Teaching for Blackberries (not pennies)

I've been teaching a 'Kundalini-inspired' class for three weeks now that is by donation, such as fruit, veggies, chocolate and such, and one of my students brought blackberries to share. The edible kind. I love this group in Granite City. They are friends and not just students. I left smiling, and then came home to some wonderful news in my e-mail inbox that I am not read to share yet. I am very happy to the point of tears of joy! I also am a little miffed that I can't find my Cross pen. I want the universe to bring it back, so I can get back to thinking about what was in the e-mail.

Of course I did Bound Lotus and all my other meditations, and also Maha Shakti Chalnee Indra Kriya and the Meditation for Change.

Deepening My Practice

Yesterday I did the "Full" practice of Subagh Kriya and 31 minutes of meditation to 'Ad Gurey Nameh', whereas before I just did 11 minutes. I felt as if my heart were being pried open like a rock shrimp being fileted. I did the same two practices again today... Then I spontaneously ran downstairs to borrow the computer and sign-up for Summer Solstice and Kitchen Seva. I am anxious about not having a tent. A little nervous about the changes Solstice will bring, and also wishing with all my might to be able to take KRI Teacher Training in August in Espagnola, New Mexico.

I finally made it out the door to teach my evening class after sitting for Bound Lotus. One of my students came by only to sign herself in, even though she can't take class because she hurt her knee. She just loves my class so much she doesn't want to see it cancelled for lack of attendance in the past few weeks. I had told her that if my boss at that studio cancels another class of mine on a whim, I will not replace it with another class at the same studio. I told her not to worry, because there were students there.

We had fun, just doing more Yin-like poses, and laughing and telling jokes. Then I came home and sang some more...

Tantric Har and Subagh Kriya

Last Fall, in September, I believe, I accidentally googled 'Tantric Har', the chant to which Subagh Kriya for Prosperity is done. Then in October I heard the Ray Man Shabd in Sat Inder's class. I had to have it, borrowed it, and copied it right away...listening to it non-stop, and all the while hearing the phrase 'Bound Lotus' in my head. In my mind's eye I saw the cover of the only Kundalini Yoga Aquarian Times magazine I ever received stored somewhere in my home. I found it, and also the article on Bound Lotus, which described how the Ray Man Shabd is recited while doing Bound Lotus. My spine lit up!

Also in that issue were an article on Japji, which had caught my eye; the Meditation of Change ( which, incidentally, involves the mudra pictured on Lululemon's announcement for their new store); and the complete practice of Subagh Kriya, part of which is done to Tantric Har. I feel drawn to all of it, though Bound Lotus was the only practice I committed to first. I've done the first part of Subagh Kriya (which can be done seperate) for almost 40 Days. I tried the full practice today. It felt good to do except for the last part. Inhaling only for 20 seconds, holding the breath in for 20 seconds, and exhaling slowly for 20 seconds made me so full of intense anxiety. The kind that in the past would have sent me to the bathroom cabinet for a Xanax or Valium. I started to hyperventilate...I need to do this.

I have so much more fear to let go of if I want to go to Summer Solstice and take KRI training. I need $808 to go to Solstice. I need $4'500 to take Teacher Training. I had $1400 saved, but had to spend it on a new car. I've since lost $150 in income and taken on a $237 monthly car payment. There was no other way...I needed the car. I need a reliable source of income that still allows me to teach. I need to be at Summer Solstice and at KRI Teacher Training. I've had so much bad luck over the years, and now it is turning good in the past few, but I need more good luck!

Yogi Bhajan describes Subagh Kriya this way: "It's a complete set. This is all called Subagh Kriya. If God has written with His own hands that you shall live under misfortune, then by doing Subagh Kriya you can turn your misfortune into prosperity, fortune, and good luck. I'm going to give you a very handy tool, one that you can use anywhere, and you'll become rich. To become rich and prosperous, with wealth and values, is to have the strength to come through. It means that transmissions from your brain and the power of your intuition can immediately tell you what to do." It sure would be nice to never feel the pull to work in a strip club again just because I'm hurting for money. It would be nice to buy my Dad a house. I need this. I know what he means by his words above: this Kriya gives you strength, intuition and the clear-headedness to make better choices in life that will lead to prosperity. It increases your energy and your auric connection in such a way as to 'attract' opportunity. This idea is hard for me to swallow, but I'm trying. Everything else has worked. Could I really become prosperous AND healthy AND happy? I'm mostly healthy (a far sight better than years ago), sometimes happy...can I just Trust? In God? In Saraswati? In Kubera? In Ganesha? Wahe Guru!?!

3HO has given me an opportunity...

...to see if another Spiritual Name in the American Sikh tradition comes up. I saw this last night in my e-mail, and after the day I had yesterday, I just cried at seeing this. The day was so wearing and so long that even good news was stressful. I felt so overwhelmed. I wanted to respond with a thank you, but could only dissolve in a puddle of tears.

I feel how dramatically Kundalini Yoga has changed my life, and I can feel in my bones how the gift of a Spiritual Name would deepen that strength. All Yoga has been healing, but something about Kundalini Yoga is just incredibly powerful. It is as if every time I sit for a practice, my Guru, my teacher, is present with me. I feel and see a profound difference in my life with the completion of each practice. The practices I do to expand the aura also heal depression, split personalities, and by their nature expand the aura, arc lines, and radiant body. Though they are not visible to the naked eye, these are what were all but destroyed from 3 years in an abusive relationship and 12 working in a bar where my already low self-esteem had plummeted to new lows. My 'she'll' is being put back together, and repainted, like a broken Flora Danica teacup.

