bansuri,
banshri,
bansri,
bansouri,
bamboo flute,
music,
hindusthani,
northern indian,
ritual,
rituals,
ceremony,
ceremonies,
meditation,
shamanic,
shaman,
shamans,
entheogen,
entheogens,
consciousness,
non-ordinary,
non ordinary,
death-rebirth,
death rebirth,
ecstasy,
extasy,
ecstacy,
breathwork,
breathing,
holotropic,
astrology,
natal,
transit,
archetypal,
transpersonal,
psychology,
transit analysis,
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A mild and quiet evening in the big meditation hall of an Indian Ashram.
Thousands are gathered to listen to the great Bansuri maestro Hariprasad
Chaurasia. Into the pindrop silence his tunes descend from heaven and put on
us a spell from the beyond. I feel my heart chakra expanding rapidly. The
magic of his playing moves me to the core. This hollow bamboo seems to hold
all the secrets of the universe, seems to point the way to the divine.
Hariprasad plays for almost three hours, and the world becomes a different
place, infused with spirit.
At the time of this concert I was struggling with a serious heavy metal
poisoning. My body was very sick. I was constantly dizzy, irritated, and
prone to fatigue attacks and headaches. I was certain that I was going to
die. In the attempt to support my healing I had started working with entheogens.
During the journeys I listened to Hariprasad's
Bansuri, and the fascination with the sound grew to incredible proportions.
I would listen to nothing else, convinced that the divine tunes of this
bamboo flute would heal me.
In one of the journeys I heard the voice that would always come to me say:
If you love the Bansuri so much, why don't you take it up yourself? I was
stunned to hear this, and replied that at age 42 I am too old to start a new
instrument. What followed in the vision was a big cosmic grin, and the voice
said: Who cares ...? Play simple tunes and see what happens ...
This is what I have been doing for 4 years now. I am still amazed at what
happens. I have given up most of what I did before in my life. The poisoning
is healed. I am moving deeper and deeper into the practice of the Bansuri.
The deeper I go the more I realize how rich and complex the instrument is,
and the great flute masters seem like far removed gods to me.
But even the simple tunes baffle me in their capacity to express the longing
for the divine. Friends around me have started to enjoy my playing more and
more, and I feel deep gratitude for their support and appreciation. The
secret of the hollow bamboo has taken over my life ...
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