Consciousness check

S H O R T

Guru, worship

I see the world from within myself, a transparent play

I see my attachments as illusion and futile, painful

I withdraw my senses, hold my shakti

I love my appetites, and slip off the hook

Shanti shanti shanti

Brahmacharini tapasya,
the unmarried version of Parvati

L O N G

Choose the world of the subtle body... inside... falling backward...

See the world from within...


Now, instead of concepts and story...

Breath, mantra... posture, subtle body...

Floating, meditation...

Love and worship and longing...


My Self, my Guru, Lord Krishna...

Mata Durga, Sree Parvati, Maa Brahmacharini

Paramashiva, who is Shree Kundalini at play...

Love and worship, longing and consciousness...

Now.

Brahmacharini tapasya to become one with Shiva

My "go to" contemplation

My "go to" dharana/dhyana. My focus and practice. My contemplation. 

My "go to" dhyana is to nudge myself out of multiplicity. I experience myself as formless, unlimited consciousness, the knower, and everything else a play of consciousness on the screen of life, the known. The play normally seems three-dimensional because of the magic of maya.

Inherent in this contemplation is acknowledging that the projection of maya cannot satisfy/protect me, or cause lack/harm me. Thinking otherwise is bondage. 

I want freedom. I see myself "unlatching" from the screen of the world going by. I let the illusion of satisfaction and lack slip away. It becomes a dance of light. And I choose freedom, the source. The real prize.

I can only do this because of the grace of my guru, because I have received shaktipat.

Step well

I also use my mind to slip out from the experience of multiplicity. When I am in this state, I experience Oneness, One without second. A singularity. My awareness resides in the great consciousness, the only Self. Immediately I am filled with great bliss.

I can reshape my consciousness like this for several moments at a time. 

An interesting aside is that my ability to shape my own consciousness was greatly improved by my years in Wicca, where "spells" are created by this containing and shaping of awareness, a discipline and practice that grows in effectiveness over time.

I also use this skill as a writer of fiction.

Swami Lakshmanjoo:

The word dhyana means “contemplation.” It is another mode in anavopaya (a means of enlightenment). Dhyana is contemplation on some point.  

There are different forms of dhyana. For example, you are practicing dhyana when you contemplate on the lotus in your heart, or on the meaning of some mantra such as the mantra “so’ham” or the mantra “Shiva.”  

This is a higher form of anavopaya because it is contemplation without any shape, without any form. If you were to contemplate on Lord Shiva as having a particular form, a particular shape, that is a lower form of anavopaya. It is contemplation with form.

Source: Kashmir Shaivism, The Secret Supreme, by Swami Lakshmanjoo
All Content is subject to Copyright © Universal Shaiva Fellowship, John Hughes.

Shrimad Bhagavad Gita

The Bhagavad Gita, The Song of the Lord, is chanted from a Sanskrit text of 18 chapters and 700 slokas (verses). If you're new to the Gita, you might begin by listening to a chapter while you study, work or relax. You will notice at a certain point that your mind will become clear and steady, and your spirit will feel uplifted. Try listening to all of the Gita. Both of the renditions below include all 18 chapters. There are many more versions on YouTube, etc.

I enjoy listening to the Gita while I attend to the duties of my home life. My experience of devotion and my focus on my spiritual intentions are blessed and lifted up to a higher level of ease and joy. 

You may choose to study the Bhagavad Gita, in which Lord Krishna reveals the highest forms of Yoga to Arjuna--and all of his devotees. My personal favorite translation for study is Jnaneshwar's Gita, which includes the exquisite commentary by the beloved Marathi saint Jnaneshwar in the English translation by Swami Kripananda.

You may decide to learn how to chant the Gita. Chanting with a video offering clear and correct pronunciation of the Sanskrit will help. Any time spent, no matter the proficiency or lack thereof, will bear tremendous spiritual fruit.

The Gita contains loving and precious revelations from the Lord himself. Find the precious jewels waiting in the Bhagavad Gita for you!

ॐ

Bhagavad Gita ~ Complete Sanskrit recitation (Isha/Sacred Verses) 

Very subtle musical changes in the background are helpful for the Western ear

Introductory mantras: Mahamrityunjaya - Mangalacharan  

A prayer to Shiva, recited by Shubha Mudgal (Isha/Sacred Verses)

Click through to playlist on YouTube with links to download

ॐ

The Bhagavad Gita recited by Kumari Vanisree and

Kumari Vijayalakshmi of Ramakrishna Mutt Bangalore

Click through to video on YouTube with links to download

 Main chant starts at 17:38

Made for this

I return to the mantra after socializing for a few hours.

