Om Namah Shivaya,
This is Pranada posting on Parvati's behalf. Parvati, Rishi and Sunanda are now in Resolute, Nunavut. They weren't expecting to have Internet access, but they must have found some. Here is a couple of video blogs taken while their plane was refuelling between Iqaluit and Resolute.
Mother Earth is calling. We have the choice to listen, and answer.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Listening to the Call
LISTENING TO THE CALL
Unseen Saints
Many people throughout the world each day perform miracles, unseen, unheard, unnoticed and often unappreciated. The more I mature, the more I feel anyone who is a mother or parent is somewhat of a saint, faced with the immense challenges of rearing a child in a hurried, demanding world. The continual call for patience and ever deepening love when faced with the many challenges that one would never have imagined pre-parenting, may seem beyond one’s ability. When in front of a screaming, needing child, a mother or parent is asked to transcend their limited perceptions of the moment and go beyond the immediate sense of me and mine to a place of interconnection, shared compassion and fluid, selfless service. And there are other people who quietly help someone cross the street or without hesitation jump into action when they come suddenly upon a crisis. The basic goodness of the human soul thrives, despite our collective history laced with brutality and immense tragedy. What is it that calls us to action, when perhaps few understand or when we feel challenged to move beyond our sense of personal limit? What speaks to us within our heart that provides unseen energy to overcome immense obstacles and adversity?
Poverty in Body, Spirit and Love
The challenge to take a trip to the North Pole is no great heroic journey, when I look at the transcendent courage in people all over the world who struggle to get through even just today without basic needs such as food, water and shelter. I have participated over the years in many charitable organizations to help feed the hungry and give money to the poor. I have touched this need. I have seen the broken look in the eyes of those living on the street, desperate for things we in the West take for granted.
And the amount of suffering on the planet goes well beyond that. There are those who tell themselves they have it all, and yet daily struggle trying to fill a deep, dark hole in their soul that only increases, leaving them feeling lifeless, on the verge of suicide. There are those that feel lost and do not know their own magnificence. There are those that have not yet awakened to who they truly are, feeling they must do things the way others tell them to, silencing their inner voice, dimming their unique light. This too is a kind of poverty and hunger, a poverty of spirit that is rampant on the planet at this time.
The more I awaken spiritually, the more I feel a deep interconnection with all. This, at one level, allows me to feel immense joy, vast energy and an inner wealth like no thing material could ever give. I also feel more aware of the suffering, the grief and the disconnect within people on the planet at this time. The more the voice of I AM awakens within me, the more I hear the planet speak, the more I hear Her children, us all, cry, in need. In addition to the poverty in body and spirit in our world today, there is tremendous poverty of love.
Before The Journey Begins
Before I considered committing to the North Pole journey, I hesitated. My only concern was, could the money required not be better spent to feed the hungry and shelter the poor? I could think only of that, to the point that it became a bit of a personal roadblock to the unfolding journey I was being called to walk. I had to look inside, sit myself down in meditation, and go deeper, deeper, deeper into the heart of the gnawing, restless question.
After a few days in this practice, I began to open and see a whole new reality. I began to see that I would not be using money from a singular, finite source of money that somehow had a hold on all money in the world. I realized there is no shortage of money on the planet. But there is shortage of consciousness, not because consciousness is not here, but because our receptors are backed up, busy listening to other channels. If we were open receptors, abundance in all ways would be among us.
I also began to see myself more clearly in the picture, the Self that is connected to the abundance of all that is. I saw that I could spend, if I had it, billions of dollars towards world famine and still, famine would be there. Not to say we must not all do all we can to ensure all beings have the food, shelter and love they need. On the contrary. This is my single and primary intention in all I do: serve. What I saw is that the money I would spend on the trip to the North Pole to facilitate healing on the Earth herself and help raise awareness to the ecological impact of the melting polar cap is my way of contributing to easing both the seen and unseen poverty of body, spirit and heart on the planet at this time. What is the root of suffering? People feeling attached and disconnected. If we all felt connected to the infinite source of love, we all would be in service to each other, selflessly. There would be no more poverty in body, spirit or heart.
The Unique Voice of the Call
Some people build houses. Some people bake bread. Some people give medicine to the sick, some counsel the grieving and some make lots of money to give to those in need. The most direct and effective way I can offer healing has always been through sound and energy-work in the unseen. This is my voice. This is something I can do. This is the Divine at work through me. I do not have the rough hands of a carpenter or the skilled touch of a surgeon. I do work that bricklayers, counsellors and medical doctors cannot. In expressing my unique voice, my unique talents, I am part of the solution.
