Anyone see my Mala beads?

I am actually skipping my lunch hour to catch you all up.  Its ok though…it was soup.

Tuesday night (7:30-9:00) was one of the most interesting, profound and emotional night for all of us.  We were instructed to come to the main chapel hall as close to 7:25 as possible w/nothing but ourselves. The instructions were to eat on the earlier side of the dinner hour & dress for motion but do not bring any books, mats, blocks etc….  The doors would open at exactly 7:28 and no earlier. We were asked to file in silently and select a space.    We were kind of freaking a bit!!!  What was up with this?

As we nervously waited outside the big, wooden chapel doors, I couldn’t help but think that the last time I stood outside a chapel door…I was about to walk down the aisle to get married….AHHHHHH. Where did that memory come from? I thought that was long gone.  Although, they say that frightening experiences have a strong tendency to bring up unconscious memories when you are exposed to a trigger. They were right.  Just the sight of those doors connected me to a moment in time that my conscious mind had long forgotten. How does the unconscious choose which moments will be recorded and filed for future flash backs? Are they all recorded? Even this very moment (you reading the blog) could be resurrected by your brain ten years from now, with a simple trigger.  Profound eh? These are the topics were are delving into here at YTT …. (its not all just leg shaking, you know).

Anyway, those doors opened up to a beautiful wide open room .It was the antithesis of what I remembered from my wedding day.  It was quiet & peaceful. No pews, no recognizable faces, no groom.  The room was dimly lit by the spectacular glow of the many candles that were scattered around the room.  Meditation pillows were arranged in a big circle (there are 64 of us and 9 teachers). And an array of different sized candles lit & aesthetically placed in the very center of our circle.  We walked in quietly and selected where we wanted to sit.  Once we all settled down into sukhasana (similar to the Lotus pose), Devarshi (one of the teachers) told the story of Ancient monk traditions.

To make a very long story short……. Ancient yogis (in India) generally practiced in silence & seclusion. They would find an empty cave on the hillsides and enter into these caves to pray & draw themselves closer to samadhi (bliss). These yogis used mala beads to assist them in prayer.  These mala beads are very similar to rosary beads but made of rosewood. There are 108 beads (and one extra….? I don’t ask). The intention is to hold each bead, one at a time, and chant a mantra, once for each bead.  Using voice (chants) raises up ones natural vibrations by combining the vibration of sound-waves. As if this wasn’t enough to digest, our mantra for the night (the one we will chant 108 times) was…” Om Namo Bagavate Vasudevaya”.  Yup! One hundred and eight times.  Loud and with rhythm, nonetheless. As a gift, each of us (yoginis) received a set of Mala beads.

The chant was in all honesty …very beautiful. The power of voice vibrations definitely changed the energy and increased the feeling of aliveness.  I have to admit the first 28 rounds of “Om Namo Bagavate Vasudevaya” sounded more like like a wild jungle but eventually we all got it down pat (or pretended to be singing).

The next piece of the night was incredible but I have to get to class so I’ll have to save that for the next blog.  More about that later…..

Tuesday continued…

…I’m going to try hard to catch you up as there is not much down time here & I don’t want to fall behind on my posts.

In a nutshell. After the shower scene, we head off to start the day in Yogi-land.  Its basically the same schedule everyday.  It goes like this:
6:30-8:00 AM       Yoga (Sadhana)
8:00-8:50               Breakfast
9:00-12:00             Classroom
12-12:50                   Lunch
1:00-4:00 PM        Classroom
4:15- 6:00                Yoga
6-7:15                        Dinner
7:15-9:00                  Classroom

So you can see that there isn’t much wiggle room to write so please bear with me.  I should also say that I miss you all and I’m really enjoying your comments! You keep me laughing too!

