Moments...

I have been struggling with Chakrasana all through the years. And viola today I held the pose for 15 secs Yippee Yeah Yeah. The headstand and plow pose is still struggle for me; but patience and I will do it!! So this was June 28th....and now Nov 28th... Chakrasana for a minute (WOW 60 secs) Plow pose - halasana a little better now and even hold for 20 secs Yippee Yeah Yeah Headstand till to be conquered. Next coming is Bow pose - go deeper into it, Paschimotasana (Seated forward bend). Let's see what 2020 holds for me.

“I am so close, I may look distant. So completely mixed with you, I may look separate. So out in the open, I appear hidden. So silent, because I am constantly talking with you.” –  Rumi

A mindfullness retreat or any retreat always has this poetry... The Guest House This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes As an unexpected visitor. Welcome and entertain them all! Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows, who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture, still treat each guest honorably. He may be clearing you out for some new delight. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond. — Jalaluddin Rumi, translation by Coleman Barks ( The Essential Rumi )

The Uses of Sorrow | Mary Oliver Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this, too, was a gift.

A couple of years back, I started my yoga journey. It was quite on and off. I enjoyed it at times, I hated it at times, I couldnt make up my mind frankly. I wasnt sure I wanted to be in the path. I am not sure if I was unhappy with my yoga teachers or was it the level of difficulty. Then one day, I took the leap of faith and enrolled myself into a yoga certification program. I had to commute for nearly 1.5 hours one way to reach that school. It was a weekend program for a year. It was again a hate and love relationship. The commute was tyring and the teachers were least bothered or concerned about real teaching. They just ticked and did their job. But I made good friends over there and just to meet them kept on going. At the end when I received the certificate, sadly it wasnt a very honest one. After the course ended I quit yoga. But there was something a deep in me which kept gnawing me towards yoga. And I am glad I did it. I started to read a lot of materials / reasearch papers....

After contemplating for more than a year, i finally took the leap of faith to participate in an intensive month long yoga course to deepen and discipline my practice. Being from a learning and development background consider it an occupational hazard i need to know the mechanics of almost everything. Professionally learning how to learn is what i do and it trickles down to my personal life too. I took time to research and read reviews and blogs of various yoga schools. Finally i narrowed my search result and chose chinmaya at Dharamsala. I was extremely anxious and apprehensive when i embarked to Dharamsala. But with support and blessings of my family i started my journey. And now in retrospect, i think it was the best decision of my life. I have never encountered such beautiful, compassionate and kind souls who despite not being a family member treats you like one. It was a very emotional journey but worth a fortune. A true spiritual lesson in progress to evolve not just mi...

Relationships can be tricky and require each one of us to make room for the other in our planned life. We expect everyone around to just fit in. The other one has to make adjustments. But we won't make room.

The sea and the shore seemed to be in one with her. She stood there as the waves deposited sand on her feet and then another wave washed it....motionless staring at the sky and at times glancing at her feet. The first waves that brought the sand came very quickly but the one that had to wash away the sand took a lot of time...she felt uncomfortable with the sand but didnt try to wriggle it away or step aside...she stood there rooted to the place. Although she appeared one with the serene surroudings her inner mind and heart were in turmoil and lashed and roared like the sea. For a long time she stood there as I watched along with the millions of twinkling stars and the moon and strangely she never blinked. I asked the stars whether she was wishing something and they said yes....she is wishing never to grant her the wishes she ever wishes. I couldnt believe, why? She sat next to him as he drove the car. There played some music which maybe he listened and tried to make her hear bu...

Of late I have stopped reading reviews or watching trailers of movies don't even listen to songs except the ones I have saved on my local machine.  Now I have a very different experience when I watch movies.  I hardly know the actors nor the premise of the story.  I don't even know the genre. My friends react saying oh I thought it will have comedy but there was hardly any.  Oh that song I waited and it came at the end - how disappointing. I can hardly relate to them because of my ignorance. But I realized that I have started to enjoy movies more and its exciting to see something without expectations. Its like a whole new way to appreciate art. Its like viewing the world through a childs eye everything for the first time.  Philosophical I am so I feel that I need to live life the same way. Every day wake up to ask to be hit by something new. No expectations no sneak peek but ready to savor the whole experience.  Happy sad moments thought provoking...

The path will be created in front of me; all I have to do is to believe that good things will happen. I will get what I rightly deserve. All I have to is to feel as if I have them with me right now. The feeling that they are already there with me.I have to let go thinking and controlling things, just let go. They will automatically fall into place. It's the repetition of affirmations that leads to belief. And once that belief becomes a deep conviction, things begin to happen. - Claude M. Bristol A mental picturing of that which we want, with the complete acceptance and the conviction that it is ours now, will bring it quickly. See it in its 'isness'. -Lester Levenson Thanks!! I thank for the experience and the people I met. Each one taught me something about me. And I cherish the experiences that has helped me evolve in life as a person. I thank that I had a chance to love and be loved.  I thank for the education that I have received. I thank for the work experien...

Suddenly at some point in your life you have this sudden urge to converse. There is this surge of words waiting to be unleashed on anyone who wants to hear me. What and Why? answer remains elusive. So what do you because the people around you don't really care for you but are actually curious about you. You resort to blogging. :) And yo hum here comes the writers block!

