Welcome to the Community pages. Here’s where you’ll find daily and weekly features, bulletin boards, healthy recipes, blogs and links
Today’s Thought from the Daily Guru
May 17, 2012
OPEN YOUR OWN DOOR TO SUCCESS
Success on any major scale requires that you accept responsibility. The one quality that all successful people have is their ability to take on responsibility.
You must choose the thoughts and actions that will lead you on to success. Nothing will happen by itself. It can all come your way, once you understand that you have to make it come your way, by your own exertions.
Find your pathway to success and begin your journey. Your life will become what you make of it. The golden opportunity you are seeking lies within you.
It's not in your environment. It's not in luck or chance, or the help of others. It's in you alone.
Opportunity is all around you. And if the door of opportunity is closed, you must keep on knocking on it, and keep on knocking on it until it opens. You'll develop your opportunity by applying persistence to your possibilities.
Success won't come to you, you must go to it. Become an opener of doors.
The GATE TRANSFORMATIONAL STORY CONFERENCE examines the role of story in promoting personal, social and global transformation. Story is explored from a variety of perspectives, with special emphasis on the human transformational journey — the Transformational Arc life-death-life.
GATE 2 will feature a variety of presenters, many high-profile, some whose names you may not recognize, all steeped in transformational arts, entertainment and media. There may even be a few surprises! Through a richly woven program of speakers, videos, music and arts performances, film clips and other multi-media presentations, attendees will leave intellectually stimulated, emotionally moved, and inspired to pursue their work with greater clarity, substance and commitment. Use the code TRANSFORM for 20% off!
Visit www.gatecommunity.org for more information
May 11-13, 2012
Experience the Bahkti at Shakti Fest the Spring Ommersion from our friends at Bhakti Fest! Also, if you are an OM Member use the code 'Omstream' to get a 10% discount!! Visit http://tinyurl.com/6q8r9nh
Sat. Oct 1, 2011 @ 11am
Master Tibetan Singing Bowl Artist and Founder of www.Omstream.com, Michael Perricone, will lead a sound meditation, designed to enhance creativity through the playing
of ancient Tibetan Singing Bowls. He will be joined by the singer/songwriter Jahna, who will guide a vocal meditation.
The event concludes with Michael Perricone and Jahna performing a concert of Conscious World Music!
Please join them in the Pacific Ballroom!
Visit http://2011.consciouslifeexpo.com/dov.htm
September 8 - 11, 2011
Referred to as “The Spiritual Woodstock,” Bhakti Fest hosts the most
renown and well-respected yoga teachers, kirtan artists and scholars
of our time. The 2011 line-up includes; Bryan Kest, Ram Das (via DVD),
Krishna Das, Seane Corn, MC Yogi, Shiva Rea, Sean Johnson and The Wild
Lotus Band, Sara Ivanhoe, Jai Uttal, Laura 'Ambika Lalita' Amazzone,
Durgas Das and Mira, Mas Vidal, Donna DeLory, Govindas and Radha,
Wah!, Kia Miller and Tommy Rosen, Howard Wills, Dr. Chris Chapple and
many more...Located just outside the Joshua Tree National Park, the
energetically charged grounds boast beautiful desert landscapes, 3
yoga halls, 2 kirtan stages, 2 workshop halls and 1 Frank Lloyd Wright
building. The perfect opportunity for the curious seeker, experienced
yogi or dedicated bhakta. This September "Be In The Bhav..."
Continuing
Follow us on twitter @omstream and be eligible for special discounts and other offers!
Sept. 9th -12th, 2010
Listen to and dance with Omstream Artists at Bhakti Fest in Joshua Tree! David Stringer, Donna DeLory, MC Yogi and more!!
Mar/24/2011
How to create an instructor playlist:
June 25, 2011
Mindfulness, Neuroscience and Creativity:
An Interactive Exploration
with Dr. Robert Bilder, Kate McCallum, Jahna & Michael Perricone and Diana Winston
Join us at MARC for a special event where we bring together artists, musicians, media makers, meditators, and neuroscientists for a half day exploring the interface of mindfulness and creativity.
