1st June: Shivir - Day 1

I was afraid I would not hear my alarm the next morning as I went to bed late, so I had to call Papa to give me a wake-up call from USA at 3:30 am. He woke me up promptly. I got ready and went for my first day! I was totally excited about this!! The ladies were sitting in a line for something so I just joined in. Promptly at 4:30 am, the meditation started. At 4:45 am the line started moving to the yagyshala. Oh my goodness, I was not prepared for the next thing – the line breaking and pushing!! I was thinking all these ladies would move smoothly since they had been sitting so well. But no! Some of these old ladies really know how to jump lines.

I was second last to enter the yagyashala before they closed the gates for the first set of people doing the yagya. I was lucky to be in the first yagya of the day and the first day of the shivir. I liked the whole process. I wish I had known a little bit more about why we do yagya before I did the yagya.

Yagya are well known from ancient times and people do them at occasions or celebrations, but why do it daily? I still don’t have the answer. That was one of the reasons I did not attend all the yagya during my shivir. Another reason was the old ladies. I just could not see myself pushing people daily to do something as holy as a yagya. Besides later that day one of the speakers said something to the effect that if you have done one yagya in the shivir then you should not do it anymore since you will be taking the place of someone else, and we should give everyone a chance. So that gave me another reason not to get up so early in the morning from tomorrow. (But later I realized he may have been talking about something else!)

After yagya I went to my room did some jap and slept a bit. Even though I have been in India for a few days, my sleep schedule is not set yet.

During the first day of my shivir, I had no idea what to expect so I attended every single thing. Each lecture was preceded by two inspiring songs. These songs were sung professionally with great music and enthusiasm. Too bad the people listening did not have the same enthusiasm. For me the harder part was to comprehend some of the lyrics as the microphone was not very clear to me, and my hindi is not that great either.

Stories/summaries from Day 1 lectures

The first day was mostly about the significance of jap and discipline in life.

1. If a lady is cooking rice and doing jap together then her mind is continuously on the rice and she is not concentrating on the jap. So at the end of the jap she will end up getting rice because that is what she was concentrating on during the jap. Moral: concentrate on the jap with something meaningful on your mind and that is the result you will get. Ideally you should think of the rising sun when doing Gayatri mantra jap.
2. When your heart is into doing something then you have no discomfort in doing that thing, e.g. when watching TV you are fully concentrating on it such that you don’t realize what is going on around you. However, when we listen to pravachan, we fidget around because our heart is not in it and we would rather be somewhere else.
3. Purpose of jap – just like you have to clean your teeth daily to keep them healthy and clean, you have to do jap daily to keep your soul clean and healthy.
4. Purpose of yellow clothes – to adjust better to the disciplined environment. To respect the clothes you will not do certain things e.g. smoke or drink. 
5. Purpose of satvik food – so that your body is also doing sadhna while your mind is doing sadhna. Satvik food does not make your body smell so you will feel clean and pure. And more importantly your mind is not constantly on food while attending the shivir.
6. Sanyam – self-control: Especially control your tongue. For two reasons – speech and taste. Control what you say and to whom you say, and control your taste buds so your life is not all about food. To control your bad habits write them each on a piece of paper and look at them when you feel you are losing self control.
7. Even God said he prefers people with a good heart and pure soul, not the one who does jap or gives money to the temples. So make your heart pure and good. One of the easiest way to be and do good is by seva – serving other people wholeheartedly. 
8. Give your children good values, no matter how old fashioned they sound e.g. touching the feet of elders.
9. Your home gives an idea of who you are as a person, so decorate your home with nice things. Animal decorations indicate that those are what you believe in, God pictures or nature pictures indicate your faith in those.
10. Treat God as you would treat yourself. This was in context of when we do ceremonies during puja on statues of God. Don’t immerse them in water and leave them there….that would be as if someone left you in the swimming pool. Respect even the idols.
11. Last story……You don’t have to look externally to find God, he is always in your heart. The story behind that is …. God made the earth so beautiful that he decided to come and live on the earth with Lakshmi. All the animals and plants lived on their own, but man was very needy, he came and asked God for everything every time. So God said to Lakshmi, "lets hide in the forest", but man found him there. They hid in the sea, but were found there also. Then they ran to the mountains, but man was right behind them. Naradji was roaming around and asked God who he was running from and God said, "man, he seems to find me everywhere". So Naradji said, "why don’t you hide in man’s heart, that is one place where he never looks". And since then man has been looking and not finding God.

