I recently met a young Indian here. He comes from Delhi and for him, South India is also a foreign world, although not as foreign as it is for me. He doesn't speak Tamil and his spirituality is also a bit more serene or enlightened, as you might say. I met him again on the street [...]
Today, for the first time, I went to the Matrimandir. Six years ago, I had a guided tour, which is a prerequisite for going alone later. It also makes sense to have a general orientation about what kind of place it is, how to behave there, and what would disturb others. During my Monday meditations in the Zen circle Bremen, I […]
Schopenhauer, who was a great admirer of the Upanishads, wrote a small book „Ueber die vierfache Wurzel des Satzes vom zureichenden Grunde“ (1847). He identifies 4 forms of causality, e.g. small cause - large effect, or large cause - small effect etc... I was fascinated by this because it offers a broader understanding than the purely [...]
I was at a place for village children with special needs (Deepam) today. Someone from the guest house here had invited me to accompany them. It was a kind of ceremony as part of Navarathri in honor of Goddess Saraswathi - she stands for education, prosperity and success. In India today, the objects used for work [...]
I have always resisted the word meditation. Much about it seemed suspect to me. However, I have always practiced my own forms of meditation without calling them that, or without having learned them. For me, meditation includes: a) contemplation, i.e., sinking into a thought [...]
In 2017 we were in Varanasi. Varanasi is the spiritual center of Hinduism. Those who are burnt here in the fires that Shiva lit 2500 years ago and which have been burning ever since are freed from the cycle of suffering.
Many films feature grand hotels that are centrally located and serve as meeting places for the political, intellectual, and economic elite. I have always perceived this as something very elitist, colonial, and power-hungry. What I missed in the films, and what was probably rarely discussed there, is the networking that takes place in such locations. […]