Ganga the river of the heavens descends to earth for mankind…

Paintings by Rajee Ba at Yogada in the Himalayas. www.yogadaindia.com

Ganga the river of the heavens descends to earth for mankind………….

देवि सुरेश्वरि भगवति गङ्गे त्रिभुवनतारिणि तरलतरङ्गे ।
शङ्करमौलिविहारिणि विमले मम मतिरास्तां तव पदकमले॥

“O Devi Bhagavati Ganga, the Goddess of the Devas, you liberate the Three Worlds with the merciful water form of yours |
O the Stainless pure one who resides in the Head of Shankara, May my devotion remain firmly established on you Lotus Feet.”

According to Hindu mythology, there was a powerful king in India named Sagar. He decided to conduct Ashwamedha Yagya, a horse sacrifice, to declare his supremacy over the gods. The King of Heaven, Indra grew jealous of King Sagar and decided to steal the ritual horse. Indra successfully abducted the horse and tied him in the ashram of Sage Kapil, who was silently meditating for many years. King Sagar ordered his 60,000 sons to search and find his sacrificial horse. After a long search, they found the horse tied at the ashram and began assaulting the great sage thinking he was the culprit who stole the horse. The sage awoke from his trance and in his anger started to destroy all the sons of king Sagar who were accosting him. Anshuman, the grandson of King Sagar, pleaded for forgiveness. The sage told him that he could save his life by bringing the sacred river Ganga down from the heavens to purify the souls of him and his ancestors and help them to attain nirvana.

King Dilip, son of Anshuman pleaded with Lord Brahma to help them bring the Ganga to earth. He failed to appease Brahma so he passed the task to his son, Bhagiratha. Bhagiratha was able to please Brahma, who ordered Ganga to descent to Earth. The furious Ganga felt this as an insult and decided to destroy Earth with her force while descending from heaven. Bhagiratha was warned by Brahma that earth will not be able to hold Ganga while descending from heaven, so he must seek the help of Lord Shiva, the only one who can withstand the power of Ganga. Bhagiratha pleaded with Lord Shiva to help him and Shiva agreed to receive Ganga in his matted locks. Ganga was arrogant and tried to drown Shiva by pushing him to the core of the earth, but the mighty Shiva easily held her in his locks. Shiva’s tie was so strong that Ganga became helpless.

Lord Shiva wanted to teach Ganga a lesson but instead released her in seven streams as he was satisfied with the prayers of Bhagiratha. The seven streams of Ganga are Bhagirathi, Janhvi, Bhilangana, Mandakini, Rishiganga, Saraswati, and Alaknanda. Ganga became calm and followed Bhagiratha, who leads her to his ancestors and with her purity, released their souls.

There are a number of legends associated with Ganga and the different names she has at different places. This is but one.

Ganga is considered to be the most sacred river in India and it originates from the depths of Gangotri glacier. Ganga, otherwise known as the Ganges, brings purity to human life. By bathing in her sacred waters one is purified to the core of their being.

Bhagiratha’s great effort in bringing Ganga to earth is known as “Bhagiratha Prayatna”. What would you consider to be the noble quality of Bhagiratha – his strong affection to his ancestors or his determination to meet any challenges to attain the ultimate goal?

Rajee Ba in Rishikesh @www.rajeeba.com

Wishing you a Happy Dussehra to all of you.

Paintings by Rajeeba @ www.yogadaindia.com
Rawana: Portraying (we all) in life.

Wishing you a Happy Dussehra to all of you.

In Indian Mythology Rawana is one of the most important characters. The King Ravana had ten heads, a beautiful metaphor, ten faces; everybody has. Who can have only one single face? – only a Buddha (the enlightened one), the original face; otherwise everybody has many faces.
We all relive rather play the character of Rawana in our day to day life.

You need one face with your wife, another face with your friend. You can’t function with the same face with them both. You need one face with your servant, another face with your boss. If the servant and the boss are both present, when you look to the left, at the servant, you show him one face, and when you look to the right, at your boss, you show him another face; you start smiling and wagging your tail.

But don’t stop at the number ten either – don’t take ten as just ten. Ravana’s ten heads are just an indication, a symbol. Ten is the last number in counting before repetition begins, hence the mention often. The actual number of faces you have runs into thousands, but all over the world counting ends at ten. Everything above ten is repetition; thus eleven means one over ten, and twelve means two over ten. Ten is the symbolic end because man began to work with numbers by counting on his ten fingers; above ten, repetition begins.

