ennar’s blog

GIVING THANKS FOR THE GOOD AND THE BAD

we might face many difficulties , hardships and disappointments in our lives. things do not always go our way. If we listen to the discussions of others and review our own words and thoughts, we find that many of them are complaints about how life is treating us. There is a bitter feeling.

A different perspective would reveal to us how fortunate we are.

During the Great Depression in early 20th century.  A representative of America’s Government agency travelled through some of the poorer parts of the country to provide financial assistance to farmers to buy seeds, fix their homes and run their farms. The agent came across an elderly woman living in a shack without flooring, she had covered the broken windows with tarpaper. She barely managed to survive. The agent asked ” if the government gave you 200.$, what would you do with it ?” The woman replied without hesitation : ” I would give it to someone who is homeless.”

There is a story of a king, who, one day while sitting with his most devoted servant, AYAZ, ventured to share a cucumber with him. Ayaz thanked him and happily ate the piece given to him by the king. When he had finished, the king then took a bite of his own half. “Yuk !” he cried, and he made a disgusted face, and spit out the cucumber. “This is so bitter ! How could you have eaten your piece if it tasted like bitter poison ?” Ayaz replied “My dear king, I have enjoyed so many favours and blessings from you all these years. Whatever you give me tastes sweet !”

A true lover of God lives in gratitude and so is able to consider the good, the sweet and the bitter as a gift from the Beloved. Ayaz had received so much from the king that he did not think it his place to complain if one of these gifts was bitter, he accepted all that the king gave him with love and gratitude.

If we could accept the cloudy days with the same gratitude as we do the sunny days, we would find our lives to be filled with more love, peace, and happiness. If we could appreciate the weeds as well as the roses, we would get enriched. Not only do we need to learn to be content, we need to expand our heart to enbrace all creation.

Like the poor woman from the Great Depression, in order to return to God we need to be compassionate and feel universal love. Most of us love for a small circle of people which includes our family and close friends. How ever, as we progress spiritually, our heart expands to embrace community, society, country, world and beyond. The ultimate state of love is having love for the cosmos.

The practice of meditation enables us to cultivate the qualities of compassion and contentment. The bliss and happiness we experience in meditation stays with us even after we come out of meditation. It is a wellspring of love and peace that we can tap into, any time we wish. The experience is so powerful and fulfilling that it helps us to transcend the pains and sorrows of life. No matter what happens to us in life, we have a fountain of nectar within us from which we can drink at anytime. This is the Gift we can achieve through meditation.

Do  the  everyday  dance  (part - 2)

Alexander Lowen, the American psycotherapist, who developed Bioenergetic Analysis, a form of mind-body psycotherapy, wrote that “a person is in the state of pleasure when the movements of his body flow freely,rhythmically,and in harmony with his surroundings”. We can do so.We can begin to notice the daily ordinary movements of our bodies and open up to the flow of life’s continuous movement. This awareness of continuty brings a feeling of inner connectedness with the self. When we feel connected inside, we have the ability to reach out to others. Connectedness leads to greater understanding within the global community.Viewed through a wide lens, all subtle and not-so-subtle ways of interacting can be a dance.The rhythm to which we move in the pace at which we accomplish our tasks.

A tired person who has walked all day will have a pace very different from that of an enthusiastic kinder garten student. Someone in love or feeling happy will walk with a different step to one who is disappointed in love or otherwise. The way we feel affects the quality of the way we move. Our planet has many different kinds of terrain. Each has a predominance of certain elements, whether patterns and climatic conditions. This bio-diversity has always determined the food that is grown,the way people clothe themselves, the types of shelters they build and the way they move. Walking barefoot on sand is different from walking with shoes on a cement pavement.

Walking in an open desert is a different movement to walking down a steep ravine. The body’s challenge is to adapt. Sometimes people say,”oh,I’m so clumsy”,or “I could never be graceful” yet an overweight person serving a tray of tea can be extremely graceful if he is properly engaged in the action. There is something about paying attention to one’s action, as opposed to spacing out. Being aware of the each movement enables the flow. And isn’t that what we love about dance ? The flow.

When we begin noticing the way our body moves, we become informed. This understanding brings more awareness of physicality and feeling, leading to greater wellness and encouraging a lighter sense of being. So, it is important to accept the invitation to step into your own Everyday Dance.

Do the Everyday Dance     (part-1)

The ‘everyday dance’ of life starts the moment we wake up and glide out of bed. It continues when we put the kettle on and sip our morning cup of tea;when we greet the early morning and notice the colours of dawn;when we run out of the door to keep an appointment.

