Switch Off!

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When everything is falling apart around us as and we feel like we are living in hell:

-as situations are turning ugly and to our disadvantage as they are not as per our expectations and requirements

-or we are highly stressed out, anxious, worried, angry, sad, or depressed

-or we have pain, poor health or sickness in our body

We could or should:

-indulge in low stress activities like light exercises, walking, cycling, swimming, games, hobbies like reading, writing, drawing, painting, singing, dancing or being and playing with our pets.

– switch off from the state of ‘Ego’ that we are in and move into the state of ‘Awareness’ or deeper into the state of ‘Being’

This will help our early recovery to our normal balanced state and make us feel once again that we are living in heaven!

Doing Exercises and indulging in Hobbies are easily understood and accepted by most of us! Switching off to a state of ‘Awareness’ is not that readily understood and therefore not yet accepted by most of us! However, ‘Awareness’ is the most powerful of our states in which we can conduct creative and artistic intellectual and physical activity for the benefit of others as well as our own self!

The key is to become aware and this aspect of our living is well covered in this blog www.livelifefully.in. Learn, experience and understand the simple way of moving into a state of ‘Awareness’ from the state of ‘Ego’.

A deeper, but a state of intellectual and physical inactivity, is the state of ‘Being’, a beautiful state of just being! When we just are! This is a very powerful regenerative state when the Savior within us is awakened!

Incidentally, we switch off every night when we go to sleep effortlessly. We not only enter the state of ‘Awareness’ but go deeper into the state of ‘Being’ and then into our ‘Un-manifested’ state! So, none of us can really say that we are not capable of going into the ‘Awareness’ state or the state of ‘Being’ in the waking hours as most of us are doing this every night when we go to sleep!

Good Health-the essence of living life fully

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One of the most profound conclusions I have reached is that health is a choice; virtually no one ever has to be sick – Raymond Francis, M.Sc. in his book ‘Never be sick again’ * 070318

                                                                               ID-10035210

The foremost attitude for good health is being in harmony with the present moment situation. This implies fully accepting the present moment situation including our body’s health as it is now! If we are not in harmony, then we are gripped by negative emotions like fear, anxiety, worry and this results in stress! Stress then gives rise to negative thoughts in our Intellect which affect and hamper the natural capabilities of our body to maintain our  health!

The reality is that good health is not within the realm of control of our Intellect or Ego. Good health happens to each one of us and it is caused by The Totality. But our Intellect and Ego can contribute to improving our health by dropping the ideas like, I will never get well or the disease I have is incurable! Miracles do happen and cures do take place of dreaded diseases like diabetes, cancer, high blood pressure, arthritis etc., classified incurable by the Allopathic stream of Medicine.

Good health can be helped by getting good and adequate sleep every night. According to Dr. Joseph Murphy we are spiritually recharged during sleep! He states that adequate sleep is essential to (also) produce joy and vitality in life! About 8-10 hours of sleep every night are required for the body to help cure itself.

Sleep happens when we are tired and when our Conscious Intellect lets go of everything in order to sleep well. When we are in deep sleep, we do not even know that we exist! This state of non existence is what invigorates and  regenerates our body and Intellect!

Likewise, during the day we also need to be capable of invigorating and regenerating ourselves too! This is done by proper and regular Meditation which should also become part of our daily routine. In meditation, however, we have to let go consciously and this process also has a great balancing effect on our life and health!

Be aware that our body, while it is in the womb till it is a small child, is an expression of our Subconscious Intellect or The Totality. As soon as the child’s Ego (conscious intellect) develops then the body follows the beliefs and dictates of the Conscious Intellect. Whatever thoughts and emotions the Ego has, they get reflected in the body. Bad health can also originate in our Ego as a result of our thoughts, emotions and stress levels. If we think that we will be sick if our head is wet for long, our Intellect will oblige and make us sick! Therefore it is very important to consciously think that we are healthy and then the Infinite Wisdom in our subconscious intellect will keep us in the best state of health and fitness. By thinking correctly and positively, we can try and reduce or eliminate numerous diseases like diabetes, arthritis, hypertension, angina, cancer etc., some of which are known to be non curable!

Emotions like anger, anxiety, worry, fear, jealousy, hatred, guilt, sadness, depression, actually injure our body from within! It is like taking a stick and beating our own body with it! Awareness of our thoughts and emotions will help us to lower or eliminate the impact of the internal injuries we are causing to our own body and help us to manage our health better!*

Our thoughts, emotions and stress levels are lowest when we move from our default ‘Ego’ state to a state of ‘Awareness and Acceptance’ of the present moment including acceptance of our Ego, as it is now. We know we are in the state of ‘Awareness’ if our body remains relaxed, whereas in the state of ‘Ego’ our body remains tense as it either ready to fight or to take flight away from the prevailing situations!

Further, we can fuel our Body & Intellect by doing daily deep breathing exercises, also called Spiritual breathing in Brahmavidya or Pranayams in Yoga. Most of us are doing shallow breathing and not even using 10% of the capacity of our lungs! Deep breathing increases the oxygen availability in our lungs which helps purify our blood, improving our health and immunity, and making us feel good and refreshed most of the time.

Yoga and stretching exercises help build flexibility in the body and prevents pain from accumulating in any part of the body. Start yoga and exercises at our own comfort level and not as per the set levels of the Trainer or Physiotherapist to avoid injury to our body. With time the comfort level will increase. Accordingly, the extent and complexity of yoga and exercises can be increased to a higher level.

Similarly, Aerobic exercises like walking, jogging, swimming, cycling, weight lifting, (to build cardiac strength and our bodies) should begin at our present comfort level!

Exposing the body daily, for 15 to 30 mins, to morning sunshine is very necessary to have strong bones and lower joint pains. One can do this easily by doing our aerobic exercises like walking, swimming etc outdoors where there is adequate sunshine. When exercises are not possible, at least sitting daily in a bright, sunny area is very desirable!

Eating plenty of raw fruits, sprouts and drinking vegetable juices help build and retain immunity in the body. Fried, packaged, processed foods, which have long shelf life, have to be avoided as they lower the immunity of our body! Having three good meals a day, chewing and masticating well, taking 20 to 30 minutes for every meal, will help us in not overeating and overloading our digestive system!

Dieters, who cut down on the quantity of food that they eat, have to be careful that they do not get headaches due to low blood sugar, other eating disorders and health problems!

Having a belly is considered as a sign of prosperity in some countries like India! Make no mistake about this! It is clearly a sign of inflammation in the intestines due to eating incorrect foods that disturb our Gut Flora!

