Moments of Silence

Tags

awareness, healing, memories, silence, spirituality

The dog sitting by the screen door, watching the heavy rain falling on the deck, as the storm finally arrives, and then leaves quickly.

The stars emerging slowly and showing off their light as the moon is yet to rise.

The rising sun emerging from behind the clouds in the distance, and the lingering of the moon fading in its light.

The drops of overnight rain sitting on new leaves that emerged over the past few days.

The pair of geese escorting their newborns through the lake, teaching them to feed themselves as they go.

The two turtles sunning on a bed of reeds by the shore as the geese swim by.

The rush of white flowers on the wild bush that I almost cut down last year because I thought it was too close to the fence.

The stillness of the dragonfly caught by my camera as I went to take a closeup of said white flowers.

The eyes that welled up, and stayed so, during many of this week’s meditations.

What are some recent moments of silence you have experienced? How did they affect you? What kind of energy did they create within you?

So much of the condition of our heart and mind is affected by the energy that we experience in our moments of silence. Many of these silent moments, particularly those in nature, tend to catch us unawares. These are often the moments that tend to bring us great joy.

However there are other personal moments, planned and unplanned, which force us into temporary silence. The impact of these moments on us is so strong and deep, that we revert to silence to process their energy. These are often the moments of grief, sadness, anger, and even bitterness.

Regardless of our physical and emotional response to the positive or negative energy brought about by moments of silence, there is much that we can learn from them. If we make space for the silence, pay attention to the timing of their arrival, we can honor the message of every such moment.

With greater awareness of the moments of silence happening around us and within us, our hearts and minds have the opportunity move towards greater peace, equanimity and stillness. As a result, we can emerge from every new moment of silence with renewed strength and resolve to take actions for the greater good of all.

Kumud

P.S. Join us for our weekly twitter chat with the Spiritchat community, Sunday May 29 at 9amET / 1pmGMT / 630pm India. Please come and share some moments with us, as we reflect on the power of silence to heal us. Namaste – @AjmaniK

P.P.S. The USA observes ‘Memorial Day’ this weekend, to honor those who ‘gave their all’ for the country. We also mourn the many innocents, including young children, taken by gun violence in the past week. May they Rest In Peace. Peace. Peace.

A moment of silence… in the company of a dragonfly

The Magic of Slowing Down

Tags

serenity, silence, slowing down, stillness

I have always been a fan of the number nine. I was delighted when I first found out that if you added the number nine to any number, and you sum up the resulting digits, you got back the sum of the digits that you started with. Nine is preservative in addition. So, let’s say we begin with 25. Two plus five is seven. Now, add nine, and we get 34. Three plus four is seven. Let’s add ninety-nine. 34 plus 99 is 133. One plus three plus three is seven. Try adding 999. 1132. Still seven.

Now try multiplication with nine. Nine becomes transformative. The resulting sum of the digits will always be nine. 25 times 9 is 225. Two plus two plus five is nine. 25 times 99 is 2,475. Two plus four plus seven plus five is 18. One plus eight is 9. Yes, we can play with nines like this all day long. Magical when we slow down to contemplate, isn’t it?

In human life, when nine is engaged in multiplication, it becomes an agent for transformation. For example, it takes nine months for a human baby to be born. Is there any greater act of transformation than two cells becoming a baby? Can you think of an example in our daily lives where addition by nine represents preservation? I will give you a personal example. 

Nine years ago to the day, give or take a few days, a few folks gathered on twitter on a Sunday morning at 11am ET and had a conversation about spirituality. The topic was, “On Slowing Down”. There was no agenda or expectation that there would even be a second conversation the following Sunday. It was simply an experiment inspired by a question posed by me to one of my good friends – why isn’t there any chat on twitter about spirituality? Wayne’s response was —  so what if there isn’t one? Why don’t you start one? 

Answer a question with a question. That’s the classic way in which a teacher and mentor can nudge us to do something that takes us out of our comfort zone. I remember thinking back then — what will I even talk about? So, I asked Wayne again. What should the topic be? His response was — what do you love doing most? Talk about that. Hmm. What do I love doing most? I love slowing down, sitting and doing “nothing”. I learnt that from my Dad.

He could sit and read the newspaper for hours. He could sit in absolute stillness and silence with a cup of tea at peace for what seemed the longest time. He could stand in the kitchen patiently and tend to the assembly of his seven-layered, seven-colored rice dish for what seemed like forever. You simply couldn’t rush him for anything.

