Daily Positive Thoughts: January 01, 2016: Sense & Sensibility

Daily Positive Thoughts: January 01, 2016: Sense & Sensibility

Sense & Sensibility

Common sense is to know the difference between being sensible and being sensitive.  Understand with your heart but protect your feelings.

The Power to Choose

It is extremely important to realize that, in any situation, you have the power to choose whether your response in that situation will be passive or pro-active, positive or negative, indifferent or attentive etc. You choose what action you take and how you feel. But do you exercise your power of choice all the time? You need to check which factors influence your decision making and push you either in one direction or the other? There are many factors that control and limit your power to make the right, and more importantly, free choices. These factors primarily include influences of people that dominate your ways of thinking, your beliefs, your attitudes, even your complete personality. You are also limited by the influence of your own fears, attachments, desires, biases or other negative and waste thoughts, which result in a lack of focus.

There are a lot of people who are not used to thinking for themselves or even prefer being a “yes” man, going along with what others think and say, without having an opinion of their own. Also as you pass through your childhood and teenage life and enter adulthood, you acquire many preconceived ideas or beliefs from your family and social and cultural environment; that is why you assume inside that some things or people are always positive and others are always negative when, in fact, that’s not necessarily true. This directly affects the type of decisions you make, each time there is a requirement for one. In any particular situation, courage, wisdom, high self-esteem and focus is required to sit down calmly and make an assessment about the possible choices before you, and then finally make the right decision. The more you practice relaxation, positive thinking and meditation, the more you rise above all the negatively influencing factors mentioned above , the more you experience the positive qualities and powers mentioned above and exercise your power of choice accurately and with confidence.

(to be continued tomorrow)

The Soul World Or Incorporeal World

The Soul World, which is the sixth element, is filled with golden-red, divine light (experienced during meditation). Over there, the conscient (living entities), the souls, have neither bodies of matter nor bodies of light. There exists neither thought, word nor action; just complete stillness, silence and peace. Just as this world occupies a tiny part of this physical universe, so too the souls occupy just a tiny portion of this infinite world. This is the highest region, the original home of souls and the Supreme Soul, God. This is the region which human beings, irrespective of culture or religion, have tried to reach in thoughts, prayers, etc. It is called by various names in various religions - Heaven, Nirvana, Shantidham, Paramdham, Brahmand, etc. Before I came to this earth, I was there with all other souls, brothers. The experience of complete and utter peace, purity and silence is there in my sweet home. There the soul is untouched by matter. Souls reside there as star-like points of light. They remain dormant, with their roles in the physical world latent (hidden) within them. The roles emerge when they the souls appear on earth, the world stage.

The souls stay in the soul world in well-defined groups. They descend onto this earth in a certain chronological order, according to the quality of sanskaras. At the apex of this configuration of souls is the Supreme Soul, whom the other souls call God, Allah, Jehovah, etc. Beneath him the souls are positioned number wise according to their degree of similarity to the Supreme. Depending on the quality and the part the soul has to play, it emerges in the human world, taking the body of a developing baby in a mother's womb. It then continues through the cycle of birth and rebirth according to the role that it has. When the parts are over, souls again return to this world of light, peace, liberation and complete purity. The deep rest the soul has had in the home has such an effect on it that even though it forgets the details about that world, there is always a desire to search for that peace and silence when it becomes lost and confused in the world of matter. In that supreme region only, souls remain in their completely original, natural state, which can be experienced through Rajyoga meditation.

Soul Sustenance

God’s Three Roles In The World Drama

God As A Creator

Logic tells us that spiritual and material energy in the form of souls and matter didn't just suddenly appear out of nothing. The First Law of Thermodynamics states that energy can't be either created or destroyed. Matter itself is a form of condensed energy. Souls are also conscious points of energy. Both are uncreated and therefore eternal. The Second Law shows us that energy, when in use, moves from a potential state, in which energy is available, to a spent state in which it is no longer available. Putting both laws together we have what appears to be a system in which the basic components have neither beginning nor end. They move towards a state of energy exhaustion (entropy). If time were linear (a straight line) and there were no external intervention, then over an unimaginably long period of time the universe would just fizzle out.

Fortunately for both the souls and the elements of matter, there is one supreme energy source which is external to the process of entropy (unaffected by the process) and thereby retains its original potency or power. When things reach a certain stage of weakness and chaos, the Supreme Soul plays out His role of re-energizing the souls. The recuperation (recovery) to their original state, in turn, has a direct effect on matter. It also comes back to its own original state of perfection. If, as has been shown above, God's presence, power and knowledge are purely spiritual, then creation has to be a spiritual act and not a physical one. Creation can be understood as the regeneration or reshaping of what is already there and not one of creating something physical or non-physical out of nothing. God recharges the souls' spent spiritual energy.

