YES!+ rocks!

Right to Emergency Care

Next 200 meters...

If you have to travel from Ashram to home in the night, all you can see of the road is next 200 meters, in your headlight of the car or two wheeler...

As they say in the movie the Secret, journey in life is similar, you have the goal, and the entire way to the destination may not be clear, but what you see is what you need to do next... and just like that is sufficient to drive a thousand miles in the dark night, so is it sufficient to live happily the entire life, and achieve the desired goals!

Logan is here!

Sabari's most awaited LOGAN is here!! 

We had some fantastic drives to Ashram and round the city in this pleasure to drive in car...! yuhu!

Chandan and Eyes!

The Chandan and Tilak was looking really good that day, so thought of staring in the camera! :)
Do you were Chandan/Tilak/Bindi/Kumkum !??

Do you know why in our culture it has been a tradition to put it on...!!!???!!!
Many think its not stylish, but I tell you it really adds a glory to your face! I like to see decorative bindis on many girls... And without Chandan and Tilak a guy's face looks rather blank!

Scientifically, application of these things is supposed to simulate certain glands that rule entire body...

Experiencially, I have always had an ease of decision making, an ease in concentration and focus whenever I put the tilak... In fact I feel something is missing, when I don't!

Second thing I wish to bring out is, look in the eyes of the people! They reveal everything you would ever want to know!
I do this exercise for few years now... Since I was in IIT for my Masters... I walk in the crowd and look in their eyes... and each person tells me a story! What's happening inside. Is that person happy or worried... Is thinking, planning, regretting, or enjoying. I walk like a King surveying his country... It showed me lot of reality in lives of people, without talking to them!

Durva

The favourite offering to Ganesha is Durva, a special type of fresh grass. What is so special about it! There is a secret...! The freshness of this type of grass has a very soothing effect on your mind. If you are getting sleep disturbance or lots of fearful dreams, just keep few bits of this grass near your pillow before you go to sleep... you will have a sound sleep!

Well, its time to bid farewell to dear Ganeshji... See here a fantastic interpretation by Bawa on why we put back the idols in the rivers or a sea...! In Marathi we have a saying "Pudhalya Varshi Lavakar ya!", meaning please come early next year, we will be eagerly waiting for you...!

Having bid farewell to Lord Ganesha, time is coming close to welcome the Godesses Lakshmi, Durga, Saraswati... in Navaratri!

Happy Onam to all!

Onam celebrates the homecoming of the legendary King Mahabali. Celebrated with great joy in Kerala and other parts of South India, this is a festival filled with elaborate feasts, folk songs, elegant dances, energetic games, elephants, boats and flowers! www.onamfestival.org is an excellent website for the information on this festival.

The Legend goes that the King Mahabali ruled wisely and judiciously, and all the people in his kingdom were happy and prosperous. The King's popularity continued to go endlessly and it also gave him lot power and a big ego. The Gods requested the Lord Vishnu to control the King's power. The Lord Vishnu took form of a Brahmin boy and appeared in front of the King. He asked the King of a donation, and the generous King said ask whatever you want, I will give it. The Boy asked for the land that can be covered in his three Footsteps. The King agreed. The boy suddenly started becoming huge in size and covered the whole sky with one foot, the whole earth with another, and asked the King where he should keep the third footstep. The King recognized that the boy was the Divine himself, and said that please keep your third foot on my head. Lord Vishnu did so, and pushed the King to the nether world. The Lord was compassionate to the King and offered him a boon for all his good qualities. The King with all his love for his people, asked the boon to visit them once a year. The day of the Onam is the homecoming of the beloved King for the people to their homes. They rejoice and celebrate his return in this festival.

Our mythology is so nice. The King symbolizes the Ego, which when grown too much, can cause harm to oneself and others. The Lord Vishnu is the maintainer of the Universe, or the Energy within us that maintains a balance for existence and proper living. The Brahmin boy symbolises the knowledge of life. The knowledge of life shows us that life alone encompasses all realms, and then the Ego humbly bows down. Uncovered by the Ego, we would love to go and meet people, which is what the homecoming of the King symbolises! And devoid of Ego, the celebration is spontaneous!

Also, if we look at the timings of the Festivals in India, we will notice that the work and celebration is put together by wise men in this country. This is the harvesting time, and for a country with huge farmland and large population of farmers, this is a time of great hardwork. The wise sages have given the celebration to go hand in hand by choosing this time for Onam!
Don't forget to check out www.onamfestival.org for the amazing details, fun games and things related to Onam!

Work in Celebration! Celebrate your work!

