Life 36 (May 20 - Sep 20)

[winston]

Making Meditation a Habit

We have to realize that for the last twenty, thirty years, we have cultivated many habits which promoted distractions and when we meditate we go against all these habits.

It is going to take some time before we dissolve the power of these tendencies.

—Martine Batchelor, “The Ten Oxherding Pictures”

[winston]

How can we become steady in wisdom?

According to the Scriptures, the true characteristics of a person of steady wisdom, is that he will be free from all desire and stable in the knowledge and awareness of the Atma (Inner-Self) only.

Now, there are two processes in this:
1. To give up all the promptings of desire in the mind is the negative process;
2. To implant ever-present joy therein is the positive aspect.

The negative process is to remove all the seedlings of wrong and evil from the mind; the positive process is to grow, in the field thus cleansed, the crop of attachment to the Divine.

The plucking of the weeds is the negative stage; the cultivation of the crop you need is the positive stage.

The weeds are pleasures that the senses draw from the objective world; the crop is attachment to the Divine.

The mind is a bundle of wishes, and, unless these wishes are removed by their roots, there is no hope of destroying the mind, which is a great obstacle in the path of spiritual progress.

- Gita Vahini, Ch 5.

Everyone should cultivate a spirit of sacrifice, that grows with you, as you grow older.

Source: radiosai.org

[winston]

Opening Through Prayer

Through prayer, we come out of the mine shaft, open our eyes, become receptive to enlightened presence, the omnipotent love and compassion, that exist for all beings.

—Chagdud Tulku

[winston]

What is the sure means to dissolve this ego-sense?

People must be happy that the Divine has placed around them, newer and newer materials for serving Him and gets the worship of Him done in various forms.

People must pray for newer and newer opportunities and exult in the chance that their hands receive.

This attitude gives immeasurable joy. To lead a life suffused with this joy is indeed bliss.

Whatever is done from sunrise to sunset must be consecrated, as if it is the worship of the Divine.

Just as care is taken to pluck only fresh flowers and to keep them clean and unfaded, so too, ceaseless effort should be made to do deeds that are pure and unsullied.

If this vision is kept before the mind’s eye every day and life is lived accordingly, then it becomes one long unbroken service of the Divine.

The feeling of ‘I’ and ‘You’ will soon disappear; all trace of self will be destroyed.

Life then transmutes itself into a veritable devotion to the Divine.

- Prema Vahini, Ch 8.

Assign to your mind the task of serving the Divine and it will grow tame.

Source: radiosai.org

[winston]

The Way to Enlightenment

To study the way of enlightenment is to study the self.

To study the self is to forget the self.

To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things.

— Eihei Dogen Zenji, “Tea and Rice”

[winston]

How should we fill the time given to us in a day?

The unceasing toil of each succeeding day, has as its aim and justification this consummation: to make one’s last days sweet and pleasant.

But each day also has its evening.

If the day is spent in good deeds, then the evening blesses us with deep, invigorating and refreshing sleep, the sleep about which it is said that it is akin to samadhi.

One has only a short span of life on earth. But even in this short life, one can attain divine bliss by wisely and carefully using the time.

Two people, in appearance the same, ostensibly of the same mould, grow under the same conditions but one turns out to be an angel while the other stays on with their animal nature.

What’s the reason for this differential development? Habits, behaviour formed out of these habits, and the character into which that behaviour has solidified.

People are creatures of character.

- Prema Vahini, Ch 5.

First weed out the evil thoughts and bad habits. Second, cultivate good habits.

Source: radiosai.org

[winston]

Achieving a Moment of Breakthrough

Enlightenment is initially subconscious awakening, which is spontaneously merged with conscious awakening, at the moment of breakthrough.

—Kazuaki Tanahashi, “Fundamentals of Dogen’s Thoughts”

[winston]

How should we conquer our mind?

The mind is made of the warp and woof of wishes. So the first thing to be conquered, is the demon of desire.

For this, it is unnecessary to wage a huge war. It is also unnecessary to use pleasing words to persuade the desire to disappear.

Desires will not disappear for fear of the one or for favour of the other.

Desires are objective; they belong to the category of the “seen”. With the conviction that “I am the see-er only, not the seen”, the steady-minded one releases oneself from attachment.

By this means, desire is conquered.

You must watch the working of the mind from outside it; do not get involved in it. That is the meaning of this discipline.

The faculty of the mind is like a strong current of electricity. It has to be watched from a distance and not be contacted or touched.

Touch the current, and you are reduced to ashes. So too, contact and attachment give the mind the chance to ruin you. The farther you are from it, the better.

By skillful methods, you have to make the best use of it for your own welfare.

- Gita Vahini, Ch 5.

It is only when the worldly attachments are expelled from the heart that there will be room for real love to abide in it and to grow.

Source: radiosai.org

[winston]

Healing Through Compassion

The gateway to compassion and lovingkindness, is to be able to feel our own pain and the pain of others.

If we are able to open in this way, our hearts can melt, and the healing salve of compassion can anoint all our wounds.

— Palden Drolma, “The Gateway to Compassion”

[winston]

Will recognising the Inner-Self (Atma) make us inactive and disinclined towards duties?

All are in you; you are in all.

You have to get this conviction fixed in your consciousness by means of analysis, discrimination, and intellectual exploration.

You have to isolate and dismiss from the consciousness the impressions of the senses, mind, intelligence, etc.

These have nothing to do with the Inner-Self (Atma), which you really are.

The Inner-Self (Atma) is unaffected by any subject or object. Even if the senses, mind, intellect, etc. are inactive, that inactivity will not affect the Inner-Self (Atma).

To know the Inner-Self (Atma) as such an entity, unaffected and unattached, is the secret of spiritual wisdom.

Every single act of yours must be carried out with this wisdom as its background. That awareness of the Inner-Self (Atma) will guide you in both the out-moving and in-drawing paths;

It will not block action but fill it with purpose and meaning; it will build up faith and moral life;

It will take you to the realm of deliverance along the road of renunciation of the fruit of action, and not renunciation of action itself.

- Gita Vahini, Ch 6.

The Principle of Love is present in everyone in the form of Inner-Self (Atma). The Inner-Self (Atma) is infinite and eternal.

Source: radiosai.org