Smile Please!

Started the new year in an amazing self-exploring environment, putting my meditation practice into use! I was working as a kitchen manager for Vipassana meditators for 10days, with 7 people from different spectrum of a rainbow, exploring different colors of personality was so much fun.

Stepped into new year with my beautiful color card, encountered lot of copain/copine ( a new word I learned during my last weekend in Paris which does not exists in English. Copain/copine - someone is bit closer than a acquaintance but not very close enough to call  friend) I wish English had that word, that would make my life easy. My heart is overflowing with happiness with all the colors of a rainbow but sad to see most of my copain/copine in grey scale, who often forget to smile, scared to be alone, wanting to change the world, desperely trying to make the grey go away!  I wish I can share the bit of rainbow I have but the are just my copain/copine, they have not given me access to their hearts as my friends do. so standing at a distance hoping my rainbow will bring some simile in their life!  My dear copain/copine some words from favorite philosopher for you !

If you do not follow somebody you feel very lonely. Be lonely then. Why are you frightened of being alone? Because you are faced with yourself as you are and you find that you are empty, dull, stupid, ugly, guilty and anxious - a petty, shoddy, second-hand entity. Face the fact; look at it, do not run away from it. The moment you run away fear begins.

In enquiring into ourselves we are not isolating ourselves from the rest of the world. It is not an unhealthy process. Man throughout the world is caught up in the same daily problems as ourselves, so in enquiring into ourselves we are not being in the least neurotic because there is no difference between the individual and the collective. That is an actual fact. I have created the world as I am. So don't let us get lost in this battle between the part and the whole.

-J Krisnamurti

Stillness in the movement

Stepping into 3rd year of yoga. I am still not fully able to understand my recent yoga obsession, often when my friends ask me about my experience with yoga, I was never able to give a convincing answer.  Practicing mostly Vinyāsa style, all the sweats, hard work, took one year even to touch my toes. I think I never had patience to do something which required so much of dedication and hard work and with very little 'visible progress'.

Yesterday it was a Vinyāsa flow class with candle lights and it was themed around, heart opening ( back bends), something I really don't enjoy, facing all the fears, letting things go, accepting my limitations. As we were preparing to do the Dancers pose (Natarajasana, shown in the photo), which can be sometimes very agitating, trying to go deeper in back bend with the other leg and getting a sense of balance in the other leg, not my favourite pose. My teacher gave a beautiful explanation to make peace with this pose, not to be agitated by trying to find the stillness in the movement. When the heart rates goes boom..boom..boom..and the blood starts flooding and rushing around the body, can I still balance things calmly in one leg? I think this is one of the thing yoga is teaching me silently for the past 2 years.  2013, was externally most agitated year, accidents, losing friends, reset in relationships yet internally very much at peace, may be thanks to yoga. 2013 was more like December in Europe, cold, deep silence of the snowy days and yet lot of celebrations and lights all around. 

Wordless communication with Existence

I am back after a year, after a fan's request :-)

I feel I lost words after moving to England, if I have to write about the summary of life in cambridge, the closest one word description will be 'peaceful'. I am losing faith in words, even more so during the past few days. What I see, feel and experience is unique to me and my surroundings, how can I expect another man-made language  to have words for that?

I will try to explain this wordless communication with existence using a new 'passion' in my life, the birds. I was introduced to a whole new world of birds few years back during the Easter holidays by a friend. They might have existed even before that Easter, there are evidences for their existence in books describing them and people have given different names,  I use these books to identify them, most of them were printed before that Easter.  So these birds might have existed for a long time.

