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A spiritual practice by itself is nothing. You have to breathe life into it; otherwise, it will not become alive. This is why traditionally,there is much reverence for a live guru. Doing yoga without a living guru is like stillbirth. If you are looking for exercise, I would say go play tennis, take a swim, take a walk or climb a mountain. The yogic system was not created as an exercise form. It is a subtle manipulation of your system to allow it to rise to a different level.Yoga means ‘union’. Every asana, every mudra, every way of breathing — is focused towards ultimate union.

If it has to become alive, you have to breathe life into it. This is why yoga was given in the form of sutras.The word sutra literally means ‘thread’. Without a thread, there is no garland, but you never wear a garland for its thread. You wear it for the fragrant flowers that it holds. But without a thread, there is no garland. When Patanjali gave the sutras, he only gave the thread. It has been for each master to put together the flowers, beads, pearls, or diamonds, or whatever else he likes. But Patanjali gave the thread; you cannot change the thread, nobody can because it is a live thread. This is not something that somebody thought up; this is not an idea. This is a very deep observation of life.

So you cannot change that because that is how life is made. But what kind of garland one makes out of this thread is left to each master or guru who comes along the way. To make a garland out of this thread, he has to have some stuff of his own; otherwise, it is not possible to do this. This cannot be done in a yoga studio.This will not happen because you have a certificate in yoga. Some subjectivity has to happen, which needs sadhana. You must hold it above your life, not as your profession, not as your hobby, not as something that you do on the side. This must be more important than your life, only then we let you teach; because without subjectivity, you cannot breathe life into it. There are many ways to breathe life into the spiritual process. The most rudimentary way is through sacrifice. The simple technology of this is to take a life which is young, a life which is vibrant. When you break that life, it releases a certain amount of energy.There is a whole technology of using that energy to convert it into another form.

Many idols are consecrated by this means. Once you have a consecrated idol, every day you must make the necessary offerings depending upon how that particular energy form is created. Because it is not a toy to play with, it is not a toy for you to work out your emotions. It is not a psychological tool. If you do not keep it up all the time, it will die. Or it will become a receding energy. When it becomes a receding energy, it causes more harm than well-being. So, constantly sacrifices were done. That is very rudimentary technology. There are more sophisticated ways of doing the same by using one’s own energy system. This needs a certain level of mastery and development of the energy system. If you were not restricted by the limitations of logic, if all of you were simply open, I would not waste your time and my time talking. Everything that needs to happen, will happen, just by the presence. My work is not about changing your attitude but to touch you at your core. A touch that will leave you transformed. Not changed but transformed.

Kailash Mansaravor Sojourn

“I have been to many truly powerful places, I have seen many powerful beings. When I bow down to them, I am genuine, but I bow down to them a little less than I would bow down to my Guru. When I bow down to Kailash, I bow down to it the same way I would bow down to my Guru.” - Sadhguru

Last date for Registration is March 31st, confirmation will be on first come first served basis. Places are filling up fast and are limited.

For Registration Contact :

Swami Nati
Kailash Manasarovar Sojourn
5/8, Ground Floor, 3rd Street, Kothari LayoutSinganallur, Coimbatore – 641 005
Ph: + 91 422 6553324, 094425 43331
Email: yatra@ishafoundation.org

Travel Dates:

Group A: 4 – 9 July 2009
Group B: 7 – 22 July 2009
Group C: 9 – 24 July 2009

You would need to go through payment process and registration to book a place.

Registration form and details of the program have been attached with this email or visit http://www.ishafoundation.org/eflyers/Kailash.isa

“A pilgrimage is not an achievement but an opportunity to subdue the sense of who you are and an access to the beyond”- Sadhguru

Pranams,
Isha Volunteers

Pancha Bhutha Aradhana

Upcoming date: 23rd April (will happen on Shivarathri day of every month)

Timings: 5.40 pm and 6.10 pm (open to all)

All the participants are required to report at temple reception by 4.00 pm on that day.

