A day at the ashram

When I talked about this trip, several people asked me "what will you DO when you're there?"  I said I really did not know!

The ashram does include some structured events that happen at more or less regular times - but there is no pressure whatsoever for anyone to attend any or all of them.

5:30AM  Morning arati at the river.   This is really beautiful, and you can hear the conch shells and the arati bells from other ashrams on the river as the sun begins to rise.  Arati is a ceremony of prayer where light (from arati candles) is offered to God, and then shared back with the devotees.  ( I just tried to find an example on Youtube, but failed.  Will try again when I'm back on my own computer instead of in an "internet cafe.")

5:45 or so.... the little boys and everyone else processes to Hare Krishna Hare Krishna - to the various temples in the ashram.  It's an energetic exercise.  I enjoy the first arati, and then watch happily as they all careen off devotionally to wake the ashram.

6:30   Homa    the vedic fire ceremony.  Very formal.  Led by Swami Sharananananda (Swami Ji)

7::something  - breakfast, a bowl of tumeric rice.

After breakfast, yoga with Swamiji - the master in residence.  Not really hatha yoga, although a few poses are familiar.  Very gentle.

No structure most mornings and afternoons.  Our rooms are off of a lovely covered veranda with an incredible peaceful view of the Narmada River. People read, meditate, do a little yoga, nap, or just enjoy the peace and the view.

12:30  Lunch (vegetable curry, dal, rice.  Maybe a chapati/bread)

4:00 Satsang wth Swamiji (most days) - includes a talk, some meditation, some chanting.  It's a lovely time.

6:30  dinner (same as lunch, maybe two vegetables)

7:00  Evening Arati    begins at the Shiva temple.  Again, I really enjoy this.  And again... after they finish the arati, the whole crowd moves briskly off to offer evening prayer at all of the various temples and altars.  I watch and listen as they energetically head off... and then offer my bow at Shiva's altar and slowly head back down all of those stairs.

7:30  Kirtan - singing the names of God.  All of the little boys participate - and this is one JOYFUL celebration of devotion.

8:45 - 9:00 -- silence in the ashram.  This ashram is in the tradition of a recent Hindu saint, Sri Anandamayi Ma.  Ma said that she did not want anything from her devotees - but that she did request ten minutes of their life every day.  And that ten minutes was HERS, not theirs.  So the ashram goes silent for fifteen minutes (not sure when it expanded from ten to fifteen minutes) while everyone meditates on Sri Anandamayi Ma and her message of love and devotion.

After 9, most folks just go to bed.

Some days there are  more or less organized outings... to temples in the area, to other villages, to meet other holy saints who live and pray on the island.  I'm here with a group of ten, and some additional guests sometimes join us.  Like the daily activities, the outings are optional.

My first thought... my FIRST thought every single morning as I swim up to consciousness from sleep is "I'm in India.:"

I'm sorry that i cannot blog more  - my computer is kaput, and it's a long walk to the nearest public computer.  Will write more when I can!

Someone, somewhere, is wondering where their stairs have all gone

Excellent news, not to worry, I have found them!   Many of the stairs from other areas have apparently migrated here.... I can think of no other explanation for the staggering number of stairs around the ashram! (Of course there is the not-to-be disregarded fact that the ashram is perched on a steep hillside.... )

Some of the ashram's stairs...

Here are the rules I have deduced about stairs at the ashram and the area immediately surrounding the ashram....

1.  Never have one step when several flights of stairs will do.
2,  Steeper stairs are better stairs.
3.  All stairs shall be hewn from rock.
4.  In the ashram, one level shall contain only one worship area.... so that the twice daily tour of a dozen altars involves running up and down many many many stairs.  (Remember those energetic boys from my previous post?)
5 (THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT),,,, When designing a flight of stairs, it is critically important to  maintain variability.  (We would not want anyone to get bored, now would we?) So....  stairs shall vary in height, depth, and surface.  Occasionally, five or six steps will sneak in where the rise and depth are perfectly even... but that is just to lull the climber into a false sense of security, and the Nth step is the height of a small wall.  Actually, this is more disconcerting when descending the stairs.... after a few even steps, one forgets where one is, looks for the Nth step to be the same as N-1, and oops!!!  the actual Nth step is a doozy, jarring loose several old fillings.
6.  Surfaces of the stairs shall be stone, or gravel, or sand, or uneven slabs of rock with patches of dirt.  Again, variety is very very important.
7. Handrails are for sissies.   We don't need no stinkin' handrails.
8. When designing a long, relatively flat path, throw in an occasional single step. It's amusing when people do not realize that the step is there.