Friends with benefits and friends of convenience is the norm of the day. Gone are the times when friends were friends. Though some stronger bonds exist but not that prevalent. The bonds built on understanding, love, warmth all are gone. People will be all drooling over you especially your work mates but once you leave nobody knows you. Why because they don't need you anymore. You cannot get them promotion, you cannot help them with their work you are now useless for them. The weekends when they crowded your place is gone. Now they crowd somewhere else. Because I stay in your neighborhood I am your friend, when you go away I don't care. You are a contact on my whatsapp group where I share just forwards. Proximity defines friendship....distance depletes the friendship. What will you accomplish by building network of friends for benefits / friends of convenience? If someone knows the answer let me know for I fail miserably to build this shallow form of friendships. They are...

The best seller by Dr. Brian Weiss. Read it like a fiction rather than a work / published report of psychiatry. I was told to read it with an open mind. You might discover something. Yes the book teaches us through Catherine's multiple lifes that patience, forgiveness, let go can help you be happy. I find the role of Karma very strange and is rightly attributed as Bitch. Why should someone suffer without recollection of what one did wrong? Why should the suffering be pushed out to a later life where you have not committed anything wrong? Why not finish it off in the same life? An ending - be it happy / sad / grey but end it then and there. And if one believes in reincarnation, then they should carry the learning in the next life and make it a better place. How much better the world will be with the learnings? Time to think!

Yes wait for the right moment. It will come when its the right time. Each one of us carry so much of baggage. Why the hell we give up living. Let go of everything. Trust the cosmos. “The Tao Te Ching says, When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be. When I let go of what I have, I receive what I need. Have you ever struggled to find work or love, only to find them after you have given up? This is the paradox of letting go. Let go, in order to achieve. Letting go is God’s law.” – Mary Manin Morrissey

I'm at peace with myself. I'm not perfect and I dont want to be perfect. Then what is the purpose in my life - To make myself evolve to be better of myself. After every fall I evolve myself, I rise and move ahead. I believe that hope in humanity still exist. No one is trying to sabotage my life. Each one is struggling to live theirs. What I refuse to give up is: Give up trusting people Give up believing every word they say I will trust everyone and all irrespective if they break my trust. Because I am a human and I will continue to do so. I cannot lose hope on humanity.  I will believe every word one says. I believe they mean what they speak. There is no dearth of words when you want to convey what you want to mean. They have the courage to do so. If they choose to do or not to do is not for me to question. I cannot lose hope on humanity.  Till I reach my destination, I will continue to evolve. Its a painful process but I choose to evolve than stagnate.

When you smile at someone you do expect a smile back but at times it doesn't happen. Makes one sad :( But finally I not only got smiles back but kind words too. I had the opportunity to travel and stay in another country. The city sadly was a small town more like a urban village. Tucked far away across the oceans I was hoping to get a glimpse of a different culture. But it was just like my country. The houses were alike in every respect except the shutters on windows and doors. Cooking on the electric stove and you having to dump the garbage on your own in the bin on the roadside was something different but I loved the ease. I gorged on veggies, cheese and fruits. I behaved as if I never have eaten them. I bought them not from the supermarket but from a farmers market :) Suddenly I felt my life revolved around food :) Me being such a good customer, after a couple of days I befriended the vegetable vendor and then my smiles were returned. Well more than smiles we exchanged reci...

This is the story of a young boy who fell in love with a girl. After a couple of months the boy made a visit to a different city. There he met another girl and suddenly realized that this girl could make him rich and successful. He forgot the girl back home. But the girl could not forget the love of the boy. She persisted in following up with the boy. The boy kept on trying to find ways how to push out the girl away. The boy was unsuccessful. The girl persisted. Finally the boy planned an evil trick. He along with his family again played a game to not just push away the girl but also kill her emotions. The girl was left shattered by the emotion less family and the boy. Her story ends there. The boy and the girl whom he met in the other city married each other. They lived rich. Another story in a different era Young girl is crying inconsolably. A boy had left her on her wedding day for another girl. The distraught father is trying his best to pacify the girl. D...

I have always had this kick when I travel. First is the challenges that one encounters - unknown faces, unknown land, unknown future....thats all I need to figure out - the unknown. But after traveling and figuring out 4 cities on my own I feel enough is enough. Does that mean I have given up. Life's over. Or maybe entered mid-age crisis. Yes somethings not going right. In retrospect I have never been like others. I have been different or maybe its just me who thinks so. I am like everyone else - unique yet common. But when I look back I may have done things differently even in my childhood. When kids of my age were playing I used to be on my own - talking to my plants, walking around in the garden, collecting bugs, beetles, fireflies, looking at different insects and even in the car I used to lie down in the rear of our Beetle and eye the sky. Not look out of the window :) But when asked to play I was pretty good in outdoor and indoor games - badminton, volley ball, car...

Yippee finally me gonna get a chance to isolate myself from the creepy crawly world creatures!! Take a break and RIP! I will be out of Internet, Phones, Laptop for 20 days :) And for a few years now in the row I have survived not having a Xmas tree at home nor any celebrations....but this year gonna be different. Me gonna walk around Xmas trees!! Will I survive yeah I will!