On Spiritual Awakenings

Tags

awakening, awareness, new year, renewal

On some mornings, we awaken and we are full of energy. We may not be able to explain why we are so energized, but we can feel the difference as compared to those days where we wake up all tired and wanting to stay asleep a bit longer. 

Some years are like that too. Twenty twenty is one of those years where I seem to have awakened to a new energy. Or maybe I just feel that way because I have forgotten about how I woke up to twenty nineteen and the years before that. Or maybe it is all the cumulative effect of the “work” that I have been doing in the past year that is now fueling this new awakening. Or maybe all this new energy is a result of the natural optimism that comes with the canvas of a brand new decade and a new set of coloring markers. 

For some, new awakenings comes slowly, in stages, like a slow burning log on a fire which occasionally sends forth a crackling spark.  For others, new awakenings can come suddenly, like flashes of lightning illuminating a dark forest during a thunderstorm. No matter how they come, the integrated energy delivered to us in the time span of the awakenings, is more or less equal. 

How do we know that we are ripe for a new awakening? One way we can feel an awakening is through the arrival of a new sense of clarity. A new clarity inspires newness of vision, hearing, feeling, sensing, intuition, and awareness. A new awareness leads to an elevation of our purpose, of our role in the world, and of our acceptance of accountability for our own awakening.

The result? In being open to it, a new awakening can bring  us face to face with a new commitment to goodness in our words and thoughts, healthiness in our mental and physical diets, and kindness in our actions. It inspires us towards growing our own inner peace, and we take another step towards awakening to all that which awaits us beyond the  circle of time, space and causation. Arise, Awake, my friends! 

Kumud

P.S. Join us Sunday January 5th 2020 at 9amET in our first gathering of twenty twenty as we welcome the new year and a new decade of awakening. I will bring some questions to keep us awake, along with some tea and cookies. Namaste – @AjmaniK

To new awakenings – an offering of light… (2020)

On Creating Contentment

Tags

abundance, contentment, creativity, giving, sharing

It is perhaps not an accident that one of the newest, if not one of the youngest members of the community shared the change that a shift to abundance mentality can bring into our lives. She first joined our monthly Zoom chat in November. In the December conversation, she wisely shared:

“Every morning when I wake up, I say to myself – there is enough for everyone” – @Quratulain

This simple and straightforward affirmation reflects a profound truth that we often tend to forget. Yes, we all have our daily challenges and conflicts. On some days, it may even seem that some parts of us are living contradictions of what we were just yesterday. And yet, it is when we find the courage to be open to the big abundance that is the nature of the universe, we take a small step toward creating contentment.

How is energy of contentment different from the energies of happiness and joy? In order to create and sustain happiness, we may often invoke an energy of ‘doing’. Our accumulated life experiences inform our heart and mind that certain people, communities, things, events, actions, seasons, holidays and such tend to make us happy or unhappy. Our natural inclination to avoid pain feeds into our ‘pursuit of happiness’, no matter how temporary that energy of happiness may be. “Do that which makes you feel good” – haven’t we all heard that mantra?

Ah. I have now infused ‘feeling good’ into the energy of happiness. If ‘feeling good’ equates to ‘optimal health’, then, yes, it would indeed be a welcome infusion. The good health of our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual containers energizes and elevates us towards joy – a more permanent energy beyond happiness. We move from merely ‘feeling good’ towards ‘feeling better’. After moving from ‘good’ to ‘better’, the natural question to ask would be, what’s next? (My gratitude to @GaryGruber for asking that question in our December zoom meeting).  

Perhaps the answer to the “what’s next” question can be found in our attitude towards abundance and  an evaluation of our state of contentment. On self-examination, if we find ourselves in a better state of contentment than we were a month ago, a year ago, or even a decade ago, then we are closer to the answer. If not, then we perhaps need to examine the breadth and depth of our discontent. What is its root? Where did its seed come from? What feeds it? What feeds on it? What role do happiness, joy and abundance play in our state of contentment?

The journey to answer these questions often raises more questions than it answers. And yet, content is the traveler who remembers that joy can be infused in every twist and turn, every spring and autumn, every dawn and dusk, every breath. And that there is enough for everyone. Namaste.

