Spiritual Messages related to Nonduality

Understanding the intricate movements of the mind

2011-08-01T17:54:00.000+05:30

“You may know the superficial layers of your mind; but to know the unconscious motives,
drives, fears, the hidden residue of tradition, of racial inheritance—to be aware of all that
and to give it close attention is very hard work, it demands a great deal of energy. Most of
us are unwilling to give close attention to these things; we have not the patience to go into
ourselves step by step, inch by inch, so that we begin to know all the subtleties, the
intricate movements of the mind. But it is only the mind which has understood itself in its
totality and is therefore incapable of self-deception—it is only such a mind that can free
itself of its past and go beyond its own movements within the field of time. This is not very
difficult, but it requires a great deal of hard work.”

- J. Krishnamurti

To be Creative

2011-02-16T21:24:00.002+05:30

To be creative means to be in love with life. You can be creative only if you love life enough that you want to enhance its beauty, you want to bring a little more music to it, a little more poetry to it, a little more dance to it.
Don't choose. Accept life as it is in its totality.

Osho

We should listen truly

2011-01-27T07:18:00.000+05:30

It is important to know how to listen, not only to me particularly, but to anybody. It is important to know how to listen because if we know how to listen truly, something extraordinary happens to us, because then without any bias, without any prejudice, we can go to the root of the matter immediately. But if we throw up a lot of arguments, concoct devices or contradictions to see who is correct and who is not correct and carry on with our own particular idiosyncrasies and ideas, then we will not discover the truth of the matter at all. We shall only be concerned with our own particular conclusions, with our own point of view. So if I may suggest, it is important that we should listen truly because if we can know how to listen, the truth will reveal itself. We do not have to explore the problem, but if we know how to listen to the song of a bird, to the voice of another, if we can listen as to music without any interpretation or translation, it definitely clarifies the mind; so similarly, if it is possible, let us listen with that intention - not to confute or to conform, but to directly find out the truth for ourselves.

Talks in India 1953

Being Free of Conflict

2011-01-22T17:16:00.001+05:30

Most of us give up the effort to be free of conflict and allow ourselves to drift, thereby making the mind dull; and if the pain of conflict becomes too great, we resort to a belief in God, hoping in this way to find peace, but sooner or later that too becomes a source of conflict. Or, being afraid that if we had no conflict we would vegetate, become dull, satisfied, we maintain the sharpness of conflict by intellectually arguing with others, by reading and being informed about every subject on earth. But there is an approach to this problem which requires the highest form of intelligence, the highest sensitivity, and it is to observe, to be aware of this whole process of conflict, without choice. If you go into it, you will find that in this state of awareness your mind understands immediately every problem as it arises so that conflict has no soil in which to take root..

Talks by Krishnamurti in Saanen, 1963

Discard Ever Self Seeking Motive

2011-01-20T18:36:00.000+05:30

Discard every self seeking motive as soon as it seen and you need not search for the Truth; Truth will find you.

If you seek Reality you must set yourself free of all backgrounds, of all cultures, of all patterns of thinking. Even the idea of being a man or woman, or even human, should be discarded.

- Nisargadatta Maharaj -

Understanding Oneself

2011-01-02T21:27:00.000+05:30

To understand oneself is one of the most difficult tasks and demands the most strenuous effort and constant alertness, and very few have the inclination or the desire to comprehend deeply this process of suffering and sorrow. We have more opportunities to dissipate our energies through absurd amusements, futile conversations and vain pursuits, than to search out, to penetrate deeply into our own psychological demands, needs, beliefs and ideals. But this involves strenuous effort on our part, and as we do not wish to exert ourselves, we would rather escape into all manner of easy satisfactions.

If we do not escape through diversions, we escape through beliefs, through the activities of organizations with their loyalties and commitments. These beliefs become a shield, preventing us from comprehending ourselves.

To understand oneself profoundly, one needs balance. That is, one cannot abandon the world, hoping to understand oneself, or be so entangled in the world that there is no occasion to comprehend oneself. There must be balance, neither renunciation nor acquiescence.

This demands alertness and deep awareness. We must learn to observe our actions, thoughts, ideals, beliefs, silently and without judgment, without interpreting them, so as to be able to discern their true significance. We must first be cognizant of our own ideals, pursuits, wants, without accepting or condemning them as being right or wrong. At present we cannot discern what is true and what is false, what is lasting and what is transient, because the mind is so crippled with its own self-created wants, ideals and escapes that it is incapable of true perception. So we must first learn to be silent and balanced observers of our limitations and frictions which cause sorrow.

J Krishnamurti

Self-image leads to pain

2010-10-30T20:31:00.000+05:30

Why divide problems as major and minor? Is not everything a problem? Why make them little or big problems, essential or unessential problems? If we could understand one problem, go into it very deeply however small or big it is, then we would uncover all problems. This is not a rhetorical answer.

Take any problem: anger, jealousy, envy, hatred—we know them all very well. If you go into anger very deeply, not just brush it aside, then what is involved? Why is one angry? Because one is hurt, someone has said an unkind thing; and when someone says a flattering thing you are pleased. Why are you hurt? Self- importance, is it not? And why is there self-importance?

Because one has an idea, a symbol of oneself, an image of oneself, what one should be, what one is or what one should not be. Why does one create an image about oneself?

Because one has never studied what one is, actually. We think we should be this or that, the ideal, the hero, the example. What awakens anger is that our ideal, the idea we have of ourselves, is attacked. And our idea about ourselves is our escape from the fact of what we are. But when you are observing the actual fact of what you are, no one can hurt you.

Then, if one is a liar and is told that one is a liar it does not mean that one is hurt; it is a fact. But when you are pretending you are not a liar and are told that you are, then you get angry, violent. So we are always living in an ideational world, a world of myth and never in the world of actuality. To observe what is, to see it, actually be familiar with it, there must be no judgment, no evaluation, no opinion, no fear.

Jiddu Krishnamurti

Some thoughts on "The Work" of Byron Katie

2010-10-23T06:57:00.006+05:30

"The Work" of Byron Katie is a set of 4 questions that each person must try to answer when he encounters a stressful thought .I see many people using this technique and also claiming to coach others on the same .I have also requested people going through stressful times to try doing "The Work" of Byron Katie and did send some basic info about that etc but quickly found out that not many keen were interested in doing "The Work" . I began to ponder what can be the reason for the popularity as well as the unpopularity of "The Work" .I really do not know how many people who are using "The Work" really using it the way it should be used .
Coming to practical terms "The Work" involves just a simple thing of accepting the reality or accepting the truth of the situation .Most of our problems are due to the fact that we fight with reality without learning to accept them and Byron Katie's key message is that when you fight with reality you loose only 100% of the time .This is the essence of "The Work" or Byron Katie's message . But are we really in a position to accept "The Truth'"or "reality" as it is ? Most of us are heavily conditioned by own thoughts ,feelings , fantasies, opinions and we take them to be real and work hard to achieve them and we encounter resistance in getting what we wanted we cry foul or blame others or pass judgement on others . We never question whether our thoughts ,feelings , fantasies and opinions are true in the first place .So this is the first thing that is needed to be done to lead an awakened life i.e questioning our own thoughts and feelings and understand how much we have been directly / indirectly conditioned by our family , society etc to have those thoughts and feelings .This needs lot of courage .This is exactly what J Krishnamurti has been advocating i.e the need to investigate deeper into our own thoughts and feelings .But J.Krishnamurti never gave any technique as such and left it to each individual to probe deeper and not to escape from this investigation by diverting to other techniques like chanting mantras , using breath control etc which can only temporarily stop the mind but as long as the basic investigation to our own thoughts and feelings are not being done we will be repeatedly keep getting stressed out .That is why Byron Katie gave her 4 questions in the form of "The Work" and I feel that the first question itself i.e "Do you know is it true?" if properly probed will help a person appreciate reality much better .
But most of the people use "The Work" to solve a problem i.e they imagine an outcome for their situation and expect "The Work" to bring out that outcome .This is mostly wishful thinking and "The Work" is not a wishful thinking but a process to understand and accept truth or reality as it is .If a couple is going through a separation then "The Work" will not help them patch up and this is what most people expect but if they honestly do "The Work" then they will understand why they landed up in such a mess in the first place and that understanding will help remove the bitterness between them and give them better insight in to their own unconscious pattern and create necessary space between them to move forward .
So unless and until an individual is willing to investigate the truth of a situation as it is without getting trapped in taking sides to satisfy his own ego or for the cause of self preservation , "The Work" will not be very useful for such a person ."The Work" is only useful for that person who respects and appreciates truth or reality as it is even if it is unpleasant to him /her .

Contend with only one day at a time

2010-07-02T17:20:00.002+05:30

Your life is rationed out to you only in tiny sections or little, individual days. You are only required to attend to one section at a time, not all of life at once. Therefore, contend with only one day at a time. This is the secret.
Swami Chidananda.

This above quote by Swami Chidananda is worth introspecting by everyone . Today people want to do many things at a time and finally they end up doing nothing properly and are frustrated . Except for few people not many are skilled in multi tasking and it is better people learn to take one job at a time and do it slowly but steadily .A thousand mile journey starts with a single step and if we start taking such single steps slowly but steadily we may progress much faster then breaking our heads in to developing many smarter strategies of how to finish the Thousand mile journey quickly and finally end up only having strategies on our table without even taking a single step . This is more visible in a Yoga practice . Some people wait for the ideal vacation or holiday or time or situation to restart their yoga practice and never end up doing the same when such a holiday or situation turns out .It would be much better if they had rolled their mat then and there and done a few minutes of simple asana practice daily and such a daily practice would have created a momentum in them that would come in handy when they get a holiday or vacation for a longer practice .

True Awakening, Part 1

2010-05-13T16:43:00.000+05:30

The enlightenment teachings of Leonard Jacobson

Art of Listening

2010-05-08T07:19:00.002+05:30

An edited version of Jiddu Krishnamurti interviewed by Dr. Allan Anderson on PBS in 1974, focusing on the art of seeing and listening. Here Krishnamurti talks about the importance of art of listening totally .

Why don't You Change?

2010-05-07T17:44:00.003+05:30

A Video Clip from J.Krishnamurti

Understanding the mind

2010-05-06T15:54:00.001+05:30

We are not concerned with what you should or should not do; that is not the problem. We are concerned with understanding the mind; and in understanding there is no condemnation, no demand for a pattern of action. You are merely observing; and observation is denied when you concern yourself with a pattern of action, or merely explain the inevitability of a slavish life. What matters is to observe your own mind without judgment - just to look at it, to watch it, to be conscious of the fact that your mind is a slave, and no more; because that very perception releases energy, and it is this energy that is going to destroy the slavishness of the mind. But if you merely ask, "How am I to be free from my slavery to routine, from my fear and boredom in everyday existence?", you will never release this energy. We are concerned only with perceiving what is; and it is the perception of what is that releases the creative fire. You cannot perceive if you do not ask the right question and a right question has no answer, because it needs no answer. It is wrong questions that invariably have answers. The urgency behind the right question, the very instance of it, brings about perception. The perceiving mind is living, moving, full of energy, and only such a mind can understand what truth is. But most of us, when we are face to face with a problem of this kind, invariably seek an answer, a solution, the `what to do', and the solution, the `what to do' is so easy, leading to further misfortune, further misery. That is the way of politicians. That is the way of the organized religions, which offer an answer, an explanation; and having found it, the so-called religious mind is thereby satisfied. But we are not politicians, nor are we slavish to organized religions. We are now examining the ways of our own minds, and for that there must be no fear. To find out about oneself, what one thinks, what one is, the extraordinary depths and movements of the mind - just to be aware of all that requires a certain freedom. And to inquire into oneself also requires an astonishing energy, because one has to travel a distance which is immeasurable. Most of us are fascinated by the idea of going to the moon, or to Venus; but those distances are much shorter than the distance within ourselves.

J Krishnamurti
Bombay 1st Public Talk 23rd December 1959 The Collected Works Vol. XI

WHERE IS GOD?

2010-03-07T19:22:00.000+05:30

Where is God? Can we find Him only in the temples, churches, or mosques? No. Is He to be sought only in the four Vedas or Upavedas, the six Vedangas or in the six schools of philosophy? No. Does He dwell in the place of pilgrimage or Tirthas alone? No. No. No. Where is He then?

He is seated in the hearts of all. He is not very far. He is quite close to you. Subtler than the subtlest, greater than the greatest, He is located in the cavity of your heart, in the innermost recesses or chambers, the Hridaya Kamala. You can reach Him by sincere Sadhana or spiritual practices.

Swami Sivananda

Mind in a State of Inquiry

2010-02-21T12:16:00.000+05:30

For the total development of the human being, solitude as a means of cultivating sensitivity becomes a necessity. One has to know what it means to be alone, what it is to meditate, what it is to die; and the implications of solitude, of meditation, of death, can be known only by seeking them out. These implications cannot be taught, they must be learnt. One can indicate, but learning by what is indicated is not the experiencing of solitude or meditation. To experience what is solitude and what is meditation, one must be in in a state of inquiry; only a mind that is in a state of inquiry is capable of learning. But when inquiry is suppressed by previous knowledge, or by the authority and experience of another, then learning becomes mere imitation, and imitation causes a human being to repeat what is learnt without experiencing it.

From the Book, Life Ahead by J Krishnamurti

Reason for this long break

2010-02-21T12:11:00.002+05:30

I have not been posting in this blog for the past 3 months because I was involved in preparing for my Spiritual Intensive in Januray 2010 . I successfully completed my spiritual intensive in Jan 2010 at the Sivananda Ashram in Madurai and spent the next few weeks in solitude absorbing the wonderful effects of the intensive and slowly started to get back to my normal teaching schedule . I still maintain my solitude and keep away from the net as much as possible except for checking my emails and for posting on my blogs etc .So from now on I will be regular in updating my blogs .

Escape from all kinds of Unintelligent activities

2009-11-13T12:07:00.000+05:30

Escape from all kinds of unintelligent activities. First sharpen your intelligence. Let a great joy arise in you. Become more watchful, so much so that not even a corner in your being is dark anymore. Let your unconscious be transformed into consciousness. Then do whatsoever you want to do. Then if you want to go to hell, go with my blessings, because you will be able to transform hell itself. It is not that meditators go to heaven, no: wherever they go they are in heaven and whatsoever they do is divine.

Osho

Don’t waste a single moment

2009-11-05T17:24:00.000+05:30

Man is born only as a potential. If you don’t develop your potential, if you don’t grow spiritually, you are just like an ox. The body will go on becoming bigger and bigger, but that is not growth. Growing old is not growing up, growing physically is not growing spiritually. And unless you grow spiritually you are wasting a precious opportunity.
Man is the only being on the earth who can attain to buddhahood. Elephants and lions and tigers can’t become buddhas. Only man can become a buddha, only man can become a thousand-petaled lotus, only man can release the fragrance called God.
Don’t waste a single moment in anything else. Do the necessary things, the essential things, but pour more and more energy into watchfulness, awareness. Wake up! Unless you become a buddha you have not lived at all, because you will not know the great poetry of life, the great music of existence. You will not know the celestial celebration that goes on and on, you will not know the dance of the stars. It is for you to become part of this celebration. This bliss is for you! All these flowers and all these songs and all these stars are for you. You are entitled to miracles — but grow up, wake up! Enough for today.

Source: from Osho Book “Dhammapada Vol 5

Do you really want the answer?

2009-10-20T10:22:00.001+05:30

One great philosopher, Maulingaputta, came to Buddha, and he started asking questions... questions after questions. Must have been an incarnation of Patrick! Buddha listened silently for half an hour. Maulingaputta started feeling a little embarrassed because he was not answering, he was simply sitting there smiling, as if nothing had happened, and he had asked such important questions, such significant questions.

Finally Buddha said, "Do you really want to know the answer?" Maulingaputta said, "Otherwise why should I have come to you? I have traveled at least one thousand miles to see you." And remember, in those days, one thousand miles was really one thousand miles! It was not hopping in a plane and reaching within minutes or within hours. One thousand miles was one thousand miles.

It was with great longing, with great hope that he had come. He was tired, weary from the journey, and he must have followed Buddha because Buddha himself was traveling continuously. He must have reached one place and people said, "Yes, he was here three months ago. He has gone to the north" -- so he must have traveled north.

Slowly slowly, he was coming closer and closer and then the day came, the great day, when people said, "Just yesterday morning he left; he must have reached only the next village. If you rush, if you run, you may be able to catch him."

And then one day he caught up with him, and he was so joyous he forgot all his arduous journey and he started asking all the questions he had planned all the way along, and Buddha smiled and sat there and asked, "Do you really want to have the answer?"

Maulingaputta said, "Then why have I traveled so long? It has been a long suffering -- it seems I have been traveling my whole life, and you are asking, 'Do you really want the answer?'"

Buddha said, "I am asking again: Do you really want the answer? Say yes or no, because much will depend on it."

Maulingaputta said, "Yes!"

Then Buddha said, "For two years sit silently by my side -- no asking, no questions, no talking. Just sit silently by my side for two years. And after two years you can ask whatsoever you want to ask, and I promise you I will answer it."