The day will include musical performances, meditations, a discussion on the neuroscience of creativity, a digital "animeditation," Tibetan singing bowls, and personal creative expression. We will specifically examine the effects of meditation on creativity, art, and the brain.
Date: Saturday June 25 Time: 10AM-1PM Venue: Neuroscience Research Building Auditorium, UCLA Cost: $50
Discounts, Scholarship and Work-exchange opportunities available.
Contact us
www.marc.ucla.edu
310.206.7503 marcinfo@ucla.edu
Sponsored by: C3: Center for Conscious Creativity Omstream.com LA YOGA Magazine Mindful Awareness Research Center (MARC) Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) Collaborative Centers for Integrative
Sep/13/2009
Tibetan Bowls At Yoga Works
March 27. 2011
Yoga Journal Magazine and Omstream partner to create a fabulous home Yoga Practice DVD program with a Companion Music CD from Omstream Artists!
Featured on Volume 4 is:
Desert Dwellers- "Moonlit Horizon"
Deva Premal & The Gyuto Monks of Tibet -"Compassion: Om Mani Padme Hum"
Dave Eggar - "SRINGARA [K.575, II]"
Prem Joshua - "Lahore Connection- (Toires Remix)"
Christo Pellani- "Unstruck"
The class begins. People rustle on their mats, seeking stillness. Breath begins to deepen. As your focus turns within, establishing the tone of the practice, the music is quiet, simple, unobtrusive. Deva Premal’s Dakshina becomes an extension of the air itself.
Slowly the body engages, eases into the rhythm of the flow. Sun Salutations ignite the physical, stimulate the mental, massage the spiritual. The music, DJ Drez’s Jahta Beat, is upbeat, even inspirational. Quite literally, it moves you.
Standing postures, arm balances, inversions. Heat is building quickly. The mind seeks something to ground it, something to hold onto. The voices: Donna De Lory , Girish, Jai Uttal, calling you into your practice, into yourself.
As cool down settles in, the hips yearn for release. Contemplative, even melancholy tunes assist in the process. Your hips are your emotional storage house of tension and trauma, as well as your doorway to emotional freedom. Snatam Kaur chants in the background. What comes up lets go.
Finally, svasansa: a perfect time for Spirit Dwelling by Geoffrey Armes to play. Perhaps Kismet by Aurah. Something that allows you to rest, yet remain incredibly alert. To disengage from the body, yet re-engage the mind. To meditate, to open up, to bring yourself full circle. Eventually back to sitting, back to life.
Shana Meyerson teaches at Bryan Kest's Santa Monica Power Yoga, and founded mini yogis yoga for kids in Los Angeles.
Yoga for Life (from Yogi Times)
The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali
by robert birnberg
Part One In A Series: The Evolution Of Yoga
Chances are you’re sitting in a coffee shop, sipping hot chai, and reading a yoga magazine. You may have just finished your favorite yoga class, and you feel really good. A great workout it may have been, and yet deep inside you know that there must be more to yoga than alignment, anatomy, and many comments about being “grounded,” “centered” and “balanced.”
And you’re right. Yoga is much, much more. The postures are but one component of a complex system of spiritual psychology, a practical philosophy whose source is India’s 5000-year-old jewel of collected knowledge, the Vedas.
The Vedas
Widely believed to be divinely inspired, the Vedas are oral teachings, preserved for generations by flawless memorization and precise repetition. From teacher to student, and parent to child, the sacred sounds of Vedic chanting have been an integral part of Indian life for centuries.
And the Vedas are vast. Through songs, chants, poems, myths and fables, humankind’s epic battles and inner struggles are told and retold again and again. The inclusiveness of this great work is captured by the Indian adage, “If you lose your cow, you can find it in the Vedas.”
The Six Darsanas
In order to bring organization and clarity to these expansive teachings, great sages extracted from the Vedas six philosophies, or darsanas. The root of darsana means “to see,” and they include six different ways of looking at life. More specifically, they are six distinct perspectives on how to reduce human suffering.
Yoga is one of these six formal philosophies. The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali is the darsana of yoga. Although there are other important works on yoga, including the Bhagavad-Gita, the Hatha Yoga Pradipika, and Yoga Rahasya, the complete philosophy is understood to be embodied by Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras. To understand Yoga, therefore, one must study its Sutras.