Kumud

P.S. Join us for our weekly twitter gathering – Sunday, December 8 at 9amET / 730pm India. We shall share on the topic of (dis)contentment, and start planning on our “what’s next” for the forthcoming decade. Bring some answers, will you?! – @AjmaniK

A state of contentment flows from a walk along the river (Dec 6 2019)

On Forward Giving

Tags

arts, giving, hospitality, science, spirtuality

I had not been to my Aunt’s house for the Thanksgiving holiday in almost twenty years. This past Thursday, a congruence of time, space and causation, and her decision to host, brought me back. I could not help but marvel at how her gatherings had grown from five to seven in the 1990s, to twenty seven this year. The artwork and handprints of all five of her grandchildren, girls ranging from four to fourteen, were all over the holiday’s decor. 

At the dinner table, the blank notecards were passed around to each family member and the guests. The “suggestion” was that each of us were to write down “what we were thankful for” over the past year. There was some rolling of eyes, some who hid the notecards under their dinner plates, and even some feigned outrage by the three teenagers. During the break between dinner and dessert, my Aunt, the host, invited those who would like to share to read from their notecards. There was a lot of beautiful sharing, and when it came to the the second youngest of her grandchildren, she was too shy to read. On her Mom’s nudging, she haltingly read out her words in the softest of voices….

I am thankful for the trees, so we can breathe through them together…

There was a hushed silence, and many smiles spread across the room. It had taken one of the youngest in the room to show us the long-term impact of a simple forward-giving act of planting a tree. She had shown us that when we focus  on what we are grateful for, and listen to what others are grateful for, we cannot help but be filled with gratitude. The result of us ‘getting filled’ during Thanksgiving – and I’m not just talking about pecan pie and sweet potatoes – is that it energizes our hearts and hands. It is this renewal of gratitude and giving thanks which gives us new energy  that propels us towards giving forward.

It is perhaps when we give with an attitude of forward giving that we are reminded of our access to the infinite source of energetic wisdom. Sometimes, it speaks to us, it lights up our heart, through the heart of a six year old. Thank you, Layla, for inspiring me to think and work forward in my acts of giving.

It is the lives that we may help today, in any small or big way, we plant the seeds for a healthy society. Our forward giving can create a sustainable forest of trees where we can all breathe love and light. Will you join me? 

Kumud

P.S. Join me and the #SpiritChat community in a weekly gathering of ‘forward giving’. We will meet on Sunday, December 1 at 9amET / 730pm India on twitter. I will bring some tea and cookies to share, and yes, some questions too. Namaste – @AjmaniK

P.P.S. If you would like to engage in ‘forward giving’, I invite you to join me in supporting two of my favorite organizations who create a daily impact in thousands of lives. The first is Mitzvah Circle, founded by my long-time friend (who I met on twitter), Fran Held. Their motto is: “When a family faces a crisis, we are here”. The second is Akshaya Patra, whose mission is to provide midday meals to school-going children across India. Please donate. Let us, the #SpiritChat community, raise a $1000 each for these two organizations in the month of December. Thank you! 

“I am thankful for trees… – Layla”

The Thanksgiving Table…

Streaming the Heart’s Light

Tags

heart, heart matters, light, lightness, streaming

 

We have come a long way from the time when our televisions and radios had rabbit ears and antennas that reached out to receive their signals. In this always-connected age of WiFi and cellular service, where cell phones, tablets and laptops can ‘stream’ almost any type of audio and video at the touch of a button or the click of a mouse, our works is inundated with the concept of “streaming.” Corporations like NetFlix, YouTube, Disney and Apple are all in competition for our audio and visual awareness and our dollars.

What does all this “streaming” mean for our spiritual practices and awareness? How are we to develop, maintain and sustain the health of our mind and our heart when we are seemingly immersed in this Alphabet soup of marketing, advertising and ‘news cycles’? What are we to learn and teach from this upheaval that is causing many of us to question our values and beliefs in things like trust, honesty, integrity, service and the like?

One possible solution to the unknown of massive change created by digital “streaming” is to apply it to what we already know. We know our heart is the repository of love and light. We know our heart is the seedbed of softness and kindness. We know our heart is the source of silence and stillness. What if we were to condition and train our heart to constantly stream love, light, softness, kindness, silence and stillness?