So, in the last week of July, which happens to be his birthday week (he would have been eight six this year), on a Sunday morning in 2011, a few friends of mine gathered and chatted about “slowing down”. There were only three questions. I did not ask the first question until twenty minutes into the hour. We had no idea what we were doing except that we were all simply happy to be there, enjoying each other’s company as we held our cups of tea or coffee and wondered about the merits of “slowing down”. 

That was then. Nine years ago. It seems like a life-time or more in online years. And yet, not much has changed in some ways since 2011, has it? If anything, the need for us to experience the magic of slowing down is all the more greater, isn’t it? How else is one to engage in remembrance and gratitude, if not through the active process of slowing down? How else, if not by slowing down, am I to thank all of those who have sent hundreds of thousands of words of hope and inspiration to the #SpiritChat community over the years?

How about slowing down offline? It is in slowing down that I can watch and deeply feel the sun rise slowly at the eastern end of the street at dawn or feel the silvery glow of the sliver of the moon’s rising at dusk. Slowing down allows me to contemplate the beauty of the flower that was separated overnight and fell to the ground in homage to the earth. It allows me to touch the dew fallen in the grass with light feet, and inhale the air of the cool morning breeze before the heat rises and melts it away. And yes – how is one to engage in meditation, if not by first slowing down physically and remembering to bring myself to a state of rest?

So yes, slowing down allows us to return to remembrance. Regularly slowing down within allows us to be in constant remembrance.  What kind of remembrance? The external world will be relentless in its demands on us, and yet That stillness will remain in our hearts forever. It shall be patiently waiting for us to accept its invitation to visit with it, to let the outer world be, and to choose to be immersed in the world within. Will we make that choice? How much can we slow ourselves down? Will we observe the observer and remember that there is That permanent, indestructible, all-loving, all-joyous, all-truthful One within All off us?

That remains the great question, the great challenge.

Nature has some pointers for us. As fast as a hummingbird flies or a bee buzzes or a butterfly flaps her wings, they all have to slow down, to come to a moment of stillness, so that they can experience the magical taste of the nectar of life. What can we learn from their behavior? Even the new puppy, who can go a hundred miles an hour, has to pause for a drink of water, a nibble at her food bowl, before she can take off again like an express train towards her next station of play.

Like the piano virtuoso Wayne Mcevilly, who inspired me to start the weekly chat nine years ago said — the greatest classical music compositions are so because the composers put as much care into putting the pauses into the right place, as they did into assigning the notes that each instrument is to play.

Let us condense nine years into nine minutes. That is my invitation to you. Take nine minutes and be still. Watch your breath or the light in your heart or the sunrise or the sunset or a single flower dancing in the stillness. Absolute stillness. There is magic in all of That. Thou art That. That is all there Is. 

We all can experience all of That, if we were to embrace the act of slowing down. No magic necessary. 

Kumud

P.S. Join me and the #SpiritChat community on Sunday, July 26 at 9amET as we slow down to create some magic. I look forward to hearing from you about your experiments with pure stillness. I will bring tea and maybe even some cake – you bring your open hearts and we will chat. Namaste – @AjmaniK

A bee slows down to visit a butterfly bush in the front yard

 

Coming Closer in Silence

Tags

coming closer, community, silence, spirituality

I arrived at “Unity Center”, just as MM was walking into the hall where she was going to conduct the morning visitation. Draped elegantly in a silk safer, her graceful figure walked silently by all those (including me) lining the hallway, with the softest of half-smiles on her face.

I made my way quietly to the far right corner of a row about 12 rows from the stage, and sat four seats in from the corner. There was almost total silence in the room — something that is unusual to find these days, particularly in a large group setting of a 150+ people. I rarely need an invitation to be silent, so I felt immediately at home.

With my eyes firmly closed, almost half expecting that she would start speaking or chanting from where she was seated on the stage, I slowly realized that silence was all we would all hear from her. The only thing I could hear was the occasional shuffling of feet and knees as each row took turns lining up, and the moving forward in the center aisle, on their way to the stage, where they would get their individual visit with her.