A very good book to read and follow for good eating and health is 21 – Day Tummy written by best selling author Liz Vaccareillo, editor-in-chief and chief content officer of Reader’s Digest. In a matter of a few days we can revitalise our immune system, improve our physical energy levels, reduce our belly fat, eliminate digestive disorders like heartburn, acid reflux, gas, bloating, constipation, cramps, diarrhea as well as irritable bowel syndrome.

Doing creative activities like having a hobby or two or more brings out our passion as well as good health. Indulging in hobbies is stress free or very low stress activity resulting in good health. This will balance our working life which can be very stressful and unhealthy at times because of achieving targets and expectations set by others as well by our own Ego!

Excerpts from ‘The Biology of Belief’ by Bruce H. Lipton Ph.D. 

  • A cell’s life is controlled by the physical and energetic environment and not by its genes. Genes are simply molecular blueprints used in the construction of cells, tissues, and organs. The environment serves as a ‘contractor’ who reads and engages those genetic blueprints and is ultimately responsible for the character of a cell’s life. It is a single cell’s ‘awareness’ of the environment, not its genes, that sets into motion the mechanisms of life.
  • My new understanding of the nature of life not only corroborated my stem cell research but also, I realized, contradicted another belief of mainstream science that I had been propounding to my students– the belief that allopathic medicine is the only kind of medicine that merits consideration in medical school. By finally giving the energy-based environment its due, it provided for a grand convergence uniting science and practice of allopathic medicine, complementary medicine, and the spiritual wisdom of ancient and modern faiths.
  • I was exhilarated by the new realisation that I could change the character of my life by changing my beliefs.
  • Signal transduction science recognises that the fate and behaviour of an organism is directly linked to its perception of the environment.
  • This new awareness reveals that our genes are constantly being remodelled in response to our life experiences.
  • Understanding on a scientific level how cells respond to your thoughts and perceptions illuminates the path to personal empowerment.
  • We are not victim of our genes, but masters of our fates, able to create lives overflowing with peace, happiness, and love.
  • Positive thoughts have a profound effect on behaviour and genes but only when they are in harmony with subconscious programming.
  • The science of epigenetics, which literally means ‘control above genetics,’ profoundly changes our understanding of how life is controlled. In the last decade, epigenetic research has established that DNA blueprints passed down through genes are not set in concrete at birth. Genes are not destiny! Environmental influences, including nutrition, stress, and emotions, can modify these genes without changing their basic blueprint. And those modifications, epigeneticists have discovered, can be passed on to future generations as surely as DNA blueprints are passed on via the double helix.
  • In contrast to conventional wisdom, genes do not control their own activity. Instead it is the membrane’s effector proteins, operating in response to environmental signals picked up by the membrane’s receptors, which control the ‘reading’ of genes so that worn-out proteins can be replaced or new proteins can be created.
  • The cell’s operations are primarily moulded by its interaction with the environment, not by its genetic code.
  • Genes cannot pre-program a cell or organism’s life because cell survival depends on the ability to dynamically adjust to an ever-changing environment.
  • The membrane’s function of interacting ‘intelligently’ with the environment to produce behaviour makes it the true brain of the cell.
  • To exhibit ‘intelligent’ behaviour, cells need a functioning membrane with both receptor (awareness) and effector (action) proteins. These protein complexes are the fundamental units of cellular intelligence.
  • In multicellular communities, there is a division of labor. That division of labor is evident in the tissues and organs that carry out specialised functions.
  • There is enough scientific evidence to suspect that we can tailor a waveform as a therapeutic agent in much the same way we now modulate chemical structures with drugs….Neuroscientists are conducting exciting new research in the area of vibrational energy therapies.
  • All organisms, including humans, communicate and read their environment by evaluating energy fields. Because humans are so dependent on spoken and written language, we have neglected our energy sensing communication system. As with any biological function, a lack of use leads to atrophy.
  • It was harder to get rid of the energy-draining defeatist thinking in which I habitually engaged. Thoughts consume energy as surely as does marathon running
  • Thoughts, the mind’s energy, directly influence how the physical brain controls the body’s physiology. Thought ‘energy’ can activate or inhibit the cell’s function-producing proteins via the mechanics of constructive and destructive interference.
  • The fact is that harnessing the power of your mind can be more effective than the drugs you have been programmed to believe you need.
  • I do not believe that simply thinking positive thoughts always leads to physical cures
  • It is important for our health and well-being to shift our mind’s energy toward positive, life-generating thoughts and eliminate ever-present, energy-draining, and debilitating negative thoughts.
  • What those positive-thinking dropouts haven’t understood that the seemingly ‘separate’ subdivisions of the mind, the conscious and the subconscious are interdependent. The conscious mind is the creative one, the one that can conjure up ‘positive thoughts’. In contrast, the subconscious mind is a repository of stimulus-response tapes derived from instincts and learned experiences. The subconscious mind is strictly habitual; it will play the same behavioural responses to life’s signals over and over again, much to our chagrin.
  • When it comes to sheer neurological processing abilities, the subconscious mind is millions of times more powerful than the conscious mind. If the desires of the conscious mind conflict with the programs in the subconscious mind, which ‘mind’ do you think will win out? You can repeat the positive affirmation that you are lovable over and over or that your cancer tumor will shrink. But if, as a child. you heard over and over that you are worthless and sickly, those messages programmed in your subconscious mind will undermine your best conscious efforts to change your life (or health).
  • The mind can affect the body…Some people get better when they believe (falsely) they are getting medicine. When patients get better by ingesting a sugar pill, medicine defines it as the placebo effect. * 190717
  • I call it the belief effect to stress that our perceptions, whether they are accurate or inaccurate, equally impact our behaviour and our bodies. *
  • I believe that medical education should train doctors to recognise the power of our internal resources. Doctors should not dismiss the power of the mind as something inferior to the power of chemicals and the scalpel. *
  • If researchers could figure out how to leverage the placebo effect, they would hand doctors an efficient, energy-based, side effect-free tool to treat disease. *
  • The groups who received surgery, as expected, improved. But the placebo (fake surgery) group improved just as much as the other two groups (with two different types of surgery). *
  • In this world anything is possible when you put your mind to it. I know that your mind can work miracles. * 190717
  • You can filter your life with rose-coloured beliefs that will help your body grow or you can see a dark filter that turns everything black and makes your body/mind more susceptible to disease. You can live a life of fear or live a life of love. You have the choice! But I can tell you that if you choose to see a world full of love, your body will respond by growing in health. If you choose to believe that you live in a dark world full of fear, your body’s health will be compromised as you physiologically close yourself down in a protection response.   200717
  • …Survival mechanisms…can be roughly divided into two functional categories: growth and protection. * 220717
  • Gravitating to a life-sustaining signal, such as nutrients, characterises a growth response; moving away from threatening signals, such as toxins, characterises a protection response.* 220717
  • Humans unavoidably restrict their growth behaviours when they shift into a protective mode. * 220717
  • Growth processes require an open exchange between an organism and its environment. For example, food is taken in and waste products are excreted. However, protection requires a closing down of the system to wall the organism off from the perceived threat. *220717
  • Inhibiting growth processes is also debilitating in that growth is a process that not only expends energy but is also required to produce energy. * 220717
  • To fully thrive, we must not only eliminate the stressors but also actively seek joyful, loving, fulfilling lives that stimulate growth processes. * 210717
  • In multicellular organisms, growth/protection behaviours are controlled by the nervous system. * 240717
  • The body is actually endowed with two separate protection systems, each vital to maintenance of life. The first is the system that mobilises protection against external threats. It is called the HPA Axis…….When the brain’s hypothalamus perceives an external threat, it engages the HPA axis by sending a signal to the pituitary gland, the ‘Master Gland’ which is responsible for organising the fifty trillion cells of the community to deal with the impending threat. * 240717
  • The pituitary gland sends a signal to the adrenal glands, informing them of the need to co-ordinate the body’s ‘fight or flight’ response. * 240717
  • Once the adrenal alarm is sounded, the stress hormones released into the blood contract the blood vessels of the digestive tract, forcing the energy-producing blood to preferentially nourish the tissues of the arms and legs that enable us to get out of harm’s way. * 240717
  • The visceral organs stop doing their life sustaining work of digestion, absorption, excretion, and other functions that provide for growth of the cells and the production of the body’s energy reserves. * 240717
  • The body’s second protection system is the immune system, which protects us from threats originating under the skin, such as those caused by bacteria and viruses………the adrenal hormones directly repress the action of the immune system to conserve energy reserves…….it interferes with our ability to fight disease…..(also results in) diminished conscious awareness and reduced intelligence. * 240717
  • Our hyper-vigilant lifestyle is severely impacting the health of our bodies. Our daily stressors are constantly activating the HPA axis, priming our bodies for action. Unlike competitive athletes, the stresses in our bodies are not released from the pressures generated by our chronic fears and concerns. Almost every major illness that people acquire has been linked to chronic stress. * 260717
  • Depression is caused when the brain’s stress machinery goes into overdrive. * 260717
  • When you are in that much pain and you’re in an unfamiliar setting, you wind up trying things you would never consider in your cushier moments. * 010817
  • When your conscious mind has a belief that is in conflict with a formerly learned ‘truth’ stored in the subconscious mind, the intellectual conflict expresses itself as a weakening of body’s muscles.  010817
  • More shocking was the fact that this hidden mind, the mind I knew little about (except theoretically in psychology) was actually more powerful than my conscious mind, just as Freud had claimed……My conscious mind was awhirl over the implications of the superior power of my formerly hidden subconscious mind.  010817
  • Thoughts could propel behaviour more efficiently than physical molecules. * 010817
  • The lower an organism is on the Tree of Evolution, the less developed its nervous system and thus the more it relies on programmed behaviour (nature).
  • Organisms higher in the Tree have more complexly integrated nervous systems headed by a bigger and bigger brains that allow them to acquire intricate behavioural patterns through experiential learning (nurture). The complexity of this environmental learning mechanism presumably culminates with humans, who are at the top, or atleast near the top, of the Tree. * 010817
  • Human intelligence can only be fully understood when we include spirit (‘energy’) or what quantum physics-savvy psychologists call the ‘superconscious’ mind. * 010817

