Philosophical Explorations of New and Alternative Religious Movements by Luck Morgan;

Author:Luck, Morgan;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2012-02-28T16:00:00+00:00

Tony

Tony’s brother was briefly involved in Siddha Yoga and Tony had been to the ashram once before for his brother wedding; but Tony discussed how he had no interest until years later when someone else he knew invited him along:

One night they were going along and asked if I wanted to go along and I went. It was a very powerful aura when I walked into the hall, something just enshrouded me, it was a certain awe, silence, almost like this power that seemed to be moving. And I actually felt a bit frightened by this, this enveloping sort of a feeling, and you sit down and you have to sit in certain parts of the room depending on whether if you are male or female, and cross your legs, and focus on what’s going on, and the chant … They were getting right into the chant really throwing their body into it and their arms up and all sorts of glee … so I kept going back, and going back, and going back, and as over time I became a bit more familiar with [it].

One of Tony’s initial attractions to Siddha Yoga was the chanting. Tony discussed how he had felt a great love, wonder and sharing while he was in the hall during the Siddha Yoga programme, particularly during the chanting. However, during his first visits he didn’t feel the same sense of community after the programme where the participants tended to sit around and socialize; Tony said this was mainly because he didn’t at first talk to the others. Then eventually one of the devotees came up to Tony and asked if he wanted to help with the washing up:

So I sort of sat down, just being a bit quiet and someone said oh look, have you got anything to do, and I said no, and he said do you want to come out with me and do some washing up, and oh yeah OK, I’ll do some washing up. Got out there and started getting into this thing, I wasn’t feeling too good when we got in there, started washing up and after ten or fifteen minutes, I was starting to feel really elevated, just doing this, and I suppose that was something that moved me on … so at every possible opportunity for the next few months I would be down there, putting a hand in and doing washing up, and one of the things of course sometimes they did, they chant, and that always elevates you a lot and over a six-, seven-month period I finally decided to do this intensive [Siddha Yoga weekend workshop], just wondering what an intensive was all about, anyway decided to go to this one, ‘Mountain of Grace’.

For Tony. being invited to do the dishes, and the fact that those in the dish room chanted while they worked, helped him to feel more part of the Siddha Yoga community and led him to become more involved by attending a weekend workshop and generally taking part in the day-to-day activities of the ashram.

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