Volume II- Issue II             Tuesday, November 2, 2011;  2:29pm
This theme has been coming up for me a lot lately. There is so much going on in my daily life that is is so easy to be driven, seemingly to madness by the endless stuff and things to do all around me. The children, the house, work, laundry, phone calls, emails....and the list goes on. i have an immensely full, rich and abundant life. I am truly blessed! I am taking on online course right now, called "THE WAY OF THE CROW" with my meditation teacher Harshada Wagner (www.livingmeditation.org), and he has been asking us to contemplate the question "What is standing in the way of my happiness right now?" It has been a really rich experience to reflect on these 11 words. Whenever I am feeling off, uncomfortable, irritable, annoyed, stressed, or exhausted, I have made it a spiritual practice to pause and ask myself this question.  "What is standing in the way of my happiness right now?" The answer was quite unexpected and very powerful.

The nectar has been in the "pause". The suffering that I experience is when I fail to pause, to stop and check in with myself. It comes when I am constantly on the go and totally unconscious. I am just a moving machine doing stuff! In this space of pause before the answers arose, i remembered the sweetness of bringing myself mindfully into the present moment and even taking the time to ask my own self to speak to me. I ask my body and spirit to endure and put up with so much every day, but how ofter do I stop to give myself or ask myself what I need in any moment  I can press the pause button whenever I chose, and bring my energy back within. When I asked myself this question, my awareness dropped into my heart effortlessly. I somehow knew that the keys to unlocking my happiness resided in my heart. This simplicity of stopping for a moment to breathe, connect, and pause has completely altered my state. When I am having a manic moment, where the stresses are mounting, I pause....and, the beauty is, no one has to know what I am doing from the outside. i can indulge in this practice in the supermarket, while making dinner, feeding my son, or writing this reflection on my computer. I have been doing sadhana for almost 20 years and this practice is changing my outlook. I have read and studdied so much from many amazing teachers. I am definitely guilty of collecting spiritual teachings, upon spiritual teachings which i have filed away somewhere away in this brain of mine. And yet, this question, I am certain will stand out and stay with me for years to come.

What keeps me for being truly happy right now......is always FORGETTING God. (Whatever name that God is called)

What keeps me from experiencing joy is forgetting to connect, failing to take the time to remember what is real in this life. What keeps me from my own joy is forgetting about my soul as I move about my day. What keeps me from my joy is forgetting about the divine order of this universe, and placing my belief in the day-to-day nonsense. It is so damn distracting, and has a way of feeling so insanely important. The beauty has come with the shift. Sadhana is truly about practice. There is a reason why they are called spiritual practices. With practice, the shift becomes easier. I have come to appreciate this practice of stopping and connecting, and remembering God, and it has been so much easier to remember the divine in the middle of the muck, mess, and stress. The divine is always there. What creates all of my suffering is forgetting!

Because I am a thick headed human creature who is distracted easily (lol) I have set an alarm on my phone to go off one time an hour- my phone rings to OM every hour on the hour and a pleasant message to myself comes up on the screen that says——-

"Mayuri——Remember God!"
Love.
your Self.

Respecting Wildlife- http://www.dailyom.com/articles/2011/31238.html
Open and Listening

When in nature we often forget we are moving into another realm, one that asks us to drop our baggage and surrender.

For better or worse, much of the world we experience is dominated and controlled by human beings. We spend our days in houses, cars, and buildings, and inside these structures, we are in control. We assert our wills and manipulate our environment. Within the context of the human world, this is natural. However, we often carry this attitude with us into the world of nature. We forget as we enter the forest, or sit on the edge of a pond, that we are moving into another realm, one that asks us to drop our baggage and surrender to a different sense of order and meaning.

When we move from our everyday world into the world of nature, we may not even notice at first. We might continue talking loudly into our cell phone or to a friend that is with us. We might walk quickly as if we are on a busy city street, our eyes downcast, our thoughts hectic and hurried. In the best case, if we are sensitive to our environment, we will soon notice that it has changed. We may hear ducks calling, or wind moving through the leaves on a tree. If we notice the shift, we will naturally shift as well. If we don't, we may get all the way through a beautiful park without having lowered our voices. Next time you find yourself in the presence of wildlife—even if it's just a duck pond in the midst of urban hustle—try to move into a receptive state of openness and listening, no matter how much or how little time you have. Allow yourself to be captivated and calmed by the energy of the wildlife that covers this earth. Teaching our children to be respectful of nature and to stop and observe is a gift they can always cherish

We preserve pockets of nature in our urban centers and large expanses of nature in our national parks because of the magic we feel in its presence. It reminds us of our smallness and calls us back to a deeper, quieter part of ourselves. When we honor nature by being respectful in its presence, we honor the mystery and wild beauty of our origin.