Tuesdays breakfast was pretty good. Stoned cut oatmeal, Miso soup (yes! for breakfast. I don’t ask!), Gluten free french toast w/fresh blueberries & real maple syrup.  It was all really good. Still can’t figure out the breakfast soup concept. Kinda wondering if it might have been left overs from the night before…. Hmmm

After the wonderful soup breakfast, I wandered off to class. The topic of our 9:00 class was “Tool Bags”.  I did a quick double check on my location wondering if I had wandered  off into a construction site.  However, it appeared as though I was in the right place,that is unless all of the construction workers had left their flip-flops outside of the hard hat area.  So I contributed my flip-flops to the pile and walked in to get my tool bag.  Turns out that the “tool bag” is a compilation of techniques, strategies and yogic secrets that are passed down behind closed doors for all of those who donate their shoes at the door. All kidding aside, they were some pretty cool techniques.

Back to the dining room for a hearty lunch of Egg Drop soup (more soup) and Moo Shu Gai Tofu along side something that I thought was a wrap.  I put my Moo Shu Gai Tofu in the wrap but as I rolled it up….it cracked into a million pieces. I took a quick glance around but no one else seemed to have this “wrap thing”. So I gathered what I could up with my fork and shoveled it into my mouth.  After chewing what felt more like shattered glass, I began wondering if I was supposed to eat this at all (could it have been a buffet decoration?) Early on we were warned not to waste precious food, but this was an emergency.  With guilt, I piled it up and tucked the rest under a broccoli florette. I hoped no one would notice the remains as I handed my plate over to the kitchen.  Im sure I’ll do some karmic penance for that one.

Afternoon class and 4:00 yoga went off without a glitch. And we all headed to dinner.  Now, brace yourselves!  I ate the MOST DELICIOUS squash lasagna (mixed with veggie lasagna) that I have ever eaten in my life.  So tasty, flavorful & satisfying. Talk about grateful & gratitude & bliss…… after my soup & shattered glass roll up, I was thankful, thankful, thankful. Hmm, wonder if this is how they get you to show appreciate that which sustains your life  aka…food.  Ok! Needless to say, I’m on board with that one now.

Tue 2/23/10

Hi everyone,

Thanks to Tori, I now know how to use this the right way.  I’ve been making comments instead of posts. So, now (if I do this right), you should be able to read my latest blog easier.  “thanks Tor!”

Tuesday: 2/23/10

Gorgeous Morning!  Woke up to realize it was snowing. Not just snowing but that beautiful kind of snow that grabs onto the branches and twinkles as the sun breaks through. It’s so pretty to look out at the gazebo with the mountains as a backdrop & birch trees scattered between me & the distant view.  It really is very magical here in the Berkshires.  Rumor has it that it will be snowing for the next few days. I think the last prediction I heard was 16-18 inches.  What makes this even more magical is that “I don’t have to get up at 3:30 AM to shovel myself out for 4:30 Am”.  Now that’s magical!!!

I did get up early this morning to beat the rush of 20 stampeding “buffalettes” into the 8  shower stalls.  The whole “get up & go” routine is a riot to watch.  Alarms begin to go off (20 of them! As if we don’t all have to get up at the same time)…. Individually, we stir around gently, wondering if we should get up immediately or stagger. When I say “stagger”, I’m talking seconds. There’s not much wiggle room for the snooze button. Then, one by one, we all search aimlessly around our 6X8 mattress. Quietly & slowly we find what we need and with the art of keen deception, we head towards the showers, pretending that we are not in a rush. Rushing? A bit competitive? No, we are yogis! We aren’t competitive in any way. So the fact that we are all picking up speed as we start to walk down the hall towards the shower stalls is a pure illusion. If we ever wanted to give up our yoga career and enter into the professional sport of  “Speed Walking” , we are all trained.  Then another strange phenomenon occurs as the winning speed walkers get to their shower curtains. Eeeeverything slows down again.  One by one we clean up and head off to class.

More on that later…….

Off to Kripalu!

Hi everyone, I’m almost on my way… just wanted to set up and test this BLOG! I’m hoping that we can all keep in touch as the adventure unfolds. Stay tuned!