Namaste from Uruguay

[Avazjan]

Namaste All,

My name is Avazjan and I'm new here. :) Don't really know what else to say, but thank you for making this forum available. I look forward to learning a great deal here.

Namaste!

[Ramakrishna]

Namaste Avazjan and welcome to HDF! I'm sure you will learn a lot from these forums. I know I have.

Hare Krishna

[Eastern Mind]

Vannakkam Avazjan:

Welcome to these forums. Perhaps you are the onloy person from your country on here. How did you get interested in Hinduism from Uruguay? I am curious. Was it the internet?

Aum Namasivaya

[Avazjan]

Vannakkam Avazjan:

Welcome to these forums. Perhaps you are the onloy person from your country on here. How did you get interested in Hinduism from Uruguay? I am curious. Was it the internet?

Aum Namasivaya

I am not originally from Uruguay, I moved here four years ago from the USA, my parents are both Hindu.

[goodlife]

welcome Avazjan

tell us somethign about yourself. what brings you to HDF?

goodlife

[Avazjan]

welcome Avazjan

tell us somethign about yourself. what brings you to HDF?

goodlife

Namaste :)

I am here mostly to keep my mouth shut and learn. I have already absorbed a great deal reading these forums, and decided that I could also contribute constructively so I registered as a member.

About me... my parents are both Western Hindus, my mother is a Gaudiya Vaishnava Bhakta, and my father is also Hindu. He is my guru, and is in my estimation a great yogi. I have received authentic shaktipat from him, but I won't go into detail about my experiences as they aren't really relevant to anyone else.

I am 21, and only in the last 3 years or so have I really taken Hinduism seriously to the point of dedicated practice, I am a committed sadhaka now. Shiva and Uma are the deities that my heart sings to. I regard "them" as one and the same - Shiva is the face of Uma, and Uma is the face of Shiva, Shiva is the heart of Uma, and Uma is the heart of Shiva, etc. For this reason the Ardhanari form is one of my favorites. But I also have great respect for Vishnu, and His forms and avatars, as an equally valid and complete Purusha form and manifestation of Brahman - it is just that I identify most with Shiva. (I guess I feel defensive here because I have seen some pretty vicious Shaiva vs Vishnaiva squabbling on other websites that makes no sense to me whatsoever.)

With my guru's blessings, I also study and practice Vajrayana Buddhism, I do not see Buddhism and Hinduism as mutually exclusive. I reject certain Buddhist assertions such as the non-existence of the soul or god but I see this as Gautama's (successful) attempt to cut through a lot of the intellectual posturing, and dead preconceptions of the time period that engaged the ego in convoluted mental constructs rather than liberation. Mostly I see it as Shakyamuni disposing of old terminology and instituting new terminology and concepts, which lead to more or less the same experiences, or the same types of experiences, and realizations. I will not discuss Buddhism on this board though, as that would be inappropriate.

As far as my contributions, I have [a few] areas where my knowledge ranges from good even to erudition, but I have a great deal more areas of ignorance, some of which this site has helped to illumine.

[Odion]

Welcome to HDF!