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In Focus
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Don’t Commiserate, Celebrate! By Ma Deva Naisha |
 Ma Deva Naisha (Roberta Lemon), B.S.Y.A.(C.I.) was born in the British Channel Island of Guernsey and qualified as a yoga instructor with the British School of Yoga in 1999. Since then, besides working as a stage and screen actress in Hollywood, she has taught thousands of yoga classes all over the Greater Los Angeles area, Mexico and Guatemala, where she has now made her home with her adopted Mayan daughter, Sundara who is 6 months old. |
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I have plenty to celebrate! I have been blessed with my beautiful, happy, healthy, adopted daughter, Sundara, who has been living here with me in Guatemala since she was born in March this year. She is truly a blessing, nothing short of a miracle. I had searched for her all over the world for many years and out of nothing and no way, a way was made as she chose me and became my little soul mate and companion on this Great Journey. They say here in Guatemala that every baby comes with a loaf of bread under their arm and because of Sundara I am able to celebrate our beautiful home on Lake Atitlan, again a miracle of friendship and unconditional kindness. I celebrate our nanny, Lucia, who loves and cares for my daughter as I do, while I work to keep our household together. I celebrate my darling friends, so many now after all these years, with all the ups and downs we have shared. Each one with their own individual character, face, voice, opinions, skin colour and personality. Those wonderful, diverse people from all kinds of cultural backgrounds and social statuses and from all across the planet that mean so much to me. They have given me the profound sense of Love that I feel for them. Without them, how could I know Love? I celebrate every morsel of the delicious food I have shared with them and others in my life; I have always been curious to sample ethnic cuisine and have been blessed with delicious tasting foods and wines from all over the world…from someone on the roadside selling out of a plastic bowl to the most sophisticated of dinner parties in major cities around the world. I celebrate my animals and pets, past, present (and future J!); cats, dogs, horses, chickens, lambs, rabbits (which my father named Mixem and Tosis! - I think the lambs were called Chop and Casserole! Oh Daddy, I can certainly celebrate your delightfully wicked sense of humour!). I celebrate the beautiful gardens I have beheld, my own and those of others that I have tended or just visited. I celebrate the spectacular views I have witnessed; mountains, valleys, jungles, beaches, old ruins and beautiful city architecture; the extraordinary sunsets in Acapulco and Barra Vieja, Mexico; fishing from a friend’s yacht moored off the Similan Islands in the Indian Ocean and the two days of pure sailing it took us to get there; the small islands and hongs off the coast of Phuket; misty dawns over Malibu Beach from a ranch I worked on in Decker Canyon; breathtaking skies over Kerala and my home in Guernsey. Not forgetting here in Guatemala…such beauty and simplicity in the rural areas and pueblos and of course our stunning Lake with its imposing volcanoes, never looking the same way twice. I celebrate all the different jobs I have had, from my own successful Entertainment Agency in London, where over the course of 8 years I met some incredibly talented people…some famous, some gifted but unknown. I celebrate my one woman play that caused such controversy and yet took me from the Edinburgh Festival to London to the Sydney Fringe Festival and Brisbane then on to Los Angeles, arriving back at the Edinburgh Festival a year later (and last year even being able to perform it again here in Guatemala). I know I celebrated passing my final yoga exams with an A+! I celebrate my lovers, some famous some not, some beautiful, some not. I celebrate the money I have made…yes, it’s very easy to celebrate when I am winning at stuff…but… Am I also able to celebrate the mountain of paperwork, legalities and sole financial responsibility that I am faced with, associated with completing the adoption of Sundara, that may take another 2 years to finish? Yes of course I can, gladly, because she lives with me; thankfully she is not shut away in a children’s home somewhere waiting for me to get my act together. Can I really celebrate the sad fact that my family don’t want us in their lives? Well, if they did, would I be here now living this exquisite life or would I be having an average life in the bosom of their Love? I can be grateful to them for that! Can I really celebrate the death of my darling Daddy, nearly 3 decades ago? I can certainly celebrate the short time we did have together. Am I so magnanimous I can celebrate those so called friends who have hurt me or died or robbed me or just pissed me off? The lovers that left me, preferring someone else after I had given my heart, Love, loyalty and much more to them, leaving me bereft and heart-broken? If I choose to, yes I can, because for sure I have learned something from the experience and become a stronger person, hopefully with more compassion, forgiveness and humility as a result. Ah, these people have in fact been my greatest teachers in many ways. Can I really celebrate the slums and the poverty I have seen in many 3rd world countries? Can I dig really deep inside myself and find something good in everything? What I think is my choice and if I choose to look for the best, yes I can find something. Just like Pollyanna. Maybe the broad smile of a child who has nothing, or the laughter of a group of skinny, ragamuffin street kids kicking around a punctured ball or a tin can. A father’s love for his family even if they live 10 of them in one room. Is it not the very seed of progress itself to find one tiny good thing in a sea of despair