It is not the worship of a person that is crucial, but the steadiness and depth of your devotion to the task. Life itself is the Supreme Guru; be attentive to its lessons and obedient to its commands. When you personalize their source, you have an outer Guru; when you take them from life directly, the Guru is within.
-Nisargadatta Maharaj-
Sunday, January 21, 2007
Saturday, January 06, 2007
The two ways of being unhappy: not getting what you want, and getting what you want
It has been said: There are two ways of being unhappy: not getting what you want, and getting what you want.
When people attain what the world tells us is desirable — wealth, recognition, property, achievement — they’re still not happy, at least not for long. They’re not at peace with themselves. They don’t have a true sense of security, a sense of finally having arrived.
Their achievements have not provided them with what they were really looking for — hemselves. They have not given them the sense of being rooted in life, or as Jesus calls it, the fullness of life. The form of this moment is the portal into the formless dimension. It is the narrow gate that Jesus talks about that leads to life. Yes, it’s very narrow: it’s only this moment.
When people attain what the world tells us is desirable — wealth, recognition, property, achievement — they’re still not happy, at least not for long. They’re not at peace with themselves. They don’t have a true sense of security, a sense of finally having arrived.
Their achievements have not provided them with what they were really looking for — hemselves. They have not given them the sense of being rooted in life, or as Jesus calls it, the fullness of life. The form of this moment is the portal into the formless dimension. It is the narrow gate that Jesus talks about that leads to life. Yes, it’s very narrow: it’s only this moment.
To find it, you need to roll up the scroll of your life on which your story is written, past and future. Before there were books, there were scrolls, and you rolled them up when you were done with them.
So put your story away. It is not who you are. People usually live carrying a burden of past and future, a burden of their personal history, which they hope will fulfill itself in the future. It won’t, so roll up that old scroll. Be done with it.
You don’t solve problems by thinking; you create problems by thinking. The solution always appears when you step out of thinking and become still and absolutely present, even if only for a moment. Then, a little later when thought comes back, you suddenly have a creative insight that wasn’t there before.
Let go of excessive thinking and see how everything changes. Your relationships change because you don’t demand that the other person should do something for you to enhance your sense of self. You don’t compare yourself to others or try to be more than someone else to strengthen your sense of identity.
-Eckhart Tolle-
So put your story away. It is not who you are. People usually live carrying a burden of past and future, a burden of their personal history, which they hope will fulfill itself in the future. It won’t, so roll up that old scroll. Be done with it.
You don’t solve problems by thinking; you create problems by thinking. The solution always appears when you step out of thinking and become still and absolutely present, even if only for a moment. Then, a little later when thought comes back, you suddenly have a creative insight that wasn’t there before.
Let go of excessive thinking and see how everything changes. Your relationships change because you don’t demand that the other person should do something for you to enhance your sense of self. You don’t compare yourself to others or try to be more than someone else to strengthen your sense of identity.
-Eckhart Tolle-
What does it profit you if you gain the whole world and lose yourself?”
The voice in the head that never stops speaking becomes a civilization that is obsessed with form, and therefore knows nothing of the most important dimension of human existence: the sacred,the stillness,the formless,the divine.
“What does it profit you if you gain the whole world and lose yourself?”
-Eckhart Tolle-
“What does it profit you if you gain the whole world and lose yourself?”
-Eckhart Tolle-
Friday, January 05, 2007
An inspiring answer by Nisargadatta Maharaj!
Here's a question posed to Nisargadatta Maharaj. The questioner expresses his inability to do any sadhana. Maharaj instead of goading the questioner to develop will-power to do sadhana, gives a profound answer, which only a Jnani could have given.
Q: My mind is weak and vacillating. I have neither the strength nor the tenacity for sadhana. My case, is hopeless.
Nisargadatta Maharaj: In a way yours is a most hopeful case. There is an alternative to sadhana, which is trust. If you cannot have the conviction born from fruitful search, then take advantage of my discovery, which I am so eager to share with you. I can see with the utmost clarity that you have never been, nor are, nor will be estranged from realty, that you are the fullness of perfection here and now and that nothing can deprive you of your heritage, of what you are. You are in no way different from me, only you do not know it. You do not know what you are and therefore you imagine your self to be what you are not. Hence desires and fear and overwhelming despair. And meaningless activity in order to escape.
Just trust me and live by trusting me. I shall not mislead you. You are the Supreme Reality beyond the world and its creator, beyond consciousness and its witness, beyond all assertions and denials. Remember it, think of it, act on it. Abandon all sense of separation, see yourself in all and act accordingly. With action bliss will come and, with bliss, conviction. After all, you doubt yourself because you are in sorrow. Happiness, natural, spontaneous and lasting cannot be imagined. Either it is there, or it is not. Once you begin to experience the peace, love and happiness which need no outer causes, all your doubts will dissolve. Just catch hold of what I told you and live by it.
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