Breath Of The Heart - by Krishna Das

This studio album is superb, both in the choice of chants and performance, in addition to the very professional production.

Tracks
• Baba Hanuman
• Kainchi Hare Krishna
• Ma Durga
• Kashi Vishwanath Gange
• Om Namo Bhagavate Vaasudevaayaa
• Brindavan Hare Ram
• Appreciations

What Krishna Das says about Breath of the Heart

Devotee: "How can I find God?"
Neem Karoli Baba: "Serve people."
Devotee: "How can I raise Kundalini?"
Neem Karoli Baba: "Feed people."

"The essence of all religions is love, compassion, & tolerance. Kindness is my true religion. The clear proof of a person's love of God is if that person genuinely shows love to fellow human beings." - His Holiness, the XIV Dalai Lama

Chanting, helps us dive into a deeper place in our hearts. Peace of heart comes as the process of coming closer to our Self continues to burn our shortcomings in the fire of the deepest Love. Tewari once said to me, "Love is what lasts the 24 hours." Chanting helps remind us and strengthens our ability to remember that deeper Reality. We get a chance to immerse ourselves in the stream of devotion. For an hour or two, nothing else is required. We have nothing else to do. We can gather ourselves and jump into that river "rushing to the Ocean of Love. Sometimes I say to a group," I guarantee you one thing tonight: No one's problems will be solved. So just forget about everything and sing. There is no reason to hold onto anything. Let go and give yourself wholeheartedly to what we're doing for this short period of time. Sing your heart out and we'll see what's left to worry about anything when it's over. I sing to save my own ass. I am happy to be able to sing with people because that helps me give myself to the practice with a greater intensity.

I wanted to be a rock and roller when I was younger. I had been the singer for a band for a short time, but I quit. Then one day I went to a Jimi Hendrix concert at the college I had gone to. The guys in the band asked me to come back. They had cut all the tracks for a record(!) and they needed a singer. This had been my dream and I would have gone, but I had just met Ram Dass and he was expecting me up at his father's place in New Hampshire for the summer. I had moved out of my house and had my 2 dogs and my cat and all my worldly possessions in the car in the parking lot. I was supposed to go up there after the concert was over. So I couldn't stay even if I had wanted to. Even before I had met him in this life, my guru, Neem Karoli Baba had arranged it so I couldn't take the wrong turn. I spent the summer there and soon after went to India to be with Maharaj-ji. But as Tewari used to say, "Now see the fun!"

All those old desires to be a singer are being fulfilled but from a totally different place. My reasons for singing have been transformed by the Grace of my guru, from selfishness into Selfishness. I tell the people who come to chant with me that the way I see it, my guru is manifesting all of them to help me. Now I am getting all the joy of singing with people and I can do it sitting down!!! This is called Lila, the Divine playfulness.

There is a meditation practice in the Buddhist tradition called Metta, Lovingkindness. The practice consists of offering love and kindness, first to ourselves and then extending those offerings to all other beings. Someone once asked me how I would say Metta in the tradition of Yoga and Chanting. Without thinking I said, "Hare Krishna!" I was amazed at what came out of my mouth. I never thought of chanting as an offering before. I tended to think of it as my own personal work on myself for my own enlightenment. But WHAM! Of course! Everything we do effects everyone around us. Chanting is my way of saying to the universe,

May we be safe,
May we happy,
May we have good health
And enough to eat,
And may we live at ease of Heart
With whatever comes to us in life.

"Rememberance of the Name is, in a way, the silent prayer of God. It's technique consists in unremitting inward repetiton of the Divine name. The power of this prayer consists not in it's contents, but in the Name itself. Saints testify that in this Name resides the power of the presence of God. Beginning with simple repetition, gradually but inevitably, the Divine power which is hidden in it is disclosed and takes on the character of a ceaseless uplifting of the heart, which persists through the distractions of the surface life" - Shirdi Sai Baba

I only got a taste of how chanting works because I was forced to. Back in 1972 we were living with Maharaj-ji at his temple in the foothills of the Himalayas. He had hired a group of Kirtan Walas to sing Hare Krishna all day, everyday. Then one day one of those guys came on to one of the Western women hanging out with Maharaj-ji. When he found out about it he sent them all back to Brindavan. One of the Indian devotees asked him, "Who will sing now that they are gone?" He said, "The Westerners!"

This was terrible. All I wanted to do was sit and gaze at him. That was my connection, my worship, my life breath, and now we were going to have to sit in a room and sing and we wouldn't be able to see him from there! Terrible. So there I was with the other Westerners singing for many hours everyday. I would get really bored but what could I do? I had to sing. There was nowhere to go. So I kept singing and I noticed that the boredom would pass and I would be back into the chanting.

Then I remembered an old girlfriend and how beautiful she was. I remembered all the great times we had together. Then I remembered what she had done to me! She had left me for another guy and I got really pissed off. There I was sitting in India in my guru?'s temple surrounded by the incredible beauty of the mountains and I was burning with anger. And all the time I was singing Hare Krishna!

After a while, the thoughts and moods began to move through a little more lightly and the mind was happily swimming a little deeper in the Name. It became easier to stay in the singing and not go on such long trips in my mind. The chants became more real and present than the thoughts. It was like a figure-ground reversal; like an Escher painting with the foreground constantly changing into the backgroundand vice versa. Even as the thoughts were coming and going, the chant was also moving within me, deep and sweet with a life of its own.

By letting go of thoughts and coming back to the chant, I began to develope the "Letting Go" muscle. This is the very muscle that will serves us when we are stuck in depression and sadness; when fear has us in it's grip. Emotions are thoughts with more juice, but we don't know how to free ourselves from their tyranny. Chanting helps us develop that ability as we offer our hearts in love to the presence of Love in this moment.

Caught in the Storm,
The ship of my life
Is blown around
By the winds of desire,
Battered by waves in all directions.

My breath rises within me,
The breath of the heart.
The sweet breath.
The sacred breath.
I follow as it leads me in.

The winds begin to die down
And the waters calm.
I am released into
the refuge of the
Harbour of the Name