The Pink Kingdom and the Girl Power Guru

I was consciously drawn to Amma's ashram to write about it. I was curious to see for myself the female guru who travels the world, giving healing hugs to people willing to queue sometimes five hours for her “darshan” (opportunity with a holy person). The stories go that expectant recipients are enveloped in her arms and all the grief from many meridians is washed away. Some break down in tears, engulfed in her motherly embrace, others are touched to the core, some healed of strange illnesses. I realized I had developed a symbiotic relationship with my blog in that it now influenced me as much as I was influencing it. On my first blog post, hugging appeared on the list of healing activities to be pursued. Research shows that deep hugs, pressing hearts together, can heal sickness, disease, depression, anxiety and stress. A deep hug boosts oxytocin, serotonin and immunity. It can also regulate the body’s production of white blood cells, relax the muscles, ease pain, increase circulation and balance the nervous system. Hugs offer a kind of meditation, causing you to seize the present moment, connect to your feelings and your breath. The energy gained from hugs is synergistic, which means that the whole is more than the sum of its parts. Luckily, Amma was shortly arriving back in town after her European tour, and this seemed like the perfect opportunity to go for the mother of all hugs.

When I pictured the ashram in my mind, I imaged a quiet cluster of white buildings hosting quiet meditation, contemplation and other devotional practices. What I discovered instead, was a small village of pink protruding buildings and tower blocks that erupted from the earth to form a haphazard maze of simple bedrooms, cafes, meditation halls, Ayurvedic therapy rooms, an organic farm and a temple like something out of Disneyland, with white horses and Hindu gods prancing out of the concrete. The place was full of Westerners, giving it the air of Glastonbury festival for spiritual seekers. The view from the twelfth floor of the block where I was staying burst through the senses, the wild sea spread as far as the eye could see to the right, birds circled overhead, a vast river ran ahead to the left, shaping the peninsular of land the ashram resided on, which had palm trees spattered over it. I could see an elephant below and people were feeding it bananas. Little fishing boats paced up and down the river peacefully.

It only cost 300 rupees (about £3.50) a day for a mattress on the floor, in a shared room of three, including vegan curries for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Other foods were available cheaply from a number of eateries. Nothing on the timetable was compulsory, and the sense of freedom suited my malaise. You could sign up to do jobs - the whole ashram is run by individuals volunteering their time and skills. Why would anyone work if they don’t have to, if it isn’t even recorded? Giving and expecting nothing in return is called seva or karma yoga and it's surprisingly rewarding. People can choose from construction, gardening in the organic grounds, chopping vegetables, washing up or helping guests with disabilities. I signed up for pizza dough rolling. It transpired that the French man in his twenties who ran the session had lived in the ashram for five years. I'd heard of people visiting ashrams and never leaving, and it had always sounded a bit nuts. But now, in the beautiful grounds, surrounded by warm and interesting people, with no expectations, it seemed no more mad than living in a polluted city and commuting to work. Everyone around Amma seemed happy. On my floor lived a South American lady with her child, who, by the look of their numerous toys and decorations, had clearly been settled in for some time.

Amma’s ashram serves as an example of feminine power; its a kingdom built on love and compassion. It all started with a little girl from a poor family who cared for her neighbours. She liked giving hugs to people and listening to their needs, heart's desires, mournings and grievances. After some time, people started traveling from other villages to see her and have their sorrows heard. Her parents allowed her to use the cow shed in their garden as a meeting ground. Men who had traveled for days would have to sleep outside on the hay because for decency sake they weren’t allowed in the house. Now Amma has hugged over forty milion people, she has body guards, is a multi-millionaire, delivers humanitarian aid in disaster zones and has meetings with global leaders at world forums.

On my first morning, still in the habit of waking up at 3:30 or 4:00 ever since doing Vipassana in Sri Lanka, I went to join puja in the temple at 5:00. Puja means “prayer”, and involves a ceremony with Hindu rituals, chanting and offerings. There are brightly colored flowers surrounding the objects of worship and a fire pit. At the end, you can offer turmeric rice and milk to the gods. As I was there, observing how invested the priests and audience were in the activity, breathing in the incense, calm and serene wonder, I realised that God exists. At least, the material seemed at that moment immaterial, since God’s presence appears in the sensations of those who believe, his pervasive influence is visible in homes around the world, in the world’s most ornate structures. God motivates action, drives war, marriage, devotion, education, culture and national holidays. God(s) will exist as long as those who believe exist.  

