Contemplation: Magic Carpet

Contemplation:  Magic Carpet

Flower carpet is displayed at the Grand Place in Brussels, capital of Belgium, The biennial flower carpet is made up with about 600,000 begonia and dahlia flowers.

Magic Carpet

Thoughts are like a magic carpet, on which the soul rides across eternity. Rest for the spirit (which is what we are) is when we allow only the current of the purest thoughts to flow through our mind - thoughts which carry good wishes and blessings for ourselves and others. This is not so much going with the flow, as being in the flow, and refreshed by the flow. For when we have powerful, positive thoughts for and about others, who experiences them first?

'Tit for Tat'

Often, we get into a 'tit for tat' situation in which we feel bad
about someone else, so they have ill-feeling towards us, which confirms
our opinion about them, and so on... Everyone loses out. We need to see
very clearly the damage this is doing. Illness often comes when we feel
ill-treated or deceived. With strength of mind, we can recover our
peace and have positive feelings even towards those who don't feel
good about us.

The Physical And The Non-Physical

In life many happenings cannot be explained only in material or physical terms. At certain points of crisis (negative) or inspiration (positive), there are deep emotional and spiritual experiences which separate us from the world around. We look inwards at such times; we look into religious or philosophical books, into rituals or symbols, in order to understand these experiences.

We are subject to a continuous commentary on life around us from our own thoughts, feelings and deductions. These faculties of thinking and forming ideas, desiring and deciding (and all the different aspects which constitute our individual personality) are non-physical, yet nevertheless real - we cannot deny their existence. Indeed, anything perceivable to us comes from two sources; that which is detected by the physical senses and that which arises from impressions recorded on these subtle (non-physical) faculties (mentioned above). The things that we can see, taste, hear, smell and feel, as well as the body itself are formed of matter. But the subtle faculties of mind, intellect and personality make up what we call "consciousness".

Soul Sustenance

Meditating With Open Eyes

It is advised to practice meditation with eyes open. When we sit to meditate, if we close our eyes, what we do is that we send a signal to our mind, intellect and our physical body that sleep is close and that signal, in turn, induces sleep. That is the last thing we want to induce inside ourselves, while meditating. Meditation is a way to wake up and stay awake, not only physically, but in terms of being conscious and alert about what is happening internally and externally. It is therefore good to practice with eyes open, so that during your meditation, you can become used to going beyond the physical inputs of what you see, hear, feel and smell and at the same time, remain exposed to these inputs.

By practicing with open or semi-open eyes, it becomes easier to create the accurate state of consciousness while still being faintly aware of our surroundings. This will be essential in day to day activities when we want to stay connected to our inner peace while others around us may not necessarily be very peaceful. It will also help us to move deeply into our peaceful consciousness during conversations which at the same time, require alertness to go into the depth of ideas and concepts.

When we are established in our peaceful, spiritual state (as a result of meditating), it is as if we are keeping our third eye, the eye of our intellect, open, which gives us the ability to see, in actions and interactions, what is true and false, and to make the right decisions without being influenced by others or our own emotions. All the above abilities are required many times during the day. We obviously can’t keep closing our eyes to meditate each time any of these abilities are required.

Message for the day

To be open to change means to experience constant progress.

Projection: We usually judge the situation according to our past experiences and we don't want to change our responses to the situation. Because we have succeeded once we feel that the particular response will bring us constant success.

Solution: We need to learn from our past experiences but also need to take care to be open to whatever new learning the situations may have to offer to us. When we keep learning from every new situation that comes our way we will be able to experience constant progress.

Contemplation: Courage

Contemplation: Courage

Sunset in Iceland

Courage

Courage is to take a step forward into an area of difficulty without a solution in mind, but yet feeling that victory is ahead. It is going empty handed, but knowing that God's hand is stretched out to pull you.

Consciousness

Self-consciousness distinguishes you from other animals. It enables you
to be aware of your thoughts, feelings and emotions and to understand
how they influence your behavior. When your consciousness awakens, you
start being truly free because you decide your destiny and take
responsibility for your choices.

Forms Of Fear In Our Modern Lifestyle

Fear is a feeling that is generated by the lack of knowledge about a certain situation, place or person. In fear, one feels threatened by something real or imaginary.

Fear often shows itself in our lives in the form of stress, worries and anxiety. Stress is connected with feeling pressure, feeling pushed, forced, to meet deadlines, to do more. Having to produce more and more, and having to be better and better at it, generates tensions and worries that arise in the form of the fear of not being able to achieve those objectives or results on time.