A disciple, a great disciple of Buddha, Manjushree, who was sitting underneath another tree, started laughing so loudly, started almost rolling on the ground. Maulingaputta said, "What has happened to this man? Out of the blue, you are talking to me, you have not said a single word to him, nobody has said anything to him -- is he telling jokes to himself?"
Buddha said, "You go and ask him."

He asked Manjushree. Manjushree said, "Sir, if you really want to ask the question, ask right now -- this is his way of deceiving people. He deceived me. I used to be a foolish philosopher just like you. His answer was the same when I came; you have traveled one thousand miles, I had traveled two thousand."

Manjushree certainly was a great philosopher, more well-known in the country. He had thousands of disciples. When he had come he had come with one thousand disciples -- a great philosopher coming with his following.

"And Buddha said, 'Sit silently for two years.' And I sat silently for two years, but then I could not ask a single question. Those days of silence...slowly slowly, all questions withered away. And one thing I will tell you: he keeps his promise, he is a man of his word. After exactly two years -- I had completely forgotten, lost track of time, because who bothers to remember? As silence deepened I lost track of all time.

"When two years passed, I was not even aware of it. I was enjoying the silence and his presence. I was drinking out of him. It was so incredible! In fact, deep down in my heart I never wanted those two years to be finished, because once they were finished he would say, 'Now give your place to somebody else to sit by my side, you move away a little. Now you are capable of being alone, you don't need me so much.'

Just as the mother moves the child when he can eat and digest and no longer needs to be fed on the breast. So," Manjushree said, "I was simply hoping that he would forget all about those two years, but he remembered -- exactly after two years he asked, 'Manjushree, now you can ask your questions.' I looked within; there was no question and no questioner either -- a total silence. I laughed, he laughed, he patted my back and said, 'Now, move away.'

"So, Maulingaputta, that's why I started laughing, because now he is playing the same trick again. And this poor Maulingaputta will sit for two years silently and will be lost forever, will never be able to ask a single question. So I insist, Maulingaputta, if you really want to ask, ASK NOW!"

Osho

What are the sings of progress in spiritual life ?

2009-10-17T18:07:00.001+05:30

Freedom from all anxiety ; a sense of ease and joy ; deep peace within and abundant energy without.

Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

Three Kinds of Business

2009-10-08T18:23:00.000+05:30

I can find only three kinds of business in the universe: mine, yours and God’s. Much of our stress comes from mentally living out of our business. When I think, “You need to get a job, I want you to be happy, you should be on time, you need to take better care of yourself,” I am in your business. When I’m worried about earthquakes, floods, war, or when I will die, I am in God’s business. If I am mentally in your business or in God’s business, the effect is separation.

Byron Katie

Time and Timelessness

2009-09-08T18:10:00.001+05:30

If we are fully present, there are no thoughts. If there are no thoughts, then quite literally, there is no time. There is no life outside of this moment. We can no longer function in the world of time, because there is only now. You would need a team of caretakers to take care of you, or an ashram would have to develop around you to take care of you and receive your enlightened utterances.

One such example is Ramana Maharshi. When Ramana awakened, he did not participate in the world of time. He remained in the silence and an ashram developed around him. That is the beauty of India. The Indian culture allows for one to enter into that fully awakened state and remain there. They know how to respond to one who is fully awakened.

But it is time for many more of us to awaken. Enlightenment can no longer be for just a select few, who do not participate in the world. If there is to be an awakening at a collective level, we will have to find a balance between the timelessness of the fully awakened state and the world of time. This means that we must master the art of moving easily between those two dimensions.

To do so, we must know that the present moment is the truth of life. We must know that everything outside of this moment is illusory in nature and so we no longer believe in any of it as true. We must recognize that life at the level of mind is simply play. It is sometimes happy and sometimes sad, because it is a world of duality. We relax and accept the dual nature of life within time. We are no longer for or against anything. We have transcended judgment. Life is accepted fully and so too is death. Joy is accepted fully and so too is pain. But we are so deeply grounded in the moment of now, that we no longer get caught in the movements of the mind and its world of thought and emotion. We are no longer identified with the story unfolding within the world of time. We are no longer defined by that story. We are deeply grounded in Oneness. We can move easily into time and the world of thought, and we are able to return to silence and Presence at will. In fact, silence and Presence are always there as the foundation of our existence, even when we consciously choose to venture into the world of the mind.

-Leonard Jacobson

The World is perfect

2009-08-28T18:20:00.000+05:30

The world is perfect.
As you question your mind, this becomes more and more obvious.
Mind changes, and as a result, the world changes.
A clear mind heals everything that needs to be healed.
It can never be fooled into believing that there is one speck out of order.

~ Byron Katie ~

The Work of Byron Katie - Freedom From Stress is Only 4 Questions Away

2009-08-26T19:43:00.001+05:30

The Work of Byron Katie - Freedom From Stress is Only 4 Questions Away

All stress comes from believing a thought that argues with reality. And when you oppose "what is" - it hurts.

In Byron Katie's first book, Loving What Is, she illustrates this with a simple and clear example with a cat:

If you want reality to be different than it is, you might as well try to teach a cat to bark. You can try and try, and in the end the cat will look up at you and say, "Meow." Wanting reality to be different than it is is hopeless. You can spend the rest of your life trying to teach a cat to bark...

And yet, if you pay attention, you'll notice that you think thoughts like this dozens of times a day. "People should be kinder." "Children should be well-behaved." "My neighbors should take better care of their lawn."...

These thoughts are ways of wanting reality to be different than it is. If you think that this sounds depressing, you're right. All the stress that we feel is caused by arguing with what is.

So what can you do when you find yourself arguing with reality? You know, when you're sitting in traffic thinking, "I shouldn't be stuck in traffic right now!" Or when the sale you were hoping for at work falls through and you're frustrated because, "They really should have followed through."

Well, you can do one of two things:

1. Believe what you think.

2. Question it.

Believing what you think can be pretty painful. I mean just think about how stressful it is to sit in traffic wanting the cars to move faster! It's about as hopeless as trying to get a cat to bark.

Questioning the thoughts, on the other hand, can open you up to finding peace where you once found stress.

You can start questioning them, or doing The Work, by writing down your stressful thought (the one where you want things to be different than they are) and then answering these four questions:

1. Is it true?
2. Can you absolutely know that it's true?
3. How do you react when you believe that thought?
4. Who would you be without the thought?

Then you look for turnarounds by taking the original stressful belief and looking for opposites to see if they are as true or truer. In other words, to see if they are closer to reality.

Here's an example:

My friend should be a better listener.

1. Is that true?

Yes.

2. Can you absolutely know that it's true? (What's the reality?)

The reality is that she's not better than she is. So, no, I can't know that she should be a better listener.

3. How do you react when you believe that your friend should be a better listener?

I get frustrated and I complain to my other friends. I don't want to hang around with her anymore. I don't want to listen to her either because I want to punish her. I don't respect her and am jealous of her attention when she puts it somewhere other than on me when I'm trying to talk to her.

4. Who would you be without the thought that your friend should be a better listener?

I wouldn't try to convince her that she should listen to me more. I'd feel gentler in my body. I'd appreciate the amount that she *does* listen to me. When she talked to me, I'd be able to listen because there wouldn't be that resentment that I was holding on to. I'd realize that I'm doing just fine in my life even though she's not listening to me more.

Turn the thought around: She should be a better listener.

TA> She should *not* be a better listener. This is true because she's not. She can't be a better listener than she is in that moment.

TA> *I* should be a better listener. Definitely! If I think she can do it, can I even do it?! I should give her what I want from her because obviously it's important to me that friends listen to each other well. So this is for me to live.

The Work of Byron Katie is a path to self-discovery and freedom from stress. Ask these four questions for yourself and find out who you'd be without your story!

"When I argue with reality I lose. But only 100% of the time." - Byron Katie

Desire the good of all and the universe will work with you

2009-08-25T18:13:00.001+05:30

The higher your aims and vaster your desires, the more energy you will have for their fulfilment. Desire the good of all and the universe will work with you. But if you want your own pleasure, you must earn it the hard way.

Before desiring, deserve.

Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

To understand God, you must first understand your own mind…

2009-06-19T18:21:00.002+05:30

To understand God, you must first understand your own mind - which is very difficult. The mind is very complex, and to understand it is not easy. But it is easy enough to sit down and go into some kind of dream, have various visions, illusions, and then think that you are very near to God. The mind can deceive itself enormously. So, to really experience that which may be called God, you must be completely quiet; and have you not found out how extremely difficult that is? Have you not noticed how even the older people never sit quietly, how they fidget, how they wiggle their toes and move their hands? It is difficult physically to sit still; and how much more difficult it is for the mind to be still ! You may follow some guru and force your mind to be quiet; but your mind is not really quiet. It is still restless, like a child that is made to stand in the corner. It is a great art for the mind to be completely silent without coercion; and only then is there a possibility of experiencing that which may be called God.

J Krishnamurti

LIFE AHEAD - PART ONE CHAPTER 7

There Is Just One Thing To Do

2009-06-17T18:53:00.001+05:30

When you become a lover of what is, there are not more decisions to make. In my life, I just wait and watch. I know that the decision will be made in its own time, so I let go of when, where, and how. I like to say I'm a woman with no future. When there are no decisions to make, there's no planned future. All my decisions are made for me, just as they are all made for you. When you mentally tell yourself the story that you have something to do with it, you're attaching to an underlying belief.

I would often return from a long trip to find the house full of dirty laundry, piles of mail on my desk, the dog dish crusted, the bathrooms a mess, and the sink piled high with dishes. The first time this happened, I heard a voice that said, "Do the dishes". It was like coming upon the burning bush, and the voice from the bush said, "Do the dishes." It didn't sound very spiritual to me, but just followed its directions. I would stand at the sink and just wash the next dish, or sit with the piles of bills and pay the one on top. Just one at a time. Nothing else was required. At the end of the day, everything would be done, and I didn't need to understand who or what did it.

When a thought appears, such as "Do the dishes" and you don't do them, notice how an internal war breaks out. It sounds like this, "I'll do them later. I should have done them by now. My roommate should have done them. It's not my turn. It's not fair. People will think less of me if I don't do them now." The stress and weariness you feel are really mental combat fatigue.

What I call "doing the dishes" is the practice of loving the task in front of you. Your inner voice guides you all day long to do simple things such as brush your teeth, drive to work, call you friend, or do the dishes. Even though it's just another story, it's a very short story, and when you follow the direction of the voice, that story ends. We are really alive when we live as simply as that -- open, waiting, trusting, and loving to do what appears in front of us now.

What we need to do unfolds before us, always -- doing the dishes, paying the bills, picking up the children's socks, brushing our teeth. We never receive more than we can handle, and there is always just one thing to do. Life never gets more difficult than that.

Byron Katie

You are the World

2009-06-08T12:22:00.000+05:30

You and the world are not two different entities with separate problems; you and the world are one. You may be the result of certain tendencies, on environmental influences, but you are not different fundamentally from another. Inwardly we are very much alike; we are all driven by greed, ill will, fear, ambition, and so on..

J Krishnamurti

All that you need is just to be watchful

2009-06-07T19:14:00.000+05:30

All that you need is just to be watchful, and nothing will affect you. This unaffectedness will keep your purity, and this purity has certainly the freshness of life, the joy of existence - all the treasures that you have been endowed with. But you become attached to the small things surrounding you and forget the one that you are. It is the greatest discovery in life and the most ecstatic pilgrimage to truth. And you need not be an ascetic, you need not be anti-life - you need not renounce the world and go to the mountains. You can be where you are, you can continue to do what you are doing. Just a new thing has to be evolved: whatever you do, you do with awareness - even the smallest act of the body or the mind - and with each act of awareness you will become aware of the beauty and the treasure and the glory and the eternity of your being.

Osho

What is SEEING the Mind?

2009-06-02T07:15:00.001+05:30

Q: I know we've must have addressed this, but can you tell me where the thoughts come from? Is the mind creating thoughts and the appearance? ... and then labeling and believing its own made up story? If not, what creates thoughts/appearance? Is this something we cannot comprehend or do we not know?

A:What is happening in direct experience? What is really the truth of what is happening? Isn't this all that is ever happening?

Can you find a location where thoughts arise from? Or do they just appear?

The mind doesn't create thoughts--the mind IS thoughts.

The mind can be defined as an endless train of thoughts....one damn thought after the other...

Thoughts can appear as labels or stories

But there isn't a mind that is witnessing mind.

There isn't a mind that is knowing mind.

Mind cannot known itself and believe in itself.

They are just labels, stories.

THAT which SEES labels and stories is what YOU ARE.

The infinite space in which these stories/labels appear on/in.

The mind gets frustrated because it cannot find SEEING.

The mind cannot and will not ever find it; so it gives up.

No matter how rigorous the search is--it is impossible because thoughts cannot do anything!

Intelligence is functioning; KNOWING the thoughts that spontaneously appear/disappear

The answer is NOT in the mind!

What is SEEING the mind?

What is SEEING the thought 'me' arise?

Surely it cannot be a 'me' that is SEEING the 'me'? Wouldn't that be another thought?

Don't you see the dog chasing its tail?

What is SEEING this maddening cycle?

SEEING is happening THEN thoughts arise

SEEING is happening then the thought 'me' arises

a 'person' is not SEEING

the label 'your name' is not SEEING

the thought 'your name' is an appearance in the SEEING

SEEING is undeniable then BS stories (seemingly) attach to 'your name' rise/fall

THAT KNOWING/SEEING never changes!

This CANNOT be understood

This is not some complex mathematical formula where it said "Yes! I have it"

This is not something that is gained--or added, what could be added to the Infinite?

IT IS KNOW-ING!

Jason Swanson
http://youare-seeing-oneness.blogspot.com/

True Awakening, Part 1,Video- Leonard Jacobson

2009-06-01T10:30:00.006+05:30

Leonard Jacobson is one of the Greatest Spiritual inspirations in my life and I have been deeply benefited by his teachings on Non Duality and in this blog apart from sharing his teachings through text format I will also be sharing his teachings through videos and one such video I am sharing here .

Benefits of Being in Present

2009-05-31T20:31:00.001+05:30

Being present is a fundamental key to true awakening. But even if you are not on a spiritual path, you will benefit immensely from becoming more present in your life and in your relationships.

How?

As you become more present,

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You will heal the emotional traumas of the past.
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You will free yourself from the limiting beliefs learned in childhood.
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You will not react so emotionally.
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You will be free from blame, guilt, and resentment.
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You will be more in touch with your feelings.
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You will feel more empowered.
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You will feel less anxious about the future.
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You will be less judgmental of yourself and others.
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You will not lose yourself in seeking acceptance and approval from others.
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You will feel less afraid of death, and more available to life.
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You will be more spontaneous and adventurous.
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You will be more open and loving.
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You will be more aware and conscious.

Being present will enhance every aspect of your life!

Leonard Jacobson

The Ordinariness of Awakening

2009-05-31T17:06:00.001+05:30

Today I live a very ordinary life. I like to walk, I enjoy a good movie, I like a good meal, I love being in nature, and I often enjoy the activity of the world. Before I met Poonjaji, every activity in my life was a search for some kind of self-fulfillment or self-definition. Whether it was searching in the peace of nature, or in the excitement of relationship, or in the mundane thrill of acquisition, it was always a search for who I was, most of the time looking for a positive answer and running from a negative one.

I am not searching now. I know and I continuously realize deeper every day that no thing can define me. However great the joy is of spending time in a in nature, however harmonious my relationships are, however delightful the experiences of the world, that from which it all arises, that omnipresent field of pure consciousness, is so much greater, so much more profound, blissful, and sublime.

On the outside, much of my life looks the same. Eli is still my husband, Sarah is still my daughter, and I know some of the same people. What’s different is that I am not looking to any one or any thing to give me what I want. I know what I want, and luckily what I want is what is already here. It has always been here, because it is who I am.

Many people have asked how it was possible to integrate these realizations into my day-to-day life. My response has always been the same. It is not possible to integrate truth into anything else because truth already exists as everything and it always has. You cannot take vastness or infinity and integrate it into some object in life, such as a day or a workspace. What you can recognize is that your life is already inside that; it is already a part of that integral whole. Then every situation in life is an opportunity to recognize the ground of beingness that holds it all.

Gangaji

The Core of Krishnamurti Teachings

2009-05-27T16:32:00.002+05:30

When asked in 1974 by his biographer, Mary Lutyens, to define his teachings Krishnamurti wrote the following: "The core of Krishnamurti's teaching is contained in the statement he made in 1929 when he said 'Truth is a pathless land'. Man cannot come to it through any organisation, through any creed, through any dogma, priest or ritual, not through any philosophical knowledge or psychological technique. He has to find it through the mirror of relationship, through the understanding of the contents of his own mind, through observation and not through intellectual analysis or introspective dissection. Man has built in himself images as a fence of security - religious, political, personal. These manifest as symbols, ideas, beliefs. The burden of these images dominates man's thinking, his relationships and his daily life. These images are the causes of our problems for they divide man from man. His perception of life is shaped by the concepts already established in his mind. The content of his consciousness is his entire existence. This content is common to all humanity. The individuality is the name, the form and superficial culture he acquires from tradition and environment. The uniqueness of man does not lie in the superficial but in complete freedom from the content of his consciousness, which is common to all mankind. So he is not an individual.

