Miraculous Escape: Blessings of Sahaja Yoga Meditation

In a family who practices Sahaja Yoga in Indore, they are four members, parents, a son and a daughter. The parents were worried about their daughter's marriage, as she was not ready to get married for next 2-3 years. The parents prayed to Shri Mataji and sent the bio-data of the daughter without the prior knowledge of her, to the guy they were looking for. As the boy was looking for an MBBS girl and their daughter was B.Com., they were still worried.

Somehow due to Sahaja Yoga the things changed miraculously. The guy not only called them for a visit but also agreed to get married. The daughter checked the vibrations of the guy, and as he was having good vibrations, she too replied in positive. Moreover he started practicing Sahaja Yoga from the day of their engagement. The parents were happy people. But the story doesn't end here; in fact it begins from here. The to be bridegroom is working in Merchant Navy. He was on the leave when he got engaged. He had to join the ship in the Houston so he left from India on 9th of September 2001. On 11th of the same month he had to catch a flight from Zurich to Houston. But somehow he got delayed, missed the first three flights and was waiting for the fourth one. Then only he came to know that one of the three flights got hijacked and crashed into the Pentagon or one of the buildings of World Trade Center, the most dreadful event of the millenium. The authorities diverted the fourth flight to Montreal, Canada.

This is how Shri Mataji saves her children.

Similar thing happened to a lady in Indore. She was going to attend a function in Mysore. She had to catch a train from Khandwa so she left for Khandwa by bus. On their way to Khandwa the bus driver couldn't keep control of the steering and bus fell down from a bridge in the dried river. The height of the bridge was 25 feet. The bus went upside down, but miraculously the lady didn't even get a scratch, while other passengers were hurt mildly, thanks to Shri Mataji. Even the presence of a Sahaja yogi can make the difference. Her husband was with her, but he was not a Sahaja Yogi. He got a mild crack in the shoulder so he needed some treatment because of the pain. As the bus got delayed due to accident, and they had to catch the train, they were unable to go for the treatment in Khandwa. Luckily in the same compartment there was a doctor travelling with his aid box and he treated him there. After the incident the husband also joined Sahaja yoga and both are living happily. These are the few miracles that happen everyday to the Sahaja yogis all over the world, but this is all the byproduct of Sahaja Yoga. The main aim of joining Sahaja Yoga is to get self-realization and to attain peace of mind. After getting self-realization, one enters into the Kingdom of God, where He takes care of all his children.

Occupy The Self: The Importance of Inviting Auspiciousness

It was a typical trick. Bait and switch. It was not minutes since i had realized i had been swindled off $1200. I was lured in with the promise of an employee discount which was yanked away when I went to renew my apartment lease, and then further increases were added on as my state has a lack of rent control laws. Yet, the cycle of emotions that followed afterwards amazed me to the bone.

For about ten days, I have been playing with a few meditation principles that deal with beginnings and ends. Whether its a project or a simple emotion that arises causing pleasure or pain, if we can control for the beginning and end of the thought process, the outcomes are amazing.

Shri Mataji advises in 1985 on success and happiness in endeavors of all natures on the occasion of Guru Purnima festival and celebration in Paris, France. The thoughts that follow, are heavily derived from the guidelines by Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi on this occasion, and several other occasions.

In many endeavors in our lives we are sometimes deprived of opportunities, sometimes we are confounded by overinformation, both to the end of being mislead and entrapped by stronger entities like corporations, who know better about laws and use their knowledge to exploit us. The result is the failure of our endeavors, the failure of our efforts and wasted time & energy. The solution is to ensure the beginning and the end are divine-compliant.

The Beginnings of Endeavors
The beginnings have to start with not just a ritual to Ganesha, the remover of obstacles, but a genuine, heartfelt invitation for him to be involved in what is to follow. That could be something as short and quick as a contemplation or something long drawn out like a project. The involvement of the Lord of the first chakra brings auspicious grounding for the purpose and the success.

The Middle and the End of Endeavors
And, as far as the end point of endeavors is concerned, the question remains, how do we measure our success? Again, in something as short as a few minutes of introspection or a decades long endeavor of any nature. We cannot manage, something we cannot measure. We cannot declare the end of an endeavor unless we feel we have failed or succeeded. The benchmarking process is simply to check vibrations at the milestones along the endeavor. The check is simple and effective because the measure is a summative variables of all and any variable deemed relevant to success: Vibrations. The pleasing flow of energy through us, which is calm and soothing. This corresponds to the pleasing of our inner energy, the Mother Kundalini.

So simply, we begin, progress and conclude by checking vibrations.

However, the process has a pleasant side effect. It helps our behavior evolution through substitution. Nature abhors a vacuum. So when we are idle, we are very much susceptible to become a devils workshop, because the vacuum in us is quickly occupied by one or more of the six enemies: greed, fear, anger, hate, lust, pride. That is exactly what was happening to me, when I learnt of my latest swindle at the hands of the corporate juggernaut that our apartment owners are.