The money I spend on this trip provides a means to touch the energy of millions of people around the globe. This is my way to reach out. If I were to silence this voice that rumbles deep within, I would not be listening to the call of the Mother. For some, the call comes in a direct message, spoken from the lips of their spiritual teacher. For some, the message comes through synchronicity, life events that guide us to act, showing us how, when, where and why. For some it comes not from the lips of physical counsel but through dreams, meditations and spoken through the unseen in clear, unshakable Knowing. Those who understand the unseen are tested through it. The tests of life cultivate unshakable faith, knowing that we are the daughters and sons of She, shown through whatever means She best knows we need to learn.
The bricklayer knows how to pour the correct portions to create strong cement. The doctor knows what medicines will save lives. The musician creates music that inspires and emits sounds that heal. The healer knows how life-force moves through all to help release obstructions in the unseen. We all can listen to the call in whatever form it comes to us. At its root, it is always expansive, even if it feels scary. There are no differing voices, just differing languages. I hear Her call. If I were to silence this voice, it would be a crime against Nature Herself, the very essence of which I am.
May all beings be free. May all be well. May all be happy. May all be at peace.
Lokah Samasthah Sukhino Bhavanthu
Jai Ma,
Parvati
Monday, September 13, 2010
The Ancient Voice of the Mother
The Ancient Voice of the Mother
I feel an immense force carrying me. She speaks to me in the quiet spaces between my breaths in an ancient voice I have known forever. I surrendered to Her, years ago, and lifetimes before. The tides are strong, stronger still, unstoppable, eternal. She is everywhere and always. Each day, in my sitting meditation practice, I empty myself more deeply to Her. Then I practice throughout the day, seeing all as Her Grace, pure consciousness arising.
As I work through the many layers, seen, unseen and unforeseen for this trip to the North Pole, I practice direct speed of body and open, quiet mind. Through emptiness, there is purification, a total surrender to that which already is and always has been…a vast, expansive perfection. I am not the doer. She is the guide, the life-force and the form through which all occurs. She is the healing we are to facilitate and the body for it. A voice beyond me, of us all, of the Mother, of I AM calls so that we may remember who we are, so that we may return home to the One.
I feel an immense force carrying me. She speaks to me in the quiet spaces between my breaths in an ancient voice I have known forever. I surrendered to Her, years ago, and lifetimes before. The tides are strong, stronger still, unstoppable, eternal. She is everywhere and always. Each day, in my sitting meditation practice, I empty myself more deeply to Her. Then I practice throughout the day, seeing all as Her Grace, pure consciousness arising.
As I work through the many layers, seen, unseen and unforeseen for this trip to the North Pole, I practice direct speed of body and open, quiet mind. Through emptiness, there is purification, a total surrender to that which already is and always has been…a vast, expansive perfection. I am not the doer. She is the guide, the life-force and the form through which all occurs. She is the healing we are to facilitate and the body for it. A voice beyond me, of us all, of the Mother, of I AM calls so that we may remember who we are, so that we may return home to the One.
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Healthy Planet, Healthy People
I am about to embark on a journey to the North Pole. For those of you who know me as a singer/producer, I will do a performance-art piece on the icy shores of the Arctic Ocean just 200km south of the 90 degrees North Pole, to help raise awareness of the melting polar ice caps and the global impact on our delicate ecosystem. For those of you who know me as a healer, I will also facilitate energy work directly on our Mother Earth, very much in stress at this time.
Through my blogs, we have been exploring the power of relationships as vehicles for spiritual evolution. We have touched upon the notion of how all we see is a reflection our own state of consciousness. There are no coincidences, but absolute perfection arising from one moment to the next. Our external world provides all we need to wake up, to love ourselves, to love others and to be fully receptive to this moment and the richness is has to offer, in whatever form it comes. Right here, right now, we have all we need to drop the sorry story and awaken I AM.
The relationships we have explored have been with ourselves and with people. All the same principles apply to the relationship we have with the Earth, our mother, our physical home and sustainer while we are in human form. The bodies we temporarily borrow and the material land, air, water, fire and ether we need to live are all part of Her. She is all matter, our mother. We are connected to her in a very practical, life-sustaining way and in a deeply mystical, spiritual way.
LIFE FORCE ENERGY
I feel the global ecological crisis is a wake up call for us all, a call to awaken I AM, the magnificence of who we are. The planet reflects how we collectively treat ourselves, each other and our environment. A collective is only as strong as its individuals. If we want to change our environment, we need to transform ourselves.
What happens most of the time when you yell at someone? If you could see it in slow motion, you would see that person shrivel and close. If you could see energy, you would see that person’s energy shrink and their light fade.