Good health is maintained when we find joy and peace within, which is dependent on our accepting the present moment situation fully as it is now! – Gul Malani 

Our Ego’s non acceptance of the present moment and fear of the future can cause health problems starting from minor headaches to major illnesses like Cancer – The Totality 

Our Ego causes fear and stress within us when we do not fully and unconditionally accept the present moments as they are now. This can lower our body’s immunity resulting in poor health – The Totality *

‘I am not feeling well’ is a reflection of our not thinking well!– from teachings of Brahmavidya

A strong belief is necessary that The Universal Subconscious Intellect or Totality, which has Infinite Knowledge, is fully capable of keeping us in Good health and delivering to us what we desire! – Gul Malani *

I would not die before death actually came. I would value each day and each moment for the precious gifts within – Neelam Kumar from her book ‘To Cancer with love’ *

I also cherish and take confidence in knowing that the body is designed to heal itself…..The body wants to heal, and every cell carries extraordinary intelligence and fortitude. While we all sometimes need outside help and direction, healing is an inside job – Donna Eden*

Brahmavidya, an art of spiritual breathing and meditation, not only cleans our Blood but it also cleans our Intellect of all the impurities our Ego is dumping into it -The Totality *

We truly detoxify our body when we become aware of our Ego’s thoughts, feelings, emotions and actions and when we fully accept the present moment as it is now – The Totality

Healing doesn’t come from outside. All that medicine can do is to help the body bring its own healing force into action…..Health cannot be forced from outside, it is your energy flowering. – Osho ‘Buddha, his life and teachings’ *

Being one with The Totality (Emptiness) regenerates and strengthens the body while being our Ego (filled with thoughts) weakens our body –The Totality *

When our Ego stops reacting to internal and external situations, then our body regains it’s best health and gives out it’s best performance – The Totality

Our Ego’s commonsense says that we should be concerned about our health in order to make the necessary effort to improve it. The fact of the matter is that even our own health is not in our Ego’s hands. It is in the hands of The Totality! Instead, let our Intellect become peaceful by accepting our health as it is now, with gratitude This will allow our body’s internal pharmacy and other capabilities to become productive and bring our health back to the best level possible now. –The Totality *

While our body is capable of maintaining reasonably good health, the main culprit that disturbs this balance or this capability  is our Ego. Ego can create situations of lowering the immunity of our body resulting in minor health issues like headaches, colds etc as well as difficult to handle situations like cancer. By becoming aware of our Ego, its thoughts and reactions, we can reduce its negative impact on our body’s health! – The Totality * 

We can rejuvenate our Intellect & Body by being in the present moment, when our Ego dissolves and we are one with The Totality – The Totality *

Sometimes, all that is necessary to heal another person is just to love them at the spiritual level. You connect to the loving essence of the ill person, allow them to heal by their own recognition that they are loved, and enable them to realise that love is an important factor in their healing. – Carnelian Sage, in her book ‘The Greatest Manifestation Principle in the World’ *?