Freedom is not a reaction; freedom is not a choice. It is man's pretence that because he has choice he is free. Freedom is pure observation without direction, without fear of punishment and reward. Freedom is without motive; freedom is not at the end of the evolution of man but lies in the first step of his existence. In observation one begins to discover the lack of freedom. Freedom is found in the choiceless awareness of our daily existence.

Thought is time. Thought is born of experience, of knowledge, which are inseparable from time. Time is the psychological enemy of man. Our action is based on knowledge and therefore time, so man is always a slave to the past.

When man becomes aware of the movement of his own consciousness he will see the division between the thinker and the thought, the observer and the observed, the experiencer and the experience. He will discover that this division is an illusion. Then only is there pure observation which is insight without any shadow of the past . This timeless insight brings about a deep radical mutation in the mind.

Total negation is the essence of the positive. When there is negation of all those things which are not love - desire, pleasure - then love is, with its compassion and intelligence."

London, October 21, 1980
Copyright © 1980 Krishnamurti Foundation Trust

Don't waste a single moment in anything else

2009-05-25T15:45:00.001+05:30

Man is born only as a potential. If you don't develop your potential, if you don't grow spiritually, you are just like an ox. The body will go on becoming bigger and bigger, but that is not growth. Growing old is not growing up, growing physically is not growing spiritually. And unless you grow spiritually you are wasting a precious opportunity.
Man is the only being on the earth who can attain to buddhahood. Elephants and lions and tigers can't become buddhas. Only man can become a buddha, only man can become a thousand-petaled lotus, only man can release the fragrance called God.

Don't waste a single moment in anything else. Do the necessary things, the essential things, but pour more and more energy into watchfulness, awareness. Wake up! Unless you become a buddha you have not lived at all, because you will not know the great poetry of life, the great music of existence. You will not know the celestial celebration that goes on and on, you will not know the dance of the stars. It is for you to become part of this celebration. This bliss is for you! All these flowers and all these songs and all these stars are for you. You are entitled to miracles -- but grow up, wake up! Enough for today.

Source: from Osho Book "Dhammapada Vol 5"

First be selfish, first transform yourself.

2009-05-24T17:19:00.002+05:30

Your life in peace, in joy, in health, can be a great source of nourishment for people who are starving for spiritual food. People are not really starving for material things. Material richness is very simple: just a little more technology, a little more science, and people can be rich. The real problem is how to be inwardly rich. And when you are outwardly rich you will be surprised -- for the first time you become more acutely, more keenly aware of your inner poverty. For the first time all meaning in life disappears when you are outwardly rich, because in contrast, the inner poverty can be seen more clearly. Outside there is light all around and inside you are a dark island.

The rich man knows his poverty more than the poor person, because the poor person has no contrast. Outside there is darkness, inside there is darkness; he knows darkness is what life is. But when there is light outside you become desirous of a new phenomenon: you long for inner light. When you see that richness is possible outside, why can't you be rich inside?

Osho

Question your Thoughts Change the World

2009-05-04T11:21:00.001+05:30

A feeling is like the mate to a thought appearing. They're like a left and a right. If you have a thought, there's a simultaneous feeling. And an uncomfortable feeling is like a compassionate alarm clock that says, "You're in the dream." It's time to investigate, that's all. But if we don't honor the alarm clock, then we try to alter and manipulate the feeling by reaching into an apparent external world. We're usually aware of the feeling first. That's why I say it's an alarm clock that let's you know you're in a thought that you may want to investigate. If it's not acceptable to you, if it's painful, you might want to do The Work.

Thoughts are friends, not enemies. They're just what is. They appear. They're innocent. We're not doing them. They're not personal. They're like the breeze or the leaves on the trees or the raindrops falling. Thoughts arise like that, and we can make friends with them. Would you argue with a raindrop? Raindrops aren't personal, and neither are thoughts. It's the meaning you attach to those thoughts that you think is personal. Inquire. Meet them with understanding. Once a painful concept is met with understanding, the next time it appears you may find it interesting. The next time it appears, you may find it funny. The next time, you may not even notice it. There will be no attachment. I meet thoughts the way I would meet my children. I meet them with love, gentleness, and a quiet understanding.

Byron Katie

On Meditation

2009-05-03T10:25:00.001+05:30

Sharing thoughts about meditation seems like a contradiction. Isn’t meditation all about "taking out the trash" and ridding ourselves of rambling thoughts? Well . . . not necessarily.

Many of us have tried meditation, but grew discouraged and after a time, stopped practicing. Maybe because it seemed boring or we didn’t have time to just sit — but more likely, we decided that we weren’t good at "quieting the mind."

As if that were a realistic goal.

I suggest that we don’t need to quiet the mind any more than we need to plug up a bubbling hot springs. It is the nature of hot springs to bubble and the nature of mind to do the same, boiling off random thought-static, a kind of discharge that may serve a function similar to dreaming.

Thoughts happen. Emotions happen. Weather happens. We may prefer certain thoughts, emotions or weather over others. But none are directly controllable by our will.

Thoughts only become a problem when we mistake them for reality. We live in two worlds: An objective world arising within our nervous system and outside of our bodies, perceived by our senses. We also live in a subjective world of the meanings, associations, fears, beliefs and interpretations we make about that objective world.

Meditation enables us to discover the nature of mind, of thought, and to see them as a sort of illusion, a complication we impose on what the Zen masters call "isness" or "suchness" prior to mind.

Many people both misunderstand and idealize this practice we call meditation. But after all, it is a practice — an exercise — like doing push-ups or learning to juggle. As with any practice, it can be done well or poorly and can improve over time.

Doing push-ups over time will predictably strengthen the upper body. Meditation practice also brings noticeable benefits: an enhanced ability to relax, focus and concentrate; more patience; a sharpening of the senses (as we learn to pay attention); enhanced creativity, self-awareness (shadow-work), and insight into the nature of mind. An experience of no-mind.

Meditation is not, however, a path to enlightenment; rather, from the first moment we sit, meditation is the practice of enlightenment — a fundamental means of adapting the body-mind to an enlightened disposition of non-reactivity.

We sit with spine erect — not leaning forward into the future or backward into the past, but stable in this present moment. Meanwhile, our awareness takes on its ultimate role as Witness: We simply observe arising phenomena: thoughts, emotions, physical sensations. Yet we do not react to any of it; we merely bear witness to passing phenomena. Relaxed. Serene. Simply being aware. Being Awareness.

This is why some Zen masters, when asked "What is enlightenment?" may respond, "Just sitting." When beginners first sit, they fidget, think, react, wonder, daydream. As it turns out, "just sitting" is not so easy.

Most meditators use a technique or device to help focus their wandering attention: We turn our attention to our breath, or to a mantra (repeated inner chant), or to inner sounds (nad yoga), or we gaze at a visual image such as a yantra or mandala or just a single point.

Since many thoughts tend to impose physical tensions, the body naturally relaxes as we release our attachment to (or investment in) passing thoughts and impressions. Giving mind-stuff no energy or attention, we slip into a sleep-like or trance-like state in which "time flies."

Some call it the void, the quiet mind. Various studies suggest that spending time in this state provides deep, refreshing rest from the usually active state of the body-mind — doing, pushing, wondering, remembering, imagining, fretful with regrets of the past and anxieties about the future.

Meditation opens doorways to a temporary state of peace, a mini-vacation from self, mind, world. Many people quite enjoy this time out. The practice of sitting meditation, central to a number of eastern (or inward-directed) spiritual traditions, balance the western (outward or extroverted) orientation. In this way, meditation it provides a balancing effect for most active men and women.

In the approach to reality that I teach — the way of the Peaceful Warrior — we can enjoy this meditative disposition, this sense of divine detachment, even after we open our eyes, stand up, and go about our daily business. Various kinds of moving (dynamic) meditation provide a bridge to every-moment meditation.

The Zen masters teach kinhin, or mindful walking — the most basic form of moving meditation. Then there are the mindful Zen arts, like the tea ceremony, or the martial arts (including Taiji), and kyudo (Zen archery), flower arranging. Even western sports provide moments of deep immersion in the present.

But even these more active rituals, which pull attention out of preoccupations and mind-stuff and back to the present, are a form of training wheels. As peaceful warriors, we don’t just practice a sport or martial art — we practice everything.

In each moment we turn our attention to every action, to breath and relaxation. In this way, we transform everyday life into the ultimate meditation. It is not an escape or respite from daily life, but a way to transform daily life.

All meditative practices bring awareness back to the Present Moment, which is itself free of thoughts. (We can only think about the past or future; in the present there is only awareness.)

Meditate for pleasure and for balance — for a whole-body remembrance of the peace that waits for us in the eternal present. Here. Now.

But do not put this practice up on a pedestal as a special "spiritual practice." If we do so — if we treat certain times or activities as special or spiritual, we fall into the trap of treating other times as ordinary. Whereas in truth, all moments, all activities, are equally important. There are no ordinary moments; every moment deserves our full attention.

Let meditation become a way of life, a quality of attention we give to each moment of our daily life. It is a gift that returns to us a hundred-fold. Peace. Serenity. Reality as it is.

Dan Millman

Awareness

2009-05-02T09:59:00.001+05:30

In the moment before you began reading this sentence, there was only awareness looking. As soon as you began reading, it appears that awareness became obscured by thought. Awareness never becomes obscured. You could not even read this page or have a thought without awareness. It is the screen on which all of the phenomena in life appear and disappear. The word “phenomena” here includes thoughts, emotions, sensations, states, experiences, buildings, computers, dirt, apples, planets and every other form. When the phenomena appear, awareness does not go away. There is no oscillation between awareness and thought or some other phenomenon that arises. Awareness is what allows the phenomena to be seen and experienced.

Let’s keep it simple and remain with the phenomenon of thought. Thought arises in awareness. When each thought disappears, awareness seems to appear again in place of thought, even if only for an instant until the next thought appears. But awareness itself does not appear and disappear. It is thought that appears and disappears in awareness. You cannot find or lose awareness and it cannot actually be obscured by thought. It only appears to be obscured. Awareness is what actually allows every thought to appear. Thought is not even independent of awareness. If awareness is the screen on which thought appears, how can thought have a totally independent nature from the screen that allows it to appear? It can't. So when thought appears, it is reminding you that you are aware. You are not a person that is aware. The person or "I" thought is one of the images on the screen. It is clearer to say you are awareness itself (although be clear about the fact that any word you use to describe what you are is an image on that screen including the word "awareness).

So why is there so much seeking for awareness if awareness is always and already here? Awareness, when it is fully recognized to be what you really are, contains within it relentless love, compassion, humility, and peace. This draws "us" into a spiritual search for what we already are. Seeking is based on a misperception that is naturally corrected when it is realized that what we are seeking is what is seeking. Awareness is looking for itself. It tends to look in every object that appears on its screen. In that way, it misses the simple and obvious recognition that awareness is what is looking right now (and always). It never leaves. It is what you already are. The search itself is a complete illusion. The search arises in awareness. If you look closely, the search is comprised mostly of thoughts about future, fueled by a sense of lack. These thoughts arise in awareness. The thoughts will never find anything called “spiritual awakening.” Awareness itself is already awake. All that can happen is a recognition of that which is already awake.

Perhaps the most compassionate thing this website or any other website, book, or pointer can do is point you to what you already are and then help you see that the pointer itself is merely an object appearing in what you are. This is so subtle it is often overlooked. Words like “awareness” and “presence” are objects appearing in what they are pointing to. There is a tendency of mind to believe that the word is the thing it describes. The word is never the thing it describes. Relentless compassion includes not only pointing you to what you are, but also deconstructing the very concepts used to point. This entire page of pointers is nothing more than phenomena arising in what you are. The words “what you are” are phenomena arising in the actuality of what you are. No one owns awareness. The notion of a person, as well as the notion of ownership, arise is the actuality of what you are. Nothing that can be said here or anywhere else is the truth of who you are. You are not a description.

If there is a tendency to intellectualize this message in any way, just notice the tendency. Notice what is looking. What is looking is awareness. The intellectualizing appears in awareness. It may be helpful to take a moment and suspend thinking completely. Simply look without thinking. Drop the intellectualizing about spirituality completely and notice the space that transcends and includes all duality. There is a simple feeling of being that the space reveals. That space is fully awake. Simply notice that awakeness. It is who you are.

Be careful with the word awareness, or any other words used to point for that matter, because language is naturally dualistic. The moment there is some attachment to a word like awareness, there is a risk of believing that the objects that appear in awareness are somehow separate from the awareness. Duality itself is illusory. Every form, including every word (that includes the word "awareness") is a temporary appearance that is not independent from awareness itself. The distinction between the various forms as well as between awareness and its objects is illusory. The forms are empty just as awareness is empty. Not seeing this creates a dualistic split in which there is identification with the idea that you are awareness and that the appearances in awareness (the forms) are separate from what you are.

If seeking or intellectualizing about spirituality arises again after you do this, then come back to that restful state of no thought. Do it over and over if you have to. At some point it dawns on you that what you are is not a concept. You are not even the greatest pointer you’ve ever heard. If you have read really rich spiritual writing or pointers from some brilliant teacher or sage, none of those words are who you are. Be clear about that. Once that clarity is revealed, you see that what you are is appearing as absolutely everything, that includes every form, idea, belief, interpretation, frog, squirrel, wall, building, and river.

Scott Kiloby

Transcending the world

2009-04-26T06:31:00.000+05:30

Transcending the world does not mean to withdraw from the world, to no longer take action, or to stop interacting with people. Transcendence of the world is to act and to interact without any self-seeking. In other words, it means to act without seeking to enhance one's sense of self through one's actions or one's interactions with people. Ultimately, it means not needing the future anymore for one's fulfillment or for one's sense of self or being. There is no seeking through doing, seeking an enhanced, more fulfilled, or greater sense of self in the world. When that seeking isn't there anymore, then you can be in the world but not be of the world. You are no longer seeking for anything to identify with out there.

Eckhart Tolle

Realizing the Self

2009-04-25T12:07:00.001+05:30

The Self is not realized through instruction,
nor by intellectual power,
nor by much hearing
.. It can be reached only
by the one whom the Self chooses.
To him the Self reveals its form.
He who has not renounced evil ways,
who is not at peace,
who cannot concentrate,
whose mind is not composed
cannot reach the Self,
even by right knowledge.

Katha Upanishad 1.2.24-25
Krishna Yajur Veda,

Who Am I?

2009-04-05T20:48:00.002+05:30

The problem is that liberation (moksha) itself is looked upon as the gaining of an experience. It is looked upon as the gaining of a type of mind, the gaining of a type of thinking, the gaining of a type of thought, rather than the recognition of who I am—the one who wants this type of mind. Who is the one who wants this pure mind? Who is the one seeking this spiritual experience? Who is the one seeking liberation? Who is the one here, right now, asking the question, “Who am I?” We think, “I am a conscious being, and aware being.” My mind, thought after thought, is known: each vritti (thought modification) is known. Now, am I the subject, the Self, or is the thought modification, which is known, the Self? I cannot be the object known and yet the mind which is an object of knowledge identifies itself with the Self which illumines it, saying “I, the mind, am the Self.” This is the problem. The mind’s mis identification with the Self is called the ahankara, the I-notion. The ahankara is also called the “knot of the heart” because it binds the Self to what it is not, through ignorance. The mind, believing itself to be the Self, wants to have an experience of the “Big Self.” Because the mind has misappropriated the Self to itself, due to Self-ignorance, it then seeks an experience of something away and separate from itself. In reality, there is no such thing as a “little Self” and a “Big Self.” There is only one Self that has been misappropriated due to Self ignorance. There aren’t two beings; there aren’t two ‘awarenesses.’ There is one awareness, you, that is illumining whatever thought happens to be present.
The ignorance born superimposition (adhyasa) that’s causing the mind to identify with the Self -- “I am the Self,” has to be negated through Self-knowledge (atma-vidya). Self knowledge does not involve the attainment of a “new experience.” You, the Self, are already fully present and your thoughts and perceptions are also present. The problem we are facing does not have to do with a lack of Self-experience. It has to do only with the lack of differentiation between the Self and the objects that I take my Self to be, such as the mind and body. The Self is already totally present, but Self-ignorance is also present and that ignorance needs to be removed by Self-knowledge. This problem is a problem for the mind; it is not a problem for the Self. If the Self were inherently bound, nothing could free it from its bondage—neither knowledge nor action. But if the Self is inherently free, then knowledge alone can solve the problem, as no amount of activity can give it what it already is. But for knowledge to take place, a means of knowledge (pramana) is necessary. As an individual you have the means of knowledge to perceive the world; your sense organs do that for you. But the sense organs are not going to give you knowledge of your Self, as your Self is not an object of perception. It is not that you need experiential knowledge of your Self. You are here, a conscious being, self-shining, self-evident, already present. The problem is that your Self has been confused with the objects of your experience. The sense organs cannot solve this problem, but proper teaching can. Words(sabdas) that are handled properly through the teaching methodology of Vedanta remove the Self-ignorance that causes one to feel bound.