I was upset, angered and helpless. And when I sat down to sulk and pamper my feeling of anger, I applied the new routine of dealing with endeavors: invite Shri Ganesha to my process and check for cool flow as I introspect. Normally I would have spent days cursing my destiny, the heartless corporate types holding us hostage and the inevitable days of mourning that destiny. Yet, just the simple act of inviting the deity of innocence to my thought process made sure the negative feeling and emotions were kept away from my introspection. I was certainly dejected, but felt in a shell of temporary remorse, rather than a prolonged self-torture by harboring hatred towards the faceless enemies.

Thank you Shri Mataji for rendering the advice so clear and practical, that a so-called formerly atheist mind like mine can not only understand, but bring into practice the true knowledge of inner peace.

Acquisition Instinct

What is the first thing that goes through my mind when I see a friend driving a new car, or a relative with a swanky new abode or a talented person? For long having seen a desire rise up to have something similar in life, something that would maybe give fulfillment, but would surely make others jealous. That is the right definition of an acquisition instinct, which is perverted by a goal which is not noble. The purpose of human made things are to give joy, at least that is how they are advertised. They don't give joy, just the occasional happiness of seeing someone else yearning for them. Thus begins the ceaseless journey of perverted acquisitions.

Communities built upon feeding such instincts are of shallow character. Spiritual systems that condone this instinct are the bane of the world and individuals who become active drivers of pandering to this instinct are surfing just the base nature of humans. The journey that takes us farther away from enlightenment.

At the subtle level, the acquisition instinct is the first reaction we have to things we perceive in other's possession. He we react to things we perceive is highly dependent on our discrimination. A Hamas chakra is balance will enjoy a perceived object irrespective of ownership. For instance, there are times when I look at my aging car and I feel the need to acquire a better one, or I look at my child and I worry about his upbringing, or I look at my apartment and the anxiety of rising rents consumes me. But when I have returned from a wholesome afternoon in the company of the meditation community, the reactions are quite different.

I would look at my possessions and feel thankful, I would look at my apartment and enjoy the nature outside, I would look at my offspring and relive my own childhood. Same perceived objects, different cognition. The Hamsa chakra, is triaging the sensori input correctly into higher thought.

The Hamsa chakra is an interesting little chakra. It is a part of the fifth energy center of the senses, the Vishuddhi Chakra. It is active when healthy, directing our sensori input from the five senses the correct subtle centers within the brain, which are connected to the subtle centers in our body. When malnourished, it is inactive and the processing of sensori input is now left to the willpower of the person, which is the balance of the left and right sides, the sympathetic channels.

Thus, when the person is well rested and at peace, the perception is processed well. But when the person is stressed out, the willpower is ebbing and the sensori inputs lead to perverted cognition. For instance, looking at something beautiful raises the instinct to acquire it, irregardless of social justice. Criminal behavior ensues and hoarding of objects results.

The hoarding that results from PAI (perverted acquisition instinct) is not just what we see on episodes of hoarders, but also in hoarding of mp3s, hoarding of ambitions, hoarding of options, hoarding of securities, hoarding of money in the bank etc.

The solution is recommended by the wise lady of the east, Her Holiness Shri Mataji, who has worked incessantly to break the chains of money-based systems on the human soul and elevate the human condition. The solution to any self destructive behavior is not in taboo or restraint. It is in finding a more powerful, fulfilling substitution. In the specific case of PAI, the recommendation is to become more involved in local flora and fauna. Replace the "cool knowledge" of where to find the best local deals and eats with the truly cooler knowledge of local trees and flowers. Spend the attention and time in knowing the living nature in the immediate surroundings and it heals our sensori processing.

So what local trees and flowers surround you?

Chakras are like flowers

They open up to the sunshine of the spirit

They close up when so surrounded by dark

They grow from small to large gradually, like all life

Fragrance and color are important  but not that important

They love being offered to the divine, and that fulfills their destiny

How else are flowers like chakras? Share your thoughts below in the comments, please:

About Gyaneshwara

Sant Gyaneshwara (Dyaneshwara) was an incarnation of Shri Kartikeya, who resides in the right Mooladhara chakra. His Guru was his elder brother, Shiva incarnate Nivruttinatha. His sister was Vishnumaya incarnate Muktabai. Bhramadeva incarnate Sopandev* was born between Gyaneshwara and Muktabai. they lived in the 13th century. Full biographies are online

Shri Mataji on Gyaneshwara on his 700th Birth Anniversary (Pune, 1996):

"Today I am going to tell you, we have within us all these powers. As Shri Gyaneshwara had described in the sixth chapter, that there is a force called Kundalini within us which when awakened gives you the self. But as you know everywhere, there are fundamentalist, we call them dharma martanda. And they said that “This is something that one should just avoid, this we cannot.” Because they can't do it. So that was not read anymore. Neither people ever tried to have.

But in these modern times, it is predicted that is going to happen to thousands of people... A specialty of this age, that it is happening all over the world. I am surprised Myself. This is the power that you have within yourself. I am not obliged. Neither you are obliged. It is your own power that rises and gives you this self-hood which is being described by Shri Sant Gyaneshwara. And this state of Sahajavastha is very easy to achieve."

Rajshri Productions produced an cheesy, yet informative animated short chronicling the life and work of the lives of these divine brothers and sister:



* 1988 Fatima Bi Puja, Switzerland

Realtime Righteousness in Second Birth

At the turn of the year, a yogi asked another yogi: What are your new year resolutions for 2010?

