Gifts of Freedom

Tags

celebration, freedom, remembrance, spirituality

The waxing first quarter moon flirted with me from outside the upstairs window as it emerged briefly from behind the clouds at late twilight. I had just finished my evening meditation, and was slowly emerging from the gift of freedom from being immersed in a deep peace from the stillness beyond light. The gift of the moon made my heart feel like a lotus that opens its petals at the first signs of light.

I needed to see more of her magic, so I walked downstairs, and on to the deck outside, just to catch a few clear glimpses before some dark clouds engulfed her for the night. Just as I was to walk back inside, out of the corner of my eye, I saw yet another gift – the first summer sighting of a firefly in the grass. And as I swept my gaze towards the trees, I saw a forest full of fireworks – hundreds of fireflies silently floating, dancing, sharing their light from within. The Fourth of July fireworks from a distant suburb that sent ‘lightning’ into a clouded sky barely held a candle to this gift of Mother Nature.

So often it is the inclination of our human nature to get focused on, get trapped by, or even become despondent in despair about our lack of freedom, or the state of our independence in the world. When we forget about our gifts, it often takes a few courageous men and women to stand up and say – enough. Inspired by divine providence, they draft a new declaration, and then pledge to it their lives and sacred honor. Then, the battle to reclaim the gift of freedom, truly begins.

Such is often the state of our inner world too, isn’t it? Immersed in fear, doubt, anger, envy, and our desire for likes, we forget the gifts of our truths. It often takes a new declaration, a new resolve, a new inspiration for us to be (re)awakened to walk our path of constant remembrance of the gifts of our freedom. It is when we are awake to our inner gifts of peace, joy, silence, stillness and more, that we can pledge to share the same with our fellow freedom fighters.

That is perhaps the significance of the Fourth of July, Canada Day (and similar ‘Independence Day’ celebrations) to me. In addition to the fireworks, the concerts, the picnics, the road trips – it is the freedom to observe and embrace the gifts of light, however small or slivered they may be, that glow constantly within my reach.

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join us for a community celebration of our gifts of freedom – Sunday, July 7 at 9amET on Twitter in #SpiritChat – Namaste. – Kumud

A (de)light gift of summer that burst forth this weekend!

The Freedom of Forgiveness

Tags

choosing love, forgiveness, freedom, healing

– by Sharon Kathryn D’Agostino

I believe in the healing power of love, in the transformation created in our lives when we allow ourselves to give and receive love with our hearts wide, wide open.

Life events this year have led me to examine more closely the various aspects of love, and to feel love even more intensely. In the process, I have been exploring forgiveness, an aspect of unconditional love that is sometimes overlooked. We may lose sight of the fear, anger, resentment and sadness associated with our decisions not to forgive others, or ourselves, for the conscious or unconscious hurts we have experienced. Some of us carry the burden of past hurts around with us for years with little awareness of their weight in our day-to-day existence. Fleeting or persistent thoughts about hurtful things that were done or said to us, thoughts pushed aside but not truly addressed, can sap our strength and energy, and they can interfere with our ability to experience joy in our lives.

Forgiveness has the potential to free us from these burdens, though the act of forgiving may be more difficult than we think. For the most hurtful experiences in our lives, the advice to “forgive and forget” misses an essential step even when our intention to forgive is genuine. Once we decide to forgive someone, we must take steps to heal the hurt, to truly let it go, before we can move to the step of forgetting it. We need to release the pain, the anger, the resentment that resulted from the actions or words that injured us. This release may come through meditation, through prayer, in conversations with a friend, in therapy, or by any of the ways we move through our important life lessons. Releasing the hurt must be intentional, as it is highly unlikely that the pain will magically disappear simply because we made the choice to forgive.

In our personal exploration of forgiveness, we can also benefit greatly from understanding the things for which we blame ourselves. That list may be short or long… the experience of not meeting the expectations of ourselves or others… the feeling of letting others down… the could haves, should haves… all of the hurtful words or actions for which we hold ourselves responsible. Self-directed blame, disappointment, and anger can be the most significant burdens in our lives and often we carry them without asking ourselves why we have not chosen to let them go.

Our choice to forgive frees us. Our requests to be forgiven free us further. Forgiveness gives us the space to love others and ourselves more fully. In every moment, we can choose the freedom of forgiveness and thereby open our hearts completely to the healing power of love.

