Unbound expeditions 🏕️ - My visit to Isha ashram, Coimbatore

Bhaskar Shastri, Seawood#

 

It gives me immense pride in penning down my thoughts to reach out to our elite community @ Hiranandani. I was asked to share my thoughts around the theme of travel. I have never been a frequent traveler either for work or pleasure. But whatever travel I have done over the past few years have always left me with comparing it with our journey in this lifetime as a human being and discovering the purpose we are here. While I have visited a few countries, nothing comes close to the beauty that is present in our own India. I want to call out the journey I embarked into in my life post my visit to Isha Yoga center, Coimbatore in 2012 when I was visiting my team in Coimbatore as part of my official trip. As I entered the ashram and familiarized myself with the ambience and theme of this spectacular place, I started connecting with several things. For one, sitting in the presence of the Dhyanalinga, the thoughts reverberated in my head, the seed has been sown, which cannot be undone. What was the seed? What did it have in store for me in this journey of life? I was to find out more than a decade where my personality has developed and I think I have found a purpose in my life, continuing with my visit to the ashram in 2022. The purpose I found is well articulated in one of the tenets expounded through the Inner engineering program: "I am the mother of this earth". 

Isha Yoga programs are not just centred around achieving inner well-being, but exude the principles of becoming socially conscious individuals. We have a lot to give in this life and this should be our purpose. We are all uniquely endowed with gifts which we can serve certain screaming needs of the society around us. For me, I am eternally grateful that I am part of this wonderful community that gives us opportunities to serve as we are in a position of both financial abundance as well as in the midst of great minds who can come together to make the lives of others around us a beautiful thing for this world to become a better place. We already have many of us engaging in Anna Dhaan, few of us leading and living the vision of Zero to Landfill, many of us who are constantly donating to good causes. But friends, let me tell you this, there are so many more things we have in our hands to do and through this medium calling out to all of those hearts who want to come together to make a difference! 

We need to fill ourselves with love and gratitude, only then we can give away love and be in service. For this, there is one clear path laid out and that is Yoga. Yoga literally means Union with the higher consciousness, how can this union be achieved if we are unable to raise our efforts after becoming socially conscious and making a tangible difference to beings around us, be it humans, animals or even our living and breathing earth. Save Soil was a very large awareness campaign from Isha, and I am sure there are several others. Can we all pledge to just one thing to start with – becoming socially conscious, this can be a life changing act!