The basic dots are connecting

4:30 am.  How lovely. India is still, quiet, cool, and expansive.  Every morning at 4:30 there is a ceremony at the Living Tree Shrine:  offerings, Baba is chanting, and meditation all in the presence of a large tree--outside. This will be one of the massive benefits of living so close to the Ashram.  As I first sat, I felt that deep feeling of love, beauty, and grace (words are so rough in explaining something so exquisite) that I experienced while the Redwood Trees exposed me to the interconnectedness of the universe, touching Gurudev's feet reminded me of that in relationship to a Being, and meditations at the Ashram exposed me to the unity of it all without a physical presence--it felt like peeking into the "the real world" and not the separated world as most of us know it.  It feels like such a deep unquenchable thirst for this place which appears to be what exists between the dots of what we consider matter/reality. The expansive/limitless reality that has no definition.  At this point, it feels like going home (?) (whatever that means from a living unit that is limited by thoughts and words.)

During my first trip to India,  I realized that I experienced this when I was born and somehow have felt it as my invisible companion throughout my life--"my" ground of being.  But landing in a body with requirements propelled me down another pathway.  It wasn't until this year that I was able to understand this point of separation and the excrutiating pain that left me distrusting and feeling alone.  Returning to the ashram without so many doubts and questions has allowed me to drop into this space quite effortlessly (thank you Gurudev, Pahari Baba, etc. as the Divine Gatekeepers)--let go and be.  Experiencing the sacredness of the Living Tree, feeling the morning breeze, in the presence of Divine Ancestors/Living Beings, hearing the cows rustling in the piles of garbage, and in meditation/stillness brought everything into a connecting of the dots.  It was me as a single point in the presence/beingness of it all--a point of involution/evolution within nothingness and limitlessness. It was a place of divine peace--no fear, no questioning, no doubts.  Hands off on the top of the roller coaster, eyes open, a perceptible smile, relaxed, and breathing.  I could get back on the plane and head home feeling a deep inner peace, so it will be interesting to see what shows up next...
(Check out the blog section in www.Selfseeds.com to see how green Jaipur is right now...)