Only very few existed in my world before that Easter, may be Chicken and Rooster as they have ended up in my lunch plate few times, Pigeons and Crows as they come in huge numbers to my house and gardens in search of food and yes! Peacocks , Parrots and Kingfishers who can miss such bright colours.  But now my experience with them is beyond that, I hear them every time I step out of my house, as walk around the natural reserve in my work during lunch breaks and during my stroll in near by woods, I hear some bird-like sound from an empty autumn tree, I stop for few minutes, sometimes even for few hours under that tree, trying to locate the source of that sound, I scan through all those empty branches but only left with the feeling that the source of that sound have transcended my limited 3 dimensional perception of this world.  But sometimes for few seconds I can see them, I can even capture them through my camera lenses. So the words are like these photos they can only show what I have seen for few seconds but my experience with the existence of these birds are beyond those few seconds, no words or photograph can capture or explain that.  I recently felt this strong, powerful wordless communication with another human begin, If I have to simplify and flatten that experience into a one dimensional thing like this bird photograph, it was magical!

I am not the only one who rambles about such wordless communication, looks like this also one of the very few idea that I share with Osho.

 Wordless communication with Existence in his own words.

 Osho : You are looking at a flower: look at the flower, feel the beauty of it, but do not use the word beauty, not even in the mind. Look at it: let it be absorbed in you, go deeply into it, but do not use words.

Feel the beauty of it, but do not say, ”It is beautiful” – not even in the mind. Do not verbalize and gradually you will become capable of feeling the flower as beautiful without using the word. Really, it is not difficult; it is natural.

You feel first and then the word comes, but we are so habituated to words that there is no gap. The feeling is there, but you have not even felt it before suddenly a word comes. So create a gap: just feel the beauty of the flower, but do not use the word.

If you can disassociate words from feelings, you can disassociate feelings from existence. Then let the flower be there and you be there, as two presences, but do not allow the feeling to come in. Do not even feel now that the flower is beautiful.

Let the flower be there and you be there, in a deep embrace, without any ripple of feeling. Then you will feel beauty without feeling; you will be the beauty of the flower. It will not be a feeling: you will be the flower. Then you have existentially felt something.

Empting the cup!

A beautiful talk. Are we not stuck with single story, ideology and sometimes just with experiences through books and how easy is it to break the belief that a book puts in your mind? My image of English people as the characters of Thomas Hardy's Mayor of Casterbridge was always there in the corner of my heart until I actually met few English people 3 years back.

Do not bring any books,” his father advised him. “No one can think for you. Look out the window, talk to people...” Am I exaggerating, if I think the above advice of Jean Monnet's father was key behind making Jean Monnet the father of European Union?

Recently met few very intelligent people getting stuck with one dimensional image of books, I hope they can come out and have real experiences of 3-dimension and beyond.

Another related note by JK about breaking the boundaries and to see the reality..Hope We can empty our cups too...

Belief Hinders True Understanding

If we had no belief, what would happen to us? Shouldn't we be very frightened of what might happen? If we had no pattern of action, based on a belief -either in God, or in communism, or in socialism, or in imperialism, or in some kind of religious formula, some dogma in which we are conditioned -we should feel utterly lost, shouldn't we? And is not this acceptance of a belief the covering up of that fear- the fear of being really nothing, of being empty? After all, a cup is useful only when it is empty; and a mind that is filled with beliefs, with dogmas, with assertions, with quotations, is really an uncreative mind; it is merely a repetitive mind. To escape from that fear - that fear of emptiness, that fear of loneliness, that fear of stagnation, of not arriving, not succeeding, not achieving, not being something, not becoming something - is surely one of the reasons, is it not, why we accept beliefs so eagerly and greedily? And, through acceptance of belief, do we understand ourselves? On the contrary. A belief, religious or political, obviously hinders the understanding of ourselves. It acts as a screen through which we look at ourselves. And can we look at ourselves without beliefs? If we remove these beliefs, the many beliefs that one has, is there anything left to look at? If we have no beliefs with which the mind has identified itself, then the mind, without identification, is capable of looking at itself as it is& - and then, surely there is the beginning of the understand of oneself. - J. Krishnamurti, The Book of Life

My Spring continues..

