Atma Yoga

A comment from an Atma regular. Interesting food for thought.

Cheers Sita-pati,

Seeing that I can't find your direct email this will have to do. Please excuse the candour but that is how I operate:

Taking a strengths based approach of what little I know of the Hare Krishna movement the following seems apparent:

Hare Krishnas are known due to their distinctive dress, topknots and the practice of Harinam (?). In this sense their are instantly noticeable if they recieve press coverage. This distinctive appearance has both positive and negative aspects. The positive being the instant recognition or branding if you will, the negative being that Harinam would tend to bewilder the vast majority of the public or possibly annoy them (pop culture references i.e. flying high, GTA).

In many ways you are dealing with what might be defined as cultural gap – the distinctive and alien appearance may attract social fringe dwellers but it is unlikely to attract people in significant numbers, and may in fact scare them off. This is why Atma is such a positive step in offering the Gita to a greater number of people as ‘yoga’ and healthy eating (i.e. organic) are considered positive and worthwhile by a growing number of people (particularly when the food is so bloody delicious). Yoga has been mainstreamed and organic is well and truly on the way if not already there. Chanting the name of a culturally foreign God on the street is not. Even the Salvos stopped adhoc public street marches with accompanying brass bands some time ago. I imagine it was considered detrimental to their broader aims.

As stated previously if Vishnu/Krishna is a universal God is dressing like an Indian essential or is it posturing. It may prove appropriate for religious service (like a priest/pastor) but may be excessive otherwise. Toning this down to the Tulsi and Tilak may be effective. Both are viable and relatively unobtrusive symbols of your faith that are aesthetically appealing and not threatening to the man and women in the street. They are more likely to inspire curiosity than ridicule or confusion.

Even though I am philosophically a Polytheist (Yep! I am a Heathen) and Impersonalist and do not support the KC (Krishna Consciousness) position , I can see that as we discussed previously the most appropriate model for the KC is an appropriate remodelling of the Christian approach to outreach for the following reasons:

KC seems to have many similarities to certain Christian churches: monotheism, ecstatic dancing/singing, sexual abstinence or control, an emphasis on non-violence, a focus on the family unit, the divine coming to earth in human form, a focus on a single scripture, universalism and missionary drive.

This Sunday, 29th July 2008, is the second annual Yoga fest in Brisbane.

Jonathan Murphy from Radiant Light Yoga has worked really hard to pull off this event, which brings together Brisbane's entire yoga community once a year.

We'll be there representing with a stall, we are doing catering for the event, so you can get yummy healthy food between classes, and we're also doing the kirtan in the evening, half and half with Radiant Light Yoga.

There are two yoga halls with classes going on all day. Prem Yogi is teaching an advanced asana class at 4 pm in Studio One. The kirtan is from 6.30 - 7.30 pm.

We'll have copies of our Sacred Chant Volume One CD and our new Introduction to Atma DVD available at the stall at a special Yoga fest price. The new DVD includes a class, a guided meditation, and a documentary on Atma Yoga.

The Yoga fest is being held at the Old Museum near the RNA showgrounds. The first class is at 9 am.

See you there!

In our strategic planning for Atma over the next three years I noticed that we will have spent half a million dollars in rent over six years. That's a huge outlay. The money that is generated and spent is a side effect of our main activity, which is sharing our spirituality and lifestyle knowledge with others. Atma is a state audited incorporated not-for-profit association. However, we need to be responsible stewards of even the side effects. That's Krishna's energy that we are leaking there.

Also, it makes no sense to continually start from scratch with each new place that we get. Here are some preliminary thoughts on how we are going to approach this:

Recently Atma was nominated for a local Business Achiever Award.

We didn't set out to achieve this, it's just something that happened along the way.

The other day we were discussing respect. Practitioners of Krishna Consciousness are well acquainted with the idea that one should not desire respect from others. However, I put another spin on it by posing the question: "It might not be good to chase respect, but what about trying to be respectable? Is that a bad thing?"

Srila Prabhupada said that a Vaisnava is a perfect gentleman. If you try to be respectable, then automatically people will respect you, or at least they are more likely to. People may respect you, and they may not. There is one person whose respect you must always retain, and that is your own. You always have to have self-respect. And you have to earn even that. Trying to have respect without trying to be respectable is unnatural.

One is a subordinate consequential effect of the other. I blogged about the award nomination on the Atma blog, and mentioned that sustained profit is a subordinate consequential effect of service.

Another example of subordinate consequential effects is our placing on Google. Tonight I talked with Michael over dinner, and he told me that he found us through Google. People find out about us through word of mouth from their friends, by meeting a staff member doing book distribution in the street, and through Google.

I asked Michael if he had googled "Yoga Brisbane" [try it] - he laughed and confirmed that he had.

We appear twice on the first page of that search.

Once someone asked me: "How do you do it? You must do all kinds of search engine tricks."

Actually, no.

