Inner Journey!! – Art of Living Courses Experience

Art of Living Courses, Art of Living Wisdom.

Kids are always fun and are all smiling. They are very generous with their 1000-watt smiles. Smiles work wonders!

Yes, kids will grow up while smiling less and less, and some eventually stop smiling, appearing all business-like. Like the ones that have already grown up and are now college-going teenagers or have graduated and have taken up jobs somewhere just like ME.

I used to wonder – why do we smile less as we grow up? Why is it that we have made our smile so expensive like Petrol? 😉 A smile certainly meant a lot more once i grew up!

Smiling and Frowning faces

Everybody, whether he/she believes in God or not, lives for happiness. Is there anyone who does not like to be happy at all? We build big bank balances, invest in stocks and shares, mutual funds or property, etc , because we do not want to be in trouble. Trouble only induces sadness. So dukha-nivritti is nothing but sukha. This samsara goes on in a quest to be happy.

A big smile!

I always believed that making people laugh (LOL’s and ROFL’s) was easy and it is a lot more difficult to bring on smiles. Can we bring on the smiles on the faces of people who are suffering, neglected and deprived, I used to ask myself?

YES!!!!, was the answer. There are people who are doing just that.

On a lovely weekend, it was a privilege to take the Art of Living Happiness Course. Not in search of peace, not to forget the stress but just to give company to my friend. After the Sudarshan Kriya, a feeling of happiness and a BIG SMILE was pasted on my face, and I don’t know from where. I was in a different world. No thoughts, no tensions… A genuine smile was on my face. Realised that – A genuine smile can come only when one’s inner journey starts. (Sadhana, Seva and Satsang)

On Last day of the course, I met my Gurudev, Sri Sri Ravi Shankar ji for the first time. He smiled and spoke to me as though HE knew me from ages.

Gurudev says – “When you wake up every morning, look into a mirror and give yourself a good smile. The smile is the sacred gift of life.”

As a kid/teenager, I used to experience Happiness by eating an ice cream/chocolate, by watching movies and freaking out with friends. But this ananda/happiness had a ‘vikara’ i.e. it depended upon other person or an object which is not permanent.

After undergoing Sudarshan Kriya, I felt my mind lighter, calmer and filled with peace and love. Guru’s love is deep and everlasting. Guru loves everyone unconditionally.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P7cvleNdF-g&rel=0]

In today’s age of anxiety, stress, tension and excessive competition, it is extremely necessary to live a Spiritual Life (of Prayer, Surrender and Meditation). I feel extremely lucky and blessed to have a Living Satguru in my life.

Love & Pranaams

Ashwin Belagodu

Keep Smiling :-)

About Art of Living, Art of Living Courses, Art of Living Wisdom.

Administrator(s)! I hope you have just got out of your meditation after Kriya – and highest state of “accept (and approve) the blog as it is…”

Even straws practice Yoga!

I start with an answer to a question a whole lot of my friends (surprised at how I suddenly changed since 1998) – Why so spiritual and amidst a busy schedule “Breathe” spirituality the Art of Living way. Answer is simple – I enjoy it. For those who know me, if it was only hard work (or even work-outs), I would be far away from it. So Sadhana (no, no! not a girl) as in Spiritual practices continues to be fun, despite my slim figure – “O” is a figure too, isn’t it?

As His Holiness Sri Sri Ravishankar rightly said God loves fun (Oye… me too) and Spirituality is not that quagmire of complicated words that I otherwise heard for most part of my life. Hence I chose to make trips to the Art of Living centres and avoid repeated trips to Medical diagnostic labs with samples in bottles.

Some Personal experiences with Yoga

With years of practice of Yoga today I gradually stretch to conclusions and don’t jump to it.

Oh yes! The best part that I am able to stretch the best is my Jaws. Research says average biting force of the human jaw is 162 PSI! And Boy…with such a workout that I give it, mine is atleast 5 times more

More facts on the biting force of various teeth – maximal biting force values of incisor, bicuspid, and first molar of all the males were 43.3kg, 99.11kg, and 120.66kg. (the last two pretty much matches my weight)

The other exercise that I practice with unfailing regularity was “Taking my Hands from the Plate to Mouth” and again and again… I can do this for hours together. The reason why instead of increasing Weights (during Weight training), I increased my Waist.