There is an important distinction, however, between the word ‘yoga’, and the Philosophy of Yoga. The word ‘yoga’ appears throughout the Vedas, and means “to link,” “to join,” “to yoke,” or “to focus the mind.” The Philosophy of Yoga is a different matter. This philosophy is a cohesive system with a specific, technical, definition of Yoga and the actions required to achieve it.
While three of the darsanas are outside the scope of this article, exploring two others, Samkhya and Vedanta will help us understand what Yoga is – and isn’t.
Vedanta and Non-dualism
Vedanta is a non-dualist darsana, and the foundation of Hinduism. Simply put, Vedanta says that “everything is all one thing.” Hinduism – a theistic non-dualism – calls this one thing God. Despite the appearance of many gods, they are really only one God, Brahma. Many manifestations, one God. No duality: all are one.
Philosophies of non-theistic non-dualism – Buddhism, for example – also say there is only one thing. Not God, but one thing
For non-dualists, the root cause of human suffering is the illusion of separation. We suffer when we see ourselves as having a separate existence from the one thing, when we believe in the ‘illusion.’ For non-dualists, suffering ends when one realizes – slowly or suddenly, with or without tools – that it’s all one.
Non-dualist religions and philosophies are comforting, inspiring, and quite popular worldwide. But they’re not Yoga. Yoga is not a religion, and Yoga’s dualistic philosophy is rooted in samkhya, an entirely different darsana. There are undoubtedly many non-dualists practicing Yoga to help deepen their experience of ‘oneness;’ you may be one of them. Yet non-dualism is not in intrinsic part of Yoga Philosophy.
Yoga, Samkhya, and Dualism
Samkhya describes all reality as having two components: purusa, or consciousness, and prakriti, matter. Samkhya, being dualistic, states that these components are connected, but separate. In samkhya, as in yoga, the goal is not to dissolve all things into one whole. Instead, emphasis is placed on illuminating the individual parts, and clarifying their relationships. Relationship, as we shall see, is central to Yoga.
Purusa is consciousness: unchanging, formless, and watching. Purusa sees but remains forever unchanged by what it observes. Prakriti is the manifest world. This includes all matter, nature, and the human mind. Unlike purusa, prakriti is ever-changing.
According to samkhya, prakriti has three distinct qualities or rates of change, called gunas. First is rajas: intense, dynamic change. In nature, fire is rajasic. Where fire exists, form changes: paper becomes ash, wood becomes ember, and cool oxygen and organic matter become hot carbon dioxide. Humans experience this guna as anxiety, agitation, nervousness, insomnia, etc.
Prakriti’s second guna is tamas: slow, heavy, resistant. In the natural world, rock is tamasic. Rock changes form, but slowly and only after much pressure is applied. Tamas is resistance to change. We experience tamas as dullness, fatigue, hesitation, lethargy, doubt and depression.
But like Goldilocks’ porridge, one of the gunas, sattva guna, is just right. Sattva is defined as appropriate change, balanced, harmonious, clear and sustaining. According to samkhya, the true nature of the human mind is sattvic.
And sattva, while still part and parcel of prakriti, is the closest that matter gets to purusa. In other words, the awareness and stability characteristic of purusa is most likely to be experienced by a sattvic mind.
A mind that is too agitated (rajasic), or too dull (tamasic) only experiences its own movement, and cannot know the consciousness at its core. Samkhya’s conclusion, then, is: “In order to know the deepest truth, to be stable and happy, a sattvic mind is required.”
Yoga Sutras and the Sattvic Mind
Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras is in simple terms a guidebook for cultivating a sattvic mind. The great sage compiled the sutras approximately 2,300 years ago. Little more is known about this man, except that he also composed foundational works on Ayurveda and Sanskrit Grammar.
The Yoga Sutras are 195 aphorisms, succinct teachings on life, suffering, and the nature of the mind. The first psychology text, the Sutras resemble lecture notes more than completed lessons, and have many possible interpretations, depending on the student’s mindset. To fully benefit from these timeless teachings, one must study the Sutras with a qualified teacher, a teacher as familiar with each sutra as they are with each student’s needs.