For Registrations, please contact Swami Abhipada (details given below)

The basis of all creation, including the physical body, are the five elements. The wellbeing of the body, and whether the body is the stepping stone or a hurdle towards one’s ultimate wellbeing, can be determined by purifying the five elements within the system. There is a whole system of yoga called bhutha shuddhi, meaning purification of the elements.

The presiding deity for such pursuit being Bhuteshwara, another element of Shiva. Pancha Bhutha Aradhana is an effort to bring down that dimension of grace of the Dhyanalinga upon the seeker. 14th day of every lunar month will be an opportunity to experience Pancha Bhutha Aradhana between 5:40 pm and 6:10 pm.
This will be particularly beneficial for those who experience weak and unstable constitutions, psychological instabilities, disturbed sleep, a constant sense of fear, and will also be supportive for the fulfillment one’s ambitions. This offering will include an initiation with Abhaya Sutra, a consecrated thread.

Donation for Pancha Bhutha Aradhana  Rs. 500/-


Linga Snanam will also happen that night. This is an unique  opportunity  for everyone to be in the  sanctum sanctorium of Dhyanalinga and participate in this process.

Donation for Linga Snanam Rs. 100/-

Offering of milk and water will happen on the Amavasya day which  usually follows the Shivarathri .

Contact: Swami Abhipada
Dhyanalinga Temple reception
Phone: (0422) 2515426, (0422) 2515345
Email: IYC@ishafoundation.org
Website: www.ishafoundation.org


“To reach out beyond your present levels of perception is the only way to touch the Divine.
And to touch the Divine is to know the Bliss of your existence.”

– Sadhguru

Pranams,

Isha Volunteers

Dear All,

Upcoming Nature Awareness Programme

Age Group: 9-15 years
Program Date: May 13 to 17 (Batch 1)
May 18 to 22 (Batch 2)

About the Programme: Nature is exciting, inspiring, refreshing and constantly changing. It is full of mysteries to be marveled at and beauty to be admired.
However, today’s children rarely have an opportunity to explore their connection with nature. Isha Nature Awareness Program is a fun-filled four and a half day residential summer camp for boys and girls in the age group 9-15 years. The program instills love of Nature and the power of yogic practices in growing children.
Living at the Isha Yoga Center and spending time in nature, children learn to appreciate simple treasures like gentle mountain breeze, musical chirping of birds, miracle of diversity in nature. These and other learning experiences bring an intimacy with nature in children and enhance their sense of well being. The program is an opportunity for children to get acquainted with numerous life forms, heighten their sensitivity to life and create an understanding and appreciation of interdependence amongst life forms.

Program Timings: Participants are required to arrive at the venue by 4 pm of starting day and will be able to leave by 5 pm of last day of the program.

Course Donation: Rs. 7,500/- per person

For more information http://www.ishafoundation.org/component/option,com_program/program_id,2050/task,details/

Please find registration form and program details as an attachment.


Contact: V.S.Raghavan ( For registrations and payment )
203, Behind Radha Rani Theatre, Kothari Nagar, Singanallur, Coimbatore – 641 005.
Phone: 98944 18089, 98478 95042
Email: raghsri@gmail.com

Pranams,
Isha Volunteers

Beyond the limitations of experience: SadhguruJaggi Vasudev

Gurus and godmen can be notoriously secretive about their past, but Jaggi Vasudev is happy nattering about his childhood. We have just teed off and Vasudev, armed with a neo-modern Nike Sumo driver that propels the ball with a metallic tink, has hit a giant slice that heads unerringly into the bushes. It seems impolite not to offer the Sadhguru a second shot, particularly one that has played only “21 rounds of golf precisely” in his entire life.

His second shot is a huge hook to the left, but it will do. The son of a physician father with a transferable job, Vasudev suggests he had a regular middle class kind of childhood. “I loved to hang-glide and race mobikes,” he says of his time in Mysore . When he graduated in English literature, he was occupied with such things as music, sports, trekking and taking his Yezdi (and later a Yamaha 350) for long trips.

Since they reach out to today’s urban middle class, new age gurus cannot afford to appear too unbending and orthodox. But the Frisbee-throwing, Beatles-loving, Davos-visiting, Kafka-quoting Vasudev pushes the definition of cool well into uber.