After about what seemed like a really short thirty or forty minutes in the silence, I heard movement in my row. Our turn had come. A volunteer was motioning to folks in our row to join those waiting in the center aisle… and we shuffled ahead slowly in growing anticipation of soon being on stage, and then, eventually, directly in front of Her for our silent visit…

At any given time, there were four people on stage. One directly seated in front of her, and three people waiting their turn. When I was one person away from my personal visit with her, I noticed a small sign next to her on the floor saying two words – “come closer”. This was purportedly so that she would not have to lean too far forward in her small chair to reach each person, and hold their heads in their hands. In addition, if we paid attention to the sign and did “come closer”, the better would perhaps be the transfer of love in the moments where she would look directly into your eyes and you could see the entire universe of love in hers.

After I came off of the stage, swimming in transformative energy immersion, I wondered if I had taken the “come closer” sign too literally. Perhaps the “come closer” invitation was a reminder of the emotional and spiritual gap or distance that we consciously or sub-consciously develop, the walls we build around our hearts, due to our inherent distrust of our ability to experience the energy of pure, divine love.

After I had returned to my seat and reverted again to silence, the shuffling of people in the center aisle and on stage stopped — now, there was Total silence. Even the whirring of the oxygen machine that an older lady had been using a few rows ahead of me, stopped. This totality of silence was accompanied by a marked and perceptible shift in the energy in the room.

After what seemed like ten minutes or so, the energy shower was turned off, I raised my head, open my eyes ever so slightly, to see that the She was making her way out of the hall with eyes gently lowered, through the very same center aisle in which we all had waited a bit earlier for our personal journey to “get closer” to her. An incredible morning session that lasted a total of seventy-five minutes had now come to a close.

I wasn’t sure that I was quite ready to socialize yet, let alone indulge in any conversation – so I sat for a few minutes in my chair, after which the lady who was sitting next time, inquired of me with a hint of disappointment – “why didn’t she speak? I thought she would give a lecture or something.”

I wanted to say that perhaps she wanted to “come closer” to us in silence, and that it was her chosen medium, rather than words. But, I wasn’t sure how my reply would be received, so I simply said – “I am not sure. Maybe she will speak next time.”

What do you think? Can silence bring us closer to our spiritual self? Can silence be a better medium than words? If so, then why does silence make some of us uncomfortable? What are some fears that stop us from “coming closer” in silence?

Kumud

P. S. This was my second visit with MM (Mother Meera) in the past three years. She reminded me of the power of renewal in silence. Please join me and the #SpiritChat community on Sunday May 19 at 9amET – we will try and “come closer”. Namaste – Kumud

“Silent Spring”

Finding Zen in a Noisy Social World

Tags

healing, silence, spirituality, stillness, zen

In an age of speed, I began to think, nothing could be more invigorating than going slow. In an age of distraction, nothing can feel more luxurious than paying attention. And in an age of constant movement, nothing is more urgent than sitting still.” ― Pico Iyer, The Art of Stillness

We are living in an era where the online and offline worlds are deeply intertwined. “Going online” happens faster than the blink of an eye, and five minutes to check an email or a Facebook message stretches far beyond the time that most don’t even feel they have to begin with.

Welcome to the digital era. A powerful resource for exchanging information and ideas, for creating impact, for creating change. Over the last decade, social influence has snowballed into a fast-paced, never-ending stream of data that most consume by default. Consequently, many are experiencing frustration, anxiety, stress, identity crisis and, sadly, even death as a result of the “noise” that constantly permeates our global and individual psyche, day in and day out.

You can only make sense of the online world by going offline and by getting the wisdom and emotional clarity to know how to make the best use of the Internet. — Pico Iyer

Investing time offline, on a consistent basis, is a practice that provides the inner peace, clarity, and wisdom we need to not only survive in this noisy world, but to thrive. Those who choose to integrate mindful practices into their daily lives are the ones who will be the true change agents, creating a more conscious, connected and creative world.

How conscious are we being with the use of the Internet and our devices? Is the media governing our time and our thoughts? How can we take a more conscious approach to the online space? In doing so, could we create more impact, gain greater fulfillment, make more meaningful connections?

You’re cordially invited to join us for a global conversation to discuss the topic “Finding Zen in a Noisy Social World.” This is a #SpiritChat community event taking place on the Twitter platform this Sunday October 28 at 9am ET. For a distraction free experience, join us in the chat room @ tweetchat.com/room/spiritchat.

We look forward to having you join us!

