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I was just back home from my one week stay at Chinmaya Vibhooti, Kolwan , when the news of the now infamous and self styled Swami Srihari from Kerala hit the headlines . It was very saddening and disgusting that these so called Swamis and godmen again and again exploit the purity and the piety of the saffron robe for power, position, money and sexual thrills. It is because of men like him that the word "ashram" itself has taken a lewd connotation in today's parlance and Swamis are looked down with sneer and mistrust. In my own case, when I tell people that I am going to stay in an ashram for a week, mostly they raise their concern about my safety -my actual physical safety and my psychological safety..."what if they brainwash you and make you a monk? what if they hypnotize you into one of their mad fanatic followers? What if they make you sign over all that you own for their ashram? what if...what if..." the questions go on and on. Having been clos

Image courtesy www.doyouyoga.com The last of the five yamas is aparighraha. Parighraha means grasping / holing on tight. So obviously a-parighraha means non-grasping. What is the ultimate thing that I am grasping on to tightly? Isn't it my life? And how is it that I am perceiving this "life" right now? As this body -the gross physical form, and as the mind -the subtle astral form. I am holing on tight to these two as the only definition and expression of the "life" that is in me. Letting go of the misconception that the Self/Life is the body and the mind is the ultimate meaning and practice of aparighraha. Going a little further, if I examine WHY I tend to hold on tightly , it is purely driven by fear. All of our thoughts, words and actions are driven either by love or by fear . If based on love, then the tendency is to expand, to share, to be open, free, happy. If based on fear, then the tendency is to hold on tight, to grasp, to contract, to h