Guru Poornima

Yesterday - 25th July 2010 was Guru Purnima. On this day, disciples offer gratitude or pay respect to their Guru (Spiritual Guide). Before I go any further lets be clear on a few questions:

1. What does the word Guru mean?

2. Why does a person needs Guru and

3. What happens when you get a Guru?

In sanskrit Gu means darkness and Ru means light. Guru is someone who dispels the darkness, darkness here is due to ignorance. So the job of a Guru is to bring you out of ignorance into the realm of knowledge and make you realize that there is so much more to life then the small cocoonish world we all live in. It is like a frog in a well who thinks that there is no world beyond this small space. Similarly, when there is ignorance the vision gets narrow and we are not able to see things in their totality. So in short, Guru is like a coach. The players in a soccer team have tremendous talent individually but it is the coach that brings the best out of the team. Similarly, when you get a Guru he makes you realize that there is so much to life than getting angry, holding grudges and taking revenge. You know your happiness is much more precious than all these things. Guru's job is to channelize the life force in us, just as water without banks is flood. But if the same water is flowed between banks it can be used to generate electricity. Similarly, when life force gets channelized all the other dimensions physical, mental, emotional and social are drastically improved. As at the end of the day life is nothing but a play of emotions, energies and outlook.

This year the Guru Poornima celebrations were in Hartford, Connecticut. We rented a car and drove from NYC to Hartford. The journey was pretty awesome and fun filled, we discussed a variety issues like operations of Armani Exchange to Karma and reincarnation. The event was in a Convention Center which was HUGE HUGE and very beautiful. The music, food, people were all great and I had a very good time. It was nice to see 5000 people from 50 different countries and different backgrounds come together in the spirit of celebration.

One of the few events not to be missed.......

Later

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