Dhyana Linga Temple, Isha Yoga Center, Coimbatore

It's most beautiful modern vedic temple I have ever seen in my life!

I arrived in Pondi from Coimbatore on a rickety bus full of school children eager to practice their English on me. I find the Isha Yoga Center waiting at the end of the bus route.

Not having as much of an affinity to Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev's teachings as compared to my Master's, I was nonetheless taken aback by the photos of the temple on the net and the scientific processes involved in its design and conception, so much so that I resolved to make the trip to Coimbatore for a visit.

The entire ashram is constructed from inexpensive materials and methods characteristic of the rural south indian style in the region. But the terracotta roof and ceiling tiles, painted plaster walls, wrought iron works, granite slabs and blocks, and timber are put together in such a modern, beautiful way as to transcend the utilitarian, pragmatic manner of construction of said rural dwellings. Most creative is the use of the snake symbol popping up as decorative motifs in the most creative of places!

Sadhguru uses the image of the cobra as a symbol for Shiva, the snakes also correspond to the feminine kundalini shakti counterpart.

The Pièce de Résistance is of course the Dhyana Linga, housed in a dome built by unskilled devotee volunteers, yet constructed in such a geometrically precise manner that every small sound in its enclosure is amplified and reveberated into an otherworldly ambience (my guess is that it is in the shape of a parabolic dom centered on the linga itself). Faint lines on its huge monolithic form section it into seven parts corresponding to its unique characteristic of possessing the energies from seven chakras. In place of the conventional yoni base is a serpent coiled seven times.

I stayed overnight in an extremely clean and beautiful room (only 550 rupees!), the whole ashram felt like a five star resort, minus the exorbitant prices.

Meditation sessions in the temple begins with a dip in the Theerthakund, a huge underground pool with a submerged linga made of mercury, sheltered by a vaulted roof with a beautifully colored mural on the ceiling. In its copper lined icy cold confines, your body and mind is prepared via the energised waters to be receptive of the energies from the Dhyana Linga. This I know to be true because the second time I emerged from its waters I felt my body humming with a beautiful intensity!



Inside the temple itself no poojas or ceremonies are performed. Sahdguru intended the temple to be for pure meditation and transcending religious boundaries, hence the name: Dhyana.. the energy field of the Linga is very very strong. It manifested itself as a throbbing on my agnya and pressure in my Sahasrara. In my afternoon meditation session it got to be so intense I actually felt a discomforting headache. The pain went away after another dip in the Theerthakund.

Had I not been in a hurry to reach Gokarna I would have stayed longer!

Leaving Tiruvannamalai

Kamaa leaves for Pondicherry to get her Nadi Leaf Astrology reading done and I head to Coimbatore to resume my journeys.

Its hard to keep travelling now after the reason you started travelling for in the first place is fulfilled. After all have I not already found what I've been looking for?

So the journey is no longer a searching. Its now a pilgrimage and a celebration, and a playground of experiences for my new spiritual awareness.

We visit Arunachalaeswara Temple for the last time, thankful that the throng of humanity that was the Vaazhum Valaru crowd were no longer around. While getting darshan of the main Shiva Linga in the temple the priest surprises us by taking 2 garlands off the linga and garlanding us!

And we meet a very friendly Mrs. Bhanu, who's grandfather was a good friend of the late Ramana Maharishi, who spent her time at the temple walking with us and guiding us with detailed explanations.

Goodbye Ma Kamaa!

Daniel is Dead

Some weeks ago, during the Nithyanandam course, I had decided that I was ready for a name change. A spritual name is a name chosen by and given by the Master to aid you on your Sadhana. It is chosen for you alone, it empowers and liberates you, and is a clear pointer to the spiritual path you need to take to your enlightenment.

I sent my application to the Welcome Centre in the Bidadi ashram. Once the application is sent to Swamiji he typically takes 2 days to come up with your name. But the sheer difficulty and inertia in getting the attention of the people at the welcome centre, getting them to hand me a form and getting my form processed pretty much suggested to me that maybe the time was not right for me to get the name. This in addition to having to wait 2 weeks only to find that the application did not reach Swamiji, and he had left the ashram to go to Tiruvannamalai, which according to the welcome center staff meant I could only get my name in January (!!!) pretty much took the wind out of the initial intent.