Christine L Bowen (CLB)

———

Finding Zen in a Noisy Social World

A Global #SpiritChat Community Event

Sunday, October 28 @ 9a ET

tweetchat.com/room/spiritchat

Christine L Bowen (CLB) is a creative, outgoing, and authentic person whose core values are Absolute Faith & The Golden Rule. She lives presently, loves wholeheartedly, laughs regularly, and she’s extremely passionate about living life at its highest potential and inspiring others to do the same.

With over 30 years of combined experience in the areas of visual communication, professional networking, and mass media, Christine passionately serves as a Creative Consultant to heart-centered entrepreneurs who desire to achieve a higher level of excellence with their brand identity & social presence.

Her unique approach inspires them to infuse consciousness, connection, and creativity into their TOTAL presence, empowering them to intuitively attract and align with the ideal people and opportunities; creating more sustainable, thriving, and fulfilling businesses… and lives!

www.christinelbowen.com

———

I am delighted that Christine will be hosting our weekly #SpiritChat for us on Sunday, October 28th. This is part of our new initiative to bring new voices to host the weekly chat. Thank you, Christine! – Kumud @AjmaniK

Fruits of Solitude

Tags

silence, solitude, spirituality, stillness

The month of March was unique for me in many ways. As one who has naturally tended towards silence, and lately towards stillness, it surely was a month filled with a lot of activity, including change and travel. Two of the #SpiritChat conversations in March were about silence and stillness (with Janet Nestor). There was also the beautiful conversation on serendipity (with Elisa Balabram).

We filled three of the four S-quadrants in March – in April, we return to color in the fourth S-quadrant – Solitude. On the face of it, solitude could pass for the fraternal twin of silence, and a close cousing of stillness. In the context of spiritual practice, solitude bears sweet fruit when it is a choice made with a sense of freedom. When imposed upon us, solitude can be a form of bullying, of punishment, of retribution. Solitary confinement was (and still is) often used as one of the most effective forms of “breaking the spirit” of prisoners.

Solitude as imposition, often bears bitter fruit, which creates an energy of insecurity, fear, anger and more. One other undesirable fruit of forced solitude is that of loneliness. When we feel isolated, a sense of loneliness invades our heart and weakens our light. After the basic necessities of life are met, one of our greatest needs is perhaps the need to belong. It takes great inner (spiritual) strength to be in a state where we can feel absolutely content in being, and staying alone, without a sense of loneliness eventually creeping in.

Even though we may occasionally, by choice, turn away from the world, deep, prolonged solitude is a tough mountain to climb…

I asked the boy beneath the pines.
He said, “The master’s gone alone
Herb-picking somewhere on the mount,
Cloud-hidden, whereabouts unknown.”
— Chia Tao in My Country and My People

Yes. It takes a certain Mastery of our own self to be at peace, even joyful, in our choice of solitude. And yet, it is often unnerving to be alone with this stranger that we often only know in the context of our relationships, our jobs, our accomplishments. We are often at see when left with our own selves, aren’t we? The regular practice of silence and stillness do help us along the way. Serendipitious discoveries on the path – an unexpected burst of spring blooms as we turn the bend, an unfamiliar yet welcoming bird call, a flash of sunlight through the trees – reinforce our choice and our practice.

And then, spring comes, and we learn to bloom, to thrive with the stranger whose silent, still company once made us uncomfortable. Solitude begins to produce that sweet fruit which we feel comfortable to share with the strangers around us. In embracing solitude, we truly embrace Oneness. In embracing Oneness, we become the masters who look forward to traveling alone, to a destination unknown…

Kumud

P.S. I invite you to join us on Sunday, April 8th at 9amET on twitter, as we gather to talk about solitude… in the community that is #SpiritChat. Namaste 🙂

Fruits of Solitude – Passionfruit and Pomegranate (on farm in Brazil)

Stillness – by @JanetNestor

Tags

silence, stillness

“When there is silence one finds the anchor of the universe within oneself” ― Lao Tzu

When I think of stillness, I instantly thought of the Taoist philosophy lectures during my Chi Healing classes many years ago. I remember the foundational teachings of Tai Chi and feel of the Qi Gong form that I practice regularly. Stillness is part of the human journey.

Using ancient thought from Chinese Medicine, energy is often categorized as yin or yang. Yang energy is sunshine, masculine, and movement oriented. Yang energy likes to get things done quickly and push to the finish line – it is direct, logical, and rational. Yin energy is feminine energy, moonbeams, soft and passive. Yin energy will stop, listen to a bird’s song and enjoy the moment – it is relaxed, imaginative, intuitive and will “sleep on” a decision rather than rush to the finish line. Each of us, male and female, young or old, is a mix of these two energies.