Yogi #2: Realtime Righteousness

Yogi #1: What's that exactly?

Yogi #2: Well, in the previous stage of growth in self-realization, righteousness and spiritual conduct had been establishing within me, but it was a process which entailed listening to the Guru's advice externally, mentally processing the advice into positive conditionings, eliminating negative conditionings and meditating for silence. The brain was an intermediary which instroduced necessary but inefficient brokering of righteousness. Necessary, because the inner being, the soul hasn't evolved enough for lesser brain and more heart based righteousness. The next stage is when the connection with the all-pervading is less riddled with doubts, fears and thoughts, so that the righteousness can just flow instantaneously. Just like dial-up and broadband internet.

Initially we needed to dial-up to the provider, we counted the minutes of use, downloaded data, wen't offline and processed it. It was inefficient, but the best approach at the time. Now that broadband connection is available, everytime you are working at the computer, it is impossible to do 90% of the tasks without a live connection. Thus, when the new bandwidth is available in our subtle system to handle the new age of spiritual conduct, we just jump onto that mode spontaneously one day, because our dial-up was too broken to fix and we needed to upgrade - no choice. Similarly, the first stage of offline righteousness had worked until December 2009, and the crumbling of the approach had begun. It was terrifying at the start, but the grace of the Comforter was standing by, assuring yogi #2 to witness the awesome creative power which destroys only selectively, and to make space for new spiritual infrastructure within. The accuracy of destruction is astounding as all innocent parts of the soul were retained and built around.

In the end, it seemed like the bird had been hatched out of the egg. The destruction was only the temporary protective egg shell, which was bound to break one day, anyways. Now the bird is out, can see reality directly, rather than interpret indirectly it from the sounds and words of the Mother outside and above. Now, in the lap of the Mother - not as an egg, but as a bird ready to fly fearlessly and do all that the Mother wishes Her offspring to do.

So its not the end, just the beginning of a new stage, which may also reach saturation one day and be abandoned in favor of newer, higher life. Like a rocket, dropping off propulsion stages on the way up, the ascent goes on, the old keeps burning up and dropping off and we attain higher and higher orbits. We only need small correction jets once we've escaped the ocean of illusion. We don't feel guilty for the initial noisy and hot state because we start seeing it as a temporary necessity. Now the old one is dead, burnt up and dropped off and the new life begins in second birth, where the only worry is "are we having fun"?




JSM!

Photo Credits: flickr users' Creative Commons photos
1. Erica Marshall of muddyboots.org (we are all connected)
2. chidorian (egg/bird)

Correction and Hurt

 When we want to correct someone, there is a chance that we will hurt them. But when we go out to hurt someone, there is no chance we will correct them.

CC licensed photo by photomequickbooth

The Ship Hath Sailed

One of my favorite proverbs is

"A ship in port is safe, but that's not what ships are built for." Grace Hooper

Our agnya chakra is the most critical, most delicate and most easily affected. A person with no conflicts of any kind is either realized or completely oblivious. Conflict resolution approaches are the best way to test a person's agnya chakra. Without conflict, there is no way to confirm who will survive the new age that is rapidly closing in.

As the grand illusion, the Mahamaya, separates the wheat from the chaff, she sets up these serious games for our personal learning. These serious games can be harmless as long as we are not involved in the emotional aspect. Because it starts of with small seeds of discontent amongst a so-called brotherhood, which ultimately erupts in a fight which will for a part of the collective to leave. The reaper is at work testing people who can truly humble themselves and forgive others.

Last Monday, it occured to me in a morning meditation that the one quality I still lack as a Sahaja Yogi, is the ability to express love. I had genuine love for most acquaintances, but my failing had been the ability to express it. I did develop the ability to express it for seekers over the past few years, because that genuine love is the only thing that a seeker of truth can feel. However, there was a serious lack of ability to express love openly to other enlightened souls. Since the morning meditations were now regular and improving, I felt courageous to ask for this new ability. As the Chinese say, be careful what you ask for, because it may just come true.

The very next day, I played good cop/bad cop to pull over a organizationally speeding brother and issue a spiritual ticket. What I got in return was the culmination of his months long plan to slow poison our common friends. This slow poisoning was successful only because of, guess what, my total lack of ability to openly express love and adoration of my fellow realized beings. This comes partly from my Indian descent, where I leave communication with ladies to my wife or other female representative of the family. The passive aggressive negativity had thrived in the brain of my weak friend, and had him sow seeds of discontent quite discretely so that some of my other weak friends were starting to cut off their time with me. I suspected something, but the "speeding ticket" brought out the complete masterplan.

Like the unfortunate cop who gets shot by a druggie on a stop-and-bust, I was repeatedly shot down in the back multiple times as I asked for the drivers license and registration. A routine stop and check had turned fatal for me.

Now came the real part - will I give in to the ideas of hatred or bring down my ego, make the ultimate sacrifice of pride and humbly apologize, even though there was a clear violation of natural law. Like many ironic court cases of America, the process started with me issueing unconditional apologies to the poisoned friends for anything done unknowingly in the recent past. Asking for forgiveness. And as that started, they their poison revealed to me. If I had aggressively pursued the matter with the poisoned innocent, they would have frozen up and confirmed the trash talk about me.