Bihar Flood Relief work

Art of Living Foundation is doing excellent service in Bihar Flood Relief work. Check out the details in this webpage.

Bangalore - A place to experience the Theory of relativity ??

Yesterday I was driving back to home from office in my good old pulsar.It's been 4 years since I bought this.Since then it's been serving me very loyally even when a car has come to take it's place.A very good companion I can say..I love driving long distances without a break @ high speeed..The thrill on the mind,the chill on the face,the vroom on the ears, the zig zag road infront of the eyes are worth a million and gives me the kick to do it again and again.My office is little far from my home.It's just 20 kilometers.Yes it is.The time to drive up this would vary daily based on many factors.It varies from 35 mins to 1 hour.Infact it would be appropriate to say the distance is 1 hour drive and thats what most people here in Bangalore would do.Self pity is not a good idea.But being a Bangalorean, after driving in Bangalore one cannot but pity on oneself.The 10 mins walk will take 30 mins if you set out on your car or bike.Nightmares and emotional peaks are guaranteed if you are in Bangalore.Theory of relativity can be experienced daily.Hope this will change once metro and overpasses have come into existence.Will see how soon it happens.

Ganesha @ my home

Contentment is the mother of creativity. And one who even briefly thinks of the Divine gets contented. No wonder then that the artists never tire out of enthusiasm in making different forms of Lord Ganesha. To my happiness, a number of these creations, have been gifted to me by my friends!

Gifted by Ekta. And of course, since I am such a good photographer, there is some nice light effect as you can see!! :)

Gifted by Sarita. The idol reminds me of our long lasting friendship.

I think I got this one as a gift in YES!+. :)

I just loved this one in Divine Shop at Ashram, so didn't stop to bring home. I feel a lot of life in this one.

My friend Bhawana has put up an article on the meaning of the Idol of Ganesha. You can see it here.

And Bawa the great is writing an amazing series of articles on Ganeshji. Here is introduction, article one, article two!

A Hindu talking about Ganesha won't be surprising, a Parsi talking about Parsi religion is not surprising either, but a Parsi writing on the Secret of Lord Ganesha is simply amazing. This is true secularism, respecting all and following one. A true mark of an Art of Living Teacher, embracing all religions.

Who can tell me the meaning of this?

இந்த தமிழ் எழுத்துக்கள் என்ன?
சபரிராம்

Will it be yummy forever??

Just came back from lunch..yes I had it late.I was very busy with the work in the morning.If you see the meaning for work in my dictionary you will get a different meaning altogether.My co is very flexible and let me do things I want even though if it is during work hours.A typical day in any techie's life would consist of these things - Mails,Browsing,Reading,orkutting,blogging,music,eating,occasional parties,chatting, and hardly any work done in these timings and if he/she is an AOL techie then calling seva will take precedence over other tasks now and then.Generally lunch in offices are like girl friends.Initially they would be very tasty and healthy and you would be wealthy.As the time moves on the taste would change and that taste would be perfectly alright and good according to the caterers.Today I missed my lunch and had a mango drink with Noodles to charge myself.Even in the shop where they serve the noodles and pastries, you can't find eggless pastries which I desperately look for at times.

When I asked about this, the owner promptly responded that I was only and first person who asked for eggless pastry and also added if he had purchased and kept the eggless pastries it would become hard and nobody would like it.Yucky is the food sometimes in these cafeterias.Very rarely do we get a chance to taste a decent food.Are you wondering how?Because of our complaints they would change the caterer and then the new food would be yummy because it would stimulate different taste buds than the previous food used to stimulate.It changes from yummy - yucky - yummy - yucky...Will it be yummy forever??

1st Post - Love - Guruji - Comments - Welcome - Passion - Food - Travel - Cinema - Yes It's Dilemma!!

I've been thinking of writing my first post in our blog!!After delibrate attempt and effort I found that today is that auspicious day to start with that 1st post.Just kidding.Abhay has already crossed 70.Real inspiration for me to write this.But what should I write about on my first post?This is the question that was in my mind while I've decided to write.Atlast I found the suitable title.Dilemma!What a better word I can think of other than this to describe the state of mind when someone starts writing!True.There are numerous things infront of me to write about.Life is giving me many things to express its love.So many things to express my love towards life.Abhay,Vivek and whoever have ever looked for my post in this blog, Here is my first post.More things will follow after this.Let me know if you read this. :-)

And the difference is...

In the Post Title Font color and Post Title Font Size! Good guesses, and Bhawana got it right! I changed the Color of old Post title from dull black to the current one, and increased the font size from 135% to 175%... Previously it used to look like this,


And now it looks like this:


I was waiting for this change for number of days, only yesterday got the time to do it.