But in the Vaazhum Valaru (Living Legend) talk I meet a woman who told me to just go and ask Swamiji directly during the energy darshan, thereby bypassing all the red tape and possibly having my name given to me in 2 days time after the darshan. Having nothing to lose I did just that.

I wrote my request on a slip of paper (so I wouldn't be tongue tied in front of him as is usually the case!) and handed it over to him when it was my turn to be in his presence. He smiled as he read it and slammed his thumb on my agnya extra hard. The resultant energy flow into my body was felt like a strong wave that descended and rippled. When it was done he gave me the name then and there!!

"Nithya Priyan" he told me. And, he told me the meaning of the name. Nithya Priyan means Eternal Love.

The ways of the Master are unpredictable and surprising indeed! Eternal Love was radically different from what I had thought my path was supposed to be. I had known of the problems associated with my Anahata and my general lack of meaningful relationships in my life as an obstacle to my enlightenment, but I had no idea it would also be the path I am destined to take to my liberation! But in receiving my name and its meaning, and sitting quietly away from the devotees dancing in celebration to the loud kirtans playing, the little clues that have been there in my all along start falling magically in place and a new perspective dawns in a matter of minutes.

I had been an intellectual person for as long as I know, my self worth has always been directly proportional to the size of my bookshelf and the intensity of my heated discussions. Even after meeting the Master I had kept the idea that my path to enlightenment would involve the gathering of knowledge or Gnana. I see now that it was a pretense all along, the seed sown at an early age when I found I could obtain all the approval and attention I seeked from bookwormish pursuits. I was goaded along that falsehood when I realised that I had an IQ of the top 5% of the population, having been evaluated by a Mensa test.

How shrivelled my heart must have looked to Swamiji during that first darshan, when he had put his finger on it! To have had the key to my enlightenment fall into atrophy all this while. To have ignored all the signs and hints in place of the suggestions from a misleading, chattering mind.

For even when I was busy trying to be who I am not, did I not respond to ideas and people in an intense emotional manner? How did I not see my violent mood swings as symptomatic of an untapped and ungoverned source of energy? Why did I not relate to the times when I threw myself so completely into relationships so as to be coughed up completely messed up at the other end? How have I glossed over the truth that the most important decisions I have made in my life were the result of intense emotional impulses, hidden by a patina of post-rationalisation? How does all this relate to the cold, intellectual persona I had thought myself out to be?

And the clues that were given since my coming to India.. during the friendship meditation with Masha in BSP, she told me she saw into my heart and that it was so pure. While talking to a lady during Nithyanandam she had told me I had the warmest smile she had ever seen. And a strange chance meeting with a man who told me Enlightment is possible for me in a very short period, that he had a feeling something was holding me back in the past but no longer. It only dawned in me later the significance of the meeting, when I remembered that he introduced himself as a HEART SURGEON.

As I sat I repeated the name to myself. "Nithya Priyan" I said in wonder at how much in love with the name I was, and how inadequate my old name is compared with it. I repeated it like a mantra and it changed me inside. My heart exploded and the tears began.

So Daniel is dead to me now, he is part of a past patchwork of ideas and experiences borrowed and slapped together in order to be loved and accepted. As Nithya Priyan my awareness feels constantly flooded with a white noise, a feeling of love for everything or nothing in particular, and a concrete connection to my Master who made it all happen.

To have your entire life put in perspective, to have your future path mapped out for you with so much understanding, I can't help but feel blessed. I have big shoes to fill and I will fill it best I can!

Vaazhum Valaru

In Vaazhum Valaru (Living Legend) Swamiji returned to his home town of Tiruvannamalai, spending 3 days recounting his history and his path to enlightment.

Outside of the wedding hall where he gave his discourses we had roamed the streets in processions and were taken to see the special places he had spent his time as a kid.

It was a great experience but with over 1000 participants there was the long food queues, the pushing and shoving, the stampedes and the crush to unclutch from!

Back in Tiruvannamalai

Nithyanandam is over. It had been 12 days of extremely intensive meditation and I am extremely grateful to have been able to attend it. We were told not to disclose course details (so as not to spoil the fun for non-participants who wish to sign up for the next one). What I can say though is that I've felt real changes happen during and after the course. My mind chatter is now almost non-existant. The sweet blissful high I felt during my first Kundalini awakening I feel now every time I meditate, and sometimes when I am not! And friends staying in the ashram but not participating in the course have said that the participants actually look different physically after completing the course. Swamiji had worked on our Sangeetha Karmas during the period and we emerged as Tabula Rasas, clean slates unencumbered by the burden of our pasts. I guess it was written on our faces!