Good health depends on good digestion, so eat the fruits and foods that our body can digest easily and in quantities that are also easily digested – Atul Bhole, Ayurveda, Pune*

An underfed body heals quicker than an overfed body – The Totality *

If we overeat or eat food that we cannot digest easily, then the food gets converted into Toxins, leading to poor health and diseases. So, eat less than feeling full; that is, only 75% of your requirement and food we can easily digest. Then, enjoy good health free of doctors and medications. – Dr. Arti Supekar, Ayurveda *        050717

Pharmaceutical drugs suppress the body’s symptoms but most never address the cause of the problem…..We are now more educated to the dangers of drugs and more open to alternative therapies….But even today very little scientific rigor has been marshaled to assess the effectiveness of complementary medicine.- Dr. Bruce H. Lipton Ph.D. *             120717

Become aware of our perceived threats besides being aware of real threats. We will notice that perceived threats occur much more often than real threats which seldom happen. Threats, whether perceived or real, shut down our Immune system and our physiological growth processes leading to disease. By become aware and thereby automatically eliminating perceived threats, we will live a healthier life! – The Totality * 250717

Our body is strongest and healthiest when our Intellect is The Infinite Emptiness state and weakest when our Intellect is in the Ego state. – The Totality * 161017

Experience reveals that our body manufactures and delivers the necessary drugs and chemicals to cure itself only when the blood requirement of our digestive organs reduce or the digestive process is nearly complete. So, to maintain good health eat 25 to 30 % less, than feeling full at every meal, eat at periodic intervals and not throughout the day. Eat early at night, preferably around sunset; eat very light so that digestion process is over soonest and the body gets most of the sleep time to manufacture and release the required drugs and chemicals to regain or maintain it’s normal good health. – The Totality  050118

There are five important indicators of good health. First is good sleep as the body repairs itself during sleep. Second is good Energy level, third is good Appetite, fourth is good Digestion and fifth is quick Recovery from sickness. – Dr. Shonali Bijlani M.D. 081218

Quiz

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3806653_origThis quiz is to inspire and motivate all of us to learn, acquire relevant knowledge quickly, experience, understand and assimilate the acquired knowledge so as to start living life fully without any further delay!

1. Where can we find peace or bliss?

 A. On a lonely island

B. Within our own self beyond/underneath our Ego

C. Up in the mountains, valleys & lakes

D. In acquiring more worldly possessions

E. Others (please specify). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

2. What is the key to unlocking our life’s full potential?

A. Good knowledge of Scriptures of Vedanta

B. A strong connection with God

C. Having a true Guru (teacher)

D. Being aware of our thoughts, desires or expectations, emotions and actions

E. Others (please specify) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

3. Who or what creates all the problems for us?

A. The desires or expectations of our own Ego

B. Other persons; one of our parent, friend, associate or colleague, teacher, religious leader, politician etc.

C. Our own past karmas

D. God who is testing us

E. Others (please specify) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

4. How should we manage our Ego?

A. We should strive to change it

B. We should try to control it

C. We should ignore it

D. We should accept it and as often as we can disable it by being in the present moment

E. Others (please specify). . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . .. .. . .

5. We can avoid having ups and downs in life if we:

A. Are devoted and pray regularly to God

B. Visit temples, churches, mosques or other holy places regularly

C. It is not possible to have no ups and downs in life. We just have to accept them and move on

D. Serve others by way of financial or other help

E. Others (please specify) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

6. Are all humans the same?

A. Yes, underneath and beyond our Ego we are all the same

B. No, we are all different based on our family background, education, social and economic class

C. No, even the Hindu Caste system says that there are four classes of people; Priests, Warriors, Business people and people who serve

D. No, even members of the same family are not the same

E. Others (please specify). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

7. Does every situation (effect) have a single cause?

A. Yes, this cause can be something we or others have done in this lifetime or in our previous lifetime

B. Yes, there can be no effect without a cause

C. No, multiple causes, many unknown to us, have to occur before any situation (effect) develops. It is complicated to understand all the causes as they are much beyond the capacity of the human mind to understand

D. Action & reaction are equal and opposite so, every cause has its effect

E. Others (please specify). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

8. Do we have to follow the traditions and rituals of the family & society?

A. The choice has to be with each one of us. We have to become aware that we have been conditioned for these traditions & rituals and we should question then and not blindly follow them

B. Yes, we should follow, it makes the family happy and comfortable as well as it binds the family together

C. These are family traditions and it will convey a lot of disrespect to our elders if we do not follow them

D. If we do not follow religious traditions, a lot of evil may befall on our family

E. Others (please specify). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

9. Is the love we are giving to any other person unconditional?

A. Yes, mother to the child and vice versa

B. Yes, when we are truly in the present moment

C. Yes, between good friends or lovers who are willing to do anything for each other at any time

D. No, as love is an emotion of our Ego, it is always self centered and conditional

E. Others (please specify). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

10. Where and how can we find our ultimate Teacher (Guru)?

A. The Guru will find us when we are ready, from the Ashrams, or Spiritual & Religious Organisations available all over the world

B. Amongst the numerous authors of Inspirational & Spiritual Books or the Book itself

C. From the recommendation of a parent or a friend

D. Within our own self

E. Others (please specify). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

A selection to the above quiz has been created by the compiler and can be found at the bottom of the previous post titled ‘Guru’

Guru

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Guru means a teacher who dispels darkness and brings us into light!

It has become very fashionable nowadays to have a Guru, and we are proud to state that we have a Guru and have been given a Mantra (a holy phrase or name of a God) for daily chanting by our Guru. Just like getting a Doctor or a Lawyer to manage our health and our affairs, we get a Guru to get us happiness and salvation too!

Once again we have tied our happiness to an external situation of having a Guru, just like we think we will be happy when we acquire external objects like a home, car, better job etc.!

While Guru can be a starting point to understand where our happiness comes from, very soon we have to understand that happiness and peace come from within! By learning and reciting from memory the Four Vedas, Bhagavad Gita, Quran, Bible or other sacred Scriptures we will not get happiness. Instead, our Ego gets further strengthened by this newly acquired knowledge! A strong Ego seldom is happy!

Therefore, as early as possible, we have to discover the Guru within us; awaken the Buddha within us! This means that all external knowledge, we acquire, has to be processed within our Intellect, experienced and distilled to a purity wherein the life’s puzzle is clearly understood!

The Guru, within us alone, will let us discover the lasting peace and happiness which has always been within us all along!

One should not worship Buddha, if one wants to be enlightened! There is no need for Prayer or Priest or study of Religious Scriptures. Nor does one need to be part of any religious organisations. One has to JUST BE and remain steady in the deep silence within our own self- Osho          (translated from hindi)

photos are a courtesy from freedigitalphotos.net

Selections to the quiz on the next post:

Selections to the Quiz as understood by the compiler! If you do feel differently, please post your comments for the benefit of all visitors to this Blog!