Stillness, yin energy, is by its nature rooted and grounded. Grounded energy is solidly connected to life and the earth. This sense of flow, permanence, and moment to moment connection creates a life lived in the present moment, de-emphasizing the past and the future. A present moment lifestyle tends to center you, meaning that you are fully aligned and allow the flow of spiritual energy and earth energy into your body and energy field. A now-centered life tends to become one that is energetically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually balanced.

Yin energy is built into each of us – a part of our humanness – a part of our body structure through our yin and yang meridian system (vessels used in acupuncture) and our yin and yang organs. For example, your central nervous system is made up of yin and yang meridians, and your body is made up of yin and yang organs. Your yin organs are your heart, lungs, kidneys, and spleen and they primarily produce and regulate your blood and bodily fluids. Your yang organs are gallbladder, urinary bladder, stomach, small and large intestines and one of the meridian vessels called the triple warmer, the meridian that takes you into fight or flight in times of danger. The yang organs mainly digest food and transmit nutrients to your body. As you can see, there is communication and cooperation between your meridians and organs keeping you mentally and physically vital and alive.

Because each of us has yin energy woven into our very existence, each of us can choose to embrace the yin within us and allow the growth of our inner-stillness. We can claim the gift that is woven into the fabric of our being. I have a favorite phrase I always share with anyone having difficulties claiming their inner-stillness – Why would the Creator allow you to be born without the ability to “phone home”? Your yin energy is your GPS and your telephone line to home – to the world of spirit – to the strength of Creation – from which you came.

I’ve chosen to share two very easy ways to use your phone line and your GPS system home to the stillness within.

• Close your eyes, breathe consciously, bringing your in-breath from your belly and fully inflating your lungs. On the out-breath, exhale slowly and thoroughly. Continue breathing in this way for a minute or two. Ask your body and spirit this question: Will you show me how to quiet my mind and find the inner silence and stillness that is within me? Continue to breathe, trusting that gradually one breath and one day at a time you will be shown the way.
• Gap Breathing: Breathe using the directions above. After a few breaths, on the next in-breath, inhale deeply and hold the breath. Listen closely. There is not one sound in that gap between your in-breath and out-breath. There is total stillness. Exhale and hold the breath again. You will once again find that same stillness. You learn to trust this silence and stillness and extend it from one or two seconds into minutes. Eventually, experiencing the silence and stillness will feel normal and natural, and you will be able to tap into it anytime you choose.

– Janet Nestor

Contact Information

• Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/JanetNestor http://www.facebook.com/JanetGNestor
• Facebook group co/admin – http://www.facebook.com/groups/IAMChoosingLove/
• Twitter: @JanetNestor
• Website and blog: http://www.mindfulpathways.com

Please join @JanetNestor as she steps up to host #Spiritchat (twitter chat) on Sunday, March 18th at 9amEDT. This will be Janet’s debut at hosting the chat (although I have co-hosted her a few times before…). Janet is a wonderful friend and long-term member and participant in the #Spiritchat community. Thank you, Janet, for stepping up to host the live chat as I travel… Namaste. – Kumud

On Practicing Silence

Tags

silence, solitude, stillness

The practice of silence is perhaps one of the tougher practices in this age of so much noise and chatter. To experience external silence, one has to make a concentrated effort to filter out the inputs that are clamoring for our attention. Even during sleep, noise surrounds us, even though some of us sound sleepers are fortunate to be blissfully unaware of it. Have you ever noticed that you wake up on some days feeling completely rested, while on others, you are still tired? Why is that?

One reason for the difference between a ‘sound’ sleep and an ‘unsound’ one is perhaps the amount of ‘internal noise’ that we may have experienced during the night. When we get ready to go to sleep after a particularly hectic, busy, noise-filled day, our brain has not had enough time during our waking state to fully process all the inputs that it received during the day. Our central processing unit, the brain, has only so much processing power. So, when overloaded, it tends to enqueue the unprocessed inputs. It is these excess, unprocessed inputs that the brain then processes during the night – in the very hours that we are physically at rest, but mentally wide awake!