What we believe also has physical manifestations. Religion has been linked to a more robust immune system, lower blood pressure and better recovery times from operations. I started contemplating further how illnesses relate to the mind. Isn’t it a bit scary that thoughts, emotions and beliefs affect your physical health? Any time there’s a downturn, it may have physical implications that are beyond your control. But what if you can harness this reality for good? The power of the placebo is widely accepted, but how far can you consciously push it, or use a spiritual tool to leverage better health? An Indian friend told me his grandfather’s saying is, “if you put all your faith in something, just with belief it could heal you in your tough times. Even take a stone and believe in that, just don’t believe in nothing”. A devotee told us a story that couples who can't conceive go to Amma and she gives them a banana, and within a year they have a baby. They are called Amma's banana babies (He didn't explain the banana, and I didn’t ask) But can you consciously invoke a placebo or engage a belief intentionally? I decided to give it a go....

I used the queue time for my hug with Amma to big it up in my head as much as possible. This single hug was going to change everything, cure everything, heal everything. What level of the subconscious would positive thinking have to reach? I had a single intention: the hug would knock my nervous system back into place. And I had to believe it really had the power to do this. 

About a year ago, I went to the doctor to complain that my heart was racing constantly. I said that I couldn’t easily sleep on my front because it’s thumping was too disturbing. The doctor told me there was nothing wrong and shooed me away. It was only when I spoke to the Optimum Health Clinic that they explained the body can get lodged in the fight-or-flight response (also called hyperarousal, or the acute stress response) - a physiological reaction that occurs in response to a perceived harmful event, attack, or threat to survival, for example, it's activated if you need to run away from a lion. In modern life, most people exist in slight hyperarousal. Many people with CFS/ME can experience this severely, because they are constantly pushed to do things they can't manage (I couldn't meet the increasing demands at work); you can also develop unintentional associative anxiety at the constant onset of symptoms and the weakened body will go into a stress state when it can't cope e.g. digesting a heavy meal or processing alcohol. Trying to "normalise" or rebalance your autonomic nervous system is no easy task, and of course the NHS offers no help (the doctor might well have said, "come back when your chronic stress has led to a disease, then we'll talk"). The NHS might offer anti-depressants to mask the issue rather than get to the route cause of it. In India, a doctor might suggest yoga and meditation or lifestyle adjustments.

The hug itself was somewhat unspectacular. My head was pressed into Amma's bosom and she cradled me, mumbling and purring things in Hindi. When I got up to leave, her hand struck out and gently touched my cheek and she stared deep into my eyes. I went off to bed. The next morning, I felt motivated to do an hour and a half of yoga nidra, then on the roof of the accommodation block, I did half an hour of yin yoga and then half an hour of meditation, altogether inducing a fuzzy feeling of euphoria. Amma's power is self-fulfilling. Calling all people her children, Amma provides the reassurance people seek. 

The problem is, the stories about Amma don't stop at the placebo. Each individual seems to have their own story about the weird and wonderful and knowing things Amma has done. For example, someone at lunch told me their friend asked Amma, “Should I stay here in the ashram, or should I go home?” and, without knowing her at all, Amma replied, “You should go home and finish your degree, and let your parents know where you are now”. Do you suppose people are deluded or lying or do you jump in and start talking about all the unnatural things you've also witnessed and whip up the frenzy surrounding her further, like the fact that out of over two thousand bedrooms in the ashram, I was coincidentally put in the same room as two people with whom I did panchakarma at the Sivananda ashram? I opted for the latter. In the end it’s just way more fun.

I do, however, consider Amma to have higher than average perception, and Amma’s “knowingness” got me thinking further about intuition. Do we even know the extent of intuitive intelligence? Tesla and Edison's branch of intelligence got us the light bulb, but do we even know what the most intuitive person is capable of? In the West, we have been suppressing or disregarding this function for two thousand years. How do you cultivate intuition and are we missing out on something? I recall watching the documentary film, “Aluna”, which focuses on the indigenous Kogi people living deep in Colombia's Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta mountains. They are highly attuned to nature and attempt to show the world the extent of the damage being done to the environment. Every gardener has an empathetic relationship with nature and wants to protect it; I imagine you can detect soil erosion simply by smelling or touching it (or tasting it!?). From outer space, the Earth looks like it has cancer, isn't that visual prompt enough for Republican skeptics? In the end of the documentary, the local government decide to involve the Kogi in their local environmental assessment plans.

However, within the ashram, you start to lose sense of where the line is. At some point, a group started discussing astrology readings. A girl was talking excitedly about how the astrologist had known the exact week she had broken up with her boyfriend two years previously. I think my mind has been opened enough, I'm going to save something for next time. Looking for connections between different parts of nature, the Chinese were the first to realize that the moon affects the tides. I can imagine the objects in the sky have more of a relationship with us than we yet know. Overall, for me, having an open mind means accepting that the information we were given at school is limited, that we exist in a cultural paradigm, it means grasping that our level of knowledge is very ‘of the moment’ as we sit in this period of history and is subject to change. Humans have been blessed with a healthy dose of cynicism that they unfortunately direct mostly outwards and not inwards, and often use it to fuel their own bigotry.Ultimately, there's so much we dont know and perfect lines are hard to draw.  

