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A Beautiful Shakti-filled poem offered to our kula by a lovely Australian teacher in the Immersion 2 in Christchurch, January 2010.
“The Lotus Garden”
by Andrew Mournehis
www.divinegrace.com.au
Blossoming “Margie Joy” Breathes Life into my Spacious Heart and one single fragrant flower blooms …
From the muddy depths of my pain something stirs, a lotus bud waits in all it’s longing to break free of its isolation, from its underworld of confusion, shadow and veiled mystery…
The lonely bud sits in the pool of Shraddha, nourished by the Light of the Divine, slowly rising to be free ...to be all it is meant to Be
The scent of its potential, the taste of its sweet nectar, the sight of its vibrant color, the texture of its fragile leaves and the sound of its breakthrough…sooth my Soul…it waits for Grace…The “anu” and the “sara” unite with one Universal Heart in the flower garden of life and seed by seed, each roots to rise, its stems reaching upward and outward with expanding shades of Shri…
My Beloved flowers …this is what I see…
The Leaf that falls from the tree in the Divinely ordered way
The leaf that says hello to Marg… the leaf that says G’day
The beaming heartfelt smile of Deb, her delightfulness, her Shakti
The Prayer from Lisa’s healing hands, the blessing of her Bhakti
The Shakti blast from Adele’s eyes… The Grace of Kelly’s pose
The beauty of their Presence …and of course their yoga clothes!!!
The Depth of Spirit of Maarie…her heart so vast and wide
The humble voice of Anna…the Devi held inside
The expanded boundaries of Donna, with new body strong and thinner
The extraordinary Svadyaya of Kirsty …girl invite me too for dinner!!!
The delicious questioning Olivia and her bright and curious mind
The passion and power in Judy’s eyes so comforting and kind
The crystal heart of Zoe and the stones filled with the signs
The inquisitive nature of Penny …All drops in the pond of Brilliant minds
The soulful depth of Justin’s eyes, his voice resonant and True
The well-walked path of the spiritual Sage, down dog, Vasistha…breakthrough!!!
The gravity defying Sheryl and her committed quiet care
Her thoughts of “lightness” stay with me …thank you for the gifts you share!
The open mind of Kristina, and her Altruistic Heart,
The kindness, warmth and courage of Paul …so welcoming from the start
The generous sweetness of Candy…I could eat you on a stick
I thank you for your heartfelt care…your touch just did the trick!
The photos captured on the ‘blue mat road’ by the wonderful wizard of Oz
His jaw dropping awe as he gazed at our art, just because… because… because
Because Because of Katie Lane …the Power of her Presence
“I hang on every word you say…I truly adore your Essence
I know you Know more than you show, your art of refinement Divine
Your Light and Insights Sweet and Rich, like a good old vintage wine
I thank you Katie for all you do, for there’s so much behind the scenes
I want you to know, I truly pray that, you too, fulfill all your dreams!!!”
Well speaking of dreams… is this one true… or is this Being an Avatar
“Dear BJ girl your are the Light, the Universal Star
Your Tejas so bright, again we’re wearing shades, but this time in 3D
Through your eyes and the path you lead us through, there is so much that we see
We see you passion, we see your love, we see your Truth and blah blah blah :))
You truly have a magic gift girl to take your students far”
The blossoming butt of BJ … “girl your booty is delicious”
You graceful care, your Shivayah, your diamond eyes so precious
Your Shakti Bhakti Junkie love, your ritual salmon for lunch,
Your creative flair, your rituals, your Saraswati, your hunch…
You ask what the Saraswati means …it is the Essence of the Highest in You
The ‘swa’ the Self, the ‘sara’ that flows …the Artistic Goddess that flows through
My Sister, My Friend, My Bhakti, My Light, Kaliyana Mitra with Heart so True
I want you to know, I LOVE you girl …
…Beloved BJ…
...I SEE YOU…
:)))))
Andrew
Andrew is a multi-talented teacher intensely embracing Anusara yoga working towards his inspired status in Melbourne Australia. Andrew can be found at www.divinegrace.com.au
 Summer - Fall 2009 - ShaktiFlash
Counting Blessings, Choosing Grace
Gazing back over the year, I'm humbled in gratitude and awe at the power of a dream, the power of intention and the power of Grace. It is by Grace that I am living the dreams and visions I held in my heart over the last few years. So many blessings, too many to even know choose a highlight! Having the opportunity to meet, study with and spend time with Ram Dass and my teacher John Friend in Maui was one of the most magical weeks ever. Just to be in the presence of these two great masters was an offering of Grace. Then of course, meeting my third grandbaby, (a girl no less!), doing handstands in the pristine company of the mighty Alps, everything....blessings of Grace. Every moment has been a profound inner initiation into First Principle of Anusara yoga, 'Open to Grace'. The very nature of traveling and teaching is an invitation into the mystery. It just gets deeper. Everything is unknown, everything a mystery!