Honestly, I was surprised by my mind's ability to express unconditional apologies and ask for forgiveness and acceptance. This could be the greatest jump in evolution of all the fantastic jumps I have seen this Fall of 2009. I am tempted to analyze the motivations of my malefactor, but the mind simply refuses to co-operate with thoughts of hatred. I would have never discovered this depth granted by Sahaja meditation, the blessing of the agnya chakra to humble down immediately. I would have expected that it would take me months before I would consider leveling with them. But the stakes are too high. The social capital we build is more precious than our fragile egos and one cannot implement this self-belief in any other system of yoga meditation. This is simply Sahaja, simply unique and simply amazing.

As the proceedings proceed, I sometimes feel distinct "working out" of negativity in different chakras. Clearing of this nature usually takes years. I am happy that this dynamic training environment exists within Sahaja Yoga where our false knowledge is actively removed, our theoratical learning is tested and corrected -- all without an institutionalized system of education.

Once you begin Sahaja Yoga, your ship, i.e., your being, will truly sail off the harbor into the wild seas and your captainship will be tested, improved and blessed.



CC licensed photo: symera_serin

Everybody Hates Chris, But Loves Raymond

Happiness & Sadness are a state of mind and that is exactly where the trap is.  If we shoot for joy which is a constant, always-on property we will not be dissapointed.

The shortcut to a high is usually exciting the parasympathetic sympathetic channel (Sushumna), through egoistic means: drugs, cigarettes or alcohol. Perhaps even food sometimes. Exciting the parasympathetic makes one happy, which leads to a crash eventually because we are simply  fighting fire with fire. De stressing the sympathetic requires detachment from the mind and the sympathetics. The good news is that that can happen in just one instant by acknowledging your spirit & denouncing your body.

Instantly one moves from being "Chris" to being "Raymond". As an aside, I must mention that the concept of detachment from the body, mind I intellect has to be innate. Not by leaving society, meditating in the jungles or shaving the head and wearing funny clothes. It has to be innate or else the true high will hot be achieved. One will only end up fooling the self for years on end.

Photo credit: CC licensed photo by swamibu

Why Everyone Loves Raymond but Hates Chris

Knowing Thyself, Definitively

One of the first questions that arises after learning to meditate, is how do we interpret our meditations? How do we judge our feelings & sensations during meditations? How to know what we are seeing within is true progress in the right direction? Three approaches are examined below for merits.

Asking Others to Judge Us


Having another meditation expert or peer feel our chakras and work on them is a great way to cleanse. It does not work quite well to get an absolute measure of where we stand within. Asking others coldly to check vibrations, in my experience, is a common mistake. Since we are all progressing towards perfection, getting a definitive answer from someone else is a risky proposition. The answer may be biased by emotion or tainted by the imbalances of the person checking vibrations without entering a good state of meditation. I usually avoid cold calling on awakened friends to check vibrations, as the spontaniety of feeling vibrations is now constrained by emotion, "performance pressure" and other stressors.

Self Checking Vibrations
The act of feeling our subtle energy centers is called checking vibrations. It is a spontaneous process when our attention reports bliss or stress in the subtle energy centers. However, the approach and practice of it varies widely. Doing it ourselves requires complete detachment and a strong witness state. The willingness to face our faults without guilt and correct them with advanced practices, which are beyond the reach of a majority, one can safely state. The lack of detachment almost always results in confusing answers.

Giving Awakening & Inner Experience of Meditation to Others
In my opinion, giving stands out as the best way to investigate our spiritual depth & inner growth. It is independent of our personal biases and present state. Our ability to pass on the experience of bliss to others is the golden yardstick to measure our growth. "We can only give what we have within" The honest and willing reciever will honestly report their inner experience. If our awakening is true, we are able to awaken others by our mere presence combined with their active desire. And to rule out the reciever's inability to report back their blissful state accurately, we can draw a conclusion about ourselves by giving self-realization to many others - to eliminate estimation errors.

If we have the light, it well pass on effortlessly to most people we attempt to enlighten. Daily meditation keeps our mortal shell clean & transplant. A non-daily mediator usually cannot sustain their connection with the universe and any attempt to pay forward the experience will by futile. In conclusion, only in giving others we can really discover what's within us. By giving enlightenment to others we can know for sure if we have nourished our light within. Based on what others recieve from us, we can make a definitive conclusion of who we are. So get going and know thyself!

Wish you all the best in your journey of meditation and personal growth.

At a Quiet Courtyard in Ann Arbor

Last week at one of our meetings in Ann Arbor, an attendee shared a beautiful story of how he was helped with the knowledge of meditation during a stressful time. Here it is, with the name changed to protect his identity

Gerald is a graduate student pursuing his PhD at the University of Michigan in Economics. Most days he can handle the stress and juggle the busy schedule that comes along with being a doctoral student. But Someday even a seasoned student like Gerald cannot find a way to juggle all the balls tossed up so quickly by the virtue of his student life.

Today he had 3 grueling classes and to top it all, a final exam. The pressure has mounted and strolling through the streets of Ann Arbor he searched for a way to relieve his anxieties. That's when it struck him. He could try out some simple stress reduction he learnt at last week's meditation class.

