A new compassion

"Being one with everything is called Great Compassion."

~Venerable Master Bhikshu Heng Tso

I have a new, immediate and deep feeling of compassion for people who are suffering. There were layers over my heart that have slipped away.

I pray for those who have lost so much.

I also recommend donating to the Red Cross if you can. The Red Cross is the largest relief agency in the world. They help earthquake and flood victims, refugees from violence in North Africa, as well as those in many other places who need to somehow find home and safety again.

One of many asylum seekers that brave the perilous trip across the Mediterranean,
his face full of determination and a desperate humanity

Amatrice Italy (earthquake)

Flooding in Louisiana August 2016

All this bliss

Bliss... bliss... Who is giving me all this bliss on my dear Lord Krishna's birthday?

Prayers for Italy

I am thinking of and praying for the sweet members in the human family who have lost so much, and those who are working so hard after the tragic earthquake in Italy, as well as all people displaced and homeless due to war and strife and flooding.

Happy Kirshna Janmashtami 2016!

Happy Birthday Dear Lord Krisha!

Jai Govinda

Lord Krishna is playing his flute for Radha

Chiang Mai Yi Peng Festival and Mae Jo Lantern Release in Thailand

Novice monks release sky lanterns during the Yi Peng Lantern Festival at Wat Phan Tao in Chiang Mai Thailand, held in mid-November.

View more photos on Roy Cavanaghs Thaizer website (thanks!)

HH the 16th Gyalwa Karmapa Rangjung Rigpe Dorje (1924–1981)

The 16th Karmapa was a dynamic, world wide influence similar to other spiritual masters who expanded their lineage of spiritual paths and teachings into India, Asia and the West. These include Swami Muktananda, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Parahamsa Yogananda, Osho and Lakshmanjoo.

The Karmapa lineage is the most ancient tulku lineage in Tibetan Buddhism, predating the Dalai Lama lineage by more than two centuries. 

"Mahamudra meditation aims at actualizing this true nature of mind, allowing the mind to settle in its uncontrived naturalness where there is, in fact, nothing to remove and nothing to achieve because it is pure and perfect in itself at all times. The essence of this practice, along with the complex tradition of philosophy, epistemology, ritual, and meditation, has been transmitted in the Karma Kagyu tradition until the present day."

(From History of the Kagyu lineage on Wikipedia)

"Yet despite this ignorance and its workings, mind’s true nature is always pure. It is buddha nature, unceasing emptiness and luminosity free from all afflictions and defilement." ~ Saraha 

More about the Karma Kagyu lineage and the 17th Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje here

More about the Karma Kagyu lineage and the 17th Karmapa Thaye Dorje here

More about the Karma Kagyu lineage controversy here

All opinions, loyalties and understanding are here respected.

"Beru Khyentse Rinpoche holds a distinct minority view, saying he believes both Karmapas are legitimate. He states' it is possible that there can be two Karmapas in order to benefit sentient beings because the Karmapa can manifest in many different forms' and writes that the 14th Karmapa highlighted that 'in many universes a hundred million Karmapas have manifested. The Karmapa is also the Buddha's emanation, thus until all the thousand Buddhas have come and their doctrine is not diminishing, my activity of the Karmapa emanations will not end.' "  ~ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karmapa_controversy

Karma Triyana Dharmachakra

I had the darshan of such a sweet, strong and steady consciousness when I visited the Karma Triyana Dharmachakra Buddhist monastery in Woodstock New York

Reaching to the Guru

Radha Krishna

My newfound sense of rest and delight comes from the Guru.

I feel these things are the birthright of every being. But I have been mistaking the source. If my freedom was delayed, and now arrives. If I have finally through my own efforts pushed aside discomfort and fear. It is not accurate to think that such blessings are here and in reach because of anything except the Guru.

Instead of trying to hold onto this ease, this profound clarity. Instead of reaching for them. My sadhana is now to accept wherever I am in this cycle of consciousness as having, losing and becoming.

Keep my mind out of the way.

Do not try. It is not a "do."

Accept, and reach to the Guru inside.

Tend to my state. Notice. Allow.

Now. Everything is now.

Accept, and reach to the Guru inside.

Treasures in my heart for You

"He who perceives Me everywhere and beholds everything in Me 
never loses sight of Me, nor do I ever lose sight of him." 
Lord Krishna—The Bhagavad Gita VI:30

The Guru within is everything I desire, that which I have sought all my life. And we are becoming One! We are each other's destiny. 

The Guru is here, has been here all along. My own self, everything. Everyone kept saying, but now I know.

You can't make this stuff up.

I am blessed beyond every blessing. 

I worship You with every moment of worship I have ever felt or offered over lifetimes, stored as treasures in my heart for You. 

It all comes from the Guru

The Inner Presence of the Guru meditation at the Ashram

We were meditating on the Guru inside. Jnaneshwar wrote about this in the Jnaneshwari.

I focused, but couldn't see the Guru inside. Not helpful. I quit trying, I thought maybe the Guru was a place.

Immediately I could see the kriyaloka meditation room at the ashram. For the first time, I realized the deep feelings I had there had a quality of presence. And this presence was the Guru.

Like a velvet blanket of hushed awareness enveloping me from without and within, no difference, I dived so quickly to a deep place each evening after dinner, moving swiftly down the hallway and then running down the stairs to the smaller meditation room for ashramites with kriyas. There was usually the same two people there, me and a man I never spoke with, but smiled at a few times when passing.





I am experiencing that all of my spiritual experiences come from the Guru. Intimate. Purposeful. Drawing me to her inside. Inside. It is her always, all the time.

I know these insights seems obvious. Recently my spiritual life has been completely reordered. I have moved my mind out of the way, and I am relearning everything at a much deeper level.

I have had so many profound spiritual experiences, all of which I now look back on with a whole new understanding. Solid.

When I experience moments out of each day when the ashram is "reaching out" to me, uplifting me and my state... that is a spiritual experience.

My Guru unseen tapping on my shoulder playfully as I sat with visitors for lunch was a spiritual experience (she had mentioned she did this, which came up casually in our conversation; the look in their eyes at my immediately wide eyes and open jaw with such a quick intake of breath!)

The ashram welcoming me when I first arrived with an experience of seeing all of the ashram as a siddha sees it, as my Guru sees it as I wandered around, (phone booths were hysterically funny!!)

Those are all spiritual experiences. And they all come from the Guru, they are the Guru.

We are all one. Everyone is being affected by the Guru, the source, whatever each may call the will and presence of God. 

The Guru is universal. The Guru is the grace bestowing aspect of God.

.............................................................

*Part of my challenge (and confusion) has stemmed from the fact that I am both Mormon and a yogini with a Guru. Family is Mormon. Spiritual sangham is Mormon on the one hand, and Siddha Yoga on the other. I have kept these both separate for as long as I can. My siblings would be upset and judgmental, sure that I've been lured by the devil to a cult (can Kool-Aid be far behind?)

Now that both of my parents have passed on, I have relaxed a little bit. I'm not sure if they've come across my many projects online, and found this blog, for instance. We rarely communicate. I don't know what they know. I suspect I should get over this separation with siblings. But I do keep (my path in Hinduism) hidden from my Mormon church folks.

My Guru says

My guru says: 

Niścintatā is a Hindi word referring to the state of being in harmony with oneself and one's surroundings.

It is within every seeker's ability to become free from worries. It is possible to experience the absence of mental agitation.

A Coign of Vantage (detail) ~ Sir Alma Tadema