So those ten faces of Ravana are to indicate the upper limits of counting – there is really no end to the number of faces you have, and all day long you are changing them. Rama has only one face: whether you meet him in happiness or in unhappiness, whether he is sitting in his palace or in the middle of the jungle, he does not wear different faces.

And whoever comes to have only one face becomes Rama.
To have only one face means to have become authentic, to show your true inner face; not to mask your truth on the outside, not to be influenced by circumstances but to let your face reveal your inner being. Rama’s face remains the same whether you blame or praise him; no mere circumstance can manipulate his features now. His face has become stable, and the name of this stability is Rama.

Rama if the exemplary King who is lives in India in every house from time immemorial. The above text is in line with Osho’s views.

Rajee Ba @ www.rajeeba.com

A Baba in Rishikesh India

Paintings by Rajee Ba at Yogada in the Himalayas – Rishikesh (INDIA) www.yogadaindia.com

A Baba in Rishikesh India :
Spirituality is a global phenomenon & Practice. It’s a tool to help you understand the deeper dimensions of life as a human.

Spirituality is individual. It has nothing to do with the social, the collective. No society is spiritual, no nation is spiritual. There are spiritual beings. There is no social soul; the soul manifests through the individual. Not only In India, they have been flowering everywhere, in China as much as in India, in Japan as much as in India, in Israel as much as in India. They have been flowering everywhere.

One thing is certain that India is one of the ancient most cultures. They were pioneers in thinking, in philosophizing, so they are very articulate people. They can say things as they should be said.

India is articulate. Amongst all the Eastern countries, India is the most articulate. It has been speaking about spirituality for at least five thousand years. That has created an idea in the whole world that India is spiritual. No country is especially spiritual; spirituality has been coming to all kinds of people and all races.

The Chinese are not so articulate; they are more trusting in silence. Their trust is not in words but in silence, hence you don’t know much about Chinese enlightened masters. And then China has remained almost a different world from the remainder of the world. It is not only the China Wall; there exists a certain subtle wall too which has kept China away from other countries.

In Tibet, so many enlightened people have existed, but nothing much is known about Tibet. Tibet has remained a remote, faraway land existing somewhere in the clouds. The very name has become a symbol for mystery.

India has been interested in philosophizing; it does not write history, it writes philosophy. It does not write ordinary things of life, it writes myth. It is not interested in history at all, its whole interest is in mythology. And naturally, five thousand years is a long time: if you go on doing a certain thing you become very, very clever at it. But there is something to be understood: there is a difference between the Eastern and the Western approach, and India has become the representative of the East. The above content is in line with Osho.

Rajee Ba at Yogada in the Himalayas Rishikesh INDIA
Yogada is a Sattya Yoga School for traditional Yoga practiced by Yogis in the Himalayas, the birthplace of Yoga. www.sattyayoga.in

Kundalini Experience:

Paintings by Rajee BA at Yogada in the Himalayas Rishikesh (India)

www.yogadaindia.com

Kundalini Experience:

Existence is energy, the movement of energy in so many ways and so many forms. As far as human existence is concerned, this energy is kundalini energy. Kundalini is the focused energy of the human body and the human psyche.

Energy can exist either manifested or unmanifested. It can remain in the seed or it can come up in a manifested form. Every energy is either in seed or in manifested form. Kundalini means your total potential, your total possibility. But it is a seed; it is the potential. The ways to awaken kundalini are ways to make your potential actual.

So first of all, kundalini is not something unique. It is only human energy as such. But ordinarily only a part of it is functioning, a very minute part. Even that part is not functioning harmoniously; it is in conflict. That is the misery, the anguish. If your energy can function harmoniously then you feel bliss, but if it is in conflict – if it is antagonistic to itself – then you feel miserable. All misery means that your energy is in conflict, and all happiness, all bliss, means that your energy is in harmony.

Why is the whole energy only potential, not actual? It is not needed as far as day-to-day life is concerned; it is not required. Only that part becomes functional that is required, challenged. Day-to-day life is not a challenge to it, so only a very minute part becomes manifest. And even this small, manifested part is not harmonious because your day-to-day life is not integrated.

Your day to day needs are in always in conflict.
There is also another conflict. The part that has become manifest will always be in conflict with the part that has not yet become manifest; the actual will always be in conflict with the potential. The potential will push itself to be manifested and the actual will suppress it.

To use psychological terms, the unconscious is always in conflict with the conscious. The conscious will try to dominate it, because it is always in danger of the unconscious manifesting itself. The conscious is under control, and the potential, the unconscious, is not. You can manage the conscious, but with an explosion of the unconscious you will be in insecurity. You will not be able to manage it. That is the fear of the conscious. So this is the other conflict, greater and deeper than the first: the conflict between the conscious and the unconscious, between the energy that has become manifest and the energy that wants to be manifested.

