Waves of Bliss !!! (Aanandha Alai)

Dear Gowri
I have been hearing this new term at Ishaworld since last month (precisely from the date of Maha shivarathri) which is a sort of rigorous campaign for Isha's 7 days Yoga Program - which is a new format that they started using since last may....I have done this course and its quite powerful with Sadhguru's powerful presence felt through out the class as they play thru' LCD monitor the CD which contains the recorded speech and guidance of Sadhguru on the meditation process...In fact the initiation into this new process (it is not a meditation technically and should be called as a Kriya....Kriya is essentially defined as some thing that we do using our energy and not with our body, mind or emotions.....which normally lead to Karma..or bondage) is kept on a sunday...resembling the old format in which Sadhguru completes the teachings that is being imparted by him during the past four days....The process is deceptively simple but too powerful....!! The total process takes 21 minutes and it does not require special posture like Vajraasana...
Now, coming to this "aanandha alai", instead of conducting this class sporadically, Isha has announced that during May- June they are going to launch series of this 1 week program in a very big wave....just to give instance, though we have just 15 - 20 centres at chennai having the regular classes 3 - 4 times in each of them during a year, it is expected to have around sixty to eighty classes in chennai alone during this short period....to put the program and also the institution firmly in the spiritual map of the country....(not just at chennai but where ever they have network, they intend to attack at top gear....if I can use the word)....
Still I am not sure with the exact details, but it appears during June, there is going to be a Mahasathsangh...for all the participants who have taken part in this series of classes which will definitely contain Sadhguru's always famous ques and ans session....perhaps could be live telecast in some TVs and definitely will be available in Web too....!! The 2 minute clipping of this advertisement was repeatedly played at Raj TV on Mahashivarathri (march) where I joined the Isha crew who were doing the Tamil Translation for Aastha TV's relay....where commentry was made from coimbatore in Hindi....
I was quite amused at the neatly made powerful 2 minutes ad for this....and of course it was mentioned in the series of article written at Ananda vikatan too....a month back....AND now, I heard it is going to get started......in another couple of days...
I met a volunteer of Mambalam at Railway station during last week and since I have been avoiding going to volunteering these days (my earlier posting on this subject pasted below this one), he - without embarassing me much - handed over few pamplets on the class that is supposed to start in "AA" series on 30th Apr.
I got the Ananda vikatan of current week which contained a free cd which played for close to 40 minutes which is supposed to further trigger the curiousity for TamilNadu people about Sadhguru and this new "AA"...Of course, He has been writing articles in this tamil magazine for little over 2 years now and quite a familiar face in the hoardings and sign boards outside the flats....but still, this CD gives him a much better introduction....
I could not see it yesterday as Madhoo wanted to watch a Kamal film and today morning, the first thing that I did after getting up was to play the CD....Amazingly made .... intro music with hundreds of clippings that introduce isha very nicely followed by sadhguru's mini lecture and answering questions raised by 3 /4 people (most of them known to me...all familiar faces of volunteers)....No doubts on the reach of the CD and the impact it can make on some one who sees it for the first time...The CD abruptly ends with a card showing phone numbers to be contacted to take part in "aanandha alai".....!! (I actually gifted the CD that I got yesterday when I bought Vikatan who has long time back got the details on Isha to put his wife in this class....& I got a new book for me to have my own copy of CD)
Now....This long posting is not to share the delight of seeing the CD..and that illuminated face of my Guru....I was happy that inspite of not being a volunteer my reverence towards him has not come down even by milli grams....and I got into my usual molten state with tears in my eyes when he walks, speaks, laughs and looks intensely in various clippings...(again....I need to repeat, the CD is nicely made)....BUT........
just to record my anguish that this was not the Isha that I knew....10 years back, when I started off with the basic class, Sadhguru used to proudly say that this organisation is "deliberately kept as a loose organisation as he may dissolve it any time he wants to...." and he identified himself as "hard core spiritualist"....& when one of the person attending the intro class told that he got a very important meeting on sunday and cannot make himself present for the whole of sunday....Sadhguru folded his hands and told him "your time has not come....let us meet in the next batch of class".....
Some time later (I mean during 1999) when Dhyana Linga was constructed, he became bit easier with the society and I was in the historic meeting during 2003 when he announced that he is going to live long in this world for the sake of the loving hearts around him.....
Then came Green Hands post 2005 which needs lacs of volunteers and Isha started expanding in exponential rate....The bliss of this project and the popularity and mileage it gave to Isha was well deserved as it was basically a social project done for the people at large more than BY isha.....!!
I have read some criticism about Sadhguru and Isha by some one quite popular in his field that "few" spiritual organisations are just marketing their chief and nothing more....which made me thinking for a while, though I was a hard core volunteer at that point of time (will a hard core volunteer allow such thoughts within himself ??? thats a million dollar question...perhaps I was only a pseudo volunteer..I dont mind these labels anyway)
Even now, I am following up for a corporate program at my own office and the way I get follow up calls remind me of the aggressive marketing that the band of volunteers keep doing which is very different situation from a decade back....!! They do every thing that marketing guys do ...but are able to meditate and do pranayam...and rever Sadhguru and remain dumbfound in his presence...This is a typical isha volunteer who involves himself in various worldly activities....There are few other volunteers too..who go deeper and deeper into yoga with no urge to speak...BUT majority of them tend towards the former segment....as it suits them and their present lives.....I can appreciate even that too (I clearly remember a particular gentleman about whom I have great admiration as a volunteer who was using filthy language as the expected sponsorship did not materialise......inspite of my energy levels during Greeh Hands days, I have never got into so much of frustrations....It is utterly impossible for me to use foul language and getting frustrated when We call ourselves involved in some thing called YOGA...perhaps, I am terribly mistaken in my attitude....!!)
