Monday, October 26, 2009
October 2009 - DSN @ Indianapolis, IN
Coming back home after the DSN is a different feeling. For many of us, it was our first DSN experience! For others too, it was surely a completely new experience as such. Please share this space to express your comments / benefits / "Aha!" Moments etc for the course! And this can help a lot in making more people aware of the knowledge that Sri Sri has brought to this world and how easily its available and how life-changing it is. Just reply in the comments section.
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Aha!, So there was this funny thing that happened the last day of the course. Many of you saw that I went through some public criticism and even public complimenting.
ReplyDeleteWell by the last day I thought "Wow, have I improved?" I found myself in a conflict with my team again. I started to physically and mentally shut down. I litterally slowly edged as far away from my group as I possibly could during our breaktime. I found myslef sitting on the ground next to Patti on the couch.
I was a mess; I could barely concentrate. I kept on fiddling with this funny little backjack that was next to me moving it around and shuffling.
Then Patti reached out to me, she said "Oh just look at yourself!" and then handed me this funny little bouncy ball. I took it without hesitation and joyfully bounced it to the beautiful blond in the Indian dress and she happily bounced it on to another person. "Oh releif" I thought.
Then an even funnier thing happened. The bouncy ball landed a few feet in front of me on this yoga mat. "Wow, look at that!" I exclaimed immediately. The ball, I was certain of it, was spinning continuously, I was certain of it. "No, it can't be, but it is..." I thought to myself.
Someone picked it up and the ball was tossed again. Not much longer, the ball landed on the same yoga mat. "Look, It is doing it again!" I said. No one seemed to notice. How strange, a rubber ball cannot spin like that continuously on a yoga mat for so long.... hmmm, it must be some miricle I thought, and then our group met again.
Later I thought of this again. I myself had bought this very ball the first night of the course. I needed some toys to play with; flyering is more fun with toys. Oh yes, the ball, it was an illusion...
You seen the ball was filled with glitter floating in water. When I saw the ball spinning I was certain it was actually spinning however it was really just the glitter spinning inside the ball. How very much like my mind... how very much like my self.
So, it's just been a week after DSN 2009 and I already see the difference in myself from how I was before and how I am now. I'm more enthusiastic about many things and I'm so ready to bring AOL to others because by Guruji's grace, even those who have assumptions about AOL that keep them from taking the course, things have turned positive in their lives as well as mine! The joy is spreading whether they know it or not and it is just heart warming to see others get happy and excited about life; sometimes just makes me want to sit there and watch their faces and expressions transform!
ReplyDeleteMy energy is a bottomless pit and I know others feel the same... Already got started on projects and ready to keep going like the Energizer battery!!!
No amount of words will ever be able to express the gratitude I feel towards Guruji, Patti, Shalin, Zankar, Akshay, Sham, organizers, Indianapolis team, fellow participants....everything was stupendous and perfect! Like Guruji says something along the lines of: when your intention is perfect, what flows from your actions is perfection! Thank you!!
Jai Guru Dev!
I spent years acting as a rebel when ever I felt a pinch. I thought that there was such freedom in this action. Little did I know that I was constructing an elaborate defense system around my self imposed limitations.
ReplyDeleteWith DSN I learned that true freedom comes with pushing my boundaries and going beyond my self imposed limitations. Yes, it's doing something now. Wow! Now! There it is.
Thank you Indianapolis team, All of you DSNers, Patti and Guruji
Judy
Before the DSN course I kept having VERY strong feelings of NOT going. Not strong enough, not good enough, not ready, not the right timing, money tight, and whatever else you could put there. I'm so grateful to my teacher, Nitya, who gently "slapped" me and said "just go".
ReplyDeleteI learned of limitations i had put on myself that I hadn't even seen before the course. I did wonderful things, like danicng with "strangers" (many of them men!), and speaking in front of a crowd, that I wouldn't have though possible.
The biggest gift is that of knowing that we can accomplish ANYTHING, with the love and grace of Gurji and the strength of the AOL family!!!! We are truly one!! The way we came together on our plans and goals and desires to spread AOL and how the person with the needed talents was always near!
Jai Gurudev
Love, Valerie
I really enjoyed DSN course very much.It was lot of fun and changed my life completely.When I came to DSN, I bought with me lots of worries,tensions,lack of confidence,and lots of inferiority complex.In DSN, we learnt padmasadhana which helped me to stay focused and give 100% in any task.Lectures given by Patty helped me to think about my life from a very different perspective.Patty's statement of "Stop making a story" was a slap on my face.Meditation helped me to relax, accomplish feeling of no regrets about the past, no worries about the future,no expectations, no hate!My biggest boundry was to talk in front of a large group.Last Day due to group support and energy I receieved from DSN helped me to cross that boundry successfully.DSN course gave me lots of confidence,Positive energy which will help me to grow in my personal and professional life.
ReplyDeleteThanks to all volunteers who tried their best to make this course successful.Thanks to everyone who encouraged me to do this course.The most important thing I learnt from this course is "LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL".
