Integritus Prime

While I was at the ashram in India, I volunteered. I started off in the dining hall, but then my arm started swelling and hurting from ladling out sambar and dal, so I went to the kitchen to see what fun I could have there. Each day was different: peeling onions (a very smelly business), shelling peas (delightful), and one day, I got to open up pomegranates and coax out their kernels.

As I was doing this with a group of other women, I began to notice the pretty patterns of the pomegranate kernels, and which technique was working. Slowly, a metaphor began to form in my mind.

I was in the ashram to meditate and clean out any leftover emotional trauma and unneeded patterns of thinking and doing. The meditation process was gentle and filled with love – heartfulness is all about focusing on the power of the heart.

With the pomegranates, I found a similar process. To remove the kernels, I had to be gentle, otherwise they would squish and stain. I noticed the hard tissue and fiber around the beautiful kernels, and to pry them loose, I had to press gently yet firmly, and also peel back the layers of “skin”. The skin had patterns to it, and had to be removed in its entirety, because it can’t be eaten. The process happened in stages, from one section of the pomegranate to the next.

To sink our teeth into the metaphor (pun intended, oh yeah), when it’s time to release the true self with all its creative juices, symbolized in this case by the delicious and nutrition-rich kernels of the pomegranate, it must be done in stages, with full attention and loving gentleness. Unneeded patterns have to be removed for good, and then the true self (fruit) can serve something (someone) greater than itself…in order to be who we truly are, in all our authenticity, we must shed unnecessary structures and patterns. When we offer ourselves with our trauma intact, we aren’t as deliciously useful to the world.

While I was in the ashram, I was unencumbered by the typical entertainments of social media and movies, so simple realizations went deeper into my psyche than usual. This was a metaphor that stayed with me, showing me the beauty of nature’s patterns, and the symbolism that synchronized so well with what heartfulness meditation was doing for me: separating the kernels of who I really am from old structures that no longer serve me. What remains is purity, from which we weave destiny.

While at the ashram, volunteering in the kitchen brought me some life lessons… Photo Credit: Arjun Kapoor on Unsplash.