Do you believe in God?

Q:Do you believe in God?

Swami Niranjan: In my personal life I believe in God, but not in any form of established religion, and in my professional life I teach yoga. We are propagators and promoters of yoga.

 

Thiruvalluvar Statue

This statue is of a southern Indian saint and embodies the glorious principles of Vaastu.
Kanyakumari where the statue is located is the place where the three oceans meet (it could be seas, I’m not sure what the difference is) – The Arabian Sea , The Bay of Bengal and the Indian Ocean. It definitely warrants a visit.
(The picture is off David Remon’s flickr page)

Trail of Crumbs.

It’s the August monsoon. Our class is on the Chatt. With their oiled hair and forever darkened eyes , they see something else entirely, they feel all the same things with their hearts though. They never let me fall into that trap, where I or anyone else sees them as a label-“blind chick”- no way!

I could, because it is just so easy to put people in a box- categorize , deal and dismiss, but they don’t allow that . They’re very much individuals, strong ones, they speak their mind, full of curiosity, eager for praise, cracking jokes at the teacher’s expense (mine)- fantastic girls, no different from any other 20 year olds except that they don’t have the eyes that work for them.

I thought teaching yoga to visually challenged people would help, it helps regular people so much with co-ordination and balance and with body-awareness. And I began it not as social service but as an interesting idea that would take hold of my brain and refuse to leave. Much like how yoga originally came into my life- I didn’t know the “why” of it- I would just do it!

The idea took seed and root, opportunity made itself known- I coincidentally stumbled across this Training institute for visually challenged women. Teaching yoga to these girls goes beyond like or dislike, it has nothing to do with it or with anything I want. I struggle though with not knowing the A to B; I have no earthly idea why I want to teach this class and where it’ll go- either for them or for me.

Which is rare because we like to think linearly and reasons to do things define us. You know how you get those inspired ideas that snowball into all these aspects of your life? One step leads to many? This is like that, except the idea hasn’t snowballed and I haven’t figured where it fits. Am I of any help to them in the larger picture? With my fitted tights, my muscles and my university degree – of what help is my evening yoga to the lives of these girls? Like when someone asks you a trick question and at first you think you have the answer but then you’re not so sure? I feel like they help me more than the other way around.

On the face of it – I’m helping them. I know this , I can see it in their now erect carriage and how their brows smoothen and I can see it in their smiles and I know they like me as much I like them and I know they look forward to the classes. But somehow when I come back home I feel like I’ve been given something. Like they’ve given me something immeasurably more and with more depth than I could ever do for them. What that “thing” is , I don’t know but I know they have given me something else than I could have ever given them.

Through this, I am becoming increasingly of someone watching me. In this interplay between giggling Mina and gang and the serious me, someone or something watches over us. I see glimpses of something, glimpses that portent to be a trail of crumbs. I feel like Hansel and Gretel from the children’s fairytale except I know that the presence is a benign one. Some one is waiting to eat me at the other end, but in a good way. I cannot qualify it, but I’ll go with it.

Nothing happens without Grace.

sound beginning

Prayer is a good way to start. Like most people, music and more importantly sound does things to me. We learnt sanskrit prayers during yoga,it took me some time  to come around to saying them but now when I do I get this indescribable feeling- it just feels right- I don’t know how else to explain it.

Now when I want to make important decisions I try to get into that state of mind that I’m in yoga class when we begin to say prayers together.

“Let me to connect to divinity, let me to connect to source, let me me connect to my inspiration, let me connect to all that is good about me and if not about me about someone or something else- so that my decisions are proactive rather than reactive and that what I do knowing I am responsible for my actions.”

Prayer is an affirmation of what exists as well as a hope. I pray to myself because there are aspects of divinity in all of us and then sometimes I pray to connect to things outside of me , because sometimes it’s hard to see divine things in oneself.I don’t want to write about only good things or be continually positive but I want to write from a sane place- that is my endeavour and that is my prayer.

ॐ सह नाववतु |

सह नौ भुनक्तु |

सह वीर्यं करवावहै |

तेजस्विनावधीतमस्तु मा विद्विषावहै ||

ॐ शान्तिः शान्तिः शान्तिः ||

oṃ saha nāvavatu

saha nau bhunaktu

saha vīryaṃ karavāvahai

tejasvināvadhītamastu mā vidviṣāvahai

oṃ śāntiḥ śāntiḥ śāntiḥ

Sab Guruo Ki Jai.