Haha, I remember when I was out in the Northwest Territories of Pakistan feeling most reassured and relieved on seeing the moon one night. I remember thinking...yes, I must still be on the same planet!!!
When I was taught the TM technique back in the early eighties I was unemployed and it was free, but the deal was an employed person would pay roughly a weeks salary. It seems now you can expect to pay as much as $1500.
Be warned...your mind wont let you do that easily, it will feel left out and continually try to break the silence. Like Ginger said, it can take a lot of practice...but it's worth it.
I guess the hound doesn't need to meditate, not too much chit chat gong on in his head I suspect. In TM a mantra is chosen for each individual, with practice repeating this mantra will allow a person to 'transcend' into a state of complete mental stillness which if practiced for around twenty minutes twice a day can relieve stress and even reduce the likelihood of illness. It's a method tried and tested and used commonly by tens of thousands of people around the world.
In the TM method a mantra is used to close the active mind off. Of course the mind resents being ignored and will try to take control and ramble on. Using a mantra one can eventually 'still' the mind to allow pure thought to replace the constant chatter we experience incessantly. This has a most beneficial effect and revitalises the body and soul to allow us to cope with our day to day challenges with refreshed energy and vigour.
Actually R, looking back there was more than one scary experience on that journey.
Part five...From the plains to the mountain passes.
The old bus was finally fully loaded and we rumbled our way through the busy Peshawar streets, out into the leafy suburbs and on across the surrounding lowland plains. We had been traveling for less than a hour when we were pulled over at a roadside checkpoint, something we would get used to during the course of our journey to the mountains. After a quick check the soldiers waved us on our way without any fuss, in fact I was surprised how friendly they had appeared. The surrounding countryside was flat and obviously very arable with cotton plantations dominating the landscape around us. I soon became thankful for the lack of glass in the window by my seat as the heat inside the bus had become quite stifling and despite the dust, the flow of air was most welcome. Eventually we drove into what was obviously a flood, the road was completely swamped, people were wading knee deep in the muddy flood water carrying their possessions or pushing small handcarts heavily loaded with what appeared to be all their worldly goods. I asked one of the passengers what had happened, he told me the area had been flooded and the people were moving on to higher ground. What amazed me was how untroubled these people seemed, even waving and smiling at us as we passed by. It was at this point when I first realised how people in this part of the world viewed things quite differently from what I was used to and how their outlook on life left quite a lasting effect on me. The road was now deteriorating into little more than a dirt track, yet it was clearly marked on the map as a major route north and I began to wonder what the high mountain passes would be like, ruing the fact that we had not waited a day or two for a flight out to our destination. Slowly the landscape began to change and we began to climb as the road deteriorated even more. At one point we appeared to be following a river bed, the bus crazily lurching to and fro as it bounced over large semi submerged boulders with no sign of a road anywhere in sight. Then to my surprise I saw a man casually washing a car in the middle of the river with a small queue of cars seemingly waiting their turn to be washed and rinsed it the flowing waters. Yes, things are quite different out here I thought to myself. A little further on after we had returned to something that resembled a road, another roadside check but this time the soldiers were not so friendly. It seemed our driver had gone through a checkpoint a few miles back where we as foreigners should have registered. The driver dutifully turned the bus around and head off back, along the river bed, past the 'carwash' and back for about ten miles. I was quite amazed in fact how well the other passengers took this unwelcome detour, I couldn't imagine how this would be taken if back home we had been forced to retrace our steps because three Pakistanis were on the bus, another lesson of how differently things were viewed out there. Anyway, we eventually reach the checkpoint, filled in the necessary forms, the driver was fined and slapped about a bit by the soldiers and we were back on our way.
Next time...Avoiding Dir and a surprise at the foot of The Lowari.
bodleing Forum Posts (13,810)
Things you didn't know about The Tower of London
And perhaps you'd rather not find out...He really gets into the swing of it around the ten minute mark...