(To be continued tomorrow .)

Message for the day

True humility comes from self-respect.

Projection: When we are full and in our state of self-respect, we will be able to remain humble in all situations. When there is no self-respect, any comments or criticism hurts the ego and we tend to lose our humility.

Solution: When I find myself getting affected by criticism, I need to check whether I am sure of what I'm doing. Let me look within myself and see what specialties I have that I can use in my daily life. So when I increase my own confidence in this way and do everything with this confidence, I'll be humble.

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

Daily Positive Thoughts: December 31, 2015: The Dawn of a New Year

Daily Positive Thoughts: December 31, 2015:  The Dawn of a New Year 

The Dawn of a New Year

To make good use of what you have and to let go of what you do

not use is to live in a contented way.

The dawn of a new year is a time for new possibilities.

Let go of the past and give birth to new possibilities.

Wishing one and all a Wonderful and promising New Year

A well-nourished heart is automatically giving and full of grace. We can nourish our hearts with the energy of positive thoughts and pure feelings. When we realize we are eternal souls, beings of consciousness rather than Matter, and that our original nature is benevolent and wise, the heart grows full. When we remember, with love, that we are the offspring of an eternal Parent, a source of eternal truth, the heart overflows. This is the greatest gift we can offer to each other and the world in the year ahead.

The Benefits Of Togetherness Over Isolation

Nowadays, there are more and more people who are choosing to live alone. Perhaps the reason for that are experiences in the past of pain, peacelessness, rejection, disappointment or failure when living together, in a relationship or even more than one relationship. As a result, the preference for living alone sets inside them. Perhaps, it is their alternative search for peace, happiness and success that leads them to make this decision. Also, the belief that if you live alone, you are free and you can do what you want, when you want and without having to explain yourself to anyone. But are we, as human beings, basically by nature, meant to live together or to live alone? Each human being has the need to belong and provide that feeling to others. You can belong to a family, a group of friends, a bunch of close school or college students, some office colleagues, a club, a community, a religious group etc. The mere presence of others; the participation, communication and collaboration with others; the assistance provided to others and received from them and the sharing of positive energy with others in a group; inspires and challenges us and others immensely. The same can happen, if we are staying alone, but to a limited extent. Greater inner spiritual empowerment takes place inside those who live and work together, not those who distance themselves from others. In a group, we broaden our limits and make our heart bigger when we do things for others that we wouldn't do for ourselves.

Each human being is a source of love for others. It is a basic human nature to love and be loved, which is not possible unless there is some kind of unity or mutual belonging. Distancing or isolating oneself implies an absence of love, neither given or shared, neither received.

Soul Sustenance

A Message For The New Year

Happy New Year !!! a greeting exchanged Every Year on 1st Jan.
But are we really happy and has the year been new.

As we begin the New Year with powerful greetings and blessings for all our family and friends,
Let us take a moment to greet ourselves. To promise ourselves a year full of Love, Peace and Happiness.

Let us leave behind what we don't need to carry ...
Hurt, Sadness, Pain, Fear and Regrets, because we have a choice and the power.

Let us take a moment to reflect on one of our most common beliefs - * It's not me, it's them.
An illusion that someone else is responsible for what we think, feel and do, making ourselves a slave to that person or that situation.

Let us release this belief and allow the truth to emerge and establish itself within our consciousness.
The truth is always simple, * It's not them, it's me. Always.
We have a choice in our every response. We can maintain a calm, positive, stable response regardless of what happens around us.

Let's remember the mantra to change our life from being a slave to being a master -
* It's not what others say or do to me that makes me feel this way, it's what I do with what they say that makes me feel this way.
Now choose how you would like to feel.

As we start making our choices, this year will be truly New and Happy. 

Message for the day

The way to accumulate the account of blessings is to remain content and make others content.

Checking: While you are doing something, check if there is any limited desire for name or fame. The instant fruit of the service that you do is that you are happy, it is not what you get later that is important. So check how much you are experiencing this fruit and remaining content.

Practice: Whatever you are doing for yourself or for others throughout the day, make sure that you are enjoying it. When you start enjoying what you are doing you'll stop expecting anything thereby you can remain content.


