Your mercy is a great wonder

Your mercy is a great wonder, nondifferent from You. It is pure eternity, knowledge, and bliss. It can empower me to always remember and glorify You in pure love. It can obtain for me Your loving sidelong glance. It can enable me to see You absorbed in the company of the cows and the gopas and the gopis. Thus for a helpless person like me it is the ultimate resort of all hopes. Your wonderful mercy is ancient and eternal but also ever new and fresh. To your mercy, again and again, I offer my obeisances forever.

--Srila Sanatana Gosvami

On the roof of Bal Krsna Bhavan

This morning I collected super fragrant parijata flowers to offer to the Lord. Delicate white flowers with a bright orange center that fall to the ground each morning at dawn. They are said to come from a tree brought from the heavenly planet as a gift from Lord Krsna to His wife, Rukmini (my namesake). Here in India, the spiritual realm is so intertwined with what's right before our eyes.Chanting on the roof of the Bal Krsna Bhavan for at least two hours, two nilagai reclined on the ridge of Govardhan, in profile, as still as Sphinxes, other than an occasional turn of the head or wiggling of the ears. How still and quiet to my murmur of the Holy Names-- calling out for acceptance into this holy realm.At one point, near them, upon the ridge, a large monkey jumped onto an aged tree and began to violently shake it back and forth. Have I seen this once in a Tarzan movie?Which consciousness do I want? The quiet murmur, calling for grace, calling to be ardent in patience-- or the violent, possessed urgency of passionate desire? Krsna, please come! I exist in a foreign atmosphere and I long to be accepted by You, in Your realm of selfless reciprocal love.

Dedicate this one life

I ask you to dedicate this one life to the Lord. I do not want you to undergo the process of saṁsāra, of repeated birth and death, any longer. Engaging wholeheartedly in the process of bhakti is not too difficult a sacrifice for attaining eternal existence. To be free of enemies, once and for all, to be permanently liberated from ongoing negative bombardments that we are forced to face every single day—whatever price we have to pay for that, it is worth it. Even if we have to live every single day in anxiety and frustration, being misunderstood, it is worthwhile because of what is ultimately attainable. If the goal is not wonderful, then of course, it is not desirable to pay a heavy price. If the goal is not permanent and we have to ultimately give it up only to enter again into the many complications from which we ran, then it is not a very captivating aspiration. But, if the end result is that all suffering is destroyed—death, disease, old age, and constantly living in an environment in which we have to struggle to survive—then it is worth it.

--Bhakti Tirtha Swami, Surrender

Photo by Emilio Martín on Unsplash

Praying for Moments of Change

I am praying for moments of profound change. Praying for one drop of taste for the Holy Name. Praying to be awakened to the reality of the pure Holy Name and the reality of this holy place. Sacinandana Swami said that we need to let the Holy Name go beyond the shore and open the gates of the heart and enter deep inside. He said that affection, chanting in relationship, is the key to accepting our helplessness in front of the ferocious uncontrolled mind. We have tried so hard to build a road to come to the Lord. But have we built the road for Krishna to come to us? How many tears, an ocean of tears are needed to call Him to us. I cry for so many other things instead. He said that we are all pilgrims and we only have the compass of the soul to show the way. We need to open the eyes of our conscious yearning of the soul. He said that these holy places fulfill that yearning of the soul. May each of us find what we are looking for! May you all be blessed! Giriraj Maharaj Kijay!

Photo by Samuel Zeller on Unsplash

Krishna's Cows

Krishna has a string of 108 jewels that He uses to count his 108 groups of cows. He knows every cow by name, and the cows like to wander away so they can hear Him call their names. If you ever feel sad or depressed you can just call out the names of Krsna’s cows and you will feel so happy! Oh, Hamsi! Oh, Pasungi! Oh, Vamsi! Oh, Priya! Oh, Mrdanga Mukhi (That name is funny… It’s a cow who has a face shaped like a mrdanga drum!) Oh, Manikasthini! Krishna takes care of the baby calves and he likes to put his forehead right on the calf’s forehead and then he looks the calf right in the eyes and says, “Do you miss your mother? We’ll take you back to her soon”. Vrindavan is all about relationships. Loving, kind, considerate relationships. Topics about Krishna are the medicine for the heart for this age. To help a human being think of others before oneself. In this age of Kali Yuga, people have lost their finer sentiments to think in these kinds of ways.

