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If you aren’t growing… You are dying. The classic business adage has something to teach us about life; let’s unpack it in this week’s musing! One of the many joys of parenthood is seeing the world through the eyes of a toddler. My daughter, following in Raya’s footsteps, has a penchant for beauty. Not only do flowers capture her attention, but they also spark curiosity in her mind. “Why do flowers have to die?” As I franticly recall my high school biology, I try to impress her with a mostly true explanation of the harsh reality of plant life. I

Imitation They say it’s the highest form of flattery, but what is the place of imitation on the path of Yoga? Yoga is an applied craft, first and foremost, it is something you do. Crowing practices, like meditation, involve an active component; taking yourself to a place and sitting down, and an inactive, or surrendered component, ie doing nothing. For thousands of years, well before the age of Youtube, seekers sought out guides. The seeker was called a shishya, and the guide, a remover of darkness, a guru. The interaction between student and teacher, guide and guided, shishya and disciple

You are walking down a road, a few metres in front of you is an absent minded friend who is about to walk off the left of the track. “Go right!” you yell. A while later, besotted by fatigue, the same friend is about to veer to the right. “Go left!” Life is a journey and our path is our daily reality. It winds, twists, bends, forks, it goes up and down and on and on. One day, it could be us that is teetering on the edge of a precarious precipice in need of a gentle nudge. Who is

Lemonade. If there is one thing certain about life, it’s that there will be an eternal supply of lemons. What is a lemon? Broadly speaking, anything that can make us sour. Our plans, despite being a source of comedic material for God, seldom get enacted without a hitch. The question I ponder this Monday as I recover from the ‘week that was,’ is, what to do when life hands us Lemons? The proverbial wisdom is of course to make lemonade. What is the secret of this metaphysical recipe? Lemon (an unfavourable circumstance) + Water + Sugar = Winning. Even though these

Trees. God bless ‘em. Can you imagine a life without leaves? One of the best things about doing a ‘tree-change’ has been the fact I’ve become a little bit of a tree afficionado. Though I’ve killed my fair share through misguided plantings and wayward wallabies who have a propensity to graze exotic growth, I have planted a bunch at it has brought me such joy. There is always a little bit of jubilation and pride when a tree you have planted takes hold and prospers, as Raya once told me, “to plant a tree means to believe in the future.”

“I can’t feel myself growing!” Says the 5 year old who only yesterday was complaining of aches in her little legs. One of the many joys (and terrors) of parenthood is seeing rapid growth before your eyes. For a youngster, the allure of adulthood must be supremely enticing; eat what you want, watch what you want, drive around, and obviously, boss kids around. Ironic that just the other day I was trying to help my daughter enjoy the carefree reality of her childhood; the consequence for her to get what she wants, ie rapid growth, comes with a price tag

You don’t feel right. A yearning, a questioning, perhaps a sense of curiosity. Maybe it’s worse; a feeling of dis-ease, a malady, excessive rumination. Lets assume that something inspires you to seek out change. And you do. You take your courage and you book yourself into a retreat. Many people join our retreats when life has thrown a curveball or two. On them, Raya and I share a heartfelt, humble and Soulful message. 99% of the time, we share what has worked for us; Himalayan Meditation. We learned Himalayan Meditation from our guide, Swami Shivkrupanad (our Swamiji). Swamiji’s teachings are delivered in

A look. A glance. A reflection. The Eye. It sees. What? The Yogis refer to the mind as the inner instrument (antakarana) and this morning, if you will indulge me, I have a little game that we can play together. Bring your awareness to what you see before you. A screen. Some text. A desk. Perhaps a phone. Notice that what you see. By default, they are seen as objects. Things. Stuff. Pick one object (any of the multitude before you,) and stay with it. What do you notice? Push further and you will notice not an object before you, but

Life moves. Stuff grows. Sadly, we are like a business; if we ain’t growing, we are most likely….   Death… gulp, what are we going to talk about next, surely not taxes? (Though it may be topical right now, I promise I will spare you!) Besides the obvious, when it comes to life, what can we say for certain? Let’s start by looking around. What’s happening. What do you see? Life… its the thing that moves. Trees, planets, quasars. All moving. Even rocks and glaciers are eroding and flowing on long enough timeframe. Life. It moves. Ponder this for a