Radha (Carol Whitfield, Ph.D.)

© 2005 Vedanta Shala

An Introduction to the Teachings of J Krishnamurti

2009-03-31T16:45:00.000+05:30

An Introduction to the Teachings of J Krishnamurti

by David Bohm

My first acquaintance with Krishnamurti's work was in 1959 when I read his book, 'First and Last Freedom'. What particularly aroused my interest was his deep insight into the question of the observer and the observed. This question has long been close to the centre of my own work, as a theoretical physicist, who was primarily interested in the meaning of the quantum theory. In this theory, for the first time in the development of physics, the notion that these two cannot be separated has been put forth as necessary for the understanding of the fundamental laws of matter in general. Because of this, as well as because the book contained many other deep insights, I felt that it was urgent for me to talk with Krishnamurti directly and personally as soon as possible. And when I first met him on one of his visits to London, I was struck by the great ease of communication with him, which was made possible by the intense energy with which he listened and by the freedom from self-protective reservations and barriers with which he responded to what I had to say. As a person who works in science I felt completely at home with this sort of response, because it was in essence of the same quality as that which I had met in these contacts with other scientists with whom there had been a very close meeting of minds. And here, I think especially of Einstein who showed a similar intensity and absence of barrier in a number of discussions that took place between him and me. After this, I began to meet Krishnamurti regularly and to discuss with him whenever he came to London.

We began an association which has since then become closer as I became interested in the schools, which were set up through his initiative. In these discussions, we went quite deeply into the many questions which concerned me in my scientific work. We probed into the nature of space and time, and of the universal, both with regard to external nature and with regard to the mind. But then, we went on to consider the general disorder and confusion that pervades the consciousness of mankind. It is here that I encountered what I feel to be Krishnamurti's major discovery. What he was seriously proposing is that all this disorder, which is the root cause of such widespread sorrow and misery, and which prevents human beings from properly working together, has its root in the fact that we are ignorant of the general nature of our own processes of thought. Or to put it differently it may be said that we do not see what is actually happening, when we are engaged in the activity of thinking. Through close attention to and observation of this activity of thought, Krishnamurti feels that he directly perceives that thought is a material process, which is going on inside of the human being in the brain and nervous system as a whole.

Ordinarily, we tend to be aware mainly of the content of this thought rather than how it actually takes place. One can illustrate this point by considering what happens when one is reading a book. Usually, one is attentive almost entirely to the meaning of what is being read. However, one can also be aware of the book itself, of its constitution as made up out of pages that can be turned, of the printed words and of the ink, of the fabric of the paper, etc. Similarly, we may be aware of the actual structure and function of the process of thought, and not merely its content.

How can such an awareness come about? Krishnamurti proposes that this requires what he calls meditation. Now the word meditation has been given a wide range of different and even contradictory meanings, many of them involving rather superficial kinds of mysticism. Krishnamurti has in mind a definite and clear notion when he uses this word. One can obtain a valuable indication of this meaning by considering the derivation of the word. (The roots of words, in conjunction with their present generally accepted meanings often yield surprising insight into their deeper meanings.) The English word meditation is base on the Latin root "med" which is, "to measure." The present meaning of the word is "to reflect," "to ponder" (i.e. to weigh or measure), and "to give close attention." Similarly the Sanskrit word for meditation, which is dhyana, is closely related to "dhyati," meaning "to reflect." So, at this rate, to meditate would be, "to ponder, to reflect, while giving close attention to what is actually going on as one does so."

This is perhaps what Krishnamurti means by the beginning of meditation. That is to say, one gives close attention to all that is happening in conjunction with the actual activity of thought, which is the underlying source of the general disorder. One does this without choice, without criticism, without acceptance or rejection of what is going on. And all of this takes place along with reflections on the meaning of what one is learning about the activity of thought. (It is perhaps rather like reading a book in which the pages have been scrambled up, and being intensely aware of this disorder, rather than just "trying to make sense" of the confused content that arises when on just accepts the pages as they happen to come.)

Krishnamurti has observed that the very act of meditation will, in itself, bring order to the activity of thought without the intervention of will, choice, decision, or any other action of the "thinker." As such order comes, the noise and chaos which are the usual background of our consciousness die out, and the mind becomes generally silent. (Thought arises only when needed for some genuinely valid purpose, and then stops, until needed again.)

In this silence, Krishnamurti says that something new and creative happens, something that cannot be conveyed in words, but that is of extraordinary significance for the whole of life. So he does not attempt to communicate this verbally, but rather, he asks those who are interested that they explore the question of meditation directly for themselves, through actual attention to the nature of thought.

Without attempting to probe into this deeper meaning of meditation, one can however say that meditation, in Krishnamurti's sense of the word, can bring order to our overall mental activity, and this may be a key factor in bringing about an end to the sorrow, the misery, the chaos and confusion, that have, over the ages, been the lot of mankind, and that are still generally continuing without visible prospect of fundamental change, for the foreseeable future.

Krishnamurti's work is permeated by what may be called the essence of this scientific approach, when this is considered in its very highest and purest form. Thus, he begins from a fact, this fact about the nature of our thought processes. This fact is established through close attention, involving careful listening to the process of consciousness, and observing it assiduously. In this, one is constantly learning, and out of this learning comes insight, into the overall or general nature of the process of thought. This insight is then tested. First, one sees whether it holds together in a rational order. And then one sees whether it leads to order and coherence, on what flows out of it in life as a whole.

Krishnamurti constantly emphasizes that he is in no sense an authority. He has made certain discoveries, and he is simply doing his best to make these discoveries accessible to all those who are able to listen. His work does not contain a body of doctrine, nor does he offer techniques or methods, for obtaining a silent mind. He is not aiming to set up any new system of religious belief. Rather, it is up to each human being to see if he can discover for himself that to which Krishnamurti is calling attention, and to go on from there to make new discoveries on his own.

It is clear then that an introduction, such as this, can at best show how Krishnamurti's work has been seen by a particular person, a scientist, such as myself. To see in full what Krishnamurti means, it is necessary, of course, to go on and to read what he actually says, with that quality of attention to the totality of one's responses, inward and outward, which we have been discussing here.

Fixing time for daily prayer

2009-03-23T09:49:00.001+05:30

Just as there is a definite time-table for work at school, office or the shop, so should we set apart for divine contemplation a few minutes out of the twenty-four hours of every day, preferably in the morning and evening. One must make a fixed resolve that this little time shall be dedicated to God throughout life. During this period no worldly activity should be allowed to encroach upon the contemplation of God. A fixed time for prayer or meditation must be allotted to all the members of the family including the servants. If this practice is continued for long, divine contemplation will become a part of your nature. Once the habit is established, the future course of your life will be made quite easy. You will feel the flow of the mysterious Divine Grace feeding all your thoughts and giving you new strength. You get a pension or bonus after years of hard work, so that you need no longer earn your livelihood. In the spiritual realm the reward for good, sincere and selfless work is even far greater and can be obtained more easily.

Sri Anandamayi Ma

Mind's arrogance and God's grace

2009-03-18T21:03:00.003+05:30

Foolishly , through my mind's arrogance , I was forgetful of the Self's eternal reality and was lost ,until the Lord ,through his gracious teaching that is like sweet ambrosia , reunited me with that eternally existing pure awareness that is my own true nature .

From Sri Guru Ramana Prasadam verse 182 ,pg.33

Sri Guru Ramana Prasadam

2009-03-17T21:59:00.004+05:30

Sri Guru Ramana Prasadam is a devotional work composed by Mukavai Kanna Muruganar, a devotee of Ramana Maharshi, an enlightened Master who lived in South India at the foot of the holy mountain Arunachala until his maha nirvana in 1950. It is more than just a devotional work, since it embodies the teachings imparted by Ramana to Muruganar, through the medium of silence, and through the practice of self-enquiry, in which the aspirant dwells upon the 'I' sense in order to investigate the nature of his own consciousness.
Sri Guru Ramana Prasadam is simply the outpouring of love and devotion of a single devotee for his guru , and as such it is the reflection in the consciousness of another of the luminous presence of Sri Ramana Maharshi .
The love he feels for Ramana is no different from the knowledge of the truth of his own existence that Muruganar , like all devotees , so urgently seeks:

He is my Master manifesting as the light of true knowledge whose nature is love , and that same knowledge is the means by which I worship him , so that the awareness that is holy silence ,wherein love and knowledge are industinguishably merged ,has arisen within my heart as my true nature .

Muruganar in Sri Guru Ramana Prasadam

Currently an English Translation of the book Sri Guru Ramana Prasadam by Robert Butler is available for Rs.150 at Sri Ramana Ashram, Thiruvanamalai .

Your duty

2009-03-02T16:47:00.001+05:30

The Power that created you has created the world as well.
If it can take care of you , it can similarly take care of the world also..
If God has created the world , it is His business to look after it , not yours .

Your duty is to 'be'
and not to be this or that .
"I AM THAT I AM"
sums up the whole truth .

Bhagwan Ramana Maharishi

Reason for my long break

2009-03-02T16:24:00.002+05:30

I have not been updating my blog for the past 2 months and the reason was that I was involved in first preparing for my Sadhana Intensive Course at the Sivananda Ashram in Madurai in Jan 2009 .Since the course involved being completely cut off from Internet ,email , phones ,chats etc I started to lay the foundation for the same few days itself before the course to prepare myself for the same and after the course was over I wanted to maintain the same to digest and nurture the benefits I experinced in the course and hence was not updating the blogs nor particpating in any activity in the various online fourms of which I was a member .I just restricted myself to being online to check my emails and do some online banking , purchases etc and have chats with few selected friends who are close to me spiritually .
Even now I am not active very much online/offline and apart from confining myself to my private Yoga teaching to my select group of serious students I am not talking much with others or meeting others and prefer to be left alone and I enjoy the solitude of seclusion . Of course I do come out of my seclusion to talk to some very good friends of mine who are also deeply in the spiritual path either online or offline or through telephone .I consider the year 2009 as a year of Sadhana( deep spiritualpractice ) for me .I derived lots of benefits by doing the Sadhana Intensive Course at the Sivananda Ashram in Madurai in Jan 2009 and felt the need to maintain my sadhana at home also .I intend redoing the same course at the Sivananda Ashram in Netala ,Uttarrkashi in May 2009 in order to keep the fame of Sadhna burning bright in me .I do know that from the Non Dual point of view these Sadhana's have no direct role but they have an indirect role in purifying my body ,making my mind one pointed /disciplined and energising me with lots of prana and this helps me feel more energised and spiritually very clear .
So with this background I will be restaring my blogs and will keep them updated as and when I find an intersting insight /article /quote etc .

Advaita and Worldly life

2008-12-28T19:52:00.001+05:30

‘Advaita [non-duality] should not be practised in ordinary activities. It is sufficient if there is no differentiation in the mind. If one keeps cart-loads of discriminating thoughts within, one should not pretend that all is one on the outside.

‘Westerners practise mixed marriages and eat equally with everyone. What is the use of doing only this? Only wars and battlefields have resulted. Out of all these activities, who has obtained any happiness?

‘This world is a huge theatre. Each person has to act whatever role is assigned to him. It is the nature of the universe to be differentiated but within each person there should be no sense of differentiation.’

Bhagawan Ramana Maharishi

Sadhana -- a battlefied

2008-12-17T21:15:00.001+05:30

Sadhana is a battlefield. You have to be vigilant. Don't take delivery of wrong beliefs and don't identify with the incoming thoughts that will give you pain and suffering. But if these things start happening to you, fight back by affirming, 'I am the Self; I am the Self; I am the Self;'.
These affirmations will lessen the power of the 'I am the body' arrows and eventually they will armour-plate you so successfully, the 'I am the body' thoughts that come your way will no longer have the power to touch you, affect you or make you suffer.

Annamalai Swami p33, Final Talks.

Immediacy of Being

2008-11-16T16:24:00.001+05:30

Trying to focus on your true nature is something like looking for your eyes, when the whole time you are looking through them. If you try to focus on your being or aware presence, you will be trying to turn it into an object. Since you are not an object, you will be looking in vain. So just see this and pause. Being/awareness is here in all of its immediacy and clarity. THAT is it. Why should you try to focus "on" it, when you ARE it? See the concept and the error in it. Your being is not to be obtained. It is pointed to as a present fact.

John Wheeler

Handling desires on the spiritual path

2008-10-31T21:40:00.002+05:30

Sometimes Bhagavan Ramana said that desires should be tackled prior to the practice of enquiry, but on other occasions he was equally insistent that self-enquiry, properly performed, was the most effective way of eliminating and renouncing desires. The following two dialogues illustrate this particular approach:

Question: What is the best way of dealing with desires, with a view to getting rid of them – satisfying them or suppressing them?

Bhagavan: If a desire can be got rid of by satisfying it, there will be no harm in satisfying such a desire. But desires generally are not eradicated by satisfaction. Trying to root them out that way is like pouring spirits to quench fire. At the same time, the proper remedy is not forcible suppression, since such repression is bound to react sooner or later into forceful surging up with undesirable consequences. The proper way to get rid of a desire is to find out, ‘Who gets the desire? What is its source?’ When this is found, the desire is rooted out and it will never again emerge or grow. Small desires such as the desire to eat, drink and sleep and attend to calls of nature, though these may also be classed among desires, you can safely satisfy. They will not implant vasanas in your mind, necessitating further birth. Those activities are just necessary to carry on life and are not likely to develop or leave behind vasanas or tendencies. As a general rule, therefore, there is no harm in satisfying a desire where the satisfaction will not lead to further desires by creating vasanas in the mind. (Day by Day with Bhagavan, 12th April, 1946)

Question: How am I to deal with my passions? Am I to check them or satisfy them? If I follow Bhagavan’s method and ask, ‘To whom are these passions?’ they do not seem to die but grow stronger.

Bhagavan: That only shows you are not going about my method properly. The right way is to find out the root of all passions, the source whence they proceed, and get rid of that. If you check the passions, they may get suppressed for the moment, but will appear again. If you satisfy them, they will be satisfied only for the moment and will again crave satisfaction. Satisfying desires and thereby trying to root them out is like trying to quench fire by pouring kerosene oil over it. The only way is to find the root of desire and thus remove it. (Day by Day with Bhagavan, 2nd January, 1946)

Source : Day by Day with Bhagavan by Sri Devaraja Mudaliar

Bhagwan Ramana on importance of Direct Path

2008-10-19T09:41:00.000+05:30

Once, when Ganapati Muni was present in the hall, a group of villagers asked, ‘How are we to control the mind?’ In reply Bhagavan asked them to look into the origin of the mind and explained the path of self-enquiry. Soon they left and Bhagavan as usual went out for a walk.

Remarking to the others [Ganapati] Muni said, ‘The path of Self-knowledge which Bhagavan teaches is so difficult even for the learned, and Bhagavan advocated it to the poor villagers. I doubt whether they understood it and still less whether they can practise it. If Bhagavan had advised them to practise some puja or japa, that would have been more practical.’

When this was conveyed to Bhagavan, he commented, ‘What to do? This is what I know. If a teaching is to be imparted according to the traditional way, one must first see whether the recipient is qualified or not. Then puja, japa or dhyana are prescribed step by step. Later the Guru says that this is all only preliminary and one has to transcend all this. Finally, the ultimate truth that “Brahman alone is real” is revealed and to realise this, the direct path of self-enquiry is to be taught. Why this roundabout process? Should we not state the ultimate truth and direct path at the beginning itself rather than advocating many methods and rejecting them at the end?’

(Bhagavan Sri Ramana, a Pictorial Biography, p. 74)

Cultivating peace through meditation

2008-10-17T17:59:00.003+05:30

Peace is not something that can be cultivated from the outside .Many people cultivate it from the outside , but it is only an appearance .Deep down they are sitting on a volcano .It can erupt at any moment .Peace should be an inner worth , not an outer cultivation ; only then it is true , only then it is liberating .And inner peace comes only as a by-product of meditation .The more meditative you become , the more peaceful .

Osho

Rebel according to Osho

2008-10-13T20:30:00.000+05:30

My rebel is a meditator .He loves peace , he loves people , he loves their well being and he will do everything for their natural growth .He will not impose any ideology .He will simply help everybody to be himself .Such a rebellion has never happened .

Osho

Mental tendencies

2008-10-12T19:53:00.001+05:30

In the peace of the Self, there are no vasanas. If you can establish yourself in the Self, all vasanas will be destroyed.Witness the vasanas as they arise but don't identify with them or act on them. If you want to get rid of your vasanas you must learn to practice non-involvement.

If you feel yourself identifying with a vasana when it starts to rise, remind yourself, 'This vasana is not me' and withdraw into the Self. If you learn to ignore your vasanas in this way they will eventually stop rising.

Annamalai Swami

Papaji on Buddhist Meditations

2008-10-11T15:43:00.003+05:30

The following in a Conversation between David Godman and Papaji on the efficiency of formal buddhist meditations with regard to self enquiry .

