“We are monks, we don’t have a home”, the fakir said to him with a voice of pride. “Maybe home is where your heart is, so where does your heart dwells”? he asked him back. They looked at each other with unspoken silence, maybe they both were in the quest to find that.
We often talk about love and yet the more we explore the more elusive it feels. Like the fragrance of the rose, we all want to tap it, hold it, possess it, consume it, yet knowing deep down that it belongs to the wind, who would caress it and abundantly share it with everyone it touches.
He discovered this fakir or Swami, living alone in a small mountain, bit away from the bustling and tourist town of Rishikesh. A civil servant until few years back, he renounciated as a monk as spends his time in solitude in this mountain. Swami was very gentle in nature, without any pretense of intellect or spirituality. He would cook delicious South Indian dosas and offer everything he had very generously to every one who crossed his way.
Together they found joy in doing little things from cleaning, cooking and chanting 1000 names of Vishnu.
He liked it here, would sit there by himself , gazing at mountains, sometimes deep in thought and sometimes distracted by his smartphone and internet. It reminded him the story of Robinson Crusoe, who was deserted in an island and built a life there.
He met this swami through his friend, Ambarish, another seeker, who left his conventional IT job, stayed with many yogis, did some extreme diet experiments on himself till realizing that only goal of life is to be happy. But then next question comes what makes us happy ? Such a simple question and yet as adults we forget that what makes us really happy. Ask a child and he would tell you without blinking his eye but the moment we are grown up with our conditioning and layers, we forget this very fundamental need and instead pursue things to create more layers so we don’t have to look at this question.
Too much thinking is not too good either, he remembered one of his teacher Annette’s advice to him “love, and do whatever you want.”
Random Photos
Path going towards the ashram in mountain.
Swami atmanand
Little shack overlooking the mountains
What have you learned so far ?
Too much thinking… Why so serious
Please come again.. He would tell us all.