Traveling is completely living the mystery. I never know how the airport, customs, immigration process will go. I never know how the hosts will receive me, if they will receive me, the conditions of where I will be housed, the food, power outages, traffic, public transport and even the reception by the communities and students is a big question mark. Will they be open? Will I be open to them? Can I meet them in a way that I can offer them the teachings of Grace through Anusara Yoga? Every single venue and event has offered me an opportunity to deepen my appreciation of the power of Grace. A constant practice, it is a moment to moment letting go of my ideas of how things should go and be, softening into the present energy, feeling the energy of the space around me, the flow of the culture, the students, the hosts, the customs guys, the flight attendants, whoever I'm in relationship with at the moment! Every moment is an opportunity to stay anchored into the Source that holds everything. Everything is first principle.
This year, as always, I count everything as blessings, every thing is a blessing, a gift of Grace. One of the blessings of yoga is developing the capacity to count those blessing that are disguised as challenges. Can you count losing your home, a friend or an injury a blessing? Those are thresholds into first principle, invitations to expand through the challenge, by Grace. We are all so blessed we have food, clean water, education, opportunity, clothing, shelter, love and each other. We have so much, we are truly blessed. When in doubt, when all else fails, count your blessings and choose Grace!
I'm filled with gratitude for my family, ancestors, kids, grand kids, all my teachers and their teachers, all my friends, students, and especially John Friend whose dreams and heart vision created the matrix for so many of us to experience the auspiciousness of life through Anusara yoga. It is overwhelming to think of all the hearts who've have awakened to the holiness within, the Source we share, the gift of life that is by it's very nature, Grace.
It is a humbling honor and privilege to offer and share the teachings of this lineage of Grace through Anusara yoga. Everyone has become a blessing to me, and it is my highest intention and prayer to be a blessing and serve who ever takes the invitation into the one Heart!
May the garden in your heart be sown in ways your life overflows with the most radiant field of wildflower dreams!
In Grace, Gratitude and Love,
BJ
"Count your blessings." - Bette Wolfe, my mom...
.....
More Messages from the Universe -
It's all about first Principle.... I was leading a retreat in the pristine Canadian wilderness. After a restorative moment on the screened in yoga shala with with my ipod, Gurumayi and Om Namah Shivaya, I opened my eyes, to yet another blessing from above...
Near Winnipeg Canada - August 2009
And then Geneva....the oui à l'autobus de Coeur! "Yes to the Heart"- bus... 
And then in Maui with John Friend and Ram Dass.....
Endless opportunities to tune into the Shakti, Grace...
AUGUST 15, 2008 - Show me a Sign!
I'm always looking for the signs from the Universe. I know from my own daily experience that nothing is happenstance or insignificant and everything has meaning. Whether it is a song on the radio, something someone says, a flash of insight, license plate and bumper sticker messages, billboards, a wild animal crossing the road, a thought I have and the shooting star that flashes across the heavens just at that very moment to affirm it. Everything matters. Pausing, being sensitive to Everything, that's First Principle of Anusara Yoga, Open to Grace. It's First Principle of the Universe, of Life! It contains Everything and Everything is contained with in it.