David: You are telling people to ‘Be still’ and to ‘Be quiet’. This is the classic instruction of Ramana Maharshi. Many people from the Vipassana tradition came to see you in the late 80s and early 90s, and most of them had done years of meditation practice which resulted in a deep quietening of their minds. You generally say that formal meditation is not useful, but are not these Buddhist meditators better equipped to follow your ‘Be quiet’ advice than those who have done no meditation at all?

Papaji: No, and I will tell you why not. When you meditate, you set up a goal or a target that you want to reach or attain. You have an idea of what the Self or God might be; you have another idea that you are separate from that God or Self; so you then plan a journey from where you imagine yourself to be to the state that you imagine to be the Supreme. It’s all imagination, including the experiences you have as a result of your practices.

The ego is very clever and very tricky. If it sees that you are striving towards a state you call ‘silence’ or ‘inner quietness’, it will create a mental realm inside you where you can go and experience, dualistically, a place where peace and silence seem to prevail. While you are in that realm, stray thoughts may be absent and you may be experiencing some peace and happiness, since these are the properties that you imagine the Self to have. But this realm of quiet is a mental state created by your idea of the Self and sustained by your intense concentration on it. That is why everyone says that the peace of meditation goes away when this kind of meditation stops. It may last for half an hour or so as a kind of after-effect, but sooner or later it vanishes. When the effort to sustain it ceases, the state itself vanishes.

The peace of the Self is something completely different. It doesn’t come and go according to how hard you focus on it. It’s there all the time. It reveals itself when the effort to focus on objects – physical or spiritual – ceases.

These Buddhist meditators have learned, through hard work, how to dwell in pleasant inner mental states. If I tell them to ‘Be quiet’, they go off into this mental realm and think that they are following my instructions. What I am actually saying is, ‘Give up the thinker, the one who wants to meditate on an object’. When that thinker goes, the peace of the Self remains. People who, through effort and desire, enjoy mentally induced experiences rarely want to give them up because they think they are signs of great progress.

In ancient times the rishis could create whole, apparently-real, worlds through the power of their imagination. In meditation you create inner spiritual worlds that you take to be real because they conform to your idea of what the Self might be.

Physical efforts produce physical results and mental efforts produce mental results. Since the Self is neither mental nor physical, it cannot be attained by mental or physical activity.

Poonja alias Papaji

Respecting all dimensions of Life

2008-10-08T20:12:00.000+05:30

It is important to not become identified with or attached to any spiritual tradition. Whilst Advaita reflects and addresses the very deepest level of awakened Presence, it is very easy for Advaita to become a concept in the mind of the seeker. When we become so present that Oneness is revealed, then of course we have transcended duality, which is what is meant by non-dualism. Of course there is no sense of self as a separate individual. But who is aware of that. Who is here in Oneness. Who is experiencing Is-ness. I am. Pure consciousness. Silent Presence. I am that I am. I would call this state God consciousness, but that is just my language. I am not sure what Ramana would call it, but we are speaking of the same thing.

We are multi-dimensional Beings, and to open into the deepest dimension of who we are, is not a denial of those other dimensions.

The pursuit of enlightenment can often be motivated by the desire to escape. There are many spiritual seekers who do not really want to be here. When asked why not, the reply is that there is too much suffering here. And they are right. The suffering exists because humanity is lost in unconsciousness. But without realizing it, they are also rejecting the natural world. If I ask them if they want to be here with the trees, the sky, the mountains or the birds, the answer is always yes.

You have to be very careful that you are not seeking to annihilate yourself in your involvement with Advaita. For those seeking to escape, Advaita offers a certain allure.

When I speak of God as Creator and Creation, I am addressing God as both. But I also say that beyond Creator and Creation I am, and God is. And beyond that, all that exists is eternal Is-Isness.

Another aspect of this is that, if Advaita is dismissive of the physical world as illusion, and I do not know if this is the case, then that would be a mistake. The only way to come out of the illusory world of the mind is to bring yourself present with something that is actually here in the moment with you. If that too is an illusion, then what will you be present with?

For me, this is Heaven on Earth, and everything in physical form is the body of God. When we are awake in the truth of life and Oneness, then we experience the living Presence of God in all things present. Who is experiencing that? I am! Pure consciousness. Silent Presence. I am that I am.

I can not imagine that Ramana would have a problem with that!

Leonard Jacobson

Clarity of Understanding

2008-10-04T10:17:00.001+05:30

Understand your own mind and its hold on you will snap. The mind misunderstands, misunderstanding is its very nature. Right understanding is the only remedy, whatever name you give it...Nothing you do will change you, for you need no change. You may change your mind or your body, but it is always something external to you that has changed, not yourself. Why bother at all to change? Realize once for all that neither your nor your mind, nor even your consciousness is yourself and stand alone in your true nature beyond consciousness and unconsciousness. No effort can take you there, only the clarity of understanding. Trace your misunderstandings and abandon them, that is all. There is nothing to seek and find, for there is nothing lost. Relax and watch the "I am". Reality is just behind it. Keep quiet, keep silent; it will emerge, or rather, it will take you in."

Nisargadatta Maharaj- I Am That p. 520

Compassion , loneliness ,relationships

2008-09-28T21:29:00.002+05:30

Compassion and the Enlightened Person

The word 'compassion" is beautiful .It is made out of the same word as "passion" .When passion is transformed ,when the desire to seek and search for the other is no more there ,when you are enough unto yourself ,when you don't need anybody ,when the very desire for the other has evaporated ,when you are utterly happy blissful , just being alone ,then passion becomes compassion .Now you don’t' seek the other because you feel empty and lonely ; now you seek the other because you are too full and you would like to share .

The enlightened person also seeks the other just as the unenlightened person seeks , but there is a qualitative difference .The unenlightened person seeks the other because he feels a negative nothingness in him .Left alone he does not feel aloneness , he feels loneliness .The enlightened also seeks the other for the simple reason that somebody had to be found with whom he could share .But now it is not a need , hence he will not compromise .It is not a need ,hence he will not possess .It is not a need , in fact it is just the opposite of it ; it is abundance .It is not a need , it is overflowing joy .When there is overflowing love it is compassion .
Passion arises out of negative nothingness and compassion arises out of positive nothingness .

Loneliness and aloneness

Loneliness is a state of mind when you are constantly missing the other , aloneness is the state of mind when you are constantly delighted in yourself .Loneliness is miserable , aloneness is blissful .Loneliness is always worried ,missing something ,hankering for something , desiring for something ; aloneness is a deep fulfillment ,not going out , tremendously content , happy , celebrating .In loneliness you are off centre , in aloneness you are centered and rooted .

Loneliness and relationships

Now if you move into a relationship when you are feeling lonely ,then you will exploit the other .The other will become a means to satisfy you .You will use the other , and everybody resents being used because no man is here to become a means for anybody else .Every man is an end unto himself .Nobody is here to be used like a thing ,everybody is here to be worshipped like a king .Nobody is here to fulfill anybody else's expectations ,everybody if here just to be himself .

So whenever you move in any relationship out of loneliness ,the relationship is already on the rocks .Even before it has started ,it is already on the rocks .Even before the birth ,the child is dead .It is going to create more misery for you .And remember , when you move from your loneliness you will fall in relationship with somebody who is in the same plight ,because no man who is really living his aloneness will be attracted towards you .You will be too below him .He can , at the most , sympathize ,but cannot love you .One who is on his peak of aloneness can only be attracted towards somebody who is also alone .So whenever you move out of loneliness , you will find a man of the same type ; you will find your own reflection somewhere .Two beggars will meet , two miserable people meet , it is not an ordinary addition ,it is a multiplication .They create much more misery for each other than they could have created in their loneliness .

What is the solution for the same ?

First become alone .First start enjoying yourself .First become so authentically happy that if nobody comes it doesn't matter ; you are full , overflowing .If nobody knocks at your door it is perfectly fine - you are not missing .You are not waiting for somebody to come and knock at the door .You are at home .If somebody comes , good , beautiful .If nobody comes , that too is beautiful and good .
Then move into a relationship .Now you move like a master , not like a beggar .And the person who has lived in his aloneness will always be attracted to another person who is also living his aloneness beautifully ,because the same attracts the same .When two masters meet --masters of their being , of their aloneness -- happiness is not just added , it is multiplied .It becomes a tremendous phenomenon of celebration .And they don't exploit ,they share .They don't use each other .Rather , on the contrary ,they both become one and enjoy the existence that surrounds them .

Complied from various talks of Osho

What are the signs of progress in spiritual life ?

2008-09-27T21:37:00.002+05:30

Freedom form all anxiety ; a sense of ease and joy ; deep peace within and abundant energy without .

Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

The function of a spiritual therapist

2008-09-27T21:25:00.004+05:30

The function of the therapist is not to teach you who you are , but to create situations in which you start discovering yourself .
The first condition is creating self -respect in you which all the religions are against .They all condemn you .They create a sense of guilt , and that is a wound that goes on growing within you .Whatever you do ,something is wrong in it .You can never fulfill the expectations of others for the simple reasons that you have a unique individuality .Each one has to discover his own truth .
The function of the teacher , of the master , of the therapist , of the educationist , is to create just the right atmosphere so that you gain self-respect ,and to give you an acquaintance with the methods for going inwards .
All educational systems take you outwards ;Listening to the person - it will look strange ,because the teacher's function is to make you listen to him .The Socratic method is listening to the person respectfully , patiently , so that he can open up .He need not repress anything , he need not inhibit anything ; he can be utterly naked and yet remain dignified .
If a therapist can do that - help a man to be utterly nude , open , with no secret , hiding nothing - the therapist has succeeded , because in this nudity one realizes one's innocence .One is born again .This nudity is symbolic .just as a child is born nude , you are born again - now spiritually nude .

Excerpted from From Bondage to Freedom , Osho

Thoughts are not a distraction

2008-09-25T21:10:00.000+05:30

Thoughts are not necessarily a distraction, nor is the body. Thoughts are arising in present awareness and dissolving back into it. The awareness remains untouched, unstained, immaculate. Thoughts are only a problem if you are preoccupied with them, giving them all your attention. But thoughts in and of themselves are not some kind of enemy. Thoughts can be very useful, functional, and even entertaining. They are allowed in this vast clearing. No problem.

Catherine Ingram

Admitting Negative feelings in spiritual quest

2008-09-24T22:17:00.000+05:30

We have to learn to admit that negative feelings are a common experience , no matter how good we are trying to be or what spiritual practice we have engaged in . Jealousy , anger , annoyance ,irritation , pettiness – they all visit with unfortunate regularity .But the trick is not to take them personally or so be shocked by them .And then they have no power over you .The thought of jealousy that arises and fades in a dew moments is not a problem .The jealous thought that is denied and suppressed or is twisted into some kind of justification due to one’s own discomfort with it can often turn into unkind words and actions directed at the object of one’s jealous .In these ways ,the refusal to admit to negative thoughts can create all kinds of problems as we so often see in spiritual leaders and masters who insinuate or even say that they are enlightened but whose behavior belies petty and desperate motivations involving sex , money or power .I prefer to hang out with what Alan Watts called “divine rascals” .Those who know both their divinity and their rascality .

Catherine Ingram
Author of “Passionate Presence – Empowering the Seven Qualities of Awakened Awareness “

The Indispensable Qualities of Awakening

2008-09-23T06:48:00.001+05:30

In essence the entire spiritual endeavor is a very simple thing: Spirituality is essentially about awakening as the intuitive awareness of unity and dissolving our attachment to egoic consciousness. By saying that spirituality is a very simple thing, I do not mean to imply that it is either an easy or difficult endeavor. For some it may be very easy, while for others it may be more difficult. There are many factors and influences that play a role in one’s awakening to the greater reality, but the greatest factors by far are one’s sincerity, one-pointedness, and courage.

Sincerity is a word that I often use in teaching to convey the importance of being rooted in the qualities of honesty, authenticity, and genuineness. There can be nothing phony or contrived in our motivations if we are to fully awaken to our natural and integral state of unified awareness. While teachings and teachers can point us inward to “the peace beyond all understanding,” it is always along the thread of our inner sincerity, or lack thereof, that we will travel. For the ego is clever and artful in the ways of deception, and only the honesty and genuineness of our ineffable being are beyond its influence. At each step and with each breath we are given the option of acting and responding, both inwardly and outwardly, from the conditioning of egoic consciousness which values control and separation above all else, or from the intuitive awareness of unity which resides in the inner silence of our being.

Without sincerity it is so very easy for even the greatest spiritual teachings to become little more than playthings of the mind. In our fast-moving world of quick fixes, big promises, and short attention spans, it is easy to remain on a very surface level of consciousness without even knowing it. While the awakened state is ever present and closer than your feet, hands, or eyes, it cannot be approached in a casual or insincere fashion. There is a reason that seekers the world over are instructed to remove their shoes and quiet their voices before entering into sacred spaces. The message being conveyed is that one’s ego must be “taken off and quieted” before access to the divine is granted. All of our ego’s attempts to control, demand, and plead with reality have no influence on it other than to make life more conflicted and difficult. But an open mind and sincere heart have the power to grant us access to realizing what has always been present all along.

When people asked the great Indian sage Nisargadatta what he thought was the most important quality to have in order to awaken, he would say “earnestness.” When you are earnest, you are both sincere and one-pointed; to be one-pointed means to keep your attention on one thing. I have found that the most challenging thing for most spiritual seekers to do is to stay focused on one thing for very long. The mind jumps around with its concerns and questions from moment to moment. Rarely does it stay with one question long enough to penetrate it deeply. In spirituality it is very important not to let the egoic mind keep jumping from one concern to the next like an untrained dog. Remember, awakening is about realizing your true nature and dissolving all attachment to egoic consciousness.

My grandmother who passed away a few years ago used to say to me jokingly, “Getting old is not for wimps.” She was well aware of the challenges of an aging body, and while she never complained or felt any pity for herself, she knew firsthand that aging had its challenges as well as its benefits. There was a courage within my grandmother that served her well as she approached the end of her life, and I am happy to say that when she passed, it was willingly and without fear. In a similar way the process of coming into a full and mature awakening requires courage, as not only our view of life but life itself transforms to align itself with the inner mystic vision. A sincere heart is a robust and courageous heart willing to let go in the face of the great unknown expanse of Being—an expanse which the egoic mind has no way of knowing or understanding.

When one’s awareness opens beyond the dream state of egoic consciousness to the infinite no-thing-ness of intuitive awareness, it is common for the ego to feel much fear and terror as this transition begins. While there is nothing to fear about our natural state of infinite Being, such a state is beyond the ego’s ability to understand, and as always, egos fear whatever they do not understand and cannot control. As soon as our identity leaves the ego realm and assumes its rightful place as the infinite no-thing-ness/every-thing-ness of awareness, all fear vanishes in the same manner as when we awaken from a bad dream. In the same manner in which my grandmother said, “Getting old is not for wimps,” it can also be said that making the transition from the dream state to the mature, awakened state requires courage.

Sincerity, one-pointedness, and courage are indispensable qualities in awakening from the dream state of ego to the peace and ease of awakened Being. All there is left to do is to live it.

© Adyashanti 2008

Happiness is your nature

2008-09-20T15:36:00.000+05:30

Mind is consciousness which has put on limitations.
You are originally unlimited and perfect.
Later you take on limitations and become the mind.”

“You need not aspire for or get any new state.
Get rid of your present thoughts,
that is all.”

"You and I are the same.
What I have done is surely possible for all.
You are the Self now
and can never be anything else.
Throw your worries to the wind,
turn within and find Peace."

"Happiness is your nature.
It is not wrong to desire it.
What is wrong is seeking it outside
when it is inside."

..."Bliss is not something to be got.
On the other hand you are always Bliss.
This desire [for Bliss] is born of the sense of incompleteness.
To whom is this sense of incompleteness?
Enquire. In deep sleep you were blissful.
Now you are not so.
What has interposed between that Bliss and this non-bliss?
It is the ego.
Seek its source and find you are Bliss."

"That inner Self, as the primeval Spirit,
Eternal, ever effulgent, full and infinite Bliss,
Single, indivisible, whole and living,
Shines in everyone as the witnessing awareness.
That self in its splendour, shining in the cavity of the heart
This self is neither born nor dies,
Neither grows nor decays,
Nor does it suffer any change.
When a pot is broken, the space within it is not,
And similarly, when the body dies
the Self in it remains eternal."

Ramana Maharshi

21 Rules of Life

2008-09-14T21:27:00.000+05:30

ONE. Give people more than they expect and do it cheerfully.

TWO. Marry a man/woman you love to talk to. As you get older, their conversational skills will be as important as any other.

THREE. Don't believe all you hear, spend all you have or sleep all you want.

FOUR. When you say, 'I love you,' mean it.

FIVE. When you say, 'I'm sorry,' look the person in the eye.

SIX. Be engaged at least six months before you get married.

SEVEN. Believe in love at first sight.

EIGHT. Never laugh at anyone's dreams. People who don't have dreams don't have much.

NINE. Love deeply and passionately. You might get hurt but it's the only way to live life completely.

TEN.. In disagreements, fight fairly. No name calling.

ELEVEN. Don't judge people by their relatives.