The materialistic values of achieving, obtaining, having, accumulating, and ambitions, competing and wanting to obtain a position, generate a lot of pressure and stress. When we are stressed, generally we are overcharged. We think, talk and react too much. All this affects the mind and body negatively. The worst thing is that it becomes a habit, often uncontrolled, so that the simple habit of stopping and relaxing is not considered a solution. Some even consider it to be a waste of time. You have to do more and more, without stopping.

We have taken on stressful attitudes as part of our daily life. When stress persists, corticoids appear, these are sometimes called the 'fear hormones'. When released continuously, they affect our immune system, increasing the likelihood of cardiovascular complications and the risk of cancer.

Soul Sustenance

Making The Journey With The Right Realization

It’s so easy to become caught up in my physical role - my name, physical personality and looks; the social setup or family I’ve been born into, my friend circle, the school I went to, the person I married, the organization in which I work, the various material objects I own or possess. I forget my true identity, the spiritual being, and that it is me, the spirit or soul, who is experiencing life through this physical body and surrounding circumstances.

The physical, human side is essential, but it’s the spirit, the being, the energy, which makes the journey. The physical body is the vehicle through which the journey is made. The people who exist in my life are also energies making their journeys through their respective vehicles. Looking at myself and others, when I realize who is making the journey and I remember this and maintain this spiritual consciousness throughout the day, I'm able to access spiritual treasures of peace, of power, of love and joy and see the same in others.

It is because of not remaining in this remembrance; I remember and identify with the vehicle and experience my false identity. That is why we find ourselves empty of these treasures today. As a result there is a tremendous increase in interest in meditation throughout the world. Unlike in the past when this interest was seen primarily in the East, today relaxation and meditation is a blooming industry in the Western countries.

The more I become trapped by a materialistic consciousness, and the more I lose contact with my inner self, the less freedom I experience. The search of happiness through the physical senses brings temporary, short-lived gains. My life lacks depth when the only things I know, realize and feel are related to the loads of information I receive from the physical sense organs, and I become disconnected from the spiritual dimension.

Message for the day

To be responsible for each thought, word and action is to be free from questions.

Projection: When we are faced with challenges we usually put the blame on others or on situations. We justify our thoughts, words and actions. We, then, tell ourselves and others that we have been forced to think that way or say and do such a thing. Such thinking creates a series of questions in our mind about others and situations for which we can never find answers.

Solution: We need to recognize the fact that no one or nothing can force us to do something that we do not want to do. Each and everything we do is our own choice and we are responsible for it. When we take up the responsibility in this way, we will not only be free from waste questions and doubts but will also be able to mould our thoughts, words and actions in the right way.

Contemplation: Sincerity

Contemplation: Sincerity

 

Schlegeisspeicher, Austria

Sincerity

The practice of silently observing life enables me to understand other people's inner concerns. I become slower to judge and better able to respond openly and thoughtfully

Peace

To be at peace is to be in our natural state, but only when our
consciousness is pure and clean and true. As soon as the pollutants of
any negative images are allowed in, or we allow old memories and
experiences to disturb us into negative thinking, our purity and
therefore our inner peace are gone. It's not the external event or
person that takes our peace away - it's because we give them permission
to enter and give them life in our minds. Keep your mind and heart free
of all pollution, and peace will always be with you.

Uprooting The Emotion Of Worry From The Consciousness (cont.)

In yesterday's message, we had explained how worry is the wrong use of the imaginative capacity of the mind and intellect. On the other hand, imagining possible positive outcomes or results will have a double effect of not only keeping the negative outcomes away from us (even if there is a possibility of them occurring), but will also attract the positive results towards us.

But to ensure that both these processes happen, it's important not to attach possible negative results to the same, even to the minutest extent, otherwise the probability of positive futures becoming a reality reduces. Worrying is another word for this attachment process.

Worry is a type of mental habit, which arises from the belief that it's good to worry. This belief gets acquired during our childhood. And then it keeps getting strengthened from our life experiences. We start from this belief. That attracts negative circumstances; as a result the belief gets strengthened further, because you think that with life full of so many negative circumstances, it's important to think of negative outcomes beforehand.

You don't realize that these negative situations occurred in the first place largely due to this belief. When we are faced with a negative situation, again we worry because we hold that belief. Again it's the same result. In this way, we are caught in a vicious cycle. How do we come out of this cycle?