What would happen if we were to yell at a flower? Would it too not shrink, shrivel and fade? Scientific studies have shown that plants respond to sound, much the way humans do. Play repeated, loud, harmful sounds with harsh vibrations to a plant and it literally dies. Play it pleasant, soothing, inspiring sounds and it thrives.
Thoughts are also vibrations. When we think angry thoughts, we emit that vibration. We all know the expression “my ears are burning”: the implied consequences of gossip and the heat of ego being expressed about another.
To me, metaphorically, the planet is like a huge, expanding and evolving flower. It is a complex living organism with intelligence, sense and wisdom beyond what we can truly know and understand. It continually responds to the energy we put out and we respond to it. As such our environment is a huge mirror to our collective state of global consciousness.
Throughout the world at this time, many people are consciously or unconsciously driven by fear and greed, living with short-term desires to get rather than give and serve. Most of us are taught to look out for “me”, rather than think about and care for “we”. In my song 911-1-L-O-V-E, which I hope to perform at the North Pole, the character I play called Natamba, a first timer to the Earth, picks up the phone and calls God to share what she sees on the planet: “A lot of people seem to be suffering. The air is more polluted than ever. Clean drinking water is scarce. People are hungry, hungry for food, but also very much hungry for love. So hungry in fact that there seems to be an epidemic, a disease called greed eating people’s souls. It is like people have forgotten who they are and why they are here on the planet, driven by an energy of wanting, wanting, wanting, living with short-term vision, looking out only for number one. People’s inner world seems polluted so our outer world is polluted.”
Most of us do not know or care how our food gets to our table or how it was grown. Most of us don’t know the tailor or cobblers that made our clothes and shoes. We can buy mangos in January in Canada that have traveled thousands of miles at the cost of gallons of fossil fuels and emitting pounds of greenhouse gases. We in the West have the privilege of clean drinking water, shelter and food. We are so very, very blessed. Yet we have lost touch with the impact of our actions on our environment, how what we think, feel and do affects all beings, everywhere, including the planet herself. We have lost touch with the cycles of Nature. We feel we can control, outsmart, out-do Nature. And Nature cries louder than ever to be heard: I am here.
What about the current natural disasters? What about global food and shortages? What about the floods, droughts, hurricanes? Like a person fighting a raging fever, building internal heat to shake off an invasive bug, so too, to me, the planet is feverish, trying to shake off the weight we put on her: the physical toxins we emit in the air, water and food, and the etheric toxins we emit in selfish actions and distorted thoughts. We live disconnected, thinking somehow we will find the love we seek by wanting more. Yet we are already love. We are already loved. I hear our mother calling us to stop. Make amends. Practice humility. Listen to one another. Listen to the still, small voice within. Reconnect with the beauty we already are, but have forgotten. We are all her children. We come from her. We sustain her as she sustains us. We go back to her. She is the mother we all share.
We need Nature as much as Nature needs us. For me, this is a call to conscious action. The pain I see in Nature is not something I can passively watch, just like I would not walk away from a person in distress. Like a hit and run, we outpour toxins onto our mother, and keep on going, expecting no consequence for our actions.
The pain I see is a call to action. Our wealth is global health. The vitality in nature gives me the energy to help create a world where all people can experience immersion in that beauty, in that health - everywhere. That is why I created Yoga In the Nightclub – to touch, inspire, expand and evolve; to align myself with Nature. That is why I felt moved to start the Earth Team, a group of volunteers that meet weekly to support evolutionary work. That is what my Positive Possibilities projects are about. That which I see in trees and flowers is that which I tap into in my daily meditation practice. Nature embodies the love we seek. Being connected to such is that which fuels all my actions to support all beings being liberated. How could I turn away from others who are in pain, suffering? I am not free until all beings are free. That is what Nature reminds me. For this, I feel so blessed.
CONNECT TO SERVE
Within each breath is perfection, infinite, still space and pure action. Inhale, allowing the notion of beingness to settle into each cell. Breathing out, allow yourself to be, absence of wanting, in a state of receptivity to this moment and the immensity of it.
As we go deeper, touch the way you are connected to Nature and interconnected to all. In that stillness, what do you find? Do you feel deeper expansion, a settling in, a receptivity to going deeper still? Be with such. Expand. If you feel resistance, allow yourself to settle more and be present with what is. Understand the unwillingness as a habit of deep tension, the mind being like a fist caught in muscular grip. This will settle. Keep breathing and allow things to be.
