Coming back!!

Wow - its been a while since i blogged last....its been a whirlwind of activity and not much rest. This is what life is like though, and that is how i like it anyway.

After Gurupoornima celebrations in Hartford, i was in the ashram for about a month. I had the privileged in this time to do Sri Sri Yoga TTC. Yes, it is a privilege to do this course.

I have never had such deep rest in my meditations, such depth in every moment of the course. The yoga asanas are simple yet, SO deep and profound. My favourite sessions were the knowledge session in the evening and mid-morning with Krishanji. Such depth!!! Krishanji is unbelievable, i really have no words. Such simplicity, yet such depth, wit, humour and makes everyone feel so comfortable. I could go on and on about him....i feel very blessed to have spent so much time with him with such deep knowledge.

Now i am back in Toronto (Brampton actually) and have kept my promise to myself of doing at least an hour of yoga everyday! Its AMAZING, my body feels great, all my little aches and pains are gone, and the mind is in amazing shape. sharp, focused, clear and without doubt it is without doubts : ) lol....

I co-taught a course with Larissa, one of our dynamic teachers downtown - and i would like to share the experience of one of our students. He is really an awesome guy, and he is having experiences like ones i had about a year after doing my first part 1 course. Enjoy....and i will write more....

Larissa and Shreya,

Thank you thank you THANK YOU for volunteering your time and holding the class for us.

I'm in on the 40 day pact though I think it's going to be more like a 40 YEAR pact for me. I've been doing it every day and plan to keep it up.

In the short time since this all started, the changes in my life have been.......life changing :-)

I've been telling some of the less close minded people at work about the weekend, about the course, about Art of Living, about what it's doing for me. I've even had a couple people ask for the URL so they could look into it more.

One example of what it's done is yesterday morning, I went for a root canal at 0730 Hrs. Sat down in the chair, started doing the 4-4-6-2 breathing (can't remember how to pronounce it or write it), after about 30 minutes of the breathing, while the dentist was drilling like a miner, I was so relaxed and at peace I fell asleep.

Really though, the changes are subtle. How I view the world that is right around me, how I consider my relation to that world, how I view the people in the world around me. Thats a big change. I've been walking around all week feeling unbounding JOY flowing through me. I can't put into words what it feels like to be in a constant state of Joy but I'm guessing you two already know full well what I'm talking about. This feeling of unbounded and limitless Joy is like a narcotic. I can't get enough and can never NOT have it again!

Really, if only you could peek inside the head and heart of who I was before "The Weekend". I spent most of my time fearful of people, irritated at what their expectations were of me (transference), pissed off at what I thought they thought of me (what I thought ...) ....... those things are all GONE. Yes, every once in a while the old patterns do stick up their heads but when they do, I recognize them, stop, put myself "in that particular moment" and the old pattern lgoes away. The joy returns. I am feeling on a daily basis the way I always in my heart thought I should feel and knew that I wanted to be able to feel but didn't know how.

One of the Supervisors at work who works under me had a conversation with me, she brought up some contentious topics about what she thought of me, my management style and the present rapport on the management team. I just looked at her and in that moment, felt nothing but joy for the person who she was. What she was saying, I heard. What she was saying did not make me angry, did not make me doubt myself, did not make me feel the need to immediately change things (things that I know are being done right anyways). I refused to be the football. I also saw with clarity what fears were driving her statements and could see how she was being influenced by the words of others. I couldn't have been that objective in that situation in the past. I also felt NO FEAR. I didn't feel WRONG. I didn't feel INCAPABLE. I knew, in that moment with her saying these things, perfectly well who I was, felt perfectly happy with who I was and continued to ride the crest of that feeling of Joy. It was actually quite surreal an experience to be faced with a situation I used to dread being faced with yet be able to react the way I knew I should be reacting.... reacting from a place of peacefullness, calmness and happiness.

Most of my life has been spent concerned with and working towards ten minutes in the future, an hour in the future, a day in the future, a week in the future....etc. I had a hard time to relax and never thoroughly enjoyed what I was doing (even though I thought I did) because each moment seemed like a waste of time getting to the next moment. Walking someplace was a complete waste of time because it meant I was wasting time I could be using achieving the next moment, interacting with people was a waste of time because it kept me from achieving some elusive and obscure goal that I knew, I just KNEW had to be on the imminent horizon.

It's all gone. That feeling. That sense of urgency. That jittery restlessness. That sense of having to move forward from "this moment" that occupation of my mind that kept me from truly interacting with and truly being with and truly relating to the people around me. It's all gone. I'm walking around in a state of successive moments and each one of those moments is perfect and inside each of those moments I am perfect and each one of those moments is "the only moment in the world". Yes, the old patterns stick up their head sometimes. Like above though, I recognized them and I say to myself, "No, just be now. Just be HERE right now. Yes.... thats it.... "that" moment in the future will come in it's own time and when it comes, it will come but just for right now, it's just right now". Thats sort of how the inner monologue goes and it brings me ZAP, right there, it makes me live-see-breath that moment I'm in right now. I used to think I knew what it was not to be stressed. I can't tell you how much this living in the moment has shown me what stress truly was.... by allowing me to experience it's absence.

There is work involved. This way of being and thinking is still so new that I make mistakes along the way but I always learn from my mistakes. I know it takes time to integrate everything. My life has been a successive series of lessons on patience though so I'm good with it. I know I'll get there eventually but I'm not rushing it and I'm being kind and easy on myself about it. I'm just taking it one moment at a time :-)

I could go on but I won't. I will just say that last night I ate a bowl of ice cream and for the first time, truly experienced and really tasted what Vanilla is. Oh.....smiling..... smiling a lot. Keeping the Guruji grin on my face every chance I get! Now if I only had more people I could hug...!!!!

You two are my superstars. If I can ever be of service or do anything for either of you, you only have to ask. I truly hope this isn't the last I've seen of either of you!!

Peace be with you both,
Jim