Sharon

Sharon Kathryn D’Agostino believes that love and compassion can and will save the world. She is the founder of SayItForward.org, a web platform where women and girls are invited to share their stories of empowerment. Sharon can be found on Twitter at @SharonDAgostino, @SayItForwardNow and @AwakeningTrue

Editor’s Note: Please join Sharon as she steps up to host our weekly twitter chat on Sunday, Dec 9th at 9amET. Sharon is a long-time regular in our Sunday morning gatherings, a great proponent for women and for choosing love, and a wonderful friend of the community. Thank you. – Kumud @AjmaniK

On Dreams and Dreamers

Tags

dreams, freedom, purpose, spirituality

For a long time, for what seemed like months, as my morning meditation practice grew, the dreams had stopped coming while I was asleep at night. I have always been a good sleeper, but these dreamless sleeps had taken it to a greater depth of dreamless sleeping. I would awaken greatly refreshed, ready to go upstairs and begin my day with meditation, and so on.

But then, over the last week or two or so, as is the wont of change that often comes suddenly, the ‘dreaming while sleeping’ returned. The seemingly ‘on-the-surface’ yet ‘active’ dreams took me on journeys with long-out-of-touch friends and long-departed family members. How ‘real’ they seemed while I was “in” them, and how quickly they disappeared on the first early-morning awakening out of broken sleep! And as is also often their wont, the more I tried to remember them, the more they slipped through my awareness like water flowing through fingers. And the net result was that I awoke tired, even lethargic.

Lethargy is not this seeker’s friend. Or of the wanderer. Of of the explorer. Or even the sitter. So, being the engineer and analyst that I am, the one whose propensity is to ask “why”, I asked – why did they return? Was it because of my increased work-related tasks, my staying up later and later before bed, the usual uptick in reading during summer, or the general cluttering of the brain? Regardless, I would like to return to my dreamless state, so I can wake up to my previous, non-lethargic, jump-out-of-bed and ready-to-go state?

But, I digress a bit (as is my wont). From a spiritual perspective, our ‘dream state’ goes beyond the surface dreams that occasionally may come. We are immersed in the deep, deep ocean of this great dream that you, the reader, is somehow fundamentally different than me, the writer. And hence, we live most of our physical life immersed in the ocean, like fish in deep water, whose awareness knows only water, and more so, its immediate waters. We may even claim ‘privilege’ of prosperity, of wealth, of knowledge, of (yes) spirituality, over those, some of whom we may even call family, friends and neighbors. We are unaware, or have lost awareness that our differences, our dreams, depend simply on our degrees of manifestation. Is this not simply a deeper dream state that we can perhaps awaken from?

Perhaps this awakening to reality is the purpose of the work of our spiritual practices.

For what is ‘reality’? Is it not the awareness that we ALL are “Infinite, Absolute, Eternal, Knowledge, Existence, Bliss”? If this reality is our truth, then perhaps we can let go of our current dream-state of illusions and delusions. If not, then immersed we shall remain, until, perhaps, grace finds us, ready to return us to a dreamless state.

For no matter how sweet my dreams may be, I feel an awareness, a knowing, that walking in an awakened reality is going to be sweeter than the sweetest of dreams.

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. This post was heavily inspired by my stumbling upon the essay, “Vedanta and Privilege” by Swami Vivekananda. Do read if you have a chance. And then join us for #SpiritChat on Twitter – Sunday August 5 at 9amET/ 630pmET. Namaste. – Kumud

What is the the flower’s dream? What is its reality?

Our Attitudes to Freedom

Tags

attitude, balance, freedom, harmony, spirituality

There is an Indian dessert called the gulab jamun. It is like a donut hole of a very soft consistency, that is deep fried, and then immersed in a vat of sugar solution. It is ideally eaten warm, so that the sweetness of the solution thoroughly pervades the senses. In the ideal gulab jamun, there is very little to distinguish the solidity of the “donut” from the liquidity of the solution that it is immersed in.

Our lives are a little bit like the gulab jamun. We are immersed in the sweetness of our attachments and desires. And yet, we claim “freedom”, even celebrate it on an annual basis, while we continue to get more and more entangled in the web of our own creation. Our social and work commitments, our hobbies, our networks seem to keep expanding. The result is that we keep finding ourselves starved for time and energy for (inner) growth that can lead us to real freedom.