In all of my forest walks this autumn, I am yet to undertake a journey that has not infused me with hope and elevation. The subtle changes of color, the falling of a leaf as it spins towards the earth, the rustling of the forest floor as I step gently, the sun emerging from behind clouds and streaming light from behind tall trees — I could go on and on. Observing and being in Nature is frequently my external antidote to the digital stream.

And yet, we need an internal antidote to the digital soup that we often find ourselves boiling in. A four-part practice has served me well in creating my own portable stream. It consists of cleaning the vessel of the day’s digital stream, universal prayer, physical relaxation, and sitting with a gentle focus on the source of light within the heart. It may seem like a lot of work, but I find these four actions harmonize the four quadrants of the heart. The heart’s light flows with clarity again, and the stream of joy and silence is available to immerse in wherever and whenever I need reconnecting to source.

No internet connection required.

 

Kumud

P.S. Join us in our weekly stream on Twitter in #SpiritChat — a gathering of folks “streaming their heart’s light” with enthusiasm — Sunday, Oct 20 at 9amET / 630pm India. Namaste – @AjmaniK

Transformative Energy of Words

Tags

empowerment, energy, language, transformation, words

What feelings and emotions come to your heart and mind when you read or hear the single word, Mother? The reactions among different people may range from positive to negative, to perhaps neutral. The reaction to that single word depends on the life experiences that we may have had in relationship to the person(s) which that word represents. 

Now, let me modify the word to “Mother Mary”. What feelings and emotions come to your heart and mind now? Are they different from the single word, “Mother”? The shift in the power and energy that the two words “Mother Mary” evoke probably depends on whether you have a Christian background and/or have friends of that denomination. If I were to ask the same question of a tribal who lives in the Amazon rainforest, what would their response, if any, be? And what about words like Durga and Kali, which evoke the divine feminine who is currently being celebrated in ‘a nine days and nights festival‘ in India?

The spiritual power of certain words, phrases, combination of words as prayers, mantras, and such, is well established. There is a scientific basis for the power and ability of words to convey certain energy. The basis of word power and energy is the mechanism of vibration. At the particle level, we are all atomic, vibratory beings. So, it would be natural that the vibrational energy of words would affect us in certain ways. In addition, certain words and prayers, repeated millions of times by cultures over time, attain special significance and energy. One such word which has spread universally from Indian (or Vedic) culture is AUM (or OM). Are there words or prayers that have achieved ‘special energy’ status in your language or culture?

Words, particularly when spoken in the language of the listener, confer thought, ideas, meaning and transformative power – Swami Sarvadevananda

The ability of certain words to affect us negatively, when spoken in a language which we can understand, is also powerful. The power of their words to send us almost instantly into a state of anger, dismay, rage, even hatred, has been felt by many of us. This is where our spiritual practices can help us. If we learn to keep track of our ‘trigger’ words and the situations in which we are particularly vulnerable to those triggers, we can take action. We can align and harmonize our practices to set up ‘early warning systems’ for such words, people and situations. ‘Trigger-word’ awareness is a bit like being the ‘squawker goose’ in the flock of geese sitting in the middle of the river who alerts the flock that a human has been sighted on the shore!

So, words have power, energy and the capability to set off positive, negative or neutral vibrations within us. By choosing words which empower and energize us, we are likely to empower and energize those in our energy field. By repeatedly choosing words and word combinations which enhance our own spiritual well-being, we can transmit universal positive and healing energy. Let us be empowered to speak healing words, or simply keep our silence. Such awareness and practice would be a sign of spiritual growth, yes?

Kumud

P.S. Today’s blog post was inspired by a talk titled ‘The Science of Mantra” given by Swami Sarvadevananda of the Vedanta Society of Hollywood in Cleveland on September 22 2019. It inspired a lot of questions about ‘word power and energy’, and I look forward to sharing some of those questions with you in our weekly twitter chat. Join us, Sunday Oct 6 at 9amET in #SpiritChat – bring your ‘power words’ and ‘trigger words’ to share. Namaste – @AjmaniK

what words does this photo evoke? what energy do they transmit to you?

On Life’s Transitions

Tags

autumn, awareness, celebration, healing, spirituality, transformation

In this last week of September, as it is often its wont, my corner of the world begins a beautiful journey from summer into autumn. The fact that I have been part of this journey every year for over three decades, does not diminish the beauty of the transition. In fact, with every passing year, I seem to look forward to this transition more and more.