and focus on It, nourish It, water It and exalt It until It grows and grows into a bigger, better, beautiful flourishing thing that shines the light that expels the darkness? Can I celebrate all the ‘failures’ in my life or can I just call them something different, like ‘learning experiences’. Is it just semantics though? I know what it is like to feel like a failure, I’ve been there. Homeless, jobless, broke, embarrassed, humiliated, hungry, frightened. The endless rejection and misogyny in Hollywood and the acting career that lies on some cutting room floor. How can I feel so bad about myself - inadequate, too ugly, too old, too this or too that because they picked the short blonde girl while I am tall and dark, when the part calls for a short blonde? The collapse of my business was exactly what was needed so that I could take off with my play and be free again! The truth is, I am glad those times are over, but I wouldn’t give them up or change them for anything, because they have given me something priceless…a balance, a strength and a compassion for others that I would have never known without these experiences from the life school of hard knocks. I don’t have a vision of ending poverty and hunger, I have a vision of every, individual, living being having plenty with all their needs met on a daily basis. I don’t have a vision of war ending, but Peace existing in every single heart. I have a vision of every living soul housed, fed, watered, loved, healthy, happy, comfortable and useful. There is plenty for everyone. Once we remove the competition for wealth and the desperate need for power over others we will have peace on earth. A tall order? No, not to me. If I believed that I might give up or not bother to teach any more. It doesn’t matter if I get to see it in my lifetime or not. Is it not up to each of us as individuals to just do our best to promote peace by finding our own first and then promoting it by living it? And while we are meditating on our own inner peace is our contribution to the collective consciousness not great, positive and powerful? So may we begin to always look on the bright side: the glass is always half full. We look for the good in everybody and every situation, without exception...even in the most difficult of circumstances. It’s the way out of those circumstances! We search and find the silver lining in the cloud and we proceed from there. Be grateful for what we have rather than ungrateful for what we don’t have. It is the single most powerful energy for positive change. The Universal Law of Cause and Effect guarantees every time that if we are constantly dwelling in a state of gratitude, the effect is a constant supply of things to be grateful for! Bring on all that wonderful stuff! And Celebrate your precious Existence! "The best way to overcome evil is to make energetic progress in the good." Ma Deva Naisha, BSYA (C.I.) |
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The Eternal Dance By Ma Anand Bhagawati |
 Ma Anand Bhagawati has been Osho’s disciple for more than 30 years. A computer hardware specialist by profession, she worked in the Shree Rajneesh Ashram’s kitchen Vrindavan, in the medical center and later, in the press office. When Osho left for America, she ran the Vihan Meditation Center in Berlin, Germany and later, in Rajneeshpuram, her work experiences ranged from legal services, to taxi driver, to ‘Twinkie’ (tour guide and press relations). During the Pune 2 years she worked in the main office.Her home for more than 15 years has been the island of Bali, Indonesia. Always interested in writing and reading since she was a child, she now enjoys being a columnist and author. She also loves traveling to and around India as much as possible. |
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This early morning interlude plays a role in setting the tone for the day ahead, and in spite of all the things that can and will happen during its course that can be labeled positive or negative according to one’s mindset, what else can there really be other than laughing and being playful, to rejoice? Such gratefulness to be alive on this beautiful planet, to be surrounded by unlimited opportunities to learn, enjoy, marvel at what is being offered by existence and to share our joy of being. Yes, there are times when mundane or bizarre manifestations sneak up on me and the mind starts chewing on the implications, going here and there and nowhere in particular. However, as soon as awareness is brought in, it all evaporates into meaningless gibber and exits the stage. Celebration does not imply running around with drums and cymbals, shouting on top of one’s voice or be in a drunk stupor. Celebrativeness is a delicate inner state of being, welcoming all and everything, an acceptance of life with every fiber of our being. The silence of this internal and eternal dance echoes within and the more we are in tune with this celebrativeness, others will feel it, become affected and turned on too! “Remember one thing: that each of my sannyasins carries something of me, each of my sannyasins becomes a part of me, spiritually, physically, in every possible way. My sannyasins are not believers, my sannyasins are in a love affair. It is a MAD phenomenon! So wherever my sannyasins meet, my presence will be felt. Wherever my sannyasins celebrate, my message is realized, because celebration is my message. We always have the choice to see a goblet that is half empty or a goblet that is half full! Guess which glass I am holding in my hand!? Ma Anand Bhagwati |
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The Joy of Giving
By Swami Chaitanya Keerti |
 Swami Chaitanya Keerti was initiated into Osho's Neo sannyas movement in 1971 and ever since has been dedicatedly associated with the world of meditation. He has been the spokesperson for Osho Commune International and also the founding editor of Osho Times International being published from Pune since 1975.