  1. B.
  2. D.
  3. A.
  4. D.
  5. C.
  6. A.
  7. C.
  8. A.
  9. B.
  10. D.

Decision Making

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One of the most difficult things we experience in life is to make decisions! This is because when we are growing up, all the decisions are made by our parents. In many cases, parents do not hand over decision making to even grown up adults who may have children of their own! Parents like to have control and authority over their children for as long as they can, making the children dependent on them! This gives the parents a reason for their existence! And in some cases, grown up adults enjoy their dependence on their parents and so willingly do not like to take over decision making from their parents and are happy to leave it to others to make decisions for them!

To begin with, we all have to take over decision making from our parents when we feel we have the confidence to live with our own decisions. The earlier we do this, the better it is for us. This act of independence may make our parents feel lost, sad and discouraged, but in the long run this is beneficial to everyone when each one of us is in the drivers seat of our own life!

How Decisions are made

Decisions are being made in various ways, some of them are stated below:

-Our Ego rapidly, automatically and confidently jumps to conclusions on a coherent story constructed from the little evidence at hand, regardless of the amount or quality of the evedence. Poor evidence actually makes a good story! Further, subjective confidence in a decision is not a reasoned evaluation that the decision is correct! Confidence is a feeling, which reflects the coherence of the information, which might not necessarily be true, and the cognitive ease of processing it!

-Our Ego decides on the basis of emotions! Either greed, fear, love, anger or other emotions lead us to our decisions. There is a feel good factor and when we feel  good about doing something we decide to do it without evaluating the proposal or the situation properly! It many instances, our Ego thinks it has used logic and rationality, but it has come to the decision based only on emotions.

-Our Intellect, in the present moment Awareness, observes the situation objectively, gets a cue to recall relevant information from our memory and decides on a single option, quickly reviewing the decision using logic and rationality and then acting on it!

-Our Intellect, in the present moment, realises the limitation of its knowledge and experience and seeks advice from an expert (it could be a parent too) before arriving at a decision!

-Last but definitely not the least, our Intuition can come up with a decision in a flash! Intuition is when we know but we do not know how we know! Intuition cannot be programmed or planned but it happens by itself when the situation has been fully evaluated by our Intellect very objectively. The decision may be very creative and may defy logic and rational as it is coming from the Universal Intelligence and not the limited Intelligence that we have acquired! But, we cannot depend upon Intuition to show us the direction every time! It happens infrequently!

Unfortunately most of us, including our parents, continue to use our Ego for decision making, which means that with binocular, self centered, subjective vision of the Ego we view the situations and then decide. One must be aware that our Ego has limited knowledge, experience, a set of norms and unrealistic beliefs. It also observes, sees and senses only what it can understand within its limitations.

Be also aware that fear also makes us frequently revisit Ego’s earlier decisions! After making a decision, we are not sure that we have made the correct one! Should we have made another decision which would have been more favorable to us, and so on? Fear and anxiety builds up after we have made a decision, making it even more difficult to correct the decision if it was wrong!

Revisiting and reviewing old decisions while in a state of fear and anxiety are a total waste of time and energy. However, every past impulsive or emotional decision can be revisited in the present moment, when fear and anxiety are absent, taking the inputs from the present moment, reviewing, revising and making a new and more relevant decision. This is an entirely satisfactory, fulfilling and useful activity, which is to update the previous decisions.

Ideally, we have to make decisions Intuitively or with the help of our Intellect which is in the state of Awareness; in the present moment. This can be done when we are in full awareness of our thoughts, emotions, actions and the situation that exists at present which warrants a decision!

Points to Consider while making Decisions

While making decisions we have to be careful:

-that our thoughts and behaviour are influenced, much more than we know or want, by the environment of the moment

-that we do not accept the contents of a report on face value, but question the report and the size of the sample as small samples give both end extreme results. Sample sizes should be large to represent correctly!

– Initial Anchoring giving values have a powerful effect on decisions. Anchors guide and constrain our thinking! There are many people who exploit our gullibility with improbable anchors! Either storm out of the negotiations, or search our memory with our Intellect for arguments against the anchor, think the opposite.

– the world in our heads is not a precise replica of reality; our expectations about the frequency of events are distorted by the prevalence and emotional intensity of the messages to which we are exposed!

– that often we are guided by emotion rather than by reason, easily swayed by trivial details, and inadequately sensitive to differences between low and negligibly low probabilities!

– that the combination of probability neglect with the social mechanisms of availability cascades. irrational fears inevitably leads to gross exaggeration of minor threats, sometimes with important consequences!

– if we ignore base rates and the quality of evidence in probability assessments we will certainly make mistakes. Overruling representativeness and basing decisions on statistics will improve decision making! Be aware that the intuition of representativeness frequently overwhelms the logic of probability!

-we should not believe whatever comes to our Intellect while it is in Ego mode! To be useful, our beliefs should be constrained by our Intellect using the logic of probability! We should anchor our judgement of the probability of an outcome on a plausible base rate. We should also question the diagnosticity of our evidence.

-that the most coherent stories are not necessarily the most probable, but they are plausible!

-that we attach incorrect causal interpretation to changing events when all that is happening is the regression to the mean!

-predictive decisions need to be moderated from our Impulsive predictions, made by our Ego, by regressing to the mean by an estimated correlation factor based on the quality of evidence available and prevalence of other unknown or relevant factors. We will still make errors, but the errors will be smaller and will not favour either high or low outcomes! Impulsive predictions of our Ego tend to be overconfident and overly extreme! Moderation  is a task for our Intellect in the Analysis and Diagnostic state! A characteristic of unbiased or unmoderated is that it permits the prediction of rare or extreme events only when the quality of information is very good! Extreme predictions and a willingness to predict rare events from weak evidence is a manifestation of our Ego state! It is natural for our Ego to generate overconfident judgements, because confidence is determined by the coherence of the best story we can tell from the evidence at hand!

– of narrative fallacy of how flawed stories of our past shape our views of the world and our expectations of the future! Narrative fallacies arise inevitably from our continuous attempt to make sense of this world! The explanatory stories that people find compelling are simple; concrete rather than abstract; assign a larger role to talent, stupidity and intentions than to luck; and focus on a few striking events that happened rather than on the countless events that failed to happen. Humans constantly fool ourselves by constructing flimsy accounts of our past and then believing they are true! Understanding and learning from a narrative story of past successes or achievements is largely illusory! The real test of an explanation is whether it would have made the event predictable in advance! The fact that many of the important events that did occur involve choices further tempts us to exaggerate the role of skill and underestimate the part luck played in the outcome! It is easier to construct a coherent story and believe it when we know little, when there are fewer pieces to fit into the puzzle! Humans have unlimited ability to ignore our ignorance! To know is to be able to predict an event and not after the event has occurred!