In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

Daily Positive Thoughts: December 30, 2015: Manage Stress

Daily Positive Thoughts: December 30, 2015: Manage Stress

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Manage Stress

Manage your stress by:

·       delegating

·       planning without having unrealistic expectations

·       giving yourself "me time" to relax

·        allowing space for life to just happen

Taking Charge of Your Responses in Close Relationships 

In relationships, sometimes positive emotions are generated and sometimes negative. On the one hand, joy, love and happiness is generated on being with them; but then attachment, dependency and expectations are also generated. In such situations, you are more focused on others and are always looking at the other person's behavior, you stop seeing yourself and being aware of your reactions and taking the responsibility for the responses that you create. You get frustrated when the other person does not meet your expectations. As you depend on them, if they don't act as you would like, if they don't reach home or call you at the time you would like; all this frustrates you. You radiate this energy to the other: "they are not doing what they should be doing" and so you feel frustrated and discontented. 

All the while that you hold the other one responsible for your frustration, you are not in charge of your own reactions, because you have given power to the other to dominate your emotional world. It is there that you lose your freedom. You lose your freedom because you give to the other, in the name of love, power over your own moods. You allow the other's energy to enter your inner world and cause inside you frustration, bad moods, irritation, sorrow and a mental and emotional dependence where you are constantly thinking about where they are, what they have to do, what they have to say, where they have to go, and all this consumes a lot of your mental energy. Wanting to control the other and the frustration that it brings with it uses up a lot of emotional energy.

Maintaining Your Self Esteem In Relationships

When a person is in love with another human, the marvelous thing about being in love is that it is a totally positive projection. There is a person who projects on to you all that is positive: you are marvelous, you are unique, you are indispensable, you are a treasure. That positive projection generates a euphoric state, of bliss, of well being, whereby you are flying. You feel loved, cared for, needed and valued. That positive projection lasts for a time until, with the dependencies and expectations, the negative projection begins. "You should have called me, you should have told me, you should have come at this time, you should be more like this, you should be less like that, you should have done this or that."

With these expectations, demands and dependencies, that positive projection and flying state disappear.The other has started interfering in your personal space and the harmony that was there previously is lost. One needs to learn to have a positive vision of oneself. You are marvelous, you are unique; don't depend on them telling you so. This does not mean you need to feed your ego, but that you need to make the most positive emerge from within you. Resort to all your creative, positive, spiritual capacity, so that you do not depend on others having to project positive things onto you in order to feel good. On feeling good in an independent and autonomous way, you will be able to share with others peace, love and positivism. You won't be in the state of a victim but will be true rulers and controllers of your own life with solid self-esteem.

Soul Sustenance

Becoming Responsible For My Destiny (Part 2) 

Factors like any particular person, a group of people, the government, nature, even God, etc. cannot be held responsible for what has happened t0 me in my life, up to this moment. It is my and my responsibility alone. Equally, what my future holds depends on me to a very large extent. Rather, whatever I choose to do at this moment is already creating my destiny for tomorrow. I shouldn't forget that the only real time I have for creating my future is the present, now. 

Karma teaches me that at every step, I am the creator of my own little world, the creator of my future circumstances. I also am the creator of the environment immediately around me. On a bigger level I am a co-creator or partner, together with God, of a positive future of the world, of the world of tomorrow, of the world of peace, love and happiness. So my responsibility and my ability to influence the future is not restricted to my life alone. 

That I can create the future of my choice - of love, peace and happiness, for myself and others, can appear as unreasonable optimism. It's just being realistic. What I create is what is going to happen. If I choose to transmit love and peace in my interactions with others today, I create relationships, in the present and for the future, based on those qualities. 

Message for the day

Set your mind on the seat of stability and you will never become upset. 

Expression: In all that you do throughout the day, check if you are able to stabilise your mind wherever and in whatever thought you want at the right moment. If you are not able to you will find yourself getting upset. 

Experience: Each morning create a positive thought for yourself. For example, tell yourself "I am the one who is in control of my mind and I can set it the way I want to." Now practice focusing on this one thought. Stabilise in this thought for sometime. 
In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

Daily Positive Thoughts: December 29, 2015: Forming an Opinion

Daily Positive Thoughts: December 29, 2015: Forming an Opinion

Forming an Opinion

Pause before you let your assumptions spin out of control, try being less fast to jump to conclusions and judge people or situations. Why not challenge your assumptions by checking out the full story first and then forming an opinion!

As is our attitude towards others, so is the quality of interactions. 

Our attitude towards others influences our interaction with them. A negative attitude towards another person not only makes me behave negatively. It also makes the other person use that quality again and again when in interaction with us. We actually become a reminder to the other person about his own negativity. For example, if I continue to believe that someone is lazy and we keep expressing that, that person will only remember their laziness when they see us, and use it too. Today I will remind one person of some quality that I see in him. I will praise or use this quality of the person at least 3 times. Thus, I will be able to become a reminder for them, of their own specialty. This will encourage them to use this quality at least when they are interacting with us.

