Meditate Like Christ - Krishna Das

I am so grateful to get emails on weekly meditations from Daily Good. I received this short story today from Awakin, which is a meditation project from Service Space. Hope you find the peace, joy and love I did through reading this short piece by Krishna Das. Now I am ever more enthused to read the book by Krishna Das which was gifted to me recently.



Meditate Like Christ - Krishna Das

One day a Canadian man arrived for his first visit with Neem Karoli Baba (Maharaj-ji). He  didn't know much about Maharaj-ji but had heard about him. Maharaj-ji didn't give lectures or formal teachings; didn't write books; and, as far as I know, didn't formally initiate people. He just kept shining like the sun. Flowers don't need to read a manual on how to bloom in the sunshine. So when Maharaj-ji asked this man why he'd come and what he wanted, he was unsure how to respond. Finally, he replied, 'Can you teach me how to meditate?'

"Maharaj-ji's response was: 'Meditate like Christ. Go. Sit in the back of the temple with the other Westerners.'

"The guy came to the back, and we asked him about his darshan. He told us that Maharaj-ji had said to meditate like Christ. At first we were surprised. 'What! Meditate like Christ! What does that mean?' But then we thought about it. We were always trying to get Maharaj-ji to tell us what practice to do, but he'd never give us any specific instructions about yoga or meditation. Now he'd said this. If he said it, he must know how Jesus meditated. We decided to ask him about it. We were so excited — we were going to get the secret teachings at last!

"Later in the day, when Maharaj-ji came to the back of the temple to hang out with us, [one among us] broached the subject that had us all buzzing. 'You said to meditate like Christ. How DID he meditate?'

"It seemed as if Maharaj-ji was about to answer, but instead his eyes closed and he sat there completely still, completely silent. It felt like he'd totally disappeared. In all the time I'd been with him, I'd only seen him sitting motionless like this a couple of times before. It was extraordinarily powerful, as if the whole universe had become silent. Then a tear came down his cheek. We were in awe. After a couple of minutes, his eyes half opened and, with great emotion, he quietly said, 'He lost himself in love, that's how he meditated. He was one with all beings. He loved everyone, even the people who crucified him. He never died. He is the atman [soul]. He lives in the hearts of all. He lost himself in love.'

Once again, Maharaj-ji had gone right to the heart of it all. I was stunned. There was nothing I wanted more than to be able to lose myself in love, but there was nothing that seemed farther away.  As Kabir once said, "It is easy to bear the heat of fire and likewise it is possible to tread the edge of the sword. But to sustain an unchanging love is a most difficult business."

--Krishna Das, in Chants of Lifetime

Sukha

ॐ Yoga and Meditation 1 ॐ

I've been meditating a lot recently, thanks to yoga class, at least 2- 3 times a week. Meditation and Yoga go hand in hand. One must do yoga to quiet the body, and then meditation calms the mind and the body! Also 3 ॐ s at the end of practice can help seal the deal, in helps the vibrations from the practice be vocalized. I used to be embarrassed of the ॐ we said as a greeting and farewell, at the Sivananda Yoga center, when growing up in India. now I find beauty, mysticism, wholeness, and energy in them. Perhaps chanting, meditation and yoga all go hand in hand. It makes sense why all the Sanyasis do all three and more. So it should feel right. There is a beauty in silence and fasting too!

Last night at yoga, we meditated after the 45 minutes of vinyasa. The yogi guided us through a very interesting technique where we focused on breathing. The difference was we focused on inhale right nostril, exhale left nostril, then inhale left nostril, exhale right nostril. When focusing on this, just through your mind, I believe the nose muscles, and nostrils start actually doing it! So it is like doing Anuloma Viloma, with no hand! It was a very amazing, although I felt my breathing was loud, deep an obnoxious, so I tried to quieten it a little. We closed with a chant, and three ॐ.

At the beginning of the practice and the end, we always set our intentions for our practice, individually, for ourselves. It's internal, a quiet whisper to ourselves. We close with remembering those intentions. At the end of the meditation, we repeated our intentions to ourselves and the yogi also asked us to remember sradha the word for faith, belief and trust, and focus that onto ourselves: Internally and externally. To have sradha in ourselves, the world, the practice, to listen and then have faith. An example was when we were in headstand, we should listen to our bodies to see how far we can go, and not to push it, but trust it. It's an amazing thing to meditate on, and be aware of. Also remembering to let go of the things we can not control, those that add to our worries. These external problems/unchangeable do not help us in our sradha, but we should let it go and accept it the way it is. I am so glad the yogi is mindful to always go back to that - the philosophy, the spirituality, the connectedness and energy behind meditation and meditation.

ॐ

 

 

Notes:

Practice = the practice of living something, in this case it is yoga and meditation. Although I won't perform it, I practice it daily. :-P I guess I picked this up from my yoga teacher training class.

Sradha - Faith or see the hindu or collective definition or Buddhist definition... I hope to post more on this subject!