Animal family from Southern California

Puppy presence

As I was petting the puppy who fell off the roof, ( we are taking her into the vets tomorrow to have the leg x-rayed), I found myself in a familiar zone of animal presence and mental communication. It was lovely since this, like the recent nature experience, has been missing in my daily process. I have been spiritually deepening without my altar of nature and animals. Being with the puppy felt like home--an internal home that I am starting to uncover and understand how to fill from the inside.

We were hanging out together in the shoe removal area. I sort of lost track of time and space when I heard foot steps approaching the entrance from the outside. Busted while having a moment of tearful gratitude for the love and presence animals show us when Gurudev walks in from the dark to switch his shoes. My ego started to come alive and say, "Get it together and show your respects. Why are you tearing up about the unconditional love this puppy is sharing." While on the heart side, I am almost knocked over by a divine lightening bolt having the three of us in close proximity. He knew instantly my dilemma: do I keep petting the dog or pranam? What was the truth of my action to my reaction? He graciously said to keep petting the dog, because I needed that. How amazing to feel the innocent presence/love of a puppy and the conscious presence/love of a Saint at the same time. All one and the same.

Divine Grace Continues

Today as I am walking up the driveway to the ashram entrance, Gurudev was standing off to the left under a tree, men are madly moving dirt/rocks, and it is hot. Here is part of my do over from the day before. (I had a discussion with one of the disciples about when and when not to pranam. Do I stand up whenever he is passing by or not? Do I just place my hands together or bow? The suggestion was made to do what you feel, since he already knows if your action is in alignment with your reaction.) As I am approaching, I start to go inside myself and access "What do I feel?" Absolute loving gratitude for the kindness, humbleness, and wisdom this man exudes as a living example of what humans could be, so to stay true in action to my reaction--I pranam on the ground amongst the rubble of the driveway construction. My ego was saying," Pretty strange for a Westerner who hadn't even done one of these before landing on Indian soil," while my heart was lost in the depth of humbleness and gratitude. It was worth it--no score for the ego--only those uncontrollable tears again.

And something shifted again--my filter became more transparent.

Ashram Speed

Starting to get a handle on the ashram living/benefits. Everything is in slow motion, but all of the same life stuff is still present with the container of humans coming and going. If you are working on cleaning the lint off of your filter (not a requirement for ashram attendance, but probably hard to get around consciously or unconsciously with the amount of divine energy present), you get to observe yourself picking up the lint and then what you do with it.

A short example of what I am observing and learning from my internal teacher at ashram speed:

After the meditation breakthrough, I felt like I was in a different groove when I left the hotel. (My walk everyday is like the acid test: trash, smells, children begging, people staring, men propositioning me, traffic, horns honking, etc. The actual activity of walking is lovely.) Lint screen feeling cleaner than usual. At the 3/4 point, I observed begging children heading towards me (no problem, I am armed with cookies to hand out--lint deflection technique gathered from the natives), but a tourist disturbs the anticipated pattern by asking me to take a photo (no problem, happy to do it) so the matrix gets a tweak. The children start to act rude at a level that my anticipation isn't ready for, so I opt not to give them the cookies (or money.) I continue to walk, but I notice that my heart energy/filter just got some stuff on it. Somehow energetically something shifted out of what alignment I had been experiencing.

Onward I walk, as I approach the gateway of the ashram, I start to feel that I am reaching the shore after being lost in the waves for awhile. But, there are men working at the gate on the construction project, so I didn't get to rest on the beach quite yet. As I continue up the hill, I notice someone in orange out of the corner of my eye and fill some bowing of my energetic field, but I am determined to reach the beach so blinders on, I march up the hill to the ashram. Now, I have two lumps of stuff on my filter, because I didn't stay present and open to what was without ego. And crap, the orange was Gurudev, so now I have "acted in a less than humble, loving way" in the presence of the God Gateway. Nice work Sue's ego-- two marks on the ego scoreboard.

