The "City" of devotion

Jagannath Puri or just Puri was the first of the places we visited with the Master on our 14 day parivrajaka (wandering). Puri literally means - the City, which goes to say that at the time when this city existed, this was the only city the people knew. This City finds place in all great Masters' biographies like the Great Master (Ramakrishna Paramahamsa), Autobiography of a Yogi (Paramahamsa Yogananda), Lives of Sri Sarada Devi, Sri Chaitanya and Shankaracharya. This is the place of Krishna and the temple is world renowned for its Rath Yatra (the Chariot Festival) when three huge chariots carrying Krishna, His brother - Balarama and His sister - Subhadra, pass through the streets of this City.

This post is not about the city. It is about the beauty of the city which sings and dances like Sri Chaitanya did, in the name of Krishna. The Jagannath Temple that is the center of attraction of this city is a testifies what all masters have always been propagating - intense devotion leads to the Ultimate Truth. Whether it is devotional Masters like Sri Chaitanya and Ramakrishna or intellectual Masters like Shankara, all say - bhakti (devotion) and true love towards the Divine is the simplest way to connect to the Divine.

If you see the main deities of the temple (as shown in the picture), there are no features, i.e. no palms, no feet, no eyes, lips etc. They are just blocks of earth and the all the features have been painted on them. There is a beautiful story related to this. Let me narrate it followed by a very powerful message that the Master spoke about:

There was a king who made a beautiful temple and he wanted to installed the most beautifully sculpted deity of Krishna, Balaram and Subhadra in the temple. He announced it to the public and put a warning that if he is not pleased with the idols, the sculptor will be beheaded. Hearing this not many were willing to come forward. Once an old man came and took the job but he too had a condition, 'I will lock my self up in the sanctum sanctorum for next one month and no one should open the doors, whatever the case may be.' The kind agreed and the work started. People noticed that there were all kinds of loud sounds of rocks falling apart coming from the main room. The ministers patiently waited for 20 days but then they went and told the king that the old man might be destroying the temple. The king opened the door and saw that the old man stopped the sculpting work. He turned to the king and told him, you broke your promise and now I leave the idols in whatever state they are. Saying this the old man merged into the Krishna idol. It was then that the king realized that it was Krishna Himself who came down to break his ego.

The Master commented, 'Lets see the truth from this story. It was the king's ego to build the most beautiful temple with the most beautiful idols. It was not out of devotion or love that he was doing it. It was purely out of his ego, to show to the world; that's all. Later he understood his mistake and become a Krishna devotee himself. This temple stands now purely on true devotion. It is not the external beauty that matters but it is the intensity of devotion that is important. The three idols in the sanctum sanctorum are unfinished and they may not be as "beautiful" as other Krishna idols in other temples but this temple gets thousands of devotees. It is based on pure devotion and love to God, not the external looks. That is what we have to assimilate from this place.'

Intense Yearning: The basic Ingredient

What makes a Parivrajaka different from just another conducted trip? The mystics and sages who wander in the quest for truth certainly don't treat their journey as just a sight-seeing pleasure trip. So, what's the necessary ingredient that makes a Parivrajaka what it is?

Intense yearning or seeking for the Truth This was one of the main messages, or should I say, the message of the Varanasi Trip - intense yearning for the Ultimate.

At each and every place, the Master kept drilling this single point into us. He said, 'The two things that are important during parivrajaka (wandering) are intense yearning for the Truth and intense excitement.'

All the enlightened masters, whether they wandered or not, had the intense yearning to find out the Ultimate Truth. That is what makes them so different from any other person. They would do anything to find the Truth. The Master gave various examples of how all enlightened masters had this single emotion in common before they got enlightened.