He is presently the spokesperson and the editor of osho world monthly magazines published from New Delhi.
He has been the editor-publisher of Osho books also. He is the author of three books on Osho: Allah to Zen, The Osho Way: In Romance with Life, and Osho Fragrance.
Swami Chaitanya Keerti regularly contributes articles on meditation and other subjects to several newspapers and magazines. He travels extensively to conduct meditation camps in different parts of the country and abroad.
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This week India is celebrating the Joy of Giving. The people are being encouraged to give whatever they can give to the needy. Frankly speaking, this kind of giving seems more like a duty. Duty is a four letter word. Duty tends to be something very serious and heavy, it can never be a joy. The people perform duties to gain respectability in society or keep themselves free from guilt that society may create in them. There's no joy in it as it is not giving in the right spirit. Now the question is how to have the right sprit. The right spirit comes with having enough to share, having an overflow of something that if you give you would feel unburdened. And who does not want to feel unburdened? Suppose, I want to give a gift to someone, but the other person is no mood to accept it. It hurts my ego and I feel rejected. Many people do feel apprehensive when they are given something, as the giving is not without calculations and expectations. Some times people give things to others to humiliate them, to make them feel small. Some times people only want to give but hesitate to receive, as receiving hurts their ego. They want to show that only they can give. This kind of giving and receiving is common in our society, but it does not make people happy and satisfied. We have to go beyond this and share with people in such a natural way, when we really feel like sharing. This sharing should come out of our overflow, abundance and heart full of feeling. This means we have to become more sensitive, raise our consciousness and evolve in our heart. Things are not so important what is very important is love. Love is the greatest gift that we can give to our friends, relatives, and even to strangers. Once on his birthday, Osho talked about this gift. "I was thinking what should I give to you today? Because this is my birthday, I was incarnated into this body on this day. This is the day I saw for the first time the green of the trees and the blue of the skies. This was the day I for the first time opened my eyes and saw God all around. Of course the word 'God' didn't exist at that moment, but what I saw was God. I was thinking what should I give to you today? Then I remembered a saying of Buddha: SABBA DANAM DHAMMA DANANA JNATI -- the gift of truth excels all other gifts. And my truth is love. The word 'truth' looks to me a little too dry and desert-like. I am not in much tune with the word 'truth' -- it looks too logical, it looks too 'heady'. It gives you the feeling of philosophy, not of religion. It gives you the idea as if you have concluded -- that you have come to a conclusion, that there has been a syllogism behind it, argumentation and logic and reasoning. No, 'truth' is not my word, 'love' is my word. Love is of the heart. Truth is partial, only your head is involved. In love you are involved as a totality -- your body, your mind, your soul, all are involved. Love makes you a unity -- and not a union, remember, but a unity. Because in a union those who join together remain separate. In a unity they dissolve, they become one, they melt into each other. And that moment I call the moment of truth, when love has given you unity. First, love gives you unity in your innermost core. Then you are no more a body, no more a mind, no more a soul. You are simply one -- unnamed, undefined, unclassified. No more determinate, definable, no more comprehensible. A mystery, a joy, a surprise, a jubilation, a great celebration. First, love gives you an inner unity. And when the inner unity has happened the second happens on its own -- you are not to do anything for it. Then you start falling in unity with the whole beyond you. Then the drop disappears in the ocean and the ocean disappears into the drop. That moment, that moment of orgasm between you and the whole, is where you become a Buddha. That moment is the moment Buddhahood is imparted to you. Or, better, revealed to you -- you have always been that, unaware. My word is love. So I say: My beloved ones, I love you. And I would like you to fill the whole world with love. Let that be our religion. Not Christianity, not Hinduism, not Islam, not Jainism, not Buddhism, but love. Love without any adjective to it. Not Christian love -- because how can love be Christian? It is so stupid. How can love be Hindu? It is ridiculous. Love is simply love. In love you can be a Christ. in love you can be a Buddha -- but there is no Buddhist love and there is no Christian love. In love you disappear, your mind disappears. In love you come to an utter relaxation. That's my teaching to you, I teach love. And there is nothing higher than love." OSHO This Very Body the Buddha, Ch 1 In another discourse, Osho concludes: LOVE is a gift. You give; you need not be worried about whether tomorrow he will be there to receive or not. Because a lover can give to the trees, to the rocks. A lover can give to the emptiness of the sky. A lover can simply flower and send his fragrance to the winds, even if nobody is there. Just think: Buddha sitting under his Bodhi tree, alone, full of love, overflowing.... Not that somebody is there to receive, but God is always there to receive, in so many forms, in so many ways. Swami Chaitanya Keerti |