Kashiji/Kamleshji – Just a question – if I was supposed to touch my knees with nose, God would have placed knees would be on my palms no? Well! that is the only part that can easily reach the tip of my nose (for now I can reach my nose with my hands – thank God! not too much of a distance between mouth and nose)

After the Yogathon 2012, my body gave me a gentle reminder of every single bone, joint and muscle that exist in me (other than the only two that I always was aware – jaws and hand). Namaste….One…Two. Those counts still ring in my ears.

Finally it would do good to know that it is far more important for a smile to spread over your chin than it is to get your chin closer to your shin.

Remember! Life is hard. It’s breathe, breathe, breathe … all the time. This is what Art of Living and staying “Within” is all about.

OM – a beginner’s narrative

Art of Living Wisdom.

This is in response to two of my fellow bloggers on another discussion forum (which is not functional now) – Ved Vahan and Subash. Cross posting it again to share it with the audience here. While I don’t have access to those blogs wherein those 2 loving souls had brought out concept of OM, I humbly submit that this is an amateurish attempt to complement their indisputable explanations. Wherever relevant, I have made any reference to their writing,I have specifically reproduced for relevance.

So here I go….

Aum or Om the universal sound

For our ordinary minds (and true for almost all beginners on the spiritual path), it is not so easy to conceptualize or comprehend an idea without expressing them in words. If it cannot spoken about or if not expressible we somehow get a  feeling of surreality or unreal.

So this idea of God or Divine, has to necessarily be associated and expressed with Words. Another condition is that since God/Divinity is considered fundamental fact of the Cosmos, the word expressing It needs to be fundamental too. The ancients saints, seers and Rishis struck upon and agreed that this word “AUM” is a fundamental word that can truly express the Divine.

Why is this word fundamental? Here let me begin by exploring deeper purport of one of my fellow blogger on another site – Sri Subashji’s explanation. Representing the “G”enerator, “O”perator and “D”estructor – nature of GOD.

“A” the creative force originating at the lower part (Step on a thorn or when you get hurt on your legs or feet, the natural sound that emerges out is “Aaaah”)

“U”, the maintaining force originating at the middle part (someone punching on your abdomen, the natural sound that is expressed would be “Uuuuuu”).

“M”, the destructive force – of evil tendencies originating at the top part (ask
someone to give a sharp knock on your head, the sound that emerges would be “Mmmmm”).

Sum total of these forces represents the entire universe and hence lends a legitimate expression representing God representing the Trinity – Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva, considered as the Creative, Maintaining and Destructive Forces.

The very construct itself renders AUM a fundamental WORD.

“A”, the root sound is pronounced without touching any part of the tongue or roof of the mouth,

“M” pronounced with closed lips representing the last possible sound.

“U” rolls from the root to the end of the palate, right upto the lips. So the three
syllables together forms the PRIMORDIAL expression called “AUM”, which represents the whole phenomena of sound production (“A” + “U” representing “O”).

The symbol of OM

Next why 3 times? As Ved-Vahan ji rightly said, “it represents three dimensions of our existence and a honor to all the three dimensions representing the
divinity in us. More importantly someone said, “It is Gurudev’s bidding (referring to His Holiness Sri Sri Ravishankar ji of Art of Living) , HE knows why :-)” (personally the most important and favourite reason for chanting it 3 times).

It is pertinent to remind here that chanting of 3 times is an aspect specific to Sudarshan Kriya and many Art Of Living processes but not mandatory – it could be more. (As HE keeps saying in various forums, in these busy times,
it is good enough if someone can chant 3 times – anything more and people would simply cite lack of time and discontinue Sadhana). 108 time chanting is quite popular too (9 Grahas x 12 Rashis).
My personal experience (not to do with numbers, but the very act of Chanting OM) – it clearly demarcates the activities on either side of my chanting. Prior to starting with a Sadhana, I disconnect the pre-Sadhana life with OM. As a rule, our group of AOL’ites whatever be the spiritual practices we embark on (viewing Knowledge Videos, beginning of AOL meetings, beginning satsangs)we chant OM, which clearly separates (mentally and physically) the mundane things from our mindspreparing the ground for our subsequent activities.

ॐ ॐ ॐ

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