 Satguru Siva Yogaswami Jaffna, Sri Lanka  Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami Hawaii, USA |
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 Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami Kauai's Hindu Monastery, USA 
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November 1, 2002
November 1: Uttaraphalguni Until 9:36PM HST November 2: Hasta Until 7:04PM HST Hindu Year 5104: Chitrabhanu, the "Year of Varied Splendors" |
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 Today was the third day of our annual Gurudeva Mahasamadhi observances. The morning program comprised all pilgrims attending the morning 9 AM puja followed by more video of Gurudeva. In an update on things in India, it seems that Singapore airline was not amenable to having Nellaiappan bring the murthi of Gurudeva over to the US as personal baggage. So, we have looked into a new routing where the image will ship from India via India Airlines as cargo. But it is touch-and-go as to whether the murthi will arrive here in time for the Chitra puja on November 3rd.
Our Beloved and Revered Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami
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Cybertalk: Bodhinatha gives a wonderful discourse on the nature of desire. Gurudeva never asked us to give up desire. Desire is life. However, on the spiritual path it is important to transmute, to change the form of, desire of grosser things into more subtle things. Transmuting our desires for lower-natured, purely self-gratifying experiences into that which is good for the whole family or community is necessary on the spiritual path.
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Live Web Cam Pix! |
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The highlight of today's ceremonies was the presence of live nadaswaram and tavil players who flew in from Toronto for the occasion, especially to play a concert tonight at Lydgate Park where a memorial event is being held for the entire community.
Sivagurunathan plays the Nadaswaram.
Manoharan plays the tavil drum. The families of the musicians, especially these drummers, hail from Alaveddy, Sri Lanka, long known as the residing home of great Sri Lankan musicians who also have farming as their family vocation in addition to music. It is interesting that Gurudeva started his first mission in Alaveddy, Sri Lanka, and that these two, now living in Toronto, Canada have come to join us.
Meanwhile the honorable Mayor Maryanne Kusaka was previously engaged on this evening and so was not able to come to the Lydgate park event. She writes:
Dear Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami:
Thank you very much for your invitation to join you for the first annual observation of the transition of the beloved Gurudeva. It is difficult to imagine that a whole year has passed since his transition. So much of what was supported and initiated by his vision is ever present and visible on Kauai. Gurudeva continues to be alive and vibrant in our hearts and minds. His spirit and efforts to make it possible for every student on Kauai to know Pilahi Paki's aloha values are unparalleled. In spite of his transition the learning of those values will continue as children enter classrooms each day. His quiet, simplistic approach to reaching for the sky when setting goals and expanding a vision will forever be a source of inspiration in my contributions to community. Although i will not be physically present for the observation service, my thoughts and heart will be spiritually connected to the event. A sincere Mahalo Nui Loa (thank you very much) to Kauai's Hindu Monastery's legacy that each one of you nurtures on an ongoing basis.
Aloha pumehana
Mayor Maryanne W. Kusaka
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We bring you today pictures from Mahabalipuram, South India's famous stone carving center south of Chennai, Tamil Nadu. This is the magnificent Dakshinamurthy carving that is nearly complete and ready to ship to Kauai.
The face was drawn by our own A. Manivelu, who did a number of renderings and Gurudeva picked this one. The image is over 12 feet tall and will be placed at the north end of Iraivan under the banyan tree.
Done in black granite, the highly polished areas become dark and the less polished areas are gray, allowing for a two-tone finish. Gurudeva gave special instructions for the image. One was that the seat was to be a replica of the stone that Gurudeva saw Lord Siva sitting on in his vision in 1975 that was the source for the inspiration to build Iraivan temple and the San Marga spiritual sanctuary.
Further, the traditional rules of sacred iconography normally require a rendering of banyan leaves and branches behind the murthi. Since we were to place this image under a real banyan tree... Gurudeva asked that these not be included in the carving itself.
The image is huge.
We have seen many beautiful carvings in our time. This ranks in the top ten for sure!
The rishis of the four Vedas have also been carved at life size to complete the scene described in ancient Saiva mythology: Dakshinamurthy means literally "South Facing Lord" who taught the rishis in silence. In his transmission He projected the Vedas, one each, to the rishis who received these as a revelation which they heard, memorized and transmitted to humanity.
Here you see the sculptor standing next to the murthy, showing you the relative size of the murthy, which is twice the height of a tall person.