So, perhaps this Independence Day (July 4th in the USA), we can choose to re-examine our attitudes towards real freedom. We are all born with certain attitudes, qualities (gunas) and energies. These are the attitudes (or aptitudes) of activity or aggression (rajas), of lethargy and heaviness (tamas), and of purity or lightness (sattva). Our overall attitude in life at any given time, can be said to be a dynamic mixture of the proportion of these three energies within us.

It is when the attitudes of individuals (and societies) trend towards agression, overactivity, and heaviness, that we tend to move away from freedom. Our inner core of softness starts to melt away, and our attitude trends towards accepting less and less freedom. We rationalize to ourselves that this state must be the “new normal”. But it does not need to be so!

A true celebration of independence means that we make a decision to change our attitude towards freedom. We decide to balance our commitments, and discard those which further enslave us. We commit to those actions that tend to increase inner purity, lightness, softness and kindness, or sattva. It is in becoming receptacles for grace, by lowering the heart’s barriers to love, that freedom can come home to us.

Yes, warm gulab jamnun, like apple pie, is one of my favorite desserts. And I have discovered that it is particulary good when eaten over ice-cream, with moderation. This new attitude is unfolding the path of freedom dessert-sattva for me. How is your path unfolding?

Namaste,

Kumud

P.S. Join us for our weekly chat, Sunday July 1st at 9amET / 630pm India in #SpiritChat ~ I will bring some gulab jamun and ice-cream to share, and we shall share some stories about real freedom… Namaste.

Attitudes to Freedom – Pausing and Celebrating on the Path

On Freedom and Reality

Tags

freedom, reality, spiritual practice

Just like that, it is the first of July and we step into the second half of the year. Time has an unerring way of bringing us face to face with reality – however we may define reality. In the USA, the onset of July brings us a celebration of “Independence Day”, and our kindred neighbors to the north in Canada celebrate “Victoria Day” (Happy 150th, Canada!). On these occasions, it is natural for many of us to reflect upon our personal freedoms, and the practical realities of said freedom(s) in our daily lives and actions.

As long as we do not live alone on a deserted island, the reality is that our friends, families and communities affect our daily freedoms, and their exercise of it. This effect manifests in the decisions that we make when we live in a civil society. In order to add value to their lives, and often for greater good, we often accept the reality that our personal freedom of external action may not be absolute. It is relatively easy to make declarations of our Independence, but we need energy and commitment to fight for “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”. Commitment conveys our declarations from mere intellect to reality, frees us to take action.

It takes even greater energy and commitment to preserve our freedom. The freedoms gained also need a constitution – a governing agreement among people – for their preservation, in order to “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity”. In order to anchor themselves to reality, and recalibrate their freedom(s), organizations, communities, families and even individuals, may establish constitutions. From these frameworks can emerge the governing principles of our live, the values that fuel our actions, and measures of our personal growth.

For most of us, the demands of living in the external world subject us to space and time. Even as I write this, there are small decisions that I need to make over the next few hours that will affect what I and my family will do this weekend. These small decisions aren’t made in a vaccuum, and a give and take of personal freedom(s) of all family members is necessary in order to maintain a dynamic family harmony. Does this reality sound familiar to you?

So, where does true freedom, if it exists, exist? For the most part, our external world seems to be devoid of it. We can intellectually read about and even talk about ‘freedom from fear’ and such related things, but how much of our daily decisions are informed by fear? And how about our internal world? Is it possible that unfettered freedom exists within us? If so, have you experienced the reality of inner freedom for yourself?

As I develop my daily practice of meditation, there are occasions where I find disconnection from the transient and (re)connection with the permanent. While the state of reconnection with the permanent is often fleeting in itself, it is the closest that I have perhaps ever felt to true freedom. Even though the reconnection is fleeting, it brings one great Joy to realize that true inner freedom is indeed an experiential reality. How about you? What have your experiences of ‘real freedom’ – external or internal – been like? How do ‘reality’ affect the exercise of your personal freedom(s)?

I invite you to visit with us in #SpiritChat on Sunday, July 2nd at 9amET/1pmUTC on twitter, as we share and celebrate freedom and reality. I will bring some real questions and virtual cookies and sparklers. You are free to bring whatever you wish to share.

