My Thoughts on Religion; Staying at an Ashram for Five Days
Ashram /ˈaʃrəm/ (noun) : a hermitage, monastic community, or other place of religious retreat.
During our stay in India, we stayed at an Ashram to practice yoga for about five days. The place we stayed at was a retreat center in Trivandrum called Sivananda Yoga Retreat. Initially the reason why we decided to do this was because we simply were tired of constantly traveling, trying to figure out which destination to get to next, which hostel to stay at, what heritage to check out and etc. We just wanted to stay at one place for a few days and relax. We also did want to experience “yoga” since we were in India and the beginner’s course that Sivananda Yoga Retreat provided, seemed applicable to our close to zero yoga experiences. For most yoga retreat centers, there is a minimum of around two weeks but Sivananda didn’t have any which made it very easy for us to fit into our itinerary.
This blog post will be a self reflection about my experience at an Ashram and also how my thoughts on religion have changed because of it.
Daily Schedule
12:30 Coaching Class (You can choose your classes like meditation and etc)
13:30 Tea Time
14:00 Lecture
15:30 Asana Class
18:00 Vegetarian meal
20:00 Satsang
22:30 Lights out
5:20 wake up
6:00 Satsang (Prayer Time)
7:30 Tea Time
8:00 Asana Class (Yoga)
10:00 Vegetarian meal
11:00 Karma Yoga
The only photo I have from the Ashram. We all stayed in these bunk beds. There was mostly no talking allowed around these facilities.
Random Memos I Left in My Notebook
ヨガの目的は瞑想ができるようになること- The purpose of yoga is to be able to meditate
Shanti(Peace) within, external and shout for the universe
Negative —(related)—Positive : The negative always has a positive
YOGA= Education of the subconscious
Why are we here? —> Timing
Who am I?
Faith is the opposite of doubt.
Anything that happens during the day is good. Never be tense, relax.
Dharma: To reach the mind, you must begin with the body.
Final Thoughts
Religion is beautiful. It’s not all about people believing in one thing, one crazy superior existence but more about living your daily life and having that time to stop and remind yourself what’s really important in life. To be kind, to be gentle, to be strong, to strengthen yourself. Get rid of the rush, the jealousy, the mean. There’s a huge difference of having to use your body, your heart, your mind 24/7 without any breaks, whereas with religion, it enforces all of us to stop and free our minds, do our hearts and bodies a favor and let them rest.
I’m currently reading this book called Paradox of Choice. This book discusses the paradox we currently live in where we used to believe in this illusion that having more choices makes us happy, when it actually causes a lot of stress and unnecessary time of consideration and regret of choices. Now that the world is getting richer and richer (in terms of standard of life) we have more control over how our life is bound to turn out. If we want to get into a good school, we can study more. If we want to look more skinny, we can eat less. If we want a partner, we can go on online dating apps and maximize our possibilities.
However, in this choice abundant society, when we try to maximize the experience and time we have, we barely have time to rest our souls.
The life style that religion, meditation or yoga can induce, is a great way to cope with the rushed society today.