TWELVE. Talk slowly but think quickly.

THIRTEEN! .. When someone asks you a question you don't want to answer, smile and ask, 'Why do you want to know?'

FOURTEEN. Remember that great love and great achievements involve great risk.

FIFTEEN. Say 'bless you' when you hear someone sneeze.

SIXTEEN. When you lose, don't lose the lesson.

SEVENTEEN. Remember the three R's: Respect for self; Respect for others; and Responsibility for all your actions.

EIGHTEEN. Don't let a little dispute injure a great friendship.

NINETEEN. When you realize you've made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.

TWENTY. Smile when picking up the phone. The caller will hear it in your voice

TWENTY- ONE. Spend some time alone.

The symbolism of Ganesh Chaturthi

2008-09-05T19:33:00.001+05:30

Ganesh Chaturthi is celebrated on the day on which Lord Ganesha is believed to bestow his presence on earth for all his devotees. Ganesha, the elephant-headed son of Shiva and Parvati, is worshipped as the supreme god of wisdom, prosperity and good fortune. Though it is celebrated as the birthday of Lord Ganesha , the symbolism behind the festival is much deeper.

The essence of Ganeshji is brought out beautifully by Adi Shankara. Though Ganeshji is worshiped as the the elephant-headed God, the form (swaroop) is just to bring out its parabrahma roopa. Ganeshji is described as Ajam Nirvikalpam Niraakaaramekam. This means that Ganeshji is never born.

He is Ajam (unborn), he is Niraakaar (formless) and he is Nirvikalpa (attributeless). Ganeshji symbolises the consciousness which is omnipresent. Ganeshji is the same energy which is the reason for this universe, from which everything is manifested and it's the same energy in which the whole world will be dissolved. Ganeshji is not somewhere outside of us, but the very centre of our life. But this is very subtle knowledge. Not everybody can perceive the formless without the form. Our ancient Rishis and Munis knew this; so they created the form for the benefit and understanding of people at all levels. Those who can't experience of the formless, over a period of sustained experience of manifested form reach the formless Brahman.

So in reality, Ganeshji is formless; yet there is a form to which Adi Shankara prayed and that form carries the message of the formlesness of Ganeshji. Thus, the form serves as the starting point and gradually the formless consciousness begins to manifest. Ganesh Chaturthi marks a unique art of reaching formless Paramatma called Lord Ganesh by repeated worship of the manifest form of Ganesha. Even the Ganesh Stotram, the prayers recited in the praise of Ganeshji, conveys the same. We pray to Ganeshji in our consciousness to come out and sit in the idol for us for a while so that we can play with him. And after the puja, we again pray asking him to go back to where he comes from; that's our consciousness. While he is in the idol, we offer back whatever God has given us through the puja of the idol.

The ritual of immersing (visaran) the idols after few days of worship reinforces the understanding that God is not in the idol, it's inside us. So experiencing the omnipresent in the form and deriving joy out of the form is the essence of the Ganesha Chaturthi festival. In a way such organised festivity and worships lead to an upsurge in enthusiasm and devotion.

Ganeshji is the lord of all the good qualities in us. So when we worship him, all the good qualities will blossom in us. He is also the lord of knowledge and wisdom. Knowledge dawns only when we become aware of the Self. When there is inertia, there is no knowledge, no wisdom, nor is there any liveliness (Chaitanya) or progress in life. So the consciousness has to be awakened and the presiding diety of consciousness is Ganeshji. That's why before every puja, the Lord Ganesha is worshiped to awaken the consciousness.

Therefore, install the idol, worship it with infinite love, meditate and experience Lord Ganesha from within. This is the symbolic essence of Ganesh Chaturti festival, to awaken the Ganesha tatva which is masked inside us.

Sri Sri Ravishankar is a spiritual guru and founder of the Art of Living Foundation

Dealing with difficult emotions like anger or sadness when they arise

2008-09-03T19:53:00.002+05:30

If you are carrying repressed emotions from your past, particularly from your childhood, you will need to allow these emotions right of passage through you so that they can be released. Just feel the emotions as they arise within you. Identify them, confess them and express them in a responsible way, but do not become identified with them.

Do not believe in the story that your feelings are presenting. The story is always from the past. The present moment is free of the past. Whatever it is that you are angry or hurt about is not happening now, so it would not make any sense to believe in it. It is just a memory that you are caught in at some unconscious level.

Let the feelings up. Allow them conscious expression within you. One of the keys to awakening is to come into right relationship with your feelings. Everything that arises within you is seeking unconditional love and acceptance, even your feelings and emotions.

It is only when you repress your feelings that you create an inner disharmony which eventually leads to disease.

Leonard Jacobson

Mental level and Spiritual Level

2008-09-03T05:02:00.001+05:30

Looking for heaven in some future time and place is absolute hell. This is because you have wrongly employed time and space to separate your spirit from the heaven of the present pure moment...

See the difference between the mental and spiritual levels. The mental level consists of thoughts, attitudes, memory, imagination. When rightly used the mental level guides your performances in work or play and other everyday matters. A distorted mental level builds egotism which makes life hell on earth.

The higher spiritual level does not employ thought or imagination but sees and acts from pure wisdom. The mental level thinks but the spiritual level knows. The spiritual level accurately guides the mental level when the individual wisely permits it.

Most people stop their inner development on the mental level, believing it to be the spiritual level. Ordinary religious people suffer emotional hell because they don't see that hell operates on the mental level but heaven does not. They fail to see the painful contradiction of calling themselves saved while still living in frantic fear and hidden hostility. To be saved means to be saved from yourself, including rescue from self-deception, self-betrayal and self-injury.

Vernon Howard

Is creative happiness realizable ?

2008-09-01T13:50:00.001+05:30

That is, can the mind keep in touch with that which is the source of all happiness ? Can this openness be sustained in spite of knowledge and technique , in spite of education and the crowding in of life ?It can be , but only when the educator is educated to this reality , only when he who teaches is himself in touch with the source of creative happiness .So our problem is not the pupil , the child , but the teacher and the parent .Education is a vicious circle only when we do not see the importance , the essential necessity above all else , of this supreme happiness .After all , to be open to the source of all happiness is the highest religion ; but to realize this happiness , you must give right attention to it , as you do to business .The teacher's profession is not a mere routine job , but the expression of beauty and joy ,which cannot be measured in terms of achievement and success .

The light of reality and its bliss are destroyed when the mind ,which is the seat of self , assumes control .Self -knowledge is the beginning of wisdom ; without self-knowledge , learning leads to ignorance ,strife and sorrow .

J Krishnamurti
Commentaries on Living , Series-2 ,Ch-1- Creative Happiness

Dissolving Personality Exercises

2008-08-31T09:00:00.001+05:30

1. Stop talking about the past. Each time you hear yourself indulging in this, stop. Be extreme to break the habit. Stop talking about your sad story. Stop talking about it is the beginning of stop thinking about it.

2. Be true to the situation, not to your personal likes and dislikes. What does the situation require? It may not be what suits you personally. The personality wants you to express your dislike of a situation. Either do what the situation requires, or quit. No negativity.

3. Give up being dishonest. Anytime you are angry, resentful or depressed, you are not being honest. Anger arises because you are not getting your own way. Instead of being angry you should be concerned with which practical action you can take. If there is no practical action you can take, your desire is impractical at this time. To be honest you must face that fact and give up your wanting.

4. Don't talk unless you have something to say. The personality is always talking. Talking consumes enormous energy so this exercise is to learn to talk less. Talking is talking about something, having a discussion, giving your opinion, speculating, rationalizing, and repeating what youve heard. In this exercise you learn the difference between talking and speaking. Instead of talking about what the politicians should do unless you yourself are doing something to right the situation, you can write them, or cast your vote, then youll be taking action and able to speak form your experience, otherwise your a talker, only action or speaking what you live is true.

5. No more complaining or blaming. Complaining about your life and blaming other people and life for your problems and difficulties is one of the major leakages of energy. When you catch yourself doing this, stop. The truth is you are responsible for your life. If you blame someone for your life you are giving up responsibilty by giving responsibility to others. To be responsible is to be responsible for everything that happens in your life. There may be things that happen that seem to come from other agencies but you'll have to do your best to sort them out, thats life. You don't complain when you get a promotion at work do you? You don't blame the boss, you feel you deserved it, so how can you duck out from being responsible for all the not so good things that happen to you. Its the personality being two faced, not being straight. It presents life as its not, and gets away with it while you continue to blame and complain.

6. Don't allow your fingers to fiddle with a pencil or other knick knack. Don't drum your fingers on the table. Don't when seated quiver or tremble your leg. Don't crack your knuckles.

7. Don't chew gum, unless you chew it to get the flavor and freshen the mouth, then spit it out. Don't lick your fingers after touching food. Don't ask for tasting form other peoples plate, either go half and half or order something for yourself. That is the personalities greed and craving for experience not being responsible for what it wants.

8. Don't fidget when talking to people.

9. Conversational habits. Remembering that the personality depends upon habitual un consciousness. Stop using habitual expressions like honey, sweetheart, dude, dawg. Don't use such terms. Don't soothe people with words when you are about to confess something bad. Don't say "To be honest", or "with all due respect" as if you are not usually honest or respectful. Such phrases have no real menaing and are actually the personality talking.

10.Don't frown, screw up your face, or look at the ceiling before you answer a question. This is the personality pretending to appear deep in thought. Don't say things like "hmmmmm" These serve no purpose and waste vital energy

Barry Long.

Just be quiet

2008-08-29T21:12:00.004+05:30

Many methods are prescribed for different temperaments .All methods teach you to do something .It may be physical , oral , or mental activity .All these exercises involve mental gymnastics .You never keep quiet .Nobody teaches this simple truth .
If you are quiet the religions will fail .The false teachings will fail .Just keep quiet .That is the way to find peace and love among people .Keep quiet .Then the whole structure of religion will collapse .Religions give you fear .Fear of hell .If you don't do this , you will go to hell .All religions preach this fear .All religions are based on the fear of hell .No religion teaches you to just keep quiet .
If you keep quiet , for just a few minutes out of your entire span of life , perhaps you will win peace .That's the way to approach reality , liberation , nirvana .Keep quiet .
This is up to you .According to their temperaments , people select their own way and follow their own way .Very few will keep quiet for even five minutes .Instead ,they go to the Himalayas ,they go to the temples ,they go on pilgrimages .But very few spend five minutes in their house keeping quiet .
Then there is no need for a teacher .If the teacher says "just keep quiet," then the business of the teacher doesn't flourish .
If the teacher says, "You've got nothing to do whatsoever , you are just to keep quiet ," why is the teacher needed ? His business will not run , so he has to tell you to do something .No religion will confirm , no books will be published .No teaching will flourish .Just to be quiet .And without quiet there is no rest ANYWHERE .

Poonja alias Papaji

Intellect and Intelligence

2008-08-28T09:39:00.004+05:30

There is a distinction between intellect and intelligence .Intellect is thought functioning independently of emotion , whereas ,intelligence is the capacity to feel as well as to reason ; and until we approach life with intelligence ,instead of intellect alone , or with emotion alone , no political or educational system in the world can save us from the toils of chaos and destruction .

J Krishnamurti
From Education and the Significance of Life

Kiki's Wisdom - Accept things as they are

2008-08-05T09:08:00.000+05:30

If you just stop and think about it you'll realize that you've experienced presence throughout your life, although there may not have been a recognition of what it was. Perhaps it was when you simply sat and watched the sunset, a child play, looked at a piece of art, or listened to some music and every care in the world, every worry about the future or regret of the past disappeared and there was just the sun setting, just the child playing, just the piece of art, or just the music playing - "you" were nowhere to be found and there was a simple silence and peace within. Why? Because all internal barriers to what was being observed dropped away because nothing was being sought, there was no looking for something to happen, no wishing for things to stay the same or be different. Labeling, comparing, judging, analyzing, and thinking dissolves when nothing specific is demanded of a present situation.

That labeling, comparing, judging, analyzing, and thinking is what creates internal barriers to "what is"; it creates a "me" which has a certain viewpoint and it sets that me apart from everything else, and everything else is then put into a relationship with that me. When those barriers have been created and you get lost in them "problems" arise because your relationship to what is then can be seen as threatening. Then there is the tendency to live life in the mind rather than letting the flow of life's events move through you unimpeded.

The real you is the wide open space that allows for everything to arise, exist, and dissolve again. Manifestation is always doing that anyway, but when the "me" is out of the way it does so in a state of peace, stillness, and inner silence. So don't look for something to happen, don't wish things to be different, don't get caught up in the past or the future. Instead, just be with whatever is in front of you, and if it happens to be drinking a cup of coffee then just drink the coffee. Be fully aware of everything connected with drinking it - the warmth of the cup in your hands, the aroma, the taste of it on the tongue, the swallowing of it, the feeling of it entering the stomach. There is nothing that you can't do in this way, and starting with the "mundane" things like drinking coffee or washing the dishes will allow you to reconnect yourself on a conscious level with the inherent peacefulness and stillness of being found in the present moment. Starting "small" like this will prepare you for when events become more challenging by building a base of familiarity of presence that appears more readily available in other situations.

KiKi

Why Retreat by J.Krishnamurti

2008-06-26T21:23:00.000+05:30

Don't you also want to go away sometimes to quiet and take stock of things and not merely become a repetitive machine, a talker, explainer and expounder? Don't you want to do that some time, don't you want to be quiet, don't you want to know more of yourself? Some of you wish to do it, but economically you cannot. Some of you might want to do; but family responsibility and so on crowd in your way. All the same, it is good to retreat to quiet and to take stock of every thing that you have done. When you do that, you acquire experiences that are not recognised, not translated. Therefore, my retreat has no significance to you. I am sorry. But your retreat, if you follow it rightly, will have significance to you. And I think it is essential sometimes to go to retreat, to stop everything that you have been doing, to stop your beliefs and experiences completely, and look at them anew, not keep on repeating like machines whether you believe or do not believe. You would then let in fresh air into your minds. Wouldn't you?

That means you must be insecure, must you not? If you can do so, you would be open to the mysteries of nature and to things that are whispering about us, which you would not otherwise reach; you would reach the God that is waiting to come, the truth that cannot be invited but comes itself. But we are not open to love, and other finer processes that are taking place within us, because we are all too enclosed by our own ambitions, by our own achievements, by our own desires. Surely it is good to retreat from all that, is it not? Stop being a member of some society. Stop being a Brahmin, a Hindu, a Christian, a Mussalman.

Stop your worship, rituals, take a complete retreat from all those and see what happens. In a retreat, do not plunge into something else, do not take some book and be absorbed in new knowledge and new acquisition. Have a complete break with the past and see what happens. Sirs do it, and you will see delight. You will see vast expanses of love, understanding and freedom. When your heart is open, then reality can come. Then the whisperings of your own prejudices, your own noises, are not heard.
That is why it is good to take a retreat, to go away and to stop the routine - not only the routine of outward existence but also the routine, which the mind establishes for its own safety and convenience.

Try it sirs, those who have the opportunity. Then perhaps you will know what is beyond recognition, what truth is which is not measured. Then you will find that God is not a thing to be experienced, to be recognised; but that God is something, which comes to you without your invitation. But, that is only when your mind and your heart are absolutely still, not seeking, not probing, and when you have no ambitions to acquire. God can be found only when the mind is no longer seeking advancement. If we take a retreat from all that, then perhaps the whisperings of desire will cease to be heard, and the thing that is waiting will come directly and surely.

(J. Krishnamurti Chennai 1st Public Talk 5th January 1952)

Listening as a Spiritual Practice

2008-06-09T10:13:00.002+05:30

Listening as a Spiritual Practice by Gina Lake

Engaging in anything fully has the ability to still the mind. Meditation is the most common spiritual practice used to still the mind. In meditation, you give your full attention to something: to the breath; to a sound, such as a mantra or music; to an image, such as a candle flame, a mandala, or a picture of a saint; or to a sensation in the body or in the energy related to the body.

A kind of meditation also takes place when you give yourself fully to any activity. Walking meditations are an example of this, but any activity, such as hiking through the woods, running, making art, or being engaged in a hobby or a sport has the potential for focusing and quieting your mind.

A quiet mind is the cornerstone of spiritual practice because it allows the Self (the Divine) to be heard and experienced. Amidst the din of the busy mind, the Self gets lost, although it is never actually lost but ever-present and living your life. Our attention to the mind gives us the impression that the Self is something that has to be discovered, but the truth is more that it is uncovered in silence. It doesn’t need to be discovered because it is and always has been here. Finding the Self and aligning with it is more a matter of disregarding the mind, the creator of illusion. Doing this is easier once we have tasted the realness of the Self that exists in the silence of a quiet mind.

The egoic mind spins a story of reality that is often disconnected from the true reality of the moment, the reality in which the Self (who you really are) can be found. The ego (who you think you are) lives in another reality, a pseudo-reality; and it perpetuates this pseudo-reality through thoughts, which include beliefs, opinions, judgments, and stories about the experience of each moment. The mind makes up stories about whatever is happening in the moment and about what has happened and what will happen.

