Satsang

Jai Bhagwan!

What a marvelous day!  Morning sadhana was led by Kamini, Gurudev’s daughter, and the focus was on maintaining meditative awareness during the entire practice.  I was immensely grateful to find that I could not almost slip in and out of meditative consciousness at will.  The reason I was grateful for this is that Jyotindir’s suggestions last night worked wonders, I still woke up at 04:00 but I slept soundly and felt wonderful!  On the flip side, I was concerned that perhaps I had completely quashed my prana and so would be unable or at least find it very difficult to return to a state of deep meditation.  My fears were unfounded.  We chanted before we met with Gurudev, as we do everyday, but today’s chanting was much more energetic than it has been.  The drums and the vibration of the voices drew me into the weave of the sounds and it wasn’t long before I had again slipped into complete stillness while the waves of sound washed over me.  This happened again tonight as we met in Gurudev’s monthly(?) satsang with the community.  Scottie led us in another chant and again I slipped into the ebb and flow of the sound.  It seems that I have an affinity for rhythm and sound; the waves on the lake, the motion of the ceiling fans—I find myself constantly swaying in time to their motion—the obvious beat of drums and chanting except with Gurudev.  When we chant with Gurudev, my attention is so concentrated on him that the rhythm must be very very fast for me to be pulled into the sounds rather than to be drawn to him.

Now, I know that if I were reading what I have written the past couple of days, I would think to myself, Oh dear, he’s been drinking the kool-aid and has gone off the deep end.  I really haven’t, I promise.  By the way, our Internet connection was blown out by a lightning storm Thursday through the day and it wasn’t restored last night and it’s too late for me to publish tonight—it’s after 22:00 which means it’s time for daily silence and I need to stay in my room.  The experiences I’ve had are very real and the community guests tonight saw some of this first hand.  Gurudev led the group through a simple posture and chant and the energy in the room was almost overpowering.  Then he did a demonstration of one of the pranayamas that he uses for his private practice.  I felt a burst of energy that left me litterally rocking in place like a buoy on the sea.  There were probably 20 or so first time guests and every one of them expressed having seen a physical change in Gurudev—he seemed much younger—others felt the energy that radiated from him and others said that the whole scene took on a two dimensional appearance.  The one theme that ran through every comment, however, was that the whole room filled with a deep and abiding sense of peace and love.  Does it all mesh 100% with every point of LDS doctrine?  No but there is only one source of peace and love.  By their fruits, ye shall know them.