And so we begin the next day, often to the sound of a jarring, noisy sounding alarm, which literally sets the tone for the day to come. And the cycle repeats itself, until the weekend, when we can (hopefully) take some time off from the treadmill of external chatter and noise. But the weekend is often not enough time to rest our body and mind, never mind the spirit. And so we look forward to the next vacation, or at least a three- or four-day weekend, to play catch-up, to truly feel physically, mentally, and spiritually rested again. I have a proposition.

What if we could vacate our mind-brain on a regular basis, every single day? Let us develop a practice, so that we actively immerse ourselves in silence at the beginning and end of every day. The moment that we wake up, we dive into silence. We may start with fifteen minutes, grow to thirty minutes, and then progress to an hour of morning silence. If we can be physically silent, then we have a better chance to be mentally silent. At the end of every day, laying in bed, what if we were to take a few minutes to be physically, and then mentally silent? How would the quality of sleep improve with this practice?

Once we can develop a practice to be mentally quiet when physically still at the beginning and end of every day, we can invoke that quiet state any time during the day. We can even invoke silence while in motion, even amidst the great noise of the world. And when we can be internally silent on demand, we have taken one giant step towards invoking peace, joy and lightness, no matter our external state of stimulus.

In the true depth of our inner silence, we discover our connectedness to the infinite. In silence, we discover that our heart has the capacity to be like the ocean that refuses no river. For it is in silence, that we can hear the message, the purpose, of the seed that was planted in us at birth.

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join us for our weekly conversation on twitter – Sunday, March 11th at 9amET/1pmUTC/6:30pmIndia. Please note that we shift to daylight savings time in my time zone this Sunday. The live hour of #SpiritChat will arrive an hour early for those not observing the one hour time-shift. Namaste!

Practicing Silence…

On Experiencing Stillness

Tags

experience, practice, silence, spirituality, stillness

The stillness with which leaves appear and grow on the trees… an overnight flood that greens the forest right before my very eyes… even the breeze has stood still to gawk at their brilliance…

The stillness with which the single goose swims in the lake at dusk… perhaps looking at his own shadow on the calm surface as it mingles with the fading light of the post-sunset glow…

The stillness with which the mother goose sits on her freshly laid eggs among the rapidly growing tall grasses… as she patiently grows life anew to sustain the promise of staying true to perpetuating the cycle of life…

The stillness with which the puppy watches the play of the geese on the water after he has registered his protest to them in no uncertain terms when he deemed that they were ‘in his space’ in the field where they came out to dry themselves off on this overcast day… in the same field where he chases robins on sunny days…

The stillness with which the rain falls on the lake and sets off circular ripples that dissolve into each other and quietly, imperceptibly raise the level of the lake… and spread infinite possibility in their wake…

The stillness with which the daffodils appear at the beginning of spring… in seemingly random clusters to light up the forest floor… a welcoming committee getting their color on to greet the leaves on the trees that are soon to follow…

The stillness of the morning fog that waits for the sun to rise high and turn it into dew drops on the daffodils… so that the hummingbirds and butterflies and bumblebees can awaken from their slumber and slake their early morning thirst…

The stillness that comes over the forest between pre-dawn and sunrise after the single morning lark has announced the wakening call of sunrise, only to then go silent in deference to the rising sun’s horse-drawn chariot emerging from the East…

And I haven’t even yet talked about the inner stillness that is inspired by, reflected in, is a conduit for, all of this outer stillness… for that is a gift of stillness that is an amalgamation of light and lightness and color and joy and levity that transcends any experience that the stillness of the outer world, limited as it is by our outward facing senses can present to us… imagine That.

Better yet, experience It.

For yourself.

Meditate.

On That.

Kumud @AjmaniK

Join our weekly twitter chat held Sunday April 30th, 2017 with the #SpiritChat community. We will try and experience stillness among conversation in our connection… Bring your stillnesss stories. I will bring tea and cookies…

On Experiencing Stillness… with flowers

Our Personal Sanctuaries

Tags

sacred, sanctuary, silence, spirituality

The idea of a sanctuary as a space which is held sacred, as a place of safety, a place of warmth, a nest of comfort, a nook of rest and relaxation, an island of silence and stillness, is perhaps not new to any of us. While the formal seed notion of a sanctuary may have been planted in formal places of worship outside the home, the individual notion of what is sacred and what consists of a personal sanctuary goes beyond. In fact, it would be unusual to find any Asian Indian home without a formal area, or even an entire room, set aside as a “mini-temple” or sanctuary – a dedicated place for prayer, celebration and contemplation.