Do you ever wonder where is Grace? Do you ask for signs from the Universe to show you the way? Do you not think the Universe is ALWAYS offering you Grace, always offering you signs and direction? Do you wonder how can whatever is being offered to you right now be Grace, an opportunity for deeper awareness, knowing and recognition of the highest, especially if it's mundane, or hard and feels yucky!? The question to ask is yourself is "am I open, am I feeling and sensitive enough to receive them, however Grace is being offered? - Even when it doesn't come in ways I think it should come? Do I trust Grace in all the ways it manifests? What meaning and value to I assign to what is showing up?"
It was August 15, 2008, the 11th Birthday of Anusara Yoga, and the anniversary the descent of Grace (devia diksa) for the enlightened master Swami Muktananda. I was in Tucson to celebrate yoga with Darren and the Yoga Oasis posse and afterward, I headed out to see my son Paco at his work. I 'accidentally' missed the turn off and before I realized it, and got a little further down the road, I came across this signpost from the Universe. I didn't believe my eyes, I thought I was imagining it. I was, Shakti'npata anusarena, fully immersed in the currents of Grace, and right in front of me, the literal signpost from heaven to show me the way.
We are NEVER not a part of the limitless embrace of Grace.
I personally choose to adopt the roadway of First Principle, Open to Grace Happens! What about YOU???
8-8-08 - Guru in 2C
On a flight to Florida few weeks ago, the eve of the Gurupurnima full moon, (the moon in which we remember and honor our teachers,) I had the magical blessing and the HUGE honor to sit with a most remarkable woman. The attendant escorted an elderly woman into my row. She was lovely. Silvery soft white curls framing her blue twinkly perfectly made up eyes and lips, sporting an exquisitely coordinated outfit earrings and bag, she was a Goddess! She even had the manicure and matching pedi!
I chuckled and said to her, “if we leave our bags on the middle seat, maybe everyone would pass our row by.” Sure enough, the doors closed and or seat remained a purse caddy. We introduced ourselves, Helen Zimmerman is her name. I asked her if she’d been traveling visiting family, and she smiled, and said, “Oh yes, I’ve been gone about a month traveling around visiting family and celebrated a BIG birthday.” Her eyes got big and and her whole expression was big when she said BIG. I thought what 85, 90? and asked, “Big? What 85, 90?” And she replied she had turned 100 years old on February 29, 1909 but since she was born on leap year, she was “really only 25.” I was floored! Not only did she look not a day over 85, she was the picture of health! Sure she used a cane, but was sharp as a tack, not at all frail and was traveling on her own!
We chatted the whole way from St. Louis to Orlando, and as soon as I had I chance, I jotted down everything drop of wisdom I could remember! Here are a few pearls of true wisdom from the Guru in 2C.
3 kids, 23 grandkids, 24 great grandkids, 5 great great grandkids.
"People get to a certain age and think they are old, but they're not old they have just begun to give back, you have to give back!"
"I eat everything and enjoy everything."
"I just enjoy life. "
"It's all about giving back."
"I hold everything in my mind and won't release it yet."
"I still do everything, bridge, shop, enjoy conversations."
"I had to recently give up driving because of macular degeneration. And I finally had to move in with my kids. I said I'd never do that but they insisted and I gave in."
"I've been traveling all month. "
"I've done a lot in my life.”
“My sister passed two years ago, she was 103. I was traveling and my niece called an said i better come back. So I did, and when i went into my sisters room we talked a bit. I left the room for a few minutes and she passed. She waited for me.”
“My kids have two computers and show me things all the time. It’s so wonderful.”
"I don't go to doctors. They said I had to see one and I apologized to him because I said there is nothing wrong and I'm taking up your time."
"I just live every moment to the best of my ability and enjoy."
"I did have a bloody mary last week, it had been so long it was so good!"
"Many many years ago, I had a dance studio outside of Cleveland OH, and Fred Waring a famous musician chose me and my assistant for the opening of the Palace Theater.. Professional Dance is so different now, we were professional!"