Soon to be coming to Kauai! Jai Gurudeva!
| FULL INDEX OF 650+ CYBERTALKS  |
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Date: October_16_2002
Title: When Everything Seems to Go Wrong
Category: The Spiritual Path
Duration: 7 min., 14 seconds
Date Given: October 10, 2002
Given by: Bodhinatha
One more area which is very frustrating, something I am sure we have all experienced: days when everything goes wrong. Is anyone here who has not experienced a day when everything seems to go wrong? Raise your hand. OK. This is a common experience, right? One that is called, getting up on the wrong side of the tatami mat, or the wrong side of the futon or the wrong side of the bed. Just from when you get up in the morning onward, everything seems to go wrong. Ah, one of those days. Maybe, it is ashtami! Even ashtami is problematic mostly, at least in the monastery, for communications between people. It is like, there is static in the air. The reception is not good. Somebody says something, you hear something else, you misunderstand. Communications between people get complicated, misunderstood, hurt feelings arise and so forth. It is not a good day for teaching or holding classes. That is why in the traditional Hindu study system, you don't go to school on ashtami.
Anyway these kinds of days do happen. When the day is over, instead of taking the two steps forward that you thought you were going to take, you have taken one step backwards. Things went so poorly, it would have been better if you had not done anything. It is like the data got erased. Now, you have to spend tomorrow recreating it. Whereas, if you had not done it, you would still have your data. But, what you did erased the data and you have to spend one more extra day to catch up to where you were, before you started that day.
So, definitely an excuse to feel, "I am frustrated and discontent because not enough is getting accomplished." Another reason for feeling frustrated - not enough got accomplished.
This can be very discouraging, if we get ourselves into that state of mind. The basic problem is, we are refusing to recognize that days like this happen. They just happen. We cannot prevent them from happening. We don't complain when everything goes super-well and we get twice as much done as we expect, right? Somehow that is OK. If we can get twice as much done, everything will go better than ever. But, if the opposite happens, it is like bad karma, you know. It is not supposed to happen. So, having a realistic expectation that things like that happen, is the first key to not getting totally frustrated.
A nice approach, if you are able, in the midst of something like that, is to step back. Sometimes our tendency is the opposite. We are like the charging ram or goat, butting our head against something. We want to push forward at all costs. Things get even worse when we push forward with more willpower, somehow. "This exertion of willpower is going to solve our problem. If only we keep trying and trying and trying, everything will work and we will figure it out," and so forth. But, that can be very externalized, pushing like that. We get ourselves out into external consciousness if we are not careful.
The opposite can be more helpful if we are in a situation where we can do it. Step back, step away from it. Go do something else. Take a short walk. Eat lunch early. Do something to step back from it. Avoid this tendency to just push, push into external consciousness. Then, come back to it. You may come back to it in a more intuitive flow, things may work better just because you stepped back, internalized your awareness enough, so that you are approaching it from a different state of mind. Sometimes if there is a problem you cannot solve, you just sit down and the solution is immediately in your mind from your subsuperconscious. You let external tension go enough to go inside and the inner comes out. You sit and say, "Oh" and quite easily solve something that you could not solve for hours. Just by stepping back.
So, that is a very helpful approach that Gurudeva teaches in 'Merging with Siva' for bringing through the subsuperconscious mind. We need to relax, to let the tension go.
Another approach to this kind of situation, particularly if others are involved in a group effort, is to see if there is some knowledge lacking. Maybe we don't know enough about this computer program. Somebody does not know enough. Maybe we don't understand a certain piece of machinery. One of the persons on the team does not understand enough about this piece of equipment. So therefore, we haven't used it in an efficient way because we are lacking in knowledge. Quite often that can be what is causing everything to go wrong. Either we or someone else does not understand something.
In the instance of everything going wrong, we usually don't think about things like that. But, if we can step back and ask that question, "Does somebody not understand? Do they need training in something? What kind of training is needed? Do we need to pull out a book? Do we need an instructor to come in? Do I need to teach somebody something?" To step back in the midst of that kind of frustration and ask that question and if you come up with an answer, then implement it. "Yes, we need training in this, this and this. This person is not trained, I am not trained. If we go through that training, we can prevent this from happening again." A very good approach to working through the situation, the frustration.
So, those are just a few thoughts. This is a topic under development, like website that says, "Under Construction." That is all I have for this morning.
| MORE UPLIFTING THINGS |
Innersearch 2003-4 in India! We just completed the July 17-23 Kauai Innersearch, 2002. Bodhinatha will lead the next Innersearch to India, between Dec 2003 and Jan 2004. We will visit Bangalore and the Iraivan Carving Village, and settle in the South in Tamil Nadu, Click on the above for details on what will be an inspiring journey to our holy land of Bharat! |
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