news from Amritanand in Amritapuri

[Guest guest]

Today is Friday. Amma has been back since Tuesday.

Every day she's been holding a meditation around noon

in the temple, followed by a question and answer

period. It has been so peaceful and intimate - mostly

westerners. The first day of public darshan for the

Indians starts tomorrow. Today's session was about

"What is meditation?" Swami Amritswarupanandaji

translated. After many devotees gave a response to

Amma's question, kind of her final answer was:

Meditation is not a doing, it is a happening. It is a

deep emotional response to any situation you happen to

be in at any point in time. Cooking can be a

meditation, doing your work at your job can be a

meditation. In other words, whatever you do, if

you're doing it fully involved and aware, then it's

meditation. Otherwise, as is usually the case, we are

only halfway aware and meditation is not present.

 

Swamiji told several stories, as directed by Amma.

One was about when he was leading a meditation after

bhajans at Santa Fe during one US tour. It was a VERY

serious meditation, he said. He began leading it in

his deepest bass voice, saying "Now take a deep breath

and recite the sacred syllable 'OM'. Right after the

first of 3 OM's, a small child repeated "OM" and then

there was laughter from the audience.

 

At this point, Swamiji was feeling annoyed with the

child and later said to Amma, "These children really

are getting out of control!" Amma replied that "No,

she enjoyed the OM and the laughter of the child

because it was very innocent - it was ENHANCING not

detracting from the meditation. He was making the

meditation too serious.

 

Another point that came up was that Amma says that one

has to be extremely careful engaging in pranayama.

One should only do it when they have a fully qualified

teacher. She said there are many people who are

saying they are qualified but really are not. They

lead people in a form of what they say is pranayama

but really it is uncontrolled rapid breathing that

makes one feel lightheaded but is not pranayama

according to the scriptures. This form of teaching

can be very dangerous to devotees.

 

Tomorrow they are having Kali Puja to

assist the surviving victims of the very serious

earthquate in Gujurat. They are also asking

Westerners to contribute to a fund and the AIMS

Hospital sent medical expertise and supplies to

Gujurat immediately after the quake.