Lakshmi | Lakṣmī | लक्ष्मी

March 8, 2015 by Elliot

Lakshmi is the Hindu goddess of wealth, prosperity, love, fortune, and is considered the embodiment of beauty. She is the wife of Vishnu and carries his active energy. Her fours arms represent purusartha, or the four primary aims of human life: Dharma, Kama, Artha, and Moksha and representations of her can be found in many Jain monuments as well. In Nepal and Southeast Asia, Vasudhara mirrors Lakshmi with some minor differences. She is Vishnu’s source of strength while maintaining the universe.

When Vishnu incarnated on Earth, Lakshmi took form as Sita (when Vishnu became Rama), Radha (Krishna’s lover), Rukmini, and Satyabama. In ancient Hindu scripture all women are declared to be embodiments of Lakshmi. The marriage between Lakshmi and Vishnu is the paradigm for Hindu religious wedding ceremonies. Their relationship forms the basis for partnership in Hinduism.

Archeologists suggest that Lakshmi’s worship may have originated around 100BC. Statues and iconography have been dated from the second half of the first millennium CE. In modern India, Lakshmi is regarded as the goddess of wealth and Diwali and Sharad Purnima are festival celebrations held in her honor.

Lakshmi is another great example of a deity that evolved in the ancient Hindu texts and was mentioned only once in the Rig Veda as a kindred mark or sign of auspicious fortune. In the later Arthara Veda, she evolved into a deity with multiple incarnations and large amounts of plurality and is associated with good luck, good fortune, prosperity, success, happiness, and the good. Later, she is regarded as the incarnation of beauty, and the goddess of fortune and was associated with Vishnu. In later myths, she is associated with the creation of the universe, giving diverse gifts to many of the other gods (ie Indra gets force and Sarasvati receive nourishment). In the later epics, such as the Mahabharata, she personifies wealth, riches, beauty, happiness, loveliness, grace, charm, and splendor.

The word Lakshmi is derived from lakṣ (लक्ष्) and lakṣa (लक्ष) which mean to perceive, observe, know, understand and goal, aim, or objective. This together form knowing goals, or perceiving and understanding objectives.

Lakshmi is usually sitting or standing on a lotus flower and carries a couple in her hands which represent the ability to grow beautifully from dirty or filth in circumstances. She is also seen with elephants (symbolizes work, activity, strength, rain, fertility, and abundance) and an owl (symbolizes striving to observe and discover when surrounded by darkness, that also becomes blind in daylight, a reminder to refrain from greed and ignorance after knowledge and wealth is acquired).

Lakshmi also has a multitude of other names: Padma, Kamala, Padmapriya, Padmamaladhara devi, Padmamukti, Padmakshi, Padmahasta, Padmasundari, Vishnupriya, Ulkavahini, Ambika, Manushri, Mohini, Chakrika, Kamalika, Aishwarya, Lalima, Indira, Kalyani, Nandika, Nandini, Rujula, Vaishnavi, Samruddhi, Narayani, Bhargavi, Sridevi, Chanchala, alaja, Madhavi, Sujata, Shreya, Maheshwari, Madhu, Madhavi, Paramaa, Janamodini, Tripura, Tulasi, Ketaki, Malati, Vidhya, Trilochana, Tilottama, Subha, Chandika, Devi, Kriyalakshmi, Viroopa, Vani, Gayatri, Savitri, Apara or Aparajita, Aparna, Aruna, Akhila, Bala, Tara, Kuhu, Poornima, Aditi, Anumati, Avashyaa, Sita, Taruni, Jyotsna, Jyoti, Nimeshika, Atibha, Ishaani, Kalyani, Smriti and probably her most used abbreviation, Sri.

In Eastern Indian traditions, Lakshmi is regarded as a form of Devi, along with Durga or Shakti. Lakshmi, Parvati, and Saraswathi are regionally considered to be from of Durga in West Bengal and Odisha, which are usually considered separate in India. She is the personification of spiritual fulfillment and is the embodiment of Param Prakriti, which purifies, empowers, and uplifts the individual.

It is obvious that Lakshmi represents an elusive and evolving subject of wealth and prosperity as well as the divine feminine aspect of spiritual energy. She is a powerful symbol in Hinduism and is worshipped often in modern India with statues and symbolism apparent in many of the places that I am currently near in Mysore. Her evolution is as interesting as her origins and I continue to find tremendous insight in the symbolism applied to her forms.

Purusartha | पुरुषार्थ

February 19, 2015 by Elliot

The Goals of Life

Purusha and Artha are two very complex Sanskrit words that represent a Hindu ideal of life’s purpose[Purusha (पुरुष) and Artha (अर्थ)].Together, the words mean purpose of being, the objective of human pursuit, or the meaning of life. Purusha means human being, soul, or the universal principle and soul of the universe. Artha means purpose, objects of desire, or meaning.