In general terms, however, Yoga Philosophy maintains that the human mind can be both a valuable tool and a source of suffering. In Sutra 1:2, Patanjali defines the Yoga state as having a mind that is sattvic, stable, and able to focus. He chooses the phrase ‘citta vritti nirodha’ to describe a mind that can experience the truth, consciousness, and joy, which according to Yoga is our true nature. But because the mind is prakriti, it can also be rajasic or tamasic. Such an imbalanced mind is prone to misperception, resulting in sorrow, discomfort and disease.
And this sorrow is real. Unlike in non-dualism, where separateness and sorrow are seen as illusory, Yoga sees everything as real. Suffering, sickness and sorrow are true realities, which can only be replaced by other realities, preferably, comfort, wellness, and joy.
The Sutras explore many aspects of living, including: relationships, lifestyle, body, breath, the senses, and mind. The aim is to achieve wholeness by refining the individual parts and clarifying their relationships. Since, according to Yoga, they are all inter-connected, refinement in one area will create improvement in the others. Therefore, using slow deep breathing to move the body into stable, comfortable postures helps to focus the mind and brighten the emotions.
This brings us full circle, to just how good you feel right now with your warm chai after your favorite yoga class. Go ahead, have another sip. Enjoy.
from Yogi Times www.yogitimes.com
Interview with Kirtan artist Govindas
by
Shana Meyerson
What brought you to kirtan?
I was introduced to kirtan through the older Neem Karoli Baba devotees, Ram Dass, Bhagavan Das, Jai Uttal and Krishna Das . I was teaching yoga in LA at the time. When I first heard kirtan, it blew me away. It felt so ancient. Yet at the same time so familiar. Music as a prayer. This is what really touched me. The longing and devotion...I recognized something inside of the chants that I have always felt inside of myself... A deep yearning and longing to be connected to something greater. Immediately I began to immerse myself in the teachings of Bhakti Yoga, of which kirtan is a central practice. In 1999 I journeyed to India with the intention of diving deeper. This is where I started studying music and bought my first harmonium. On my return from my trip I began chanting in my yoga classes.
How has your kirtan evolved over the years?
The whole process has been incredibly organic. All of which I attibute to the grace of my guru, Neem Karoli Baba. There have been a few major chapters though. Of course first, was spending time in India. To sit and chant kirtan in the temples of India has a way of deepening the understanding of where all of this comes from...To really feel this tradition’s ancient roots. Another major chapter has been attending two of Jai Uttal’s kirtan kamps. It is a ten-day workshop where Jai and master tabla player Daniel Paul share their wisdom of the kirtan tradition: melodies, rhythm, Indian Gods and Goddesses, mantras, etc. I feel so grateful to Jai for showing us the way of the Heart, and making the path of Bhakti and the practice of kirtan so accesible. His devotion, melody, humility and laughter continue to show me the way. And his message is wonderful, regardless of musical talent anyone can start leading kirtan and truly enjoy this “jewel of a spiritual practice.” And the greatest chapter has been my wife Radha and I coming together. When we met, I had no idea of her involvement in music since she was a child. When I first heard her sing, play flute and drums I just smiled and knew it was a great gift that my guru was giving me. Now kirtan is a major part of our relationship. It is a tool for us to connect with the Divine through each other...So we spend our evenings practicing, singing each other love songs.
Neem Karoli Baba was considered a great Indian saint, yet his message was so simple, “Love, Serve, and Remember.” And as the story is told, where ever Maharajji was, kirtan was always sung. This is where Bhagavan Das, Krishna Das , and Jai Uttal, all learned the devotional practice of kirtan in the 60’s and 70’s and brought it back to us. These guys are my teachers, and pioneers in America, in their own unique way all opening our eyes to the bhakti path. They all continue to point to the same place as the source: a picture of an old man wrapped in a plaid blanket, Neem Karoli Baba. This is how I was introduced to my guru. As I walk down this bhakti path, Maharajji’s presence has become more influential in my life. My relationship with him is really interesting because he left his body in the early 1970’s. All I can say is it feels as though he is a guiding, creative, and protecting force in my life. I try to keep a picture of him around me at all times. For me he is a reflection of love, grace, service, and truth. When I chant, my intention is to get really open, feel him inside of me, and follow the river of his grace.