Namaste,

Kumud @AjmaniK

A new experience of freedom this week, as I discovered a new reservation with unexplored trails and bridges…

Creating Freedom through Creativity

Tags

creativity, freedom, socialmedia

For virtually every Sunday of my short life on social media, I have had the privilege of spending an hour or so on twitter, being part of the #SpiritChat community. In the form of questions and answers, with guest hosts and friends who step up to host in my absence, we the people have stood fast to our goal of “transforming the spirit with conversations in social media”. Over the years, many (hundreds?) have come through the virtual doors that formally ‘open’ every Sunday at 9amET to share their ‘answers’ to ‘questions’ posed during our gatherings.

As we research and probe and pry open our hearts and minds in the company of those of varying life backgrounds and experiences, we manage to take a deeper look at our beliefs, our faiths, our values and our actions. We may not always like what this self-exploration may bring us face to face with, but my thesis is that we all somehow walk away from our community experience with some agglomerated wisdom that sticks our hearts opens a little bit more every week.

It isn’t that the #SpiritChat community is some kind of homogeneous community with a single mindset. In fact, we are perhaps all grateful that it is exactly the opposite – a kaleidoscope of heterogenity! At the end of the day (or the hour), the issue is not whether we agree or disagree with each other – it is whether we can look at each other with a little bit more love in our heart’s eyes. And if we walk away with a little bit more empathy, a sense of friendship, an attitude of joy, or even a realization of the cause(s) of the pain and hurt that we carry around with us, then it is indeed time well spent in sharing and learning within a safe space.

I have often felt that I am the greatest beneficiary of the community’s loving heart. If the amount of stretching that often occurrs for me – before, during and after the chat – is any indication of ‘progress’, then I have the ‘spiritual stretch marks’ to show for many a new self-birth over the years 🙂 The creative energy of the community ensures that we all keep growing and evolving and involving. I am grateful that my stories of ‘walking’ and photos of being in nature and my attempts at poetry are received with grace by the community. In symbiosis, the creative energy of the community continues to inspire many to experience even greater freedom in their practice and work.

As some of you know, it was @waynemcevilly (piano viruoso extraordinaire) who inspired me to create the Sunday #SpiritChat on twitter, five years ago. Wayne’s creative, fun-loving and carefree attitude taught this staid, lackadaisical engineer to lighten up and learn to ‘go with the flow’. I have learnt the virtues of ‘practicing patience’, ‘art of showing up with a smile’, ‘this too shall pass for that is nature’s way’, ‘be kinder to yourself than you expect others to be towards you’, ‘don’t try so darn hard because a lot of it is beyond your control’, ‘give people time and space and that includes you’, ‘talk about the good stuff for there are many out there talking to them about the bad stuff’, ‘always and never are like hot chili peppers so use them sparingly’, ‘make time for tea and cookies’, and much more. All this agglomerated ‘wisdom’ from hosting the chat and associating with all of you – every single one of you!

And so, it continues. The need today to have conversations that ‘transform the spirit’ is no less, perhaps much greater, than it was in July 2011. I know in my heart that our conversations have just begun. For if the conversations that I have with myself after the #SpiritChat hour every week are any indication, there is an infinity of creative freedom that remains to be expressed. And who better to transform the ‘spirit of conversations’ in our world at large than some of the most kind, loving and generous-of-heart people that I have had the privilege to connect with?

Namaste, my friends. Stay tuned. For the best of our creativity is yet to come…

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. ICYMI The first #SpiritChat blog post (July 29th 2011) – On Slowing Down. And do join us, Sunday July 31st 2016 at 9amET on twitter – bring a sample of your creative energy to share with the community. Cake and cookies are always welcoome too. Thank you!

On Friendship and Freedom

Tags

freedom, friendship, spirituality

Friendship is a many splendored flower that blooms when hearts connect. Regardless of their origin, their depth or their breadth, friendships have roots in connection. Wherever there is more than one gathered, the potential for friendship exists. Two may create interdependence, codependence or independence, depending on the health of the friendship and the interactions.

From a spiritual perspective, the Indian sage Patanjali (said to be the organizer of Yoga principles), refers to friendship in the precept of maitri. In one of his oft-quoted aphorisms, maitri inculcates the ’attitude of friendliness to increase the level of happiness in our world’. In particular, we can raise our awareness to be friendly towards those who are friendly towards us – reciprocity with a friendly attitude waters the seeds of friendship. The more we develop this attitude within us, the more our heart consciousness grows.

