Contemplation: July 11, 2020: The Quality of Mercy

Contemplation: July 11, 2020:  The Quality of Mercy

The Quality of Mercy

A person with the quality of mercy works on such a subtle level that the support given never demeans or implies weakness in the other person.

Going Beyond

If the quality of my thoughts can influence my physical health, the atmosphere around me and my relationships, it will definitely affect my relationship with God. Unlike physics in which dissimilar forces (positive and negative) attract each other, the basic principle of spirituality is that similar forces attract each other. If my mind is caught up in cycles of negativity, the dissimilarity between me and God will create distance between me and Him. With the awareness of being a soul, a being of spiritual energy, spiritual light, I begin to have a certain amount of mastery over my own thoughts and their quality. Also, the process of finishing negativity is accelerated. Just stepping away from the limited consciousness of the body and bodily connections (not leaving them) stops negative thinking in the same way as by just putting a switch on, a light is turned on and darkness finishes.

If explorers had never ventured beyond their home countries, they would have remained firm in the belief that the rest of the world simply didn't exist. In the same way, if I allow myself to stay only within the physical and limited sphere of thinking, then I would declare that there is nothing beyond. It is when I make the effort to go outside the boundaries of my previous thinking, that I have the chance of discovering more. The quest for a source of love, truth and beauty – the Supreme eventually brings me to the necessity of looking beyond not only my own body, but also other human beings and matter itself. Through the practice of seeing the self as an eternal soul and disciplining my mind I create the possibility of discovering the existence and nature of God and having a deep relationship with that One.

Bring about a change

If someone behaves negatively towards you, can you have good wishes for them?  When you get affected by other people's negativity, your positivity depletes.

Try to work on creating good wishes for all (especially for the negative people in your life).  

Your good wishes can help, support and empower the other person to bring about a change for the better.

Best wishes to you!

Message for the day

Concentration develops when the intellect is clean and clear. 
Expression: For the one whose intellect continues to wander, concentration becomes difficult or impossible. On the other hand, for the one who is focused on one thing there are no other distractions at that time and there is easy concentration. 
Experience: When I am able to remain focused, I am not troubled by distractions which lessen my concentration. Instead I am able to increase my discrimination power and am able to decide and judge well. This happens because my intellect becomes clean and gets cleared of waste. 

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

https://astudypoint.blogspot.com/

Contemplation: July 10, 2020: Grace of an Angel

 Contemplation: July 10, 2020: Grace of an Angel

 

Grace of an Angel 

Move through the world with the grace of an angel, 

the dignity of a sovereign and the wisdom of a child.

The Gateway To Peace And Happiness (Part 3)

Deep silence filled meditation is the method of filling the self with the sanskaras ofmukti or liberation because the soul in the soul world is completely peaceful and meditation is the method of experiencing peace by connecting oneself with God, the Ocean of Peace. So, the regular practice of experiencing oneself as a soul and visualizing the self or the soul in the company of the Supreme Fountain of peace in the soul world is the method of opening the gate of the soul world for the self. This is a liberated state or an out of body experience by detaching myself from action. That is why it is called liberation and not liberation-in-life. To fill the self with the sanskaras of jeevanmukti or liberation-in-life, we need to bring all the four subjects of a spiritual lifestyle in our life –spiritual knowledge or gyan from God, meditation or yog or a powerful connection with God while performing actions, filling oneself with seven spiritual qualities - peace, joy, love, bliss, purity, power and truth from God, who is an Ocean of these qualities which is also called dharna and sharing God’s knowledge and qualities with others or seva. The combined power of these four subjects increases the soul’s capacity to remain untouched by the ups and downs of life and remain constantly happy under different types of negative situations. This is jeevanmukti or liberation-in-life i.e. while leading my day-to-day life; I am liberated from the influence of the negative circumstances around me, which helps me fill myself with the sanskarasof jeevanmukti. We need to spend many years of our present life in both these experiences – mukti and jeevanmukti and fill ourselves with both these sanskaras as mentioned above.

When the world drama comes to an end shortly, souls, on the basis of their sanskaras ofmukti and jeevanmukti, which they have filled themselves with at the present moment, will go back to the soul world i.e. experience complete mukti and then after staying the soul world for some time, they will come down on Earth to play their part of happiness i.e. complete jeevanmukti i.e. a life without any trace of sorrow. Both these experiences are the birthright of every human soul, which can be taken from God at the present moment.

To understand the importance of something is to do it immediately. 

When I understand that something is important in my life, I need to bring it into action immediately. If I don't do that, it means I haven't fully understood its importance. So, I need to make time for it on a daily basis. When I take little steps towards it, I will be able to slowly get the courage and also the time to do it. Today I will not say I do not have time for what I feel is the right thing to do. I will allocate at least 5 minutes each day to do what I have to. Slowly, I find that the time space available for this activity would automatically increase.