Greetings from Govardhan Hill

This month, in November, I’m attending two retreats right at the foot of the sacred Govardhan Hill in Sri Vrindavan Dham. There is a very rare and elusive animal that lives only in this area called a nilgai, or a blue cow. It has the legs of a deer and the body of a cow. It’s kind of blueish gray colored. Kind of an Indian version of a unicorn. It’s considered a great fortune to see one. Once many years ago before Vrindavan was so built up I saw one running across the road. We were watching a whole herd of them walking on top of the Govardhan Hill while we were having our sanga. So rare and beautiful!Once Radha asked Krsna to create a place for their personal pastimes. With a love-laden glance from Krsna’s heart, He created a seed that manifested His love and created the Govardhan Hill where there are many caves that are like palaces inside where Radha and Krishna have their own private pastimes. For people in the Bhakti tradition, it’s considered to be the most sacred place in the universe. Coming here is like an investment in eternity. Coming to such a holy place brings one's past belief or knowledge to a place of experience that empowers us and sustains us in times of difficulty. My intention has been to try to awaken to the reality of the pure Holy Name and Holy Dham. The material mind is a gift of the material energy to make me think that I am the center of existence. If I can hear one Hare Krishna mantra beginning with the word Hare, I am so fortunate. Be determined to confront the mind, this is the easiest way to learn humility: I need help! Humility means taking shelter of Krishna. Krishna is there when we are in that mood. Let every distraction in chanting help us to beg for help! Krishna is not different from his name, but His name is more merciful than Krishna Himself.--RukminiRadha and Krishna on Govardhan Hill painting by Vrindavan Das

Bhakti Blossoms Book Review

by Tammy T. Stone at The Tattooed BuddhaEditor: Dana GornallAs a young, fledgling writer in high school, I often found myself penning anything from creative writing exercises to poems, songs and short stories (even a film treatment—I was ambitious!) featuring male protagonists.I never questioned this tendency. My teachers as well, both male and female, never asked me to reflect on why I might not be writing women characters or female perspectives.It took me many years, and a male protagonist-driven novella later, to realize what seems so glaringly obvious: I had been under-examining and also not understanding or embracing a massive part of who I was, in no small part due to prevailing societal forces: I grew up in a “dead white male” world where the vast majority of authors—including those used in the school system—along with their main characters, were men. It’s not that I, myself, identified as male, but that my imagination was molded and encouraged to align with the dominant voice of many, many, generations, to the extent that it was easier for me to imagine worlds through the male experience than my own.It is no secret that the all-pervasive patriarchy—now, at the very least, under public scrutiny in the wake of the Weinstein scandal and the #metoo movement it inspired—extends to the realms of spirituality and religion, where the suppression of the feminine and women’s voices and practice has long been the norm. That’s why, before even opening Bhakti Blossoms, there is so much to admire and be excited about. Editor Krishna Kanta Dasi, founder of the Vaishnavi Voices Poetry Project, has invited 108 women practitioners of Bhakti Yoga to express their devotion to the Divine through poetry.

The four main branches of yoga in the Gita—Raja, Karma, Jnana and Bhatki—all seek, through different means, to achieve a union between people in their bodily incarnation, and the Divine. Bhakti is the path of loving devotion; the root of the word, the Sanskrit “bhaj”, means to love or worship God. As Graham Schweig explains in Bhakti Blossom’s foreword, “Bhakti is a practice that cultivates purity of heart, selflessness of devotion, and sweetness of character.”