He knew about the perfect spot - a little garden between the Michigan League and the Alumni Center, a small courtyard that would be the perfect place for an activity like meditation.

Ten minutes of silence and saying simple affirmations while placing his hands on his heart and forehead, he was already feeling good. The buzz in the stomach was gone. The racing mind was now working at a more normal speed.

A few minutes that morning put everything in perspective for Gerald He slipped into this dynamic. yet centered state where he was a witness to himself, sorting out a hectic day, one activity at a time.







Images:
"Stress" by flickr user otherthings 
"Butterfly" by author

Work Your Powers - Photography

Yesterday, while collectively listening to the 1982 Vienna address in September on the occasion of the 9-Nights festival, before the talk begins, Shri Mataji was browsing pictures taken by Sahaja Yogis in and around Europe. She then quietly but surely remarked something to the effect that photography has now become one of the powers of Sahaja practitioners. almost 3 decades down, photography has become accessible through digital camera and online sharing mechanisms. This must be taken up by realized souls and enlightened yogis to observe, report and transform their societies. There are a few remarkable blogs already displaying high quality photo blogging efforts (1000 petals). I would like to see some more.

Karaoke and Meditation: Unusual Partners in World Peace

CC licensed image by flickr user fensterbme

Listening to a podcast about technology today, the topic of ethnographic studies came up and the interviewee mentioned how the study of Karaoke had revealed much about the differences of cultures in the east and west. And then it struck me. My use of Karaoke to break ice with acquaintences, was not a random co-incidence. (See Book referred to at the bottom of the post).


Karaoke is such a powerful activity when done collectively, and fails miserably when done alone (I mean REALLY alone, not recording for later distribution as many websites let you.) Over the summer we had Karaoke sessions almost once every month.

Past summer, during a long weekend, we hosted 3 families and a hoard of local friends which had more cultural diversity than one can imagine. Meditation is the activity that has traditionally brought us all together for weekend seminars. However, there were a few accompanying spouses who were not us much into meditation or were just getting their feet wet.

Like other weekends spent together, it seemed like another one where the non-meditating & newly meditating spouses would possibly feel alienated or just bored. Thankfully someone had the idea to jump start karaoke sessions and the ice was broken, melted and crushed into a smoothie. All of us, ALL - pre-teens, children, an Italian, an Irish American, a Indo-Pakistani-American, Russian, Finnish, Bulgarian, Indian and Brazilian were joined in ecstatic enjoyment of each other's company like never seen before. Participative music is the next best thing to integrate us, period.

World cultures, generations and other identities will merge by burning the candle both ways. The integration inside-out comes through meditation and outside-to-in comes through participative music.

What song would you like to sing along?

7 things you should know about meditation

Scenario

1. What is it?

2. Who’s doing it?

3. How does it work?

4. Why is it significant?

5. What are the downsides?

6. Where is it going?

7. What are the implications for you?

11 ways to reduce stress without spending a dime: http://is.gd/4pFkb

If the past and the future do not exist, why do people worry about them?

Question from Y! Answers: Past is gone, future is not here yet; if it ever gets here, yet many people's lives are controlled by these two nonexistent forces...

My Answer:

Humans have 3 main energy channels: left (past), central (present) and future (right). The stresses of mundane life accumulate as blockages or disturbances in these subtle energy flows.

Thoughts in the brain come from the left (past) and right (future) constantly. There is almost no way to stop them, as they are innate part of human existence. Spiritual masters who know meditation are able to soothe their left and right channels and stay on the central channel, which results in these thoughts from past/future subsiding.

Eventually the person is able to experience freedom from these annoyances. Check out the references below for more info. Or try a simple meditation exercise here: Meditation Basic Excercise

Source(s):

ResearchingMeditation.org
Left & Right Channels

Is hate a form of love?

Question on Y! Answers:
Do you ever love to hate? can hate ever be an expression of love?

My Answer:
Hate and Love effect our body in different ways. Hate creates blocks in our energy system, eventually "chocking" good energy. The satisfaction from hating is self-destructive and temporary. True love dissolves blockages and makes one feel genuinely good.

Love > Hate

Reference: http://www.azsahajayoga.org/meditation.html

Feeling the Cool Breeze: Experience of People of Different Faiths

[Compiled by Oleg Florow on the now defunct Geocities web]

[Oleg:]If one looks at the religions of the world, they fall into two main categories. The first group believe that to worship, or pay respects to any holy image is wrong, while the second use images in their doctrine. Perhaps at the end of the day there is no conflict. If the image is created by, or is a true likeness of, someone who has strong vibrations, then to put oneself in a situation where one absorbs those healing vibrations can only be for the good. But if someone bows down before an image which is made by someone who themselves emitted heat (problems) then no wonder Moses spoke so strongly against 'graven images'! But the solution is to be able to have a heightened awareness so as to be able to distinguish between what is 'holy' and what is not. Once a person has settled into Sahaja Yoga they can generally do this.

'Shri Mataji arranged a weekend at her house at Hurst Green, Sussex, England in 1976. In her house there was a big drawing room downstairs with beautiful Indian rugs. There were large statues of Indian deities, and one of them was a beautiful wooden Shri Ganesha.