– the fact that our Ego immediately adjusts to a new view of the world to accommodate the unpredicted event that has occurred! Unfortunately the Ego is imperfect in its ability to reconstruct past states of knowledge, or beliefs that have changed! If asked to reconstruct our former beliefs, we will retrieve our current one instead – an instance of substitution – and we will not believe that we ever felt differently! Our inability to reconstruct past beliefs causes us to underestimate the extent we are surprised by past events! This tendency to revise the history of one’s beliefs in light of what actually happened, produces a robust cognitive illusion of ‘I-knew-it-all-along’! Hindsight bias has pernicious (harmful) effects on the evaluation of decision makers. It leads observers to assess the quality of a decision not by whether the process was sound but by whether its outcome was good or bad! This outcome bias makes it almost impossible to evaluate a decision properly-in terms of beliefs that were reasonable when the decision was made! Actions that seemed prudent in foresight can look irresponsibly negligent in hindsight! Hindsight and the outcome bias foster risk aversion by decision makers! They also bring undeserved rewards to irresponsible risk takers who take a crazy gamble and are lucky to win! A few lucky gambles can crown a reckless leader with a halo of prescience (foreknowledge) and boldness!

– that the long term developments and the future are really unpredictable. The illusion that we understand the past and it makes sense in hindsight fosters overconfidence in our ability to predict the future! The reality (future) emerges from the interactions of many different agents and forces, including blind luck, often producing large and unpredictable outcomes! Short term trends can be forecast, and behaviour and achievements can be predicted with fair accuracy from previous behaviours and achievements.

– that subjective confidence is a poor index of the accuracy of judgement or decision!

– that we dislike losing twice as much as winning but we become risk seeking when all our options are bad.

-that the disadvantages of change loom larger than its advantages, inducing a bias that favours a status quo or small rather than large changes.

– that decision weights that we assign to outcomes are not identical to the probabilities of the outcomes.Due to the possibility effect, low probability outcomes are over weighted. Due to certainty effect, almost certain outcomes are under weighted compared to the high probability! This is due to the psychology of hope & worry!

– that we are not perfectly rational choosers!

– we attach value to gains and losses rather than wealth!

  1. when we have 95% chance to gain a large amount, we fear disappointment, become risk averse and are willing to accept an unfavourable settlement
  2. when we have a 5% chance to win a large amount, our hope is of large gain, so we become risk seeking and reject favourable settlement
  3. when we have a 95% chance to loose a large amount, we hope to avoid a loss, so we are willing to take a risk and reject a favourable settlement
  4. when we have a 5% chance to loose a large amount, we have fear of a large loss, so we become risk averse and accept an unfavourable settlement

– that highly unlikely events are either ignored or overweighted by our Ego!

– that our Ego has superficial processing characteristics. Vivid imagery leads to denominator neglect! So, low probability events are heavily weighted when described in terms of relative frequencies ( how many ) than when stated in abstract terms of percentage ‘chances’, ‘risk’, or ‘probability ( how likely ). E.g. Tsunamis are are rare, but the image is so vivid that we over estimate the probability!

– that we underweight rare events like earthquakes, fires, devastating financial crisis, long term environmental threats, etc., which we have never experienced.

– when we focus on a single scenario, we will overestimate the probability. We should set up specific alternates and make the probabilities add up to 100%.

– that sunk cost fallacy keeps us for too long in poor jobs, unhappy marriages and unpromising projects and investments.

-that we strongly regret an outcome that is produced by action than when it is produced by inaction! Further, we also generally favour conventional and risk averse choices!

-that single case evaluation will be guided by emotional response of our Ego. Rationality will be served broadly and comprehensively in joint cases evaluation and so this should be preferred!

-that decisions can change on the basis of how the situation or problem is framed!

-that decisions are based on memory rather than the experience of pain or pleasure and that memory retains only the peak and end experience of pain or pleasure ignoring the aggregate pain or pleasure experienced as well as the duration! Confusing experience with the memory of it is a compelling cognitive illusion which brings about discrepancy between decision and experience! So, decisions we make will not produce the best possible experience and erroneous forecasts of future experiences! Tastes and decisions are shaped by memories, and the memories can be wrong so our decisions will not serve our preference for long pleasure and short pains!

Further, Pain out plays Pleasure in decision making! E.g. Moving into a new apartment, the pain of doubling the commuting time for the father far outweighs in his thinking the pleasure to the family of a roomier, brighter, breezier and safer apartment!

-of the focussing illusion which gives too much weight to the aspect we are thinking about, and too little to all other aspects not being thought about!

-of duration neglect as we focus on a few critical moments, especially the beginning, the peak and the end

-of miswanting that results in bad choices that arise from errors of affective (emotional) forecasting

Timing Decisions

Too many times we decide and act too early or too late. Our decisions and actions are rarely well timed! Early and late decisions and actions are due to the fear and anxiety of the future as imagined by our Ego and sometimes due to over confidence of our Ego!

An example of a very early decision is that of the parents pre-planning their children’s area of education & specialisation! Even though, the children may not have even started pre-school, they plan to make one child an Engineer, one child a Doctor, one child a Chartered Accountant. This is in total disregard of the developing interests and capabilities of the child, who may want to be Sports Person, or a Singer or an Artist or a Fashion Designer etc.

Example of delayed decisions can be of relationships growing apart as one of the partners is unable to take a positive decision of making the relationship permanent or long term! Or, it could be of ignoring the symptoms of a very critical disease until it is too late to be cured!

Timing the decisions properly can be done when we are in full awareness, which is being in the present moment, when we are free from disturbances like fear and anxiety of our future, etc. Only when the iron is hot, then we should strike it to make it into a Chisel. Likewise, the situation should be just ripe for decision making and only then a decision need be made!

Positive & Negative Thinking

All motivational and spiritual teachers goad us into thinking positive at all times! This is like looking at one side of the coin! In order to make good decisions, we need to see both sides of the coin, otherwise our decision will be based on only half of the information. We need to look at the positive and negative sides of all situations. This cannot be done by our Ego as our Ego gets seriously disturbed when it sees the negative side. But it can be done rather comfortably by our Intellect which is detached from our Ego, and is in the present moment only! So, consciously come into the undisturbed state of the Intellect, which is being in the present moment when you are making decisions! Good intuitive & Intellectual decisions will emanate from our Intellect helping us, as well as a larger section of our humanity!

