My Tuesday night yoga class has been featuring some hip hop infused yoga chants by M.C. Yogi from his album Elephant Power. I've been digging the tracks "Om Namah Shivaya" and "Be the Change."I mean, how can you not like a rap song about Mahatma Gandhi?
Om Namah Shivaya
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Om Namah Shivaya
Now I bow to Shiva with love and respect / I invoke him with the slogan so I’m open to connect / with devotion cuz I’m knowin that he’s always in effect / in deep meditation with a snake around his neck / he’s the husband of Parvati Maha Shakti / & he rides a white bull the vehicle Nandi / he’s Ganapati’s father mister Mahadev / and the Ganges flow down, from the crown of his head / a crescent moon rests right next to his dreads / he’s the god of the dead,covered in ash / with a smile on his face his compassion is vast / living in a place called Mount Kailash / in the Himalayan kingdom known as his home / & in the shape of a lingum he’s a rolling stone / to the king of all yogi's Shankara, Shambo / singing Om Namah Shivaya, Shivaya Namah Om /
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Om Namah Shivaya
To Shiva Shankar, the yoga master / known as Nataraja the cosmic dancer / lord of destruction, god of disaster / and if you don’t invite him he’s the of party crasher / to the old school mystic, who’s non dualistic / Shiva guides my mind so that I can shift it / away from a place that’s materialistic / into a space that’s more holistic / magnetic ascetic you make my soul shine / you awaken the snake at the base of my spine / third eye wide open in a yoga pose / you show us how to focus so the lotus unfolds / in deep concentration with breath control / returning to the source now you feel the force flow / when Jiva meets Shiva opposites become whole / singing Om Namah Shivaya Shivaya Namah Om /
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Om Namah Shivaya
Om Namah Shivaya the flames get higher / as the corpse gets burned on the funeral pyre / the soul never dies so it won’t expire / when it’s time to die just take off your attire / exhale to let go of your ego’s desire / let your soul be inspired to shine even brighter / like Shiva the one that I admire / dancing on a demon in a burning ring of fire / you embody pure Truth Consciousness, & Bliss / Mahadev it’s been said that your pure auspiciousness / creating, devastating and always transformation / you save the whole world when you swallowed up the poison / destroying bad habits ignorance, and greed / practicing detachment, compassion, and peace / to the king of all yogi's I offer these prayers / to the lord of meditation living in the Himalayas /
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Om Namah Shivaya
Be the Change
once upon a time not long ago / there was a boy who would grow and become a great soul / he lived in India and his name was Gandhi / he believed in human rights and he felt so strongly/ that he made a vow to train himself / he realized first he’d have to change himself / so he changed his clothes, and decided to walk / some days he practiced silence and refused to talk/ when he was young he studied to be a lawyer / and then he became a great spiritual warrior / he read from the scriptures of every religion / came to the realization that we’re all God’s children because he understood that we’re all equal / he became a spokesman for the people a karma yogi devoted to service / to spread truth & peace was his purpose /
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Be the change that you wanna see in the world, just like Gandhi
Gandhi dedicated his life to the cause / even when it meant breaking unjust laws / he often faced prison and incarceration / but that only strengthened his determination / he said he would make every sacrifice / but that he would never kill or take a life / he used his heart instead of his fist / and he taught nonviolence as a way to resist / a peaceful soldier who used his mind / to fight for the rights of human kind / but not just people, animals too / his basic teaching “God is Truth” / he joined Muslims, Seeks, & Hindus / Christians, Buddhists, Jains, and Jews / all the many paths that lead into / the light that shines bright inside of me and you /
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Be the change that you wanna see in the world, just like Gandhi
“An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind” / and it takes more strength and faith to be kind / with that in mind Gandhi took a stand / against the foreign occupation of his land / when things got violent Gandhi would fast / not eating for days until the riots would pass / but the biggest event that made the british halt / is when Gandhi G decided to harvest salt / the British empire installed a salt tax / and stealing salt was an unlawful act / so Gandhi and his peeps, took the streets / ten thousand deep they marched to the beach / but when they arrived they were beaten with clubs / but they didn’t fight back instead they chose love / the foreign military realized they were wrong / and eventually decided to go home / you see Gandhi G was a very great leader / but before all that he was shy and meager / as a young child he was just like you and me / before he became Mahatma Gandhi / the word “Mahatma? it means great soul / and its inside of us just waiting to unfold / if you follow your heart and act real bold / next time it’ll be your story that’s told!
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Be the change that you wanna see in the world, just like Gandhi
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