Join us this Saturday, March 28th for a LIVE stream from Facebook. Kanth Swami will be conducting a Vajra Vyrochani Homa for world peace and good health for everyone. With this powerful homa we will be sending prayers for everyone who’s effected by the Corona virus and also we will implore Mother nature to stop this virus.
If you would like to sponsor, email your sankalpa information to info@srimcenter.org. Include your name, immediate family member names, along with your Nakshatra and Gotram if you know them. The sponsorship fee is a special rate of $27 and can be paid at https://srimcenter.org/donate/ Onsite sponsorships are not available at this time as the temple is closed to the public. Jai Karunamayi!

By Carol Billingsley

What is Amma to me …

It’s easy for me to say, Amma is Everything to me. It’s clear to me I have looked forever for Her. My whole life is better with Amma. I had so longed to have God’s love in my life in a way that transformed my family. I have that now!

My work is better with Amma. As a chiropractor I’m deeply reliant on the awareness that our bodies create healing. Now I feel my adjustments are different because I know Amma. Her Love and Blessings come through the adjustments. My life is filled with love and happiness, inspiration and dedication because of Amma. I will spend the rest of my days loving and offering Seva to Amma.

Dearest Amma, we wish you the happiest of Birthdays and may we your devotees be led to be who you see us to be.

All my love,

Carol B.

By Mary Ann Luckett

As a little girl my heart was full of God’s love. Everything I saw was overflowing with God’s light. The trees had a glow that would extend yards outside of their physical boarders, the same held true with all of nature. When I would talk with people I would see God in them, through them and pouring out of them. I was raised Catholic and loved Jesus with everything in me. I had a personal and deep relationship with Him that influenced every decision that I made. My heart was full, enthusiastic and innocent. I knew the truth because it was in plain view. I remember my mother coming to my side as I gazed out the screen door into our lush green backyard and saying, “I wish I could see what you see Mary Ann, I can see it in your eyes – how beautiful!”

My longing to join with Jesus, with God was overwhelming. I wanted to be completely at one with Him. At the time I worked for the church as a Secretary. When I was working late, and no one was there I would sing and dance for God in front of the altar for long periods of time. I was swept up in the ecstasy of God. My longing to be one with Jesus was real and overwhelming. One evening, while I was working at the Church alone I decided to offer my ring to God. I said, “God take this ring from me and know I am giving you my life. If you pick up the ring my body will die, and I will be at last one with you. If the ring stays I will know that you want me to stay.” I was the last one in the church as I locked it up I was filled with a wondering if I would ever see this place again. Later that night, after I was tucked into bed, the fear of death overcame my delight and I changed my mind. “God, I’m not so sure about this anymore,” I said. I felt the beads of sweat on my forehead as I tried to stay awake, fearful that if I closed my eyes, death would take me. I was torn between the two ideas, living – dying. Exhaustion took me over and I went to sleep. The next morning when I woke up I jumped out of bed, dressed and ran out of the house to go to the church. I was the first one there, turned all the lights on, and my ring … it was gone.

I was dumbfounded! It made no sense to my 14-year-old mind. If the ring was gone, I should be dead. Since I wasn’t dead the only conclusion that I could make was – God wasn’t real. It was all a lie. I had made it up.

I left the church with my head down and shaking. God was not real.

From that moment on, the light that was in everything and everyone was gone. I became disconnected from what was the central understanding in my life, that we are all connected in God’s energy, God’s love. Within weeks I started making bad decisions in my life. Drinking, smoking, skipping school to go to the bars—an overall a slippery slide away from God. Later I did things that were terrible and selfish. I finally found myself to be suicidal, alone in my apartment with no one to talk to. It was like I was at the bottom of a deep well, with cold stone around me, only able to look up to see a light that was far, far away from me. I hit bottom, I screamed out to that little bit of light that I could see and pleaded to God, “Help”! I was in a heap, crying, knowing that I was a hair away from making a truly awful decision. I was panicked and scared. Again, I screamed, “help”!

The phone rang …

… It was the only person it the world that I could talk to. Someone that had no judgements towards what I was going to tell her. I poured my heart out as she listened and supported me. I don’t remember anything that she said. At the end of the call, I was lighter and not alone. Another person knew me and didn’t judge me.

From that moment I made my way back, slowly and painfully, to myself. Finally, I was blessed enough to meet my Guru, Gurumayi. She opened the door in my heart to God. During Shakipat, the transmission of the Divine spark, I felt unconditional love flow through me like it was cool liquid Gold. When it reached the base of my spine, I felt the same love come out of me and go to her. Nothing was like this. I remember driving back to Atlanta in complete bliss. The roads, the trees the grass blades were full of light. God was everywhere. The bliss lasted about 6 months, but the gift has lasted forever.