If you think about it, the goal of Google is to offer relevant search results. Assuming that Google works (which it seems to do quite well), the way to go higher in search results is to actually be more relevant to people.

So we just try to be ourselves, and strive to serve people in a more and more relevant way. The other stuff is just a natural consequential flow-on from that.

Seth Godin wrote about it the other day [his blog entry]: he contrasts "trying to beat the system" with "working the system". One is legitimate and healthy, the other illegitimate and unnatural.

Seth also wrote about it in his book "All Marketers are Liars: The Power of Telling Authentic Stories in a Low-Trust World" [Amazon.com]:

The only way your story will be believed, the only way people will tell themselves the lie you are depending on and the only way your idea will spread is if you tell the truth. And you are telling the truth when you live the story you are telling - when it's authentic.

(You) are not sitting around scheming up new plans on how to deceive the public. Instead you are living and breathing your story.

This is what makes it all work: a complete dedication to and embrace of your story.

So again, you've got to be yourself. Krishna Consciousness is about self-realization. It's about being authentic, being yourself.

There is no one more qualified than you to do it.

Vrajadhama sent me this video a couple of months ago with the note: "The origins of the Loft?"

Of course, we had no knowledge of or contact with this while the Loft was developing. The Loft paradigm evolved as an organic response to the environment, influenced by the interaction and realizations of devotees.

This video strongly suggests that this is indeed a natural process of cultural integration and missional outreach that Eastern traditions undergo in contact with contemporary global culture.

Orthodox at the core. Innovative at the edge.

My mate David Jorm recently wrote about his visit to Gaura Yoga in Wellington, New Zealand.

You can listen to an example of the westernized kirtan that Dave described here. Just scroll down the page until you see "Roar Sound sound track".

My wife and I were there to open that center ten years ago, along with Khadiravan devi dasi and Sudevi devi dasi, and we were there for the first three years. Being passionate by nature I'm the guy they send to start new things. After that a more sattvic long haul maintenance dynamic kicks in and I go somewhere to start something else.

You can read my 2006 Congregational Preaching Journal article about the Loft preaching paradigm, and the 2008 article about our preaching in Brisbane for some background.

Since we left Gaura Yoga it has solidified and gradually and steadily built momentum. Today they have the original center in the city, a number of ashrams, and additionally an eco-retreat in the countryside.

Over the last four years Param and I have been working on pioneering our center Atma Yoga, here in Brisbane, Australia.

The working model of contemporary urban preaching of Krishna Consciousness is there in the form of Gaura Yoga. Without changing anything essential (like Srila Prabhupada's books) in ten years they have made enough devotees to significantly expand their operation, restock ISKCON temples in Australia and New Zealand, and take New Zealand (a nation of 4 million inhabitants) to number 5 in the world during the Prabhupada Christmas Marathon.

So there is no pioneering that needs to be done on that front. What we've been working on here is how to integrate a powerfully functioning center like this with an existing ISKCON temple.

As result our growth here has been slower and our rate of innovation lower. A lot of the work we have done up to this point has been laying groundwork and exploring how we fit together.

In the case of Gaura Yoga there was no official ISKCON temple in Wellington. There was a congregationally-run center in the suburbs, but no temple with installed Deities.

This meant that the center was able to move more freely.

Different ages = different bodies. Different sizes = different organizations

I listened recently to a question and answer session on leadership with Pastor Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill Church. One question was the changes in leadership as the size of the church changes. Driscoll explained as a church grows to a different order of magnitude of size it effectively becomes a different organization - one requiring a different style of leadership.

It's just like our body, really - you have the same name, but you have a different body when you're 20 from the one you had when you were 5. Similarly, the ISKCON temple in Dallas is still the ISKCON temple in Dallas, but it is a completely different organization from the one that Visnujana Swami set up.

And that's an important point with wide-reaching implications. Prabhupada disciples visiting our center here in Brisbane frequently remark that it has "the feel of the early days". Actually, Loft preaching is closer to the dynamic of the early missional ISKCON (the real "old school") than the dynamic that a lot of ISKCON centers have evolved to today.

What happens when a center has been established for some time and all the external props and processes of formalized Krishna Consciousness are put in place is that the internal value structure changes. It effectively becomes a different organization.

It goes from the early "start-up venture" days to being "a mature company", and it loses its edginess, and its appeal to new, young recruits.

The inevitability of multiple ISKCON centers per city

Recently the GBC has been considering multiple ISKCON centers in one city. It's an inevitable historical development that is currently being grokked. One center cannot be all things to all people. The reality is that a cutting-edge urban preaching center reaching out to a western population has radically different priorities to an established ISKCON temple serving Deities and an established congregation including many ex-pat Indians. You can't effectively do both in the same place at the same time.

In order to have these two centers functioning at their optimum we've discovered that you need to have separation and cooperation between the two - they need to be interdependent. Each can remain focused on its core values and identity. There needs to be a constant process of communication and negotiation between the two. One cannot be subservient to the agenda of the other. In this way they can coexist in a symbiotic relationship.