A feeling of relief in mind and body, and the sweetness like a fragrance in my mind.

I no longer fear I have lost my way, or that I am incapable of real progress.

The mantra makes my being sing. I am made for this.

Awakening me

So recent, I remember.

Shakti and bliss would start in me. And I sprang into action!

What does it mean? How can I keep it? How can I increase it?

How should I think about it to control it, make it larger, keep it from going away?

What should I be doing? What if I don't do it right and I lose it??

Recently.

Now the shakti and bliss comes, and I breathe deeply. I open myself to whatever will happen.

Thank you for this shakti and bliss. 

Perhaps it is my Guru sending me shakti, awakening me.

Be awake. Be alive. Be now. Become more transparent with every breath. Feel your heart open.

And I breathe deeply.

Going large with Shree Kundalini

Om Namah Shivaya

There is nowhere to get to, only now. I chant forever, for what is established.

My mind feels betrayed. There's a jerking sensation. How can we be there already? I've got plans. And this is boring and stupid, by the way.

I am firm, yet gentle with my mind. Discipline feels good, and we soon settle down.

I chant and listen to the mantra hour after hour to soften my heart, to express and worship the forever divine, to be transformed. What could be better? (It's even easy! That's from her grace).

That One. Soham. I am that.

My ego dissolving dharana: Eyes open or closed, I concentrate on the light all around me, dancing completely free, frustrating my mind's obsession with engaging multiplicity. I remember how attempts to join with and direct this play of time and place is always fruitless, and worse than unkind. And I let go. Freedom. Freedom, bliss, and a profound contentment is where I go when multiplicity ends.

PS LOTS of things are freakin' HILARIOUS when multiplicity takes a hike. Like Shiva taking shape as an elaborate device and his communications called a "telephone." Ha ha, like Shiva needs help to talk to parts of himself. 

This is not intellectual. It's laughing while swooshing large with Shree Kundalini... amazing fun!! 

Bliss and equipoise

Radha Krishna ~ a divine love

Every moment, I feel my mind, my ego shirk as a little more of me is pulled away. Another tiny rent in my attachment to the play becomes another little in-rush of freedom, spinning stars and stardust on timeless breath. 

Kriyas and spontaneous meditation. Head falling forward.

So often the shakti of "Chidvilasananda" visiting me as the ashram. I hear the silence there, see the golden gleam of low light on the spotless floors, feel the close mantle of love and protection about me. 

I belong "there." "There" belongs to me.

I play the mantra always, very quietly when I'm asleep. I repeat the mantra until I am floating on the bliss.

I am undone from within. I feel limp, very tired. I shuffle backwards when something grabs my attention. I do not surge forward. The anxiety I usually keep under control is flowing around freely. It hurts but I experience it as consciousness being released.

I control nothing. I experience it all as coming to a single-pointedness of bliss and equipoise.

Radha Krishna ~ a spiritual love

New rule

Former lifelong rule: only commit to (sadhana and other) methods that will give solid and immediate progress, that don't require constant attention and effort. I decided this as a child so I wouldn't "get lost" in the depleting pursuits of others around me.

"Chanting (etc.) is okay, but it doesn't get me there." Everything was about getting there.

Then, I dropped all the "fixing" and "getting there" architecture built up in my being.

All because I said yes to merging with the guru, with finding her inside me, and the gifts that my guru given to us for several months, gifts she is showering on me right now? 

New rule: chant, mantra, meditation (etc.) to experience the love of God, drawing near to God, loving God... God and guru. To feel the vibrations of purity and love in my being.

The experience is now, always now. Progress is not required. It really is the journey, not the destination.

I guess most or all of this seems obvious to seekers. But I thought I had to somehow achieve realization. I had reached a point where my sadhana wasn't about practices. It was about the discipline, purification and enlightenment of my mind. This control of my mind has blossomed into something unexpected.

I am on the path of choosing God, loving God, and opening myself to my guru's grace. I don't have to worry about the right actions and/or timing. I don't have to worry about "getting there." I already worry about that way too much.

How can I further describe the revolution that is taking place in my life?

I am returning

I feel as though I have a hidden cache of the solution to every problem, the solution to even having problems. That which my soul craves. All I have ever dreamed of, longed for, felt a soul-stinging lack of, lamented with no relief, none.

Oh yes, I whisper to myself every time I reach for all that I have ever desired, here in my soul.