The next morning as I began my walk, the challenge was did I learn anything from the day before? I was getting a do over opportunity. Check, made it today. Of course, there were other opportunities showing up, but I had a chance to observe, sense, and be with small fragments of life (ashram pace) instead of our usual mega pixel life matrix. My goal is still to be in any situation and stay present/loving, but the ashram environment is giving me a petri dish to study the process of how to get there.

Guru and General Contractor

Startling findings when you simplify your day enough to notice every time you lose being in the moment and/or lose consciousness in an action--shouldn't be that hard--right? Currently living in a flood of positive energy (when I am not outside the ashram), so when I fall out of it, it is obvious. Watching the kind actions, clarity, and humbleness of Gurudev is humbling to say the least. Is it possible to even achieve a percentage of that purity and grace? He sets the bar way up there. Learning by watching him juggle being a guru and general contractor. They are rearranging the landscape with intentions of building, so he is popping outside to make decisions. He appears to take it all in stride. Well, maybe a fraction of glow is subdued after standing in the heat organizing the bulldozing and rock removal.

Lint Screen Detector

When is the last time you got caught by an authority for not washing your hands? While I was in some new state of bliss, I got invited for lunch at the ashram. (They have been so generous to keep inviting me for meals. This style of Indian food is amazing and doesn't use curry. It all kind of looks the same--yellow, but does it takes great! They could open a restaurant. The other brilliant part is no preservatives, vegetarian, and made fresh daily.) I was sort of partially present when Gurudev called me out on not washing my hands. Hee Hee. I had to laugh, (of course to myself.)

Learning the rules of the ashram: 1) no socks (Initially, I left mine on because of the mosquitoes--wrong!), 2) I put my shoes in the wrong row of boxes (I was trying to put them out of the way and put them in Gurudev's private row--wrong! Now there is a curtain covering his row), 3) I reached to move one of the serving dishes with the wrong hand (I didn't know that I needed to know my hands like turn signals--still not sure about the correct way--wrong!), 4) folding the feet and legs up in a way not to have them exposed or pointing in the incorrect manner (working on it, but often wrong!), 5) keeping track of how your body parts are covered (even though your mid section can show--still haven't quite wrapped my mind around that incongruity--wrong!), 6) making sure to sit on the rug correctly (or that you are sitting on a little rug when you aren't sitting on the big rug--wrong!), and.... They are remarkably tolerant of my uncivilized western ways. Thank heavens Narayana gave me a starter package. At least, I haven't been thrown out. It can happen.

Breakthrough in meditation

When I started meditating with Narayana's sangham at the ashram, I was wondering how and if I could transition to 6 hours of meditation a day. Not to mention the struggle with the position (still struggling, but making some small gains there.) The nine days of the Durga Festival helped with the longevity and made me more aware of the different intensities of bliss, but it was still "work." I was benefitting from staying disciplined and sticking with the practice--no doubt, but not feeling drawn to it (ego and skepticism hanging on to the bitter end.) I am drawn to dancing, riding, eating ice cream, reading a good book, watching a movie... Would I ever be drawn to meditation?

Not quite sure what breaker shifted, but I had one of those dissolving moments and ended up at a different energetic frequency. It (subjectively) felt like some sort of merging to a new source that was so inviting that I didn't want to leave. I was kind of hanging out there (not sleeping) when Narayana's face emerged out of my third eye (spot between my eyes), dissolved into Gurudev's face and I showed up in Gurudev's left eye in a lotus meditation position. The first moment that Narayana's face was morphing into completeness, it was a little bit odd like Pahari Baba levitating in my room, but I am starting to get use to these odd and varied experiences. As I came back to a familiar consciousness (starting to question that too), I had this overwhelming desire to go back into meditation. I was on the skateboard going down the hill instead of pushing it up. As the afternoon progressed into evening, the desire never left. From fitness junkie to meditation junkie???