Once a journalist asked Sri Sri Ravi Shankar,"Are you enlightened"? and He said, "NO". The journalisk repeatedly kept asking. He said ," no tell me really are you enlightened?" Sri Sri repeatedly kept saying "no I am not". We always know the truth. Deep inside our heart knows. So even when he said "No I am not enlightened" the journalist could not believe it.
Many a times I have seen arrogant, rude reporters asking idiotic questions to Sri Sri. It is great to see the calmness with which he replies all the questions and there definately seems something special in the personality. But more importantly even if we assume that he is a FAKE and is a born great actor what about the thousands of his followers on whose faces there is an unmistakable sense of joy, enthusiasm, and a willingness to contribute.
One of my friends in Ahmedabad told me that on 2nd november the Art of Living family is hosting an event called ," Annabrahma". 5000 varieties of food are going to be cooked and served to underpriviliged children. Sri Sri is also going to inaugrate the project of free tribal schools in Gujarat in the presence of thousands of people during the evening satsang.
Around 1000 part time volunteers and teachers are having a great time working for it. He was telling me that the levels of enthusiasm amongst the volunteers is unbelievable. Of course there may be differences of opinions, a few skirmishes here and there but instead of doing a postmortem of the negative events I really wonder what on earth inspires these guys to do and accomplish such events at such a large scale.
Is this just a bubble thats going to burst in just a matter of time? Are all these people faking joy? Even in that case good work seems to be happening in society. Atleast they are not sitting at home and plonking themselves in front of television sets watching stupid TV serials and cricket matches.
Something worthwhile is being done. Instead of jumping to conclusions and screaming at the top of our voices just because we know of a few others who were fake, let us atleast wait and watch. So far these guys seem genuine.
"J"
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Really?
Why would a naxalite commander surrender his weapons to the police after completing an Art of living course? Its easy to instill negativity in the minds of "innocent" people about something genuine but how easy it is to brain "wash" a Naxalite and make him give up violence? People who are habituated to mudslinging and involved in writing negativity against Art of Living I request them to read this http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Naxal-leader-surrenders-in-Jharkhand/articleshow/6423651.cms
I also challenge them to approach and interview all such people who have been transformed by the Art of Living and write about it in their blogs if they are even remotely interested in propagating the "TRUTH" and maintaining objectivity.
First of all more than ninety percent of the people working actively with the organisation come from the educated middle class section of the society. Considering this how is it that all of them are completely overlooking the so called "facts" propagated by these blogs? Most of the Aolites consist of people who are intelligent and educated enough to not get fooled into something blasphemous.
Out of all the people who "complete" the course and practice the techniques "everyday" 100 percent people have positive feed backs. To me this seems to be the only reason why Art of Living is growing at such an exceptionally fast pace.
Another point to be noted is that the diversity that one can see in Art of Living. One of the signs of an enlightened master is that HE or SHE attracts all types of people from all different types of backgrounds and from all strata of society. Sri Sri in a span of may be a month or so would meet people of all types from slum dwellers to CEO's, From prison inmates to top scientists, from politicians to housewives, from village farmers to urban youth.
An organisation which is here only to make money, charging exorbitant fees for courses and giving almost nothing in return, having a leader who is angry and screaming all the time, and followers who have corrupt minds, psychotic behaviour and quite a few of them being characterless morons - Will such an organisation last? that too for 30 years? will it spread over 151 countries? Will it survive the test of time?
At least my common sense compels me to completely disbelieve the so called propagators of truth and who think that they are doing a great job by acting like messiahs saving people from going to hell!
J
I also challenge them to approach and interview all such people who have been transformed by the Art of Living and write about it in their blogs if they are even remotely interested in propagating the "TRUTH" and maintaining objectivity.
First of all more than ninety percent of the people working actively with the organisation come from the educated middle class section of the society. Considering this how is it that all of them are completely overlooking the so called "facts" propagated by these blogs? Most of the Aolites consist of people who are intelligent and educated enough to not get fooled into something blasphemous.
Out of all the people who "complete" the course and practice the techniques "everyday" 100 percent people have positive feed backs. To me this seems to be the only reason why Art of Living is growing at such an exceptionally fast pace.
Another point to be noted is that the diversity that one can see in Art of Living. One of the signs of an enlightened master is that HE or SHE attracts all types of people from all different types of backgrounds and from all strata of society. Sri Sri in a span of may be a month or so would meet people of all types from slum dwellers to CEO's, From prison inmates to top scientists, from politicians to housewives, from village farmers to urban youth.
