Daily Positive Thoughts: April 16, 2017: Create rather than wait

Create rather than wait

'Create rather than wait' - at least not for too long! Seeing options, choose what to do now rather than wait for the ideal time, person or circumstance to arrive before acting decisively. Though patience is important, it's important not to become passive.The Art Of Living (Part 3)

Our mind, body, wealth and relationships are four out of five aspects of each one of our lives and all of us intend to make them successful. It is natural to desire that our mind be content and peaceful, our body be healthy and we earn wealth without facing any obstacles and also our relationships our beautiful. But all of these desires will only get fulfilled if along with taking care of all of them, we include God at every step of our lives. You might ask what has God got to do with my physical wealth or my job? But remember it is your healthy and pleasant mind which influences your physical body positively and makes you healthy and a powerful mind cannot be experienced constantly without a loveful relationship with God. In the same way, without God’s help, we may be able to run our jobs for some time but the journey may be stressful and the money earned may not give to us a lot of happiness. Also, what use is a beautiful relationship if God is not there to share the happiness of that relationship with? A lovely parent or a child for e.g. is a result of our good actions of past lives. So shouldn’t I include God in this happiness? God is like a parent Himself who deserves to be told each and every little thing that I experience in a worldly relationship. By doing this, relationships will be positive and peaceful continuously.

Sometimes, we start to think that God is just a concept and not a reality. But remember God is a beautiful living energy with a heart and all that we have to do is love Him with a pure heart and He will fill our life with happiness and make all the different aspects of our lives, which we have discussed, full of success and our lives will become an inspiration for others.

H O P E

One of the ways through which you can give others hope, is to Have Only Positive Expectations of them.

When you see beyond their shortcomings, and only see their strengths and potential,  your vision of hope allows them to discover and use their strengths and potential.

Message for the day

It is on the basis of actions that praise is received.

Thought to Ponder: The one who only talks but is not able to put his talk into practice does not become worthy of praise. On the other hand, the one who is able to bring his good thoughts and words into action becomes worthy of praise. Such a person's actions become inspirational for others and encourage them to follow him.

Point to Practice: When I am able to act according to my thoughts and words, I am able to take inspiration to do more. For every positive action that I do, I experience support and good wishes from others which encourage me constantly. My account of positivity is always full and it takes me further to a cycle of positivity making it a habit. So I find that I don't have to work hard for performing positive actions. 

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

Daily Positive Thoughts: April 15, 2017: Relationships

Daily Positive Thoughts: April 15, 2017: Relationships

Relationships

A sensible person knows it is a waste of time and energy to get angry. Effort will then have to be made to reconstruct that relationship. It is much more useful to breathe deeply, pay attention to your attitude and answer without rushing. In this way, improve and strengthen your relationships with others

The Art Of Living (Part 2)

A very important and the fourth pillar of life that we all depend on so much is our personal and professional relationships and interactions which give us strength and are also a medium of give and take. We give peace, love and happiness and get blessings in return. They say that all the people who surround you and make up your life play an important role in shaping up your personality and success filled relationships are a source of immense joy for each one of us. 

The fifth and most important aspect of our lives is God, who makes our life beautiful and our mind, body, wealth and relationships are shaped positively by remembering Him. God does not give us our minds but teaches us how to make our minds beautiful by connecting our minds with His. Also, our physical costume or the precious vehicle, when used in the way God wants us to use it, makes our actions filled with divinity and purity. Even our wealth and the way we use it gets affected positively when we earn it by making God our constant companion and giving Him due respect by keeping a small amount aside from our profits, for the service of people and their betterment. And lastly our relationships can never be successful without including God in them. What that means is that I take from God and share with others. I connect others with Him. These five different aspects of our life define our life. All are important in their own way and how good we are in handling all of them makes us happy and content. These different aspects or pillars are the foundation of our lives and all of them are connected with each other. Even if one pillar is weak, it affects our lives in a negative way. 

(To be continued tomorrow …)

Let go of what you can't control.

Try to control the uncontrollable, & you end up feeling more frustrated & stressed.  

Realize:  There are aspects that you can control, & there will always be aspects that you can't control.

Let go of what you can't control.  And focus on what you can control. Then you'll reduce your stress & increase your response skills.

Message for the day

To make the internal stage powerful is to be protected. 

Thought to Ponder: Situations and challenges will continue to challenge me, but when I am strong from within I am able to withstand and move forward with every challenge. I need to work on making myself stronger at each step. When I have weaknesses, even a small little challenge will make me weak and vulnerable. I will, then, not have the strength to move forward. 

Point to Practice: Today I will strengthen myself. Strength comes from faith. When I believe that I am strong, I am. So, today I will practice a simple thought like "Victory is my birthright" or "I have the power to transform" or "God is my companion at every step". Such thoughts silently build strength into me. 

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

Daily Positive Thoughts: April 14, 2017: Cheerfulness

Daily Positive Thoughts: April 14, 2017: Cheerfulness 

Cheerfulness

Protecting my sense of optimism is the best way to remain cheerful. I can do this by starting the day with meditation to pour light and love into the scenes I am likely to find ahead of me that day. And then if I keep touching base with God’s mind and His benevolent way of seeing things, the inner happiness I experience will help me pass through any situation without feeling weary.