Early this spring, I told a friend that I am experiencing a divine peace and tranquility in me, which I have never experienced before. He said, with his usual tranquil smile," well! that's ..just.. may be the spring speaking"! Now the trees started changing colour and even some cold north winds started blowing. Usually the cold northern breeze makes me restless, remind me of the places I want to see, the friendships I want to make, the battles I want to fight and during those days I found comfort in my imaginary kangaroo.

But still the clever North Wind...
was not satisfied.
The Wind spoke to Vianne...
of towns yet to be visited.
Friends in need, yet to be discovered.
Battles yet to be fought.
By someone else... next time.
And so it was, the North Wind grew weary...
and went on its way.

As for Pantoufle?
Well, his bad leg miraculously healed...
and he hopped off in search of new adventures.
I didn't miss him.

And thus my spring and the peace I made with myself continues! Life cant be more beautiful and Yes! I saw the movie Chocolat today!

Can life get more beautiful?

Can life get more beautiful? Enjoying the English spring... which triggered my new passion...and opened a whole new dimension in life...more on that later..

Wow Taj!

Finally as the sun came out the fog started disappearing, it was a magical moment to see Taj Mahal appearing from the fog. Shajahan, the emperor who built Taj, used the description of paradise in Quran and replicated it on earth as Taj it seems. No wonder, after 400 it is still makes an impact on people. The Persian immigration and all their efforts to blend in with the Indian culture was so evident in the Persian floral arts. It was my first experience of Mughal dynasty in India. I hope I will have more chance to discover their works in and Delhi in the next few coming days. End of the day, after interacting with 100s of people who were trying to sell us the beautiful souvenirs of Taj Maghal, we learned few tricks to identify the real marble. When you put light on one side of the marble who can see how opaque they are and also able to see the tiny crystals of the marble. This property of the marble makes Taj Mahal glow in different lights of the day it seem. Hoping to catch Taj on a bright sunny day, sun set and sun raise some day.

Back home!

Back home after 3 years where everything seems to be new but nothing feels like new, felt like home right from the minute I landed. After having stunning views of Himalayas from the plane, we landed in the Delhi airport. May be thanks to the recent Common wealth games, this international airport finally looked like one. The facilities in the airport may be like any other airport I have visited in European but many things around me reminded me that I am back in India. The crowd outside with garlands, waiting to receive and impress their foreign business collaborator; a very emotional grandma hugging a few months old baby, maybe she was seeing her grandchild for the first time and the group of at least 5 to 10 aunts and uncles waiting to have the first glimpse of that baby. I couldn’t stop wondering why I feel at home in both the airports where l left 8 hrs back and in the other end of the world where I landed . “ when you never lose the need to wander then you belong” these words in that huge master card adv. banner adv came as an answer to my puzzle.

We got into my friends SUV and hit the road towards Agra, they have new highways but still with old mad traffic, but I still enjoy the peaceful co-existence with cows and buffalos, we Indians still share the roads with them. The minute we entered Agra, the four lane road turned into 6 or I should say 6 and half, with traffic coming in every direction in each lane, we were in a Jam for more than an hour, just trying to untangle ourselves from the madness of the road. Finally arrived at a stunning oasis among all the madness, the most beautiful hotel I have stayed. The hotel rooms with pieces of arts replicating the works of Taj Mahal made me feel like princess, now I am in this king size carved bed waiting for the Taj Mahal to come out of the fog.

Another year of illusion!