Jai Gurudeva!
Love
Sheetal
This was a life changing experience for me. I really understood the meaning of living in the moment and giving my 100% for 15 mins in this course. These 15 min where one of the most memorable 15 mins. I was just there acting...acting and acting...it was an experience which cannot be put into words. Thanks to the FANTABULOUS Indy Team and All the wonder angels who contributed to the growth of each other.
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ReplyDeleteFor me it was also a life changing experience, I have gain so much in 4 days. I have so much pending projects in my life, that I was not sure how to start or even I had courage to start . I was always looking for a reason not to do it.. I think it was a boundary for me. The DSN put my Life in prospective. I know I can do it and I know I will finish it.. The number one boundary was for me to start something that I always wanted to do. Go back to school and get a degree.. which i have already register..
ReplyDeleteAlso one day you wake up and you realize, that your whole life, which was revolved around your kids. The Kids are on with their lives, and you feel lost.. That was me. didn't know what I was going to do next. I thought it was just impossible for me to go on without my kids..
After doing the DSN, It has made me realize Wow My Life has just began. It's My time to do whatever I want to do.. I Feel very strong, very positive.. I know I can do what I put my heart to. I had so many Aha moments.. Patty is a great Teacher.. loved being with her...
Dancing was my favorite part of the course.. LOL
This is probably a comment added very late.I am thankful for this experience and it is the people that were involved that made it SO special.Its amazing how people whom I thought I would never get along with just connected, I guess we are all on the same page...a thirst for the truth and enlightenment had brought us there.
ReplyDeleteThere is now a spring in my steps when I walk, a smile on my face(for no reason)and a happy song that plays in my head(atleast most of the time).
Thank you Indy team for making this happen,thanks Marcie for that beautiful satsang, and (last but not the least)thanks to Patty-who is both a tough taskmaster and the cutest angel:)
Jai Gurudev!:D
Ok so my thirst is just barely quenchable, I check back in here every few days to reconnect. Since we are home now I have a few stories to share from during and after the course.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all intentions: They work!
I had my first Public Satsang yesterday as was my intention I made on the spot during our group presentation....And the intention was fulfilled to its specific. I simply said "next weekend."
So I started working for a Satsang the first weekend after the course. I went to flyer with a friend of mine on a college campus to do a spur of the moment Satsang the first Friday after the course. We rescheduled the next Friday.
In the mean time I spoke with this art gallery store on Halloween that has been in my contacts for about a month now. I met them when they were having an Open Mic. night and band show. And they were all over having a Satsang event.
Due to college dynamics the college Satsang as I thought I "should" be organizing came up to an obstacle and was postponed even further. Nevertheless I still had this amazing store that was totally into doing a public outreach partnership.
And so the Satsang was a success and really was the "Next Weekend" after the course. Whereas if I had said this coming weekend, that would have been the first weekend after the course, specifics wise.
It has been a dream of mine to overcome my fear of public singing since my youth, for real, I could name countless trials that I had not surpassed before. And starting the Satsang yesterday I could feel the slight burn inside of the fear melting away.
So I closed my eyes and sang from inside. I even learned to sing and drum on the spot, quite successfully as my new store friends told me. I did not even know I could do this and had said at least twice to them before "I can not sing and drum at the same time."
Yesterday at the Satsang, I felt so free and open to the possibilities and accepting of my new tribe in this endeavor. Such a change from even at DSN; when I often would get to the event I would let my mind tear me down questioning "how things are supposed to be." Even after my three local Satsang groupie supporters had to leave my team early, I felt free enough to carry on the Satsang on my own with my new store staff friends. I even had a new friend, the girlfriend of the staff, join in a song with me, she was great!
It was not a big event however I am open to the possibilities of continuing reaching out and sharing my talents known and unknown like this in the future. Thank you DSN, intentions really do work, especially when they are specific, nature really does support us, especially the purity and truth that comes with Art of Living intentions. Be specific and keep the flame up my DSN!
Ok, second story: Flyering.
ReplyDeleteIt was the first night of DSN and what do we want to do, of course we want to flyer, talk to people, rock their world. So anyways, the three of us girls were fearless and undying of energy. We made a home base in a burrito restaurant amidst the Friday evening college hang outs. We had some fun all night long!
Then I went up and talked to someone. Are you into yoga?, I just asked. And then this amazing conversation started. I found out that this young man, Ruben, had just had some people try to pick a fight with him for “looking” at them; just right there in the restaurant. He was so happy that I came up and talked to him, he said, so. He said it made him feel human again, and asked to give me a hug. So I gave him a hug.
I found out how he actually has totally been into yoga and had become scared at the idea of other people “being a mirror of you.” I shared with him how I had a similar experience working in a grocery store; it scared me when I wondered about the reality of the people all coming though my lines and talking things, random and beautiful and insensitive and still so sensitive.