I never came upon any of my discoveries through the process of rational thinking-Albert Einstein

Don’t let the voice of other people’s opinion drown your inner voice-Steve Jobs

Failure is inevitable. One of the hardest and most enduring lesson everyone in business learns is that not all great ideas succeed. Plan for failure. Embrace failure. But understand that failure is a comma, not a full stop. You don’t fail in life when one thing goes wrong. Tomorrow will still be there, no matter how dire today feels.

Every Failure, far from being an impediment, can open the door to a treasure trove of learning- Ronnie Screwvala in his book ‘Dream with your eyes open’ *

Each one of us has the capabilities within us to make decisions in three ways; firstly, decision can emanate from our Ego; such a decision is generally self centered for the betterment of our own self. It can incidentally help others too. The second way, is when decision emanates from our Intellect and it is centered for the betterment of a bigger group of people who are around and near us. The last way, is when decision emanates from our Intuition, which is for the good of all and is generally the best decision we can make. Unfortunately, Intuition is not on call and will come to us at it’s own time schedule and when we are not thinking excessively and are in a state of Divine Emptiness.

There is also another way to make decisions, which is external. This is by seeking advice and opinions from our known people, which is good but accepting their decision and imposing it on our self is not; as we can transfer responsibility for bad decisions to others. In such cases we are escaping our responsibility, weakening our internal strength and making it difficult for our own self to live this life properly and fully.

While we make decisions, we have to be also aware that the final outcome is not in our hands but in the hands of the all powerful Totality. – The Totality

It is important to differentiate between the action taken for a specific result and the actual result that happens. The result that happens can be entirely different than the result that was expected while taking the action. This is so, because the action taken is by the human Egos, with their severe limitations, whereas the result that happens is due to the limitless Superconsciousness (Universal Forces or God). – The Totality * 200118

In order to make a decision we can do rational and logical thinking. However if there is an error in our perception or programming then the decision can easily end up being incorrect. Before finally making the decision we have to ask our heart how it feels. It it feels good then go ahead with the decision. Unfortunately we have been programmed not to listen to our feelings and so many of our decisions get us into trouble.- extracted from the YouTube of Dr. Bruce Lipton * 011118

Mistakes are wonderful tools of discovery. Many of the world’s greatest creative works began as a mistake – Mumbai Mirror * 071218

Fear

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Fear is the most debilitating & devastating of all our emotions. It is also the origin of other emotions like anger, unhappiness, depression and others.

When we observe a child, we will notice that the child has no fears. Then why does an adult have so many fears?

Firstly, all the fears of the parents get automatically transmitted to the child. If any of the parents screams upon seeing a cockroach or if a dog comes close by, the child builds fear of insects and animals. If a parent is superstitious and afraid of crossing a road if a black cat has crossed it earlier, then the child too builds a fear of crossing such a road. If any one of the parents is afraid of entering a dark room, the child develops fear of the dark. If the parent is afraid of trusting any one else but him/herself then the child also distrusts everyone!

Secondly, fear is built into the child because of the concern of the loving parents for the health and safety during the childhood! Parenting is caring and the side effect of caring is fear being embedded in the growing child. Parents help build fear of running, jumping etc as they convey to the child that it may fall and get hurt, fear of dogs and other animals as they may get bitten and hurt. When the parent is sick and requests that the child does not come near him/her, the child may develop a fear of being near sick people and may develop a fear of visiting hospitals too! When rain soaked children happily come home, the Mother’s concern of the child catching a cold may drive the Mom into a frenzy to get the child as dry as possible quickly. Such a child may develop a fear of getting wet in the future!  Parents frequently use fear to discipline a child to prevent it from doing something that may make it sick or hurt it!

Thirdly, the high expectations of the parents builds in fear of failure. Most parents want the child to be the best, first in everything it does. They want the child to be the best loved and respected person at home, in the school, and in all the social environments. So, the Ego of the child is always anxious to do the best and this anxiety results in under utilizing it’s own capabilities and then under achieving! For example, the child may be afraid of speaking in public for fear of not doing well, not getting the appreciation and respect of the audience! This fear will make the child under perform. So, it is a vicious cycle. To overcome this, the child and the parents have to learn to have little or no expectations, and allow the child to be him/herself and do whatever he/she can! Then we will find that children will bloom into stronger adults in their own way and in their own time!

Fourthly, most parents programme their children to fear the future by imagining the worst situation in the future. Parents feel that when they teach their children to face the worst situation, they will then be able to handle any situation! The reality is that the future is really unpredictable and the probability of the worst situation occurring is extremely low, perhaps much less than 1 %! What is strange that parents and many humans do not imagine a good situation happening in the future even though the probability is more than 99%! Why has this kind of thinking or imagining been handed over from one generation to another since the beginning of the human race? Because everyone has fear of the future! Once we become aware of this way of negative thinking of our Ego, slowly and automatically our imagination will change to a positive state from the existing negative state!

So, fear becomes an integral part of our Ego during our growing up years. Many fears get imbedded into our subconscious and so they arise without prior thought or reason! Desires and expectations of our Ego’s which have to be fulfilled in the future also cause the fears to arise!

We have fear of getting emotionally and physically hurt in the future, fear of failing, fear of loss of wealth, power, honour, respect etc..As our Ego exists when we are either in our past or our future, so also Fear exists when we are in our past or in the future. When we return back to Awareness or being in the present moment, our Ego along with imbedded fear disappears!

In order to live life fully right away, we have accept our Ego as it is now. We also have to accept and live with the fears of our Ego, unless  we are in the present moment when fears vanish automatically!

Handling of fear is all we can do, This is done by becoming aware of our fears, accepting and experiencing them fully, and not denying that we have no fears!

Be also aware that fear, along with other emotions like anxiety, worry, hatred, jealousy, guilt can affect the health of our body. It can lead to diseases like diabetes, heart condition, cancer and others!

