Thanks to all of you for sharing your introductions and joining as you can in our exercise of “bringing a BMCM retreat home”. Your reflections are always inspiring because they remind us that Easwaran speaks to each of us in just the way we need. This week, we’ll revisit Easwaran’s teachings about deepening our meditation.
As another way to bring the retreat experience home, you might like to meditate with others this week. Perhaps you have an in-person satsang to facilitate this, or another place to meditate with others. We’ll share a way you can do that! This week, we’ll also continue our reading study in which Easwaran discusses how deepened meditation brings wisdom to every aspect of our lives.
we would like to explore the idea of how you might bring a BMCM retreat experience to wherever you are in the world.
Easwaran felt that our BMCM retreats here in Tomales are essential to his students and to the world. Here are his words when he inaugurated our retreat house, which he named Gokulam, in 1997:
“Come here often, as often as you can. Renew your commitment. Come together to support each other and rededicate your lives to this supreme ambition. This is a waystation on your pilgrimage. This is your second home.”
With this in mind, over the next two months we’ll offer a taste of the retreat experience by focusing on this year’s weeklong retreat theme and providing suggestions so you can experience elements of this retreat from wherever you are. We’ll start with a reading study that emphasizes the theme of this year’s weeklong retreat: Deepening Our Meditation. We’ll be referring to Easwaran’s book Seeing With the Eyes of Love. Feel free to read along if you have a copy of the book, or use the excerpts provided on this site.
This week we’ll wrap up our month-long video study with Part Four of Easwaran’s video talk. Easwaran concludes that the glory of the goal helps us take all difficulties in stride. He promises that the Supreme Goal of life allows us to be at home everywhere, and at home with everyone, all the time.
Is there at least one idea you will be taking away from this month of video study and reflection? Do you have something new you can continue to explore? Have you noticed an impact on your meditation practice?
In this week’s video study, Easwaran vividly describes the beauty of the moon, using a number of phrases in English and Sanskrit. He tells us that we all have the moon in our consciousness, and that there are ways to see the beauty of the moon by making our hearts pure.
In this week’s video study, Easwaran shares an anecdote from the Bhagavad Gita in which Arjuna is caught in the world of duality. Easwaran gives us a number of suggestions to help us understand how we can be equal in pleasure and pain, overcoming our own selfishness.
In March, we tried out a Video Study for the first time on the eSatsang, and many of you told us that you wanted to do again. We are happy to oblige!
This month, we’re shifting our focus to Easwaran’s videotaped talk on the Dhammapada, in a talk in which he describes how living for others brings permanent joy and harmony to our lives. He’ll give a number of practical and realistic suggestions to help us catch a glimpse of this joy.
We will close this study with Part 2 of Easwaran’s article “The Secret of Selfless Action” in the Spring 2019 Blue Mountain Journal. In the comments below, we’d love if you’d share a line or two that really stood out to you, or a practical step you’d like to emphasize for yourself and others.
Is there one thing you will be taking away from this month of reflection and practice? Do you have something new you can add to your practice of the eight points?
This week, we’re starting a new article on work and sadhana, in which Easwaran emphasizes the importance of selfless work. He places before us the promise of learning to work hard without any ego involvement at all. He reminds us that a quieter ego means a stiller mind.
Thank you for your inspiring reflections on last week’s reading from the Spring 2019 Blue Mountain Journal “The Purpose of Work”! We’re continuing our conversation as a community on cultivating a new understanding of work as an opportunity to attain wisdom and deepen our practice by reducing self-will.
This week we’re diving into Part 2 of Easwaran’s article “Work: A Chance to Grow” to continue our exploration of the profundity hidden in the routines of daily working life, in the home or outside of it. After reviewing the article, please share your reflections in the comments section below. Is there one practical thing you can experiment with this week while you work?
This month, we’re shifting to a series of reading studies from the Spring 2019 Blue Mountain Journal “The Purpose of Work”. We always like to share journals through the eSatsang because it’s a great opportunity to deepen our understanding of Easwaran’s teachings together, and gain new insights. What reflections do you have on Easwaran’s statement that the purpose of work is the attainment of wisdom? Does it inspire any reflections on the tremendous opportunity for growth in our daily lives?
Below is a story from Easwaran to illustrate how these lofty ideals look in an everyday context. As always, please share what stands out to you in the comments section. Feel free to summarize what you noted and/or share implications for your meditation practice. We look forward to hearing from you!
This has been such a rich and productive month of reflecting on the Self in our hearts and in recognizing the Self in the hearts of those around us. At the beginning of this year, we shared a message of hopefulness and a call to deepening our meditation practice. As we come to the end of the first quarter, is there something meaningful you took away from this shared Vishu celebration to help fuel your deeper practice?