These two types of conflict are why you are not in harmony. And if you are not in harmony, your energy will become antagonistic to you. Energy needs movement, and movement is always from the unmanifest toward the manifest, from the seed toward the tree, from the dark toward the light.

This movement is possible only if there is no suppression. Otherwise, the movement, the harmony, is destroyed and your energy becomes an enemy to you. You become a house divided against itself; you become a crowd. Then you are not one; you are many.

This is the situation that exists as far as human beings are concerned. But this should not be. This is why there is ugliness and misery. Bliss and beauty can come only when your life energy is in movement, in easy movement, relaxed movement – unsuppressed, uninhibited; integrated, not fragmentary; not in conflict with itself, but one and organic. When your energy comes to this harmonious unity – that is what is meant by kundalini.

So energy can have two possibilities. The first is just a relief, a throwing off of energies which have become a burden to you, which you could not utilize and with which you could not be creative. This state of mind is anti-kundalini.

Kundalini is just a technical term for your whole energy when it is in unity, in movement, in harmony, without any conflict; when it is cooperative, complementary, and organic. Then and there, there is a transformation – unique and unknown.

Kundalini means to change this absurd situation into a meaningful one. The science of kundalini is one of the most subtle sciences. The physical sciences are also concerned with energy, but with material energy, not psychic energy. Yoga is concerned with psychic energy. It is a science of the metaphysical, of that which is transcendental.

The whole must be realized; your whole potential must be actualized. There are methods to realize the potential, to make it actual, to make it awake. It is sleeping, just like a snake. That is why it has been named kundalini: serpent power, a sleeping serpent.

If you have ever seen a serpent sleeping, it is just like that. It is coiled; there is no movement at all. But a serpent can stand up straight on its tail. It stands by its energy. That is why the serpent has been used symbolically. Your life energy is also coiled and asleep. But it can become straight; it can become awake, with its full potential actualized. Then you will be transformed.
The above content is in line with OSHO.

Rajee Ba at Yogada in the Himalayas Rishikesh INDIA
Yogada is a Sattya Yoga School for traditional Yoga practiced by Yogis in the Himalayas the birthplace of Yoga. www.sattyayoga.in

Krishna the absolute consciousness.

Paintings by Rajee Ba at Yogada Ashram in the Himalayas – Rishikesh India www.yogadaindia.com
Krishna the absolute consciousness.

For the first time in his long history, man has attempted a great and bold experiment through Krishna. For the first time, through Krishna, man has tested and tested fully his own strength and intelligence. It has been tested and found that man can remain, like a lotus in water, untouched and unattached while living in the throes of a relationship. It has been discovered that man can hold to his love and compassion even on the battlefield, that he can continue to love with his whole being while wielding a sword in his hand.

Krishna has great significance for the future. And his significance will continue to grow with the passage of time. When the glow and the glamour of all other godmen and messiahs has dimmed, when the suppressive religions of the world have been consigned to the wastebasket of history, Krishna’s flame will be heading towards its peak, moving towards the pinnacle of its brilliance. It will be so because, for the first time, man will be able to comprehend him, to understand him, and to imbibe him. And it will be so because, for the first time, man will really deserve him and his blessings.

It is really arduous to understand Krishna. It is easy to understand that a man should run away from the world if he wants to find peace, but it is really difficult to accept that one can find peace in the thick of the marketplace. It is understandable that a man can attain to purity of mind if he breaks away from his attachments, but it is really difficult to realize that one can remain unattached and innocent in the very midst of relationships and attachments, that one can remain calm and still live at the very center of the cyclone. There is no difficulty in accepting that the flame of a candle will remain steady and still in a place well secluded from winds and storms, but how can you believe that a candle can keep burning steadily even in the midst of raging storms and hurricanes? So it is difficult even for those who are close to Krishna to understand him.

It is this paradox that makes Krishna difficult to understand. Therefore, people who have loved and worshipped him have done so by dividing him into parts, and they have worshipped his different fragments, those of their liking. No one has accepted and worshipped the whole of Krishna, no one has embraced him in his entirety. Poet Surdas sings superb hymns of praise to the Krishna of his childhood, Bal. Krishna. Surdas’ Krishna never grows up, because there is a danger with a grown-up Krishna which Surdas cannot take. There is not much trouble with a boy Krishna flirting with the young women of his village, but it will be too much if a grown-up Krishna does the same. Then it will be difficult to understand him.