Now, the bottom line of this musings is that beneath the wonderful breathtaking shots of the CD that I saw today, I could smell the stench of marketing constantly...It was too much visible and audible for a volunteer like me who has stayed closely with this organisation for more than a decade....and still not willing to help admiring at lot of positives about this place.....
I particularly noted Sadhguru's answer to a particular question on the quality of Isha program...that each teacher is trained for TWO / THREE years before he becomes a Teacher....I have heard the same person telling proudly on Jan 19th 2003 at a Maha Sathsangh organised at Chennai Marina Beach (Seerani Arangam) that the teachers are undergoing FOUR TO FIVE years of training......!! Of course the present class and the syllabus does not need 4 years of training......BUT the question is not about the quality of training and Sadhguru....
The whole point is "why this mad rush" in the name of spreading something that is called YOGA.... which is all about preparedness of the receiving mind more than the maturity of imparting person ??
The people around him (most of them) are only ordinary & simple people (though Sadhguru recently announced that by the time he leaves, there will be 1 lac realised people at Isha.....) and the way things can get misinterpreted and distorted with not so sharp people around him......I wonder if I am going to be a odd man out from this circuit.....I may stand in a corner glaring Sadhguru as he delivers his message in a Maha sathsangh with the same intensity that I have today...BUT may never be able to be a part of so called "family" full of laughter and jokes....which in my feeling, dilutes the flame inside....at least inside myself....!! people who can continue to balance between their intensity AND socialising may go deeper and deeper - I am sorry - wider and wider in "volunteering"...and become a tiny molecule in the wave of Bliss....!!
It will be very nice if I dont regret in my life time for what I have penned out in this posting.....At this moment, what is being written is directly from my heart without any alteration...lets see....
Time is a great teacher...
krishnaarpanam...as always...
suchoo
Nov 27, 2007

Volunteering
HiBasically sort of lazy guy and having an added advantage of not knowing too many aspects of practical life, it was quite a huge thing for me to be a volunteer at Isha for a brief period....It all started in 2004 when I joined Ford...I started attending all the 13 days class at Mambalam (which happens once in 4 months)...I have attended practically all classes until this March....around 10 classes excluding one session that happened during my sweden stay......The indulgence in Green Hands was a huge part of experience and for close to 4 months I enjoyed every moment of our Awareness Camp in various schools and it was wonderful to see that such a social project was not very different from the class volunteering......I still remember lot of tender moments and my own frequency levels while I was in action.In one particular school - the principal Lady (Gurunanak Hr Secondary school, velachery) observed me waiting to meet her outside her room...after she walked to her room supervising few people she sent for me and I went inside....I told in 3 minutes about our project and wanted to have some time to talk in their assembly...she was watching me quite intently and I could see that she had a very calm and powerful eyes...perhaps she is into some transcendal meditation....after I finished off my crisp introduction, she bluntly told me before any thing else that I carry very positive vibration around me...I literally blushed in front not because I felt underserved for this comment because I COULD FEEL IT MYSELF !!....she was very co-operative for the project too)During those 13 days, I reach a different frequency and there were many days I cannot sleep more than 2 or 3 hours considering that I had to leave very early for the morning class and sleep would not come before 12 AM midnight as I will be fully charged....Office just passes off effortlessly on those days and I think that whole eternity gets adjusted itself to ensure that I dont take a break in between those 13 days...in Particular, on the Games day and on initiation, I used to be in full flow without any other thoughts on any other aspects of life.....!!I still remember the March 2007 class which was the last 13 day program - on the initiation day I was crying my heart out...(perhaps I knew that it was my last class !!) It was the last class at chennai in the old format and the new format was without Shoonya meditation....which was like a rude shock for me... Later when I did the class in May, I did enjoy the sunday which was very different experience BUT still it did not have a seperate initation hall arrangement....and some how I never felt like going to the two subsequent classes at Mambalam until now....I just absconded from the class....I dont want to reason out my sudden change....neither I want to justify my absence these days.....The phone call kept coming for the august class and during october, there was just a courtesy call which was not followed up....there are enough people to take care of the class !!I some how feel that I have seen the depth of the volunteering within myself and I am bit scared that I could become full of action and bit dry and mechanical if I go on and on in this....Further, it is quite costly in terms of time and allocation of substantial time....I know there are lot of people who go deeper and deeper and their whole personality change over a period of time with volunteering but I am quite contented with getting into a molten stage as an outcome of my volunteering....and would prefer to retain my "expression".....It will be ofcourse quite nice to regulate it but definitely I dont want to throw it away completely....Who knows, I may reach a stage when I get fed up with my volatile moods and decide to throw away my "expressions" ...then perhaps I have no shame in going back to Isha as a volunteer....Till the time I get ripened to this state, the "moments of bliss" and "transcendance" will keep me enough fit ..... I am sure.....suchoo
Posted by Suchoo at 10:36 PM