As we go deeper, touch the way you are connected to Nature and interconnected to all. In that stillness, what do you find? Do you feel deeper expansion, a settling in, a receptivity to going deeper still? Be with such. Expand. If you feel resistance, allow yourself to settle more and be present with what is. Understand the unwillingness as a habit of deep tension, the mind being like a fist caught in muscular grip. This will settle. Keep breathing and allow things to be.
Go deeper. Imagine how every cell of your body is born on the Earth. There is no separation. By finding the connection to Nature itself, how she not only runs through your veins, but is the very stuff of which our veins are made, do you feel a love, a connection and a call to action? As a child of the Earth, as a steward of the land, do you feel the call to give voice in communion with Nature to help protect the life that sustains all?
Maybe you feel you have gone deep enough. You feel the impulse to get up from your meditation cushion and walk out your door to open an organic cafe or turn your company policies to 100% green. Or maybe you decide to start tithing a portion of all you make to helping Nature, protect wildlife, plant trees, save our water systems. Whatever it is, it is there, a voice that is waiting to be heard by each one of us, and belonging to us all. That voice is Her call, reminding us all that we are not alone.
As I travel to the North Pole in the coming days, I will be updating this blog more regularly with thoughts, reflections and feelings. What an immense journey to the crown of our mother’s body! We are all journeying together.
May all be well. May all be happy. May all be at peace.
In service,
Parvati
Friday, September 3, 2010
Instant Karma
INSTANT KARMA
I value the honest sharing in response to my weekly blog posts. Thank you. I admire your transparency and candor. Through it, I feel we all grow, myself included. I would like to answer a question I received in response to my last blog entry Finding Balance In Relationships: “When do we stay in relationships for our own personal growth and when do we end relationships because the other persons neediness and controlling behaviour has made it toxic for us?”
When Do We End Relationships?
I understand and believe that all that happens in our lives is for our growth. The universe lovingly supports us, be it through situations we find painful or pleasant. Usually we experience pain because we are in resistance in some way. When we are not in resistance, there just is, witnessing, unfolding, I am. In that state of co-creation we are connected and interconnected to all that is.
A relationship that challenges us is an opportunity to go deeper into self-awareness and ask ourselves what we are being asked to learn. In that state of receptivity, we begin to sense what we are learning. When a relationship feels constrictive, it is good to remove ourselves for however long we need, be it for a moment through skilled witnessing, as I described last week, or be it for weeks, months or years to gain some quiet objectivity. In silence, we go within and explore what triggers our constrictive reaction. Then, if it feels expansive to do so, we go back to explore the relationship with that new-found wisdom. Through the practice of witnessing, we can experience release and spaciousness where there once was reactivity. We learn to be present, to be with what is, rather than trying to change this moment to suit our needs.
We can find in most relationships an inner, expansive presence in which to evolve. However, when a relationship begins to feel predominantly constrictive despite one’s effort to practice witnessing, it is time to move on. When we do so, it is good to leave in gratitude for the teachings we have learned, rather than in anger, judgment, resentment, guilt or blame. Inwardly or outwardly we can thank that person, as he or she has been our teacher. As we move on, if there is any doubt that we have not learned all we could, do not worry. The laws of the universe will ensure that we do, either with this same person somewhere in our future or with another, in which very similar patterns exist. In this place of gratitude, we maximize our ability to receive the gifts of each moment along our path.
We Are All Students
I too am learning to practice balance in relationships. Relationships touch root issues and provide perfect fertile soil for growth. Inspired by the candor in the responses to my weekly posts, in this entry, I share a humbling process that keeps the teachings alive and real for me. Please know that each time I post, whether I say so or not, I too am working my own process. I trip. I stumble. I soar. I cry. I laugh. I doubt. I transcend. I believe. I live. I am. We all share this humbling, rich and powerful journey.
Instant Karma
Virtually minutes after I posted my last blog “Finding Balance In Relationships”, I was brought face to face with opportunities to put into practice what I had just shared. I call that “instant karma”. Like a universal, predestined "put your money where your mouth is" law that guarantees we walk the talk, "instant karma" ensures that our actions align with our thoughts and speech. It may come as a gentle feathery tap on the shoulder, or a bold, even life-threatening strike. Instant karma is a wake-up call to help us be righteously aligned with our highest potential. We may miss it, attached to our ways and absorbed in the speed of life. We may see it as we slow down and receive its grace. Maybe willingly we have learned to slow down and expand, or maybe we have been cornered by some unbending circumstances that seem to have conspired for us to learn the lesson without fail. However we come to see it, what I call “instant karma” provides an amazing opportunity to evolve…quickly.
