After a tsunami wave of multiple retreats in the last few months, a few of us got together to reflect on what were our insights / ripples / moonshots. What emerged out in the circle was no short of an inspiration. Gentle 'nudges' were the running themes amongst us all.



Khush opened the circle with her reflections from the MBL retreat recently and how the emergence was felt through the gentle nudges from so many cultivations for the past so many years, but particularly visible even more strongly since the last 3 months. When Rika came to India for Gandhi 3.0 straight from Mount Fuji, one of her intentions was to have an app for prayers. What started off as a moonshot idea was gently nudged into an actual prayer page. Within a few hours the first prayer for Jayesh Bhai's mother was requested and a few days later Trupti's beautiful prayer offering inspired many across our ecosystem. Another instance that nudged her was Trupti's incredible insight into her own lineage which prompted Khush to actually reach out to her own lineage - her grandparents and was able to bring together the entire family in celebrating their 60th anniversary of togetherness - MBL style! She also shared about how Ashwin's zest to be independent inspired the gym instructor at his company to convince the other physically abled to exercise more often. All of these examples started off with gentle nudges which eventually created a domino effect who's source would probably be difficult to trace in the larger scheme of things.

Anu reflected of how all these years, 'many to many' was just a theory for her, until the past few months - starting from a gentle nudge at the StartUp Service retreat where many to many was literally playing in full action. Her recent Vipassana experience was able to bring in a deep reverence for holding space and she is able to look at different perspectives of holding spaces. She reflected on how when spaces held together create opportunities. And is interesting to see how a teacher emerges in each of those opportunities. Everything and everyone becomes your teacher. She reflected on how Rupali and Devesh found their expressions through art and how they blossomed in their own way through gentle nudges and conversations.

Swara had an incredibly deep aha moment for everyone in the MBL family to see how each one was stepping up in their own spaces. She compared it with 400 people in a room during Vipassana. When you look around you observe that everyone has their own strengths and weakness, yet how everyone continues to sit and gives it their best. It was her highlight to witness how each volunteer served to their absolute best capacity in spite of holding equanimity towards their own strengths and weaknesses.

Vidhi shared of how her journey with Karma Meals had kept her grounded and in sync with service until she came back to Mumbai where she felt incomplete in some way. Recently she started attending the Heart Circles and was able to find her inspiration to get out of her comfort zone. She connected to the Meals on Wheels team in Mumbai and was able to understand what holding space means. Her moonshot idea is to extend her practice as a Psychologist to not just children but to anyone who crossed her path. To extend the practice of holding space in every form and shape.

Rupali found a found big change at StartUp Service recently. Her biggest insight was her realization of working towards being a good listener. At first she would listen to answer or justify. But soon realized that deep listening is life transformative. She feels more peaceful and different person altogether now. It's no more a theory for her but more experiential.

Smita Ben who is our serial nudger shared of how some of her biggest ripples were after the NGO retreat. 5 of them including Sister Lucy are meeting Gautam dada and Usha Tai this week. She shared how Gautam Dada's humor in the conversations leading to the trip have been incredible and inspiring. In her recent trip to Amritsar she went to the Golden Temple. She couldn't help but notice the similarities between the temple and MBL / SSP spaces. She saw how the entire space was managed by volunteers whether there are 2 Lakh or 5 Lakh people daily. The serenity of the place felt like 3 steps and bow. There was no security but only trust. With the recent experiences of meeting folks like Dada Vaswani, Jetsun Ma, and holy places like the Golden Temple she's been holding a question deeply of 'why i am here', with the trust that the answers will emerge eventually.

Deven Bhai has also been pondering on the 'why am i here' lately. He shared how recently Auroville celebrated The Mother's birthday starting with the morning meditation. A lot of people had gathered including our extended family from MBL like Joserra, Rina et all. There were diyas lit, rangolis made just like our MBL movement. - Having recently moved into their own home at Auroville they noticed how the space is inviting folks from our extended family to come and create a community while cross pollinating it with the one's in Auroville. He reflected how both these spaces work for collective cultivations and it's amazing how their home is being that space to bring the two communities together. Awakin Kids was also another beautiful ripple that he resonated with while being a witness to the conversations of the hows and what's of Awakin Kids between Rev Heng Sure and Aunty and was happy to see it come alive. His moonshot idea is that he is thinking about space as more intergenerational where there is collective learning and inner work for all age groups starting with Awakin Circles, Awakin Kids and Awakin Elders, all of which he would want to start in his own home in Auroville - He is looking forward to more family members to visit him, from his mom to Arun Dada who are to arrive shortly. He feels deeply grateful for all the feeds and blog posts coz that keeps him connected to the deeper friendship and kinship amongst us all!