I travel to Tiruvannamalai with Ma Kamaa, an extremely blessed american lady who is a Poojacharya at the LA ashram, and Ma Vibhuuti.

To come back to this town again is such a blessing. This time around I am able to feel the peace welling up from the very ground of this place as a very real sensation. Inside Arunachalaeswara temple I am overcome with a very solid wave of energy each time I near a diety for Darshan. I was not able to feel any of this the first time around. The Nithyanandam course must have done something to me!

My Agnya and Sahasrara which had been very active since the course go into overdrive here. A strong buzzing feeling and pressure in the Sahasrara, and an intense throbbing in the agnya.

Last night Ma Kamaa tells me one night that she had a darshan of Shiva and Ganesha while staring at my face. She saw them between my Agnya and Sahasrara and that they were working on my transformation.

Kamaa herself has had so many inexplicable things happen to her. And here in the spiritual center of India the experiences are really ramping up for her. But I am not allowed to blog about them =P.

Pondicherry

Its a sleepy town with a french influence, though not as french as you would think! I can assure you the people here are very much Indian, though we have met a young male on the streets who is studying french to act in a film.

Lots of restaurants, some really upmarket ones, and a very nice (but a little unshaded) Beach road running beside a sandy strip. Where the land meets the sea, however, is a very rocky stretch, so swimming and sunbathing isn't the order of the day here.

Though there isn't much here in terms of touristy attractions, we end up staying for 3 days in the Park Hotel owned by the Aurobindo ashram. We were very lucky to get a beach facing, well ventilated and spacious room without a prior booking! The hotel filled up the next day and new guests were turned down. Actually the ashram seems to own just about everything in Pondicherry.

My latest antic included discovering that I left my passport behind in a shop in Tiruvannamalai one week ago! I had only discovered its loss when asked for it by the reception staff. It was a mad bus trip back and alot of help from the Dhyanapeetam in Tiruvannamalai, coupled with Masha's encouragement that saw me through! Thanks to the grace of existance and Swamiji the passport is now back in my hands.

Our trip to Auroville, the model community founded by Sri Aurobindo's main disciple - Mother, did not happen. Masha received an opening in Kerala to do some volunteer work feeding the homeless, and after some soul searching, I found my ache to return to the Dhyanapeetam ashram to be too strong to supress.



Byebye Masha 8*(.

Mamallapuram

The Banyan Tree in the Theosophical Society

The sign next to the tree touted it as one of the 3 largest banyan trees in the world. Of the other two, one has had its main trunk rotted away, and the other was discovered to have actually been 2 trees which grew together. So wow!

Kanchipuram

Masha's living the good life as a guest in the home of the friend she met in the ashram in Bangalore, while I've been languishing in a grubby hotel room near Egmore Station. Grr!

Today I get invited along to their day trip to Kanchipuram. Yay! Chauffered in an air-conditioned car with Masha, Havisha her friend and her grandma. More important than the luxury was meeting up with friends again! I didn't really realize how crappy travelling alone was till I had friends along for the journey. I guess I'm not really an island after all.

Lost without a Guidebook!

It was my crazy idea the night before Masha left to stay with her friends in Chennai, that I hand over my well thumbed guide book to her. She came to India totally unprepared and lost, with only a deep trust in existence to guide her experiences and travel. I came to India having pored through tons of internet pages and travel guides, clutching my Rough Guide to India for dear life!

It was her enviable connection to the Divine source that led her to a serious of beautiful and remarkable coincidences and events that constitute her spiritual journey so far. It was my incessant reading that led me to mine. But our experiences were not without their pitfalls.

I guess it was natural of us to want to exchange a little of our energies, a little bit more prudence and planning on her part, a bit more spontaneity and trust in the divine on mine. So I came up with the idea of handing over my guide book to her. it would be mutually beneficial!