He shared with me his passion about his work, marketing security systems in people’s homes in Indianapolis, (if you ever need one go to his company for sure- Defender Direct). So most of all I made a friend, this is amazing; who knows if I will ever run into them again.
Mostly from this I learned, the power of words being able to create peace in someone and feel human again. It’s like everything is nothing at all in the long run yet somehow it makes a difference.
Guys, actually I have been holding out on you all, as if I could share too much.
ReplyDeleteSo I was going through this part of the course where we all went out together as a group. It could have been so fun for me, I saw other people having fun, however I keep thinking “this is not how it should be..” I realized in the car ride back I needed some help with a barrier in my life that I had just realized. “I think I need help with my barrier,” I said out loud, “I think my barrier is feeling ok no matter what happens.”
NOBODY in the car heard me or responded, in fact I was certain the angel sitting next to me was making it a point to let me know she was ignoring me, what a funny game I thought, so I let it drop. Then I took it to Patty in the class and wham, wow, she really told it to me.
I really let it go then, however when my team got together in a group that evening I found that the angel sitting next to me in the car, my lovely team mate had some really good advice to give me. And it was so helpful, a secret about how to take the breath with more reverence and respect!
And what was even funnier the other members of my team were enthralled about the secret advice she was giving me and I was just going with the flow. It was so funny, the other ladies kept of saying to the group, “Be quiet, we want to hear too, and speak louder, this sounds really interesting.” It was amazing to see how naturally their interest was sparked with such sincerity and with complete ease in our conversation; we were having a real conversation with real advice and it was making people interested in what we were doing.
I learned that my team can do a really go job without me taking control and has so much skills and knowledge to share already. My team leader for the first time really lead a group discussion so wonderfully and I was able to just go with the flow and it was exactly as productive as it needed to be at that time.
The second part of the story, the next day I was doing my yoga really diligently, and “I was doing a good job,” someone told me. The sting of doing good, in contrast to last night, was just as shocking. I told myself, “What? Am I doubting the positive now? So what if I am doing a good job, Who is doing a good job anyways, If I am doing good it is just because the situation lent myself to do good and I was in the right space to take up on it.” In other words, it was just as disturbing as finding out that I was a control freak the night before.
So I did this practice that I do sometimes and learned from a part two course which has pretty much no talking on it. Instead of letting it bug me, I wrote it on a slip of paper, put it in a basket, and let it go. The next thing that happened Patty came back for the next session and she was all praises and complimenting me. How amazing that just after I let go of “How good I was doing,” that the “being good,” just started coming back to me so intensely.
To make a long story short; the best experience I learned from in the course was when I stood in front of the trash can taking peoples trash to throw it away, as if that would speed it up. Wow, I now see people are much better at throwing their own garabage away, and it is quicker and more efficient.
Thank you Patti, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make 'em drink. I am truely the horse, I have it all now to just drink.
Asha, thank you for your post, you give me courage! I realize from dsn that when I am late there is some doubt in my mind. That when I am not aiming for the highest stars then I do not give my 100 percent. When I think I can do something already, I am not fully aware. There is a long story with this... you can ask me later.
ReplyDeleteI am not registered myself yet Asha, however you are giving me courage to take those steps even now.
So it is over a month now and I have a few new stories ted to tell.
ReplyDelete1) Yes mind
There was this beautiful and shy girl in my tribe. She may not even know. When we went flyering I asked her to come with me to talk to this car and she said 'no' out of shyness. When I suddenly reached my hands open to take hers and pull her out and up a few seats, I asked her to sit up in the front by Patti with me, she said 'no' too.
However by the last day of the course something amazing changed, it was so subtle I didn't even realize how significant it was until much later, although it gave me such a thrill when it happened. In passing I asked her to help read a poem to Patti (this other group had been planning it to say thanks to her), and she said "yes!"
I didn't know how she was going fulfill her ‘yes’to read with them, I wasn't even organizing the poem. Furthermore there was not an opportunity for me to tell the team she would read with them. I stood back behind the team while they were reading the poem the whole time wondering how she was going to step up and read. She had said one of her obstacles was getting up and standing in front of the group, raising the hand to answer the question.
Nevertheless, she did not read the poem, I don't even think now that she needed to read it, her answer, her willingness, the 'yes' that came from her mouth and her heart was everything that was needed. It was so complete in that moment, I think the whole course was just for her to say this one beautiful yes!
2) Dsn is not Do something now, it is Be free now! Doing something is all in the being, like the freedom of being happy just right now in the present makes all the difference, freedom from the doubt and the cravings and desires, complete contentment! Freedom to see with awareness the happenings around you and keep moving through them without being caught up in your ideas about them. DSN+ Be Happy Now= Freedom from within!
I'm reading the comments from our DSN and remembering everyone of you with so much love. In Dubai now and with Guruji's blessings we're going to have a DSN in Dubai and another in Abu Dahbi over the next few weeks. Sharing your blog and inspiring stories with all here. Its so interesting to see this part of the world...and know that no matter where we go - we carry one another in our hearts...always. Jai Guru Dev/Patti
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