Here is how to do it. In Layout, Edit Html, Search for the following 2 things...


And Replace them with these....(change is only in the value associated with the font color and size)
I don't know the exact logic of numbering and colors, something to do with RGB Scheme... May be our techie friend Vivek can write an article on which number for which color. I just used LCS, Littel Common Sense, and changed the numbers till I got the right combo!
You can play like that with your blog layout quite easily. Don't touch the tags with <> and don't forget to save the copy of your current template before you tamper it!
If you like any blog template, or for that matter any web design, there is a simple way to know what lies beneath. When you open it ine your internet explorer or Firefox, go to View, Page Source. or View Source. Something like that will be there. Check out this website for html,or such similar websites, to understand the meaning of html syntax. Correlate the things in the source and those on the webpage... That way you can bring those changes in your blog. Its that simple. Happy troubleshooting HTML!

waah, what a lunch!

On occassion of Ganapati Festival, the Prasanna Ganapati Temple in Koramangala performed the Sahastra Modaka Ganapati Homa. After the Homa they offered lunch to all the visitors to the temple, about 1000!
A meal in the traditional way on the banana leaf was so fulfiling! They did multiple servings, the lunch had Pongal, Masala Bhat, Payasam(a sweet kheer) , a mixed vegetable which was served hot and was not spicy, salad and boondi, chutney, plain rice and dal! The pongal and Payasam had abundance of cashew-nuts.
Apart from the taste and style, the happy atmosphere and devoted serving made it such a worthwhile meal. May God bless all those who give me good food!

Find the Difference!

So, what's the new thing that I have done to my blog! Find out the difference! Its not so difficult, but it may not be so obvious also!

Happy Ganeshotsav to all!

Today is the day of worshipping the lord of all wisdom, the Lord Ganesha. He resides in you!
The symbols have a meaning in our intellect and an impact on our mind. With the elephant's head what does Ganesha tell you!? Elephant is a vegetarian, yet strongest animal. He is not afraid of anyone, and anything comes in his way, he will throw away and go ahead. That's what is your potential, to overcome any obstacles in the path. That's why Ganesha is also called as Vighna-harta, remover of all obstacles. With small eyes, and wide ears, he suggests you that don't rely only on what you see, also take into account what you hear, and then make the whole picture. The big belly is a symbol of contentment, prosperity, total joy. His four hands are engaged in four different things. Be skilled to do different things simultaneously. He is also called 'Ganapati'- the in charge of all ganas, the individuals. Your true self is encompassing all the individual identities you have made up for yourself. Uniting them you become one with yourself. In the days of Farari, why should one want a little mouse as a vehicle!? A vehicle is what takes you from one place to another. The little mouse signifies the small, simple piece of logic, a subtle enquiry, with which you can achieve all knowledge. One hand of Ganesha is in the pose of giving blessing, and other is offering the Modak, a Maharashtrian sweet. This way he says, "Wait wait, I am giving sweets to you"!

Columns by Sri Sri Ravishankar

His Holiness Sri Sri Ravishankar writes weeklyarticles at this url.

Check the previous articles on the same page, there are so many!

Bharatnatyam

Indian Classical Dance is an amazing dance form. Bharatnatyam, a geometrically asthetic dance form, encorporates Natyam:- the play, into the dance. Few days ago I was lucky to go with my parents to see the performance by Vishwa Bharathi Natya Shala students. This is dance academy run by my friend Nirupama's Mother, and they did an excellent performance. Colorful costumes, fantastic beats and rythmic movements. Excellent coordination in the group, and meaninful facial expressions in the solo. Anyone who has ever took part in a dance would know how much efforts have gon in! An audio visual treat.

We did it, we did it!

Its been a while for not writing the post... so here I go!

Last few days have been too fast to add posts, and the story of last weekend is yet to get complete!

This weekend Raghav and I did 108 Suryanamaskars...! Its was so nice to have Raghav's company. His home carries that energy... We did so much group sadhana there. This time I had better control. And I could see that, beyond a point, its all grace...

Rintu, just make sure that you stick to "Sthiram Sukham Asanam":- An asana is a steady and pleasurable posture, while doing every Suryanamaskar... Its important that your breath flows as normal as it would if you were generally talking to someone.

So we have a Club 108 now! Memberships open!

I had made a friend long ago,during a lunch, in Sukhasagar hotel. His name is Neelkanth. He has such a good memory that he recognized me after few months now! He is very good at painting, you can check his paintings here on his blog.

So nice to read all the comments, keep posting them!!

And yes, I will fill up the gap of the posting soon... keep checking for updates!