An organisation which is here only to make money, charging exorbitant fees for courses and giving almost nothing in return, having a leader who is angry and screaming all the time, and followers who have corrupt minds, psychotic behaviour and quite a few of them being characterless morons - Will such an organisation last? that too for 30 years? will it spread over 151 countries? Will it survive the test of time?
At least my common sense compels me to completely disbelieve the so called propagators of truth and who think that they are doing a great job by acting like messiahs saving people from going to hell!
J
Sunday, August 8, 2010
The Art of Leaving
I believe that for any person or organization, it takes a very very long time to build trust and reputation in the society, and being a spiritual organization it is all the more difficult. It takes an immense amount of time and social work, before even people know about the organization, forget recognition. The Art of Living has succeeded in many ways to convince people about the work it has been doing.
Though I agree that there could be a little flaws within the organization, the kind of work that they have been doing overshadows any minor glitches. There are not many other non profit social organizations that I know of, spread across a hundred and more countries, irrespective of religion and caste. They should be doing something brilliant to spread at this rate in a little more than 25 years. I am still surprised and taken aback to see a few people maligning the name of an organization recently, which otherwise did not gather a lot of criticism all these 30 years.
I personally know that the Art of Living is indeed the Art of Leaving. I have seen the transformation in a small group of people I met a few months back. They have totally given up drugs after attending just one of the Art of 'Leaving' workshops. The joy that could be seen on the faces of their close ones and friends cannot be expressed. Recently there have been media reports of a few naxals (a group of rebels in India) who gave up violence and came to the path of peace after talks with Sri Sri. I have also heard a story (story because I have not seen the person for real) which says a lady is taking the Art of Living course for a naxalite leader who murdered her husband. I am sure there would be countless other stories that you and I have not heard of and probably never will. When such reports come in popular electronic and print media, which is otherwise very critical about anything spiritual, there should indeed be a lot of good things they are doing. If the Art of Living was really looking to make money and was purely looking for profits, they wouldn’t be bothered to have workshops and courses happening in slums and prisons. They wouldn’t be bothered to take up social initiatives and community projects in disaster struck regions, but would be focussing mainly just on corporate courses and funding from government agencies.
From what I have observed, it is right to call the organization - Art of Leaving - the art of leaving violence, drugs and things that destroy the harmony in our society. Like I have said in my earlier posts, I request the critics to do some basic research before making blank statements and injecting poison in the minds of people
Though I agree that there could be a little flaws within the organization, the kind of work that they have been doing overshadows any minor glitches. There are not many other non profit social organizations that I know of, spread across a hundred and more countries, irrespective of religion and caste. They should be doing something brilliant to spread at this rate in a little more than 25 years. I am still surprised and taken aback to see a few people maligning the name of an organization recently, which otherwise did not gather a lot of criticism all these 30 years.
I personally know that the Art of Living is indeed the Art of Leaving. I have seen the transformation in a small group of people I met a few months back. They have totally given up drugs after attending just one of the Art of 'Leaving' workshops. The joy that could be seen on the faces of their close ones and friends cannot be expressed. Recently there have been media reports of a few naxals (a group of rebels in India) who gave up violence and came to the path of peace after talks with Sri Sri. I have also heard a story (story because I have not seen the person for real) which says a lady is taking the Art of Living course for a naxalite leader who murdered her husband. I am sure there would be countless other stories that you and I have not heard of and probably never will. When such reports come in popular electronic and print media, which is otherwise very critical about anything spiritual, there should indeed be a lot of good things they are doing. If the Art of Living was really looking to make money and was purely looking for profits, they wouldn’t be bothered to have workshops and courses happening in slums and prisons. They wouldn’t be bothered to take up social initiatives and community projects in disaster struck regions, but would be focussing mainly just on corporate courses and funding from government agencies.
From what I have observed, it is right to call the organization - Art of Leaving - the art of leaving violence, drugs and things that destroy the harmony in our society. Like I have said in my earlier posts, I request the critics to do some basic research before making blank statements and injecting poison in the minds of people
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Not a BIG Deal
I have been asking a few people who have taken courses with the Art of Living Foundation whether they found it too expensive and whether they regretted having invested in the course. Most of them said that they did initially hesitate to do the course because of the cost. But after having experienced the course and noticing the obvious benefits, they did not regret having invested the time and money at all.