After about 17 years of following and learning from Gurumayi, I met Amma. I am embarrassed to say that when I first saw Amma, I was not enthralled. I thought, “who is she, she doesn’t seem so impressive.” My thoughts were pervasive. I was given the opportunity to offer Arati. As I started to move the tray, Amma looked at me with complete compassion. I expressed inside of my heart the disappointment that she wasn’t my Guru, Gurumayi. Her eyes were filled with understanding and compassion. There were no expectations of how I should feel coming from her gaze. It allowed me to have my pain fully. When the evening was over, Amma walked past me and without moving her lips spoke loudly and clearly to me. The message was one that I am still contemplating. From that second, my heart turned towards Amma. Slowly and surely, she brought me closer to Her. I had not yet put the pieces together in my life.

In 2017 I had the privilege of going to Manidweepa for Navaratri. During one of the evenings of fireworks and spontaneous spurts of singing and dancing Amma looked at me and said, “Marianna, you can dance if you want to”. The invitation horrified me. Dance! What, me dance. I could never do what the Indian devotees were doing. Yet I had learned to follow Amma’s commands and so I started to dance. Within seconds I was lifted back in time, as I used to dance in the church with all my love for Jesus. My arms moved, by body twirled, my feet were light and sure footed. I was back. I was lost in the Love.

That night I couldn’t sleep as the events in my life started to connect. I hadn’t recognized how the day when I was 14, changed the course of my life until that evening. One memory after another was revealed as I lay in bed fitfully. Finally, the whole circle was complete and the Miracle of Amma was clear. She was healing me from that fateful day. Bringing me back to the truth. My longing to join with God was back. This time I understood that I could become enlightened while I was still in this body. I knew that Amma was there, answering my plea for help. She was there guiding me to Gurumayi. She was there in all the moments of my life. Even when I felt completely alone – she was there.

Tears of gratitude filled my heart.

Who is Amma … I don’t know except she is the beginning, the end and the middle. She is the ultimate relationship that I can have with God. She is with me always and her loving hand is with my children.

From the bottom of my heart – thank you Amma

Happy Birthday,

I love you,

Mary Ann

I am donating the sum of my families ages which is $458.00

By Leigh Moore

Jai Karunamayi!

In early May of 2014, I celebrated my birthday and unbeknown to me at that time, I also was blessed with a re-birth when Gurumayi Chidvilasananda, my Beloved Guru of over 30 years, lovingly handed the reins of my sadhana to Amma Sri Karunamayi at the Ati Rudram at the SRIM Center.

I had become very complacent in my sadhana, did not seek out this transition and I wrestled with it for a long time—caught in duality and conditioned thinking. My Guru’s personality is bold, big and Her stride is long. The earth shutters at the force of Her footsteps. Her approach is highly structured. My Beloved Amma’s arrows are tipped with flowers, Her voice is soft. One has to listen with intent to hear the gentle jingle of Her ankle bracelets. There is less structure.

Who is Amma, what does it mean to be the Divine Mother, and why am I so irresistibly drawn to Her when I have a Jugadguru who has given me everything? Can Amma take me across the ocean of samsara?

As the fire of sadhana melts my ignorance, my contemplation and reflection on Who is Amma continues to reveal itself. I now recognize how many of my own limitations I have projected onto Amma. I diminished Her magnificence through my lack of understanding; She is the primordial power behind the entire cosmos. Her compassion and power are dancing brilliantly behind the veil and She calls to us to refine our receptor to be able to see Her fully.

She is Mother, She is Guru— all creation comes from Her alone. She looks for every opportunity to bestow grace and end the cycle of birth and death for Her devotees.

Amma has given me an inspired life—a burning desire to merge with the power of Her lotus feet, an inner flame that refuses to bow to inner commotion, a fire that melts my heart over and over again. My life is dust without Amma and this flame.

Kabir, Enlightened Mystic & Poet from Varanasi, India, says

In this upsurge of divine love,
The planets and stars are dancing in ecstasy,
Each new birth of a soul is a matter of great joy,
The hills and the sea and the earth dance.
All humanity celebrates this bliss with laughter and tears.

Amma, on October 18/19, the entire universe will be dancing in ecstasy for your birth!  There are no words to express my gratitude so I will join the dance!

On your 60^th birthday, Divine Mother, I offer with gratitude and appreciation $1 for every year of your life and the lives of my beautiful family members and Guru totaling $564:

Amma—$60
Gurumayi Chidvilasananda—$63
My birth Mother—$82
My birth Father—$75
Sister—$72
Sister—$63
Brother-in-Law—$73
Brother-in-Law—$65
Kitty—$11

Jai Karunamayi!