A Beautiful Memory (ies)

असतोमा सद्गमय ।

तमसोमा ज्योतिर् गमय ।

मृत्योर्मामृतं गमय ॥

ॐ शान्ति शान्ति शान्तिः ।।

I chanced upon this mantra this morning when online.  I felt as though something in me was auto attracted to it, refusing to move further....I could actually feel the tug, like a magnet whose pull cannot be resisted by those iron filings.

I read. And I found it was going into natural rhythm, into tune. And then I realized this was from my very first job, way back in 1987 (sounds ancient huh). I was teaching at this Indo German project, where we were integrating marginally handicapped children with the normal stream, using the Montessori method of education. We would recite this twice each day, everyday for two years.

It had become a cellular memory.

We had about twenty little children in the class from the surrounding underprivileged section of society. And today this brought back the times, the children.....Mamata, Satish, Jyoti, Navin, Rebecca, Vani, Ashwin, many of whose homes were also familiar places. 

asato mā sadgamaya

(from ignorance, lead me to truth)

tamasomā jyotir gamaya

(from darkness, lead me to light)

mrityormāamritam gamaya

(from death, lead me to immortality)

Oṁ śhānti śhānti śhāntiḥ

It's a hymn from the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad. What a beautiful hymn. And I think this is where some dots connect.(in hindsight)

When doing my masters in Philosophy, I was fascinated by the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad. So much so, that I enrolled for private Sanskrit classes, just to be able to read this one tome. I still have the copy, a huge massive piece.

The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, and the Bhaja Govindam. That's another which fascinated. College days, I've spent hours and hours on my terrace learning the Bhaja Govindam, reading, singing, feeling. In fact went to Khaladi in Kerala just to visit the birth place of the genius who created the Bhaja Govindam, Sankaracharya. (words which come to mind are crazy, nuts, passionate, mad...an indulgence the age allowed into 'normal')

And now ( more dots connect) the novel I'm currently reading "The Vine of Desire' by a favorite author, Chitra Banarjee Divakaruni, starts with lines from the Bhaja Govindam

Again the day, again the night

Dawn and dusk, winter, spring

In the play of time, life ebbs away

Only desire remains

Again birth, again death

Again the dark journey through the womb

In this world of changes, nothing holds fast

Except the coiled vine of desire

Bhaja Govindam, Sri Sankaracharya (AD 788 - 820)

Memories so dear and so deep, and so beautiful, that they made their way here.