I must have talked to probably a few hundreds, but I have yet to meet a person who said that it was really not worth it. I went one step further and asked quite a few who practiced the techniques regularly whether they would give up their practices if they were given ten times the course fee in return. All of them replied in the negative. I must also mention that I came across quite a few people who were given scholarships after they convinced the teacher that they could really not afford it.
Some people in India say that AOL charges exceptionally high amounts for their courses and is only for the rich and elite. Well, looking at the tremendous following that AOL has across India, it is difficult for anyone to believe that all these people belong exclusively to the rich and elite class of society! Most of them seem to be from the middle class. In fact even in Mumbai a course in Mulund or Thane (middle-class suburbs) generally attracts many more people than a course in South Mumbai (pre-dominantly elite class) though the course fee is the same.
It would be absurd to say that all the people practicing AOL techniques in remote Indian villages belong to the rich and elite. And I don't think that people living in the slums of Dharavi would do AOL courses if they were exorbitantly priced. It is obvious that AOL has designed their fee structure based on the socio-economic strata of the population living in the area and this policy seems perfectly sensible.
A little research can clear a lot of misconceptions. I sincerely request the cynics to adopt such an attitude instead of resorting to useless wrangling.
J
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Brain Washed
Unfortunately lot of people in the world suffer from preconceived notions and concepts about spirituality and enlightenment. One of them is that, Art of Living has rearranged ancient knowledge of all the scriptures and put it in a package and sold it to millions and made lot of money. In that case what is a book? Its just words from a dictionary rearranged. Why do we spend money to buy books and not just dictionaries? Spiritual knowledge was given by masters as per the need of the time. A master “HAS” to package the knowledge in such a way that is relevant to the prevalent times so that people can relate to it and implement it in their day-to-day life.
A few others say that Art of Living is just brainwashing people into something and charging money to support Sri Sri 's extravagant life style. Well,according to me there are far more easier ways of earning money than going around teaching people how to meditate. I would also like to challenge such people to keep pace with Sri Sri's schedule for more than a week. They would have no energy left to even wonder about the difference between "extravagant" and "extraordinary".Moreover service and charity cannot happen with an empty bowl. I would challenge the cynics to do a bit more research about the service projects of the Art of Living rather than just having blind faith in the words of a few other cynics. Just because the media rejects all good news as "soft news" one cant go on believing people who have got into the habit of resorting to shameless and baseless character assassination.
I recently attended a satsang in the Bangalore ashram in the presence of Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. Towards the end Sri Sri was talking about a story of a village called kathewadi in Nanded district in Maharashtra which was completely transformed in a few months after a few dedicated volunteers of the Art of Living reached out to the villagers with this beautiful knowledge and also trained them into organic farming. The village was totally violence prone but now the entire village folk get together every morning and meditate. There is no sign of any violence. Everything that is sold in this village is organic. There are shops with no shopkeepers! People take what they want and drop the money in a money box. You would barely find anybody smoking or consuming alcohol. Each one has done the Art of Living course and has been brain–washed!! As Sri Sri narrated the story HE introduced us to the village sarpanch (Village Head) and a few others who had come to the ashram to invite Sri Sri to the village. It was quite heart warming to see the gratitude in their eyes.
I don’t see anything wrong with such kind of brain washing! After hearing and reading what people talk and write about something so genuinely beautiful I think there are lot of brains out there that need to be washed… desperately. While I was having dinner I met a young guy who had just finished teaching the Yes!+ course to 200 inmates of the TIHAR jail. His experience was absolutely amazing. He said that quite a few of them told him that if they had met him earlier they would not have landed up in Jail.
Given the end result I would only wish that more and more people get their brains and minds washed and create a beautiful environment which is exactly what is anyway happening and no matter what will continue to happen.
J
Monday, May 31, 2010
Guruji and everyone at the Ashram are safe
A shot was fired at Sri Sri Ravi Shankar as he was getting into his car. It caused a minor injury to a devotee called Vinay.
This was a cause for grave concern for me, that such an attack could be made on Sri Sri's life. Guruji's response was balanced, calm and muted. Watching him made me feel relaxed and instantly took away a lot of the worry this incident had caused in my head. I had a few friends at the ashram and they said they were amazed that they felt no worry at all and in fact slept as soundly as they had on any other night. That a few thousand people had no worries, no panic at all after a shot had been fired in their midst and they went on with their meditation and seva as usual in itself is quite incomprehensible. As Sri Sri mentioned, the power of Sadhana and meditation is such that it will make you fearless.