Do we pay attention to our everyday movements?Do we enjoy multilayered events,such as holding an object while walking and at the same time,keeping track of where we are heading? Very few of us take the time out to remember this everyday dance.

As human beings, we are born in a body that becomes our home as long as we are on earth.

From ancient times to the present, people have been studying and observing the way the body works. It is with its help that we accomplish all that we are here for.

One of our most important tasks is maintaining the health of our being. An inherent awareness about this organism of consciousness, motion and feeling leaves us with a sense of wellness. Due to the growing pressures of our fast-paced lives, many of us are adopting ancient as well as contemporary techniques of slowing down and becoming more “aware”.

Learning to slow down is not a one-time experience. Rather, it is a way to be in tune with time while being on the go. A good way to practice this might be to observe the sequence of everyday functions.

An example would be slipping one’s shoes on and off. We could notice how the entire body collaborates in this sequence of simple movements. Even if it is not immediately enjoyable, it could be interesting to notice. If one were to see the act of taking off one’s shoes as part of a dance sequence, each movement would appear connected to the next and with an underlying rhythm.

This may be a lovely idea but most of us have important things to attend to, leaving us little time to spare for a meditative approach to everything in our daily lives.

Even if one believes that there is too little time and too much to do, it is important to learn how the common movements we make everyday can help reach greater awareness of one’s health. When I am walking from my front door to the bus and I’m in a hurry, I try to remember to note the feeling of “being in a hurry”. This allows me to enjoy the speed while feeling the flow of the movements at that moment, instead of being controlled by the hurry of the mind. It is fun.I can sense the way the muscles enjoy the pace of “dance to the bus”.

(await for concluding part -2)

A young boy left his house in search of truth. He met many people; he became richer in his awareness of his ignorance. Since people went to forests to meditate, he too went to a thick forest.He did not know how to meditate. So he screamed at the forest to give him knowledge. For years his only mantra was screaming at the forest to give him knowledge. He belived that if you are commited, existence will help you.

One day, a monk came to him. He asked : “what do you want,my son ? “I want to know what the meaning of life is,” he replied. “Go to the town. The first three persons that you meet will give you the meaning of life,” replied the monk.

The boy went to the town. The first man he met was doing carpentry work. The next man he met was doing sheet metal work. The third man he met was making strings. Disappointed, he sat on the bank of a river. Suddenly, he heard the sweet strains of violin music. Something mysterious touched him. He suddenly got the answer he was looking for and he started dancing.

The carpenter was preparing the wood for the violin. The sheet metal worker was preparing metal for the strings meant for the violin. Life has everything ; all you need is to be able to connect the dots. You need to work out new combinations. And for that you need creative perception.

Life has all the ingredients. Be creative. Don’t let yourself feel victimised. You might think that what is easy is beautiful, that what is easy is joy. You are a victim of such illusions. Difficulty has such a joy. Discovery has such a joy. Seeking out has such a joy.

You have to change the notion that difficulty is pain. In exercise, there is difficulty but also joy. In sports,there is difficulty but there is joy. In your relationships,when there is difficulty,treat it as joy, just reprogramme your mind.

In prayer you don’t have to do anything ; just be available to God’s grace.Prayer is a deep readiness to receive God’s flow. It is passive alertness. Go deep and you discover your original mind… it is deep passiveness.

• It is not true that everyone should follow one path. Listen to your own truth.
  
• Don’t change direction, and you may end up where you’re heading.
  
• You move totally away  from reality when you believe that there is a legitimate reason to suffer.
  
• Man is free at the moment he wishes to be.
  
• Deep down in me I knew it was a lie, and ‘HE’ knew it. You can’t pray a lie — I found that out.
  
• Money can’t buy friends but it can get you a better class of enemy.
  
• Love is misunderstood to be an emotion, actually, it is a state of awareness.
  
• Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.
  
• You learn to speak by speaking, to study by studying, to run by running, to work by working ; in just the same way, you learn to love by loving.

QUOTES    ON   RESULTS

• The results you achieve will be in direct proportion to the effort you apply.
• The person who sends out positive thoughts activates the world around him positively and draws back to himself positive results.
• Offering the fruit of action to GOD,the karmayogi attains everlasting peace in the shape of God realisation, whereas he who works with a selfish motive,being attached to the fruit of action through desire,gets tied down.
• You will not get anything out of selfish action,because you are organically related to the whole organism of the creation of the world. This is a fact that you forget when you individually take initiatives and when you expect the fruit  to follow from your individually motivated action.
• That fruit does not always follow,because the means and ends have some connection. You cannot adopt one kind of means and expect another kind of end. The means - in the ordinary case of people - is a selfish motivation, but the end that you expect has to be sanctioned by the structure of the whole.