As I look to some of my own personal friendships over the years, some key characteristics seem to emerge among the ones that have sustained the passage of time and space. Mutual respect and an unwritten agreement to ‘live and let live’ is one key. Commonality of values, ethics and principles – even though their implementation may be different – is another key. The ability to speak our heart and mind to each other, particularly when we disagree, is another key. The celebration of each others’ successes, and the sharing of lessons learned from our ‘failures’, is yet another. What are some ‘key’ characterestics of your enduring friendships?

In all of the keys listed above, one common theme seems to be that my friends and I let each other ‘just be’. I am free to be myself among them, whether they be in the physical world or the virtual. A corollary is that the ones whom I do not feel free with, fall off the friendship realm. It does not mean that I abandon my attitude of friendliness towards them (unless they are openly hostile towards me and mean me harm) – it is just that the depth and breadth of the actual friendship changes over time and space. Have you ever had a really ‘good’ friendship unravel quickly? How did that happen and what did you learn from the experience?

As we enter the final week of July, I reflect on some of the friendships that have formed within the #SpiritChat community online. Some of these have ‘graduated’ to wonderful offline friends who value, support and communicate with each other on a regular basis. It should come as no surprise that folks who share their hearts in an open forum on topics of interest to them would form friendships that enhance each others’ freedom. As we approach the end of our fifth year online, I propose that the week between July 24th and July 31st be celebrated as ‘friendship week’ – both online and offline.

Join me. Let us reach out and grow our attitude of friendliness and raise the vibration of happiness in the world.

Namaste,

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join me as I host #SpiritChat on July 24th 2016 at 9amET/1pmUTC on twitter – ‘Friendship and Freedom’. Next week, July 31st – Celebration! Thank you for all your support – whether you have just joined our community, or you have been us for months and maybe, years.

Friendship – Passionflowers (photo by Marcia Nelson Pedde ~ @tomarciamae – My friendship with Marcia and her husband, Mike goes back a long way on twitter. Check out their beautiful blog at M&M Musings 🙂 )

On Guidance and Guides

Tags

freedom, guide, guru, spirituality

Most of us will readily accept and acknowledge that we often get ‘stuck’ at some waypoint in our lives. The guidance of a mentor or guide in these instances has the potential to greatly reduce the life energy that we may expend in getting ‘unstuck’ from our situation. The quality of the guidance that we receive in these moments can even mean the difference between (spiritual) ‘life’ and ‘death’.

My first year working at NASA, I was fortunate enough to find a guide who was willing to train and mentor me. These weren’t just engineering lessons, mind you. They were career and life lessons, inside and outside of the work environment. Over the years, the lessons that I learnt from him served me well, and encouraged me to be open to training and mentoring those who were willing to ask and listen. Now that I look back, I am glad that I did not listen to the ‘work whispers’ about him being a ‘tough guy who expects a lot from his students’ and so on. I am glad that I chose to evaluate whether he was the right guide for me from my own experience with him. After my graduate school thesis advisor, he was the second person who I trusted with my professional life and career guidance.

So, what was it that made my relationship with these guides in my life stand out from acquaintances and friends? They were willing to help when asked, without any hesitation or even a hint of a negative attitude. They showed, beyond a shadow of a doubt, by their actions, that they had my best interest at heart. They did not ask me to serve them – they were always serving me. They wanted me to accomplish bigger and better things than they had accomplished. They were willing to share some of their life stories, about moments when they themselves were ‘stuck’, and how their guides helped them to get past those roadblocks. They opened their hearts and homes, their families and friends to me, and we became family.

This is not to say that a good guide, in order to provide great guidance to you, needs to meet ALL of the above criteria – although, it does not hurt if you develop that special relationship with them. One thing is for sure. In order for us to accept guidance that we will actually act upon, the guide has to convey that they have our best interest at heart. Their highest, an perhps only ‘agenda’, is for us to succeed and not remain ‘stuck’. They do not want to necessarily hold our hand all the time, although they are willing to do even that if that is what it will take for us to develop trust in their guidance.

The great guides have walked the path, are present when called upon, point the way when asked, give us the tools to remove that which blocks our progress, and serve us with a loving heart so deep that it takes our breath away…

Some of us may question whether we even need an ‘external’ guide in our lives. This happens because some of us may have been led astray or been caused egregious harm by a guide that met seemed qualified to provide good guidance. Our heart and spirit refuses to ‘trust’ the external, and so we retreat to the internal guide. Our own ‘inner compass’. Yes, there are some among us who have that inner strength and reservoir of spiritual energy to be able to get ‘unstuck’ by themselves, to carry their own map as they climb the mountain. And I say, more spiritual power to them. For me, I am the Edmund Hillary who would not dream of climbing the mountain for the first time without my trusted Sherpa, Tenzing Norgay. I submit my welfare and well-being into the sherpa’s hands.