Why is it that being in a sanctuary, or the mere thought of revisiting them, generates mostly positive energy within us? Is it because out hearts and minds are assured safety, security and silence in the time that we spend in the safe-zone of a sanctuary (inside or outside our homes)? In the past few decades, the idea that similar safe-zones would benefit animals and plants (mainly forests) have led to the creation of national parks, protected forests, wildlife sanctuaries and more. One would imagine that us humans would feel more at peace, if there is a feeling of peace in the flora and fauna around us. If you regularly take a walk in any park or forest or in a natural space that you consider to be a sanctuary, you will feel the radiance of peace.

If greater inner peace were the only benefit of investing time and space in developing a personal sanctuary, it would be enough. However, there is more. Most of the time, the amount of time that we experience in the peace of a sanctuary is limited. In fact, unless we have a personal sanctuary at home and we have made a spiritual agreement to regularly spend time in it, the fraction of our daily lives that we spend in such a sanctuary is extremely limited. In fact, as our lives become more and more mobile, we are perhaps wise to develop a ‘mobile spiritual sanctuary’! How can we make this possible?

Let us begin at the beginning. We will have to do some work to construct this mobile sanctuary. First, we shall clarify and define what is sacred to us. This is a highly personal and personalized task. If necessary, this can be derived from our core beliefs and values. Write them down. These are your ‘self commandments’. Second, we can excise or clean out those thoughts, words and actions that lead us away from our definition of sacred. We may have to do this spiritual house cleaning on a regular basis, even daily, lest the dust of the world gets to grow too thick on the coffee (or tea) tables of our sanctuary. Third, we can focus on growing into higher mindfulness and heartfulness – or whatever fullness we choose. This will be done with our preferred tools – meditation, association, recitation, writing, walking – any portable tools that we can bring with us wherever we go…

The three-step process – identify the sacred, clean the dust, invest in practice and tools – can create a portable sanctuary for us. I posit that this is a sanctuary framework that can work for any and all of us who choosed to do so. It is portable and shareable. And better yet, this portable sanctuary can be recharged when we are near ‘home base’ – our physical sanctuary at home or outside the home!

Did I miss any steps? Do you personally see any challenges or flaws in the framework? Do you have any other ideas that you would like to share on the subject? Well, thank you for reading this far. I invite you to share on this subject in our live hour on twitter in #SpiritChat – Sunday, December 13th at 9amET / 2pmUTC / 7:30pm India. Or share your personal sanctuary thoughts in the comments below. Either way, we would love to hear from you!

Until we meet again – from my sanctuary to yours – I offer you a deep bow in Namaste,

Kumud @AjmaniK

On Stillness and Silence

Tags

silence, spiritchat, spirituality, stillness

I had planned to sleep in Saturday morning… the one day in a week where I feel that I can have a few extra winks, as a throwback to my ‘younger’ days when I could sleep for as long as a I wanted to, at any given place 🙂 But, getting ‘older’ has its ‘side-effects. One of those is this propensity to wake up at exactly the same (early) hour every morning, ready to begin the day. Over the summer, my days have fallen into the habit of beginning with ‘meditation’.

The word, ‘meditation’, along with ‘yoga’, is getting a lot of press these days. It is perhaps for good reason, because, as our lives get busier, and we feel the imbalance(s) caused by the dynamic energy of stress, some of us may seek therapies that can help restore balance for us. Any new practice, whether it be ‘meditation’, ‘yoga’, ‘mindfulness’ or a combination of them, requires practice before we can feel some positive changes within and without. In addition, we may have to review some of our conditioned responses, divest some of our habits, in order to allow these new(er) practices into our daily life.

One of the habits that has served me well for a long time, even before ‘meditation’ and ‘mindfulness’ were practices for me, is the practice of silence, the practice of stillness. Some say that we have to be still and silent before we can truly ‘meditate’, while say the opposite – that it is ‘meditation’ which helps us be silent, experience stillness. Either way, let us focus on silence and stillness. ‘Being quiet’ in the context of ‘not speaking’ is only a very rudimentary form of silence. True silence is a ‘systemic’ event. There are three aspects to complete or ‘systemic’ silence:

1. Silence of the body. One way of achieving this is by being physically still, in a comfortable posture, which we can hold for a reasonable amount of time. Good posture tends to put us in a dynamic tension and equilibrium, avoiding superfluous motion. My ‘posture of silence’ may be different from yours. I hope you have an opportunity to discover yours. What may be some challenges for us in discovering, exercising our physical ‘posture of silence’?