I have not used a cane since right after my knee surgery last spring... but man, I made a good decision to bring a cane with me on this trip!!!

And by the way...  these are my absolutely favorite stairs.  Ever.  Note that they go nowhere.  Now *these* are people who appreciate stairs.  You can never have too many stairs.

Out of darkness, light

Lead Us From the Unreal To the Real,
Lead Us From Darkness To Light,
Lead Us From Death To Immortality,
Let There Be Peace Peace Peace. – Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 1.3.28.

I was thinking about that prayer this morning as I sat by the river in the darkness, waiting for the group to arrive for morning prayer.  ("The group" includes a number of adults, and also about thirty VERY enthusiastic young boys.  One could say that they walk down the steps to the river.... but it's actually more of a cascade of energy pouring down the steps to the river.  Moving fast.  In the dark.  On crazy steps... but more about the steps later.)

Anyhow.... many years ago, when I first fell in love with Hinduism, I spent a good deal of time at Kripalu, in Lenox Massachusetts.  Morning prayer began, if I recall correctly, at about 4:30AM.  So the ashram would begin to awaken and stretch and shower.... all in silence.  And since that ashram was the residence of the guru, everyone would don whites.... white saris, white shirts and pants, white kurta/pajama.  So here we all are, in this enormous building (built as a Jesuit seminary eons ago), in almost dark (with only an occasional dim light to mark a turn in the hall, or a stairway.  And we are all in silence, and all in whites, and all in darkness.  And the traffic was silently, whitely, darkly flowing into the main chapel, where everyone would gather for morning arati (offering light to the deities, offering light to the guru), and morning prayer, and then yoga... and one more set of prayers and off into the day (which by now was in fact in daylight).

Years later, I was in Varanasi, walking to the Ganges before sunrise.  Same feeling... all around me, ghostly figures scurrying toward the river in the dark... just glimpses of the people as the moved quickly by me, all drawn to the holy river.   At the river, no sense of organized prayers.... just thousands of devotees praying, praying, praying.... praying to be led from darkness into light, as the sun rose with incredible beauty over the Ganges.

And then today... sitting alone by the Narmada river, immersed in what has become a familiar feeling.. the sense of stillness, and waiting prayerfully for the sun to rise.

The other mantra most associated with the sun, the Gayatri Mantra.  I spent some lovely time yesterday chanting this mantra with some people also staying at the ashram.

In Devanagari:

ॐ भूर्भुवः॒ स्वः ।

तत्स॑वितुर्वरे॑ण्यं ।

भ॒र्गो॑ दे॒वस्य॑ धीमहि। ।

धियो॒ यो नः॑ प्रचो॒दया॑त्॥ ।

Transliterated:

Oṃ bhūr bhuvaḥ svaḥ

tát savitúr váreṇ(i)yaṃ

bhárgo devásya dhīmahi

dhíyo yó naḥ pracodáyāt

There are an infinite number of translations... I like this one:  "We meditate on the effulgent glory of the divine Light; may he inspire our understanding."

Out of darkness, light.

Today, Pittsburgh.... tomorrow, on my way to India!

I am hoping that I will be able to post blog entries while I'm traveling, although I am still a little fuzzy on exactly how that will work!

I will be in Mumbai for a couple of days, then will be heading off to Omkareshwar.  Here is a blurb about the two weeks we will be spending at the ashram: 

If you want to read more about the island and the temples, just Google Omkareshwar... lots of stuff will come up!