In some ways, he positions himself as an anti-guru. He is telling me that he is not into religious texts (“reading a couple of chapters of the Gita can’t qualify you as a guru”) and has never learnt formal meditation, when he is spotted by a group of women — ground staff who maintain the fairways and greens at the golf course. “I knew it was you,” cries one of them, clearly overwhelmed, as she prostrates before him.

Others, sobbing loudly and looking adoringly, follow suit, dispelling my belief that he is a wholly middle class phenomenon. “Didn’t think they would recognise me,” he says. In dark glasses, a floppy hat, olive green shirt and sneakers, it does take some doing. Or does it? “Must be the beard,” I suggest tentatively. He smiles sportingly as he runs his fingers through the forest of curls.

Having consumed more strokes than I care to remember to reach the 10th green, the Sadhguru proceeds to make an astonishingly good putt. “Very good,” I congratulate him. “This is different. This [putting] is only a mind game,” implying — not inaccurately — that while the golf swing involves the science of mechanics, putting is all in the mind. Science and the mind will occupy a fair bit of our discussion and we walk down the fairways, rummage through the rough, and consume masala dosas at the golf hut.

Around 10 years ago, he says he was subjected to a scientific experiment, had electrodes put on his body, and asked to meditate. He told them he didn’t know how to meditate, but can sit still, which he did for some 20 minutes. “Then, they started pulling out the electrodes, knocking on my knees and elbows and looking at me weirdly. “What’s up?” I asked them. “‘Our machines say either you are dead or your brain is,’ they said”. He pauses before chortling, “I replied I prefer the first possibility. The second is too insulting.” The story is intended to emphasise the limitations of science and how life cannot be “contained in a few physical parameters.”

Seeing anew

His message, he suggests, is not derived from a body of religious or cultural work. It is basically to take his own experience — born out of a sudden, unexpected and life-changing mystical revelation atop a rock in the Chamundi hills — and to present it as a “science” after stripping it of the influence of such things as culture, language and religion.

So, he’s not a Hindu guru? Hindu, he replies, is a cultural and geographical identity rather than a religious one. “Anyone born in the land of the Indus is a Hindu.” He goes on to add: “This is the only culture on the planet which is a godless one, one in which there is no concretised idea of god. We worship whatever we feel like — a tree, a rock, a cow, a snake, a mother. One survey says there are 13 million gods and goddesses in this country.”

Pointing to an object, he continues: “You can worship that stone on the golf course and nobody will think that is absurd. Being reverential is important, not what you are reverential about. It’s about how to take a human being to his full potential, that’s all.”

Sada, the golf course’s coach, has recognised the Sadhguru and chooses to walk along, providing him with impromptu lessons. He tweaks his grip, adjusts his stance, modifies his backswing and although Vasudev says he will “never be able to hit the ball this way”, he is soon making better contact than ever before.

While he seems to enjoy being taught, he doesn’t like referring to his discourses as teaching. “Yes, I have no teaching, no philosophy. All I have is methods, which you can call a technology. If you ask me to say in one sentence what my central message is, I would say, ‘Do not settle for the limitations of your experience. Try to break it and move to the next level. If you do that, you will know there are many levels of reality outside and within yourself. Don’t settle for who you are right now.”

But why not? He throws the question back at me. “Don’t you want to play golf a little better tomorrow?” We all want a little more of what we know best — money, love, power, knowledge. “There is something within us which does not like boundaries. If we find unconscious expression of this, we call it materialism. If it is conscious, we call it a spiritual process. You can either walk with your eyes open or closed. I am saying why not keep them open.”

Talk of materialism makes me wonder about Davos, where Vasudev has addressed the World Economic Forum for four successive years. What’s a Sadhguru doing in a gathering of the business elite? “See, the 2,000 people who come there control 80 per cent of the world’s economy. If I can influence them even 10 per cent, problems such as the lack of nourishment and education can be solved. We have the resources, capability, technology to address every human problem on the planet. The only thing missing is the lack of inclusiveness.”