According to my favourite Dhamma the cat, "Time is an illusion and illusions should be dealt with", Cambridge, the 15th town and 34th year of my life, which makes it an average of around 2 years per town. Dealing with this time bound illusion is more difficult when I have to meet new people every two years. can I really make new "best friend" every two years or its just me idealizing relationships. ‘Rail Sneham" a term used in Tamil for the friendships one makes over a train journey, which terminates the same time as the journey itself. I thought my friendship was more with the train than the people in it! but I don't know when I started missing the people. But it was big consolation to know that I am not the only victim of train journeys. Ruskin Bond, Indo-English author wrote "A song for the lost friends" in train. May be one day, I will stop idealizing my relationships with my train acquaintances and learn not to miss them. Until then let me miss the acquaintance, I just met during his first train journey. For one its just a journey and for the other thats the way of life! So, let me shed some tears even when they are not understood!

He called goodbye and waved
As I looked back from the bend in the road.
....
And the trains roll on, everyday
Hundreds of people coming or going or running away
Goodbye, goodbye!
Into the forest's silence,
Outside the dark tunnel,
Out of the tunnel,out of the dark
...
Twilight and evening bell,
And after the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark.
-- "A song for the lost friends" by Ruskin Bond!

Is Seeing Believing?

Not so successful in my war on fear..Screamed so much 'celebrating' hallowing weekend in scaresville in Kentwell and staying in a 16th century country house in Suffolk. Few fears made me scream, few are still hidden behind the clouds. I wish the Sun can be as brave as me, to come out and face the fears. “Love is what we were born with. Fear is what we learned here.” and both are our own perception of illusion, saw this very interesting 'horizon' program on our perception of illusion. Synaesthesia - The Mixing of the Senses, can be a solution to my fears?

fighting the fears!

recently..fighting some fears...fear of water..swimming 3 times a week! darkness..biking through dark fields! horror movies...watched one alone! no fear of the unknown, but of the loss of the known...how many times I yelled in this fear..no yelling ..let the bird fly..may be will come back!

A hero with thousand faces..

Many things will always remain a puzzle, one such tiny Tamil puzzle is Rajnikanth. A 60 year old man who don't know to dance sing or act is enterining the region and treated like a 'mythical' character for last 30 years. Today I got to see him in his new avatar as a robot. It was special to watch him in the silver screen, from UK along with my adventurous (non-Indian) friends who volunteered to share this 'cultural' experience with me, after all like mythologies, movies can be a dream of a society. It was a pleasant evening to revisit my childhood dream land with my friends today.

La Tête en Friche..

Among all the chaos in life, I am still enjoying the Cambridge film festival, I was able to cry along with many other audiences as I watched La tête en friche, a French movie which beautifully depicts the friendship developing in very unlikely conditions. Today again watched a French movie but this time I was not able to laugh along with other audiences, when pain and emotions can cross the barriers of language and nations, I don’t know why the sense of humour fails to cross the boundaries. How many times I have offended people with my Indian sense of humour. I often forget that I grew up in a country where there was no concept of personal space, especially between friends. I grew up in a country where asking and taking favours are part of friendship, a sign to show people that I share a special space with you and how many times I have seen a crappy movie just to share the space and time with a friend I like. After I fought my way into this new world and I do enjoy this personal space I created for myself. But I still take liberty to invade the personal spaces of friends, with my silly sense of humour and sometimes even get disappointed for my personal space not getting invaded by friends close to my heart. Finally the Swedish short movie I saw yesterday came as an answer to my recent disappointments, the movie was a small recreation of a failed bank robbery happened in Stockholm in 2006. So, let me blame the cultural differences for all my disappointments, at least until I understand the actual reasons.. La Tête en Friche...

This day that year!

15th Sep 2008, I had a deadline for a manuscript submission, worked non-stop...yes! non-stop 25 hours in my Paris lab and the next day (15th sep 2008) when I stepped out of my lab around noon, I found my bike stolen. Which made me write this(to my lost love) blog entry..Oh! god ! I was so cheesy then! Now 2 years later, I started biking again, I almost biked 1500 kms in last 6 months, including London to Cambridge..Love can find you back in many different ways! I wish I will be fit enough to bike till I die! This photo taken during my first break after 30 km, during my London Cambridge biking. Yes! on 25th of July London and Cambridge was linked by a long chain of cyclist! And ...also.. thanks to my friends for their kind donation for this event!

