Dear Friends,

We are delighted to host a remarkable Himalayan mystic, Sri M, at this Wednesday's Awakin Circle in Santa Clara. Learn more.

Sri M's autobiography, which has sold millions of copies internationally, opens with a powerful lesson from his teacher: "One act of kindness is more powerful than a hundred years of penance." At the age of 9, Sri M was initiated by a stranger. And by the age of 19, he had left for the Himalayas in search of answers for life's deeper questions. Soon he would meet that stranger again, and that stranger's teacher. After years of cultivation, he returned back to serve society. And this Wednesday @7PM, we're delighted to be in dialogue with Sri M! If this particular journey speaks to you, do add yourself to the waitlist -- due to limited space, we'll prioritize local volunteers. To offer invisible service, you can also help chop veggies for 100 folks tomorrow night! :)

Speaking of kindness, here's a memorable chat with Nathan in Australia about the need to find the sacred in the subtle ...

Aspiring to be extraordinary requires us to multiply our wants, instead of finding joy in simply fulfilling our needs. We tend to draw a straight line from contentedness to laziness, but actually if we can be content with a deeper awareness, there's an upwelling of gratitude that ripples into giving. Such acts of service catalyze deep relationships and create greater trust in society. Unfortunately, we've designed society with the opposite criteria -- with systems that encourage us to be sensational, to be extraordinary. I was part of that rollercoaster myself, but it doesn’t make much sense to me now. Sure, the sensational draws our attention, but if we deepen our awareness, the ordinary is every bit extra-ordinary. In that sense, the ServiceSpace journey has been about creating a field that honors the sacred in the subtle. When we do that, kindness is no longer a cute add-on to a tedious, mechanistic world -- it’s actually a revolutionary impulse to bloom into our oneness.

With gratitude for the ordinary, :)

Nipun

P.S. Last weekend, Banyan Grove was home to our annual ServiceSpace retreat (see community night photos) where we inaugurated our "meditation huts". To use them for personal retreats, apply here.