I carry the living shakti of my Lord, paramashiva. He lives in my heart. He isn't in my mind, (except as mind), I don't perceive him with my senses, though I do feel the emanating bliss of the eternal flowing through me in waves.

This is real. Not because I decided it is.

I have chased so many things in this life. But I only found the idea of all of these things, including God. I loved God so much as a teen, but I felt separated from God, empty and profoundly unfulfilled. I tried everything, tried escape in fiction. Everything was bright, shining cardboard. I felt so empty.

Look, I say to myself. This treasure... This universe without end in my heart. The gift of shaktipat, of endless love and shakti. Thank you...

And I slip into it like dark, cloudy cotton, like fresh and fragrant sheets, so cool. I slip into the chosen place between two worlds, the place where I become.

My treasure. There... whenever I reach for it. It doesn't go away!

When I offer pillow mantra. When I mediate throughout the day, my eyes open meditation. Always there, whenever I reach out (in).

I am rich beyond every need or desire, so far beyond any, any.

God lives in me. God answers my touches with bliss and more bliss. The bliss is changing me, dissolving me.

I love this inner darkness measured by light years of travel, of flowing, of not moving as the universe dances around me. Not as thoughts. Not detected by the senses. A living reality, my source.

I am accepting the gift of freedom. I am becoming free. I am returning. I am home.

Longing

Is there anywhere where the Beloved is not?

I am courted by the Beloved.

Here... This inner touch, sacred.

My mind insists, my mind paints from a lifetime of pictures. It makes the pictures to go with these sensations, but my mind only gets in the way. The pictures are not You.

Longing so intense I hold to the mantra, saying Your name, my private name for You.

If I can just sit with You, that is grace. You come again and again, and I am so glad, but it feels harder when I must pause, over and over, to just sit with You, then stop. I always stop. My mind simply wanders off.

Illusion, I remind myself. We reach for each other in every moment. Every moment, and there is only one.

We embrace in the now.

Burning

When everything goes to hell. When I start choosing anything besides the center place.

Don't waste time with trying to figure out what it means or what went wrong or what to do to get the guru mojo back.

Throw yourself on the fire.

It will all burn faster.

You are burning, girl. Mantra is the protection from the discomfort of the fire. It's all good.

OM Bhurbhuvah svah Surya Iha gacca

Iha sah Suryaya Namah ||

(Rg. Veda 1-35-2, Yajurveda 33-34)

Santa Monica

Longing... so much longing... I am breaking open, the pain of separation from my Beloved is so beyond anything I have ever felt.

I pray night and day for my Beloved. I see him in every place... this place, that place.... here... you're always here

Why aren't we one??

Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh.......................

You, you, you....... He is there, I see him in you.

I offer myself to You, my beloved. I offer my guru's shakti, all of my merits, every breath in prayer for You.

We are in love. I have given you my heart.

Breathe out 
So I can breathe you in
Hold you in
And now
I know you've always been

~Everlong/Foo Fighters

Dave Grohl ~ Foo Fighters

Sleepless

How? How can I learn how to sleep while I pray for my Beloved?

I am the bride

I am the bride

I am falling through satin and silk to the marriage bed

I call to you, and you answer me as this passion

I pray for you with this passion, and you caress me with fire

I offer everything to You

Each moment

Everything is for You

Everything is You

You call me every hour

(We are one in this surge of muscle and breath)

You call me every moment

(The prana rising as fire, we are the dancing Devi)

My Lord... My Love...

(Om nama shivaya)

You have moved in

(Om nama shivaya)


My heart is your home

Be mine

I will

Be mine

Mahashivaratri 2014

I wish to all the sweet blessings of the great Lord on this His day!

Om nama shivaya

Sadgurunath

I'm burning such ick, existential pain and goo. I don't remember ever burning this layer before.

Just to breathe is painful, sound and light are jarring, everything would push me off my center if I was anywhere near it.

I'm defenseless. And the worst is coming at me. I open my arms, breathe. The purifying fire....

I remember feeling these feelings as a girl, and wondering why life was so horrible.

Mantra mantra mantra.......

I hear the divine little tinkly nada often throughout the day, and it helps me to relax and be comforted.

I know I am surrounded by, permeated by guru's grace.

Sadgurunath...

Equipoise

I have been growing inside, spiritually... not pushing or pulling, not trying to find the words.

Equipoise. What happens dissolves by the next moment, the next now. I feel the tug of the moment, and let it carry me.

Freedom.

~ . . . ~ . . . ~ . . . ~ . . . ~ . . . ~

Shiva as my main squeeze,
God and actor,
Mr. Naveen Andrews

My insight a few seconds ago. My longing for a relationship, for physical closeness, is not a symptom of remaining tied to the world, of not being ready to let go of distractions so I can focus on my sadhana and realization...

