RUNNING BEHIND HAPPINESS

Deep rest is the essence of sadhana. You have become so tired by doing something or the other all the time. Now just sit down for some time and to be with yourself. Do some meditation. When you meditate, you will start seeing a new world in front of you. You get deep rest is meditation. You get rest when you are content, and this rest is what gives rise to Happiness. 

Running behind happiness makes you tired. When you run behind happiness you get tired, but when you repose in the self, when you rest, you get energy, and that brings you strength, joy and happiness. So every once in a while, stop the rat race, and take some time out to be with yourself, and get some rest. This is what knowledge is and this is what spirituality is. 

Many time, in the name of sadhana also, we start engaging ourselves in some activity, and once again we get tired. I tell you, the physical body does not make you as tired as the mind does. Work doesn’t make you as tired as much as your desires. Nothing else makes you more tired than your own desires, or greed. So what is important is for you to become content. Again and again, be content. This is an art and this is what meditation is. True sadhana is to being calm, contented, and rested.

RAKSHA BANDHAN

This full moon is dedicated to the seers - the Rishis. It is also called the Raksha Bandhan. Bandhan means bondage, Raksha means protection. A bondage that protects you - your bondage to the Knowledge, to the Master, to the Truth, to the Self, all Save You. A rope can be tied to either protect or strangle you. The small mind and mundane things can strangle you. The big mind or knowledge saves you. Raksha Bandhan is that bondage that saves you. You are bound by your bondage to the Satsang. Your bondage to the Master, to the Truth, to the ancient Knowledge of the Rishis, and that is your saviour. Bandhan is bonding and bonding is essential in life. Let the bonding be divine in a life free from bondage.

HOW TO HANDLE EGO

If you find that there is ego, then let it be. Even ego belongs to the divine. Don’t try to surrender, don’t struggle. If you say that I have surrendered my ego, then it is bigger ego. It’s like saying, "I am the most humble person in this entire world!" That doesn’t show humility. Just be Natural. 

The more you grow in knowledge, you see that ego goes away. You know, around the seed there is a membrane. When you soak it in water, the seed bulges, sprouts and automatically the membrane breaks away. But if you try to peel the skin, the seed itself will break. Same way, when you soak yourself in knowledge, in devotion, in love, and in wisdom, you automatically find the ego going away.

Struggling in life

Lord Krishna says, “Think of Me even as you struggle or battle in life". 

When you give your 100% in anything that you do, then that is a battle. A battle does not always imply killing someone. A battle means, wherever you put all your efforts and everything at stake. So if life appears to be a struggle, then put in your 100%. But Lord Krishna says, “Do so by keeping Me in your mind at all times as you struggle. Surrender both your mind and your intellect to Me when you do this”.It means to surrender totally – both by feeling and by understanding (logic).
Some people do not apply any understanding but are driven greatly by feelings only. Some people are able to understand and interpret things correctly but there are no feelings or emotions in them. That is why Lord Krishna has said many times in the Bhagavad Gita, “Be connected to Me both by your feelings and by your intellect”.
Krishna says, “Surrender unto Me and accept Me totally – both at the level of emotions and the intellect. By doing so you will surely attain Me and there is no doubt about this. You will attain that steadiness and equanimity; you will awaken into that true Self that is Me. I do not reside somewhere distant away from you. I reside within you".

benefits of meditation

Benefits of Meditation


Take a few moments every day for doing nothing. It really brings a lot of energy and uplifts the spirit. I think this is what is needed today. Our brain is bombarded with so much information, and so we need to recharge from time to time. Isn't it so? So a few moments of conscious relaxation will make a difference.

There are two types of relaxation:
One is unconscious relaxation, which is absolutely essential, and which we do every single night; probably in the day time also. But there is a rest which is different from sleep, when we are conscious and still relaxing. That is what is meditation.
You must have heard about a research paper which has been published recently, that if someone meditates for two months, i.e., eight weeks, the structure of the brain changes; the grey matter increases.