Navigation was one of those things that was drilled into me at an early age; scouts, cadets, and a father who himself served in the reserves. By the time I needed to navigate in the Army, I had my fair share of bearings under my belt. To navigate (with an old school map and compass, tsk tsk the GPS crowd) one must first orient the map. In order to orient the map, one must have a vague idea of cardinal directions (North, South, East and West.) How do we know which way is north? Enter; the compass. How is it

Doom. It’s everywhere. AI is going to take over, bots are driving us apart. Don’t make the mistake of browsing the comments section under a video, picture or article! Foreign interference. Left vs Right. East vs West. Simply put… Hate. How to cope in this tit-for-tat world, especially when it seems to be accelerating so damn fast? My suggestion; we do what humans have always done. The core ingredients of bread have not changed for millennia. Nor the method. It’s a staple. The modern myth is that the latest and greatest thing will cure what ails us. I say give us

I grew up as part of the game-boy generation; back then Tetris was considered a mind-blowing experience. It was revolutionary that we could have an entertainment device in our hot little hands, able to be played when we wanted. Over the proceeding decades, games have got increasingly sophisticated, to the point that at a glance, a casual observe would be hard pressed to tell if a game was in fact a recording of reality. Why are we drawn to games? What does it say about our human experience? (And what does this have to do with meditation and yoga?) Before

Modernity is awash with good intentions; people support all manner of causes as they capture the collective imagination. Few consider, though, the old adage of ‘good intentions pave the way to hell’ and fewer still believe it applies to them. Why is it that we are drawn to cast judgment? To pick up arms? Why are we bothered with righting wrongs in the world? The traditions of Yoga and Vedanta posit that a Saint need not wait for global peace for themselves to be at peace. But is that us?  In life, we get a choice in who we take

“But whyyyyy?” Anyone who has spent time around an inquisitive 3 or 4 year old will surely have had their fill of that simple question! Invariably, I grasp around trying to remember a relevant fact from high school geography, and try to bring my explanation down to the level of a pre-schooler. “The clouds are read because…. it is morning!”  The concept of the refraction of light as it passess through different densities is a few years away. It won’t be the last time for the day that I cuff it… We short-hand life constantly. Why?  God, the cause of being, Higher Power

I’ve spent a considerable portion of my life asking the question “what’s the point?”  Often I am triggered to ask this sort of question when I don’t understand a predicament I am facing. In my despair, I’ve gone so far as to ask “what’s the point of even living?”  They say it never hurts to ask a question, but to question one’s own being? Ouch… it’s rough.  When I ask “what’s the point” I have certainly lost track of my ‘why.’ Without a why, the mind spins endlessly.   The point is an aim, a goal, a device to focus the

Trying. Striving. Struggling. When we first start upon the path of any applied pursuit, be it self-cultivation, a skill or hobby like learning an instrument, there is no denying that effort is absolutely required. Indeed, effort seems to be rewarded with what seems like progress. And the more effort we apply, the more effort we seem to make. Imagine yourself learning to play a guitar.  At first, the fingers are barely able to hold the shape of a basic chord, and when the guitar is strummed there are more notes out of tune than in. (Flashbacks to my childhood when

We’ve been a bit quiet the last 9-12 months and we are sorry if you have missed us or if we have been slow to respond. Where have we been? Let us bring you up to speed… Traditional Yoga has the lofty goal of enlightenment; freedom from suffering in this lifetime.  Practices like meditation, hatha yoga, devotion and spiritual study are not quick fixes or band-aids, but methods that help us to probe the depths of our own experience as a Soul, as a body, a mind and a human on planet Earth. To be free though, we must become aware

Who would have thought? Way back when, I got taught to fight. As a soldier, you learn at boot camp that you don’t bring a knife to a gun-fight.  “Weapons overmatch” is the military jargon for “bring a bigger gun” and this Monday I’m reflecting on how the outer conflict of my service can provide insight into the ‘inner-battle’ that is fought inside the human heart.  How do you know if you are caught by this mysterious inner conflict?  Simple. You are suffering (don’t despair, it’s a human universal.) Now I am not glorifying war or violence… but there is a