Within Bhakti, he goes on to explain, the Vaishnava tradition revolves around devotion to the Divine as Vishnu, or Krishna, and highlights the Bhakti practice as a yogic path.Though this devotional yogic path is thousands of years old, the voices of its women practitioners have been all but obscured. Devotional poetry written by men abound, from the Sufi traditions’s Rumi, Kabir and Hafiz, to the Hindu trandition’s Rabindranath Tagore, Ramprasad and Sri Aurobindo, but Bhakti Blossoms represents the first coming together of women devotees in Bhakti yoga in expression of their spirituality and devotion through this rich and impacting medium.Many of the poetesses featured in the book are new to poetry, and for many, English is not their first language, but it is no exaggeration to say that the primary language here is love, and the book is tremendously affecting as a result, a real balm for our times and gift to pore through.The book is divided into nine chapters—Bhakti, Divinity, Guru & Sanga, Our Selves and Others, Maya’s Magic, Prayers, Seva, Divine Nature and The Holy Names—that speak to the multi-faceted and fascinating qualities of the Vaishnavi devotional pathway. The chapter introductions do the poems that follow a great service, helping readers understand the specific individual flavors of the spiritual experiences to be presented. From there the individual poetesses reach out through the page, embracing the reader as a result of they themselves having opened up to their own expressivity in devotion.[perfectpullquote align="left" cite="" link="" color="" class="" size=""]As I read each poem in this book, I am transported into one woman’s journey—her contentment, happiness, bliss, struggle, self-reflection—in her relationship with the divine, and the cumulative effect of reading the poems in succession is striking.[/perfectpullquote]

There is simply great power in the collective voice.

I think of a mosaic, or a woven textile, or a string of pearls, in which each part gleams with beauty and clarity, only enhanced by the role it plays in creating a larger totality. As I read each poem in this book, I am transported into one woman’s journey—her contentment, happiness, bliss, struggle, self-reflection—in her relationship with the divine, and the cumulative effect of reading the poems in succession is striking. I am reminded of the bhajan (devotional song) performances I’ve attended and often listen to, in which holy words are repeated over and over, their power increasing with each repetition until the song rises to a crescendo that leaves me simultaneously shattered and feeling utterly whole.The poems in this book have a similar effect; each one glistens, helping create a momentum that potentially sweeps the reader into a universe where light, inspiration, and selfless love prevail, even in the context of the shadows and struggles that are a natural part of the true human and spiritual experience. The poems themselves, without generalizing—for each speaks so directly from the heart that generalization is impossible—are inspired and completely honest, and they touched me to the core. In her introduction to the book, Krishna Kanta Dasi alludes to the many flower metaphors that adorn the Bhakti tradition, one of them being, “the tighter the bud the more resistant we are to Bhakti, the more our petals open, the more awake our heart is to receiving and reciprocating the love God has for us.”As I read this book, often devouring pages at a time, this metaphor came to mind as each poem felt to me like a petal opening—by turn hesitant, gentle, unsure, questioning, vulnerable, brave, exultant, inspired, emboldened. It revealed not only the author’s exquisite relationship with the Divine, but the capacity each one of us has to open our hearts more, to not be afraid, to surrender to what lies behind the veil of our senses, to be a flower, which protects itself and hides when it needs to, but which so willingly opens at first opportunity, unfailingly, as long as it exists.If this sounds overly poetic, this is what the book inspires! Sitting down with Bhakti Blossoms is like sitting down with a steaming cup of tea on a rainy day, or in an orchard under a bright, midday sun: it is comfort, community, love, passion, strength, devotion and faith. It is inspiration in a world that desperately needs it; it is hope for a future guided by the feminine principles of receptivity, intuition, communion, creativity and generation.From a spiritual perspective, it is a reminder not to jump over our own humanity—our glorious triumphs and also failures, our doubts, fears, joys and sorrows—on our “way up” to enlightenment, but to live, experience and also attempt, at every turn, to give expression to our beautiful humanity as an integral part of the spiritual journey.It is also—in the sheer feat of its coming into being—a politically-engaged assertion that women’s voices will not be silenced. But nor do they aim to dominate. Instead, they rise in chorus, guiding us on a pathway to that which is larger than all of us.These are the guides we need, and I am so thankful for their existence.Available at Amazon.com.

India Pilgrimage

Have you always wanted to go to India, but had some trepidation about embarking on the journey? If so, this is the trip for you!

Let go of your fear and know that you’ll be in the best of hands with Gaura Vani and Rukmini! Both have multiple years of experience (more than we can count!) and have actually lived in India in the past. Be assured that you will be taken care of, you’ll always feel safe, you’ll stay in lovely accommodations, eat delicious food and visit places that will give you a deep and profound experience of India…not just the “tourist version”. If you want to see the sights and hear the stories and chant along with the Kirtan that bring the feeling of Bhakti alive then we invite you to join us!

We promise you will come back home with an open heart and a new perspective on life!

The link HERE will take you to the information form. Contact vrindarani@gmail.com or +1 (240) 447-0245 for further questions.

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