Walk The Talk
I am often shown ways to ensure I am living what I speak, teach and sing about. As a performer and healer in service to awakening I Am consciousness in all beings and in all I do, I feel a deep calling for integrity. As such, I welcome instant karma. In my current show and album “Yoga In the Nightclub”, I step into the role of an Avalonian Goddess Natamba whose wisdom-compassion transforms the desolate Earth into a blissful I Am landscape. More than entertainment, the show is full of active invocations such as in my song "I Am", as well as unseen invocations of energies that converge to create a transformative group experience. If I am to be a channel for multidimensional transformative energy, I feel I must be true to my word, which must align with my actions with complete integrity and transparency. If I am to be of service to awakening I Am in others, I need to be fully aligned with that within myself.
I see instant karma at work whenever I put myself out there in an expanded way, be it in media interviews, live performances, or teaching and healing individuals and groups through YEM: Yoga as Energy Medicine, or just talking to friends. Whenever I am seen by others in expansion, the universe reflects the energy of such back to me to ensures that the expansion is fully integrated in my own body being. The universe compassionately provides an opportunity for me to internalize and embody the expansion that I just shared. If I experience something in an expanded state that I have not yet fully integrated, I will get an instant karma opportunity to integrate the wisdom personally.
The Perpetual Student
So…last week, moments after I posted a list of relationship principles that I choose to live by, I was given a chance to look at my relationship principles. In particular, I had to look at how I express my needs through healthy boundaries and follow through to act upon them. As we all know, it is one thing to think or write about something and another thing to do it. When we align our word, thought and action, we give ourselves a chance to experience the infinite power of multidimensional co-creation. Touching down of sorts by bringing the breadth of thought and inspiration into active form, we bring together the power of expanded, infinite spirit into the finite, temporal body and material form. With sincerity and humility, evolution towards I am happens as we align our thoughts, words and deeds with our soul's expanded voice, which is an expression of the universal.
To ensure I was integrated with my sharing, I had another chance, just moments after my last posting, to put to action what I had just written. This time it was about the gift of people pushing my buttons. One such person in my life who has an uncanny ability to push mine did so right away. Instant karma. I was given an opportunity to voice and act upon what supports me from a place of balanced witnessing. Yet, this time, my witnessing wore thin. I lost my patience and I jumped into the lake along with the button pusher. "Ok", the universe says, "Nice words! Have you fully embodied these teachings?" and I, the perpetual student, reply, "I am open, ready and willing to be completely restructured around the positive possibilities of being me. I lay my ego down and surrender to die the temporal death and be reborn into I Am." Faced with the knee-jerk desire to react in anger, I remembered the story of the master who took the annoying chai boy on his meditation retreat to the mountain caves, the master telling his students that this boy was his teacher. So thanks to instant karma, I am humbly reminded that my button pushers are my teachers and I a perpetual student. How the universe conspires to inspire!
Deeper Still Into Dreams
Clearly, these immediate teachings right after my posting were not enough. That night I had a significant dream. In it, I saw that within the basement of my psyche I have more clearing to do, which involves changing the way I am in the world and the way I treat myself. In the dream I saw unseen layers of my blind spot and was given tools to grow stronger through releasing them.
My Recent Instant Karma Lessons
Thanks to the instant karma teachings after my last blog post, I have been able to think, speak and act with new strength in situations I have found previously challenging. I saw new layers of how my mind still goes towards wanting others to make me happy, relying on their behaviours to be the source of the way I feel.
In my daily meditation practice, I cultivate a place within that is steady no matter what the outside may be. This place can only come when I have released attachments to the external projections of my mind, be it wanting, seeking or pulling on the outside to try to fill me, or pushing things away to keep me feeling ok.
Last week I posted “The Chinese Taoist master Lao Tzu from the sixth century B.C. reminds us: "If you look to others for fulfillment, you will never be truly fulfilled." In that I got to see myself. Then I came across a similar quote “by chance” from my guru Amma: “Peace and contentment depend entirely on the mind not on the outside.” Relying on others to make me happy would be like relying on the wind to keep me steady. Then I asked, what is steady? Even aligning ourselves to the rhythms of the Earth is a non-constant, as it too fluxes with radiant sunny days and devastating Tsunamis. Is it then not only the quiet, immense and perfect expanse of this moment, pure consciousness arising, upon which I can rest? And do I rest, or do I dissolve there? It seems in the dissolving, in that death, there is true life and an eternal constant. I know that I wish to make others happy, because it brings me great joy to see others smile. I expand when others do. We all win. Yet sometimes, there is selfishness there. In what seems like giving, the sneaky ego can in fact be trying to get... get approval, get attention, get temporary connection, get a wanting fix to keep the voice of loneliness at bay, ever for just a moment, until it rises again. When I meet those with an insatiable appetite to take, I am reminded that I too am in the picture, my voice, my space, that inner flow which is no less or greater than the another. My “I AM” voice within tells me when it is enough, when I feel I have given enough.
