What I've Been Up To

The short answer, obviously, is "not blogging." Not that there hasn't been anything to share, I just haven't been as much in the mood to spend time writing about it all these days.

So here's the Cliff's Notes version of it. In the last 5 months, I have....

• written an article for Ananda's Clarity Magazine.
• been to Yosemite with Cheryl for our anniversary. (Hmm, photo-posting is another thing I haven't kept up with. Oh, alright, here's one.)
• sung in a concert.
• meditated a lot, and done some yoga on and off.
• attended Spiritual Renewal Week at Ananda Village.
• done a lot of volunteer work for Ananda (creating and managing a blog and a Facebook page, working on a database migration project, helping post class recordings on the internet, and miscellaneous other things).
• gotten a job. 

I'll go ahead say a bit more about that last item, since it's the biggest single change in my overall situation. But no, I haven't gone back to a typical 9-to-5. I enjoy the lifestyle I've created over the last couple years since Google, and so I prefer to keep a flexible schedule, with time for serving in ways that are important to me, whether or not they pay. But to keep some of the financial energy flowing, I'm now working for Revolution Prep as a teacher and private tutor. I'm doing SAT prep right now, and maybe more stuff later on. I enjoy getting a chance to do more teaching, so as part-time jobs go, this is a good one.

[P.S. I guess, since I have a new employer, it's time to add my disclaimer back in: I speak only for myself.]

Me and the Impending Doom

This weekend, I got to be part of a small reader's theater production at the Ananda Easter brunch and festivities. We did an adaptation (by Dambara) of P.G. Wodehouse's story "Jeeves and the Impending Doom," which was a great deal of fun. I played the part of Bertie Wooster, and was joined by Nirmoha (Jeeves), Mom (Aunt Agatha), Tim (Bingo Little), Nishkama (Mr. Filmer), and Cheryl (swan). And, as luck would have it, we were video taped! So if you like this kind of stuff, have a look, and enjoy!


Wodehouse Play 4/4/2010 from Ananda Palo Alto on Vimeo.

Meditation Teacher Training

I recently spent 9 days up at The Expanding Light retreat in Ananda Village for Meditation Teacher Training. The course is intense, but an overall fantastic experience. Savitri and Diksha are excellent teachers, and made the whole thing very enjoyable.

Each day starts with getting up around 6:00, and going to the first 2-hour sadhana session of the day - energization exercises, yoga postures, and meditation. (Or, in my case, going over to Hansa temple for the community group meditation.) Then there's an hour for breakfast, and a couple hours for class, and that rounds off the morning. There's a short noon meditation, and then lunch break. In the afternoon we have two more hours of classes, and the second sadhana of the day before dinner. After dinner we'd have another class most nights, leaving us maybe an hour or so before bed to keep up with the course reading. A couple evenings were "free" time, which mostly meant doing reading, working on the written assignment, and preparing for presentations and student teaching. So it was a pretty full schedule.

What I found, though, was that once I got into the flow of it, I was able to stay in "always-on" mode pretty much all the time. I can't remember the last time I'd been so completely focused for such a long time, and it was an amazing experience. There was a really good illustration of that on the penultimate evening. I had a couple free hours to work on my final presentation, to be given first thing the next day, so I was doing that. Then my neighbor came by to talk to me about her presentation, and to run various ideas by me. I was able to just completely switch modes and focus on her, and then go directly back to working on my own project afterward. No transition time, no frustration, no wasted energy, no nothing. Just being right in the moment with whatever I was doing at the time. It was great to get to practice that so clearly.

Another amusing little bit for me was my morning walks over to Hansa. Getting there by 6:30 meant it was still dark, and I didn't have a flashlight. That made it tricky at first to find and follow the trail through the little section of woods I had to traverse. But though the trail was indistinguishable visually from the rest of the forest floor, I found that I could hear it as I went along. My feet crunched on more fallen leaves when I strayed off the trail than when I was on it. Of course, once I'd done it the first time, it wasn't as tricky, but I was amused at following a trail by ear, nonetheless.

Lake Shasta

Cheryl and I went up to Lake Shasta over the Valentine's / Presidents' / Chinese New Year three-day weekend (it seems we're being very efficient with our holidays this year).  We rented a lovely little cabin at Tsasdi Resort, right by the lake. The weather was pleasantly gray and only a bit drizzly, making it nice to stay inside and be cozy, and also pleasant to hike around by the lake occasionally. The water level in the lake is still extremely low, because all the rain this year still hasn't been enough to recover from several drought years. That's a shame, but it does mean that there's a huge border or red dirt between the water and the treeline, which makes a very picturesque color combination in places.

We also took a tour through the Shasta Caverns, which are quite impressive. I thought it was silly, though, when at one point the guide turned off all the lights to show us "how dark it gets inside a cave." That could have been quite dramatic if it weren't for everybody's cell phones and cameras and such providing backup lighting! Oh well.

Other fun parts of the trip included a stump alien, wild turtle riding, and stowaway Bedouins.

(See more photos here.)

Singing in the Choir

About 5 weeks ago I joined the Ananda choir, singing tenor. (Major thanks to Ramesha for helping me figure out how to sing in that range, which will be much better for me in the long run than faking bass.) Tonight I'll be singing in the annual performance of Swami Kriyananda's oratorio: "Christ Lives."

This is a bit of an adventure for me, since a lot of the choir members have sung this many times before, and so we've been pretty light on the rehearsals this year. Which is trickier if you're the new guy. In addition to keeping up with the songs we've been singing for Sunday services, I've been trying to learn the 12 oratorio choir pieces, with just a few rehearsals and a practice CD. Last night at the dress rehearsal was actually the first time I ever sang some of the songs with the choir. But I think I've got it okay. I've learned the music enough that I don't need to carry my binder with me, which was my main goal. It's easier to pay attention to the director and tune in to the rest of the choir if I'm not looking down at music all the time.

At the dress rehearsal we mostly did the full-choir pieces, with just spot checks on the solos and small group pieces. It'll be nice to hear all of those in their entirety tonight, because we've got some fantastic singers, and beautiful songs. So I'm really looking forward to tonight, getting to both sing and listen to a lot of wonderfulness.

If you want to attend the concert, it's free (donations accepted) and at 7:30 tonight. Here's the info. It'll be great!