Six years ago, I was looking for an artist name...not just an Instagram handle, but a vibration. I found "Layasthana" in a Sanskrit glossary by Swami Sivananda. The moment I saw it, I knew it was mine. “A place of dissolution,”  it said. I immediately checked; no one else had claimed it. I changed my handle, started signing off as Layasthana, and settled into the name. But a name like that doesn’t stay quiet. A year later, I dug deeper and found a definition on Wisdom Library that made my...

Ten years ago, the Spanda Hall at the Isha Yoga Center was filled with the charged, festive energy of a social evening. I was new to this path, standing at the edge of the crowd, caught between a deep longing and a primal fear. A fire Theyyam performance was happening...a towering, rhythmic force of red and flame and I had always been terrified of it. I stayed far away, trying to remain invisible, yet my heart was vibrating with a single desire: I wanted to "steal a glance" from my Guru,...

They say you don’t choose Devi; She chooses you. And if you’re stubborn like me, She’ll use whatever means necessary to get you where you need to be, including a friend, a last-minute cancellation, and a perfectly timed "coincidence." In my previous post, I wrote about the "striking" sound in my bones and my intense desire to finally step into the Kalari pit. For years, I’ve felt Kalaripayattu running in my blood. It never felt like a new hobby; it felt like a practice I had mastered...