

to prove yourself to the world,

and leaving too much behind.

Delhi, in my belly, on my mind:

are you aware of what you’re doing?

For 3 days, we did things that would have made us look so crazy to the outside world. For 3 days we looked within ourselves and found ourselves not just inside but outside; in every person, stone and leaf. Even in the wind and clouds and the wonderful rain. My tears didn’t stop flowing for 3 day…I wasn’t sad, just overwhelmed by what I was experiencing. I felt so foolish for being the way I was and the way I had lived. I believed that looking inside means cutting off everything that outside provides because these outside forces are distractions. In the process I had really stopped living. As my tears washed off these imaginations and prejudices I had, something inside of me grew bigger and bigger to encompass everything that ever existed and allowed me to melt away completely.

And here’s an excerpt from Eleanor:

Everyone’s experience of BSP is completely different. I experienced a wide range of emotions at BSP, from total exhaustion and a desire to go home immediately, to transcending that into complete peace and exuberant joy. By the end, I never wanted to leave. When it was time to go home, I bid farewell to my dear, new friends and started thinking about what was next for me in the world of yoga. All in all, it was an unusual, wonderful and worthwhile experience.

Let the juice of life touch you in every possible way. May your lives be rich, wonderful, ecstatic and, if that is your quality, let that be shared, because it only grows by sharing.–Sadhguru, “Grace Grows When Shared”, February 2010 Forest Flower

I have left this blog for dead many times, but then keep resurrecting it. It won’t let me leave it alone.

It has evolved from being a venue for feminist venting and ranting, to a platform for showcasing the depth of my experience with Isha Yoga. Admittedly, the majority of words are no longer my own, and those that I can muster hardly do justice to the profundity of what I have felt through these practices and my encounters with Sadhguru.

Yet, I must continue to keep it alive, in my feeble attempt to share the juice that I have tasted. The chance that a reader may also catch a drop of it keeps me coming back.

If you had read this blog two years ago, you only would have tasted bitterness. Now, such emotions hardly cross my mindscape; if at all they do, they are quickly passing clouds that don’t deserve my attention.

There was a time when I was aspiring to be an inspiring writer. I wanted to put out a positive message, in the midst of all the negativity I saw in the world. But I myself was looking for inspiration like a weary nomad in search of an oasis.

At the In the Lap of the Master 3-day Sathsang program that I attended in April, Sadhguru said that, for someone who’s parched, a glass of water is like a benediction.

That’s how I felt when I found Isha.

To be brutally honest against the makers of social media (not that I think they’ll start crying heresy against me, a low-ranking BeckyBlabber):  I never saw the point of social media before Isha. Yes, I reluctantly started a blog, but didn’t actually believe people would be interested in reading it. Why my blog, when so many others are out there? How would they find me?

But it’s become such a powerful outlet for me, and for others I see it can be a useful resource. So I push on, despite the fear of embarrassment.

There is a song that I can’t get out of my head recently, based on a poem by Kabir:

Fearlessly I Will Sing the Attributes of the One without Attributes

Using the Base Lotus as the Steady Seat
I Will Make the Wind Rise in Reverse
Steadying the Mind’s Attachments
I Will Unify the Five Elements
Ingila, Pingala and Sukhman are the Channels
I Will Bathe at the Confluence of the Three Rivers
The Five and Twenty Five I Will Master by my Wish
And String them Together by One Common Thread
At the Summit of Aloneness the Un-struck Anahad Sound Reverberates
I Will Play the Thirty-Six Different Symphonies
Says Kabir Listen Oh Practicing Aspirant
I Will Wave the Flag of Victory

Explanation

In this song, Kabir clearly shows the “real” meaning of certain phrases used in ancient texts. Often these are mistaken to be reference to physical places while in reality an internal experience is actually being told.

Fear is the first and biggest obstacle to spiritual realization. And a state of fearlessness shows that a person has actually accepted the environment or physical reality for what it is. In that state of accepting oneness, Kabir says that he is going to expound on the attributes of the ultimate.

YOGA MARGA (21 days)

A 3-week treatment program which rejuvenates your system and restores vitality lost due to modern day stress. Sadhguru’s deep understanding of the human body and mind is the very quintessence of this program. A team of dedicated specialists evaluate and prescribe a detailed treatment plan for each individual. This includes yogic practices, meditation, diet, and siddha medication and therapy (if needed). Also, just to be in the highly charged energy of the Isha Yoga Center and Dhyanalinga meditation shrine has undeniable healing effects.