So, there are many benefits of meditation:
It just gives you more alertness
It gives you a very relaxed and happy feeling from inside
It helps you create a stress-free and violence-free environment
It helps improve your communication with people
It boosts your immune system
See, the mind is very judgmental most of the time. And with these breathing exercises and relaxation, prejudice in the mind just disappears.

put in your effort and give up

In the field you throw so many seeds. Not all seeds sprout. Some sprout, some don’t. When you sow saplings, not every sapling grows. Some do, some don’t. In a tree, not all flowers become fruit. Some fall when they are not even ripe. That’s why you put your effort and then you give up (here meaning surrender).

Giving up without putting any effort is foolishness and after putting all your effort, not giving up is also foolishness. Put all your effort and give up. Not putting all your effort and giving up is also foolishness.

What makes you free? Putting your effort and giving up makes you free. If you say, 'I give up', without putting effort, it doesn’t make you free. You say, 'I give up', but you have not really given up because of that tendency of wanting to do. That will hold you back from being free. The secret of freedom is, put your effort and give up.
Not putting your effort and giving up doesn’t free you. And, putting all your effort and not giving up will also not free you.

Any action should only be done with awareness. An action from an unaware state has no meaning. Then it’s not called effort.

yoga-stilling the mind

Yoga: Stilling the mind
There is a new icebreaker in the international diplomatic circuit. The Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s call at the UN General Assembly for declaring an International Yoga Day has gained support from several quarters – many representatives from Congress and President Obama as well have shown keen interest in yoga.

From being an ancient spiritual pursuit for those seeking enlightenment, yoga has been absorbed into mainstream lifestyle by people from all cultures and backgrounds across the globe. And now it has also arrived in the global political arena. Good governance and administration require multi-faceted skills and yoga brings skill in action. In fact, it was called Raja Yoga because it was practiced by kings and princes in the ancient days.

Yoga became popular in the west as a solution to lose weight or as a physical exercise and people also found relief from many ills such as stress, anxiety, professional burnout, addictions and insomnia. In additions to its remedial properties, yoga is also a path to realize and harness your deepest potential.

It has a profound impact on multiple levels of our existence. While stretches and postures make the body supple, pranayama and meditation take the mind deep within. An unknown dimension opens up within our being that enriches the experience of life in many ways. There are several benefits of yoga – it enhances health, improves memory and concentration, sharpens the intellect, de-stresses the system and increases energy levels. It also unveils an intuitive ability within us which is much needed for creative pursuits and in overcoming obstacles like the writers’ block.

According to Maharishi Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, the oldest known text on the subject, yoga is freedom from all the distortions of the mind. If we observe the mind, we will realise that it is always engaged in one of five things

Seeking proof or answers
Forming conclusions
Imagining or fantasising
Remembering past events or memories
Dreaming
Yoga or union with the Higher Self happens when the mind is not engaged in any of the above. You usually identify with the activity in the mind. In the waking state, you are caught up in all that you see, smell, hear, touch, taste. If not, you return to sleep or to the state of dreaming where you are completely cut off from the world. None of these really give that deep rest that the system needs to totally recover from the stress that it gathers.

In the physical realm, it takes effort to get results. In the realm of the mind, what is needed is effortlessness. For instance, you cannot relax or go to sleep by putting effort; in fact, putting effort is counterproductive. It takes a certain kind of skill to become effortless. The ability to deeply relax renews your ability to be dynamic in action. Passion is like the in-breath but you cannot just breath in; you need to breath out as well and that is dispassion. Life becomes a harmony when we have all three – passion, dispassion and compassion.

Often one has to sacrifice personal freedom to some degree to observe discipline. But yoga is a discipline that opens the door to inner freedom, contradictory as it seems. With practice, you acquire the knack of switching between different modes of the mind, from engaging with the outside world to withdrawing from it and going within; between passion and dispassion. This skill of moving outward or inward at will makes you the master of your own mind, and when you win over the mind, you win over the world.