(not necessarily in that order)
This evening we watched the video of Friday’s very beautiful Ananda Village event celebrating Swami Kriyananda’s birthday.
Of course, it would have been lovely to have participated ourselves (if only we could have been at the Village and in Lugano at the same time!), but it was deeply satisfying to see how wonderfully the music is going in our absence.
Kudos and heartfelt appreciation to the entire music team!
At some point — hopefully in the not-too-far-distant future — I’ll share photos of the various events, places, and experiences that have filled the past three weeks or so.
In the meantime, this is our current home-away-from-home: Villaggio Turistico Reka in Sureggio (Lugano).
We don’t have amazing, expansive views like in Aldesago, but it’s much more conveniently located in relation to Ramesha’s father. And it’s still quite beautiful, just in a different way.
I started writing this blog on Swami Kriyananda’s birthday in 2019, largely as a way to combat my tendency to doubt. I doubted not only myself, but also whether I had anything worthwhile to share.
On the day after Swamiji’s birthday that year — my second blog post — I shared how I had been inspired by what famous blogger Seth Godin had to say about the benefits of writing a daily blog, and how “The first 1,000 are the most difficult”.
Well, today I realized that four years of daily blogs means I’ve reached 1,460 posts! Not only am I well past my first 1,000 but I am, in fact, having a lot of fun doing it.
So, that’s the background to today’s post. But what I really want to share is how this is the first time in almost twenty years that Ramesha and I haven’t been in an Ananda community or center, celebrating Swami’s birthday with our spiritual family.
It definitely feels rather strange.
We thought about trying to perform somewhere, but we don’t even have a guitar with us here in Lugano. But then I thought about a recent (and very impromptu) “performance” that we gave during a family luncheon couple of Sundays ago.
The primary entertainment was the duo Tacalà, a lovely couple who’ve been specializing in the traditional popular music of Ticino for the past twenty years. A number of extended family and friends were in attendance, with everyone singing along with a lot of joy and great gusto.
But someone had told the duo that we were musicians, and at a certain point they invited us to sing. We were rather hesitant about making the switch from the fairly boisterous sing-along mood to our more “spiritual” music, but they wouldn’t take no for an answer.
So we sang. First we did a couple of perky, upbeat songs (“I Will Always Think of Thee” and “Life Is Beautiful”); but when they asked for a third one we figured, “Oh, what the heck!” and sang “O Signore mio altissimo/Make Us Channels of Thy Peace.”
There was actually quite a bit of talking going on in the restaurant as we began but then things settled down and people absolutely loved it.
It feels appropriate to share this on Swamiji’s birthday because it represents our ongoing gift to him.
Swami gave us so much — the music, of course, but also spiritual family, community, divine friendship, guidance, unconditional love, and so much more – and in return, we can keep singing and playing his music anywhere and everywhere the opportunity arises.
You see, Swamiji wanted his music to help people, mainly by raising consciousness. And every time we sing — especially in the extremely unlikely places! — we experience yet again the tremendous power of our music to change people for the better.
Thank you, Swamiji. And happy birthday!
It was raining really hard as we drove up the A-1 on Tuesday, but we had no idea just how much rain the region was getting until reading about the flooding, evacuations, and deaths this morning.
I’m extremely grateful that we decided to stick to our departure date, rather than delaying by even a day.
Our guardian angels were definitely looking out for us.
First came a couple of super early mornings, one of them coming after a late night pizza dinner. Then there was lots and lots of interacting with lots and lots of people. And finally we spent something like eight hours driving from Assisi to Lugano, much of it in pouring rain.
It isn’t surprising that by bedtime last night I was feeling slightly under the weather. So this has been a cozy recovery day — with an afternoon nap, cups of herbal tea, and I even put on warm socks (an extremely rare occurrence)!
Divine Mother gifted us with a stunning sunset display in Umbria last night, complete with rainbow.
This morning’s weather continued dark and rainy, which was a match for my slightly sad feelings.
And now — after a long day of driving — we’re back in Switzerland, enjoying a different though still beautiful view from our latest Airbnb. Located in Sureggio, it’s close to Ramesha’s family home in Canobbio, which will be nice for the final two weeks of our visit.
I’ve been greatly enjoying all the hugs and laughter of connecting with friends (old and new) here at Ananda Assisi.
On the other hand, I’m also feeling deeply exhausted.
It seemed rather surprising until I took a moment to list all the people I’ve connected with in the past two days: it comes to over fifty!
No wonder I’m feeling burnt out.
Today — from start to finish — was about catching up with friends from Ananda Assisi we hadn’t seen in years.
I feel like we did about a month’s worth of connecting in one long day.
We enjoyed Sunday service, laughed a lot, exchanged many hugs, shared news, and also sang. An altogether lovely day.
This is the view from where we’re staying in our friend’s Airbnb near Ananda Assisi.
In the five years since we were last in Umbria I had almost forgotten just how beautiful these hillside views are…and how it’s what you see in pretty much any direction you look.
And then there’s the quiet and sense of peace that pervades the area. Ramesha and I were speculating that perhaps it has to do with the fact that the vast majority of visitors to this area are religious/spiritual tourists — drawn to Assisi because of St Francis.
Whatever the reason, my soul loves it here.
The train trip to Genova went smoothly, but the drive from Genova to Assisi was a form of GPS hell.
No need to go into detail. Suffice it to say that instead of driving for four and a half hours, we were on the road for more like seven and a half.
We saw a lot of beautiful Tuscan countryside, but still…