The goals of man, the aims of human life, purpose of being, four goals and virtues that lead to a happy life:

Dharma – Dharma is a key concept in Indian religion that has multiple meanings. Dharma is said to be in harmony with the forces of the cosmos, Brahman, or rta which denotes the “right way” of living. In Buddhism it means “cosmic law and order” and refers to phenomenon and the path and teachings of the buddha. These can be considered virtues.
Artha – can be defined as the means of life, sense, purpose, meaning, goal, or essence. Essentially, it is the activities or resources required to live in the desired state for the individual. How you make a living and feed yourself.
Kama – means desire, wish, or longing in Hinduism. Kama most often denotes a sexual desire, but also can mean longing for pleasure, desires, wishes, passions, aesthetic enjoyment of life, affection, or love with or without sexual connotations. This goals are considered healthy and essential when balanced with the other three goals.
Moksha – means emancipation, liberation, or release more specifically from Samsara and the Maya of this world. It connotes self-realization, self-knowledge, and ultimate freedom.

Together, these form the goals of human life according to the Hindu tradition, however these aspects need to be balanced. Together these turn the wheel that leads towards Moksha, or liberation from the cycles of death and rebirth, ultimately suffering.

It’s nice to think about life as having a need to balance between different pursuits. Too much focus on one, and you become imbalanced and therefore unhappy.

The Hindu traditions recognize certain necessities in life, that all pleasure cannot be avoided. Very different from the Puritan influenced american spiritual traditions such as the quakers or amish. There are nights of indulgence, days of fasting, all kinds of different traditions to allow the body to fluctuate and process the world in the way that it tends to do naturally rather than forcing it to do things in order to conquer the mind. If you are interested in learning more about balancing as your strive forward successfully, Nishkam Karma will be a great guide for you, which is a central message in the Bhagavad Gita.

Hinduism also has answers for those who do understand the tensions between pursuing wealth and virtue simultaneously and provide answers in terms of pursuit with renunciation, craving-free dharma-driven action. In cases of conflict, Dharma is said to be the most important because it leads to Moksha more so than the other two do and Moksha is the main ideal of human life. It is also the foundation for pursuing wealth and sexual pleasure, or whatever it is that you desire.

So this is a method for you to go after the things that you want in life, granted that you remain detached from the end states, because desire for an “end-state” or “product” will only lead to suffering because such things are temporary. Remember that you are a process, that you are happening, right now, processing the world around you in various different ways that you couldn’t possibly be aware of. So enjoy the ride, as they say.

Temples in Mysore

February 8, 2015 by Elliot

Another photoblog. For those of who actually like my writing, I have published a lengthy article on the tenets of Maya, or reality.

Preparing to Leave for India

November 12, 2014 by Elliot

http://www.jod.uk.com/media/1146/india-hero.jpg?width=1280

I bought a plane ticket this morning. Lufthansa Airlines, 21h30m of fly time, taking me through Frankfurt, GE and into Bangalore, the silicon valley of India. I’ll spend the day there, hopefully after sleeping on the plane, then heading to Mysore on a 5pm express train to stay at a hotel. $15 a night, 4 stars, I guess we’ll see how that goes.

I was waiting to buy tickets for a month and a half, because I was waiting for acceptance from the Ashtanga Institute where Patthabi Jois taught the Ashtanga method and Sharath, his grandson, and Saraswathi, his daughter, continue in his footsteps. I applied for Sharath’s class and got rejected in October for January first (there is a 3 month advance registration required to practice at the institute). I didn’t get the rejection letter until October 28th, so I am not willing to wait that long again. I figure I will take Saraswathi’s class at first and then maybe my second trip I can practice with Sharath. I am open to whatever needs to happen, but obviously would prefer to practice under Sharath because of his experience with the advanced series of Ashtanga. I am also open to practicing at a different studio, but I think that the Institute is the place to be.

I bought my ticket today, one way. I don’t know how I’m getting back, don’t care right now. I can figure that out when I’m ready to leave. So I will probably be gone for a while. I applied for my visa appointment today, but no worries, the appointment is six weeks before my flight. Plenty of time for 5-10 business day delivery, or whatever visa delivery speed is. Worst case, I can always pay a little extra to get it expedited.

Bangalore sounds awesome, I can’t wait to explore over there. The first couple of days will be very intense, then I will probably start to learn the language after the first week or so. I will need to find lodging for the three months, but I think it is supposed to cost around $150 a month. No problemo. Food should be around another $100 or $200 a month, hopefully the former, though how can I complain. So 3 months in Mysore, until the end of April. Then maybe Cambodia and Thailand. We’ll have to see what I can swing by then with my language/negotiation skills.

