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?

Someone is rejecting me, Someone is dying for me… Some work is falling apart, Some work is coming together… Simultaneously, the dualities of life are manifesting around me… And neither is affecting me… Inside I am joyful regardless of what is happening… What I want or what I don’t want… It matters not… For my inner climate is independent of outer events, circumstances and people… Ah, everyone should do Isha… Ah, everyone should be as fortunate as me to have a Master like I do…

It matters not if people love me or hate me, It matters not if I get what I want or I don’t, It matters not if life is good or bad… I wonder with wonder, how am I becoming like this! Such tremendous Grace is being showered on me… I am watching the play of life like a spectator, playing my role as an actor on the stage of life, yet moving away from identification with the roles, faster and faster…

India as a culture has invested more time, energy and human resource toward the spiritual development of human beings for a very long time. This can only happen when there is a stable society for long periods without much strife. While all other societies were raked by various types of wars, and revolutions, India remained peaceful for long periods of time. So they invested that time in spiritual development, and it became the day to day ethos of every Indian.

The world looking towards India for spiritual help is nothing new. It has always been so in terms of exploring the inner spaces of a human being-how a human being is made, what is his potential, where could he be taken in terms of his experiences. I don’t think any culture has looked into this with as much depth and variety as India has. Mark Twain visited India and after spending three months and visiting all the right places with his guide he paid India the ultimate compliment when he said that anything that can ever be done by man or God has been done in this land.

So definitely as humanity, today we have reached many peaks in terms of science, economics or technology but if we do not heal the inner damage then all the power that technology has given us will only be used destructively. We are already on the verge of threatening the extinction of the planet. If human beings are not tempered from inside there will always be conflict.

I don’t know about the other gurus traversing the globe, but my endeavor is and theirs should be also, to aim at the political, economic and other areas of leadership. If some element of spirituality enters the life of these leaders, it could change the complexion of the world in a very short time. It is a priority and is beginning to happen but not significantly.

From Kavita Chhibber’s interview with Sadhguru.

India

She wore a raiment of so many a hue An unfamiliar eye would think she is madness true Her children are such multi-flavored stew This amalgamation of culture a heady brew Isn’t man just an outcrop of the land that his forefathers slew It’s antiquated history of blood & beauty knew A faraway visitor here saw what man or god could ever do Now it is time that you & me blow life & breath anew. –Sadhguru

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/silence-program-round-2/661/ http://beckyblab.com/silence-program-round-2/661/#comments Thu, 04 Mar 2010 11:41:43 +0000 bexband http://beckyblab.com/?p=661 Inhalation:

Inundation,

Exhalation:

Dissolution.

From utter simplicity

I create chaos & confusion.

Devouring your breath,

the highest honor.

Forever entwined,

enshrined in my being.

Missing this breath,

the biggest mistake.

Seeing it is

seeing all:

Clarity.

from 2009. see if you can find me...

To revisit last year’s sharing, click here.  I’m so glad I attended the 8-day Silence program again. I fell into it much easier, and was able to enjoy it more thoroughly. Most importantly, it was all the more incredibly intense.

Gratitude doesn’t begin to explain…  to Sadhguru, for offering himself endlessly; Isha volunteers, Swamis, Maas: for dedicating their lives to seeking the unknown & providing the situations to others to deepen their search.