It takes time to build the network of working relationships and establish the understanding of how the whole thing fits together. Devotees have developed an unconscious model of temple=yatra, and rebuilding a conceptual model of a yatra with multiple, diverse centers operating in concert takes time.

One example I have used to help devotees grok this is that of movie theaters. In every city there are so many movie theaters, even in the same multiplex, and they have session times all over the place, including at the same time. It's not that there can only be "one center to rule them all" that has "the program" for a city. With hundreds of thousands to millions of people in each city, if we really are serious about making the world Krishna Conscious we need tens to hundreds of centers in modern metropolises.

Some will serve mature congregations, others will focus on serving the edge of the organization and people outside it.

Orthodox at the core, innovative at the edge.

The "all things to all people in one place" paradigm doesn't work. Do a yoga class, or some other outreach activity, in the temple and you'll upset the devotees (and rightly so I feel - I'm a devotee too). Do only temple kirtan and Bhagvatam class and you'll miss a large section of your target market of potentially interested persons. We have to do both strongly, without compromising one or the other.

Unfortunately this paradigm of "all in one place" is now being mooted to be extended to Prabhupada's books, the core of our orthodoxy. Some devotees want to write a compatibility layer, or as I call them "Defensive Annotations" into Srila Prabhupada's books. Instead, I believe that we should follow the successful principles demonstrated in Loft preaching: keep Prabhupada's books as they are and work out from there, writing more books to allow people to come in gradually.

Orthodox at the core, innovative at the edge. It's not all one.

Yesterday was an Ekadasi day. Ekadasi is Sanskrit for "eleven", and the ekadasi day occurs twice in each lunar month, on the 11th day after the full moon, and the 11th day after the dark moon. On these days Vaisnava devotees fast from grains and beans.

Sometimes it can be a challenge to arrange for something to eat. Last night Prahlad and I stayed over at the local temple, to wake the Deities in the morning. We got there at 6.25 pm and all the ekadasi prasadam was gone. Luckily we were able to go back into town to Atma and get something there. We had to go back anyway to drop Stefan off at the airport for his flight to Thailand, so it worked out well.

Julia and Suvilasa cooked. Julia has been influencing the cooking lately with her Spanish styles and some unique recipes that she got from her mother.

Here's the hovering aerial shot of the whole plate - salad, potato pie, subji, and quinoa patty. The secret to simple, healthy, and tasty prasadam is in the ingredients, the consciousness of the cooks, and the sauces.

Here's the salad. You can see a marigold in there. Sometimes we bring maha-marigolds from the temple or home and add them to the salad after it's been offered.

This is a quinoa patty with a tomato and coconut sauce.

Now this was interesting - it's some kind of vegetable pie made with a layer of sweet potato and a layer of potato. Tasted at least as good as it looks.

There was also a nice dessert, a confection of coconut, nuts, and fruit. I didn't get a picture of it, but it was awesome.

So we got to eat well, and after dropping Stefan off at the airport made it back out to the temple to take rest.

Carmella Baynie doing kirtan at Atma Yoga, Brisbane, Australia.

Carmella Baynie @ Atma Yoga April 2008 from vraja dhama das on Vimeo.

Sacred Chant Volume One, our 2006 album, continues to move on Jamendo, where it is available as a free download.

A recent reviewer wrote:

I'm not a krishna devotee myself, but I enjoy their chants & music, they're great! Those enchanting rhythms & sunny sounds make me smile :) Never mind SaReGaMa's review, the music is good, more than that - it's live in its mere essence. Thanks to to Atma Bhajan Band! I liked their performance as well.

SaReGaMa was the very first reviewer of the album back in 2006, and he panned it, giving it no stars out of five ("Mediocre religious hymns - skip this one" - he said). Reviewers since then have consistently given the album 4 - 4.5 / 5.

I checked out some of SaReGaMa's music, and it's ok. He's a follower of Osho, which might explain his reaction to our album. He does multi-instrumental ambient music. It sounds like a one man show, so it's missing that dynamic interplay that arises from a group, especially live, but it's not bad as background music, say for an elevator or a shoe store - just kidding! I listen to it sometimes at work - it's quite relaxing and mellow - not at all imposing.

Anyway, if you haven't checked out Sacred Chant Vol 1 yet then grab a free download. If you like it you might also like our 2007 album "Heart of Devotion".

We're working on a new album at the moment, should be ready in a month or so.

On Saturday night at the recent Springbrook Retreat Param Satya gave a talk on Healthy Eating. Luckily Adina-lila recorded it, so if you weren't able to make it you can still hear it!

Here it is for your listening pleasure:

• Healthy Eating (original recording) - mp3, 22MB
• Healthy Eating (lower quality / smaller size) - mp3, 13MB
• Healthy Eating (free format) - ogg, 19MB