Rajyalaxmi Shaha of West Windsor has organized the ninth annual 24-hour vigil to promote fearlessness beginning Saturday, December 29, at 10 a.m., at the Durga Temple in Kingston. She is a co-founder of the Omkriyayog Foundation, based in West Windsor. The event, also known as pooja, focuses on a 24-hour repetition (jaap) of the Mahamritunjaya Mantra. Yogiraj Brahmrshi Barphani Dadaji, known as Dadaji (grandpa in Hindu), will guide the worship service from India.##M:[more]##
“We live in a time when fear pervades our lives. Repeating this mantra banishes fear. Imagine what we all could do if we had no fear,” says Shaha. “Chanting this mantra erodes one’s level of fear the way drops of water eventually wear away at stone. Repetition enhances the effects. Uniting voices multiplies it even more.”
Shaha, a project manager in Piscataway, served as the chairperson for the West Windsor Human Relation Council for four years. She was also president of India Voice of West Windsor, vice president of Community Middle School PTA, and president of the Asian American Political Coalition for Princeton Chapter. Born in Varanasi India, Shaha has her master’s degree in English from BHU University.
As an undergraduate she studied Sanskrit as a language. As a project manager for MarketSource, she developed and created websites for Fortune 500 companies, Hershey, Johnson & Johnson, Mylanta, and Pepcid. Shaha also gives workshops on meditation and breathing techniques to relieve stress. “You manage, health, wealth, family, and friends, but where and why do we give so much importance to stress,” she says. She, and her husband, Shree Prakash Shaha, a civil engineer who works for Key Span as senior project engineer, founded the nonprofit group in 1999.
“You could say it was a calling for me and my husband,” she says. “A pleasant breeze came and just swept us to the higher plains. We have not stopped going with the flow of the being.” Their son, Arunabha (Arun) Keshari, graduated from West Windsor-Plainsboro High School, Class of 2000, and from Manhattan School of Music in 2005. A freelance music composer for video games and television advertising, he is working for the American Stock Exchange. Their daughter, Avantika Rajyalaxmi Devi, graduated from High School South, Class of 2004 and is a student at Pratt Institute.
“Taking Sanskrit has been extremely beneficial towards my spiritual journey,” she says. “When you start offering all your being to the one who created you then work and away from work has no difference. You start doing your best because it for the one who created you. And it is his desire for you to go to work to take care of you family and friends.”
Jappa (mantra repetition) is also known as nada yoga, the yoga of sound. “With the right sounds that come from chanting, we are inviting a calming energy,” says Shaha. “You can use sound as a means of spiritual transformation to connect to your inner self, your internal voice. The chanting or reciting of mantras activates and accelerates the creative spiritual force, promoting harmony in all parts of the human being.”
The event, open to the public, is free and there is no obligation to stay the entire 24 hours. The mantra in Sanskrit is approximately four lines long. The English version will be provided for those who are not familiar with it.
— Lynn Miller
Mahamritunjay Jaap and Pooja, Om Kriya Yoga Foundation, Durga Mandir, Route 27, Kingston, 609-936-0263. www.omkriyayoga.org. The 24-hour event is conducted in a mixture of Sanskrit, Hindu, and English. Bring a cushion or blanket to sit on. Donations invited. Saturday, December 29, 10 a.m.