Please enjoy this 3 minute video clip of Easwaran sharing Vishu’s truest meaning: learning to see the divine in ourselves and others – what the mystics call the Face behind all faces.
We are invigorated to hear about the many ways you participated in our worldwide community practice day on Vishu last Sunday. It was special to be connected with our friends at Ramagiri Ashram and with all of you as we took part in ways to deepen our practice of passage meditation. This week, consider simply reading, refreshing or memorizing one of the mirror-themed passages below that speaks to you of your true Self, or a passage that Easwaran reminded us of in his article “Bringing Heaven to Earth”. You may already have chosen one as part of the Vishu mirror ceremony on April 14. Here are a few more suggestions…
We’re all looking forward to the opportunity to ‘gather together’ for shared contemplative practice along with our friends at Ramagiri Ashram. Although we won’t be physically together, the spiritual forces that connect us are far beyond the borders of time and space. Together, we can collectively deepen our meditation to light the lamp of wisdom within us all. As you are able, we invite you to ‘join in’ on the activities scheduled at Ramagiri Ashram (Pacific Time). You might follow the schedule in your own home, or gather with a few satsang friends for some of the activities – find a way to make it work for you!
Friends at Ramagiri Ashram will celebrate Vishu on Sunday, April 14 and invite us to join them from wherever we are in the world in a day of shared contemplative practice. There are suggested activities throughout the day providing us with many opportunities to connect with each other virtually.
Let’s continue preparing ourselves for Vishu by finishing Easwaran’s article from last week. This week Easwaran shares the symbolism of looking at one’s reflection in a mirror on Vishu. We’re reminded that to see our true beauty, we must clean the dust from past conditioning a little each day to break free from self-will.
We’re really thrilled to share our focus for the month of April because it is anchored in an invitation to participate in a special shared practice day for our worldwide community.
In honor of Easwaran’s grandmother, Ramagiri celebrates the yearly Kerala Spring holiday called Vishu. The significance of Vishu is to mirror the pure spark of divinity within each of us, making this ancient ritual a very modern remedy for our times.
Friends at Ramagiri Ashram will celebrate Vishu on Sunday, April 14 and welcome us to join them in a day of shared contemplative practice. Would you like to participate?
In the reading below, Easwaran reminds us that there is a divine source of love, wisdom, beauty and compassion in all of us. Please share what stands out to you in the comments section below. We look forward to hearing from you!
In this final week, Easwaran reminds us of the supreme goal of all our spiritual striving and efforts. He also shares the faith and confidence that Gandhiji has for all of us. Is there at least one idea you will be taking away from this month of video study and reflection? Do you have something new you can continue to explore? Have you noticed an impact on your meditation practice?
This week, Easwaran addresses breaking free from guilt, and reminds us that his God is an ocean of mercy. With this background, Easwaran’s key lesson is using our meditation and the eight points to learn to forgive ourselves and others. To watch this week’s video excerpt, we suggest you start the video where we left off last week at 17:54 and end at 25:03. After watching, please share your thoughts in the comments section below. What resonated with you? What thoughts or questions do you have about forgiving yourself and others?
This week we’ll move on to part 2 of our study of Easwaran’s video talk “Gandhi, Man of God”. Easwaran continues sharing writings that reveal the restless striving for growth that marked Gandhi’s inner life, and relates it to our own lives and spiritual practice. In particular, Easwaran refers to Gandhi and his own approach to making mistakes, and how to learn from them.
To watch this week’s video excerpt, we suggest you start the video where we left off last week at 8:30 and end at 17:54. We look forward to hearing from you!
This month, we’re continuing our focus on meditation, with a special emphasis on effort during meditation. We’ll also enjoy inspiration and hopefulness for ourselves and others through a video study of Easwaran’s commentary on Gandhi and his spiritual teachings. This video talk is called “Gandhi, Man of God”, and is just over 30 minutes long. We’ve divided it into four sections so that we can review each part together over the next four weeks.
Thank you for sharing your ideas on simple ways to deepen meditation and to strengthen evenness of mind. We’re also very grateful to everyone who joined us for last week’s online workshop. It’s a great boost to our practice to strive together as a worldwide community as we put our meditation first, more of the time.
We are very interested to hear how your experiments went this past week. What did you try and did you learn something new? What impact did you notice on your meditation? Feel free to share any reflections as they always inspire us.
Please enjoy this six-minute video clip from the online workshop during which Easwaran shares stories and anecdotes about how the Lord is always closest to us in our time of need.