இது ஒரு பொன் மாலைப் பொழுது

Got to see a very beautiful sunset on the way back from my work. I love this evening bus trip through the fields...

Today sky reminded me of my lines favourite from a tamil song!

"வானம் எனக்கொரு போதிமரம் (sky is my Bodhi tree)
நாளும் எனக்கது சேதி தரும்" (it enlightens me each day)

as the title says...it was a golden evening!

Green horizon!

I missed and was whining about the lack of nature, green and horizon in Paris.

Now in Cambridge all I have is nature green and horizon...

taking that long walks to see the place where this green mixes with that blue.

Science facts remind me that such a place doest exist, but why do..

I still have hope?

PS: Hug from 4th dimension totally works!

Hug from 4th Dimension

I have to contradict myself again, as a follower of tenth dimension blog, I should be believing in magic sort of things, after all human can see only up to three dimensions. Sometimes we even pretend not to understand the realities of third dimension. Today I pretended not to understand my mother and my friend pretended not to understand my email, we both live in the fear of facing strong emotions. To overcome the fears of 3rd dimension, here is a hug from the 4th dimension. Mom! this hug is for you on your birthday! and one for you my friend, to face the emotions of today which doesn't need a year long planing and agenda. So, Now if you wonder how this 4th dimension hug may look or feel like, you can have a look at Sarah Maxine Williams animation of two dimensional beings getting hug from 3rd dimension.

And if you are curious enough to spend 18 min to see whats around the corner from 4th to 10th dimensions have a look at this blog.

Magicians do not exist!

Travelling this incredible journey called life, I even forgot to update my blog for sometime. When I was away from the virtual world, I was travelling in the far lands, enjoying the beauty of Sweden and Scotland. After three months, as I return to my blog I realize I am in the very same place as I was 3 months before. Today, I was spending my lunch time, listening to the beautiful beats of my heart and talking with these fishes in cam about how to let things go. I felt like this ignorant little girl in the movie L'illusionniste, we both wandered over Arthur's seat in Edinburgh and we both ignorantly believed in Magic. Expecting Magic from friends and family, expecting them to understand my heart beats but "Magicians do not exist!"

Let it go!

Something I discovered in my meditation is, how many 'unrelated' events that happened in my life are connected with a small thread of emotions. Often in my meditation, when a certain type of emotion comes up on the surface of mind, for example disappointment, I can reflect 'all' the events lead to disappointment since my childhood. Yesterday as I was having my lunch at my favorite spot on the Cam bridge at my work, staring at the fishes . Seeing this Pike fish for the first time, with nice patterns on its body shining in the sun rays in the shallow water, I was trying to find the balance between my impassioned wish to hold it closer to me and fear that it will suffocate the little fish. Finally tried to enjoy this beautiful reality that this fish is very nice part of lunch and rejected the impassioned wishes or fear as my own projections of the reality and not actually part of the reality.

Walls of Prejudice

A confused day, and like most of my confused days I spent the evening reading J.Krishnamurti. I watched the Video: The Challenge of Change - J. Krishnamurti Online. The source of my confusion was due to my disbelief in others experiences. For past few weeks I am living the following lines of JK "I have long been in revolt from all things, from the authority of others, from the instruction of others, from the knowledge of others; I would not accept anything as Truth until I found the Truth myself."
When I was 12, I studied Alexandre Dumas 's The black tulip novel in school and argued about the existence of tulips and black flowers. My botany teacher was able to convince me the existence of tulips with a picture, but she was not able to convince me about black tulips. Finally yesterday after 21 years I was able to say my botany teacher was right...black tulips do exist. It is a big struggle to break the wall of prejudice and to reject the experience of friends, family and wise people but there is no joy like experiencing the experience oneself. Still...like to share my experience of black tulips!