I went to pay my respects to the “Akhand Deep” around 4 pm, as I was told that is the least crowded time. And they were right!! I went right in, paid my respects. I was hoping for some inspiration from the jyoti – but nothing. Or maybe I am not ready for inspiration yet….who knows?

Food was challenging the first day as I had figure out how to eat unsweetened and unsalted daliya. I had no sugar and I don’t really eat salty daliya. And since we are not supposed to leave any food in our plate I had to do the unthinkable (for my taste) – I mixed it with daal and rice and ate it! Oh! What an experience! Never eating daliya here again….And I have to remember to bring a spoon (which I never really did), I have a hard time eating the watery daal with my fingers.

I did not have any dinner. I was true to having just one meal per day. I did have to go out and get some bananas for that 5 pm hunger.

Taking the Sankalp

31st May - evening
Before starting the shivir on the 1st of June, we were asked to meet at 8pm the day before, on 31st May, and take “sankalp” (promise) that we will abide by all the rules of the shivir and finish all that is assigned to us during that time. This was all to be done in the lecture hall.

I was surprised to see that it was full!! There must have been more than 900 people participating in this 9 day shivir. Wow! Okay, no problem, I found a nice spot in the middle of the hall and sat. Seating was free for all and there were no chairs. It was a large hall, no walls, covered with carpet and we were to sit on the ground. Alright, I think I can do that also. Another thing that took me by surprise was that everyone was sitting straight lines instead of sitting haphazardly. That was another part of a small discipline instilling behavior that Shantikunj is trying to promote (but they are losing – sorry! The people of India just don’t like sitting in lines or doing what they are told to do).

The speaker, Dr. Dutta, got us initiated. He told us that we were embarking on a journey to self discovery and that we should take it seriously. He mentioned some rules, but a number of things were not clear to me, as I realized later. If some the reasons were clearer to me in the beginning, I may have approached the shivir little differently. But no problem, that did not cause too many problems.

The sankalp involved Dr. Dutta telling us to do the jap, eating once a day only and attending everything as seriously as possible. There would be a half day break on the 5th day, i.e. only the morning programs, not the afternoon or evenings ones. That was designed so visitors could go to Har ki Pauri during their stay at Haridwar. The sankalp process ended by chanting a mantra of promise and tying the kalava on the wrist to remind us of our promise. That was the end of that day.

I decided to eat tikki chat and gulaab jaamun for dinner that evening because I knew I would be eating satvik food for the next 9 days!!

Pre-Shivir Experience

31st May

My goal of going to Shantikunj was to volunteer for 2 months at their university: Dev Sanskriti Vishv Vidhyalay. I had been in communication with some people and it seemed a like a done deal – meaning that they had some projects for me. Since this was my first time at Shantikunj I was advised to attend the 9 day shivir (at Shantikunj) so I could get an idea of what it’s founder Acharya Sharmaji’s philosophy was all about. I was ready for that. Once I had decided to volunteer, I was ready for anything.
After arriving at Shantikunj, Haridwar, on 25th May, I took a break for a few days in Dehradun with family, since the shivir was starting on the 1st of June. I came back to Haridwar on 31st to start my shivir on 1st June. 