By changing this belief to - 'it's not good to worry'. Once we do that, there is no guarantee that negative situations will completely stop arising in our life, because we have performed negative actions in the past (either in this birth or past births), which need to be settled in our present, but the extent of negative situations will be minimized. And even if they do come, they will bid goodbye sooner, if we have a worry-free consciousness.

Soul Sustenance

The Gender of God

In a large number of religious traditions, all over the world, God is always referred to as a male entity. But, just as the soul does not have a gender and is neither masculine nor feminine, God’s i.e. the Supreme Soul’s gender is neither male nor female specifically. Therefore, as a soul, a spiritual child of God, I can come close to God without any inhibitions or difficulty, which I may experience in any relationship in the physical world, due to the gender of the body I am occupying.

We need to take a look at the Supreme Being or God closely. The Supreme Being is the Supreme Mother who provides spiritual sustenance and whose love is full of unconditional acceptance. No matter what has happened, how my nature or personality may be, I experience unconditional acceptance from God. It's a love that strengthens me, as well as it purifies me.

At the same time, God is also the Supreme Father, a very powerful entity, who provides protection and fills the soul with the inheritance of divine qualities and powers. It's a question of just being an innocent child and claiming that inheritance. These are the first two relationships that have to be experienced with God. The Supreme is a balance of being feminine, having the qualities of caring, giving and full of good wishes and masculine at the same time, having the qualities of power, authority and fearlessness. He is She and She is He. These two relationships with God, whereby God plays both the roles of both parents are the basis of my spiritual development.

Spirituality introduces to us the concept of taking a new spiritual birth to the Supreme Father and Mother. This birth is based on a change of consciousness. One needs to let go of the negative, impure and sorrowful past and develop a new consciousness, based on the present introduction to spirituality, which is positive, pure and blissful. The awareness of the self as a soul changes my way of looking at things immensely, but the consciousness of being a child of God, who is the Mother as well as the Father and seeing others with that vision brings respect and love for myself. Then all these qualities start showing in my actions and interactions as well. 

Message for the day

Others experience sweetness when words are filled with the power of truth.

Projection: False sweetness is saying that something is good without having taken the pains to find out what it is i.e., commenting on something superficial. Sweet words are those that are spoken after having understood the reality.

Solution: In order for our words to have an effect on others, we must take time to see if we have really understood the goodness in the other person. Our each comment should be based on the truth that we have discovered in others and we will find others taking benefit from our words.

Contemplation: The Spiritual Aspect Of Healthcare

Contemplation: The Spiritual Aspect Of Healthcare

The Spiritual Aspect of Healthcare

Silence, happiness, love and blessings are important aspects. Happiness leads to good health. It is only you who can give this medicine to yourself. Some bring illness to themselves through anger, greed, unfulfilled desires, expectations, suppression of feelings and relationships not based on true love. Look in your heart; you will know where your illness comes from. There are three ingredients for a long and healthy life: live with attention but without worry; use time in a worthwhile way; keep your thoughts pure, positive and filled with strength.

Accurate Decisions

Making accurate decisions means to make right and benevolent decisions,
that is they should bring benefit to all. Before making an accurate
decision, we need 1. Time to reflect 2. To understand the power of
choice. Ask, understand, discuss and then decide.

Uprooting The Emotion Of Worry From The Consciousness

What is a good definition of worry? Worry is a process of imagining the worst possible outcome or result or future in a particular situation and creating a living and active image of it in front of the eye of your mind, and then using the energy of that negative image to flow inside your consciousness so as to completely overpower or weaken your spiritual and as a result your physical self to evoke fear in the self.

When people are asked about this process, a person who is attached to this process and is involved in the process very regularly the whole day in different types of situations, one who is a habitual worrier, responds "But it's important t0 worry, it's good to worry. If we don't think of different possible negative outcomes, how will we prepare for them?" It's important to realize that the belief, that by worrying, we prepare for the worst in the future is a false one.

This belief causes us not to realize the truth that all worry is simply an incorrect and fruitless creation. It is a wrong use of the positive, constructive and imaginative capacity of our mind and intellect which, instead of empowering the mind and intellect, weakens it. Preparing for the future is important and necessary, but very often while doing that, we enter the territory of worry, which leaves us, defeated or weakened.

There is an extremely fine line between proactive preparation (necessary preparation in advance) on the one hand and worry on the other. The preparation can be done without creating an excessive number of possible negative outcomes in the mind.

