In Yoke

Existence is a strange bargain. Life owes us little; we owe it everything. The only true happiness comes from squandering ourselves for a purpose. -William Cowper We often think that if we go after what we want, we will probably get it; then we will be happy and secure. The mass media have latched onto this line of thinking and intone it like a litany: grab, grab, grab! Yet sooner or later the whole smorgasbord of things begins to lose its luster. Then the sensitive person asks, "If I go on grabbing and grabbing, at what point do I become secure and feel no more need to grab?" This question can lead to some far-reaching changes in our lives. Our needs are much too big to be satisfied with things, no matter how many we can manage to acquire. The more we try to get, the more acutely we feel those bigger, undeniable needs. Our deepest need is for the joy that comes with loving and being loved, with knowing we are of genuine use to others. The more we give of ourselves to others,...

A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger~ Proverbs 15:1 In the past few years there was a movie with Jack Nicholson as a therapist who helped folks with their anger issues by provoking them to be more angry, and then using that as an object lesson. Actually, in real life--not the life portrayed by movies, our inner life is the "controller" of our own anger issues. When you feel angry towards someone and want to say something unkind(or for me--the response is usually sarcastic ), that is all the more reason to speak kindly. If someone provokes you and you respond with anger, you are reinforcing anger as a part of your personality. Through much life experience, I know this to be true, always. Our best response to angry behavior is to relaize that by controlling our anger, we are benefitting ourselves. So returning kindness for unkindness is not simply being kind to that particular person. You're being kinder to yourself, because you are undoing a co...

He insulted me, he cheated me, he beat me, he robbed me - those who are free of resentful thoughts surely find peace. -The Buddha Resentment is nothing more than compulsive attachment to a set of memories. If you could peek through the window of the mind when you feel resentful, you would see a production line turning out the same emotion-charged memory over and over: "He did that to me in 1993, he did that to me in 1993 . . ." You are dwelling on something that took place in the past - or, more likely, on how you misunderstood that event and reacted to your misunderstanding. When you keep pumping attention into an event in this way, a limp little memory gets blown up into a big balloon of hostility. When you withdraw your attention by repeating the mantram , the balloon is deflated. It's as simple as that. ~ Sri Easwaran I am definitely synchronous with Sri Easwaran's position, in that my own personal mantra is the Jesus Prayer: "Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy...

On the one hand I felt the call of God; on the other, I continued to follow the world. All the things of God gave me great pleasure, but I was held captive by those of the world. I might have been said to be trying to reconcile these two extremes, to bring contraries together: the spiritual life on the one hand and worldly satisfactions,pleasures, and pastimes on the other. ----Saint Teresa of Avila Saint Teresa of Avila was a remarkably spiritual woman. Even as a girl she could say passionately, "I want something that will last forever!" Yet this woman who was to become one of the world's greatest mystics went through twenty years of doubt and struggle before becoming "established" in God. If Teresa took twenty years, can people like you and me think of doing it in less? Her words can inspire all of us, for everyone begins with d...

Each of us sees the Unseen in proportion to the clarity of our heart, and that depends upon how much we have polished it. Whoever has polished it more sees more - more Unseen forms become manifest. -Jalaluddin Rumi As your meditation deepens, there will still be occasions when you get upset, but you will be able to watch what goes on in the lab of your mind. It's like getting into a glass-bottomed boat, where you venture out onto the ocean and watch all the deep-sea creatures lurking beneath the surface: resentment sharks, stingrays of greed, scurrying schools of fear. You slowly gain a certain amount of detachment from your mind, so you can observe what is going on, collect data, and then set things right. Some of the chronic problems that millions of people suffer from today might be solved by gaining a little detachment from their minds and emotions, so they can stand back a little when the mind is agitated and see the ways in which it makes mountains out of mole...

"Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love." -Martin Luther King ________________________________________________ "Hostility is like an infectious   disease. Whenever we indulge in a violent act or even in hostile words, we are passing this disease on to those around us. When we quarrel at home, it is not just a domestic problem; we are contributing to turmoil everywhere."- A teacher of meditation in ancient India, Patanjali , wrote that in the presence of a man or woman in whom all hostility has died, others cannot be hostile. In the presence of a man or woman in whom all fear has died, no one can be afraid. This is the power released in true nonviolence, as we can see in the life of Mahatma Gandhi. Because all hostility had died in his heart, he was a profound force for peace.---   Eswaran I have struggled with this concept for my whole life, and only now , as I app...

From Eswaran: "If we could interview a negative tendency, say, Resentment , it might say, "I don't worry! I've been living safely in this fellow's mind for years. He takes good care of me - feeds me, dwells on me, brings me out and parades me around! All I have to do is roar and stir things up from time to time. Yes, I'm getting fat and feeling grand. And I'm proud to tell you there are even a few little rancors and vituperations running around now, spawned by yours truly!" So he may think. But when you repeat the mantram, (and practice presence and detachment with self remembering and mindfulness) you are prying him loose. You are saying, in a way that goes beyond vows and good intentions, that resentment is not part of the real you. You no longer acknowledge its right to exist. We use something genuine to drive out impostors that have roamed about largely through our neglect and helplessness.We move closer and closer to our divine Self, because thes...