Padma in satsang with Giten
GITEN IS CURRENTLY EDITING HIS NEW BOOK “WHEN THE DROP BECOMES THE OCEAN” ON THE UPANISHADS, THE INSIGHT AND WISDOM OF INDIA
“Man is like a river on his way towards the ocean, towards the divine. The drop has a thirst, a longing. The drop knows nothing of the ocean, but the drop longs to become one with the ocean. The drop cannot find fulfillment until it becomes on with the ocean, the divine. This satsang series is a journey to the ocean, to the divine.”
– Swami Dhyan Giten
Giten is currently compiling the book “when the Drop becomes the Ocean.”, which will be published in August, 2020.
The book is a compilation of lectures from satsang with Giten on the Upanishads, the insight and wisdom of India, between March 2016 and July 2018 in Stockholm.
The book is dedicated to Padma, Gitens beloved friend since many lives, who participated in the satsang on The Upanishads.
Don´t lose the quality
The foreword to the book by Deva Emanuel
From Deva Emanuel’s beautiful, insightful, honest and humorous foreword, which is also a tribute to Padma, whome the book is dedicated to.
The Upanishads is where the outer joy caused by outer circumstances gradually cools, loses its grip and disappears. At the point where impulses are born out of an inner depth, a being. From a spontaneous gap from the sensations, the silence flushes over me. The sensations and the identification with “me” no longer exist – and this is joy. The deeper the emptiness, the more joy. Here is home, here is bliss of the divine, amen.
Upanishads & satsang
In order to describe the Upanishads, the focus is instead pointing at satsang as the central tool. In contrast to traditional Western education – where the students from a very early age learns to obey orders and obtain knowledge from outer sources – the student’s focus is here on the inner work and to involve himself totally. Satsang challenge the student so that he gradually deepens his own inner listening.
Satsang with Giten has continuously challenged me and taken me deeper in myself. The core of this process is to become conscious of what is standing between me and being in contact with my inner being. The environment within warms, softens and relaxes inside in this first “witness”-phase. The moment I lose identification with “myself”, I slip into the phase of silence, and here there is no longer any mantra, prayer, ideology or judgments left – this is just being.
Satsang reminds me of experiences I have previously had from spontaneous presence. Some time ago before I had any knowledge of what meditation was, I was finding myself in a series of bomb attacks in London. Exhausted after being forced to walk for hours, I settled into a bookshop to rest. Suddenly the London police were heard in the speakers at the cafe and we were ordered to sit still and wait while the area was searched. Presence increased, fatigue disappeared, everything became very clear and intense – and every moment was precious.
After a few minutes, the London police were again heard in the speakers. The area was secured and all visitors were free to go. I walked out of the store and straightened my way home. The same streets passed, the same houses and English gardens were passed, but still changed. Everything was suddenly so incredibly fragile and beautiful. Although in the outer feelings I was filled with worry and with eyes filled with tears, there was inside me a deep, warm, dark, emptiness. Out of contact with this inner quality that remained for a day, new strange inspirational flows arose. Life felt precious, fragile, beautiful and inspired, and the next day with a guitar in my hand, astonishing three new songs were written, even though I almost never composed before.
In satsang with Giten, I notice how this quality of presence is not a static phenomenon. The meditative quality changes, is refined, goes deeper and has many different flavors. Nor does satsang develop any “sit beautifully in lotus”-ambition or become a “better” high-performing person. The dream that yoga- and meditation images from the health food magazines sell – where breathing exercises and pills should make me more useful for the market – has totally disappeared.
Meditation has instead gradually developed an inner source that embraces and accepts my own joy and myself as I already am. This has given me insights into the process of how love comes from within.
Life teaches through both positive experiences and failures. I remember a while ago when I was about to take a new step in life. The situation accentuated an unconscious inner self-doubt in me. I had become stuck in an hesitation unable to give myself to the risks it meant to nurture myself, my joy and my creativity. As a result, my outer most significant relationship with my then girlfriend, who wanted to be flowing in a living relationship, also got tired and totally broke with me. There I stood and had to bitterly taste the non-existent harvest that the lack of love in myself brought up and the pain was a fact.
Padma & The mystery school
In ordinary relationships I often repeat a kind of sluggishness and boredom. It was like a total shock to me to start acquainting myself with Padma. Before that, my meditation worked mostly as a “magic carpet”, where I could fly away to some kind of isolated mountain monastery for a moment’s rest from reality. Here, my worldview was completely shaken and turned upside down. By swinging this meditative hammock with Padma, my meditation has instead integrated into the world in a complete new way that I could never have imagined.
Life here in the West usually educates man in the choice between the two belief systems heaven and capital – with excessive belief in capital before retirement age and the belief in heaven after retirement age. In the relationship with Padma, I rather notice how the focus on practice meditation, instead of theory will be increasingly accentuated. Here I also notice how my own belief systems and theories of reincarnation are challenged – and just fall to the practical living fact in the humor and love from Padma.
Another memory while Padma was still in the body was when she brought me to the sea and we just sat and played didgeridoo. Then it happened to me what happens in satsang with Giten. There were no words and suddenly there was just such a beauty and synchronicity between us, the music, the nature and the sea. I was so happy and this insight taught me more about the importance of also consciously practice the process to come back after meditation. I experience more and more how all the qualities and gifts that come from my meditation melts together in a calm inner smile. A desire is gradually developed to be able to give back some of this beauty to the earth, life and existence. These keys open within me new doors to the unknown.
The Emergence of The mystery school
There is an even more subtle aspect of synchronicity that has been developed during satsang with Giten that is so difficult to define. This cornerstone also relates to the process of exploring and understanding the Upanishads. Padma, who also participated during the satsangs about the Upanishads, burst out lyrically and called the phenomenon for the emergence of a “mystery school”.
With this phenomenon I notice how my meditation has gone so much deeper. It is more quiet and easier to come back to silence. Something new arises out of this synchronicity with hearts and belongingness with nature.
From this contact a wish wells up to give back to nature, the earth, life and existence. Only a moment of this meditative relationship with nature and my whole perspective on life changes into a view I could never have figured ten years ago. Coming back after one of these moments create such healing. Right here, competition, power games and mind games and to continually adapting and improving myself, just becomes so distant. It falls away. From this quality, I am also mysteriously linked to the music again. That’s despite a number of really powerful efforts to stop playing music through my life.
Don´t lose the quality
One of the last sentences that Padma pointed out, before we separated physically for the last time on the subway after satsang with Giten, was just about honoring this cornerstone, “don’t lose the quality”.
Deva Emanuel, musician and music teacher, University of Orebro
The Giten Blog 