When we take that leap to try something new and not chase the person who is leaving us because we want their approval, or wish for their love, but rather pause and wait, breathe and be, there is a vast space that opens beyond the pain of constriction, of holding onto old patterns, beyond the fear of being alone, left helpless in this big world. In that space, we find a new life, a freedom from limiting beliefs, a renewed vitality, and a field of possibility. We also find that we are alone.
For the faint of heart and for those new to the path, the aloneness can teeter into feelings of abandon and loneliness based on wanting and a fundamental disbelief in our own innate beauty and ability, capability to be here, to be now, to be interconnected in this moment. For those who at that juncture wobble into incapability and constricted emotions, a new opportunity will return to once again give them the chance to release the holding of old patters.
For those who welcome the aloneness, we find tremendous strength and renewal. In that aloneness, everything is. There is the space to be who one is without interference. There is the place of possibility to connect with another without losing oneself. In the aloneness we are not in any way severed from anything but majestically and richly interconnected to all. In that aloneness we are more "with" than without. In that place of aloneness, we can touch our own place of enough. Aloneness does not need to exist in physical solitude, thought it may. Aloneness exists in the contented completeness within the infinite Self that is everything, everywhere.
Instant karma highlighted these things for me this week. For this, I feel grateful.
Beginner’s Mind
It is healthy to be in a place of renewed beginner mind, ideally, constantly. This really helps us receive the teachings of instant karma, especially after the ego can creep in when we have put ourselves out there in an expanded way. The universe immediately comes swooping in to give us a chance to grow beyond ego. In this way we learn best when we are humbly open and receptive to this moment and all it brings. Even that which we feel we already know becomes new and fresh. There are always deeper teachings and richness that may be revealed to us.
Take The Instant Karma Challenge
So in the coming week, I invite all who read this post to take the instant karma challenge. Notice when you say something wise or do something new or think something inspiring. See what immediately follows. Do you see the universe reflected back to you? Do you see the opportunity to align to what you think, say and do? What are you learning?
Instant karma is such a loving gift. Open to it. Thank the universe and willingly receive. To me this is part of the co-creative dialogue we all have with the Universe at all times, whether we are aware of it or not. What comes back to us is a reflection of what we put out. What comes back, be it pleasant or not, is the universe caring for us, giving us all we need to grow. There are no mistakes. All that occurs is perfection, teaching me how to live rooted in I am and return to the One. And, yes true to my word, I will soon write about what that means to me, as promised in response to a posted request a few weeks back. I have not forgotten.
May all beings be free. May all beings be happy. May all beings be well. May all beings be at peace. Lokah Samastha Sukhinoh Bhavanthu.
Jai Ma,
Parvati
I value the honest sharing in response to my weekly blog posts. Thank you. I admire your transparency and candor. Through it, I feel we all grow, myself included. I would like to answer a question I received in response to my last blog entry Finding Balance In Relationships: “When do we stay in relationships for our own personal growth and when do we end relationships because the other persons neediness and controlling behaviour has made it toxic for us?”
When Do We End Relationships?
I understand and believe that all that happens in our lives is for our growth. The universe lovingly supports us, be it through situations we find painful or pleasant. Usually we experience pain because we are in resistance in some way. When we are not in resistance, there just is, witnessing, unfolding, I am. In that state of co-creation we are connected and interconnected to all that is.
A relationship that challenges us is an opportunity to go deeper into self-awareness and ask ourselves what we are being asked to learn. In that state of receptivity, we begin to sense what we are learning. When a relationship feels constrictive, it is good to remove ourselves for however long we need, be it for a moment through skilled witnessing, as I described last week, or be it for weeks, months or years to gain some quiet objectivity. In silence, we go within and explore what triggers our constrictive reaction. Then, if it feels expansive to do so, we go back to explore the relationship with that new-found wisdom. Through the practice of witnessing, we can experience release and spaciousness where there once was reactivity. We learn to be present, to be with what is, rather than trying to change this moment to suit our needs.
We can find in most relationships an inner, expansive presence in which to evolve. However, when a relationship begins to feel predominantly constrictive despite one’s effort to practice witnessing, it is time to move on. When we do so, it is good to leave in gratitude for the teachings we have learned, rather than in anger, judgment, resentment, guilt or blame. Inwardly or outwardly we can thank that person, as he or she has been our teacher. As we move on, if there is any doubt that we have not learned all we could, do not worry. The laws of the universe will ensure that we do, either with this same person somewhere in our future or with another, in which very similar patterns exist. In this place of gratitude, we maximize our ability to receive the gifts of each moment along our path.