Will to change

So poverty and backwardness are not systemic problems but arise out a lack of will? Absolutely, suggests the Sadhguru, turning anecdotal and recounting stories. One of them is about Klaus Schwab (“now a dear friend”), founder of the World Economic Forum. Schwab, the story goes, asked if there was one thing the Forum could do for him to change the world, what it would be. “I told him give me the 24 heads of state of the major nations for five days and I will solve the basic problems. That’s all it takes — we need to touch the leaders on the planet.”

There is another story about a private meeting with Bill Clinton during Hilary’s presidential campaign, during which the Sadhguru asked: “How does it matter to us who becomes President. Won’t the same games go on? You have spent $600 billion on Iraq. Every child could be nourished and educated with a fraction of that.” Apparently, Clinton’s tone changed and he agreed with Vasudev, which the latter interprets as yet another sign that the rich and the powerful are slowly beginning to understand they have the capability of changing the world.

Vasudev’s conversation is punctuated with remarks that reveal a taste for the dramatic quote. “Look at our industries,” he laments. “The biggest one is armaments, next comes pharmaceuticals and then alcohol. The first puts you on the way to death, the second pretends to pull you back, and the third gets you there for sure!”

We have already done 12 holes and it is time to go to work. But the Sadhguru, who is totally engrossed with his golf lessons, chooses to play some more. As I leave, I cannot help thinking that — as his website rather smugly declares — he is indeed “an arresting blend of profundity and pragmatism”. There is an unconventional plain-speaking side that is hard to miss. On the subject of Lord Krishna, he is quoted as saying: “If Krishna lived today, he would make you all very uncomfortable. Your wife would want to go dancing with him. So would your daughter and your 80-year-old mother.” There is also a more predictable esoteric side, which manifests itself in arcane talk of inner transformations and mastery over the mechanisms of life. As I watch him continue to chip balls on to the green, I feel there is also a very childlike side. “I don’t get to do this very often,” he says in explanation of his decision to stay on. “I’m going to make the most of it.”

The man and his vision

Jaggi Vasudev is the founder of the Isha Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation that runs yoga centres around the world. The Isha Yoga Centre and Ashram near Coimbatore was founded in 1992 and conducts self-awareness programmes for people from all walks of life.

He was the spearhead of the project Green Hands, which aims at increasing the green cover of Tamil Nadu. He has been invited as a speaker to the World Economic Forum for four successive years and served as a delegate to the United Nations Millennium Peace Summit and the World Peace Congress.

‘I have no teaching, no philosophy.

All I have is methods, which you can call a technology.’

Isha Yoga Sathsang

Dear Meditator,

Reaffirm your intention to awaken the formless divine within. It is indeed rejuvenating and supportive to attend Sathsang and rekindle your affirmation.

“Sathsang is to go beyond all duality of anger, hatred, jealousy, like, dislike – just to bask in the light of the enlightened.” -Sadhguru

The details of the upcoming Sathsangs in NCR are given below, in order to help you plan your participation. We will keep updating you regularly so you don’t miss out on this opportunity.
Please come on an empty stomach condition and practice your kriyas with fellow meditators and under the guidance of the more experienced.

Dwarka
Date: Sunday 15 March
Time: 6:00 pm – 8:15 pm
Venue: “Sai Mandir”, Adjoining Church , Sector 9 , Behind Azad Hind Apartments, Dwarka
Contact Person: 9868128910

Faridabad
Date: Sunday 15 march
Time: 9:00 am – 11:15 am
Venue: Henna Industries Pvt. Ltd. Plot 45, Sector 27A, Noida
Contact Person: 9811027222

Isha Center in Delhi
#4, Osho Drive, Gadaipur, Mandi Gaon Road, Mehrauli.
3km from Andheria More.

Isha now has its own space in Delhi. The Center is open to meditators and non-meditators on Saturdays and Sundays from 5pm to 7pm. The evening schedule starts with Guru Pooja, followed by Sadhguru’s discourses on video, Presence and chanting.

Come and bask in the Presence of the Master. All are welcome.

SMS
Information about sathsangs, programs, Sadhguru quotes and media appearance etc. is available through SMS at Rs.100/ 3years. Register with Arunava 9811487009 .

Pranams
Volunteers,
Isha Foundation