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Investment...Misery vs Celebration By Swami Prem Sarito |
Born in England, raised in Bihar, India where his father was a mining engineer... served in British Army Intelligence in Austria, became an architect and worked and lived in England, Middle East, Africa, Australia, India, Canada, USA and Central America. Dropped out of a lucrative career in Australia when his students asked him what he was doing with his life...went on the road as a Hippy in Asia and California and ended up in Poona...took Sannyas in 1977...four years in Poona One working in the Kitchen and as a Handyman in the Boutique...then worked as an architect for four years in Rajneeshpuram …and has lived for the last twenty years in Guatemala where he built a small commune and retired to painting, writing and playing music. |
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“Jesus saves, Moses invests and Bhagwan spends,” went the headlines on the Ranch. Investment, misery, ambition etc. have not featured much in my life since I met Osho. Before I dropped out in the Sixties they were very much part of my life. Hard work, trying to keep ahead, getting to the top coupled with a marriage that was going downhill fast and all that entailed drove me to let go of everything I had invested up to then. My misery was exacerbated by the realization that I was stuck in a spiraling whirlwind of anxiety that I seemed always to be trying to relieve by going to pathetic “celebrations” like Friday Night bar-hopping. Mainly because we may lose our identities. We may have to change our games. We may not have something to worry about. So we invest in Misery. These days my identity is of little concern in that I don’t think about it very much. I used to spend a tremendous amount of time looking for the ideal partner. My lovers always fell short. It wasn’t my mother. Certainly not my father. None of my friends or teachers. It was ME !…. Nobody knows me better than me. No-one else stood a chance. I just had to love, accept and understand me. My games are pretty light hearted…I don’t need to manipulate people into doing what they don’t want to do so that I can have my own way. I have my own way by accepting what I have. Swami Prem Sarito |
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Transforming small things into celebration By Swami Yog Pradeep |
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Swami Yog Pradeep has been a wanderer in his young days. Born in Mumbai, he has traveled across the country before settling down in New Delhi. Equipped with a degree in Business Management, he has worked with a number of reputed corporate companies. Initiated into neo-sannyas in 1995, he is now meditatively balancing his life. |
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The shrill sound of the alarm clock shakes me out of slumber but I reach out to turn it off. Open my eyes with an effort to check the time. Tired and smelling of alcohol, the body aches but I continue a dazed sleep. Again a musical sound wakes me with a shock and I reach for my mobile phone. Its from my office What the hell am I doing? My colleague is informing that the boss is furious and our sales meet is due in 1 hour. Hurriedly, I run through a quick cold shower, skip my breakfast and reach office as fast as I can. Half asleep, half awake, finally the meeting is over with the boss staring at my absent minded face. Go out for a cup of coffee and bump into a colleague who is genuinely concerned about “what is wrong with me”. I narrate about the celebration that we have had last night on the occasion of a friend’s birthday. My friend’s question “Is this your idea about celebration?” hit me somewhere deep in the belly. Yaar…. What is celebration? My friend took me to Oshodham the next weekend. I was held in the pristine surroundings of a dhyan mandir. Not once did I miss out on the weekend merriment I always had. Celebration as the word sounds is more often used as a let go of the stresses of the week when you do not take life seriously and just relax. But is this celebration is all about, to become unconsciously ecstatic for a few hours, drift away from the reality of this world and suffer the next morning with a hangover and lethargy. Fortunately, browsing through the internet I hit many articles written by people who not only narrated their tales of the past but also made clear that celebration can be very different from what we perceive and it is not necessary to go through the suffering in the hunt for momentary pleasures. Osho, the compassionate enlightened master, without any discrimination and in