So by the end of April, I should be finishing up with Saraswathi, Sharath is apparently traveling in April. I’m so excited to practice over there, just to feel myself in the ancient space. Its going to be so fucking epic.

I’ll probably check out some other Ashrams as I leave too, to see if there is anywhere I want to spend some time. I also want to spend a week in the Himilayas and see how I like it, but maybe that will happen in the end of April instead. Then I will head over to Germany in May to see my sisters so I spend the end of May and beginning of June in Berlin, hopefully Warsaw, Prague, Budapest, Munich, and maybe Zurich with my family. We don’t have the trip fully mapped out yet, but that is going to be a nice tour through history that I’ve never seen.

I think I’ll spend a week or two or three in Paris after that. My second family lives in Nandy, which is near Sauvigny le Temple, if you know the Parisien metropolitan area at all. 45 minutes via RER (public train) from Paris, no biggie at all. I first went over there when I was sixteen, it will be a blast from the past because I have a second family over there. Plus, I haven’t been back since I was 21 and in a very different place in life.

I want to say that I will also spend some time in London, but for some reason, it just sounds dreadfully expensive. But I have so many friends there and have never been! Ugh, maybe, I don’t know. I will probably be very broke by then.

So maybe I will be back by June? No idea if I will come back to Auburn either.

Anyways, I am really hoping I don’t get sick or anything over there, that would be awful. But hopefully I can soak up the Ayurveda, Yoga, chanting, philosophy, and everything that India can offer. Wish me luck!

Ahimsa | अहिंसा

December 24, 2023June 20, 2014 by Elliot

Yama #1

Ahimsa is the Yogic concept of non-violence, or non-harm to other beings. Himsa means to strike, injure, or harm and adding an ‘a’ before a word in Sanskrit makes the meaning opposite; in this case meaning non-injuring, non-harm. This is especially important in the yoga practice that occurs in the studio, but plays an equally important role in getting you to and from the yoga studio and all around in your life. Ahimsa is one of the Yamas, or principles for living that Patanjali expounded in writing the Yoga Sutras. I believe it is one of the most useful and important concepts in yoga and philosophy in general. Words, deeds, even thoughts have the ability to create harm; and by renouncing violence you allow life to flourish around you.

All beings have a divine spark within them, trees, plants, flowers, animals, and humans. God, or divinity (however you want to define it, “the universe” is also useful here) is intrinsic in all things, so harming another being is really harming the shared divinity within yourself and the other being. By hurting others, you hurt yourself because of the connection we all shared. Separateness is an illusion, as any astrophysicist, molecular biologist, or mathematician will tell you, electrons are constantly colliding and interweaving in everyday objects that appear to be still. Everything is vibrating and melting, but the human eye does not perceive these realities; instead we construct a conscious image that is useful for things like eating, hunting, and surviving. By truly allowing other beings to grow and flourish you are allowing yourself to prosper simultaneously.

But the concept is even more useful on the yoga mat. Instead of working against the body, work with it to relax and sooth the tension and stress within muscles. Mostly this becomes apparent in the breath, in how relaxed and focused you are on the sensations of the muscles. Injury is probably the easiest way to completely halt the journey of yoga; avoiding it is the key to progress and cultivation of joy within a yoga practice. Make your yoga sweet, not forced, and gentle instead of moving through physical strain, even in the intensity of a pose like Warrior 3. You can amp up your breath to match a difficult pose, but don’t force your body to do things. Mindfulness and care of your body will keep you on the yoga mat working to relieve the stresses of the body even with very intense asana practices rather than being injured and not being able to work on the physical asanas and prana-yama.

As I mentioned earlier, it is also an extraordinarily useful concept off the yoga mat. Mahatma Gandhi was a huge proponent of Ahimsa; you could offer that Martin Luther King Jr. was too, though he was likely unfamiliar with the Indian concept. Violence is cyclical, meaning that is progresses in a downward spiral and the only way to allow for it to cycle is to put energy into it. If everyone in the world could find a way to be non-violent with one another, than world peace wouldn’t even be discussed. It would be a given.

I lived in Paris when I was 20. I also drank a good amount in this time, because I was a rebel, liked being a rebel, and loved to party. So one Saturday night, while in the center of the city (I lived in the 13th, a solid 45 minute or hour walk from the center of the city) my friends and I decided to take one of the night buses home. We were at a club before, drinking and dancing on tables so we were all tired and still quite drunk. All 5 of us got on the public bus and right when I got on, I knew it would be a shit-show.