"I always look for the good, you know."
"When people do things that i might not think are the best, I just think that's their life. "
"The things I don't particularly care for, i just let them go."
"I wanted to take a picture with her and she laughed and said I'm a freak of nature! You can say you know someone that old who has it all together up there!"
I wish I would’ve been able to tape her, she was wisdom in the highest embodiment of the Goddess.
We bonded in such a deep way in those fews hours, or at least I did. She was a rare treat and so happy, cheerful and clear! I insisted on waiting with her on the plane and then accompanied her with the wheelchair attendant to collect her bags. A sweetheart she was, not once a complaint or anything! The attendant took our picture and left us on the curb. We chatted about what car her son would be driving and waited together until he arrived to pick her up. As the proverb goes, the fruit doesn’t fall far from the tree. A tennis pro, like his mother, he 78 years young. Also like his mom, his sweetness radiated his gratitude that I had I accompanied her. We all hugged and I told her what a gift, honor and privilege to be with her, and I'd remember her my whole life! What Grace to have been in her presence, my Guru in 2C.
May 2008 - Traffic Wisdom
The
magic and beauty of the Universe is always available to us to feel and
celebrate, within ourselves and all around. That is First Principle of
Anusara Yoga, "Open to Grace". The variable is our own awareness and
sensitivity, and what our Shri-sight is focused on. The signs of Grace
can come in myriads of forms from the very
subtle to the blatant. You know that feeling when you think of someone
and they call, or
a song comes on the radio just at the right time, or you experience
spontaneous joy when you witness a baby's giggle or spectacular
sunset? One of my favorite ways I receive subtle messages of Grace is
in the
form of license plate messages in traffic.
Many years ago a
friend mentioned she received subtle energetic messages from license
plates. I wanted to receive them too, so I just 'asked the universe'.
Immediately I began to see license plates that mysteriously offered
ideas and insights to what I was contemplating at that moment.
Synchronicity or Serendipity? In my book, nothing is happenstance, and now I too, am spreading Shri-dom on Arizona highways... XPCTGUD is what you'll see if you're sitting behind me at the light.
Here are a few of the license plate wisdom sightings I've recorded over the last year. It makes commuting ever so enlightening! The next time you hit the road, put on your Shri-specs and NJOY the ride!
2007 I started keeping track!
SHIVAYA • BLISS • MYSTIC1 • ONE1ONE • IMISSU2 •
SPARKLYB • 1PLANET • ONENESS •ILIKEU • DSTNJOY • NEERG • XMPLRY •
JUSTGO • EPIFANY • BLUWOLF (my maiden name is Wolfe) • ILVLIFE •
WILDRYD • 4MYJOY • BEIN • LV EWE • WOWMOM • EMPRESS • 1LIFE • BE EPIC •
4 SHER • 4 MAGIC • R MAJJK • WILD1 • B LUV LVT • WISELY • SYMPHNY
• CUTIPIE • MT C GOD • AGREE • WE B AVN • GRLZ ROK • GV IT AWY • JYFULL
• LUVS2GO • MANIFST• GIGLE • FEELLKY • 2DAY4U • DRIVIN1 • MIDWYVS •
GDZGRAC • ALGOOD • NOHATE • AGILIS • F4SITE • BLUBLIS • EVALU8 •