At Bodh Gaya, the Master narrated the story of Buddha's life which showed the intensity with which He was yearning for enlightenment. Buddha was weak and feeble and was almost dying without food for many years in His pursuit for the Truth. One day, while He was lying down almost dead, a lady offers Him a handful of food. After eating that, with whatever energy He got from that food, He sat up with no other thought but knowing the Truth. With burning determination to seek the truth, He made a vow to Himself, 'Idam aasanam sushyate shareeram', which means 'Let my body dry up and wither away but I will not get up from this position till I get enlightened.' That was the intention which came out with such force, intensity and strength that He got enlightened immediately.

In Dakshineswar, the Master narrated similar incidents from Ramakrishna's life. He used to rub His face on the ground, hurt Himself and cry to Goddess Kali, if at the end of the day, He found that He hadn't yet realized the Divine. Ramakrishna used to say, we cry for so many things in life. But one day, just one day, 24 hours if we genuinely cry to see Her (the Divine Mother), she will appear!

The Master also talked about His own experiences; how He was immersed in one single thought - enlightenment; how He was unperturbed by whatever people said, whatever society thought; how only one thing mattered to Him - enlightenment.

At one point towards the end of the trip, with regards to enlightenment, the Master said, 'Even if you meditate for 24 hours, without the intensity of yearning for the Ultimate, you will go nowhere. But if the intensity is so strong that even a tornado cannot push you away if you were sitting in the middle with the resolve of seeking the truth, then even if you do not meditate, you will see the Truth.'

He also gave us another analogy: If a person's head is on fire, will he be thinking of anything else but to ran to a nearby pond and cool it? His FULL attention and intensity is to put off that fire first. He would do anything for that! Just like that, the sole focus of our lives should be that of seeking the Truth.

His concluding beautiful words of the trip were: This trip need not end here. All you need to do is to maintain that intensity even after the trip and you will see that this trip never ends! He also reminded us that the very intensity will show us the path. So, whenever we a low or a dip in the intensity for the truth, let us remember these great inspiring words and pull ourselves back. Let the fire of seeking be alive in each of us, guiding us forward...

Parivrajaka - What is it??!!

In the previous few posts we mentioned about Parivrajaka. This post is to further elaborate on it based on inputs from Swamiji during the Varanasi yatra. Our very first halt at Puri, during the opening discourse, Swamiji spoke about our deep rooted identity and how our reluctance and inability to let go of it causes problems. When we are staying in the same house, with the same people, interacting with the same colleagues, friends about the same topics, reading the same kind of news daily, gradually our identity solidifies.

We start to identify ourselves with the objects/people/situations around rather than our real core and drift away from our REAL identity. Sometimes, through meditations or by the grace of the Master, we start to transform. But then again, our surroundings pull us back. Society constantly reminds us - you are son of so-and-so, you are employed at so-and-so, you are a friend of so-and-so... and because of this our identity based on our possessions is constantly reinforced in us.

This reminds me of a beautiful video discourse by Swamiji (attached to the post in the end) where He gives us deeper truths about "I" and "mine". Personally for me, it has been one of the most powerful discourses that shook me. He says that we all think we came first and then gradually started acquiring our possessions. In other words, we think that the "I" came before the "mine". But shockingly, it's the other way around! We start to build our very identity on our possessions! Till the age of 7, we associate ourselves with our physical possessions - mother, toys. After that, the mental layer starts to get choked with our other kinds of possessions. This includes our desires, fears, worries etc and our identity is built on top of all this.

What does this mean? If we take away our possessions, we feel we are nobody. How true! A true parivrajaka journey means breaking away from our solid possessions (not just physically, but mentally as well) and becoming more fluid. When we keep moving from one place to another, meeting new people, there is freshness every moment. The unexpected is always in store, which means the courage/spontaneity to face up to anything starts to flow inside.

During Swamiji's Parivrajaka, He used to take whichever train came first to the platform, not knowing where He was headed. He never touched money throughout His wandering, so you can imagine the inner strength!