Vinit shared of two things that came up for him after Gandhi 3.0. He was moved by Giang's New Year story of how clothes were passed on from her sister to he while she reflected on how much she was consuming in the US. Vinit reflected on how he was able to look at his life as more 'give aways' and not 'take aways'. Of how even learning something new felt like a subtle form of consumption to him. When he started to look at his own patterns of consumption, he is now determined to shift from consumption to contribution. He started applying all those learnings into the recent modified processes at karma meals and how these changes could be more value oriented. Speaking of nudges, he also shared how one conversation with Nipun Bhai around his failure club idea turned around to an addition of Mumbai Meals on Wheels and how that enabled him to go deeper in his own Karma meals. Just like a perfect domino effect. With the new process in place, even the volunteers are bowled over and looking forward to new ways of cultivating to deepen their own practices in the process.

Harsh shared of how a breakout at the recent Laddership retreat around 'relationship - an enabler or a catalyst' caught his attention the most. He reflected on how Nipun bhai wakes up early because Guri leaves early and finds an opportunity to serve in each and every moment/situation. He has experienced a beautiful pause in his own fast paced life and looked into how he can serve in his own capacity. In his recent volunteer experience at Seva Cafe Bangalore this week, many volunteers who had signed up got canceled unexpectedly and yet no one was worried. With 8 volunteers, it still happened because it was about giving their best in the moment, giving their best in the opportunity in front of them. He has realized now that necessity is the mother of all inventions and feels a deep need of community around him. He looks forward to sit in silence for an hour but lacks the motivation if he is all by himself. What if there was a group online that sat together every day and anyone could sign up to sit together for an hour was something that he envisioned as his moonshot idea.

Bhumika also resonated with what Smita Ben shared- about how did she get here. During the G3 she reflected on a song from the movie 'Sound of Music' and thought that best gave the answer to her question "Perhaps I had a wicked childhood, Perhaps I had a miserable youth, But somewhere in my wicked, miserable past, There must have been a moment of truth,...I must have done something..Something good". She looked around at all the people she was surrounded by and thought how everyone accepted her inspite of all her craziness, not for the sake of it but for pure love. That gave her an opportunity to reciprocate the same. In the recently released G3 Video - the part where Rev Heng Sure talks about how the negative thoughts start from the mind - you start from plucking it and using it as a compost like a 'skillful gardener' and watching the video repeatedly, gave her the strength to pluck the negative thoughts herself. She finds that to constantly remind her to be a skillful gardener herself.

Sheetal shared of how in the past 2 - 3 months he was feeling less peaceful inspite of truly stepping up his own cultivation of being the change. He had started to doubt himself and was wondering if he was doing something wrong. His conversation with Rev Heng Sure about bowing brought back the perspective when he encouraged him by sharing that the pandoras box had finally opened up and all the junk was coming up. This was truly his test of equanimity. Recently he was also pondering on a comment that Smita Ben had shared a few months ago whether serving was about increasing Punya or doing Prayashchit? While the exploration for him his still on, he wondered, if that may be about sweeping and cleaning in today's context. Three words that have come up for him recently are 'Masti - Maryaada - Maitri' and that has made him feel more humbled and hopeful towards his onward journey. He shared his moonshot of how can he really see each life as a pilgrimage of going to our own highest potential individually and collectively while quoting "jeevan na safar ma pravasi cho - vasi nathi' (In the journey of life you are a traveller/pilgrim not a resident) and how to cultivate an heart of a pilgrim within himself.

Kishan and Sanchi who could not make the call sent in their shares via email.

Sanchi shared of how her role as a Tech at the recent retreats helped her see the subtle and yet important aspects of holding space while constantly having to struggle her inherent 'always in action' being. It helped her be more still within which is now completely resonating with her contribution at the Vinay Mandir when she interacts with people or situations that may or may not be in sync with the values. Watching herself hold the space for all those difficult moments reminds her of the subtlety that she experienced in the process of the Tsunami :) Her moonshot is to be able to tackle any difficult situation with keeping in mind her own relationships, herself as the tool, her strengths and what she needs to transform with absolute mindfulness and stillness.

Kishan shared of all the endless ripples around the Gandhi Ashram ecosystem and was thoroughly inspired to see his own role in the bigger scheme of things. His moonshot is "I am pondering over the Lokmitra project. Taking it up, while being a lokmitra myself. Opening and expanding the vistas which I sometimes feel bounded with."

With deep bows of all your share, spoken and silent we look forward to marching together with the new normal, in the marathon of Love, Trust and Compassion.