These stories cannot contain everything that is true about a moment. Rather, they are the spin the egoic mind puts on the moment, and therefore partial truths. These stories, or partial truths, take us away from the experience of the moment and cause us to live in a parallel, unreal world of thought. Meanwhile, life is happening and continuing to unfold moment by moment. Each moment is experienced only partially by the mind, which immediately forms an opinion and spins a story about the moment without touching into it fully. The mind doesn’t experience all that the moment contains because it immediately gets involved in its story about whatever is happening, which is usually a story of rejection of whatever is.

Because the mind is programmed to reject what is, it cannot truly experience the fullness of what is. If it stopped to experience everything about the moment, it would find it to be very full—full of joy, peace, contentment, wisdom, love, and acceptance. But the egoic mind doesn’t want these things. It wants drama because drama is what gives it reality. If the mind didn’t generate a story, which essentially amounts to generating a problem, it would have very little to do, nothing to solve. It creates a problem by rejecting the moment, and then it goes about trying to find a solution to that problem. It attempts to mobilize the body in behalf of the problem through fear and other feelings. If it succeeds, this becomes what your life is about. If you don’t follow the mind’s desires and suggestions for improving your life, your life would look very different. It would be much simpler and free of suffering. The mind causes us to struggle and work at life far more than we have to.

The Self lives in the quiet moment, which is so often bypassed by the mind. That is why meditation is so important to spiritual practice. How can you experience who you really are when you are believing and following the egoic mind’s ideas about life and who you are? We cannot serve two masters. We serve either the mind or the Self, and identification with each creates a very different reality—a very different life and a very different experience.

One of the simplest forms of meditation is listening. You don’t even have to sit still to practice listening. Except for when you are asleep, listening is always happening. You are either listening to the mind, which we call thinking, or you are listening to something else. Most of us spend most of our time listening to the mind. It can be difficult to ignore, especially if it is full of fear and negativity, which is one of the mind’s favorite techniques for getting us to pay attention to it. Fear and negativity get our attention because it feels like our survival is at stake if we don’t pay attention to these thoughts. With awareness of the mind and diligent questioning of its assumptions, it is not difficult to overcome the negativity of the mind.

When we are not listening to the mind, the opportunity exists to be aware that listening is still happening. Listening is part of Awareness, which is a name that is often given to our true nature. If you look closely at who you really are, you find only awareness—vast empty space that is aware, conscious. You are this consciousness, this awareness, of the mind, of feelings, of sounds, of sights, of sensations, of energy, of what is in any moment.

Listening aligns you immediately with this Awareness—the Self—because listening is an aspect of it. This Awareness is allowing by nature, and listening allows whatever is being heard. Listening puts you in a receptive state that allows whatever is. It doesn’t act on what is, it doesn’t have an opinion about what is, it just allows it to be the way it is. This kind of listening can be a very useful spiritual practice. It is the opposite of what the mind does with what is. The mind is constantly going to battle with what is—saying no to it and arguing with it, forming an opinion about it, and trying to change it.

Listening as a spiritual practice is much easier, more peaceful, and keeps you much less busy than listening to the mind. While listening to the mind is wearisome and following it is exhausting, listening as a spiritual practice is simple, joyous, and calming. This type of listening could become the way you are in the world in every moment. Listening is much more than a spiritual practice. It is a way of being and remaining aligned with the Self, and life can be lived very nicely from this vantage point.

We think we will not survive if we don’t listen to and follow the mind, but the Self has been living your life all along, with or without your awareness of that. How much simpler it is to align yourself with what is already living your life than with the mind, which is constantly worried, confused, afraid, and ill at ease with life. While the mind fusses and fumes at life, the Self allows whatever is.

Although we may not like what is, we can decide to allow it to be the way it is rather than fight it, as the mind does. When we do, we find that what is, is constantly changing into something else and that our ideas of like or dislike are irrelevant not only to us but to the Self, which embraces every moment for the joy of existence it affords. The Self says yes to every moment because it is creating each moment and wishes to experience it. This is the joy you can experience as well if you allow yourself to drop into the moment and just listen to what is. You are, after all, the Self that is creating all of it.

You will find that this listening is more like a full-body listening because it takes place not only through the ears but through your entire body, energy field, and beyond. Listening gets you in touch with the broader awareness that is paying attention to this moment. It aligns you with the Self, your true nature.

As you listen and allow yourself to be receptive to whatever is happening in this moment, you can feel the energy of the Self, which is fully at peace and content with this moment. This tangible energy of the Self is a sign that you are aligned with the Self. When this energy is absent, you are likely to be aligned, or identified, with something else—the mind. You can use this sensation of energy to check each moment to see whether you are identified with the mind or the Self. You listen to this energy, which is another way of saying you notice this energy.

The act of noticing, or listening, brings you into the moment—the now—and the act of allowing keeps you in the now. Once you notice what is by listening, in order to stay in the now, you must allow it. Once you land in the now, the mind tends to come in and reject something about it, which takes you back out of it. Allowing is the nature of your Self, so when you allow, you automatically align yourself with the Self. This doesn’t mean you will be passive in the world because the Self also takes whatever actions are necessary to move in the world as it sees fit.

Aligning with the Self through allowing and listening, although it may appear to be passive, puts you in a very alive place from which actions spontaneously arise. There is no shortage of actions arising from the now, from what is. Part of what is, is activity. The Self initiates activity when appropriate according to its drives. It takes care of itself—the Whole—by taking individual action in behalf of the Whole. So you don’t need to be concerned that you will do nothing if you don’t follow your thoughts. True greatness and goodness have always come from this quiet place, not from the mind. When you live from this place, you can live a much more fulfilled and productive life than when you are identified with the mind.

How do you begin to use listening as a spiritual practice? Just listen without thinking. You cannot listen and think at the same time, so if you catch yourself thinking, just bring yourself back to listening. Any judgments, opinions, stories, beliefs, labels, or concepts that arise while you are listening are the mind coming in. Note these and then return to listening. Just keep coming back to listening and see how this transforms your life. Do this as often as you can until you become established in listening as your natural state, and you will find yourself more and more aligned with the Self—with peace, contentment, joy, acceptance, and love.

Copyright © 2005 Gina Lake

This article is based on Radical Happiness: A Guide to Awakening. For more information, please visit www.RadicalHappiness.com.

Inner Peace on the Job: 7 Ways to Minimize Stress

2008-06-06T10:00:00.001+05:30

Inner Peace on the Job: 7 Ways to Minimize Stress
Although it is not possible to eliminate stress completely, there are some things we can do to reduce it. Here are effective ways to reduce stress in your day.

1. Slow down and be in the present. It is natural to believe that the harder you work, the more you will get done. However, though it may seem paradoxical, if you work at a slow and steady pace with full awareness, you will most likely turn out better work with fewer mistakes - and feel better while doing it!

2. Set boundaries. Are you the go-to person for every favor and question that is needed in your workplace? Learn to respectfully set your boundaries and say no. Also, take a look at your calendar and make sure you are not over-scheduling yourself after work. Write in one night a week for yourself, and treat yourself to a tai chi or meditation class, a bath, or just an evening curled up with a good book.

3. Remember to breathe deeply all day. Most people who are under a lot of stress or tension breathe shallowly, up in the throat area. When you breathe deeply into your lungs, you are naturally bringing in more oxygen and activating energy in your body.
Try this to remember to breathe: set your intention to take 10 deep breaths once every hour. (If necessary, set a timer to help you remember.) It will only take a minute, but the rewards will be tenfold.

4. Bring nature inside. As much as possible, let natural light and fresh air permeate your workspace. Surround yourself with the inspiring colors of beautiful flowers, which have a powerful influence on a person's mind-set. A beautiful bouquet can lift a less-than-lovely mood and even eliminate stress. In fact, one study showed that people who sat next to an arrangement of colorful flowers were able to relax more during a five-minute typing assignment than those who sat near foliage-only plants.

5. Give yourself a time-out. Take the breaks that are given to you. In this high-paced world, people often work through their breaks, claiming they have too much work to do - this will lead to serious repercussions in the future.

Remember that you are a human, not a machine. Even a machine needs downtime for maintenance! Try taking a 15-minute powernap on your lunch break. If you only have five minutes to spare, just close your eyes. Even this brief rest can reduce stress and help you relax.

6. Meditation brings relaxation. Meditation gives your body a rest and produces slower brain waves that are similar to sleep, effectively combating tension. Regular practice of meditation, tai chi, or yoga can help you slow down and bring peace, not only in your job, but also in your life.

7. Perk up naturally!
Skip the second latte, which stimulates your central nervous system, makes your mind race, and adds to your stress. Instead, try these simple and natural pick-me-ups:

• Take a tea break. Instead of coffee, go for teas that gently boost your energy, such as ginseng, eucalyptus, or ginger.

• Find ways to keep moving all day. Take the stairs instead of the elevator. Drink a glass of water from the water cooler every hour. Park your car a few blocks away from where you're going. Not only will this perk up your energy, it will also improve your mood.

• If it's a nice day outside, eat lunch outdoors or just take a walk around the block. The fresh air and the break from routine will be an invigorating addition to your workday.

• Get sustainable energy with snacks. Eat a snack at mid-morning and another one at mid-afternoon consisting of nuts, seeds, fruits, or protein-rich foods like humus made from beans will help you sustain your energy and prevent low blood sugar from setting in.

I hope you find the ways to minimize stress in your work environment! I invite you to visit often and share your own personal health and longevity tips with me.

May you live long, live strong, and live happy!

-Dr. Mao

An Inner Revolution

2008-06-03T17:44:00.001+05:30

The enlightenment I speak of is not simply a realization, not simply the discovery of one's true nature. This is just the beginning—the point of entry into an inner revolution. Realization does not guarantee this revolution, it simply makes it possible.

What is this revolution? To begin with, revolution is not static; it is alive, ongoing. Realization of the ultimate reality is a fact. Revolution is the continuous ongoing birth of intelligence. This intelligence restructures your entire being. This intelligence cuts the mind free of itself, of its old structures which are rooted within human consciousness. If one cannot become free of the old structures of human consciousness, then one is still in a prison, the prison of humanity's consciousness.

This revolution is the awakening of an intelligence which alone has the ability to uproot all of the old structures of one's consciousness. Unless these structures are uprooted, there will be no creative thought or action or response. Unless there is an inner revolution, nothing new and fresh can flower. Only the old will flower in the absence of this revolution. But our potential lies beyond the known, beyond the structures of the past, beyond anything that humanity has established.

One must be willing to stand alone—in the unknown, with no reference to authority or the past or any of one's conditioning. One must stand where no one has stood before in complete nakedness, innocence, and humility.

Adyashanti

Desire for Self

2008-05-28T13:16:00.001+05:30

'You claim everything that happens to you as 'my' because that is the way you have become accustomed to categorising the things that go on inside you. But the desire for the Self is not 'my' desire for the Self; it is the Self itself calling you, calling attention to itself within you. That only happens when your desire for other things and objects is absent. The pull towards the Self happens when you temporarily stop being interested in all the things that usually keep your attention away from the Self.

'People ask me, "Papaji, how can I increase my desire for the Self since you say that this desire is enough for liberation?"

'My answer to this is, "Stop having desires for other things". When this happens, the Self pulls you into itself and liberates you.'

Poonja alias Papaji

David Godman's Blog

2008-05-19T21:58:00.003+05:30

Many people on the path of Non Duality are aware of David Godman and his books related to the teachings of Bhagawan Ramana Maharishi .David Godman has been maintaining his own web site www.davidgodman.org for many years but recently he has started his own blog related to the teachings of Sri Ramana .The link for the blog is given below :
http://sri-ramana-maharshi.blogspot.com/

David Godman almost daily updates this blog and I relish reading the material everyday and find it very refreshing and inspirational .
I am sure others will also find the same .

Power of a Jnani's Words

2008-05-18T09:58:00.001+05:30

If a jnani says 'You are consciousness, you are the Self,' then there is a power in those words that comes from the experience and authority of the person who says them. If you hear those words with a quiet, still mind, then those words have the power to reveal their true meaning to you. An ajnani can say that to you and it will just be a piece of information that you store in your memory, but when a jnani says something like this, it has the power to silence the mind and reveal the true import of the words themselves.

For this to work two things are necessary: the words must come from an enlightened being, and they must be listened to with a silent mind that does not think about or analyse what has been said. Personally. I believe that the power of a jnani's words will remain even if they are read in a book after the jnani has passed away.

David Godman

Learn to give love rather than seek it

2008-05-14T11:43:00.001+05:30

Lord, grant that I may not so much seek to be loved as to love.
– Saint Francis of Assisi

Millions of people today suffer from loneliness. Here Saint Francis is saying, “I know the cause of the malady and I know the secret of its complete cure.” No matter what the relationship may be, when you look on another person as someone who can give you love, you are really faking love. That is the simplest word for it. If you are interested in making love, in making it grow without end, try looking on that person as someone you can give your love to – someone to whom you can go on giving always.

Learning to love is like swimming against the current of a powerful river; most of our past conditioning is pushing us in the other direction. So it is a question of developing your muscles: the more you use them, the stronger they get. When you put the other person’s welfare foremost every day, no matter how strong the opposing tide inside, you discover after a while that you can love a little more today than you did yesterday. Tomorrow you will be able to love a little more

Eknath Easwaran’s Thought for the Day

Bhagawan Ramana Maharishi on Yoga

2008-05-06T21:56:00.002+05:30

When Bhagawan Ramana Maharishi was in Skandashram , a learned Malayali gentlemen , who was also adept in yoga went there .He lectured for four hours .
Bhagawan listened patiently , but at the conclusion of his talk he remarked ,"You have said everything that you wanted to say .The goal of your yoga practice is to have some visions and hear some sounds .While these are happening , the mind will be dormant , but afterwards it will rise again .You must try to annihilate the mind .The annihilation of mind alone in Jnana ."

Create the effect and cause follows .

2008-04-29T15:09:00.002+05:30

Become alert .Each moment when you are choosing to become miserable , remember : this is your choice . Even this mindfulness will help - this alertness that this is my choice and I am responsible , and this is what I am doing to myself . this is my doing .Immediately you will feel a difference .The quality of mind will have changed .It will be easier for you to move toward happiness .

And once you know that this is your choice then the whole thing has become a game .Then if you love to be miserable , be miserable , but remember this is your choice and don't complain .There is nobody else who is responsible for it .This is your drama .If you like it this way , if you like a miserable way , if you want to pass through life in misery ,then this is your choice , your game .You are playing it - play it well ! Then don't go and ask masters and gurus how to be happy .The so-called gurus exist because you are foolish .You create the misery , and then you go and ask others how to uncreate it .And you will go on creating it because you are not alert to what you are doing .
From this very moment try - try to be happy and blissful .

I will tell you one of the deepest laws of life .You may not have thought about it at all .You have heard that cause and effect is the base - the whole of science depends on it .You create the cause an the effect follows .Life is a causal link . You put the seed in the soil and it will sprout .If the cause is there then the tree will follow .The fire is there - you put your hand in it and it will burn .The cause is there and the effect will follow .You take poison and you will die .You arrange for the cause and then the effect follows .This is one the basic , the most basic scientific laws , that cause and effect is the innermost link of all the process of life .

Religion knows about a second law ,still deeper than this .But the second law which is deeper will look absurd if you don't know it and experiment with it .Religion says : Produce the effect and the cause follows .This is absolutely absurd in scientific terms .Science says :If the cause is there the effect follows .Religion says the converse is also true : you create the effect , and see - the cause follows .

There is a situation in which yo feel happy .A friend has come , a beloved has called , a situation is the cause - you feel happy .Happiness is the effect , the coming of the beloved if the cause . Religion says : Be happy and the beloved comes .Create the effect and the cause follows .And this is my own experience , that the second law is more basic than the first .I have been doing it and it has been happening .

Just be happy and the beloved come .
Just be happy and friends are there .
Just be happy and everything follows .

Osho

Truth Comes at a Cost

2008-04-22T22:08:00.001+05:30

If I was to translate the enlightened state down into human terms, I’d have to describe it as contentment. Being nobody, going nowhere, needing no reason to exist. To the ego, that probably sounds a little boring, and of course to an ego it is. But then again, there’s really nothing for the ego in enlightenment. In enlightenment, the egoic false self is rendered an irrelevant illusion, a mask, a character that nothingness wears while pretending to be human.

Not only is there nothing in enlightenment for the ego, the ego is really nothing but a defense against enlightenment. I’m not saying that ego is bad or evil because it’s not. I’m saying that ego is a social and personal construct and therefore an illusion. But there’s nothing wrong with an illusion. A painting is an illusion; a movie is an illusion; a good novel is an illusion. The problem isn’t with illusion; the problem is with the emotional attachments and addictions of ego.

To most people "attachment" is a very abstract word that they think they understand. People in spiritual circles think of attachments in terms of things that they are attached to. They identify the things attached to and endeavor to let go of them, but this misses the whole point of what attachment really is. Attachment isn’t about things attached to; it’s about emotion in the form of a magnetic energy of attraction. That energy is how you know who you are as an ego. That energy is who you are as an ego. Ego defines itself by what it does and does not like. There is no ego outside of this emotional energy of attraction and repulsion—better known as love and hate, like and dislike, good and bad, right and wrong, us and them, me and you. Without emotional investment in the ego’s points of view, what’s left of ego but a hollow shell with a little personality mixed in?

