Ashram life is not for the faint hearted and a
week at Parmath Niketan Ashram was enough
to send my ego packing or maybe it just
drowned in the Ganges where I, like thousands
others bathed each day in this river that rushes
forth from the Himalayas and purifies all who
bath in it, giving life, carrying purity, bliss
and liberation. Parmath is known for it’s very
famous Sunset Ganga Aarti Ceremony and
draws between hundred and thousands of
visitors each day including a recent visit from
Prince Charles and Camilla. The power of the
Aarti transcends the borders and boundaries
of laungauage, culture and religion and dives
straight into one’s heart, carrying one to
heaven. The divine light ceremony is filled
with song, prayer, rityual and a palpable sense
of the divine. Aarti is the beautiful ceremony
in which dias (oil lamps) are offered to God,
the essence of the ceremony, is that all day
long God offeres us light – the light of the sun,
the light of life, and the light of his blessings.
Aarti is the time to say thank you and we offer
back the light of our thank you, the light of our
love and devotion. It is time to break free from
the normal stresses and strains of everyday
life and gather together in joy, reverence and
peace.
As the week drew to a close, I began to see
my own truth so very clearly. I understood
that our life is not about sitting around doing
nothing, swimming on the banks of the river,
meditating, being, just surviving and that a
life of poverty and renunciation is not what
God intended for all of us. We are not here to
beg for our livelihood but to create it by using
the talent with which we have been endowed,
the question is how do we bring the ways of
the East together with the West so that our
lives have both meaning and material success
and in India answers are always found in the
most unlikeliest of places and little did I know
that finding bliss would be as easy as a 45
minute ride to Ananda Spa in the Himalayan
Mountains. Living the holy life just got a whole
lot better.