Saturday, July 26, 2008

My Monk

This is an article on the nevindpress.com on my childhood partner in crime during our days in elementary school - we were best friends. Recently he retired from professional "monkdom" and began his "Joyshop" tours. I spoke to him last year, after almost a decade of no conversations (we kept in touch via emails from time to time) and I must say seems to have found what he is really good at. Someday, I'll have to attend his "Joyshop" too.

The happiest day of your life

HE draws the attention of the participants with a haunting sound produced by a thick metal cup.The stick that strikes the rim of the cup is taken round and round letting the sound to continue and taper off. Nithya Shanti is the master in white, teaching people how to make today the happiest day of their life at what he calls the Hadayoli Joyshop. Blending spirituality, emotional wellbeing and physical fitness, Nithya Shanti brings in his Buddhist tradition from his six-year life as a forest monk. An MBA from XLRI, Jamshedpur, he opted out of corporate life and is now sharing his experience of “is-dom,” He has just two words to help take people to enlightenment and that is “Be Loving.” Whatever our thoughts, words and actions, the Universe responds with an “And so it is.” This makes our thoughts a reality. His workshop focuses on how to create a loving and joyous reality around us. When we live consciously, we begin to balance the physical, energy, emotional, intellectual, spiritual and social dimensions of life. We learn to live in harmony with the natural principles of the Universe. This gives us the strength, clarity and energy to realise the purpose of our life, he says. Physically it means to create a sense of lightness, physical freshness and alertness, flexibility and stamina, energetically to have abundant energy and enjoy a high level of activity, emotionally to be expressive and open, intellectually to provide clarity and depth of thinking, spiritually to have a strong sense of values based on love and compassion for oneself and others and socially to be financially independent, with a healthy relationship with family and community. He teaches the practice of a five-minute miracle that helps the individual to focus positive energy toward any specific outcome with relationships or situations. He draws four sublime attitudes called the Brahma Viharas which are also mentioned by Patanjali in the Yoga Sutra: Metta (Maitri) – loving friendliness to all, Karuna – compassion to all, Mudita – joy in another’s accomplishments and Upekka (Upeksha) – equanimity in accepting both loss and gain, praise and blame, success and failure with detachment. (www.lovingsilence.org swahilya.soulmate@gmail.com