Mysore Sandalwood and other meditations

November was the busiest month ever in our little enterprise to bring the most unbelievable hand made incense from ‘old india’ to the connoisseurs of scent around the world. We are just a small little enterprise and our artisans in India are just a small little workshop with a maze of rooms up and around a 16th century building in a bustling town in the foothills of plush agricultural Maharastra, famous for its rich dark soil and abundant rural culture.

When they have to move though, a small army of saree clad ladies come in throngs to sit and chatter and sing away, their bangles jangling on their wrists, as they briskly and expertly hand roll each stick in less than a second; the dampness of the mix clings effortlessly and smoothly round the punk (bamboo stick).

This morning I had a chance to think and time to ponder and in the gentle, alarmingly beautiful scent of a stick of Mysore Sandalwood I felt fresh energy and inspiration for the coming year. How can we get people to experience this Mysore Sandalwood. The sheer scent is enough to soften the hardest heart and make one consider that all they know, all they have seen and all they have heard, is just a tiny insignificance compared to the real wonder of existence and its potential.

In the moment of experiencing this wonderful scent all of life seemed to be perfect and complete. As it is stated in the Vedas, not a blade of grass moves without the will of the Lord. Nothing that happens is outside of the sanction of Krishna who controls all space, time and inner consciousness; awarding the results of all activities and just like a cat allows the mouse some freedom as it plays with it before crushing its skull, we act out our dreams and desires through the field of material nature, imagining we are free, all the while being completely under the control of Providence. Our only real auspiciousness is to take one incense stick and offer its burning beauty to the lotus feet of Krsna who has eyes like a lotus, whose abdomen is marked with the depression of a lotus, who always wears garlands of lotus flowers, whose glance is as cooling as a lotus, whose feet are engraved with lotuses and who knows all living entities but whom no one knows.

Therefore the real secret to happiness is not to endeavour for it. Happiness and distress will automatically come, just as the Bhagavata says “Persons who are actually intelligent and philosophically inclined should endeavor only for that purposeful end which is not obtainable even by wandering from the topmost planet [Brahmaloka] down to the lowest planet [Pātāla]. As far as happiness derived from sense enjoyment is concerned, it can be obtained automatically in course of time, just as in course of time we obtain miseries even though we do not desire them.”

Wishing you all inner peace and spiritual progress for the coming year. love always Adi-Guru dasa