How would you say your art of kirtan differs from that of others?
I would say first that our kirtans are very simple. It is in this simplicity that one can truly drop into the flow of the chant, which ultimately serves the meditation. Quite central to the yogic philosophy is the idea of balance between masculine and feminine... Sita Ram, Radhe Govinda, Shiva Shakti. This balance is uniquely embodied in my wife Radha and I leading kirtans together. Our love for the Divine, our Guru, and each other is the essence which is hopefully reflected and transmitted through our music.
How would you say kirtan has changed your yoga? Your life?
Kirtan and the path of Bhakti yoga have helped to open my heart! I know it sounds kind of corny but the practice of chanting actually works. I feel much more aligned with the energy of love, the dedication of my heart to the good, and the qualities of gratitude and appreciation. Gratitute is the core of bhakti. Gratitute for our teachers, gratitude for these amazing practices that are helping to ease our suffering. We have been given this great miracle called life from the Divine. All of the circumstances that come our way in life are a Divine blessing, too. From a certain view, even the most difficult times in our lives can be seen as our greatest blessings. I know it sounds crazy but Maharajji would say, “ suffering is grace.” When we are really at our edge there is only one place to go: and that is to God! Isn’t that the whole purpose of this dance called life? To know our own spiritual nature and integrate it into our human earthly lives, so we can spread love and share peace...In 1995 I was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis, a debilitating form of IBS (Irritible Bowel Syndrome). The first few years were incredibly challenging, like living in a hell realm. As I have stepped onto the bhakti path and been working with these practices, it has helped me become more accepting of myself, and accepting of the days that I feel pretty terrible. Of course we are all human, and I can surely be a real jerk sometimes... Just ask my wife!!! Ha Ha! Yet from a very real place I do feel more connected to my soul’s evolution, my dharma, and a quality of love that emanates from all hearts.
What is your mission with your kirtan? Do you see this as integrated with or separate from your yoga instruction?
Ever since I was a little boy I have had the dream of being a traveling musician. I certainly never knew how it would manifest. Bhakti is the path of surrendering our own individual will to the will of the Divine, something we are not so comfortable with here in the West. My personal practice is giving it all up to my guru, and letting him handle all of the details. Sometimes we joke and say he is our booking agent. Like most people, my tendency is to have some pretty strong agendas. So my practice is to let go, open up to be guided by something greater. In saying that, I do feel really drawn to doing charity kirtan events to benefit those in need. We are so blessed here in this culture with abundance on the material plane. Yet there are so many people on this planet without clothes to wear or food to eat...starving children living on the street. It is up to us to give back. This is my path, to serve, to give back in a way that uplifts the collective. And, sure, I look forward to making more albums and sharing this blessed practice, but the truth of the matter is that it is all in God’s Hands.
As far as kirtan, bhakti yoga, hatha yoga, karma yoga, teaching yoga, etc...They are all different lines that lead to the exact same point, different rivers that lead to the same ocean of integration. We use the word and image of “a path” quite loosely. “The path” is an imaginary vehicle that we use to keep us on track, to keep us straight as our souls evolve. Eventually though, the notion of a path dissolves into a completely integrated way of Being.
What is your favorite piece on your album and why?
All of the tracks on this album are connected to my soul’s expression in one mood or another. It is a very difficult question for me to answer, yet if I had to pick one, it would be track 2, the “Shri Ma Goddess Kirtan.” It is a chant to the Divine Mother, Mother Earth, Mother Ocean, my Beloved, and all things feminine in nature. Still to this day, some of the most intimate and precious moments in my life, were as a young child, my head resting in my mother’s lap, and she would sing me these unbelievably sweet mantra-like repetitive lullabies. These were my first memories of unconditional love, perfect trust, and total surrender...I knew that I was totally taken care of by something larger. I thought it was just my mother, and on one level it was, yet from another level wasn’t she a manifestation of the Divine Mother? And aren’t we all wrapped in her warm embrace all of the time? This is the practice, to remember. I ask myself now, how can I show my appreciation for her unending gifts...By praising Her beauty and of course, singing back to Her from the depths of my Heart!
