The Way Out of Sorrow

The significance of Holi

Tonight as the Holika burns , offer a coconut into the Agni, take a parikrama around the Fire, sprinkling water along the way & simply say " Burn away all the Obstacles and negativity that is keeping me away to reach my destination ".

Put an intent that Holika is burning away all roadblocks leaving you with Divine Hapiness.

Wishing you and your Family a Very Colourful and Joyful Holi .

 

 

Lift Your Spirit with Joy of Color - By Sri Sri Ravi Shankar.

There is a famous story associated with the festival:
The word purana comes from the Sanskrit word 'pura nava', which means 'that which is new in the city'. It is a new way of presenting things. Puranas are full of colorful illustrations and stories. On the surface they may appear to be mere fantasy, but actually they contain subtle truths.

An asura king, Hiranyakashyap, wanted everyone to worship him. But his son Prahalad was a devotee of Lord Narayana, the king's sworn enemy. Angry, the king wanted Holika, his sister to get rid of Prahalad. Empowered to withstand fire; Holika sat on a burning pyre holding Prahalad on her lap. But it was Holika who was burnt, Prahalad came out unharmed.

Hiranyakashyap symbolizes one who is gross. Prahalad embodies innocence, faith and bliss/joy. The spirit cannot be confined to love material only. Hiranyakashyap wanted all the joy to come from the material world. It did not happen that way. The individual jivatma cannot be bound to the material forever. It’s natural to eventually move towards Narayana, one's higher self.

Holika stands for the past burdens that try to burn Prahalad's innocence. But Prahlad, so deeply rooted in Narayana Bhakthi could burn all past impressions (sanskaras) and joy springs up with new colors. Life becomes a celebration. Burning the past, you gear up for a new beginning. Your emotions, like fire, burn you. But when there is a fountain of colors, they add charm to your life. In ignorance, emotions are a bother; in knowledge, the same emotions add colors

Each emotion is associated with a color- Anger with red, jealousy with green, vibrancy and happiness with yellow, love with pink, vastness with blue, peace with white, sacrifice with saffron and knowledge with violet.

Knowing the essence of the festival, enjoy the day with Wisdom.

 

 

Art of Living Course details

Source: Art of Living Course / Followup

Are you miserable???

 

 

When you are miserable, what has happened is that you have gone away from the Self. This is called Ashaucha. It means you have become unclean. In India when someone dies, the close relatives are said to be Ashaucha for 10 days because they are very sad. They are impure because they have moved away from the self. After 10 days of just being with that experience and reading the Gita, being with the Knowledge and pulling themselves back into the Self, then it is called Shaucha. They have purged out the impurities that have come during events.

This keeps happening again and again in dealings in life. You become Ashaucha and you have to get back to Shaucha. Go deeper in to yourself, then real Shaucha happens.

Shaucha's benefits are clarity in the intellect, a pleasing mind, focused awareness in the mind, a say over the senses, and therefore eligibility to realize the Self.

Shaucha is disinterestedness in the tendencies of one's own senses and non-association with other people. If a tendency in your body arises just have the understanding, "Oh yes, here is this old familiar tendency coming up again. Come on, you have had this experience enough, and still the body is craving for it again." Disinterestedness in one's own body -- just an idea, a sort of distaste, and in one moment it changes.

Why do people love each other so much, have such an intimate relationship, and then fight? Ashaucha has happened. If you don't get distaste for the tendency of the senses then distaste for the object of the senses will come and you will blame the object.

When Ashaucha happens then come back to Shaucha quickly. Suppose you get drowned in any worldly aspect, just know this is Ashaucha... "That is why I am suffering misery." Then come back to Shaucha.
Your attraction or craving is only as long as you think someone is "other." When you think they are part of you or your Self, then the attraction dies out. That is why a husband or wife is not attracted to the partner but to someone else because the partner has already become a part of them.

When you realize everyone is part of your Self, you enjoy the whole world without a sense of craving.

 

 

The saint who never sells his smile

The story of the monk who sold his Ferrari made it to the list of Best Sellers! The story of the saint who never sells his smile touches the hearts of millions and beckons as the hope for the humanity! Here’s a moving chapter from the book yet to be written!