How about you? Are you ‘going it alone’, relying purely on ‘inner guidance’? Or do you have an ‘external’ guide – or maybe even a team of them – who walk the path with you? How did you find your guide(s)? What criteria did you use to determine that they were the best guide(s) for you? Have you ever been disappointed in a guide that you chose and then switched to different one? How did that change your life and what did you learn in the process?

In this month of July 2016, we have been talking about freedom in our weekly #SpiritChat conversations on twitter. One could ask – how does our reliance on a guide impact our ‘spirit of freedom’? Join us Sunday morning, and share some of your guidance with us.

Namaste,

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. For more about the student/teacher/Guide/Guru ‘principle’ in Indian culture, do see this Wikipedia article about the Guru Purnima Festival, which falls on July 18th/19th this year… Also see, Celebrating the Guru (Guide) in Vedic Tradition. Namaste.

Our Freedom Journey – What’s Your Story?

Tags

freedom, journey, stories

Sleeping in – Will Today’s Journey Even Begin?

It’s Saturday morning and I am half-awake, Lazing in bed, hoping to catch a few extra minutes of sleep before I get going. I know what time it is by looking out the bedroom window at the amount of sunlight reflecting off of the trees laden with leaves. Just to make sure, I flip over the phone. It’s six twenty nine. I really have nowhere to be this morning, and I have already missed the pre-sunrise window’ to ‘sit’. Sleep a bit more, I tell myself. Everyone else in the house is still fast asleep…

Setting Up for the Journey

The next time my eye opens, the phone says it’s five past seven. (No, I do not have a ‘real’ clock in my room. I have tried that, and it made a ‘clock-watcher’ out of me. So, it now sits in the bedside drawer). Now, it’s decision time. I am either going to literally drag myself out of bed and ‘sit’, or… well, there is really no alternative. Today’s journey needs to begin ‘right’. So, in the next few minutes, I am all set up on my favorite handloom-woven mat, my back-pillow and my blanket. One final glance at the phone sets the beginning time for me. It is twelve past seven. I am ready for today’s freedom journey. I begin with a ‘full-body’ relaxation, sitting in a cross-legged pose, grounded.

Energy surge – Sitting up

Grounding is an essential part of this freedom journey. Some days, that comes through physical connection to the earth. Some days, it comes from this current that flows through you. Today, it was both.
I ‘told myself’ to sit up straight as I began, and almost immediately, the energy flow started from the ground up. This ‘double-grounding’ was very welcome, as I had begun today’s journey with a very low physical energy level – sleepy and a bit grumpy – but that was soon to be history. The grounding flow continued. It was as if Mother Earth had opened up a special geyser, just for me – I could tell that this was going to be a special journey. But wait. What’s this? My thought orchestra was also being energized, drawing from this energy boost, Tuning up! What am I supposed to do now? Help! Anyone?

Give me sixty seconds

No sooner had I ‘asked for help’, that the guide appeared. I have done this before, so I knew that a response would be forthcoming. Over time, I have trained myself not to be shy or afraid to ‘ask for help’ when needed. I am among those who no longer believes that I can negotiate all the obstacles on my own, be my own guide. Today, I needed help to ‘tone down’ the orchestra a bit, or at least harmonize the different instruments. “Give me sixty seconds,” – came the response – “of silence uninterrupted by thought.”

Sixty seconds of uninterrupted thought? That’s it. That should be easy peasy. Here we go.

I am not sure how long it took me to string together sixty seconds, but the only way I could do it was to countup to sixty. One thousand one, one thousand two… and so on. One thousand sixty. Well, that didn’t work. Let’s go again. Finally, there was a countup where I did not make it past thirty… I was immersed. Then I seemed to be dissolved . And all that was ‘left’ was my grounded connection to Mother Earth. Aha. Maybe that is why ‘grounding’ is important – so that you can ‘return’.

On the return, among a sense of serene light, I was asked – see what happens when you ask for help, sit still to receive, and give the sixty seconds you are asked for?

Sixty seconds – Reprise

I figured I was all done with today’s journey. But, before I opened my eyes, I wanted to relax out of the journey – slowly. So I did a very slow count – again to sixty – one thousand one, one thousand two, and so on. I tried to slow down the count as much as I could, but finally, there I was. One thousand and sixty. That’s all.

