and the band played on...........

JammsGP06
Originally uploaded by alxindia.

well, so here we all were, at Guru Purnima, this year -- one of the greatest days in my life over the last year and a half.

it was an incredibly high and holy day -- we opened up our home temple to the public, for people to come and receive free healings, enjoy a kirtan/bhajans concert with The Mystic Jamms, and attend a homa (fire ceremony) together.

we started off the morning by doing an abishek of our little Shirdi Baba statue -- it was an INCREDIBLE experience, huge high energy and a whole group of Americans, who'd never witnessed an abishek before, receiving the blessing and the energy as though they'd done it all their lives.

ah, the USA -- Mahamaya Loka -- it causes great huge blessings to the whole area, and it also triggers the Maya to respond and react in Its own way.

the next thing was teaching some beautiful spiritual knowledge to a group of about 30 people here in the garden near our house -- and that was when the neighbors started getting restless.......

we did a free healing day, again, on the following weekend and, well, yikes.

in the middle of the kirtan, one of our neighbors starting playing heavy metal music as loud as she could, with all her windows thrown open -- just in case we missed the point!

so we stopped the kirtan and went on with the healings and a group meditation later in the day.

the incident prompted a visit from our landlord, which was completely comical in its tragically funny script: he was astounded at how NICE all the people were (hey! it was a bunch of white-clad, mala-wearing, pie-munching siddhas! of COURSE we're nice people!) and, well, the neighbors didn't appreciate all the people coming in......

and, well, "at least you're not running a meth lab!" he said, helpfully.

(geez, at LEAST, not that.)

but the upshot was: no more teaching in and around our home, Frost Cottage. period.

(despite plunging us into severe financial disorder, given this stricture.)

it was another interesting twist in the experience of bringing the high divine energy into a place that can barely stand it -- any time there is high positivity, immediately the negativity is interested and wants to play, to divert or pervert or destroy the divinity.

so we got to see this principle playing out, in a graphic display.

(but, hey, at least we're not running a METH lab!!!!!!!!)

and not only that, but we were reduced to scrambling to change our schedule of classes and offerings (already published on flyers and the internet by then), to find peoples' homes where we could still offer the workshops and classes......

so the last few months have been rocky in the extreme.

we're pretty philosophical about it, all the shakiness and feeling that we're standing on slippery sands -- it's clear to me that this is the price one pays, à la Big Boss Jesus, for bringing the powerful light into this world of entrenched illusion and tamas.

at the same time, it was clearly another kind of wake-up call from the OTHER Big Boss (giggling), Shirdi Sai Baba, in whose service my life and my husband's, Jonathan, is dedicated:

it's time to expand.

our cottage -- a tiny 800 square feet, counting 2 sleeping lofts! -- has been full to the gills with the people coming on these public days and for the larger classes... almost full to bursting.

it's been a little like the clown car -- you know, the teeny-tiny car and seemingly DOZENS of clowns pouring out in a never-ending stream! -- there's no WAY, in terms of what we know about modern physics and spatial relationships, that we could fit more than 25 people in this house without everyone being in each other's laps....

and yet somehow, magically, the cottage would seem to sort of stretch and expand to accomodate yet a Few More Bodies.....

(people who've witnessed this phenomenon frequently joke about it, with wonder in their eyes!)

but the point is -- it's time to expand our teachings and the scope of our healings and it's clearly time to find a large, beautiful space that can accomodate our steadily-growing spiritual community here in the Santa Cruz mountains.

in the last year, our satsang group has grown from 4 people, on average, to a regular crew of about 20.

our student body has expanded exponentially -- at this point I'm not even actually sure how many people we've taught this ancient divine knowledge to, but it's in the hundreds.

dozens of students are actively practicing The Five Elements Process (you can see more details about this at www.karmatalk.com) and many have started doing healings through the elements' energies. the results are stunning.

the groups of people attending the healing kirtan/bhajans concerts we offer monthly with The Mystic Jamms Band have increased to anywhere from 30 or more, per night.

finally -- the icing on the cake -- Sri Kaleshwar's magnificent book, called The Divine Mystery Fort, has become one of the most popular sales titles at our local spiritual bookstore, Gateways, in Santa Cruz.

Kaleshwar often says that the negative energy tends to build up fast, accrue power rapidly (like Hitler's 3rd Reich), but it crashes and burns -- but the divine energy builds up step by step, slowly, slowly, and NEVER fades away.

this is why connecting with the divine takes faith and patience.

Shirdi Baba's famous begging career, during his lifetime, was reduced to his asking people, constantly, for merely two rupees, symbolizing his two favorite virtues: Faith & Patience.

two rupees, anyone?