...it is my love of God, my longing. Of course. It has always been there, and now it is becoming about You, my true love.

Many times a day now, when I feel that need inside for something real and truly satisfying, (not just a shade of what I long for), for the first time, I always seek You, I reach out for You. You are always there.

Shiva shiva shiva... I love your name I LOVE YOUR NAME.

Om nama shivaya...

My longing is for You.

The true success

Kashi the city of light, never forsaken

All of my life I have wanted what is missing, wanted to find and hold onto an experience that was real, that didn't dissolve away..

Now... When I am weary... of chasing the sparkles, of serving my obsessions, of leaning into this human torment... (even tingling all over when I visit _________, bearing alone this unrequited love)...

I am so happy, so lucky. At last I crave what is real, seek nothing more than this: to turn inside and be with God. This is the real sustenance, the real intimacy.

Torment is another word for purification. The fire takes only this, when I am that... So'ham.

Kashi the city of light, never forsaken

God You are real, you are here for me every time I reach for You inside... every time without fail. Over and over through the day I take a moment to love and worship you inside.

Om namah shivaya. Shiva Shiva Shiva. I love your name...

My heart at last knows where to rest: God is the true success. There is no other God but You.

Kashi the city of light, never forsaken

Nothing but God

Yearning, yearning, yearning... God, God, oh God.......

The yearning fills my whole body, a warmth and an ache. (I grasp and sigh...)

I keep praying: You God... You are all that I want, oh God...

When I walk through the room and hear the mantra playing (over and over), it sounds so sweet, like a brook tumbling over mossy stones, sweet with their mossy smell, I taste the sweetness, the nectar in the mantras, the sacred form of your sacred name.

I am praying, God. I am wandering, drunk with this passion, no place to seek, no person to seek, nothing to seek but Shiva, Shiva, Shiva....

Burn me, God. Burn everything that I have mistaken for anything but You.

I am driven to tears.

Naveen

Parvati performing
tapas to achieve
"reunion" with
Lord Shiva

I am aware that my blog has taken a new turn. To me, it is still a blog about myself as a Hindu (it is not about Hinduism per se). Now my sadhana (spiritual practice) has entered a different, deeply personal phase of tapas (purifying fire).

Anyone who knows about the tapas of sadhana knows that everything is burned, and some of the deepest, rawest emotions and karmas go right on the fire too, and provide a great deal of heat for the purification.

Even people who don't spend their life in spiritual practice experience going through a time in their life that is so intense, so complex, perhaps so painful that they emerge changed, the unessential slicked off. Sadhana is like that; to emerge from the intensity lighter and closer to truth is the sustenance that gets one through the next round of burning.

Realization is nothing more than living in the truth. The Self is already attained, here now. It is coming to know this in every moment that is freedom from delusion, delusion that has become habitual, automatic. Looking around and seeing "others" changes to looking around and seeing only God at play (I can do this, but not sustain it all the time).

To burn off delusion is necessary for most people to attain this state of being which is steady in their identification with the Supreme. The dualistic delusions of separateness from God take many forms. To burn it all in a lifetime and attain God requires the grace bestowing aspect of God, which is called the "guru."

The guru is mystical. My guru and I are closer than close, and yet, we are "thousands of miles apart." Her grace is my salvation. She gave me the supreme gift of shaktipat, and now she is burning all that is delusion in my life (because I want her to). Her grace lifts me up, up above Shree Maya and the delusion of multiplicity. Thank you...

So many parts of my life I see so much more clearly after all these years of sadhana. Trying to fit in. Fear of being alone. Pushing to attain, then pushing to reject as life strategies. These destructive patterns have ruled my life. No more.

Naveen Andrews

When I was an adolescent, like most girls I obsessed on my prince, my cowboy, my teen idols. I imagined myself with my beloved, riding the range on our horses, sleeping by the campfire. I spent hours listening to music and dreaming of him. Eventually I composed wistful and beautiful songs on the piano.

I waited with wonder for when we would finally meet. I just knew that life was all about the all-consuming relationship with him. My prince would fill me with love, and the aliveness that seemed missing in my dull life.

This "story of the Beloved" has always been there, throughout my life, all of my adulthood. This is part of my story as a "seeker".

And yet, after facing the fear of being alone, and the pattern of pushing and trading myself away all the time trying to bargain for a "real life," (which I was not meant to have, since I am dedicated to sadhana in this life), I was caught off guard by this onset of burning my need for an "other."