2. Silence of the mind. I surmise that ‘mental silence’ is perhaps the toughest for many to achieve, as it is for me. It often takes me a while as I sit in my physical ‘posture of silence’, to experience slivers of ‘mental silence’. The falling rain outside the window, the chirping of a bluejay, the starting up of a car, the rustle of the breeze through the leaves – all of these tend to activate the senses and send waves of thoughts on the surface of the mental lake…

If our aim is to ‘quieten’ all thought (to silence the mind), then we may have to ‘silence’ all senses. If our objective is to fill ourselves with ‘thought’, it doesn’t take as much work, for it seems to happen naturally! Perhaps we can reframe our objective? We can choose to simply let the thoughts flow, become observers, and practice a kind of ‘mindfulness’. Or we can fill ourselves with a single, dynamic, energizing thought, which eliminates all the spurious, energy consuming thoughts that bombard our mind. What might be this single, dynamic thought?

3. Silence of the heart. Heart silence can be loosely interpreted as emotional silence. Anger, confusion, frustration and such often send negative emotions which disturb the silence of the heart. A high degree of positive emotions created by excessive praise, victory celebrations and such, can create emotions which disrupt the silence of the heart. Disruption caused by ‘positive’ emotions may be preferable to ‘negative’ emotions, but both require work to restore our heart to a state of equanimity.

Silence and stillness of the body, mind and heart – when experienced simultaneously, these three can make us feel whole again – a sense of spiritual wellness. Yes, our silence and stillness can be misinterpreted by those who do not realize or understand their value and beauty. We need to be patient, and stay with our practice, and with time, space and grace, the light that suffuses from within us will be enough to disseminate the value of silence to those that connect with us…

In writing the words above, I was fortunate to find some of my notes on silence, from the book “Silence as Yoga”. In it, Phillips Brooks is quoted about the ‘creative power of silence’ as saying:

Even in our silence, our apparent inactivity, it is good to know that we can be something for others; to know (and this we may know surely) that no man or woman of the humblest sort can really be strong, gentle, pure and good, without the world being better for it, without somebody being helped and comforted by the very existence of that goodness.

It is the lives, like the stars, which simply pour down on us, the calm light of their bright and faithful being, up to which we look, and out of which we gather the deepest calm and courage. – Phillips Brooks

Namaste, be well, and enjoy your stillness and silence,

Kumud

P.S. If you have read this far, thank you. I also invite you to join us on twitter in our weekly chat in #SpiritChat on Sunday September 14th at 9am ET / 2pm UK / 6:30pm India. If you cannot join in the live chat (or you read this after the chat time), please share some thoughts on ‘silence and stillness’ in the comments below.

Ready? Deep breath. Q1. The two words ~ "Stillness and Silence" ~ what energy do they invoke within you? #SpiritChat
http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/511138525820227584

Q2.  Why is silence important in our lives? How is it different from stillness? Is it?  #SpiritChat
http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/511139856744202241

Q3.  Physical silence (of the body) - how can we achieve it and still avoid inaction?  #spiritchat
http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/511141852289183744 

Q4. Some say Mental silence is tough to achieve. What are some obstacles? How do you overcome them?  #SpiritChat
http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/511143778087075842

Q5. Silence of the heart (of emotions) - how is it disrupted? How is it restored? #SpiritChat
http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/511145458937634816 

Q6. The connection between stress, stillness and silence is...? #SpiritChat 
http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/511146919415271424

Q7. Q7. Choose a Single dynamic thought/emotion that would give you mind/heart 'silence'. What is it? Why? #SpiritChat 
http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/511148146756698112

Q8. How do we explain our practice of stillness, of silence, to the 'world'? How does it benefit the 'world'? #SpiritChat  
http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/511149504083820545

Q9. What would you like to ask (or tell) the community about #Stillness and/or #Silence? #SpiritChat 
http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/511150909775433728

Q10. If there is a project you have been working on in 'silence', and would like to share, go ahead! :) #SpiritChat
http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/511151989150199808

Full Transcript (with stats)

“Silence and Stillness” – the storify summary – https://storify.com/ajmanik/silence-and-stillness