The occasion was momentous. It was an event that will change the destiny of India. The turnout was more than what was expected. The mood was upbeat! Expectations were high! Tens of thousands of eyes were set on him, looking up to him for inspiration. Yet the man — I call him that for lack of more acceptable description – who was the source of it all remained his natural Self, completely untouched by the occasion. Not losing his trademark smile even for a moment!



That Sri Sri didn’t play to the gallery and incite people to go on sloganeering at the Ram Leela Maidan during the Volunteer for A Better India (VFI) launch on 3rd February isn’t probably big deal. But that he didn’t lose his sense of humour even for a moment in such a charged environment speaks a lot about the depth of the movement. This is what will make it a milestone in the history of India.
Sample this. The serious point of alcohol being the main culprit of majority of the crimes in the country was hammered home with a humorous story. It goes like this. A man who comes to attend a public gathering gets a headache after listening to speech after speech and goes to a friend seeking a treatment to get rid of his headache. The friend promptly advises him to have a glass of alcohol. The bewildered friend asks how alcohol would help. “My land, job, wife and everything else left me after I started taking alcohol. Why wouldn’t it take away your headache too, when it has capacity to rob of you of everything you possess?”
Only a mind that is free of a personal agenda and has no feverishness for achievements can handle such a serious topic in such a light manner without diluting to the essence of the message he wants to communicate.

His sense of humour isn’t momentary! It is in the spirit! He could sense a few egos were getting hurt as their speeches were cut short because of paucity of time. Then just to lighten them up, he came up with the hilarious story of a speaker taking off and giving away his kurta when it was repeatedly pulled from behind by the prompter as signal to end his speech! This combination of sensitivity and supreme awareness is what makes Sri Sri stand out.
Even the authorities’ attitude towards previous confluences in Ram Leela Maidan was dealt with wittily when Gurudev commented that he visited Tihar Jail the previous day to pre-empt the bad omen of being sent to Tihar after the agitation! For the record, Gurudev went to Tihar Jail to inaugurate a skill training centre!

What moves me the most about Sri Sri is the way he looks at everything from a space of wisdom and with compassion, even at the height of adversities. I recall a live event Gurudev attended in Bangalore some years ago! It was billed as a debate between Sri Sri and Zakir Naik to establish the unity of God. But it turned out to be a pre-planned conspiracy to indulge in Sri Sri-bashing.
I could see blood boiling among Gurudev’s devotees in the crowd as the self-styled Islamic evangelist went on belittling Hinduism and Sri Sri with blinkered logic (kutark), parroting verses he has memorised from the scriptures. Everybody expected Gurudev to give a fitting reply and waited with bathed breath for his rejoinder! Nothing of that short happened. He stood up with his trademark smile and demolished Zakir Naik’s hard-laboured (il)logic in a sentence. “Pothi Padh Padh Kar Jag Mua, Pandit Bhayo Na Koye Dhai Aakhar Prem Ke, Jo Padhe so Pandit Hoye.” His opening couplet of Kabir was enough to make everybody including Zakir’s hardcore fans realise who is the real wise man!

The story repeated at the India Today Conclave of 2009 where Javed Akhtar mocked Indian spirituality and called spiritual gurus hypocrites. Instead of joining issue with him, Gurudev delivered profound knowledge through a beautifully written article titled, ‘Everyone has the right to be ignorant’. He wrote, “Should I argue and put him down? No! I have never put anyone down. I can’t deviate from my nature. So I simply said, everyone has the right to be ignorant.
“A flash of Aurangzeb, who butchered thousands of gurus and would not listen to any reason or logic, came to mind. An intelligent man would look into all the avenues before he makes a comment or accusation. It is necessary to stand up for justice and expose the misdeeds of the world. Instead the so-called activists only engage in accusations. Blaming the entire modern-day spiritual guru and sadhu community is as foolish as branding the entire Muslim community as terrorists.”
Only an enlightened sage can see such mockery through an eye of wisdom. How blessed to have found such a master, who doesn’t have to perform a miracle of manifesting a golden ring from from thin air to tell of his status! His fully blossomed being is the biggest miracle and blessing!

 

Rajaque Rahman, artoflivingsblog