very simple language differentiated pleasure and celebration. And this has been an eye opener. “Pleasure is escape. That's why pleasure is not worth it. In fact it is not pleasure, it is a sort of suicide. You escape from the problems, you put your back to the problems, but this is no way to solve them. You will have to come back, because once you have become conscious, unconsciousness cannot be a permanent state of affairs. You can have a dive into unconsciousness, but how long can you remain underwater? Alcohol or drugs or sex or anything in which you become unconscious, in which you lose for a moment all your worries, forget about them -- it is a forgetfulness, but forgetfulness cannot be a permanent state. So this is not helping in any way, pleasure doesn't help. You have to come back again and again -- and then it becomes a vicious circle. When you come back and you find the anguish is waiting, the anxiety, all the problems -- rather, they have increased -- you become afraid, you become nervous. Your whole being trembles and becomes fear; then you have to escape again and again” The only possibility of getting out of this whole nonsense is to find a new space in our beings through prayer and meditation. People who are alcoholics need meditation. They are in search of meditation, in deep search for ecstasy, but they cannot find the door. Groping in the dark they stumble upon alcohol. Alcohol is easily available in the market; meditation, not so easily available. People who are taking drugs all over the world are in search of inner ecstasy. They are trying to create the feeling heart and they cannot find the right way, the right path. The right path is not so easily available, and drugs are available. Drugs give false glimpses. Without discrimination, Osho shows us a way, to celebrate life consciously. “Alcohol is a private door to religion. Not a very good door, very temporary, momentary. But my understanding is that humanity will remain alcoholic till religion becomes its alcohol. Till more and more people come to religion, alcohol is going to remain; alcohol cannot disappear from the world. I am not against alcohol; I am all for bringing people towards religion, towards meditation, prayer. Once they start entering into prayer, once they have the real thing, they will drop alcohol. But the real thing has to happen first.” Meditation is real spiritual alcohol. Whether it is anxiety or ecstasy, whether it is tension or relaxation, alcohol or drugs simply helps to forget. For going into meditation, none of these are needed and if meditation happens, life will be full of love and joy and life can become a festival. Osho says, “If you really go into meditation you will not need alcohol, you will not need drugs. If you really go into meditation, your life will be a life of love, of sharing, of joy -- non-competitive, non-ambitious. You will not become a politician, you will live as a nobody. You will not suffer from an inferiority complex because you will not compare yourself with anybody else. And you will live in great gratitude because your life will have joy. You will not be attached to misery because you will not have any investment in misery. If you don't have any ego, you need not have any investment in misery. Then you can feast and your life can be a festival.And to me this is religion: to make life a feast, a festival; to transform energy in such a way that you become a celebration.” Swami Yog Pradeep |
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Celebration: Mystic Champagne by Lakshen Sucameli |
 Lakshen Sucameli is an Italian writer, filmaker and independent producer. At the moment is working on a big feature film on Osho.Details of the project can be found at : www.oshothemovie.com |
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Celebration... This very word makes me feel so delighted : expecially if it´s put into Osho´s teachings contest ! Also I remember a sticker we used at the Ranch in Oregon : ´”Moses invests - Jesus saves and Bhagwan spends” ... Osho whole message is based on Celebration ! The very concept of ´Zorba the Buddha´ is based on celebration. The very essence of Osho´s focus on celebration is His proposal for a BRIDGE between ´this´ world and ´the other´ ... between ´this´ shore and ´a further one´ ! He´s playing the same flute Krishna played and dancing the same whirling dance that Rumi did !!! For those who are acquainted with the mystical path´, celebration can fill the already beautiful space of silence with a subtle corrent of bliss ... as if champagne is served from the sky ! Yes : bliss and celebration is the Champagne ... as love and prayer is the Wine ... and cristalization plus awareness, is the Cognac. Osho didn´t drink alcol, but if He did ... He may have enjoyed champagne, as Jesus enjoyed wine and Gurdijeff the cognac ! Let me end with an Osho´s statement : “When I´ll be gone ... you will taste Me in all of my sannyasins and you will find the same taste : as the taste of the Ocean is the same everywhere you go !!!” That taste is that of CELEBRATION Lakshen Sucameli |
This morning I heard Osho say,| Previous Issues |
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