07.04.2014

Positive Vision
Our thoughts and feelings
can so easily be influenced by how we perceive others.
If we make a firm choice to always keep a positive
vision of those around us, then we will enjoy better
relationships.
Meditation
Situations arise where it may not be
enough to tolerate or accommodate, but where I need
power to face very unpleasant and perhaps threatening
realities. What we are talking about here, in effect, is
courage. Meditation helps enormously.
First, the practice of the awareness of myself and
others as eternal souls greatly reduces fear of death,
an ever-present reality that we spend much time, money
and mental and emotional energy trying to avoid. If soul
consciousness is firm enough, I'll have the absolute
conviction that when someone dies, it's not that they
are no more, just that they have moved further on their
eternal journey. This faith makes it much easier to face
the departure of someone close to me. It also removes
much or all of the fear I might otherwise suffer about
leaving my own body. I'll still value my life greatly -
probably even more than before, because of having the
burden of fear removed. But I won't let concern for the
body stop me from facing what I must.
Secondly, meditation makes it easier for me to oppose
evil. It does this by allowing me to differentiate
clearly between the actor and the action. Spirituality
helps me understand that the original qualities of every
soul are peace, love, happiness and so I have no hatred
in my heart for anyone. This helps me become fearless
and stand firm against wrongdoing. With a clean heart, a
clear understanding of good and evil, and connection
with the divine, I am much more likely to have the faith
and courage with which to stand up for what is right.
Thirdly, if the negative behavior I am opposing
activates negative tendencies within my own personality,
the fight will soon wear me out and I'm unlikely to be
victorious. Power absorbed from the Supreme in
meditation helps me remain positive and above negative
tendencies and hence face someone’s negative behavior
and emerge victorious.
Love And Suffering
There are two things that touch or move us
in life: pain and pleasure. Both create addiction. We
feel pain in the body, and sometimes it is even
emotional. But suffering arises in the mind. The
suffering in the mind arises from thinking negatively
towards the self, towards others, looking at them with a
vision or attitude that causes grief, sorrow and
suffering. Both extremes, pain and pleasure, can create
addiction. On creating addiction it can start to form
part of someone's identity. Later if one tries to stop
the addiction of pain or suffering, it can almost feel
like a threat towards the self, and towards one's own
identity as one perceives it, because suffering is
identified with. It is too hard to see oneself as no
longer suffering.
An e.g. in this regard is that of a mother, with three
children, who was undergoing a meditation course at one
of the Brahma Kumaris centers. Her daughter had learned
to meditate and became very happy and joyful. Seeing her
happiness the mother came to learn to meditate. With a
few sessions she felt much more at peace and had very
good experiences, but all of a sudden she decide to stop
the meditation practice and leave the course because she
was starting experiencing a positive detachment, which
she perceived as negative. Now, she was no longer
feeling afraid of what might happen to her children. The
meditation was awakening in her a love free from fears,
but it brought on in her an inner clash of beliefs
between the old and new beliefs. Her old belief was that
to love someone is to suffer about them or create pain
related to them.
(To be continued tomorrow ...)
Soul Sustenance
The Seven Relationships With The Supreme
Every soul has a close relationship with the Supreme
(God), but we simply forget it as we become
over-involved in, attached to and distracted by our life
on the physical plane and our different relationships
with different physical beings during our journey of
births and rebirths. Spirituality makes us realize the
need of restoring our connection with God, which has
either broken or has become loose. It also makes us
realize that this connection needs to be a very deep and
personal one.
God plays many roles, just as a good parent, being
one, but will play many roles while bringing up his or
her child. Each role consists of different spiritual
characteristics and virtues of God, expressed by Him.
Take a few moments to think about the main roles that
God plays in our life and identify the main virtues and
characteristics which He expresses e.g. in the role of
Father He demonstrates the art of living to us and how
to perform right karmas. In the role of Mother he gives
spiritual sustenance, in the form of virtues like peace,
love and joy to us. In the role of Teacher, he showers
us with true knowledge of the spirit or the soul. These
are just a few examples. We suggest you do your own
thinking about seven different roles that God plays:
Father, Mother, Teacher, Guide (or Guru), Companion (or
Beloved), Friend, Child and how he plays them. Once
you have done this inner thinking exercise, experience
each of these seven roles on each of the seven different
days of the week, one role per day. Feel Him being in
that role for you and then note what you feel exactly
and how you relate to Him. Also identify the spiritual
characteristics and virtues that it brings out from
within you.
Message for the day
The power of
detachment helps us to watch the different games of
life.
Projection:
Whenever we are faced with a
situation or when we watch someone dear going through a
difficult situation, we tend to overreact because we
feel caught up in it. Then we are neither able to work
to remove it nor are we able to enjoy all that life
brings.
Solution:
Whenever a situation comes up, we need to use the power of
detachment that is within us. With this power we can see
and appreciate all the variety that life brings. This
makes us enjoy, whatever the situations may be.