My health has continued to improve tremendously after attending Inner Engineering, with practice of Shambhavi & Shakti Chalana Kriya (learned in the Shoonya Meditations program).  I was still quite stationary though, and would get drained if I took on too much, which I inevitably did. I wanted to enable myself to sustain a radical shift in lifestyle, one which would require more traveling and a less regular schedule of sleeping and eating.  I wanted to free myself completely from the chronic illnesses that had plagued me since childhood–asthma, allergies, sinusitis.

I wanted to get rid of the fear of life outside of my routine, life beyond the boundaries I’d fixed for myself; the fear of illness, of my body’s incapabilities, of my fragility.

I wanted perfection, cure. Freedom, empowerment. The first two are still pending, but I got something much more.

I went in with a list of things I couldn’t do, came out with a list of things I shouldn’t eat. The prescribed diet was a blessing, since I had become thoroughly confused after reading too much of the nutritional nonsense that inundates the Internet. Although it was coming from the most well-reputed sources, still I couldn’t make sense of how it applied to me. The center’s food was delicious and fresh; prepared and served with the utmost attention and love. I’m not sure I can say the same about my own mother!

The schedule was rigorous, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I felt a tremendous amount of energy and support throughout the process. It was not a quick fix or a magic wand, but it enabled me to see my limitations more clearly and be more accepting of them.

Below is a poem I wrote, dedicated to all of the people who attended the program with me–a few of whom fell sick with fever at some point. Seeing their commitment was so inspiring. It reminded me of Sadhguru’s quote:

“”Our lives become beautiful not because we are perfect. Our lives become beautiful because we put our heart into what we are doing.”

It also reminded me that there’s no such thing as perfection, and I had been striving towards an empty goal.

Lovesick for Isha

You give me fever,

burn through my veins

with an insane intensity.

I long to know the beyond,

my parched tongue pleads

for a taste of the divine.

The sweat pours off my forehead

in my feverish craze,

I push myself beyond all limits

of sanity, unstoppable

in this incendiary yearning.

My search for the boundless

knows no bounds,

beyond reason I pursue You,

my Isha.

In my feverish dreams I see

a glimpse

of what I imagine you to be.

Obsessed with your essence,

I only scratch the surface.

May this Isha love-sick being heal,

so that it may know Your Wholeness.

]]> http://beckyblab.com/six-months-post-yoga-marga/720/feed/ 0 http://beckyblab.com/these-walls/556/ http://beckyblab.com/these-walls/556/#comments Fri, 17 Apr 2009 08:50:42 +0000 bexband http://beckyblab.com/?p=556 These walls we build

the armour around

our hardened hearts.

What is their purpose,

if all withers within?

Like a snake, I shed

these skins,

layer by layer.

This dry, brittle shell

can crumble.

I welcome you in,

waiting for the re-growth.

that I’ve gone insane

the truth remains

I’ve never been less so.

More clarity comes in simplicity,

more peace in dissolution.

While it may seem to some

that I’m swimming upstream,

I’m constantly being pulled

down by the torrents.

Becoming an offering

is no easy task,

requiring erasing

of all the past.

Limitations, like ropes

bind me tight;

still, Iike lightening

I strive for what’s right.

With no morality to direct me,

no rules to break,

I can’t escape from

this wonderous web

of creation.

The beautiful breath:
an oceanic expanse.
Riding the waves,
watching the tides
take me away
into myself.
Cleansing the past,
shedding the shackles.

You gave birth to me;
I owe you my life
which I would have squandered
without You.
Instead of committing suicide
in installments
or in one fatal blow,
I dedicate this one to You
which is anyway Yours.

Dying into You has been the sweetest
liberation
my beloved breath
as the path,
Your venom
thickens in my veins
tightens my heart
so that it explodes
with exuberance.
You have dissected me,
made me examine my insides;
my guts pour forth,
refreshed by the gaze.

I had become apologies
instead of awareness.
Now I’m an empty vessel:
You fill me.
I’m your tool:
use me.

I want to drink You up,
You make me intoxicated.
You tickle my insides,
You make them bubble
with bliss.
I can’t get enough of You,
this compulsive craving
won’t subside.
You’ve ignited
a fierce thirst
which can only be quenched
by Your knowing showers.

You, the tender destroyer,
break me down with
Your blows
and sculpt me
with Your clay.
Death in your hands
is eternal life.

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