Sacred Grove

It is the day before the auspicious dip into the Ganges River.  Allahabad is electric with excitement.  More people than the human mind can comprehend are gathered to participate.  It is a cacophony of sound; loud speakers everywhere amplifying chants to the divine.  It is the sound of hope and anticipation.  It is an acknowledgement of the chasm that exists between human and divine and the belief that tomorrow that chasm will for an instant cease to exist. It is a belief that the secret prayer carried in each heart will be heard and answered and benevolence will rule for this day.

I am meditating in the Sacred Grove.  It is a quiet place held in the grace of magnificent trees and the vibration of great practitioners who have previously meditated in this spot, including Patanjali and Swami Rama.  In front of me is the Ganges River, seemingly oblivious to the activity around it and the hope it symbolizes.  It floats by with a stately grandeur, steady and unperturbed.

I am aware that a parallel universe exists within me.  The cacophony of seemingly competing sounds I am hearing exists in my mind, sometimes as heightened as the sounds I am hearing around me.  These sounds seem to compete not only for my attention but for my emotions, taking me on a stimulating ride of ups and downs.

But there is also a river that runs through me, and that river is my breath.  I can feel this breath as it flows through my nostrils.  Like the Ganges, my breath has the possibility to be more interested in maintaining its quiet steady nature than becoming turbulent with what is happening around it.  Like the Ganges, my breath has the possibility to take refuge in the flow of its own movement.

Sitting in the Sacred Grove, I see these two realities played out around me and within me.  One is a stimulating ride with the senses, the other a stately ride on the steady current of my breath.  I am aware that I can turn my awareness to my nostrils at any time and rest in this riverlike flow of breath.