We Are All Students
I too am learning to practice balance in relationships. Relationships touch root issues and provide perfect fertile soil for growth. Inspired by the candor in the responses to my weekly posts, in this entry, I share a humbling process that keeps the teachings alive and real for me. Please know that each time I post, whether I say so or not, I too am working my own process. I trip. I stumble. I soar. I cry. I laugh. I doubt. I transcend. I believe. I live. I am. We all share this humbling, rich and powerful journey.
Instant Karma
Virtually minutes after I posted my last blog “Finding Balance In Relationships”, I was brought face to face with opportunities to put into practice what I had just shared. I call that “instant karma”. Like a universal, predestined "put your money where your mouth is" law that guarantees we walk the talk, "instant karma" ensures that our actions align with our thoughts and speech. It may come as a gentle feathery tap on the shoulder, or a bold, even life-threatening strike. Instant karma is a wake-up call to help us be righteously aligned with our highest potential. We may miss it, attached to our ways and absorbed in the speed of life. We may see it as we slow down and receive its grace. Maybe willingly we have learned to slow down and expand, or maybe we have been cornered by some unbending circumstances that seem to have conspired for us to learn the lesson without fail. However we come to see it, what I call “instant karma” provides an amazing opportunity to evolve…quickly.
Walk The Talk
I am often shown ways to ensure I am living what I speak, teach and sing about. As a performer and healer in service to awakening I Am consciousness in all beings and in all I do, I feel a deep calling for integrity. As such, I welcome instant karma. In my current show and album “Yoga In the Nightclub”, I step into the role of an Avalonian Goddess Natamba whose wisdom-compassion transforms the desolate Earth into a blissful I Am landscape. More than entertainment, the show is full of active invocations such as in my song "I Am", as well as unseen invocations of energies that converge to create a transformative group experience. If I am to be a channel for multidimensional transformative energy, I feel I must be true to my word, which must align with my actions with complete integrity and transparency. If I am to be of service to awakening I Am in others, I need to be fully aligned with that within myself.
I see instant karma at work whenever I put myself out there in an expanded way, be it in media interviews, live performances, or teaching and healing individuals and groups through YEM: Yoga as Energy Medicine, or just talking to friends. Whenever I am seen by others in expansion, the universe reflects the energy of such back to me to ensures that the expansion is fully integrated in my own body being. The universe compassionately provides an opportunity for me to internalize and embody the expansion that I just shared. If I experience something in an expanded state that I have not yet fully integrated, I will get an instant karma opportunity to integrate the wisdom personally.
The Perpetual Student
So…last week, moments after I posted a list of relationship principles that I choose to live by, I was given a chance to look at my relationship principles. In particular, I had to look at how I express my needs through healthy boundaries and follow through to act upon them. As we all know, it is one thing to think or write about something and another thing to do it. When we align our word, thought and action, we give ourselves a chance to experience the infinite power of multidimensional co-creation. Touching down of sorts by bringing the breadth of thought and inspiration into active form, we bring together the power of expanded, infinite spirit into the finite, temporal body and material form. With sincerity and humility, evolution towards I am happens as we align our thoughts, words and deeds with our soul's expanded voice, which is an expression of the universal.
To ensure I was integrated with my sharing, I had another chance, just moments after my last posting, to put to action what I had just written. This time it was about the gift of people pushing my buttons. One such person in my life who has an uncanny ability to push mine did so right away. Instant karma. I was given an opportunity to voice and act upon what supports me from a place of balanced witnessing. Yet, this time, my witnessing wore thin. I lost my patience and I jumped into the lake along with the button pusher. "Ok", the universe says, "Nice words! Have you fully embodied these teachings?" and I, the perpetual student, reply, "I am open, ready and willing to be completely restructured around the positive possibilities of being me. I lay my ego down and surrender to die the temporal death and be reborn into I Am." Faced with the knee-jerk desire to react in anger, I remembered the story of the master who took the annoying chai boy on his meditation retreat to the mountain caves, the master telling his students that this boy was his teacher. So thanks to instant karma, I am humbly reminded that my button pushers are my teachers and I a perpetual student. How the universe conspires to inspire!
Deeper Still Into Dreams
Clearly, these immediate teachings right after my posting were not enough. That night I had a significant dream. In it, I saw that within the basement of my psyche I have more clearing to do, which involves changing the way I am in the world and the way I treat myself. In the dream I saw unseen layers of my blind spot and was given tools to grow stronger through releasing them.