I opened my eyes, searched around me for my phone, flipped it over, and glanced at the time. Twelve minutes past eight.

I had journeyed into freedom for exactly sixty minutes.

Even though I had ‘given away’ sixty seconds when asked, they had been returned to me. As sixty minutes. A pretty good return on investment, don’t you think?

Kumud @AjmaniK

The Story Continues – #SpiritChat Sunday July 10th

The story above is part of my freedom journey for today. Journaled immediately at journey’s end. Mostly unedited. What’s your story? Will you share a bit of it with us? Where did you begin? Where are you now? Whom are you traveling with? Who have you become? Where are you going? What is your biggest distraction? Who or what inspires you to continue? What ‘bridges’ have helped you on the way? If so inclined to share, do join us, Sunday June 10th 2016 at 9amET/1pmUTC in #SpiritChat on twitter. I will host on the topic of “Our Freedom Journey” as we continue the theme of #Freedom for July. Thank you for reading. Peace and love to you and your friends and family. Namaste.

Bridge in Rocky River Reservation (photo by @AjmaniK)

On Freedom and Letting Go

Tags

freedom, lettingGo, spiritchat, spirituality

We begin the month of July, having benefited from all the reflections on discussion topics related to #energy in the month of June. The first weekend of July celebrates #freedom in the two countries of Canada (Victoria Day) and USA (Independence Day). So, it is perhaps appropriate that we had decided on #freedom to be the theme of #SpiritChat weekly chat topics for this month.

The first chat topic for this month will be “Freedom and Letting GO”. It isn’t that we haven’t talked about #freedom or #LettingGo before – but I do not believe that we have talked about them in conjunction. I imagine that we all have our individual ideas of what #freedom means to us, and conversations and celebrations can help us revise and clarify the importance of #freedom. So, take a moment and stop reading. Consider the questions:

• What does true #freedom mean to you?
• How does #freedom manifest in your life?
• How does personal #freedom affect your sense of responsibility?
• What is the greatest #freedom – the one that you would not want to give up at any price?

Now that we have clarified our current ideas about #freedom, we can visit with #LettingGO. The idea of ‘letting go’ often creates a sense of loss within us. The ‘sense of loss’ may exist even if we know fully well that ‘letting go’ is the best choice for us. Maybe that is why, when we meet the prospect of ‘letting go’ of some ‘thing’, our instinctual response is to resist. We have tried ‘letting go’ before, but the ‘sense of loss’ that comes in return, is not a good trade. Of course, the ‘thing’ may be any multitude of things – an idea, a relationship, a person, a place, a habit, an emotion, a memory, a perceived virtue, an object of great attachement, and more. It’s all about connection.

The deeper our connection in space and time to the ‘thing’, the tougher it is for us to even entertain the notion of ‘letting go’. The more threads that are woven between us and that ‘thing’, the greater the difficulty in ‘letting go’. So, how do we get to the point where ‘letting go’ becomes a reality for us? One way of getting to that point is when our freedom to live our full life of grand potential is being impacted by our resistance to #lettingGO. This raises a few more questions:

• When was an instance where you chose #LettingGO to enhance your freedom? What was the result
• Are you currently in a situation where you are choosing to live with less freedom over #LettingGO?
• Think of an instance where you helped someone in their #LettingGO process. What did you learn from that?
• What are some non-physical ‘things’ that you could immediately let go of and gain more freedom?

It is when we unclench our fists and let go of our oh-so-tight grasp of nothingness, that we can let the river flow through our spread-apart fingers and experience the joy of freedom. It is when we uncurl our toes and spread them just a tiny bit, that we can feel the earth send us a message of freedom through our bare feet. It is when we begin to let go of all of that which puts shades on our heart in the summer of our life, that we can celebrate freedom.

I hope I have made a small case for the conjunction of #Freedom and #LettingGO. Make your case by joining us Sunday, July 3rd 2016 at 9amET/1pmUTC on twitter in a #SpiritChat conversation with @AjmaniK and the community.

Namaste,

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. I do realize that this may be a big family-holiday-Sunday for many in Canada and USA – if you cannot join us live, we will see you next week with more #Freedom! I invite you to answer some questions posed above in the comments, or reflect on them in your journaling. Namaste.

Fireworks ‘Letting GO’ – Photo by @AjmaniK