Love , Devotion & Surrender : Raja Bhoga Artik at noon today.
Prasada-sevaya :
bhai-re! sharira avidya-jalkrishna baro doyamoy, koribare jihwa jay,
swa-prasad-anna dilo bhai
sei annamrita pao,radha-krishna-guna gao,
preme dako chaitanya-nitai
Via HareKrsna.com
Thank you Lila for sending these images from Mysore.
I can feel the Bhakti from the kirtanas you are conducting with the Ashtangis there.
These images really helped me warm up on Thursday morning in Chicago where it was 17 degrees. Jaya & Haribol !
I took this picture of the exterior of the festive New Orleans Temple prior to Tulasi Puja on an early Sunday evening.
NOLA aka New Orleans Louisiana was looking & feeling unseasonably wintery & festive a week ago.
It has been over a decade since I last visited NOLA. New Orleans , like Miami , feels like no other place in the United States. With its French & Spanish heritage & flavor.
Maya is illusion. Maya-mi , the land of illusion , where everything is seductive & sensual. Always happy to be back , to be able to walk on the beach & boardwalk after meetings & get to practice at Miami Life Center's Mysore evening class.
Patrick is back from Mysore & is full of humor & good cheer. And I found street parking outside MLC prior to each class. South Beach karma.
Not so happy Saturday night as I had to fly to New York early Sunday morning & the party on the hotel roof deck is keeping me awake. Definitely not an illusion , hehe.
I am grateful this Thanksgiving that I received blessings from my Guru Maharaja on the occassion of his Vyasa Puja.
Happy that I had Thanksgiving lunch after artik at the LA Temple today with my teacher.
Led class tom.AM , Mysore class Sun. AM then the Tulasi & Salagrama Festival in the afternoon. Jaya !
Santa Monica has been home for me for over a decade now. The image on the left is of Palisades Park looking out towards Malibu.
I'm a 21st CE nomad. Ever since I was put on a plane alone & travelled by myself at the age of 7 , I knew I was destined to never be able to sit still , to commit to anything for an extended period of time.
So its ironic that I have manged to be based in SaMo for all this time ; the city which turned me on to yoga. Perhaps knowing that LAX is just down the road & having the ability to travel every other week for work has kept me here.
I will be going on hiatus for a while. Will be flying out to Dallas & Houston next week , then heading to Italy the following 2 weeks ( I am intending to drop-in at AYRI Roma ) , Chicago end of Oct. & then onwards to Maya-Mi 1st week Nov. ( evening Mysore at MLC South Beach , yes ! ).
" May the longtime sun shine upon you , all love surround you , and the pure light within you , guide your way on. " Sat Nam. Haribol. Jaya !
Via Eddie Stern @ AYNY / The Broome Street Temple :
Hari Om !
I hope you have all had a happy and relaxing summer ! As September approaches, the festival season at the Broome Street Temple begins, starting with Ganesh Chaturthi from September 15th to 19th. During the fall season the days shorten, and we naturally become more quiet, inward and reflective. Ganesh, with his small eyes and trunk of discrimination, symbolizes our reflective nature, and removes the obstacles that cloud our consciousness that prevent our inward journey towards Self-knowledge. He is therefore also regarded as the bestower of the wisdom that accompanies inner reflection.
The Ganesh festival is followed by Devi Navaratri, where we seek the blessings of the Divine Mother in her aspects Durga, Lakshmi and Saraswati - She who removes difficulties, bestows spiritual merit and prosperity, and makes us fit to receive divine knowledge. It is also the fall harvest festival, when the Divine Mother is thanked and celebrated for giving the bounty of food and nourishment.
The season culminates with Deepavali, the festival of lights, where we celebrate the light of realization, the inner light of divine consciousness that resides equally in all beings, with music, dance and worship.
There are three levels that all of these festivals, and all spiritual practices, address: personal, elemental and collective.
* On the personal level, we devote ourselves to internal purification, clarification of our intentions, and intensify our spiritual practices;
* On the elemental level, we see that we are an intricately woven part of the natural world, and therefore strive to respect and care for nature and our planet;
* On a collective level, we strengthen our understanding that at our core we are one, unified field of consciousness, and through mantra, ritual, yoga and other practices, seek to move beyond differences to a state of wholeness, compassion and understanding.
When we chant Om Shanti Shanti Shantihi at the end of our prayers, we are acknowledging these three levels.
So, please save the dates of September 15th - 19th for our grandest festival of the year. Our special additions to the schedule this year include Veda chanting and arati on Pier 40 at the Hudson River to inaugurate the festival on Saturday the 15th, from 4-6 pm, and the Ganesh Utsav procession on Wednesday the 19th, at 6 pm.
In the next email we will send a detailed schedule, and ways for you to get involved in making our 11th annual festival a huge success!
Yours,
Eddie, Ankur and Kaustubha Das
I got to practice at David Miliotis ' evening Mysore class last Thursday ( which was also Krishna Janmastami ) at Jois YogaShala Encinitas.
It felt great to be able to practice , especially in the town which is considerded the birthplace of Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga in the United States.
At the left is Guruji's image in the practice space of the yogashala.
David is an Authorized Ashtanga teacher as well as a Sanskrit scholar. He was very hands on during my attendance at his class.
JYS Encinitas is celebrating its 2nd anniversary on Aug. 15th with a special guest , Sanjeev Verma , who will be conducting a talk on Understanding KARMA.
Learn how to transform Karma & evolve towards Moksha with effortless practices that remove negativities from your mind , bringing peace & abundance into every aspect of life.
Puja will proceed the event.