Meditation And Health

Each original quality of the self or soul is specially required for nourishing and empowering one human body system. The quality of peace is responsible for taking care of the respiratory system, joy for the gastrointestinal system, love for the circulatory system, bliss for the endocrine system, knowledge for the brain and nervous system, purity for the immune system and the five senses and power for the muscular and skeletal systems.

Each one of us has at least one body system, which is most prone to disease. When our mind is under the influence of stressful emotions, there is a decrease in the flow, from the soul to this body system, of that quality which is required by it for its nourishment, which leads to the development of disease in this system over a period of time e.g. when an individual with a weak respiratory system is in a negative state of mind, there is a decrease in the flow of the quality of peace to the respiratory system which in turn can lead to a disorder like asthma.

  

Soul Sustenance

Becoming Responsible For My Destiny (Part 1) 

These are examples of some of the inner questions that emerge in our minds from time to time:

* Why is she rich and successful and I am not? * Why did he behave in that way with me; I've always behaved well with him. * Why does that one have easy success in life and the other, however hard he tries, fails at every step? * Why is he nice natured but is born blind and the other ill natured but has no health problems at all? * Why does she suffer so much? * She is so sweet, but yet everyone disrespects her. * Why did that child die at such a young age? She was so innocent. * Why did I get married to such a person? * Why am I here? * How is that student in my class so intelligent? 

There are lot more questions like these that trouble us. In the case of sorrows, it is seen more than the sorrow, it is the question - why this sorrow exists in my life that troubles us. Why? What? How? When? Even so, they all have only one answer: karma. 

I don't need to go into minute details of each situation. If I see that nothing can happen without having had a justified cause in my past or in that of others, life becomes much easier to face, with responsibility and the power of courage. 

(To be continued tomorrow …) 

Message for the day

You can always be successful when there is a desire to serve others. 

Expression: At the end of each day, check if you have done anything for others. Also check if there is any consciousness of 'I' in all the things that you do for others. When there is even the slightest trace of a desire for benefit for yourself you cannot experience either contentment or success. 

Experience: Each day take up at least one thing that would bring benefit to others, irrespective of whether it will get you anything or not. When you serve with no selfishness you will find yourself succeeding in all you do. 
In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

Daily Positive Thoughts: December 28, 2015: Letting Go of Sorrow

Daily Positive Thoughts: December 28, 2015: Letting Go of Sorrow

Letting Go of Sorrow

If I allow bitterness and resentment to fester inside, it will make my relationships guarded and unsatisfying. The more I close down to others, the more I become a stranger to myself. By letting go of sorrow and negativity, I can keep my nature open and loving. Remaining open to life, with its constant adventures and opportunities to grow, is the only way to reach my full potential.

Life's challenges

Life's challenges are like house guests - they come and 
they leave. So, the next time a challenge comes your way, remember: they will also go away.

And when house guests leave your home, you wouldn't let them take everything from your home, would you? 

In the same way, when challenges leave, don't let life's challenges take away your happiness. Why? 

Happiness is your property. It always remains with you. 

No matter what happens, don't let anything take your happiness away from you.

Analyzing Success And Failure (Part 2)

For many, society has conditioned us to look for success through the path of our career, achievements, profits, praise, financial wealth etc. That way, we have learned a narrow view of success. Running in search of this kind of success and pursuing it, we come to exhaust ourselves, get burnt out and depressed. In order to achieve these successes we have stopped caring for the inner being (the soul) and relationships. That has meant and means stress, pain, anxiety, family break ups, personal and relational disintegrations, the destruction of the environment and planetary and climatic imbalances. As a consequence, we feel empty. Although we achieve the applause, the income and other successes, the soul is malnourished and has the sensation that it is lacking something. Reaching fame, financial wealth, the power of a visible position, and reaching it with a broken soul, broken up family and a sick body, causes depression which explains why, in our recent history, famous people have ended up committing suicide.

If we want to redirect our personal and collective lives toward true well-being and wholeness, we have to re-evaluate and redefine our beliefs and factors that lead to success and failure. Before asking yourself what success and failure mean for you, it is important to be clear what context you want success in. Depending on the context, the dimension and the meaning of success and failure will be different. For example, in the work context, a failure will be different to that in the family context. In the personal context or in life in general, the way of perceiving success or failure varies.