Can I survive without a guidebook? Most certainly it makes locating good and cheap accommodation hard. I arrived in Chennai in the middle of the night having had to wait for the bus to plow through the molasses of the Chennai traffic jam, managed to get a room and a decent night's sleep. I think I will buy a new guide book =P. But far from returning to my old ways, am definitely going to hold on a little to the spirit of surrender and let go a little to the spirit of control.

Bye bye Masha, may we get to travel again if existence permits!

My Naadi Jothida Reading

The life and death of every person destined to seek his destiny by finding his naadi leaf was written ages ago by Rishis on palm leaves (naadi leaves). Find your leaf and find a wealth of information about your past, present and future lives! Naadi Jothida has had me enthralled since prior to my India trip, and finding my Naadi leaf in India is definitely a must do on my list.

However weeding through the mass of astrologers to find the authentic ones had proven to be quite a challenge.

In the Tiruvanammalai ashram we were given a referral for a Naadi astrologer living near the north gate of the temple!

We submitted our thumb impressions for the readings but Masha has since cancelled her reading - she had to leave for chennai to meet with friends and they had delayed the retrieval of the leaves.

So it was just me that morning at the astrologer's place. From my thumb impression he had narrowed the search down to 2 stacks of leaves. We had to painstaking go through each leaf, him reading the writings and asking me questions pertaining to my life, and me confirming or denying.

One and a half stacks of leaves later and something magical happens. He reads off a leaf that fits my life to a T. Details like my name, parents' names, my birth date, time of birth, my current pre-occupations, martial status.. all questions turned up yes. It was as if he was reading some eerily accurate record of my life so far.

To be fair, however, there was some hokey pokery involved with coming up with my name and parents' names. Through the plethora of questions I had to ask in the previous 'rejected' leaves he had on many occasions resorted to guessing the names letter by letter.. sometimes he would even go "is the next letter of the name T? Is it U? V? W??" Like some tedious hangman game. However there are many other details that he could not have known, like how my dad married twice, for example, and that I was the son of his second wife.

Having found my leaf, he then goes through the process of transcribing all the details into a colorful notebook. I go out for lunch with the translater and return to listen to him describe to me my life from the present to the age of 70.

Apparently though I do not think much about marriage at present, I will still be getting married, to a person that I have already met in the present! This will happen in November where my life will similarly pick up in terms of prosperity and happiness. My life after that seems too incredibly good to be true, very minor incidents occuring, amid long periods of fulfillment. And I will have 2 children - a son and a daughter!

I will also get a blessing from my guru at age 34 and 37, though I don't really know what 'blessing' refers to..

After age 37 my endeavors really take off with great success.. strangely, this is during and after 2012.. the time of great change talked about by conspiracy theorists the world over.

For anyone reading that wants the contact of this astrologer:

K.S.Krishnan
Sri Agathiar Mahasiva Vakiya Nadi Jothida Nilayam
11A Vada Othavadai Street
(Near Swathi Lodge, North Temple Gate)
Tiruvannamalai 606601

Tel: 04175-320069

This person's practice is part of a larger organisation from Vatheeswaran Koil. The rates are 1000 rupees per kandem (a chapter pertaining to a specific area to be looked into) and 150 for the translator.

Am currently waiting for rest of the kandems I requested to be sent to me by email and a copy sent by normal mail to my home. Will write again when that happens. Am also trying to post the video I recorded..

A Full Day at Tiruvannamalai

In the morning we climbed Arunachala Hill in search of the cave that Sri Ramana Maharishi used for meditation. We did not make it to the upper cave but found the lower one. Getting there was half the fun!



In the afternoon we reach the site for the new temple and ashram of Paramahamsa Nithyananda's.. and bump into Satya and Usha from the Bidadi ashram courses! It was part of a long string of fortuitous coincidences and circumstances that made our day a very eventful one.

In addition to a very warm welcome at the ashram and the best ashram food I have ever tasted in India, we had joined yet another small group of Nithyananda devoteees for a very special guided tour of Arunachala temple. Strange thing was, it was arranged by Swamiji and we don't quite know how it was that 3 separate groups of devotees can meet without planning in Tiruvannamalai and have such a tour arranged as if in advance! We were treated like VIPs and came out of the experience with extreme gratitude.

We spend the day meeting various people, sites and samadhis of people and places that influenced Swamiji's life before he attained his enlightenment.



We get to meet Swamiji's brother!

TIruvannamalai