LITLLUK • EFFORT • ANGLLV • BLSDMOM • ITS ART2 • GOFY GRL • UBSRVD •
DOBAGDB • GODNUS • KARP DM • STAR LT • EMPWR • LIMITLS • ITROCKS•
NDLOVE• NXTLVL • LVNLYF • IBLUCKE • DREMBG • 1SPCLYF • BLSKYS • BILEVE•
INJYLIF • PCE4YOU • MEASRUP • HEAL1 • 1WITCHY • AWSMLADY • BTRNEVER •
HAPYLDY
2008
LUVTRVL • SHAKTI • BADDIVA • WEREALL1 • JOOYFIL • BNVOLVD •
AGRACE • NIT4LV • BALANCE • SEEMORE • 4GIVING • 1BLESS1 • BNGUD •
LVNFRE • HPPYHRT • KOEXST • ALLOWER • SKYFIRE • TWNLUV • TITO • GRAATFL
• INVCBLE • IAMLOVD • THEO TKS • MIRROR2 • 1SATYA • BLV2RCV • MI KARMA •
OHPYDAY • LIVNJOY • BTRNVR • AZMAGIC • LUV JET • INFNIT1 • GODWILL • BEGR8FL • JOY2U • TE AMO1• PRAISEB • JUSTDUN • IMADEIT • BHOPE • UPNATM • BRZIN • CASHFL • MVNFWD • BRKTHRU • B HAPE • AZ PEAC •GOD LUV •SHIVAS • SKYBABI • 1DERCAR • BHOPFUL • PRLJAMR • 4TUN81 • S ANGEL • INRPWR • 1GR8LIF • REJOYCE • BTHNKFL • USPEACE • 2EACH • BELIEVE • GV OFTN • JST LOV• PURE JOI • GO LOVE • GLORI B • BEE WELL • GUD 4 U • ETERNT • 2SRV GOD • LUV T LA • 1SOURCE • FNTSTC • GOD 24 7 • RZLYNT • G KARMA • GOD GIVS • MWISHES • CAREGVR • BTHNKFL • JUSTBU • JST BLV • JOYFUL • RENEW • ENLITND • DONT W8 • LCHAIM • EMAGIN • LVPOSHN • APREC8 • AZ PECFL • BE YOU 1 • GDSPD1 • HOW TRU • FAL N UP • LOVLY • 02BING • THE WIZ • IBMOVIN • ANJALIZ • CRE8TV • WEGVTHX • MAKTGR8 • CHUZJOY • URWRTHY • SKYNITE • BWISE • ABL ONE • GD ENRGY • ONE WRLD • LOV LYT • PSN THRU • JS2DOIT • FABULUS • KOEXST • SWTHART • U2 4EVR • EMAGIN • REMEDY • WRKNG4U • WELL NOW • OPR2NIT • PACMAN1 • JOYRIDR • 1INAMLN • RCSTAR • OMMOM • REOFSUN • VALUES
2009
B A LITE • KRAZDAZ • BEELOVD • DN2IRTH • ALWZLVU • 1MENSCH • ELOWLIAM • U CAN 2 • BULZAI • AWSOME • JAZZD • GOGRLGO • RESULTS • LIFE2GO • MIANGL1 • ENERGY • FTH4EVR • LOV GOD • DANCE• SRVANT • TOTLXTC • MEDIT8 • SATYA • LOV2PLA • 2LIVLUV • WLTHG • JS RIDE • BLESD1 • GR8LIF • SHAKTI • INURHRT • NJYDRDE • BECALM • JOYEFUL • TOOBLSD • SO42N8 • AGR8DAY • GOTLUV
February 2008 Drishti - The Shakti Arm in Handstand
(or any handbalance!)
If you have the handstand bug, you're not alone. There is something so
intoxicating about hanging around upside down, something so
invigorating and addicting, it has become what I think of as an Anusara obsession. It is
that moment of 'hanging' that opens the space in which we recognize our
Nature. We get a hit of our own Light and highest possibility.
One little seed I like to plant surrounds the power of the drishti. The drishti (gaze, inisight,vison) is a powerful energetic component in Adho Mukha Vriksasana, downward facing tree pose.
The shape of the pyramid creates a powerfully strong structure as a foundation. When the hands are placed in alignment under the shoulders, they create the energetic baseline of the equilateral triangle. The drishti acts as an energy conduit. Where we place
our focus, gaze, the drishti, is where our energy goes. With my inner
drishti deeply connected to the focal point in the base of my heart, I place my outer drishti at the tip of the energetic equilateral triangle. I find a place on my mat, a dot, a ripple, and place my focus there. My drishti becomes a beam of Shakti anchoring me as a supporting third eye arm of light in this powerfully intoxicating pose.
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