Hero's journey

Genuinely and uncontrollably moved to tears for the first time in 8 years!

Session on Hero's journey by Sashikala Ananth and Raghu Ananthanarayanan put me firmly in touch with some of my own deeper motivations! A most fantastic evening exploring the meaning of hero in the Indian context which provided increasingly more light on Mahabharatha - in particular on Vidhura, Dhritharashtra, Draupadi, Karna and Arjuna! Pranams and more pranams 

Millets at home

Benefits of re-introducing past culture in ones house. The following uber tasty stuff at home in the last week or so:
1. Siru daniyam Upuma
2. Siru daniyam pongal
3. Kambu vella kozhukattai
4. Kambu inippu kozhukattai
5. Kambu + kezhvaragu + karupatti kozhukattai
6. Kambu dosai
7. Kezhvaragu idly
8. Kutharai vaali arisi thayir satham

and mom has promised many more An extraordinary and welcome break from the usual routine of having everything made only from raw rice!

Taxi driver stories

Every taxi driver has a poignant story that he is more than ready to share! Hear ten taxi drivers and the fate of the hoi polloi of this nation is revealed.

Belongs to a impoverished farming community from the hinterland - shift to city with hopes of doing a decent job defined as one that involves wearing full pants - live in squalid conditions and work graveyard shifts to make 15K a month - spend most of it in paying for mostly useless white mans education of kids and dream that somehow magically they will be much better than him.

அஞானம் ஒழிதல்

அகம்பாவமாய் பார்த்து தியானிக்காவிட்டால்
அஞானத்தை ஒழிக்க முடியாது

Ramyam

Atop a tiny hillock with an ancient temple and a clean ashram - climax of a well planned trip - pleasant weather - most pristine water I've ever had from mountain pond - incredibly windy - not even the slightest man made sound - wifes mellifluous rendition of 'raghavam karunakaram'!!!

குடும்பப் பெருஞ்சுமை

குடும்பப் பெருஞ்சுமை தாங்குவர் தாங்கார்
சுயம் அறிதல் முயலாதார்

Building Relationships

"We all pay dearly when people respond to our values and needs not out of a desire to give from the heart, but out of fear, guilt, or shame. Sooner or later, we will experience the consequences of diminished goodwill on the part of those who comply with our values out of a sense of either external or internal coercion. They, too, pay emotionally, for they are likely to feel resentment and decreased self-esteem when they respond to us out of fear, guilt or shame. Furthermore, each time others associate us in their minds with any of these feelings, the likelihood of their responding compassionately to our needs and values in the future decreases."

  --  'Nonviolent Communication' by 'Marshall Rosenberg'

Nayikas Quest

Extract from a talk that Sashi / Raghu / Jyotsna gave recently.

"In the last 200 years or so what we have been pushed into not experiencing ourselves through our own eyes but through the eyes of Eurocentric constructs of the world, therefore our view of ourselves lacks dignity and respect. We end up overlaying a natural growth experience and traditional ways of growing up with interpretations and injunctions that actually prevents you from experiencing ourselves fully. Our ways get into conflict with the structure and underlying assumptions of man that govern the ‘modern educational systems’. We therefore get caught with all kinds of blocks. The open design of living and imbibing a whole way of looking at self and the world has all of a sudden become a liability! The lived grammar is subtle, and possibly not understood in its depth by the parental generation. The explanations and criticisms are grounded in a very different world-view and idea of self. So the object that you see that is supposed to trigger something reflective becomes an object for discussion and the discourse is framed in Eurocentric frames! Art that draws one inward from gross to subtle gets enmeshed in confusion! Freud comes in the way and calls the Lingam a sexual object and lo and behold, all Indian Gods can be critiqued as representations of sexual repression. The grammar of Yoga is replaced with the discourse of sexuality, of freedom and feminity. The young aspirant is faced with the very difficult task of honoring profound inner stirrings while being bombarded with an explanation fraught with guilt and shame. Indian Art is now forced to answer the western criticism and problematic of eroticism, and not follow its own path of movement from the outer to the inner."

Heal-thy

Heal-thy dosa via ayurveda
Heal-thy svasa via bahiranga sadhana
Heal-thy citta via antaranga sadhana
Heal-thy sanga via dharma

Long exhalation

Parinama (change) / taapa (craving) / samskaara (habit) duhkam (suffering) is always round the corner. Keep a long exhalation handy.

Practice

Aarambham samsheelanam punah punah abhyasah!
Practice makes better practice