I was thinking the shivir will be something like getting up in the morning, having breakfast, going for lecture then lunch and more lecture, some bhajan and so on. But I was quite mistaken. I was told that the following was going to be my program for the next nine days:

1. 3:30 am: Get up to get ready for the meditation at 4:30 am.
2. After meditation is yagya for about 30 mins, if you are early, or 15 mins if you arrive after 6 am. (The first yagya is longer because the fire is ignited which includes more mantras.)
3. Then you get a break till 8 am (which is really not a break – see point 11)
4. You have to visit the “akhand deep” once during the day. This deep (lamp) was lit by Acharya Sharmaji more than 70 years ago and it has been lit since then.
5. 8:00 am: lecture, followed by lunch at 10 am.
6. 10 -11:30 am: lunch time and a general rest break till 1:30 pm. (Again – not really a rest break – see point 11. Although we were advised to take a short nap here.)
7. 1:30-2:00 pm: meditation followed by a lecture till 4 pm.
8. Then there is free time until 6pm. (This could be real free time, but not for some of us - see point 11.)
9. 6:00 pm: 15 min meditation and then lecture till 8-8:15 pm. That is when the day is over.
10. In all these days, one is supposed to have satvik bhojan only once a day. I could eat fruits or drink milk other times if you get hungry. Food is provided by the bhojnalay at Shantikunj.
11. Lastly……one is supposed to do 30 maala jap of Gayatri mantra daily, that is saying it 30 x 108 times. So now you can see there is really no free time or break time. This number of jap can take anywhere from 4-5 hours depending on your ease and speed of saying the mantra.

So that is how it was supposed to be. I knew a few of the things I would be required to do, but I was not ready for the 30 maala jap! I was already thinking, what is the point of that?? I am used to listening to speakers, so lectures were not going to be a problem, neither was getting up early. I can do all that….but jap thing was bugging me a bit. But in the spirit of things and with the notion that this is what I am here to do, I dove into the shivir.

Summer of 2011

So here is my first entry of my India trip this year. 

My destination for June and July this year was Shantikunj in Haridwar (Uttarakhand). Shantikunj was established by Acharya Shriram Sharma in 1971 in Haridwar. You can read about Shantikunj at http://awgp.org/. They also established a university, Dev Sanskriti Vishv Vidyalay (DSVV), http://dsvv.org/, about 10 years ago.  The campus is about 1 km from Shantikunj.

I was lucky to attend a shivir (camp) for nine days at Shantikunj and then I moved to the DSVV campus to volunteer at their university for six weeks. I chose the worst months, weather wise, to be in India, but what to do? As a professor I get summer holidays only during summer.  So periodically you might read my woes on the hot summer of India!

Do come back to read more....

Coservatives vs Liberals

Following all the election news the past few months, its a little surprising for me to see how divided (still) America is on values. We define our candidates as liberal or conservatives. And for us the liberal and conservatives have a some major differences, but the one that stands out clearly is: relegious values. Why religion? Does a religious person make better choices that an athiest? Does an athiest not have to eat and go to work...or deal with the same issues a religous person does? Just because I may not believe in "the" god (the ones that conservatives have a hold on) does not mean I don't know what the current issues are or what is good for the country or make good decisions. Big discussion point here.

Despite how small the world is getting we still don't see the big picture. I know it is important to know how one will drive to work tomorrow in order to get the paycheck which will let one survive in this world. But if all we care about is our small immediate needs, then that is what we will get as a result, we will not be able to see big changes in our society and consequently the world. One should learn to live beyond our small circle and enlarge it to include the community, the state, the country and finally the whole globe.

I don't think it is liberal to think that I should:

• try to use alternative sources of energy.
• try and help my neighbor in times of need.
• try to make this world a better place for everyone.
• help the lower income group become more independant and less dependant on the government.
• penalize anyone who is different from me - in ethnicity, religion or the choices they make.
• respect one and all for who they are.

For me just voting for a woman or colored candidate is not enough. What the candidate stands for is what is important.