(To be continued tomorrow ...)

Soul Sustenance

How Does the Mind Work?

We can compare the mind with a screen, where thoughts, images, feelings and associations are constantly appearing. Thoughts manifest themselves in the mind in the same way as images on a film are projected onto the cinema screen.

The mind often interprets negation as affirmation. Therefore, when we tell you not to think about something, it is as if we were saying, "Think about this" and these thoughts are produced with even more force in the mind. Therefore transforming negative habits and personality traits becomes a struggle. The most effective way of fighting is to ignore these unwanted thoughts, but we should then immediately focus our mind in another direction, thinking about something positive. Thus useless or negative thoughts have no space to grow in our mind. Thinking positively is not a battle against negativity but by imbibing spiritual knowledge, we transform the negative into positive.

We can compare the mind with a naughty child who is playing with a dangerous object: if you take it away from them they will cry until they get it back again. Perhaps a more effective method would be to offer them something that would be of more interest to them and in this way, by having a new inoffensive toy in their hands, they will leave the dangerous object alone. 

Message for the day

Sweetness is the ability to see the good in all things.

Projection: Deep within each and every situation is something good. It only takes a little patience to look within and find it. When we are able to understand the secret behind what is happening, it automatically brings sweetness in our life

Solution: Whatever happens throughout the day, we should be able to see the good in it. Even if we are not able to discover something good at that moment, we should maintain the faith that whatever happens is for the best.

Contemplation: Being at Peace

Contemplation:  Being at Peace

 

Being at Peace

We spend most of our time running after things, doing things. We forget that being comes before doing. Those who remember this secret make an effort to "be" and discover that when they stop and observe, life helps and brings whatever is needed. Learning to be is learning to be at peace. It is our most fundamental nature.

Be Yourself

You search for something you know exists because you have experienced
it in the past. All your searching ends when you find yourself. You do
not need to go anywhere, or to look beyond yourself. Just become what
you were before. You fill your life with peace when you discover you
only have to be yourself, to be what you have always been - a peaceful
being.

Rising Above The Look Of The Other

We have to trust that, being ourselves, we will be well-received and loved by the world. If we are here, why have we been incarnated on Earth? To satisfy the look of the other or to bring what is unique and exceptional in us? We all have two eyes, a nose and a mouth but no face is the same. We are all a being of conscious energy, a soul, but each one has a colour, an art, a creativity and something different to contribute. Let us trust in ourselves and use our talents to bring our difference.

You can be your best friend. Imagine that someone accompanies you in your life, values everything that you do and finds it to be great: what you do, what you say; you are the best; extraordinary; a shining being; a star. Now imagine that you have that person next to you day and night. How do you feel? On top form and you are fine. This happens in relationships. When someone loves you very much, they practically only think about you; they ring you, they send you text messages, maybe they write you letters or emails. You feel unique, special and loved. But this does not last forever and, nowadays, it lasts less and less. The difficulty is that if you depend on the look of the other to feel fine, sometimes you will be fine if the person looking at you does it well, but if not, you won't be fine.

How do you look at yourself? This unconditional friend that loves you so much and that supports you is what you have inside. You can be your best friend. This gives you security and trust. If someone else likes you or doesn't like you and criticizes you, you won't collapse within because to be fine you do not depend on the look of the other.

Soul Sustenance

The Lamp Of Hope

You create the future basing yourself on what you think, feel and do in the present. If you act according to your values, it is easy for you to trust in your destiny. That strengthens your hope that all will go well, and, if it doesn’t, you know and trust your inner resources or treasures to be able to deal with things and change. That trust feeds the enthusiasm, the motor energy that, along with motivation and passion, helps us to advance.

When you lose courage and you feel weak, when you feel insecure and do not see with clarity where to go towards, hope lights the way for you to carry on going forward. If you fall, get up again and carry on looking ahead. Don't look back. Don't let your past be a burden that is too heavy and prevents you from advancing. Focus your vision on your objective and on all your potential to achieve it.

Whatever happens, keep the lamp of hope lit. You can. You will achieve it. Change will become reality. You will free yourself from the shadows of fears, blockages and the other limitations that weaken you.

Live each situation as an opportunity. Learn from criticism and failures. On living life as a constant opportunity for personal growth and learning, you keep hope always alive.

Give yourself moments of silence on beginning each day, during the day and on finishing the day, to connect with your inner self. That way your awareness stays awake, the lamp of your hope, your motivation and your values remains lit.

Message for the day

Detachment gives the power to be uninfluenced by desires.

Projection: When we are able to use the power of detachment that is within us, we are able to go beyond the attraction of things even whilst using them. We will be able to be in the consciousness that we are the true masters who use all things as and when needed, while being uninfluenced by them.

Solution: When we find ourselves having a desire we should remind ourselves that we are the ones who are the creators of things. So we are the ones who influence and not the ones who are influenced by the creation. This will easily make us detached from the things that we are using.

Contemplation: Great Wealth

Contemplation: Great Wealth

Great Wealth

To be content with a little is a great wealth

Detachment

There is benefit in every situation, but to gain benefit especially
when loss is in the air, one must be honest with the self. This means
assessing and facing the self with no lame excuses. If you have the
power to transform negative to positive, you will always experience
positive. Those who defame will be your friends; obstacles become
opportunities to take high jump and storms will cement your
relationship with God. It is important to see the total picture which
includes seeing your own actions. You have to be detached from the
scene - only then can you assess the situation without being
influenced by your injured ego.

Meditation On Experiencing My Original Loveful Nature

I sit in silence, letting my thoughts go away from the outer world... I allow my mind to relax... to calm down... I focus my attention on the heart of my being... My heart is like a sacred silent place where I can feel what I really am... I am peaceful and light... a loving soul... strong... secure... kind...

I have many virtues and qualities that I can share with others... Now my attention is going towards the quality of love... I imagine love like a seed in my heart waiting to awaken... grow... and blossom... like a rose... For this, I only have to accept... believe... feel... that I am a soul full of love... child of the Ocean of Love... I am a spiritual rose flower... radiating the spiritual fragrance of love...

Letting go of the past... letting go of expectations... fears... negative feelings... forgiving... opening my heart... feeling that it is cleansed and this energy of love is as pure as the clean water flowing from a waterfall. Nothing and nobody have touched it... this is a love that asks for nothing in exchange... the love of a clean heart is unselfish... free of ego and expectations... It makes truth and sincerity grow... acceptance and understanding... I open my heart completely to love... I inhale deeply... I visualize my heart filling itself with this energy of pure love... I exhale slowly... and I visualize radiating this light of love from the deepest part of my heart towards the world... I am a beautiful soul of light radiating peace and love... I am love... I love myself and accept myself and others...

Soul Sustenance

The Cyclic Functioning Of The Three Faculties Of The Soul

The soul consists of three faculties – the mind, intellect and sanskaras. They work together in a cyclic fashion. How they work together can be illustrated by looking at how habits or sanskaras are formed e.g. if you are used to scolding your children to get them to do their homework, here is what happens when you visit a friend’s place and watch, for the first time, how your friend is doing the same to his/her child, you might think (done by the mind): ‘I should adopt the same method to discipline my children, they never listen to me '. Your intellect discriminates and judges whether that thought is right or not. Seeing others using the same method, and also seeing that the children are not being affected in any negative way (at least in the short term, not realizing the long term harm) and also seeing them get the desired result, you make a decision to do the same, which leads to the action of scolding your children.

This creates an impression or memory within the soul, somewhat like cutting a groove in a piece of wood. This groove in the soul becomes a characteristic of your personality and is known as a sanskara. Within the groove is recorded the memory of, firstly, the action of scolding the children and, secondly, the desired result from the action. Now, whenever your child disobeys you even a little bit, this sanskara is activated and the memory of the action and result associated with it emerge in the mind triggering a thought: 'Let me scold my child, that’s the best way to get him to do things'. The intellect judges the thought, remembering the proof of the scolding, based on past experience, and then makes the decision that it is alright to using anger as a weapon to discipline the child. In this way, the sanskara keeps getting deeper and deeper. The cyclic process explained above, applies to all habits, whether physical or non-physical.

Message for the day

Detachment adds quality to each and every action.

Projection: When we are detached, we will not be bound by the action itself, but will perform the action in a detached way. This means that we perform the action, yet we are not dependent on the fruits of the action. This automatically increases its quality. Then we would be free and uninfluenced by the bondage of the action.

Solution: In any situation where we find ourselves doing a lot yet with a feeling of not attaining anything, we should ask ourselves if we are attached to the task at hand. The more we are attached, the quantity of work that we put in increases at the cost of the quality. When we are detached we are able to give our best in all that we do.