The falling of a single leaf, when witnessed with a cup of tea in hand while sitting on the deck, or in the midst of a nature walk in the reservation, is often an event of great silence. It takes me back to my first autumn in Southwest Virginia, and the surprise and immense joy that I felt when I saw, for the first time, all those trees change color. The oranges, yellows and reds and many more colors in between, seemed to create an aura of special warmth in my first season away from home. Autumn seemed to say to me – I feel and see your great transition, and I am transitioning with you. I will be your companion on your journey.

That was then and this is now. My journey, my transitions continue – and so do hers. Awareness informs me that every moment, every breath, every heartbeat is a transition. The loss of a beloved one, the birth of a new flower, sickness and storms, celebrations and new beginnings. The impermanent nature of life as we know it means that transitions are our constant companions. And yet, there is a certain fabric of permanence on which the needle of life’s transitions creates its embroidered artwork. The colors and the thicknesses of the threads may be vastly different, but so what? Is not Autumn present in all her brilliance for all of us who choose to see?

Just this week, I walked two long walks in two separate parts of the reservation – the river valley and the lagoon – three days apart. The river was shallow enough that I could walk into its middle and look back on each of the banks, and upstream and downstream. When the sun rose high enough above the trees on the cliff side of the valley, it shone its light on all that came in its path – every tree, every changing and falling and fallen leaf, every boulder and rock and piece of broken off shale, every flock of geese that let itself be carried downstream by the gentle streaming of the river, and more.

I observed that all they needed to do to be illumined was to be present to the sun’s light with patience – for the play of light and shadow changes day by day, hour by hour, instant by instant – such is the nature of transition. And what about those who seemed to be in ‘permanent’ darkness? I am sure that, in a different season, when the sun’s angle changes, or they choose to bend ever so slightly towards the sun, they would find luminosity too.

So, if you are like me, and you love and cherish autumn as much as I do, you are already well equipped to be in harmony with life’s transitions. If you are like some, who are in love with the idea of an eternal summer, you may want to consider taking a walk into the beauty of autumn.

Go. Stand in place or walk into the middle of a shallow, softly flowing river. Open your heart and take in a 360 degree view. Did you see any transitions?

Kumud

P.S. Join us Sunday, September 30 at 9amET in our weekly gathering on Twitter. I will bring some fabric – you bring some colored threads – we will create some transitions. Namaste – @AjmaniK

In the middle of transitions

The Spirit of Ideation

Tags

creativity, healing, ideas, nature

Some of you know that I am a ‘nature’ walker, and that I am often looking for opportunities to look at the trails that I walk with new light, perspectives and framing. The results of some of these ‘nature walks’ is often shared in photographs, poetry and short writings.

It wasn’t until this week, sitting in a Biom* workshop over two days, that the idea emerged — there is a deeper, long-term, holistic effect of these walks on my being. One speaker talked about the importance of ideation in the fields of biomimicry, biomimetics and bioinspiration. All of these fields, collectively called Biom*, are connected in the origin of the idea that nature and biology already have created a lot of solutions to some of our grand-challenge problems.

If we are to believe that some of these solutions already exist in nature, then the question becomes – how do we ‘define’ our complex human problems in a language that biological systems can understand? It is in the creation of this common language where ideas and ideation comes in.

How often is it that someone’s ‘new idea’ or ‘new theory’ is laughed at and dismissed? What if there were a repository or knowledge base, where the innovations required to make the new idea a reality, could be compared with existing natural and biological solutions? The goal of Biom* is to create a ‘safe space’ for the the ‘idea person’ and their ideation. It is to provide a canvas, buckets of paint and paint brushes, for ideation to create new masterpieces with the help of nature and her infinitely diversified and brilliant solutions.

The workshop happened on Monday and Tuesday. On Wednesday morning, after a mixup about the time for my dental appointment, I decided to go walking before I went into work. The idea, the question, that I held in my heart was – how could I apply what I had just learnt over the past two days about Biom*? In search of the answer, I found myself slowing down even more than usual during the walk.