Namaste,

Dorothy

Kripalu and Amrit Desai

The "Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health" was founded as simply "Kripalu," by Yogi Amrit Desai. The ashram was named for Yogi Desai's guru, Swami Kripalvananda. At that time, the disciples called Yogi Desai "Gurudev," and Swami Kripalvananda, "Bapuji."

I first visited the ashram in the mid 1980's. I was completely stressed out with my high tech job, and saw an article about this place with mountains, yoga, and vegetarian food. Sounded like heaven to me. I signed up for a week long class... I don't remember the name, but in general, the class was "fitness and bonding with a group of women." And to get the feel of the place, I signed up for a "Welcome Weekend" a few weeks prior to the class.

Kripalu was built as a Jesuit seminary -- it's a large, blockish building, not particularly attractive -- but located on a hill overlooking a lake. Lovely location, not-so-lovely building.

That first weekend, I found that I liked many things about the ashram - the food, the yoga, the peaceful atmosphere, the lovely surroundings. I was uncomfortable with the enormous attention paid to the guru - virtually every room, every hallway, had a picture of Gurudev, and many also had a picture of Babuji -- and much time was spent bowing to those pictures.... foreheads on the floor. I had never seen anyone "pranam" before - the prayerful bow with forehead on the floor. It was all very strange to me. This was all very strange for me.

The last day of my "Welcome Weekend," Gurudev visited our class. He performed what they called a posture flow -- some years earlier, while Gurudev was still an art student, he practiced hatha yoga. One night that yoga practice spontaneously evolved into a "meditation in motion," where one pose just flowed into the next. I watched the posture flow, and was drawn into that meditation with him -- the room was incredibly still.

I enjoyed my class a few weeks later, and began visiting the ashram regularly for their Rest and Relaxation program. Over time, I also began reading a bit about Hinduism -- I had read "Be Here Now" in the far distant past, and now re-read it -- and also found many other books on Hinduism and Hindu practice. About a year later, I was at the ashram one weekend when Gurudev showed up to give the dharma talk on Saturday night. I had never seen him in person -- and was really attracted by what he had to say. (And bowing to the guru was not seeming so strange to me anymore!)

Some six months after that, Gurudev was leading a weekend workshop in Chicago, and I signed up. I would never have that kind of exposure to him at the ashram in Lenox -- so I just took myself to where he was going to be. The facility for the weekend retreat was pretty bad -- very very run down. The shag rugs were not clean. The food was *terrible.* But I enjoyed his talks, and that was ok. And at one point that weekend, he began a session with a meditation. I closed my eyes and followed his voice - and one minute I was sitting on a dirty shag rug in Chicago, and the next minute I was in the very presence of God. It was a completely transformative moment for me.

The following spring, in a lovely ceremony, I was received as a disciple at Kripalu. 

Years later, Amrit Desai left Kripalu in disgrace... after financial and sexual malfeasance, exacerbated by lies and ugly attempts to cover up his misdeeds.  The devotees who saw him as the next-thing-to-God were devastated.

I am grateful that I never confused the finger pointing at the moon with the moon, and never confused the stained glass with the light shining through it... because (although I certainly concede that this took a whole lot of prayer and deep thought), I am able to remain grateful for Gurudev's gift of shaktipat, and to see the wholly beautiful impact of that shaktipat on my entire life.   

I am going back to India!

I leave on February 11 for three weeks.... several travel days on either end bracketing a two-week stay at an ashram on Omkareshwar.  I've started packing.. or more accurately, I've started thinking about packing and have begun to pile stuff up near suitcases.  I have my reservations, hotel, flight from Mumbai to Indore, shots, and as of this week, visa.

I am not taking a computer with me.  We hear rumors of an Internet cafe about ten minutes away from the ashram... if I have access to a computer and wireless, I will blog here about the trip.

Beyond excited.  WAY beyond excited.

Cross-posting (from a Christian blogger)

I really appreciated this blog entry:

http://wakingupnow.com/blog/bryan-brown-hates-himself-so-gays-cant-marry

I am baffled by Christian theology, but am able to appreciate Christian music, and Christian stories, and Christian liturgy. This blogger gives words to some of that.