I've decided I want this opportunity for a new name with 3HO. As long as they remember to factor in my birth time astrologically, I feel this new one will be right. Professionally I will stay with Phoenix Amira Lei...but I will say yes to a new Spiritual Name with 3HO. I will say "yes" to Ram Dass Singh and Nirinjan Kaur. Thank you Yogi Bhajan and Ammachi for your blessings!

It's 7 PM and I am tired and angry.

My day started at 5 am. I taught two classes. Then I waited patiently to get my back cracked at the chiropractor's, trying to close my eyes and meditate in preparation for the long day ahead, while the therapist kept walking by, making snide comments, and punching me in the arm telling me I'd better wake up. When I said I wasn't sleeping but simply trying to meditate, I got grilled about whether my mala beads were a 'rosary'. I finally got my back adjusted, and grabbed some lunch, unfortunately walking in to find myself joining people who I'd rather not sit with; people who think asthma is pretty much all in your mind. I endured and was polite, thankful that the issue of my offending lungs never came up.

Then I went to the DMV. For an hour. Then to my garage for an emissions test. Then to downtown City Hall for almost two hours with ghetto-ass freakazoids bothering me while I waited for my Personal Property Tax Waiver. Then I went back to the DMV. My car is now legal. My taxes are paid. I've also lost $150 a month in income from one of my classes being cancelled. And now I have a traffic ticket to pay, so I'll be eating ramen noodles probably for a while. But I smiled anyway. I smiled at the assholes at City Hall, I smiled at the DMV people, and the babies I saw all day... Then I came home to find that a Census worker had visited my home.

The first form they sent never arrived. The 2nd form came as I was jumping through hoops to buy my car, and then get rattled by harassment from a student, and wondering if I'd be fired for standing up for myself. Now a man, no less, a strange man came to knock on my door. I now HAVE to be interviewed in person. When I called this man back as requested, he was so inarticulate that it took 10 minutes for him to simply confirm that I'd have to be interviewed in person now. I said no way was any man coming into my home, or standing at my front door. I have an appointment with a woman for Wednesday around lunch to answer five stupid questions.

I feel like Greta Garbo. I've had enough of the world for a month. I want to be left alone. I am naturally a recluse. I want to do Bound Lotus and be left alone.

This day started out well...

Or sort of. I do wish students would show up early for Yoga class, instead of driving me crazy having to enter everyone's data and credit cards, new students and everything right when class starts, so that we start 15 minutes late. That is not relaxing. But I did get to let off steam by taking a class afterwards. Then I came home, cleaned up a little, and got ready to teach again. I left early, as I usually do. I was in no hurry, but according to the cop who pulled me over for driving the same speed as everyone else on Brentwood Blvd., well she saw it differently.

I had to listen to her lecture about how my license plates will expire tomorrow, so I told her all about how the dealership that sold me my car forgot to send me the paperwork I would need to pay for my taxes and tags, and I didn't receive it until yesterday. Yes I'll get it taken care of and do it tomorrow. I'd already planned on it. I would have called the dealership to ask where my papers were, if I hadn't been what I now see was totally rattled by the threat to my job, and the harassment.

So I took my ticket and went home. Slower. With my only recently reemerging enthusiasm for life dampened yet again. But never fear Bound Lotus actually saved the day. That, and the tree pollen dropped significantly, allowing me to breath and sing. I guess, considering how pissy I am today, the theory of 'positivity' curing breathing difficulties, i.e., asthma, allergies, what have you is bogus. It WAS because the pollen dropped. Because I've been pretty pissed off at the world for a month now. With some rare and exceptional days. But of course, I must expect it with all these days of Bound Lotus dredging up old crap to be released.

Wet Wings Bursting Forth

I read Gabrielle Roth's "Sweat Your Prayers", think of Saul David Raye's 'Ananda Tandava' dance and wonder what the dance of destruction he mentioned is called. I want to put on some music and dance my lingering grief, sadness and fear away. I felt like, when my job and character were threatened by someone who sexually harassed me, as if everything I'd worked for would be taken away. I try to be positive, but I am having difficulty breathing freely, both because of the pollen, and this fear. I feel like I am myself wrapped in a cocoon of grief woven through with the grief threads of every woman who has been labeled as unbalanced or crazy because they protested a man's actions. I feel like I am my own mother wanting simultaneously to beat that guy over the head with a wall air-conditioning unit, and pour myself a nice cup of tea, and say, "There love. It's okay. The bad man is gone. All gone now." I sing to mother, to Ma, to Kali Ma, Durga Ma...protect me!!!!

I do Bound Lotus, again, and erupt into dance. Then I read Gabrielle Roth's words: "I know she'll emerge next month like a butterfly from a grief cocoon, flap her damp wings until they dry, and flutter across town..."

Last night, in meditation, I saw the physical eyes and the 3rd eye as an Infinity symbol with a sun above it. It is the Heart of the Christos symbol from Sekhem-Sekeim-Reiki that I teach. A little SSR and some R&R is what I need.