My Recent Instant Karma Lessons
Thanks to the instant karma teachings after my last blog post, I have been able to think, speak and act with new strength in situations I have found previously challenging. I saw new layers of how my mind still goes towards wanting others to make me happy, relying on their behaviours to be the source of the way I feel.
In my daily meditation practice, I cultivate a place within that is steady no matter what the outside may be. This place can only come when I have released attachments to the external projections of my mind, be it wanting, seeking or pulling on the outside to try to fill me, or pushing things away to keep me feeling ok.
Last week I posted “The Chinese Taoist master Lao Tzu from the sixth century B.C. reminds us: "If you look to others for fulfillment, you will never be truly fulfilled." In that I got to see myself. Then I came across a similar quote “by chance” from my guru Amma: “Peace and contentment depend entirely on the mind not on the outside.” Relying on others to make me happy would be like relying on the wind to keep me steady. Then I asked, what is steady? Even aligning ourselves to the rhythms of the Earth is a non-constant, as it too fluxes with radiant sunny days and devastating Tsunamis. Is it then not only the quiet, immense and perfect expanse of this moment, pure consciousness arising, upon which I can rest? And do I rest, or do I dissolve there? It seems in the dissolving, in that death, there is true life and an eternal constant. I know that I wish to make others happy, because it brings me great joy to see others smile. I expand when others do. We all win. Yet sometimes, there is selfishness there. In what seems like giving, the sneaky ego can in fact be trying to get... get approval, get attention, get temporary connection, get a wanting fix to keep the voice of loneliness at bay, ever for just a moment, until it rises again. When I meet those with an insatiable appetite to take, I am reminded that I too am in the picture, my voice, my space, that inner flow which is no less or greater than the another. My “I AM” voice within tells me when it is enough, when I feel I have given enough.
When we take that leap to try something new and not chase the person who is leaving us because we want their approval, or wish for their love, but rather pause and wait, breathe and be, there is a vast space that opens beyond the pain of constriction, of holding onto old patterns, beyond the fear of being alone, left helpless in this big world. In that space, we find a new life, a freedom from limiting beliefs, a renewed vitality, and a field of possibility. We also find that we are alone.
For the faint of heart and for those new to the path, the aloneness can teeter into feelings of abandon and loneliness based on wanting and a fundamental disbelief in our own innate beauty and ability, capability to be here, to be now, to be interconnected in this moment. For those who at that juncture wobble into incapability and constricted emotions, a new opportunity will return to once again give them the chance to release the holding of old patters.
For those who welcome the aloneness, we find tremendous strength and renewal. In that aloneness, everything is. There is the space to be who one is without interference. There is the place of possibility to connect with another without losing oneself. In the aloneness we are not in any way severed from anything but majestically and richly interconnected to all. In that aloneness we are more "with" than without. In that place of aloneness, we can touch our own place of enough. Aloneness does not need to exist in physical solitude, thought it may. Aloneness exists in the contented completeness within the infinite Self that is everything, everywhere.
Instant karma highlighted these things for me this week. For this, I feel grateful.
Beginner’s Mind
It is healthy to be in a place of renewed beginner mind, ideally, constantly. This really helps us receive the teachings of instant karma, especially after the ego can creep in when we have put ourselves out there in an expanded way. The universe immediately comes swooping in to give us a chance to grow beyond ego. In this way we learn best when we are humbly open and receptive to this moment and all it brings. Even that which we feel we already know becomes new and fresh. There are always deeper teachings and richness that may be revealed to us.
Take The Instant Karma Challenge
So in the coming week, I invite all who read this post to take the instant karma challenge. Notice when you say something wise or do something new or think something inspiring. See what immediately follows. Do you see the universe reflected back to you? Do you see the opportunity to align to what you think, say and do? What are you learning?
Instant karma is such a loving gift. Open to it. Thank the universe and willingly receive. To me this is part of the co-creative dialogue we all have with the Universe at all times, whether we are aware of it or not. What comes back to us is a reflection of what we put out. What comes back, be it pleasant or not, is the universe caring for us, giving us all we need to grow. There are no mistakes. All that occurs is perfection, teaching me how to live rooted in I am and return to the One. And, yes true to my word, I will soon write about what that means to me, as promised in response to a posted request a few weeks back. I have not forgotten.
May all beings be free. May all beings be happy. May all beings be well. May all beings be at peace. Lokah Samastha Sukhinoh Bhavanthu.
Jai Ma,
Parvati
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