One of the Sahaja Yogis who had been there before took me upstairs and showed it to me.
"This statue has such cool vibrations," he said.
"Hang on," I replied. Being from a Muslim background, I thought, 'What is he talking about?'

Although I had received my realization, and could feel the cool vibrations, because of my Islamic conditioning I was a bit sceptical that this statue would emit them. So I tried feeling the vibrations, while stepping back, and it did have vibrations, in that there was a cool breeze coming from it.
One of the things that struck me also in the house of Shri Mataji, was that it felt as if every statue in the house was vibrating with power. Everywhere you went, you felt a kind of silent, peaceful, but extremely powerful environment, which is very difficult to describe, except to say that you knew something very powerful was working very deep inside you and working it out. You were in the middle of this and you felt you were in a different universe altogether. (D.M.)

This story shows that the experience of the cool breeze of the Spirit goes far beyond our cultural conditioning. The writer is from a Moslem background, a citizen of the European Community, a successful banker in early middle age and married with children.



My parents were very, very religious Jews. The first weekend after I got my realization, I went up to see them at our home in a town in the Midlands of England. I was still working the whole thing out myself, but I gave my mother realization and she felt the vibrations as a cool breeze.

She went to the synagogue the next Saturday, as she always did. At a certain point in the service the scrolls of the law would be taken out. They are kept in a beautifully decorated altar, which we call the Ark, and this is a replica of the place where the ten commandments were kept after they were given by Moses on Mount Sinai. The scrolls are all parchment and beautifully written and decorated, by hand. In Judaism we have traditions which are in many ways parallel to those of Hinduism.

As soon as they opened the Ark, my mother said she couldn't believe it. She felt a cool breeze pouring out of the Ark. The rest of the people in the synagogue had no idea of this. As soon as the Sabbath was finished and she could use the phone, she phoned me and said:
"The most extraordinary thing happened to me today. I went to the synagogue, and when they opened the Ark, I felt the same cool breeze pouring out of it as I felt when you gave me realization. Now I know that this is right."

Sadly she died in 1987. Before that, although she was always a firm follower of Judaism, she came to accept Christ and understood about Shri Mataji and the great gift she has brought to the world. Shri Mataji came to stay in our house and my father, a deeply learned and religious Jew, also had profound respect for and understanding of Shri Mataji. (R.H.)

[Ed: Oleg] Here we see how all the problems between the religions could be resolved if their followers could understand them as being different flowers of the same tree of universal wisdom. What is vital is that we can all evolve to gain our Self Realization, so we can actually experience the truths which the great personalities of the past have come on earth to reveal to us The writer, like his family, is learned in the Torah and Caballah, and sees Sahaja Yoga as a fulfillment of this wisdom.

So what is this cool breeze?

It is time for an explanation! Some of this might be quite a lot to digest and accept initially, but read on, and you too might feel it.

In this first personal report, Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi is conducting an introductory programme of Sahaja Yoga, to give Self Realization. The newcomers are told they have this experience when they feel a cool breeze coming from their own bodies. Sahaja Yoga is extremely simple. The first stage is to get Self Realization.

In many scriptures this experience is reported as being accompanied by a wind, or coolness, for example the wind of the Holy spirit in the Christian bible, or the 'sali lam' or cool wind which accompanies the awakening of Kundalini, necessary to attain 'moksha', or realisation of the self as spirit, in the Hindu tradition. It is interesting that in many languages, the word for Holy Spirit, or Adi Shakti as it is in Sanskrit, is a feminine noun. Christ used an Aramaic word which was feminine, and in Islam, the word is feminine: 'ruh'. In at least two African languages, Zulu and Xhosa, the word for Holy Spirit and cool wind are the same: imoyo.

'My family and I live in Sydney, Australia. I was never what is termed a seeker. My brother was always looking for something, and said he would tell us once he found it. One memorable day, in the early 1980's, I was seated in front of the television watching a football game, when my brother came home and said the most incredible thing had happened.

He had just met an Indian lady called Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi and had received his Self Realization. He told me he had spent the day with her and a group of people and he had felt an incredible cool wind coming from her body, when he put his hands in her direction.' (C. K.)

In this account, a young man reports feeling this coolness coming from Shri Mataji herself. Shri Mataji is an extremely powerful spiritual personality, and as she has said on many occasions, she has come on this earth to give en masse Self Realization to all those who are sincerely seeking inner fulfillment. She explains that this coolness is a very subtle form of vibrations, and it is felt as a cool wind or breeze. As she is the one who has opened the way to this en masse awakening for all the rest of us, it is hardly surprising that even her body radiates this coolness very powerfully.

'I got my Self Realization in August 1979. The first strong experience was when Shri Mataji invited some of us to her flat in London a little later. Before getting my realization, I had been experimenting with different forms of consciousness, and seeking for something, but unfortunately it had caused me to have all these voices going on in my head all the time in those days.

Shri Mataji got me to put my left hand towards her and the right hand towards a candle flame. After some minutes all the voices in my head stopped and a cool breeze just came blowing into my forehead. It was a lot easier to be experience inner peace and inner stillness after that.

