The trip to India was as anyone can Imagine, a profound transformational experience. I travelled there with my eldest daughter with the main goal of getting closer to one another.
Started off by arriving in Delhi where we were fortunate enough to be picked up and offered accommodation for 2 nights by a good friend that worked at the Canadian Embassy.
We visited a couple of interesting sites, but one stood out to me was ancient ruins of a temple in the middle of the city. It threw me off… and also, as I would later realize, was just a glimpse of the many contrasts I would observe in Indian society…
The old close to the new, openness and conservativeness, science and spirituality.
Time For Some Yoga (Of Course!)
We left Delhi and headed off for a week long yoga retreat in Rishikesh, the world capital of yoga. Imagine the setting, a small city riddled with so many ashrams, gurus and students from all over the world in one spot… and a highly polluted Ganges river runs right through the middle of it.
The ashram was great. A good Canadian friend of mine was familiar with the place and the owner, a fellow Canadian Yoga Master residing part time in India and part time in Toronto.
For 16.00 CAD a night, we ate, slept and practiced Yoga 3 times a day!
We enjoyed every second of our time there and my body and spirit welcomed the unity I was bringing through that great discipline.
I feel that in the West, because the Spiritual and philosophical aspects of Yoga are more than often absent, we don’t really experience the real magic of Yoga…we don’t have to sweat or hurt for Yoga to be beneficial.
It is not about athletics but rather Oneness, uniting mind, body, and spirit.
Following The Path Before Us
Our second stop, after and long bus ride, was Dharamshala, high up in the foothills of the Himalayas.
As a Tibetan Buddhism practitioner, this stop was a powerful symbol of the spiritual path I follow. I slowly discovered this peaceful town with a strong population of Monks, Nuns and Buddhist practitioners that shared of vision of love and compassion.
The Himalayas overlook the town and I admired them as I savored chai tea and potato momos.
Such an incredible feeling to be in the Himalayas
On the way down from Dharamshala, we made a short stop in Amritsar where we visited the Golden Temple, an architectural marvel and an important spiritual gathering point that comes right out of a fairy tale.
There I felt something I can only define as “Deep Respectful Peace”, I know that it sounds strange (to most at least), but I cannot better words to describe what I felt.
And So We Return…
For the third leg of the trip, we went back to Delhi, in the Tibetan area, where we hooked up with a group of Canadians and Swiss to travel the Buddha Enlightenment route along the Ganges river.
Our guide was a Monk which studied with my Lama back home. He studied in India and regularly took group on the same trip.
At the same time, while we followed the Buddha’s footsteps, the Monk would give us the teachings that the Buddha gave at the exact places we journeyed.
As you can Imagine, this was a powerful and life changing experience.
The most powerful moment for me occurred in Bodhgaya, a city that generates a tremendous and transformational energy.
It was there that for the first time, I was able to achieve and maintain a state of consciousness between sleep and being awake. A powerful state of clarity that is difficult for me to describe. It instantly brought about the awareness that we are not the body, we are not our thoughts or our emotions.
It was during that leg of the trip that my daughter and I got closer and met at a different level, one with less conditioning.
After 10 days of travel with the group, in which we visited amazing spots such as Sarnath, we started the last leg of the trip on our own. We hooked up with a private driver and started a journey towards Rajasthan. And yes, we made a stop at the Taj Mahal to witness its incredible beauty and “grandeur”.
In Rajasthan, we toured castles and gardens in Jaipur, Jaisalmer and Jodhpur. We discovered smells, spices and colors which varied from one city to the next. It left us marveled on how the same dish or drink could be so different by moving a few kilometers away.
An Unexpected Gem
Our favorite city was by far Udaipur, an Oasis in the desert.
Amazingly, beautiful lakes are situated in this very dry area. Combine this setting with incredible architecture, you have a breathtaking environment to experience.
And the people, well that was the greatest experience.
Wowww!! Such a contrast of different beliefs, cultures, races in the same living space. Clashes of modernity, clans and conservatism…yet, so much beauty and resilience.
All of this deeply moved me in all senses and was a real opportunity to observe the movements of openness, closure, joy, fear, love and compassion which surged from one experience to the next.
I feel so much gratitude for such a life-changing exposure to “myself” through India. A definite turn in how I see life and myself…or rather my non self.