After all, we can understand something on our own plane, on our own level. There is no way to understand something on a plane other than ours.

So for their adoration of Krishna, different people have chosen different facets of his life. Those who love the Gita will simply ignore the Bhagavad because the Krishna of the Gita is so different from the Krishna of the Bhagavad. Similarly, those who love the Bhagavad will avoid getting involved with the Gita. While the Krishna of the Gita stands on a battlefield surrounded by violence and war, the Krishna of the Bhagavad is dancing, singing and celebrating. There is seemingly no meeting-point whatsoever between the two. The above content is in line with Osho.

Monks on the way to the monastery in the Mountains.

Paintings by Rajee Ba at Yogada Ashram in the Himalayas – Rishikesh India

Monks on the way to the monastery in the Mountains.

I have heard… In the Himalayas, two monks, one old and the other young

making their way to the remote monasteries. They had just crossed the high passes and It was evening and the sun was about to set. The village was far away and the path led through dense jungle and mountains. They were in a hurry to reach the village.

They met the farmer of the village on the way and asked, “We want to reach the village before the sun sets because we have heard that the entrance to the village is closed at sundown. At night it will be dangerous to travel the path through the forest. Will we be able to reach?”

Tying up his load of woods for the home the farmer replied, slowly, without any hurr: “Certainly you will reach, but go slowly. If you hurry, then I cannot say whether or not you will reach.”

The monks said to each other: “Have we asked a madman this question? He is advising us to go slowly and then we will reach, but if we go fast, he is not sure whether we will reach!”
The rains have started and the sun was about to set, they started running. Even then the farmer said: “Friends, do not hurry. I have never seen a man in a hurry to reach that village.” Hearing this, they started running even faster.

This is the peculiarity of man; his mind is like this. They still thought the farmer was crazy, asking them to walk slowly.
They ran. A little further along the path, with the sun setting, the darkness growing, the old monk fell over a rock and seriously injured his knees.. The young monk was running here and there trying to retrieve the books and belongings.

Just then the farmer on his way home strolled by, humming softly, swinging his stick. He said: “See, what I had anticipated, happened. Why this impatience?

I told you to go slowly on this mountain road. You can only reach the monastery if you are not impatient.

Often this happens, frequently it happens, that people want to reach the village (Nirvana & Samadhi ) quickly. I tell them to go slowly, but they do not listen – and they fall.”

Yogada Ashram is located on the banks of roaring Ganga river in the foothills of the in the in the Himalayas little above from Rishikesh town in north India. The ashram practices and share the ancient wisdom of Himalayan Yogi’s through traditional, primitive, time tested and scientifically based yoga for evolution and transformation to the highest level of existence of life as a human being.

Come to Yogada Ashram and explore a new world within. www.yogadaindia.com

Paintings by Rajee Ba at Yogada Ashram in the Himalayas

Himalayas – Rishikesh India www.yogadaindia.com
Nirvana
Nirvana: Gautam Buddha used the word for the ultimate state of consciousness. He could have chosen a positive word, and in India, there were many positive words for it: moksha, freedom, liberation; kaivalya, aloneness, absolute aloneness; brahmanubava, the experience of the ultimate. But he chose a strange word, which has never been used in spiritual contexts: blowing out the candle. How can you relate it with a spiritual experience?

Buddha says your so-called self is nothing but a flame, and it is being kept burning through your desires. When all desires disappear the candle has disappeared. Now the flame cannot exist anymore. The flame also disappears – disappears into the vast universe, leaving no trace behind it; you cannot find it again. It is there but it has gone forever from any identity, from any limitation.

Hence Buddha chose the word nirvana rather than realization, because realization can still give you some egoistic superiority – that you are a realized person, that you are a liberated being, that you are enlightened, that you are illuminated, that you have found it. But you remain. And Buddha is saying you are lost – who is going to find it? You disperse, you were only a combination. Now each element goes to its original source. The identity of the individual is no more. Yes, you will exist as the universe…

So Buddha avoided any positive word, knowing the human tendency, because each positive word can give you a feeling of ego. No negative word can do that; that’s why it remains unpolluted. You cannot pollute something which is not. And people were very much afraid to use the word – with a deep inner trembling – nirvana.

Thousands of times Buddha was asked, “Your word nirvana does not create in us an excitement, does not create in us a desire to achieve it. The ultimate truth, self-realization, the realization of God – all those create a desire, a great desire. Your word creates no desire.”

Unless you have come to a deep understanding of yourself and existence, the word nirvana will create fear in you. It is a negative word.

Literally it means blowing out the candle.
The above thoughts are in line with OSHO.