Congregational Development in ISKCON

Anyone need to rev up their Sunday Feast presentation?

Rock! It's a winning formula. Two or three even otherwise mediocre speakers can hold attention and engage an audience with the material when they are speaking to each other.

It introduces elements of relationship (rasa), and unpredictibility, both powerful stimuli for engagement.

Not that either Arjuna or Krishna are mediocre, but you'll notice that this is the format of Bhagavad-gita and much of Srimad Bhagavatam.

Preaching to the Anglo-Saxons of Ipswich

On Sunday I was in Ipswich, the oldest continually inhabited Anglo-Saxon town in the UK. It goes back to around 400 AD, when those Angles, Saxons and Jutes first came over here to take our jobs and marry our women. Because they called themselves Englisch they gave our country and people the name. They lasted in power until the Norman French invaded in 1066 and stayed for quite some time.

Brisbane's Yogafest 08

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.

A Packed Weekend in London

Three congregational programmes happening today. First was a devotee weekend retreat at a temple over in east London. The theme was practical preaching for congregational members and Jayapataka Swami was the main speaker. A mini-Rathayatra was part of the weekend. We’ve been having some brilliant sunshine over the past few days - quite remarkable for this country (that’s why I’m remarking on it) - and its giving a new mood to our events.

Weekend Warrior

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Cakes, Books, Gaur-Nitai and happy devotees during the monthly sankirtan festival in London’s Harrow district

Defining Your Brand

... The other day Vyenkatta Bhatta talked about paradigms. In an upcoming post I'd like to talk a little bit about Chowpatty, the Simple Temple; how what is going on there is really a paradigm shift that means that changing a few basic understandings gives rise to a functional community; and different ways and means we can use to get the same effect where we are, no matter how the details of our environment differ from Mumbhai, India. Here's the Simple Temple video embedded (not going to be visible on ISKCON News - use the link above): ...

Atma Yoga: the full picture

By Karuna Dharini Devi Dasi

Atma Yoga began as the dream of Atmananda when he was still Bhakta Dirk.

His desire was to create a bridge to bhakti that would serve the burgeoning hatha yoga community. While accepting Srila Prabhupada's declaration that mechanical yoga (hatha yoga, raja yoga, kundalini yoga, etc…) will not lead to liberation, he considered that the many persons getting involved in yoga nowadays might not accept that declaration quite so readily.

What these ambitious yoga participants would need is something that would give them a positive and healthy yoga experience and at the same time an opportunity to experience the potential of Krishna consciousness.

The goal was to give people a transformative experience with mechanical yoga while slowly and lovingly cultivate in them an appreciation for the beauty and magic of bhakti.

Hatha Yoga and Krishna Consciousness

Hare KrishnaBy Sita-pati das

As I consider myself "within ISKCON", I consider that what I do is "within ISKCON". The teachers at our yoga school are a mixture of initiated grand-disciples of Srila Prabhupada and aspiring grand-disciples of Srila Prabhupada who have been introduced to ISKCON through association with the devotees who teach there.

Temples

Hare KrishnaBy Radhanatha Swami

Our temples, it is so very important that we learn the science of properly giving and receiving the association of devotees. Actually every guest that comes is Krishna’s specially invited guest. And it is our duty to give them every possible opportunity to make spiritual advancement. It is the first priority.

Kundalini, and the Real Goal of Yoga Practice

Lately I’ve been reading a few of the articles on yogadangers.com. I first came across this site a few months ago when it popped up in the Google ads I was trialling on my blog. I read through it then, but revisited it the other day after a recent incident.

On Friday night on the bus home from Atma Yoga I got chatting with a guy who told me he had not been back to the Sunday Feast since I last saw him there because his digestion was “cactus” (Australian for b0rked). When I enquired what was wrong and how it had happened, he explained that it was “tantric misadventure” and then gave me a bone-chilling account that mirrored some of the ones I had read on yogadangers.com about Kundalini awakening gone wrong.

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