Message for the day

To have tolerance means to be stable. 
Expression: When one is faced with defamation or insult, tolerance gives the power to be stable and cool. And so there is the ability to smile even when there is negativity that comes. Tolerance means to see beyond the insults because of being stable in the stage of self-respect. 
Experience: When faced with criticism, if I am able to be stable in my stage of self-respect, I am able to learn from every negative remark that comes my way. I will never become defensive, but will be able to see clearly what new learning I could take. 

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

https://astudypoint.blogspot.com/

Contemplation: July 09, 2020: Lightness

Contemplation: July 09, 2020: Lightness

Beehive Geyser is in the Upper Geyser Basin of Yellowstone National Park in the United States

Lightness

Lightness is like hitting a spring of water inside. A sudden break out from the dryness of your normal reactions as you begin to express from within, rather than just responding to what you see outside. It usually happens when you come upon a quality that hasn't been destroyed or jaded by time, something very old and inherent in you that has survived. Most qualities and talents are developed through use, but are also in some way diluted and changed. Lightness is touching what makes you unique, because it has never changed.

The Gateway To Peace And Happiness (Part 2)

Remember that the soul world is the home of peace where all souls have stayed before coming down in the world, to take births. It is the place where we stay in complete silence and in our original pure state, a state which is called mukti or liberation. The soul world is a non-physical world of souls which are conscious beings of spiritual energy or non-physical light of consciousness, a light which cannot be seen with the physical eyes. All of us stay in the soul world in a state of silence, without any thoughts, in complete peace and without a physical body. We get the physical body when we come down on Earth. This is why this state is called a state of mukti or liberation. The other state is the state of jeevanmukti or also called liberation-in-life, which is the stage of complete happiness experienced by the soul, when it first comes down on Earth.

To attain mukti or to go to the soul world, we need to visualize God in the soul world and make a meeting with Him at the present moment. Souls, who remember God in this way more, will stay closer to God in the soul world when they go there plus their sparkle or light in the soul world will be higher. Along with mukti, souls who fill themselves with the seven qualities of peace, joy, love, bliss, purity, power and truth from God, much more than the others at the present moment, they will experience a much higher stage of jeevanmukti i.e. they will be happier when they start playing their roles on Earth. Souls who are more full of the seven qualities mentioned above will be happier and for a longer period of time, while playing their roles in the world. Along with the qualities, the soul needs to be absolutely clean of many impure sanskaras which are created in the soul by performing actions under the influence of the five main impure emotions of lust, anger, greed, attachment and ego in their previous births and in the present birth; to experience mukti and jeevanmukti.

(To be continued tomorrow …)

Inner Peace

We're surrounded by noise.

Then there's our noisy thought-thinking head that never seems to cease.

Raise your focus out of the noise and float effortlessly above it all!

Rise above the noise to enjoy inner peace.

Message for the day

The one who is able to discriminate well is able to bring about real benefit. 

Expression: Everyone naturally works for the benefit of the self and others. But the one who discriminates well is able to understand the other person's need and give accordingly. So whatever is done naturally brings benefit for others and also for the self.

Experience: When I am able to bring benefit for the right person at the right time with the right thing, I am able to win the trust of the other person. I expect nothing in return, but have the satisfaction of helping at the right time. 

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

https://astudypoint.blogspot.com/

Contemplation: July 08, 2020: Success

Contemplation: July 08, 2020: Success

 

Success

It is a sign of wisdom to be able to set goals and then, having done so, to let them go. All that is required for success is a vision of the destination. The journey itself will reveal the means to take you there.

The Gateway To Peace And Happiness (Part 1)

There was a time in the world when everyone was happy and there were no complaints whatsoever from the journey of life. That is a time remembered by many religions as heaven. People often say when a soul leaves the physical body or what we refer to in common language that a person has died, that he or she has gone to heaven. In these cases although we should be happy at the fact that the soul has gone to a happier life or to heaven, we feel sorrowful because we miss that soul’s existence in our lives. Here we normally refer to a heaven that is far above the sun, moon and stars. But the fact is that no one goes to such a heaven, which is above us, but takes a birth in the world over here. This is because no one can become free from the cycle of birth and rebirth without cleaning up all the negative actions performed over many births. A soul with the burden of impure karmas on its head has to continue its journey in the birth-rebirth cycle till it becomes pure by the remembrance of God and performing pure actions in His remembrance. This is the natural law of the world drama and not a law created by God or anyone else.