I started a conversation with an ex-marine walking his Siberian husky on the trail. He told me that there were some American Eagle nests in the thicket of trees across the water, but he hadn’t seen them in a few weeks. Fifteen minutes later, I had stopped downriver to watch some bees working with a bunch of flowers who had all their petals folded backwards. A fluttering of wings, and I looked up to see a dozen mallard duck in full and swift flight, traveling upriver. What’s their hurry, I wondered? And then, there they were, a minute or so later. Two bald eagles flying upriver, in virtually silent flight, painting with majestic brushstrokes against a clear blue canvas.

So, what does ideation have to do with spirituality, our spiritual journey? Let me posit that if and when we choose to appreciate our inherent talent for ideation, we can grow creativity. When we grow creativity, we can grow solutions to all of our complex challenges. If we were to be heart-facing towards any idea which is simple, credible, ‘tells a story’, and enhances value for humans and the ecosystems that we live in, then we are enhancing human values, aren’t we?

Perhaps bioinspiration can create a better conversation between our ideals and ideation, between us and our ecosystems, and All of Life that surrounds us. What can be a better spiritual practice than that?

Kumud

P.S. Join us for our weekly chat, Sunday Sep 15 at 9amET ~ I will bring some Qs and tea, you can bring some new ideas! – @AjmaniK

Reference: Ask Nature Database – http://www.asknature.org

Of Storms and Landings

Tags

chandrayaan, exploration, hurricanes, remembrance, storms

It would be an understatement to say that the East coast of the US and the entire eastern Caribbean has been feeling the effects of hurricane Dorian over the past week — some, like the Bahamas, suffering a lot more than others. Even with all the latest technologies and forecasting models, the exact paths and timings of storms of such rapidly changing intensity, momentum and energy are extremely difficult to predict accurately.

While hurricane Dorian had the Eastern seaboard in its sights, hundreds of millions halfway across the world in India stayed up into the wee hours on Saturday morning. They had their eyes, hopes and prayers focused on an audacious lunar landing of India’s first ever rover on the South Pole of the Moon. The landing sequence was all going according to plan, until about 2km above the lunar surface, contact was lost with the lander. Slowing down a lander from 3000mph to zero from 250,000 miles away is perhaps as difficult a task as trying to predict the path, let alone slow down a hurricane a few hundred miles offshore.

Such is the nature of life’s storms and landings. Those who are in the path evoke the concern, the prayers and positive energy of those watching from a distance. The outcomes, while uncertain, remind all involved of the messiness of life, and a reminder that Life itself is meant to be lived in the eye of the storm. It is in dare greatly in our explorations to other worlds and the worlds within, that we risk landing in unfamiliar territory, bruised and bartered, suffering loss of contact and communications with our “home”.

And yet, it is through the journey into the unknown, the struggle to ride it out or to leave, the decision to attempt a landing or to simply fly by, the facing of the fear of loss of all that we hold dear, that we can find our Truth.

It is in that inner discovery of our core, assisted by our all-seeing inner eye, that we remember our innocence, our simplicity, our purity, our silence and our stillness — and our destiny.

Our destiny may be as simple as to remember to choose direct experience — to remember that we can be whole with joy, to dip our toes in the water once again; to remember that we can keep daring greatly, and attempt new landings once again.

Kumud

P.S. Join our weekly chat on twitter, Sunday Sep 8 at 9amET in #SpiritChat ~ we shall talk about storms and landings, toes in the water and daring greatly. Namaste – @AjmaniK

Spiritual Integration

Tags

integration, spirituality, unity

Spiritual Integration for #SpiritChat by Christy Johnson

 

Dictionary.com defines integration as an act or instance of combining into an integral whole. In Latin the word integer means untouched, meaning an undivided and whole number.

 

Each of us comes into life as a whole being, yet we may forget our inherent wholeness as we traverse our imperfect way through life interacting with other flawed, yet paradoxically whole, humans. Spiritual integration balances our human imperfection with our divine perfection.

 

To heal the internal split and integrate, we must learn to accept of all parts of ourselves, including any aspects we’d prefer to keep secret, especially any aspect that is violent or unforgiving in thought, word, or deed. This requires self-awareness, courage, and persistence.

 

The turbulence and violence in the world calls for integration of both our collective and personal shadows. As Carl Jung wrote in Modern Man in Search of a Soul, “How can I be substantial if I do not cast a shadow? I must have a dark side also if I am to be whole.” 