The Art Of Living (Part 1)

A very significant and beautiful intention that all of us carry inside our minds is of making our lives full of plenty of joy in every sphere that is connected to us e.g. If our relationships lack love then the first thing that comes to our mind is to make ourselves so nice as a person so that people around us respect us and we receive love from them and life becomes fulfilling by doing that. Remember there are five beautiful aspects of our lives that need to be made perfect in every way. One is our physical costume or body which we need to take care of in every way including our health and physical personality which helps us in achieving life’s purpose through it. Spirituality helps us in making proper use of our body for achieving our purpose. This is called karma yoga or the art of performing day-to-day karmas in the remembrance of God for making the actions successful.

Another aspect is our mind which is also like a temple in which we need to always have pure thoughts and feelings as well as emotions. Our mind is the place where our entire life originates and everything we do on a physical level first takes place in our mind. Remember the negatives and the positives will at times exist in our minds but it is the extent of both which matters. The negative needs to be minimal and the positive needs to be as much as possible. Also, our wealth is a third aspect of our lives, which needless to say, is important in its own way and life would be incomplete without it.

(To be continued tomorrow …)

Criticism

Do you get defensive when being criticized? Get defensive and you stop yourself from taking useful suggestions from the criticism.

The next time criticism comes your way, try this: get your focus away from the negative tone of the criticism and focus on deep breathing.  Breathe away any heightened emotion and watch your defensiveness fade away.

Now think about the criticism and keep the useful bits and filter out the rest.

Message for the day

The best dress is humility. 

Thought to Ponder:   I need to always wear the dress of humility. When there is arrogance or ego of any kind, there is no beauty in anything I do. On the other hand, humility brings the willingness to learn and grow. It also keeps me cheerful at all times. So, there is beauty in all I do.

Point to Practice: Today I will wear the dress of humility. I will consciously watch myself if I am caught up with ego of any kind. Feelings of inferiority or rigidity also come from ego. So, today I will be free from ego and do whatever I have to with the consciousness of being humble. 

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

Daily Positive Thoughts: April 13, 2017: Space for God

Space for God

The best solutions to problems will not be the result of hard thinking. Use your time better by creating peaceful thoughts, and problems will cease to affect you. Do not try to solve everything on your own. Leave some space for God to come and help you.

Performing A Spiritual Audit At The End Of The Day (Part 2)

Yesterday we had explained how self-evaluation at the end of the day is extremely vital to one's progress and development. A useful exercise in this regard is keeping a daily chart for about 3 personality traits or points and filling it up every night (lesser than 3 is also fine, but not more, because then you might feel lazy in keeping the chart after a few days and also you might lose focus and the personality traits may not transform as much as you want). You could either evaluate yourself with a yes or no or perform a percentage wise evaluation like 50% or 90% for e.g. we have mentioned below, some of the common traits from which you could select the traits to keep a daily chart for. You could incorporate some other specific traits (not mentioned in this list), which you want to change or develop, depending on your personality:

In the entire day, today; not only in my words and actions, but also in my thoughts:

- Did I see everyone's specialties and keep good wishes for each one, in spite of obvious weaknesses being visible?
- Did I remain free from all forms of anger, like irritation, frustration, grudge, revenge, etc.?
- Did I ensure that I neither give nor take sorrow, hurt, pain from anyone?
- Did I remain free from waste and negative?
- Did I remain ego less?
- Did I remain untouched by name, fame, praise, insult?
- Did I remain stable?
- Did I remain free from judgments, criticism, jealousy, comparison, hatred, etc.?
- Did I keep a conscious of serving each one whom I met?
- Did I bring the 8 main powers into practice and experience being powerful?
- Did I remain in self-respect and give respect to everyone?
- Did I practice being soul-conscious in actions and interactions?
- Did I take a one minute break every hour to reflect, meditate and control the traffic of thoughts in the mind? 

Life is a mystery

We live in a world that tries to explain everything.  But does everything need to be explained?  Should all of life's mysteries be unraveled?

Well, life is a mystery.  And mystery matters!  

Search.  Seek.  Wonder.

And bask in the mysteries of life.

Keep interested in life and it keeps life interesting.

Message for the day

To be impressed is to imbibe virtues.

Thought to Ponder:   When I see someone whose qualities I like, I tend to admire them. But, this is not enough. If I really admire them, I need to make an effort to bring those qualities in my life. Inspiration always leads to transformation. It becomes easy for me to see an example and follow. 

Point to Practice: Today I will pick up one quality in the person I admire and make a conscious effort to bring it into my life. That is the tribute that I would be paying to that person. When I keep doing that with every person who is important in my life, I will be free from feelings of inferiority, jealousy or any other weakness. 

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

Daily Positive Thoughts: April 12, 2017: Holiday Everyday

Daily Positive Thoughts: April 12, 2017: Holiday Everyday

Holiday Everyday

How do you feel when you're about to set off on a holiday? Can't control the smiles, can't hold in the anticipation of discovering new landscapes, and the promise of exciting adventures!

How exciting would life be, if you set off on your morning commute, every day, with that same holiday feeling!

Set off with a smile, an anticipation of discovering something new, a promise of an adventure, and make every day feel like a holiday.

Performing A Spiritual Audit At The End Of The Day (Part 1)

Our normal day at the office or and at home is filled with lots of actions and interactions. On a normal day, without realizing consciously, we create almost 30,000-40,000 thoughts. So, not only are we active physically but extremely active on a subtle or non-physical level also.  Imagine sleeping with all this burden of thoughts, words and actions which have been created throughout the day, many of which have been waste and negative in nature. What would be the resulting quality of my sleep? So it is extremely important to perform a spiritual/emotional audit or evaluation at the end of each day.

In a lot of professional sectors of life today, people recognize the need for reflection and audit, not only of financial records but also a general evaluation of the respective sector, to maintain and improve both the service to customers and the job satisfaction of people working in the sector. Checking my own behavior, as a daily exercise; not just checking, but also bringing about respective changes for the next day, enables me to continue to develop and grow, as a human being and in the quality of my work and personal and professional relationships. Have gone through the self-evaluation, it is also advised to become completely light by submitting the mistakes made and heaviness accumulated in the day to the Supreme Being. Doing this helps me put a full-stop to the same and settle all my spiritual accounts at the end of the day. I need to put an end to all commas (when looking at scenes that caused me to slow down and reduced the speed of my progress), question marks (when looking at scenes which caused a why, what, how, when, etc.... in my consciousness) and exclamation marks (when looking at negative or waste scenes, which were unexpected and surprising) which were created in the day's activities. Along with remembering what all good happened during the day, what did I achieve and what good actions did I perform, there is lots to forget at the end of the day, which should not be carried into my sleep at any cost. Disturbed, thought-filled, unsound sleep, will result in a not so fresh body and mind the next morning, which will cause my mood to be disturbed, adversely affecting the following day.

(To be continued tomorrow...)

Love what you do

Approach everything you do, with love.  And when you come across any difficulties or tasks that you don't like to do, remind yourself: I love what I am doing!

Do things with love and you begin to develop an interest, a love for what you do.

Love just makes things seem easier, more like a game to be enjoyed.  With love, even difficulties stand aside to let love in.

Message for the day

Wisdom lies in being strong, rather than being vulnerable. 

Thought to Ponder: When something happens that is not to my liking, I need not get caught up with it. The situation tends to colour my thoughts and I become negative because of the situation. Wisdom lies in being strong, uninfluenced. I need to become a source of power rather that becoming vulnerable to the weaknesses. 

Point to Practice: Today I will smile at everything that happens. Every scene in the drama of life, as it unfolds in front of me, has something beautiful in store for me. It has a gift (maybe in disguise). Today I will appreciate the gift that it brings and move forward. 

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris

Daily Positive Thoughts: April 11, 2017: Dream On

Dream On

Why have we forgotten how to dream? With our innocence gone, and the entertainment industry doing all the work for us, we quickly lose our capacity to dream possible futures. Stop. Close your eyes. And dream again. Put the stars in your dreams. And then reach for them. No need to struggle. Simply nurture the dream, sustain the vision, and watch it come true. It must, it's the law.

Churning Spiritual Knowledge (Part 2)

We had discussed a few benefits of churning spiritual knowledge yesterday. Some more are as follows:

3. The knowledge that we have becomes more real: and so can give more effectively to others. We can use the jewels of knowledge in serving others. This knowledge will have much greater power and be of much greater help to others than any form of scholarly or bookish knowledge.

4. Our personality changes: Limited views and thought patterns which give birth to various obstacles can be finished by churning. Our outlook towards life becomes very broad and we become completely content internally so that name, fame, respect, insult, etc. don't affect us, they seem totally insignificant.

5. Natural bliss: By churning, spiritual knowledge becomes a source of bliss. Because of the spiritual happiness and intoxication that comes from churning, our faces will become radiant and we become instruments to attract other people towards spirituality.

6. Our concentration power increases: By acknowledging and not suppressing impure thoughts we will easily clear negative thoughts within a short period of time. Our concentration power will increase. We will be able to clear and burn impure or waste thoughts, and easily become an embodiment of positivity.

When someone upsets you, it's so easy to react.

But if you want to stop the relationship from a downward spiral, first, take care of your upset feelings.  Then extend yourself and see things from the other person's perspective.

This doesn't excuse why they upset you, but it does give you a starting place to try and mend the relationship.

Message for the day

To race with myself is better than trying to compete with others. 

Thought to Ponder: I can really excel when I try each day to be better than what I was yesterday. Instead of trying hard to compete with others, I need to compete with myself. This will ensure that I am moving forward in the direction of my own specialties. This will bring excellence in what I do. 

Point to Practice: Today I will work on one quality of mine and use it consciously. This quality could be a simple skill or a virtue. When I recognize and use it consciously, I will find it increasing. So, today I will put into use one quality of mine. 

In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris