Twitter Updates for 2012-06-13
- Read Bodhinatha's article, Which Yoga Should I Follow?, in English, Gujarati, Hindi, Marathi, Russian, Spanish or Tamil http://t.co/GcAhZIdQ #
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Sadhaka Mayuranatha Receives Samaya Diksha
[This slideshow has large versions, click on the full screen icon.
Today Sadhaka Mayuranatha received his Samaya Diksha, hearing the sacred Panchakshara Mantra and special instructions for daily japa sadhana from the lips of the Satguru. In the Saiva Siddhanta tradition this moment of diksha is considered a crucial point in the long journey of the soul, when the Lord Siva's Power of Revealing Grace, comes down to the devotee through the form of the Satguru, opening the door and the opportunity and means to liberation.
Nataraja's Nilayam Opens Today
The old kitchen of Kauai Aadheenam had parts and pieces going back to the 40's and 50's when the estate here was built. After living here since 1969, it was badly deteriorated. Four months ago, Sivanathaswami began a process to renovate the kitchen by hiring a professional designer to design the interior. The plan was not only to clean up and refurbish, but to radically transform the space into a more useful, user friendly kitchen. And the goal was achieved in four months. As Kulapati Deva Rajan remarked today: "It's amazing to see how many work spaces there are now." Indeed, eight or nine people could now work together here.
Twitter Updates for 2012-06-11
- http://t.co/DRknQCxW One of Bodhinatha's favorites in our garden, "Barnum & Bailey," a fuzzy & fancy pendant heliconia in bloom. #
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Hindus Visit from Maryland
Manisha Kavadi from Maryland, with her parents Vasudha and Sharad from Texas. Visiting us for first time after hearing about our rudraksha grove and then discovering we also have a temple and more!
Shankaralingam Sent By Lord Ganesha To Help with Noni?
An unusual coincidence brought Shankaralingam Pitchaiah to our office today. The monastery, as most of you know, has a five acre organic noni field. We're exploring producing our own noni juice, and spoke with a chemist at a lab in Honolulu (as testing is required). That chemist turned out to be Tai Khan, originally of Fiji, who knew about the temple and mentioned his friend, Shankara, would be on Kauai on Saturday. Shankara, Tai explained, was a microbiologist who could help me understand the testing requirements for noni. This turned into quite a boon, as Shankara and Arumuganathaswami discussed government regulations for half an hour, greatly increasing our knowledge of this previously opaque area!
He was accompanied by his wife Nagasundaravalli Ramakrishnan and his friend Lakshmanan Pitchaiya and his wife Shanmuga Sundari Subramanian, all from originally from Tamil Nadu.
Vaishnava Swami from Mayapur Visits
Late this morning we were suddenly graced with the presence of Vaishnava swami Bhakti Purusottama Swami and his assistant from Sri Mayapur Chandrodaya Mandir in West Bengal, India. They were brought here by the Chakraborty devotee family near Chicago.
Swamiji is on a tour through many cities in USA, lecturing on Bhagavad Gita and Srimad Bhagavatam.
They had a wonderful time here, marveling at the atmosphere, environment, rudraksha trees which they had never seen before, let alone the blue fruit around the seed which is visible right now. Their website is http://www.mayapur.com
Bhakti Purusottama Swami on the left
Gajanan Helping in the Ganapati Kulam
Gajanan is serving in the Ganapati Kulam for two phases. He is focusing on two projects. One is to assist with the migration of media content to our new web site which is still under construction. This phase he has been working on slideshows. Click here for a sneak peak Note: not all the navigation links are functional yet. The new site will dramatically improve access and exposure to our right collection of digital assets.
His other project is to process scans of an unusual book which has the stories of over 300 temples in India, each of which is accompanied by a piece of black and white line art. He is cropping the scans to extract the art which was done by famed artist S. Rajam. This collection might otherwise be lost but will now live on in future publications and web apps. Two examples below.
These drawings, simple as they are, have a compelling quality.
Golden Gate Mission Satsang with Bodhinatha
This is another series of photos of Bodhinatha's satsang with the Golden Gate Mission, members, meeting some local Saiva priests and the Samaya Diksha of Punita Ajaya
From Our Gurus' Teachings
Archives are now available through 2001. Light colored days have no posts. 1998-2001 coming later.
