0
Blogs Our Founder - Vimala's Blog

For parents, a child’s infancy is one of the easiest times to experience the feeling of unity. I remember the peaceful hours that went by, just watching my babies and being in love with them. One day, when my first child was only two months old, I was holding him, lying backward in a big bean-bag chair. We were gazing into each other’s eyes. It seemed to go on and on — he didn’t break his gaze and neither did I. My consciousness began to feel as it did when I meditated deeply. I began to feel one with him, that nothing else existed; bliss flowed over me and tears fell from my eyes. When at last he closed his eyes and went to sleep, I came back to the world. I cried. The feeling of oneness was so powerful it filled me for hours afterward.

 

Before I had my children, I was a yoga practitioner and teacher. When I had my first baby, I assumed my life would go on as before. I had meditated 6 hours a day since I was 20 (1972), and in 1976 I had my first baby. I was in for a rude awakening, when my baby required all of my time and energy, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I missed my meditation time, and missed the solitary quiet of my practice. However, I refused to accept that I could no longer meditate. I knew my new life required that I change.

afam2

There is a practice in yoga called “madhuvidya” or “sweet knowledge,” and I turned to this. It means you can find everything as an expression of the Infinite, and make your everyday life a meditation. The experience I described above made me see that my baby was an expression of meditation. Spending spiritual time with him was just as enlightening and uplifting, if not more, than my long hours of concentrating alone with my eyes closed had been. Those long hours helped me as a new mother, when I needed focused concentration and patience.

 

Our daily massage was another opportunity to meditate with my baby. After we had resolved the colic issue, he loved being massaged, and gazed, smiling, into my eyes for much of the massage. Afterward I felt as if I had been sitting in the lap of the Divine.

 

by Vimala McClure

Vimala-McClure-200x300

Related Posts