 

Unintegrated shadows may manifest as judgment or can extend further to discriminatory or even violent acts. To integrate our own shadows, we need to acknowledge all humans have the potential for darkness rather than deny that aspect of humanity in general and ourselves in particular. Being aware of our shared human frailties while consciously choosing not to be driven by them reflects our spiritual integration.

 

How do we make peace with our own shadow? How do we shine light on humanity’s collective shadow to support integration? 

 

Please join us as we explore how we might help ourselves and the rest of humanity heal the collective trauma of unintegrated shadows. Let’s shine a compassionate light on darkness and brainstorm about how to create a healthier, less shadow-driven, more integrated future for mankind.

 

Dr. Christy Johnson quit her decades-long engineering career in 2010 to open her integrative energy healing practice. She helps clients grow, evolve, and get empowered via soul level information and energy healing. You can connect with her via her website www.intuitiveheal.com or on Twitter @IntuitiveHeal .

P. S. Join our special guest host Dr Christy Johnson as she steps up to host our weekly twitter chat (Sunday Aug 25 at 9amET in #spiritchat) on this wonderful topic. Thank you – Kumud

 

Growing the Heart’s Intelligence

Tags

celebration, heart, heart matters, intelligence, sisters, spirituality

There was a confluence of events which occurred over the past week that reminded me of “the heart’s intelligence”. Two back-to-back lectures by a visiting monk from the “Vedanta society of Houston”, two pieces of mail that arrived on Thursday, and my stumbling on a few personal notes from a book that I had read a few years ago.

The Vedanta lectures address some important questions – Who am I? What is real? What is the truth? What is awareness? And more. My one takeaway was that the mind is not real. From the physical plane, the ‘mind’ is fed inputs by our senses, and creates reactions, which we then respond to as actions. So, what is real? Our awareness that ‘we exist’, even when we are asleep, is a reality. Where does this awareness register? It is in the ‘heart’ – not the physical heart, but the ‘heart’ of every cell of our body. That is the “heart’s intelligence” fed by our spiritual practices.

Fast forward to Thursday morning, when I was “celebrating all my sisters, then and now”, on the day of annual “brother sister festival” called Rakhi. Phone conversations with my sisters in India are a must on this day for me – I actually get to hear their heart’s, share my heart, and there is much laughter and good-nature’s ribbing. They both always ask the question – “did you get my ‘Rakhi’?”

In both cases, I had to reluctantly say – no, not yet. In both cases, I said with a confident heart – “but I am sure that it will come, right on time, in today’s mail”. It is a festival of the heart – and yes, each piece of mail, after traveling 7500 miles, arrived that afternoon. The heart’s intelligence grew a bit more, with two shiny threads from my sisters this week. They’ve been sending me love-filled threads for many decades. I am in awe of them and their hearts.

“The Heart’s Code” was a wonderful book that explained the multiple dimensions of the “heart” and its importance, as I started a focused meditation practice a few years ago. Sorting through my electronic notes this week (getting ready for my “book”), I stumbled on some treasures. First, there was this reminder, to take time to receive.

Take time every day to be open to the energy those you love give off; let your heart receive that energy, store it, and recall it as often as you can. Look, listen, smell, touch, and feel with your heart those you love as profoundly and deeply as you can while the physical manifestation of their energy is still yours for the feeling.

Then, there was this reference to the heart’s role as a ‘memory-keeping’ intelligence portal.

The brain is very busy with its own memory system. It is less sensitive than the heart to the more subtle energetic memories. By putting our heart into remembering those we love every day, we are recovering cellular memories…

And finally, this note spoke to a special propensity of my mine, and perhaps yours too…

When poets describe love as “giving our heart away,” they are cardio-energetically correct.

All the events of this week were designed to remind me that there is perhaps no better return on investment than in growing the heart’s intelligence. I am thus inspired to focus on tearing down my walls of intransigence and prejudice, so that I can heart-connect more often with more of my brothers and sisters across the world. Join me in growing the world’s HeartIQ, will you?

Kumud

P.S. Join us for our weekly gathering of brothers and sisters in #SpiritChat on Sunday, Aug 18 at 9amET. I will bring some sweets – we shall grow our hearts. Namaste – @AjmaniK