Another important message Swamiji says a Parivrajaka conveys: It makes us feel the loving hand of existence if we are open to it. Swamiji recalls that wherever He used to be, He would invariably be given food and shelter. He never thought about it, nor carried the necessary money, but Existence used to make sure He was well taken care of. He says, not one day did He starve. Amazing isn't it?

We are so used to planning that we cannot accept this logically. We not only plan, but have back-up plans, insurances and what not. When the deep trust with existence happens, we suddenly relax. Also, when we relax, the trust is further strengthened.

Most importantly, a parivrajaka helps to relax from our solid identity. When we are constantly on the move, before we start to get settled and comfortable in one place; before we start to identify ourselves with that place and people, we have moved to another. So, there is no scope for that societal identity to solidify. With awareness, we learn to use that identity only when we absolutely need it. The rest of the times, we just relax from our societal identity and enjoy being with our core - our true nature - that of bliss!

Enjoy this video that I mentioned above on "I" and"mine":

The journey continues

The yatris are back from the parivrajaka. Yes, the theme of the Varanasi trip was 'parivrajaka', which means wandering. To put our experiences with the Master during the entire trip in just one single post is simply impossible and more importantly, some experiences are hard to be described in words; they have to be experienced. We will try our best to put our experiences with the Master during the trip in the next few posts that come up in our blog.

For now, let me give you all a brief write up on the entire trip, where we went, what happened etc. in a summary form.

Like I said in the beginning, we were on parivrajaka. In our previous post - 'Off we go ...', we talked about a seeker being a person who lives in utter insecurity. The trip started off with the Master's words, 'In the next two weeks, we are going to cut ourselves off from our identity. When we are located on single place, we start making ourselves comfortable because of the familiarity we start associating with that place. When we wander, every place is new, every moment is fresh and uncertain. That is when our identity is shaken. We cannot associate our identity with any one place during parivrajaka because we are not stationed at one place for long. We are on the move ...'

That is how we started on our parivrajaka with the Master. Every moment during the trip, the Master was continuously working on us. We went to places where He had visited during His parivrajaka. Konark, Puri, Bhubaneswar, Dakshineswar, Kamarpukur, Joyaram Bhatti, Bodh Gaya, Vishnu Gaya, Varanasi and Allahabad, we went from place to place with the Master. Each place was an energy hub, related to an enlightened master. Every place, we had a beautiful discourse and an intense meditation by the Master to help us connect to the energy of the place.

This was not a simple sight-seeing tour and the Master was not our tour guide. Each one of us in the trip had intense spiritual experiences during the course of the tour. He worked on each one of us. And we could clearly see the change in energies as we progressed from place to the other. The Master expressed the energy of the place and made us experience it.

During our stay in Puri, we were dancing and singing kirtans all the time. In Dakshineswar, He talked about devotion towards God or the Ultimate Cosmic Consciousness and put us through intense meditation to connect with It. In Bodh Gaya, we were immersed in meditation for 2 to 3 hours under the Bodhi tree where Buddha got enlightened. In Varanasi, He made us connect with Shiva and Ganga. While I am writing this now, I can feel the surge of energy that we all experienced at each and every place.

We had many light moments; if I list them down here, the post can go on for ever. The Master took care of each one of us; We had 3 hour long boat rides on Ganga with the Master cracking jokes, telling stories... and many more like these.

We saw how the Master lives in closer quarters during these two weeks. We had goose bumps, tears when we saw some aspects of the Master. We were taken to a completely different plane. One thing is certain:

what we see as Nithyananda is nothing; the six foot body that we see as Nithyananda is nothing. There is much bigger, unexplainable and unfathomable energy behind that six-foot frame. He coming down to our frequency to interact with us is His compassion.

On the last day, the Master said, 'the trip will never come to an end if you take the intensity of the trip - the intensity of seeking the truth - to wherever you are going back.'

And so, the journey continues....



More photos at http://www.nithyananda.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=393&Itemid=380