This became more apparent during a two day meditation course where I learnt Amma’s technique, “I Am Meditation”. It began with a specific sequence of gentle yoga stretching followed by brief pranayama, breathing, after which you naturally sink into quite a deep meditation. Then the technique works through the chakras. I’d heard about the yogic chakras before - the body’s seven energy centers - in the crown of the head, centre of the head, the throat, the heart, the stomach, the reproductive organs and the base of the spine. I had felt skeptical and disinterested. Were these chakras real? If you cut someone open would you see them? But now that didn't seem to matter, since you can experience them either way. I have been amazed by how much meditation is a physical experience. Your whole body fills with energy, you can freely disperse it around your body parts, endorphins are released. 

My favourite thing to do was to sit on the roof of the accommodation tower block, developing my own yoga and mediation practice amongst the washing lines and hanging towels, shirts and under garments, with the rising chanting from temple below and the wind blowing my hair and the raucous birds above as the meditation lifted me into the clouds. One time, there was a huge thud on the front of my yoga mat and I opened my eyes to see half a bird, with its legs sticking up pointedly into the sky and its head and torso cleanly cut off. I let out my best girlish scream. An older woman, impressively calmly, came and picked it up by its legs and disposed of it. An eagle had torn it clean in half in the air, taking the blood with it.

The social life at the ashram enhanced tlife there. I met up with Maset, a girl I had made friends with at Sivananda, and together with a group of other Israelis, we celebrated Hannukah, which involved lighting candles each day for a week and singing in Hebrew.

One evening, bajans (devotional songs) were held in the main hall. A collective plays traditional instruments on the stage, emitting music that is deep and other worldly as Amma sings. The "spiritual energy" in the hall around her is so intense that it almost thickens the air, and you can somehow tip from a normal state into deep meditation within seconds. I sat directly in her line of vision breathing it all in. Your body becomes so sensitive and receptive in this state, that when she graced the audience with her hand movements, I felt tingling across my collar bone as if her fingers touched me, first as she glided her left hand and then her right across the audience. 

In the same evening, I received an acupressure massage. The masseur's hands dig so deep into the body's pressure points and grooves that it's painful, but you feel toxins being released as they rush into your blood stream. Acupressure focuses on clearing blockages in your life force energy, so it can flow more easily. I hadn't really realised just how healing and impactful a therapeutic massage can be. I woke up the next day overcome with heightened emotion. I went down to the cafe for breakfast at the Western cafe. Half drifting into meditation whilst eating, I reached such a high level of inner peace, happiness and higher consciousness - or was it just that I was so pleased to have eggs and hash browns after months of vegan curry for Breakfast lunch and dinner - that I started crying silent tears of profound joy into my breakfast. Christmas was drawing nearer and I'd worried that I had no plan, but now I grasped that Enlightenment means being able to spend Christmas entirely alone with just the trees and the sea and the wind and feel elated.

They say Amma always finds a way for you to stay, and three days soon rolled into nine. When I finally departed, I could reflect that being at Amma’s was certainly a life changing experience. I came away feeling a lot more well than when I had arrived. My nervous system was calmer. My digestion had improved significantly already. In the Ayurveda book, I read that when you're eating correctly, you should defecate every morning after waking. I thought it was pretty odd being instructed when to poo, but following the doctor's dietary instructions as if from a recipe book, it works like clockwork. I was stronger, and I gained hope.

The reason India is the place to come to to learn about living well is that people here have been concentrating on it for thousands of years. In the West, our priority has been to conquer the world, gain riches and make important technological advances. We have developed toughening, yet delusional expressions like, “Whatever doesn't kill you will only make you stronger”, and until more recently, acknowledgement of our emotional or mental life has been a taboo, let alone something to be explored and developed. Interestingly, sports teams have hushed the fact that athletes use psychologists to propel their performance, until very recently when cyclist Chris Hoy openly attributed the gold medals won by British cyclists in the 2012 Olympics to prof Steve Peters. My time here made me more attune to the subtle relationship between mind and body; I can slow my heart rate during mediation for example (Yogis have been reported to be able to make their heart stop entirely, read more).

The puzzle comes when you start to experience things that have not yet been sufficiently understood in scientific terms, or are so far removed from the Western experience or  field of interest, that at some point you feel like a wizard trying to explain Hogwarts to a Muggle. Hindus are more likely to suggest explanations that are religious or spiritual, which makes it even harder to relate to. The secrets of India remain secret because people fear that when they go home they might be burnt at the stake like witches in the 1400s. At Amma’s ashram, sensation, impression, experience, reality and materiality start to get blurred. In philosophy, believing in something because it serves a purpose is called pragmatism. I’m not sure how far I would take this, but since my priority is health rather than the truth of existence, I’m more open than I would have been before, and the results are tangible.