There were a few younger guys in the back smoking what was obviously hash and cigarettes. They were being pretty rough, so my ground and I sat in front of them, by the door. But these kids were drunk so eventually someone smacked me in the back of the head, for no reason. I turned around and looked to see what happened, I was a rugby player back then so I was a bit more inclined to violence than I am now. I saw a guy just a bit older than me, staring back drunkenly. His friend started to apologize and I said thanks and just turned around. But I was pretty heated; it took every ounce of energy not to yell, or get up, or get my friends to start something. I took the headshot and sat quietly.

When I was 14, I got my black-belt, so I had committed myself to only using violence in self-defense and this did not fall under that category. This is the biggest reason I didn’t react. But as the older kids continued to push each other around in the back of this public bus, the police pulled the bus over; the driver had called in because of his passengers breaking the law. Five squad cars pull up with their lights blaring and we all exit the van. I see the kid that hit me and the others that were causing the trouble get to put the side and the rest of us were allowed to walk from there; we were at the Bastille which was 15 minutes from my foyer, or apartment building. As I began to walk home, I saw the one that was behind me resisting an officer that was questioning him. Then the officer searched him, found more drugs and a switch blade. A big one.

I probably would have been stabbed if I had given that dude just a comment. If I had defended myself, I am sure that someone would have been hurt badly. Sometimes it is really better to end the cycle of violence immediately, as soon as you come into contact with it. Absorb it for everyone else, process it yourself and you just made the world a better place. The story reminds me of the commitment to pacifism. If everyone could sit still and process their own emotions including fear and anger, the world would be peaceful. But it requires commitment from each individual, everyone has to be disciplined to serve the same vision.

Ahimsa is powerful. It shifts the ego lens inward rather than externally making you more aware of your projections of insecurity and fear. Use it in the yoga room and your practice will flourish. Add some love and knowledge to the mix and you will be flying in no time. Then take it outside the studio and live by it; violence in society is never a good thing. Help to make the world a better place.

The Origin of Yoga

December 17, 2023February 19, 2014 by Elliot

DALL·E 2023-12-17 08.47.39 - Create an image of an old man with a long white beard, wearing a loincloth, performing a handstand in a dark cave. The man should appear as a wise sag

Yoga is old. Really old. The word itself is a marvel to etymology, because of its origins in Vedic Sanskrit, the mother language of Sanskrit. In this context, yoga means union, joining, or adding, more particularly in the use yoking oxen and horses. In epic Sanskrit, the word evolves into a combination, connection, application, or conjunction. Both yujir yoga (to yoke) and yuj samādhau (to concentrate) are the sources for the word yoga according to Pāṇini, a 6th-century BCE Sanskrit grammarian. In the modern world, most would agree that yoga is the attempt to realize and unite with the divine and communion with all living beings. Yoga could be anywhere from 2500 years old to 3500 years old, but the real answer is that we don’t quite know.

So how and where did it start? Many scholars/historians agree that it started in Western India with speculation that the Indus Valley Civilization was the origin, which lies in India, Afghanistan, Iran, and Pakistan.Of the three early civilizations of the ancient world (ancient Mesopotamia and ancient Egypt being the other two), the Harrappans or believed inhabitants of the Indus Valley were the most widespread believed to have nearly 5 million inhabitants. So the question we should ask is, “did the Harrappans practice yoga?”. The possible answer of yes comes from this seal, found in an excavation site:

Seal of Pashupati (possibly Shiva) — Seal of Pashupati

The analysts are unable to make a conclusion because of the lack of knowledge surrounding the Indus Valley language. But, it is possibly that this is an early version of Shiva. The relationship of the figure to the animals is unknown, but widely speculated upon. One thing we can definitely agree on is the seated position of the figure, so some type of postural study, possibly religious, was occurring at the time.

Whether the Indus Valley civilization practiced yoga, we start to see the Vedas spread between 1500BC and 500BC, which is where yoga and mantras start to become popular. The Rigveda is considered by many to be the oldest, but was surely a huge step for the spread of yoga. So it is at least 2500 years old, surely older, but no one really knows how much older, or how widespread it was.

The beauty of yoga’s history is its connection to other religious traditions and human history. Between 200 BCE–500 CE philosophical schools of Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism were taking form and a coherent philosophical system of yoga began to emerge. Even before that yoga was practiced and appreciation, if not worship, of animals in connection to the spiritual has been the foundational findings of anthropology and study of the ancient world. Sanskrit words for poses were created later, but poses were given names of animals far before Darwin and modern science arrived leading to the possibility that ancient yogis, or Rishis (truth speakers) knew about concepts of evolution.

Because yoga is ancient, its origin is often obscured, but we are sure that civilization gave birth to the practices and beliefs. What has evolved into asana, relaxation, breathing exercises, and detached meditation we know as yoga started with the most ancient of philosophies and religious practices thousands of years ago.