Dear avid readers,

Hello.

I am currently faced with the task of blogging about our week at the Ashram in under 15 minutes so I can get to the Pakistani boarder in time for the show. And even I was stricken by the sheer weirdness of that last sentence. The week took on completely different meanings for each one of us as we all trekked through mountains and walked across beaches in silent meditation, visited waterfalls and tiny idyllic villages resting on mountain summits, ate chapatti after chapatti, bathed in the Ganga, and received ashtanga yoga lessons from Lalita Gi. Ah, Lalita Gi, this woman presented herself as one of the most serious human beings to ever walk the planet dressed in bright orange, until about day three or so when her stern countenance gave way to tiger pose ( a particularly sensational assana from laughter yoga) and the explanation that the reason Shiva can get high whilst us mere ashram-dwelling mortals cannot is because "Shiva can breathe and destroy the world, I cannot do that."
Reading was one of the main activities for almost all of the group, Herman Hesse being a general favorite with three titles currently in circulation amongst group-members. Other groups were also an important of this week as Carpe Diem and Leap Now! united with travelers from all over the world (seriously, I'm still wondering about the acrobatics doing, non-English speaking, exotic miniature instrument playing Russians) to make this week a meditative affair to remember. Actually, I'm still wondering about most of the souls that embarked with us on this journey and about the cosmic fiber that brought us together at this time in our lives and for this peculiar experience. Ashram life revolves around the yogic path in all eight of its incarnations and had us breathing, cleansing, meditating, serving, eating, renouncing, and developing a more intricate understanding of ourselves, together. The underlying belief of the path is that everything in existence is a manifestation of a single consciousness, a higher entity to which all beings pertain separated merely by the distraction of living, and the ashram was the optimal place to silence the distractions and dwell on our inner selves for a while. One big thing that suddenly commanded the attention of many group members was our individual relationship with food. Due to the emphasis placed on the ritual of eating, a silent and solemn practice at the ashram, our attention was brought to how we nourish ourselves and blessing our food and meditating on it before digging in is now a widespread practice. Nourishment, inner nourishment, I could say, became the central practice of the ashram as our greatest interaction became purely with ourselves for most of the day. The beautiful landscape combined with a supreme sense of self succeeded in opening the gates to a somewhat new mindscape that will continue to take form as we move on to our next challenge: a completely silent five day retreat. But before that is Amritsar, of course, home to the Golden Temple with its supreme beauty, overflowing and raucous kitchen, and BABY SIKHS!...all kind of Sikhs for that matter. Oh, and Dylan is still with us, for those of you who were wondering.

On a final note,

May the Long Time Sun Shine Upon You,

All Love Surround You,

And the Pure Light Within You,

Guide Your Way On

-Andi