Soul Sustenance

Positive Consciousness 
The habitual way in which you use the house you live in and its contents are all affected if you use them in a positive consciousness (mental state). The result is purification while interacting with the physical object, so that when the object is in use, it fulfills its function accurately, and it has also undergone a permanent change. This can happen when you are cleaning the house, cleaning any object in the house or preparing objects for a particular purpose. If such actions are done in a positive consciousness then the physical object will have such a vibration of peace and purity that no harm can be done with it and whatever action it is used to perform will be successful. Any other soul who comes into interaction with those objects will also feel the affect of their pure vibrations.

If we perform each action with the physical body in a positive consciousness, then the physical body gets purified and we can become free of illnesses.

In our relationships it is the same principle. First there needs to be that detachment in relations. Secondly, when there is a positive consciousness, I will find that my interactions have a purifying affect on all that I relate to and I can bring benefit to everyone I meet.

In this way a positive mental state enables all actions to be successful, whether at work or at home. 

Message for the day

Instead of thinking of the situation, think of your own stage. 

Expression: When you find yourself questioning the things that are happening in your life, ask yourself if your own stage is good. The situation might be bad, but check if your own stage is good and if you have the power to face the situation.

Experience: Remind yourself that you are learning from the things that are happening so that you can improve your own stage.
In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

Daily Positive Thoughts: December 27, 2015: Inner Peace

Daily Positive Thoughts: December 27, 2015: Inner Peace

Inner Peace

Where attention goes, energy flows; and where energy flows, things grow.  This is the blueprint behind all meditations.

For example, if we focus on inner peace and 'give' mental attention to the idea of peace, we water it with the energy of our consciousness.

It then grows from a thought into a deep feeling,

resulting in an experience of inner peace.

Intrinsic qualities

Turn your mind away from distractions and have it face inwards to the inner being. 

Like a perfectly calm lake when all whispers of wind have stopped, the inner being shimmers, quietly reflecting the intrinsic qualities of the soul.

Analyzing Success And Failure (Part 1)

You feel positive and joyful when you realize that you are successful. However, when failure comes to you, you feel defeated. The definition of success and failure varies from one person to another and according to the stage of life that you are in. It is important to have success and failure well defined for yourself, because, based on your definition, you feel greater or lesser inner well-being, happiness and wholeness. There are also different levels of success and of failure. For example, for some the greatest success is to be happy and radiant, whatever happens inside or outside. If one manages to keep happy in the face of failure, for them it is a success. Because to be happy means that I am connected with my essential worth or inner self, my being is awake and alive. Failure does not reduce my vitality, my contentment levels. The greater or fewer external achievements do not reduce the quality of the inner being or of being happy. The important thing is that you believe your own definition of success and failure. Some ideas can be shared that can act as guidelines, but, in the end, each person has to create their own guidelines, definitions and factors leading to success and failure. Basing ourselves on these guidelines and beliefs, we evaluate our successes and failures.  You can reflect on what true success and failure mean for you and, according to those meanings, centre your attention on the values and efforts that lead you to achieve your objectives.

(To be continued tomorrow ...)

Soul Sustenance

Taking The Path Of Spirituality (Part 3) 

The religious mind-set is sometimes threatened by the approach of spirituality (discussed over the last couple of days) and sometimes calls it a self-absorbed approach. Spirituality calls it the awakening of the self or the soul so that it can realize its true form and nature. It also reminds us that everything and everyone are interconnected. While we are all unique and have individual characteristics, we are also members of one spiritual family. If each one of us wake up spiritually and restore our personal link with the Source, with God, then that in itself will benefit all others around us. Seen in this way the enlightenment of the self becomes a spiritual service to others. 

This does not mean that the religious person is not spiritual. Many are naturally spiritual and carry a healthy and positive criticism about organized belief systems and the institutions which are built around them. They are often attracted to the universal truths found at an intellectual level in all religious philosophies. But an intellectual understanding is not enough, as the saints have reminded us through the ages. Having had direct experiences of a Supreme Being, they remind us that God can never easily be put under scientific investigation, but rather will be found in the personal experience of spiritual communication/connection. For this reason, in spirituality, there is always an emphasis on the practice of meditation/contemplation and the purification of the soul. 

Message for the day

When you are content you can give the experience of contentment to others too. 

Expression: Each day check if you are content with what you are doing. Also check if others are content with what you are doing in your life. If there is an experience of contentment within yourself others will be content with you. 

Experience: At the end of each day, make a mental list of all that you have attained for the day, things that you are happy about. This will enable you to be content even during the phase when things are not going so smooth, because you are able to look at the positive aspect too. In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris