16.07.2015 Beautiful Eggshell Art Opportunities Opportunities are never lost - someone will take the ones that you miss ! To know what I want is to work for it. When something happens that I don't like or don't want, I tend to wish for it to go away. I may even pray to God that it should be over. At such times, instead of thinking of what I don't want, it is more important to think of what I want. This will give me clarity of where I want to go and use my resources constructively. Today I will think of one thing that I really want to bring in my life. I will do something constructively for making it happen. When I work on what should be there, it would automatically help me get rid of the heaviness of what I don't want. Eventually, the situation will change anyways. The Art Of Stepping In And Stepping Out In Relationships (cont.) In the same way as the gardener (explained yesterday), we have the duty, or rather the honor, of planting positive seeds of good intentions, love, respect and tolerance, at the same time allowing others and the forces of the universe to be given the space to work and respond according to their time and inclination. Very often we plant those seeds but want an immediate result: * I have shown so much patience, but she doesn't change or * How much longer do I have to tolerate? I feel suppressed. We become attached to what we do, so there is no space for things to happen at their own appropriate time. Sometimes we have the wrong type of mercy, or we want to take control, thinking we know better, so we step into people's lives too much. This interference and lack of free space provokes hatred, resentment and conflict with others. At other times, we get fed up with others; our tolerance and empathy is completely reduced and we say, * I've had enough, or * I have got to do my own thing and so we step out, but in a selfish way, that is, we isolate ourselves from others, or situations. We justify, or disguise, this isolation and rejection and dislike towards others with such phrases as, * I need my own space or * Let them stand on their own feet. In actual fact, we aren't bothered anymore; we have stepped too far out of the picture because we have not cultivated the patience which allows the good and positive to germinate and grow in its own time. It is an art to know when to step back and when to step forward, but a very necessary one if well-being is to be achieved. Soul Sustenance The Original Ingredients Of The Soul Our original resources are very simply - peace, love, purity, knowledge and happiness. In Raja Yoga meditation these are called the five original qualities of the soul. When we return our consciousness to these five qualities and remember them, then the following feelings arise in us, which finally get reflected in our actions: Love: I care and I share. Peace: I harmonize and reconcile (adjust). Purity: I respect and I honour. Knowledge: I am and I exist. Happiness: I express and I enjoy. To understand and remember these qualities, we need to recognize the heavy deep shadows or personality traits (sanskars) which have blotted them out, or polluted them. Sometimes we don't recognize the pollutants because they have ingrained themselves so deeply into the personality that we say I am this. True, complete spiritual knowledge, makes us aware of these pollutants and the practice of meditation empowers us to dilute them and get them out of our consciousness. Message for the day Contentment makes me a giver. Projection: My mind is busy usually with expectations. I continue to expect something or the other from people. Yet I find that people are too busy fulfilling their own expectations to notice or to give what I need. Since my expectations are not fulfilled I am not able to be available for others and give them what they need. Solution: I need to be so aware of what I have and be content with it, that people should never think about what I need but should be able to take from me what they need. Then I'll be free from expectations and give others what is required.