Although everyone desires to go to heaven, we have to work on ourselves and make ourselves full of the qualities of peace, joy, love, bliss, purity, power and truth, which are required to earn a birth or many births in heaven or in other words a completely happiness filled life. The happiness filled life is not in the skies where perhaps God is waiting for us which most of us believe. God shares with us that you can fulfill your dream of coming and staying with me up above, but that world above, is not heaven, it is the soul world, where I stay. God also tells us that you can fulfill your dream of going to heaven which is not above the skies but on earth and has existed in the past and will come again on earth soon. That is a heaven, on which every human being in the world holds a right to go to, along with the right to go to the soul world, because every human being is the child of God. How? We shall explain that in the next two days’ messages.

To have the right intention while performing actions is to bring success. 

When the heart recognizes the need to do something, there has to be reasoning in the intellect, why I want to do it and with what intention. Without the right intention, feelings can make me get carried away, not able to contribute my best. For example, if I want someone to change (feeling) because I want to be more comfortable, it will not work. But, if I bring the thought that I want them to change, because they would be happier. This is the right intention, which would bring success to my feeling. Today I will do actions with the right intention. All the major tasks that I do, I will first take a thought about why I am doing it. I will then do that action. This will enable me to bring quality to the actions that I do. So, whatever I do, I will be successful in that.

 

Message for the day

The one who is aware of one's fortune enables others to experience their fortune too. 
Expression: To be aware of one's own fortune means to appreciate and use all that one has. Also when there is the awareness of one's own fortune, there is a natural tendency to help people become aware of what they have and how they can benefit from it. So the one who is fortunate becomes a giver. 
Experience: When I am able to recognize my own fortune, I am able to have the joy of being a giver constantly. Whatever the circumstances, I am able to give knowing that I am fortunate. But never is there dependency created on me, because my help is to make them aware of their fortune too and make them independent.

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

https://astudypoint.blogspot.com/

Contemplation: July 07, 2020: Determination and Patience

Contemplation: July 07, 2020: Determination and Patience

Determination and Patience

Determination is the strength that will enable you to pass the barrier of useless thoughts in order to create positive thoughts and to be successful in whatever you wish. It comes from within and its partner is patience. Patience teaches you not to push but rather to wait and appreciate the game of life instead, knowing that nothing remains the same, and everything will change at some point.

Innate (Basic) And Acquired Value

Everything we see has what can be called its acquired value and its innate or basic value. The acquired value is that which it has picked up by coming into contact with external objects throughout its existence or life. The innate value is what it always is irrespective of its external interactions. For example, the acquired value of gold changes with the fluctuations of its price in the market. Its innate or real value is that it's one of the most beautiful metals; very ductile, malleable, etc.

If we were asked about the qualities of any good, peaceful relationship with someone, we would quickly reply: love, trust, patience, respect, honesty, sincerity, tolerance, humility, sympathy, etc. How do we know this? Is it purely from experience? Can we remember having really experienced any of these qualities in any relationship completely and constantly? Probably no. Then how can we say it is from experience? In such a case, where does this urge for rightness come from? Our heart tells us it comes from a basic, inherent sense of what is true and good, of our innate value. Though these qualities are what we see as our ideal qualities; when I am in a weakened state, I’m unable to bring them into practice, when I want, according to the needs of the moment. They need to be strengthened inside. One of the most immediate benefits of the practice of meditation then, is to bring about this internal strengthening. My basic qualities are just waiting for a chance to emerge out in the open. Like a light bulb without current, possibility of lighting up my qualities exists, but they need to be connected to a source of power, which is exactly what meditation gives us.

Be a Role Model

Work is only work if you prefer to be somewhere else. Work tends to be a negative perception of a task which we reluctantly approach. Work is only labour when we forget to see our life as it truly is - an opportunity to be creative, enrich others and be enriched ourselves. When we are able to see work in this way, we find something called enthusiasm inside. When we are enthusiastic we work well and we are valued. We are used as a role model. When we work well it is much easier to say no when we need to, for we know our own value, and we are not dependent on others' approval to feel good about ourselves. When we put love and enthusiasm into what we do, it rebounds in the form of opportunities and blessings, two of the most important ingredients of a truly wealthy life.

Message for the day

To be careless means to misuse specialties. 

Expression: To be careless means that there is no awareness of one's specialties and so there is the inability to use them for the benefit of the self and for the good of others. On the other hand there is also a tendency to become overconfident because of these specialties and not to work on self -transformation. The one who is careless is not able to recognize the need for self-change and so is not able to bring about transformation. 
Experience: When I am able to be free from carelessness, I am able to understand the importance of the specialties that I have , and am able to use a particular specialty that I have , and am able to put them into use. So I find that the more I am able to use a particular specialty that I have, the more I am able to bring out and use the latent specialties that are within me. So I am able to experience quick transformation and constant progress.

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

https://astudypoint.blogspot.com/