Some months later, a woman and her brother brought a sixteen year old boy who had cancer to Shri Mataji's house in Brompton Square, London. I was doing some decorative work, maybe painting or wallpapering, in the same room where Shri Mataji was curing this boy.

He was so weak, he couldn't even sit up. She had him lying down. She called me over to help as well.

"What do you feel?" She said. I felt incredible heat coming from him. Shri Mataji gave him healing vibrations on his Nabhi chakra, at the level of his waist. I was feeling it all and, maybe after twenty minutes or so, it was just blowing cool. I saw and felt Shri Mataji cure this boy of cancer. What a tremendous experience. After being almost carried in, he walked out, full of energy.' (J.W.)

This young man had some sort of imbalance, and when he is cured he feels this same coolness. He gives a short account of how he is healed, which anyone who practises Sahaja Yoga quickly learns about. The same man is involved in helping to cure someone, and whereas when the boy is clearly ill he feels heat coming from him, once he is better he feels coolness radiating from his body. In any system heat indicates friction and often a problem. Once a person has Self Realisation he or she can become sensitive to this subtle heat or coolness, and can also learn how to direct these subtle vibrations to help heal people of diseases.

'I was at a public meeting in about 1978, in London. I had been coming to Sahaja Yoga for a few months and a Sahaja Yogi gave me vibrations, particularly on my Agnya, (forehead). All of a sudden, I began to feel a tremendous cool breeze flowing.

In those days, Shri Mataji used to come by and talk to each one of us.
"Are you feeling the cool breeze?" She asked.
"Yes," I replied.

Then she told me to put one hand towards her and one hand towards a long-haired person who was next to me. The hand towards Shri Mataji felt this fantastic cool breeze, whereas the one towards this guy felt tremendous heat. As I was doing that, this man, a complete stranger, turned around to me and for no apparent reason said something like he didn't like me at all. It was the first time I had felt the difference between the cool and the heat.' (B.K.)


This writer, an aerospace engineer from Singapore and now settled in America, also shows how the cool breeze indicates positivity whereas heat indicates some problem.


'My mother went to an introductory programme of Sahaja Yoga and received her Self Realisation. She came home with a photo she had been given of Shri Mataji, the lady who started Sahaja Yoga.

My mother showed me the photo and two extraordinary things happened. Firstly, for no apparent reason, I smelled a very strong and beautiful aroma of roses, and then I felt a cool breeze coming from the photograph. The following week I went along to the Sahaja Yoga programme too.' (R.I.)

This young woman, who comes from Italy, feels the coolness coming from a photograph of Shri Mataji. We find by experience that photographs of Shri Mataji, and anything She touches emits the same coolness. In a sense the matter is transformed.

Many people have been healed of serious diseases and others have gained Self Realization from the photograph of Shri Mataji, without ever meeting her. The beautiful smell of roses has been experienced by many people in the vicinity of Shri Mataji, her photo, or places where she has visited, even some time after she has left.

'My mother and I have been involved with Sahaja Yoga for many years. She never misses a chance to take me to an art gallery, but one visit stands out. We were in Milan, Italy in 1998. It was a warm day and we went to the Castello Sforzesco. We walked around for about an hour, until we reached the room which has the Rondanini Pietà by Michelangelo in it.

There were some benches, and being hot and tired, we sat down to look at the statue. We both suddenly felt a blast of cool wind, like air conditioning on full. It seemed to be coming from the direction of the statue.

"You've got strong air conditioning on in here," my mother said to the attendant.
"No, signora, there isn't any in here," he said, looking rather puzzled.
"That was a bit slow of us," laughed my mother, "after all, Michelangelo was a realised soul."' (A.W.)

The mother and daughter feel a powerful cool wind coming from a great work of art. This is a continuation of what has been written above. Because Michelangelo was a realized soul, his artworks emit good, or cool vibrations. And how does one know he was a realized soul? Because if a Sahaja Yogi puts his or her attention on him, a coolness will be felt on the palms of the hands.

Originally published by Oleg Florov on Geocities, which will be shutting down in 2009. The stories and explanations below have been collected from a number of friends and acquaintances around the world, all of whom also have this very special awareness on a daily basis. We hope that you too will enjoy it, and you may easily, if you browse through the following web pages. Central to what we would like to share with you is our gratitude to Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi, who, through her gift to the world of Sahaja Yoga, makes it all possible.

"Can the Air Conditioning be Turned Off?"

'We were in Athens in October 2001. It was a warm evening and Shri Mataji was giving a public programme, an introduction to Sahaja Yoga, in a hotel there. In many traditions, one of the signs of Self Realization, or as the Christians say, the awakening of the Holy Spirit, is a cool wind or breeze.

At the end of the programme, Shri Mataji gave the experience of Self Realization or kundalini awakening. Nearly all the people who had come for the first time said they had indeed felt a cool breeze, on their hands and above their heads, but some insisted it was the air conditioning. Someone went to find the hotel staff to ask them to please turn it off, and the staff, when found, said it was not on in the first place.'

-- (M.S.)

