WOW, a fabulous Awakin Circle this Wednesday.

I had been holding these circles over the past month, on behalf of our dear friend Jaideep, who had to travel. This Wednesday we had with us, a dedicated Service Space Volunteer, Rohit, who had also volunteered in a Laddership circle, that I was a part of, this spring.

As he was to be with us, I requested him to share his amazing life journey during the circle of sharing. To my utter joy and surprise, I received 24 RSVP’s. Inspite of the torrential rains just one and half hours before the circle began, we had 16 participants, all youngsters. And this was after a circle, the previous week, where I was the only participant.

We observed an hour of silence, then I read the Awakin reading, and then I welcomed and informed the participants about emergence of Awakin Circles. Then I requested Rohit to speak on his journey, from being an Investment banking to impact to inner transformation.
Reflecting upon the week’s reading Opening thy Palm, Rohit spoke humbly about his attempts to give, which always have returned him greater wealth in another form. Giving up pursuit of professional achievement returned him the inner wealth of satisfaction of staying true to conscience than stifling it. After driving strategy and operations for an online charity fundraising platform, his experiments in giving up external impact and efficiency, are returning him the capital of deep connections and resiliency. He jokingly says that refers to the hindi saying “lene ke dene pad gaye” (I went to make a profit, but instead suffered a loss) but says that he repeatedly keeps getting caught in the opposite “dene ke lene pad gaye” (I try to give but more comes back.)

After the talk, there was a rich circle of reflections. One friend spoke about her similar experiments with money, another spoke about surrender to the universe’s intelligence, many echoed the importance of balancing outer work with inner work, importance of inner peace amidst external chaos, of finding one’s own middle path, and a subconscious pattern of always seeking the next big thing. For most participants, it was first experience of awakin circle and for some, their first experience in silent meditation. They found the meditation and the circle a refreshing experience and expressed desire to continue.

The circle ended with a simple meal, smiles and hugs. And I slept with a deep sense of fulfilment and gratitude, having received so many ripples from the participants and especially Rohit, to reflect on and maybe imbibe some of them in transforming my inner self.

(sorry no pics , as i just got lost in the moment, and did not click any