Recently GPIW held its first in-person gathering in over two years. The small meeting was held in the desert town of Sedona, Arizona with a visit to Divine Grace Yoga Ashram, just outside of Sedona, under the direction of the wise and kindly Swami Sankarananda.
Twelve old friends from the Contemplative Alliance network joined the three day retreat to meditate together and explore some questions that longtime spiritual practitioners are having. How can meditation and inner prayer affect the outer circumstances and provide support for a world during this time of transition? What is the need of the hour? For those who have spent 30 or 40 years developing a strong meditation practice, have traveled and taught, have written books and directed spiritual centers, spending decades on the outer work, there is the sense that now is the time to focus more fully on the inner -- on being rather than doing. It is the "being" that awakens the joy, and joy is what the world desperately needs now. Despite all that is happening externally, we must not lose touch with the joy that is the very nature of our being. And we must keep the perspective that change happens over a period of time, decades not months or even years. It is enough to sow the seeds of the future.