At the various places where people write ill about Art of Living and Sri Sri, i was dismayed at the utter lack of sensitivity shown to the incident. They have quoted Guruji saying in the Astavakra Geeta (some 20 years ago) that violence happens only to violent people. It is Karma. So how come violence happened to and around Sri Sri?
I would like to point out here that violence DID NOT happen. A gunman in a crowd of a few thousand people could have wreaked utter havoc. He just fired exactly one shot which was almost harmless and fled. No one panicked, there was no stampede, nothing. It could have been much, much worse, but thankfully it was not.
I think it was because of Sri Sri and all his devotees and their faith in their Guru that the bullet was not fatal for anyone. Even a person with utterly violent thoughts in his head couldn't take much action in the presence of Sri Sri. We definitely need many, many more people to become like this. People in whose presence, violence would cease or diffuse harmlessly.
Our world would be a far better and safer place to live in.
J
This was a cause for grave concern for me, that such an attack could be made on Sri Sri's life. Guruji's response was balanced, calm and muted. Watching him made me feel relaxed and instantly took away a lot of the worry this incident had caused in my head. I had a few friends at the ashram and they said they were amazed that they felt no worry at all and in fact slept as soundly as they had on any other night. That a few thousand people had no worries, no panic at all after a shot had been fired in their midst and they went on with their meditation and seva as usual in itself is quite incomprehensible. As Sri Sri mentioned, the power of Sadhana and meditation is such that it will make you fearless.
At the various places where people write ill about Art of Living and Sri Sri, i was dismayed at the utter lack of sensitivity shown to the incident. They have quoted Guruji saying in the Astavakra Geeta (some 20 years ago) that violence happens only to violent people. It is Karma. So how come violence happened to and around Sri Sri?
I would like to point out here that violence DID NOT happen. A gunman in a crowd of a few thousand people could have wreaked utter havoc. He just fired exactly one shot which was almost harmless and fled. No one panicked, there was no stampede, nothing. It could have been much, much worse, but thankfully it was not.
I think it was because of Sri Sri and all his devotees and their faith in their Guru that the bullet was not fatal for anyone. Even a person with utterly violent thoughts in his head couldn't take much action in the presence of Sri Sri. We definitely need many, many more people to become like this. People in whose presence, violence would cease or diffuse harmlessly.
Our world would be a far better and safer place to live in.
J
Saturday, May 22, 2010
Only time will tell
I strongly believe that a sign of a matured mind is to have a balanced and a universal perspective towards everything that one comes across in life. As a movement gains enormous popularity it is but natural that it attracts criticism. According to me it does not take even a fair amount of creativity to put down something. We live in a world where the embodiment of love was crucified and even the lives of the greatest scientists were not spared because they spoke the truth.
There is no denying the fact that the Art of Living has been tremendously successful in bringing about a great transformation in the lives of millions of people from all over the world. I have myself met many people who have completely given up addictions like smoking, drinking, drugs just a few days after taking up the first Art of Living course, and will shortly be putting up their testimonials on this blog.
How can anybody just discard all these experiences as delusional or false or a marketing gimmick? The stories of transformation are no doubt real and irrefutable. On the other hand most of the critical observation some people have made seems to be overtly exaggerated, the stories seem to be made up just to sound scandalous and there does not seem to be any mention of any of the positive aspects of Art of Living or Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. Such one sided, evidence less, biased observations seem to be unreal to a rational mind.
One thing that creates problems for the Art of Living as an organization is that it seems to be quite loosely structured. There are no fixed criteria for a person to be a representative of Art of Living as a volunteer. There is hardly any specific hierarchy amongst the teachers and as human beings come together and work together especially in such a framework errors are bound to happen. As Sri Sri has been known to quote on occasion the event (that was being organized) was mesmerizing but behind the scenes things were a mess.
One thing that creates problems for the Art of Living as an organization is that it seems to be quite loosely structured. There are no fixed criteria for a person to be a representative of Art of Living as a volunteer. There is hardly any specific hierarchy amongst the teachers and as human beings come together and work together especially in such a framework errors are bound to happen. As Sri Sri has been known to quote on occasion the event (that was being organized) was mesmerizing but behind the scenes things were a mess.
It has been 29 years and Art of Living is moving from strength to strength. Totally undeterred, it is making its own way through various obstacles. Ultimately only Time will tell how genuine this movement is and how long it lasts.
J