In every difficulty there is an opportunity. Life is really a choice…. to be either wise, not wise or otherwise.

Once a wise king wanted advice from his master about what to do when he faced a real crises in his life.The master gave him a locket and told him to open it only when he was in difficulty.After some years he was defeated in a battle and he lost his kingdom.

He was worried and was hiding in a cave.He suddenly remembered what his master had told him.He opened the locket and there he found a note,”even this will pass” and a second noe which said,”if one door closes another door opens”.He gained strength from this piece of advice and after a month,with the help of a newly formed army won his kingdom back.He went to his master and thanked him and asked a question: “why does the door close?” “The door is always open,your mind is closed,” replied the master.

There are two types of worlds we live in.The visible world and the invisible world.The outer world and the inner world.Our body is in the outer space but our mind is in another space.Just as our body gets dirty if one is in a dirty space,our inner-self,our mind,gets dirty if we visit dirty areas in the inner world.

If one broods over worry,dislike,anger,jealousy,then our mind is polluted, with such pollution you find the outer world a pain.The real pain is when our mind lives in negativity.

What type of world are we in?This is what one should really be aware of.Where are we placed psychologically is what we have to watch for.One believes that the outer world is the real world and not the inner world of mind.For example… You are very happy that you are invited to a party where celebrities are attending.Then when you see them beautifully dressed, you may feel bad that you are not as rich as they are, you may feel bad that you are not a celebrity. Now tell me,what has impacted your life directly…. the outer world or the inner world.The inner world,is it not?So watch that very carefully in your life.

When you don’t watch the mind what happens? A negative system is created.When you dwell on negativity,your pattern of anger,your pattern of justifying,your pattern of jealousy,creates a negative system.Then the negative system takes over and you lose control of yourself.

It is as though you have installed a programme in your computer and when you open the computer,that particular programme opens up.Then you get angry with the computer.What you have to realise is that it is not the computer that is the source of the problem,it is how you have programmed it,is the problem.Each time you are negative,watch how you have programmed yourself.

When the world outside is singing and dancing ,in the morning sunrise and evening sunset,in the twinkling of the stars and the dancing wind,you feel negative and sick….. for it is like mixing bread with mud.Hence don’t create a negative system around you.

• Begin at once to live, and count each seperate day as a seperate life.
• Man improves himself as he follows his path;if he stands still,waiting to improve before he makes a decision,he’ll never move.
• For every sin but the killing of time there is forgiveness.
• Our business is to stand strongly for principles,but never to attack persons,about whose lives we can know but little.
• Great things are possible only to strong souls and it’s from the trivial events of daily life that strength is won.
• When you come to see you are not as wise today as you thought you were yesterday, you are wiser today.

• Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.
• A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.
• Beginning is easy ; continuing , hard.
• What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from.
• Be a self starter ; let your first hour set the theme of success and positive action that is certain to echo through your entire day. Today will never happen again. Don’t waste it with a false start or no start at all. You were not born to fail.
• Hope is an orientation of the heart,of the spirit. It is not the belief that  things will turn out well. But that things will make sense,however they turn out.

I believe that every difficult situation has a brighter side to it and will lead to better times.

Spirituality for me is a way of saying ‘ thank you ‘ to God for making me feel so blessed. Being spiritual gives me the strength to connect to my inner self and provides me comfort that my life is part of a higher purpose.

Of course, there is God. But i also have confidence in the ‘ power of self ‘.I do visit places of worship, but at the same time, i feel that the temple is in me. To connect to divinity and develop lofty thoughts, i converse with God.

I am not religious per se but i believe in all religions. Although i recognise all physical manifestations and various forms of God, but in a spiritual sense, i deeply connect with the higher being who is omnipotent.

During a stressful situation, i self connect, which gives me a sense of belonging and reminds me that there is a universal power that is manifest within.

There is a thin line between faith and spirituality and religion and ritual. I live in a state of contemplation that makes me a better and simpler human being. I consider amulets and lucky charms a way of showing  belief in God. I chant mantras but above everything else, i believe in keeping a clear conscience.

Certain experiences, good and bad, have made me feel being led by God. There is an escape route for everything.