But should I write about it?

Naveen Andrews

My blog is about my sadhana, my love of God and my sacrifices and austerities by which I attain oneness with my Beloved.

Over the years, there were times when I YEARNED so much for God, so much for oneness with the guru, that I was drenched in the soul and fire of nothing but yearning, yearning...

So much so that sometimes my guru would come to me, once in meditation, unseen I felt her fingers giving me "the touch," firmly, between my eyes on my forhead. Once I was so full of yearning while doing computer work in the ashram bookstore at Anugraha, and yearned for her, wished so much that she would come be with me that she sent her faithful dog to me, and he came straight to me, which moved me greatly (she was doing seva no doubt, her life is one of service).

Yearning is divine. It is about union with God. It is essential to the life of a sadhini and devotee.

But... I had to consider. Would I write about burning and purifying the feelings and karmas of romantic desire on my Hindu blog? Basically, this is Shree Kundalini purifying my second chakra, which includes sexuality. I have been almost entirely celibate for over ten years, mostly because of a "failed" marriage. I am a Western Hindu, with many of the values of a college-educated secularism. As a writer and a blogger, I am feeling my way through how open I wish to be about myself and my emotions. I have chosen to be very open.

I believe that I have a unique talent for writing about things that are often left unsaid or misunderstood. I am a generalist, a person who is just good enough at a great many things, an armchair ________ [everything]. Having a talent that is deep enough to carry me forward as far as I wish to develop and express it is a precious thing to me. The fact I only have certain talents (computers, design, writing, music) tells me that these are what I am meant to develop and use in this lifetime.

Naveen Andrews

ROMANTIC LOVE

I dreamed of beautiful Naveen last night. I burn for him now, but I know that it is Paramashiva as Naveen that I long for so deeply, so deeply... And though I know intellectually that this "apartness" is an illusion... I still carry the YEARNING in my eyes, in my breath, in the tilt of my head, in the very feeling of being alive... and cannot help but crave over and over the feeling of touching his hair, his hands... even though to experience this would be so poignant as to be almost too much to bear.

Oh oh oh... this is so hard to burn... I have burned so many different things all these years. This is turning me inside out. The very air seems too heavy to breathe, it is as though I must bear it about, pushing on my chest, a "whu..." sound in my ears, making my body feel heavy and indescribably painful in a concentrated, gasping sort of way.

I believe the guru is burning this very very close to "unbearable" so I can get it burned and become free. The more of it I can bear to burn in each moment, the higher the flames for all my other karmas to be purified at the same time. This is what I mean when I say a karma or samskara becomes fuel for the fire.

I try to remember the mantra. Om namah shivaya.... Om namah shivaya... Om namah shivaya..... Why is it so hard to reach for the mantra when I need it most?

Naveen Andrews

THE DREAM

Finally... Such delight. I want to return to it... I'd have to think twice before saying 'no' to trading in my life as a sadhini for the "life" of my wonderful dream.

That would, of course, be silly. This time I'm looking for My Beloved as everyone and everything. No separation or lack (anava mala). No other. No thinking anything I want or love is not already inside of me as He. I love God, who has made me from Himself.

I've put in for the real deal. "It's the only way to be sure" (Ripley, Hicks ~ Aliens).

Finally... This is the burning, the fire...

In the dream, we had just met, we were immediately attracted and open about it, sharing a day together of spontaneous fun. We were so happy, that feeling of beginning and knowing it is going to be good. The feeling of meeting someone who makes you tingle, and it's that way for them too, and of being open about that.

That's it. That's enough to make me swoon all day and all night.

It was always like that. All I wanted was a touch. Kindness. Protection. To be cherished and loved.

Perhaps I am still meant to experience these things with "another" in this lifetime. If I am meant to love then it would be cruel and lonely for me to avoid it. Either way, my True Love lives in my heart, and sees through my eyes, feels through my touch. We are ONE in every moment.

There is only ONE.

In freezing mists of foreign lands 
I lost sight of my true love's hand
Into the arms of warmth I ran 
I knew my love would understand

She kept me warm my soul was fed 
I had a muse a fire a bed
I soon forgot the life I'd known 
This foreign land became my home

The waves rolled in across the sea 
They brought my true love's voice to me
I knew this girl would understand 
I had to find my true love's hand.

~ "The Minstrel's Tale" Carl Barat, Karsh Kale, Papon (The Dewarists)  

Now read this beautiful song with the understanding that your love, your true love is God....

This song rocks and is very beautiful at the same time