You breathe life into your ego in the form of emotional addictions. Emotion is the very life-force of ego. So the point of detachment isn’t to detach from things, but to detach from your emotional bonds with things. And you don’t simply let go of emotional bonds; you burn through them with investigative awareness. You see them for what they are: prisons, false structures holding you in spiritual infancy. You may think that I am being a bit harsh—which I am, but awakening to truth is a harsh business. The bottom line is "What do you want more: to feel better or to realize the truth?" Sure, truth realization feels really good, but no one gets there whose driving motivation is simply to feel good. Feeling really good is a byproduct of the awakened state; it is not the state itself. The state itself is reality, and it’s won at the hands of unreality. Simply put, ultimate truth comes at a cost, and the cost is everything in you and about you that is unreal. The end result is freedom, happiness, peace, and no longer viewing life through the veils of illusion.

Adyashanti

To find something original and true

2008-04-19T21:32:00.000+05:30

To find something original and true, something timeless, you cannot come to it with the burden of memory, knowledge. The known, the past, can never help you to discover the moving, the creative. No amount of technique or learning, no amount of attending talks and discussions, can ever reveal to you the unknown. If you really see the truth of this, actually experience if for yourself, then you are free of all Masters and gurus, of all teachers, saints, and saviors. Because, they can only teach you what is known, and the mind which is burdened with the known can never find what is unknowable.

J Krishnamurthy

Are You Ready to Lose Your World?

2008-04-12T08:37:00.002+05:30

There is a very famous poem written by the third patriarch of Zen, Seng-ts’an, called the Hsin-Hsin Ming, which translates as Verses in Faith Mind. In this poem Seng-ts’an writes these lines: “Do not seek the truth; only cease to cherish opinions.” This is a reversal of the way most people go about trying to realize absolute truth. Most people seek truth, but Seng-ts’an is saying not to seek truth. This sounds very strange indeed. How will you find truth if you don’t seek it? How will you find happiness if you do not seek it? How will you find God if you do not seek God? Everyone seems to be seeking something. In spirituality seeking is highly honored and respected, and here comes Seng-ts’an saying not to seek.

The reason Seng-ts’an is saying not to seek is because truth, or reality, is not something objective. Truth is not something “out there.” It is not something you will find as an object of perception or as a temporal experience. Reality is neither inside of you nor outside of you. Both “outside” and “inside” are not getting to the point. They both miss the mark because outside and inside are conceptual constructs with no inherent reality. They are simply abstract points of reference. Even words like “you,” or “me,” or “I,” are nothing more than conceptual points of reference existing only in the mind. Such concepts may have a practical value in daily life, but when assumed to be true they distort perception and create a virtual reality, or what in the East is called the world of samsara.

Seng-ts’an was a wily old Zen master. He viewed things through the eye of enlightenment and was intimately aware of how the conditioned mind fools itself into false pursuits and blind alleys. He knew that seeking truth, or reality, is as silly as a dog thinking that it must chase its tail in order to attain its tail. The dog already has full possession of its tail from the very beginning. Besides, once the dog grasps his tail, he will have to let go of it in order to function. So even if you were to find the truth through grasping, you will have to let it go at some point in order to function. But even so, any truth that is attained through grasping is not the real truth because such a truth would be an object and therefore not real to begin with.

In order to seek, you must first have an idea, ideal, or an image, what it is you are seeking. That idea may not even be very conscious or clear but it must be there in order for you to seek. Being an idea it cannot be real. That’s why Seng-ts’an says “only cease to cherish opinions.” By opinions he means ideas, ideals, beliefs, and images, as well as personal opinions. This sounds easy but it is rarely as easy as it seems. Seng-ts’an is not saying you should never have a thought in your head, he is saying not to cherish the thoughts in your head. To cherish implies an emotional attachment and holding on to. When you cherish something, you place value on it because you think that it is real or because it defines who you think you are. This cherishing of thoughts and opinions is what the false self thrives on. It is what the false self is made of. When you realize that none of your ideas about truth are real, it is quite a shock to your system. It is an unexpected blow to the seeker and the seeking.

The task of any useful spiritual practice is therefore to dismantle cherishing the thoughts, opinions, and ideas that make up the false self, the self that is seeking. This is the true task of both meditation and inquiry. Through meditation we can come to see that the only thing that makes us suffer is our own mind. Sitting quietly reveals the mind to be nothing but conditioned thinking spontaneously arising within awareness. Through cherishing this thinking, through taking it to be real and relevant, we create internal images of self and others and the world. Then we live in these images as if they were real. To be caught within these images is to live in an illusory virtual reality.

Through observing the illusory nature of thought without resisting it, we can begin to question and inquire into the underlying belief structures that support it. These belief structures are what form our emotional attachments to the false self and the world our minds create.

This is why I sometimes ask people, “Are you ready to lose your world?” Because true awakening will not fit into the world as you imagine it or the self you imagine yourself to be. Reality is not something that you integrate into your personal view of things. Reality is life without your distorting stories, ideas, and beliefs. It is perfect unity free of all reference points, with nowhere to stand and nothing to grab hold of. It has never been spoken, never been written, never been imagined. It is not hidden, but in plain view. Cease to cherish opinions and it stands before your very eyes.

Adyashanti

Handling repressed emotions

2008-04-08T20:04:00.000+05:30

Do not believe in the story that your feelings are presenting. The story is always from the past. The present moment is free of the past. Whatever it is that you are angry or hurt about is not happening now, so it would not make any sense to believe in it. It is just a memory that you are caught in at some unconscious level.l

Let the feelings up. Allow them conscious expression within you. One of the keys to awakening is to come into right relationship with your feelings. Everything that arises within you is seeking unconditional love and acceptance, even your feelings and emotions.

It is only when you repress your feelings that you create an inner disharmony which eventually leads to disease.

Leonard Jacobson

How should I deal with desires?

2008-03-20T19:30:00.000+05:30

When you look really deeply into the motive for your actions in daily life, you will see that they are generally for the survival of the “I-concept”, the person. It is important to be aware of this. When you really feel in you the desire to be happy, totally follow this desire. Fundamentally, all desire leads to the one source of desire, the desire to be desireless, to be free from desire. But we must follow desire like we follow the shadow projected by a tree. It leads to the tree.

Jean Klein

Focus on the present - A Zen story

2008-03-16T10:38:00.002+05:30

A young boy traveled across Japan to the school of a famous martial artist. When he arrived at the dojo he was given an audience by the Sensei
"What do you wish from me?" the master asked.
"I wish to be your student and become the finest kareteka in the land," the boy replied. "How long must I study?"
"Ten years at least," the master answered.
"Ten years is a long time," said the boy. "What if I studied twice as hard as all your other students?"
"Twenty years," replied the master.
"Twenty years! What if I practice day and night with all my effort?"
"Thirty years," was the master's reply.
"How is it that each time I say I will work harder, you tell me that it will take longer?" the boy asked.
"The answer is clear. When one eye is fixed upon your destination, there is only one eye left with which to find the Way

Zen Story

Useless Thinking

2008-03-09T10:49:00.001+05:30

Question: My thoughts run my life, driving me pillar to post. How do I learn to recognize when I'm trapped in useless thinking? I feel drained!

Answer: Whatever dominates us in the moment is what is first in our lives. We value things that seem to put us first, but actually put our true best interests last. We squander our lives -- our precious energy -- thinking about things that only serve to fill time. The cost of having a conscious first, being truly whole and successful, is giving up useless thoughts. How do you know a thought is useless? Ask yourself how long you've been thinking the same thing! Beyond that, here are some specific areas of useless thinking you can watch for:

Any thoughts whatsoever about what tomorrow may bring.

Thinking about what someone said or did to you.

Thinking about your possessions and your possibilities.

Thinking about what you could have said or should have done.

Thinking about what some kind of pain or illness may mean to you, or thinking about your own aging.

Thinking about how others displease you -- judging others.

Thinking about yourself.

Meditation is an attitude not an activity

2008-03-01T18:16:00.001+05:30

Meditation is an attitude not an activity , so whatever you do can become meditative .The so-called meditation that people go on doing is not meditation .It is the attitude of being in the present which is the core ,the central , the essential thing .
Do whatever you are doing - walking on the street , running , taking a bath , eating , going to sleep, lying on the bed , relaxing - and remain with the activity totally ,with no past , no future ,remain in the present .It will be difficult in the beginning - very difficult and very arduous but by and by you will get the feel of it and then a new door will open a new realm .Then the thought process will no longer be there .
By that I don't mean to say that you will become incapable of thinking ; on the contrary , only then will you be capable of thinking .Thinking is a different thing from this mad rush of thoughts .This crowd of thoughts is not thinking at all .The thoughts go on and on , and you cannot do anything about them .You are just a victim , not a thinker .You suffer , you try not to think about them .

So be aware .Don't waste the present anymore .Live in the present .Live in the meditative quality of the present .

Osho

Why is one a slave to thought ? - Freedom from the Known

2008-02-25T21:39:00.000+05:30

Why has thought become so important in all our lives – thought being ideas, being the response to the accumulated memories in the brain cells? Perhaps many of you have not even asked such a question before, or if you have you may have said, ‘It’s of very little importance – what is important is emotion.’ But I don’t see how you can separate the two. If thought doesn’t give continuity to feeling, feeling dies very quickly. So why in our daily lives, in our grinding, boring, frightened lives, has thought taken on such inordinate importance? Ask yourself as I am asking myself – why is one a slave to thought – cunning, clever, thought which can organize, which can start things, which has invented so much, bred so many wars, created so much fear, so much anxiety, which is forever making images and chasing its own tail – thought which has enjoyed the pleasure of yesterday and given that pleasure continuity in the present and also in the future – thought which is always active, chattering, moving, constructing, taking away, adding, supposing?

J Krishnamurthy

What causes physical illness?

2008-02-05T20:42:00.000+05:30

What causes physical illness? Is it state of mind, random factors, external influences, karma, past lives, or biochemical? Is it all of the above? Is it different for each of us?

I think you have answered your own question. It really is all of the above. However, there are some significant factors, which I would like to mention here.

One significant factor is that, if we ignore emotional dis-ease, it will most likely manifest as physical disease or illness. For example if you carry resentment within you for a long period of time, then that will have an impact upon your body and will eventually create physical dis-ease. It is the same with repressed hurt and anger. And guilt!

If the body has to carry all these repressed and unresolved feelings within it, eventually it will show the signs of that burden. That is why it is so valuable to live more fully in the present moment. To continually release the past and live more fully in the present moment is very supportive of a healthy body.

As for Karmic factors, the most important aspect in this regard is to learn those lessons that will heal your soul and release it from its Karmic history. Any conflict or disharmony in your life is a good indicator of those lessons. Sometimes a past life can be at the root of a physical illness and it is necessary to bring that past life to consciousness before a healing can occur. That healing can occur at the soul level as well as at the emotional and the physical level and is sometimes quite miraculous.

I once worked with a woman with an inoperable brain tumor. Her life expectancy was very short. When she uncovered a past life, which involved extreme guilt in that past lifetime, her brain tumor disappeared. It is interesting to note that there had been a significant re-creation of guilt in this lifetime, but healing that was not enough. The true source of her dis-ease was in another lifetime.

There are many factors involved in physical illness.

What you eat and how you eat has a direct impact upon your state of health. Your state of mind is obviously a significant factor. If you are constantly stressed or anxious, that will affect you.

If the inner environment is still and quiet and in a state of harmony, obviously that will promote physical well being. If you consistently release the past from you, there is no burden for your body to carry and so nothing accumulates.

On the other hand, if you accumulate the past within you, it becomes an increasingly intolerable burden for your body to bear and eventually it weakens, and illness or dis-ease sets in.

Sometimes illness is simply a result of environmental factors. I worked with a woman who had extreme toxic poisoning from the environment. This had nothing to do with her state of mind. Did her karmic history play a part in her being subjected to the poisoning in the first place? Possibly! But that was not revealed in my work with her.

Another client had been involved in a series of serious motor accidents several years earlier, and she experienced some permanent disability as a result of those accidents. In working with her, it was revealed that her karmic history played into these events, as did her unconscious resistance to actually being here on the earth plane. At an unconscious level, she wanted to leave, which somehow played into her involvement in the accident.

It is difficult to generalize. It really depends on each individual as to which causative factors are prominent. It is even possible that illness is simply a sign that the body is cleansing.

One thing is sure though. Whatever the cause of illness or disease, the actual experience of the illness or dis-ease provides an opportunity for healing and evolving at the level of soul. What is your relationship to the illness and to your body during the illness? How do you respond? Some people find great inner strength in the face of illness. Some people's lives are transformed in a way that is profoundly healing for the soul, even if it sometimes does not lead to the healing of the physical body.

Leonard Jacobson

Foucs on changing yourself

2008-01-14T21:27:00.000+05:30

People want others to change but they do not include themselves in the project .today every intelligent person feels that a drastic change is needed in political, social , economic , academic fields ; that the world needs a great revolution .They believe that when the systems change it will usher in a new ear of progress , peace and prosperity .

Philosophers down the ages have been hooping to achieve transformation by changing ideologies .But the change that happened through outward revolutions was temporary and only on the surface .

It is Osho who , for the first time , points out that all revolutions failed because the revolutionaries dealt with ideas , not reality .Society is an idea , the state is another idea , humanity is a hazy blur and systems are mere concepts run by individuals .It boils down to one basic reality : it is the individual who really exists .If a change has to be brought about , it has to occur in the individual .You cannot change the shadows , you have to change the original form that is casting the shadow .
Osho makes another point of great importance .The individual who needs to be changed is you , not someone else .Change , like charity begins at home .Each person has to take the responsibility to change himself or herself .We have no right to try to change others ; it is an invasion in their privacy .

Osho does not only present this new vision, he gives us the tools to make it happen : expressive and cathartic meditations and meditative therapies especially developed for today's men and women .These are joyous and playful techniques - not the old fashioned methods based on control and repression .Tens of thousands are doing them and experiencing remarkable changes in themselves .

Surprisingly ,these people who are deeply involved in transforming themselves don't worry about the world .The world around them changes for the better by itself .

From the Editorial of Osho Times ,July 2007

Understand that ego is not real

2008-01-13T21:04:00.000+05:30

To begin with, the idea that you have to kill the ego is one that is counter-productive because all such efforts only keep the ego going. Instead, come to see that the ego isn't real; when that is seen to be the case then there will be a dissolving of identification with ego. With that dis identification the ego will still arise but will no longer cause the trouble it currently does; one will no longer get sucked into it and get lost there.

Use times when you aren't feeling emotional turmoil to simply look at things without commentary - just return again and again to what's actually before you, the naked sensory input of it. When you find that you've strayed into thought return to what's actually real. This will be training ground for when you do experience emotional turmoil. When that happens, turn attention very closely to what is actually felt, the naked sensory input, and when labels about those sensations arise return again to the actual sensation. Do this again and again.

Kiki's wisdom

You can see the rebelliousness of Zen

2008-01-09T22:37:00.000+05:30

Every religion is concerned that you should be good , you should not be bad, you should be respectable , you should not be condemned by society .You should not lose your good repute even if you have to be a hypocrite. Just be good , even though the good is not arising on its own , but you are forcing it .

It is the greatness of Zen: Don't have any thoughts about good or bad . Be absolutely a witness , and while you are just a witness , whatever happens through you is bound to be good .The whole world may condemn it ; it does not matter .You have to listen only to your own heart .

Osho
The Buddha : The Emptiness of the Heart

Happy New Year 2008

2008-01-09T22:11:00.000+05:30

Dear Friends

Wishing you all a Very Healthy ,Wealthy , Prosperous and spiritually fulfilling New Year 2008 .I was not active in updating my blog in the past couple of weeks and will do so from now onwards .In order to maintain quality of postings I will post only few per week and not daily .That will ensure that I post the high quality ones .

For those who are new to my blog I suggest that go through my other blog(s)

1) http://eyogateacher.blogspot.com/
2) http://yogaproductreview.blogspot.com/
3) http://trainingforexcellence.blogspot.com/

I will see to it that apart from this blog the other blogs are also regularly updated . These blogs are a means for me to share with the world those information , articles , quotes that educated , inspired and enriched me and I am sure it will also be useful for others .

Once again wishing you all a Happy New Year 2008 .

Krishnanand
Sivananda Yoga Teacher ,Chennai ,India

Quest for learning

2007-12-28T11:10:00.000+05:30

You need to have a passionate interest in why things are happening. That cast of mind, kept over long periods, gradually improves your ability to focus on reality. If you don’t have the cast of mind, you’re destined for failure even if you have a high I.Q.

Charlie Munger

Charles Munger-Charlie, as he is known throughout the investment world-is vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, the holding company run by Warren Buffett, the world's most famous investor. Trained originally as an attorney, Charlie is Buffett's partner, friend, and straight man. He commands attention whenever he speaks.