Wisdom from Gujarat

The tiny state of Gujarat that sits north of Maharashtra, is home to Mahatma Ghandi. Literature from Gujarat is quite rich and contains significant quantities of travelogues, observational humor and rustic wisdom. It has relatively fewer saints, vis-a-vis the state of Maharashtra. When I was forwarded some couplets/aphorisms in the regional language of Gujarati, I was pleasantly surprised at their depth and could not resist translating them and share it. Who ever compiled these, saved the best one for the last:

Measured words and measured fire
Tie the ties of wedlock
Excessively use the former
And the bonds will catch the latter

Earthly life is akin to earth
Shower it with tears too often
And surely it turns to muck

Life is to be cherished
As one would value ice
As the past and future of both are fluid,
only the 'present' is tangibly real

Some questions will continue to persist
The wealthy ones will keep on asking:
"What can I do to stir some hunger in me?"
The poor ones will keep on asking:
"What will I do when the hunger stirs in me?"

Life, you art irony
The day laborer lifts five bags of wheat,
but cannot affort a single
The money lender can buy all five,
but lift not even one


And finally...

If life ceases, but soul's desires do not:
Death has surely come
If the desires cease, but death is still afar,
Liberation has surely come

Who is your favorite Greek Tragedian? Or the Saga of the Duex ex Machina

Vedic lore has less heroes than herioc Godesses. It does not have logical situations where rational negotiations have given resolution. And this is not just written dramatics, as in Greece, but in almost every challenge that faced human existence.

The divine drama that almost always gets played out is:

Act 1: Trouble brews when powerful entities gain blessings and start their reign of terror on earth.

Act 2: The reign of terror takes the pain to the extreme and the troubles of earthly life become quite unbearable. When humanity is unable to resolve the situation, they begin praying for divine intervention, which acts in a sure shot way. An incarnation which brings about a long term solution to the miseries of the populace

Act 3: The battle for earth begins between the forces of good and evil. The forces of good more often than not lead by a female incarnation of the divine, which prevails, establishing peace, justice and happiness for generations to come.

This three act play of the divine always depends, and is orchestrated by the Goddess divine, the duex de machina.

While the Greek-Romantics rejected the use of divine intervention as a plot device in their story telling, it was very much a fact of life. The Greek tragedian Euripidis was criticized for overuse of duex ex machina for giving resulutions to the story and so was the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation. But real battles for the earth were always resolved by none other than this phenomenon.

Euripidis, you just became my favorite Greek tragedian*.

* as if I know many others....

Star Trek: Destruction by Alcohol

Alcohol and its effects on humans are well explored in the episode "The Naked Time", and how. A drunk Irishman from the Enterprise crew turns off the ships engine as its orbiting a collapsing planet and thats when the fun begins. The episode contains gems such as, a shirtless Sulu wandering the hallways with a sword, Scotty saying "I cannot change the laws of physics", traveling backwards in time and other geeky astrophysics fun. And best of all? Discovering the formula to travel back in time, how exciting.

Star Trek: The Original Series / The Naked Time

Star Trek: Posession

Star Trek: The Original Series was excellent for taking on fringe questions like race, greek gods and in the case of Episode "Operation Annhilate", posessions. The episode explores the parasitic mechanism, effect on hosts (physical & psychological-behavorial), complexity of curing and means of working around it. Must watch!

Star Trek: The Original Series / Operation Annihilate

I will let you watch the episode and conclude how close the writers come to the "cure" for posessions in this story. Its fun to watch how Spock shows his failing resistence to the parasite posession with twitches. Credits to writer

Self Realization better than "Happiness Surgery"?

Attending a talk on gaming in education, I heard the keynote speaker mention the well known link between the vagus nerve and emotions. Game-designers want to add features and events which will result in vagal stimulation - i.e., send "happy waves to the brain".

Here is a small animation to help you place the nerve within us:



Searching for more information, there seemed to be two main applications in the medical field (a) An FDA approved Treatment for depression when "all else has failed" and (b) Treatment for overeating. The common theme here is satisfaction and contentment, rather than happiness and sadness, IMHO.

For the depression application, long story short, this is an FDA approved treatment option, applied usually when most treatments have not worked (Mayo Clinic). The 'aha-moment' for me came when I saw the info-graphic showing how this is achieved - through a pace-maker. The location of the pace-maker in the graphic made it even simpler to understand:

Vagus nerve stimulation at Mayo Clinic

In Sahaja Yoga, the method to achieve balance, harmony and joy is based on awakening the spirit, "self-realization". Sahaja means born within. Born with us is the heart with the spirit within. In it's awakened state the spirit would keep us in joy, which is the characteristic. However there is a disconnect, caused by imbalance which stops the pulsations of the heart from acting on our central nervous system and transferring the joy of living. This blanket of darkness, called ego, when exceeds it's boundries, envelopes the heart and literally becomes the kill-joy.

Sahaja Yoga explicitly connects oneself with one's spirit, bringing the qualities and contributions of the human spirit onto the central nervous system. Before implaning a battery driven vagus-stimulating pacemaker, I would highly recommend trying the option of self-realization - awakening the spirit to reconnect and send those "happy pulses" from the heart to the vagus nerve and eventually the brain.

Disclaimer: I am not a doctor, and I do not play one on this blog!

Malaysian newspaper reports on Sahaja Yoga Meditation

Key Quote "Benefits proven by research, not a claim"