When we are in our Ego state having desires and expectations, we have fear; when we are in the present moment when there are no desires and expectations, then there is no fear -The Divinity

We are afraid that the desires we have may not be fulfilled in the time frame we have set for them! So, if we can have no desires or no time frames then we will have no fear! – The Divinity *

I’ve never understood why people are so afraid to fail. Or why they hesitate to stretch for the next rung on the ladder of life just because they may topple over. Failure is part of life. Everyone fails. I know I have. More times than I can count.- Ronnie Screwvala 

When our Intellect is in pure awareness and fully accepts what the Totality presents to us every moment, then our Ego will have no fears, anxiety, worry or anger – The Totality

If you go deep into your fear you will find love. …When you are in love, fear disappears. And when you are afraid, you cannot be in love. …..Fear and love don’t exist together. That means it must be the same energy that becomes fear; then there is nothing left to become love. It becomes love, then there is nothing left to become fear. – Osho ‘Buddha his life and teachings’ *

All of us are programmed to fear death of our Ego and our Body, whereas both are naturally occurring phenomenon in The Totality – The Totality *

Our Ego is a program in our Intellect which fears the future! Even though our Intellect may have experienced and understood that the future is unpredictable and not in the control of our Ego, our Ego or programming continues to remain fearful of the future. Fear as well as our Ego disappear when we are Alive in the now. – The Totality *

The opposite of love is not hatred. It is Fear. Love is the natural state when fear is eradicated. Conversely, fear is the most common obstacle that keeps us from being aware of love’s presence within us………..fear is simply an ego-based emotion, – Carnelian Sage, in her book ‘The Greatest Manifestation Principle in the World’ *

Fear is a denial of the existence of the divine power that resides within you-the divine power of which you are a part. – Carnelian Sage, in her book ‘The Greatest Manifestation Principle in the World’

The simple truth is, when you’re frightened, you’re dumber. – Bruce H. Lipton Ph.D. * 260717

If we can control fears, we can regain control over our lives. – Bruce H. Lipton Ph.D. * 260717

Letting go of our fears is the first step towards creating a fuller, more satisfying life – Bruce H. Lipton Ph.D. * 260717

We have nothing to fear, but fear itself. – US President Franklin D. Roosevelt * 260717

Thinking is the bedrock of fear. No thinking, no fear. – The Totality * 231117

Fear is the programmed reaction of our Ego to the present moment situation or the anticipated future situation – The Totality * 220818

As long as our conditioning or programming (Ego) has expectations, we will have fear – The Totality * 011218

Our fears are the creation of our Ego, which has a wild imagination. Often it imagines problems in the future. Perhaps it is brought about by our Parents lovingly warning us to be careful or take care. In effect our Ego has the tendency to frighten itself. Most of these imaginary fearful situations rarely happen in the future. Rather than being careful, we could help our children to calmly accept every situation that arises and take the required action to overcome the difficult situations in their lives. –  The Divinity 060223 *

Quotes to help uncover Peace & Tranquility within us

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Living life fully simply means to be our own Self (preferably our own True Self) all the time! Be aware that only our own Ego prevents us from being our own self! – Gul Malani

Living our life fully, also means to be aware and fully accept the present moment and situation as they are now! This also gives a decent burial to our past so that it does not torment us in the future! – Gul Malani

We all have done Divine living in our childhood! We can do it again in adulthood, if we were to once again merge or dissolve our Conscious Intellect, our Ego, into the Divinity or Totality residing within our Subconscious Intellect! – The Divinity

Totality is life! Life is neither good nor bad. This classification is done by our Ego, a unique illusion each one’s Intellect creates for itself! To live Life, is to fully experience it in the present moment! –The Divinity

If the inner becomes beautiful – which is in your hands – the outer will have to mould itself according to the inner. The outer is not essential, it will have to reflect the inner in same way. – Osho * 090118

Intuition is soul guidance, appearing naturally in a man during those instants when his mind is calm. – Paramhansa Yogananda in his book “Autobiography of a Yogi’ * 190118

You have depended on people’s opinions so much that you have lost all track of (your) inner sense. (Your) inner sense has to be rediscovered, because all that is beautiful and all that is good and all that is divine can only be felt by (your) inner sense. …. Stop being influenced by people’s opinions. Rather, start looking in…allow your inner sense to say things to you. Trust it. If you trust it, it will grow. If you trust it you will feed it, it will become stronger. –Osho, in his talks compiled in the book ‘The Silence of the Heart’

God is not a person but the ultimate sense of well-being, the ultimate sense of being at home, the ultimate sense that “I belong to this world and this world belongs to me. I am not an alien here, I am not an outsider.” The ultimate sense – existential – that “This whole and I are not separate.” This experience is God. –Osho, in his talks compiled in the book ‘The Silence of the Heart’

The secret of change is to focus all of our energy, not on forcing the change, but on building the new! A new beginning can be: Experience and understanding that I am not only my Ego but also The Superconsciousness or God from where everything and everyone has manifested. – The Totality * 280218

We all have been brought up to believe that we (our Egos) create the present situation for us. The reality is, and experience will show that we (our Egos) are very insignificant in this Universe and can achieve very little on our own! The all powerful Totality is what creates the present moment! Wisdom is that we (our Egos) accept the present moment gracefully, as we accept a gift, even if its not as per our Ego’s requirements! – The Totality 

How can you (Ego) decide what is right, what is wrong? Drop yourself (your Ego). Let life take possession of you. Let life decide. Give your hand to God, or to life, or to existence…and follow it in trust. – Osho, in his talks compiled in the book ‘The Silence of the Heart’ *

Ego is a very perfectionistic one. Ego always wants to be higher and better than others. Hence it is perfectionist. But through ego perfection is never possible. So the effort is absurd. Perfection is possible only when the ego is not. But then one never thinks of perfection at all. …. The real artist certainly thinks of totality – how to be total? – but never thinks of perfection. –Osho, in his talks compiled in the book ‘The Silence of the Heart’

When our Ego asks for anything from others, or Totality or God, then we are not any different from a beggar. When our Ego is content with whatever it has or gets. we become very peaceful, powerful and humane Royalty! – The Totality *

Acceptance of the as-is is often mistaken for a passive process of surrender. Little do we realize how radical and active this process really is. Instead of passivity, it requires that we are vigilantly at peace with how our life has presented itself, fully owning our part in the co-creation of events. This does not imply blind obeisance. Hardly. Nor does it mean haplessly abiding with circumstances out of a dejected defeatism. Not at all. What this essentially means is that it is only when we can fully “see,” “own,” and “accept” our life for how it is that we stop resisting it. Once we stop resisting it, we free up a tremendous burst of creative power and energy. This THEN allows us to create powerful choices and transformations in our life.

When we commit to a life of acceptance, we move from resistance to grace. Our life becomes centered on the present moment where choices are aligned to the here and now. Our understanding of what is “good” and “bad” undergoes a transformation as we see the futility of predicting either. We accept that the future is unknown and move into that space with an awareness of impermanence and neutrality. _ Dr. Shefali Tsabary * 240918

Useful energy and activities flow out from a Peaceful Intellect (or Mind). A disturbed or over thinking and analysing Intellect, emanates unhealthy energy and indulges in unnecessary activities! -The Totality *

Our past is of absolutely no relevance, our future may have some relevance. The present moment is the only part of life that is truly relevant and requires our undivided attention and involvement! Regretfully, our Ego is always injecting either our future or our past into our present moment, bringing with it fear or regret, preventing us from enjoying and living life fully in the present moment – Gul Malani

We have to unlearn mostly everything to become addicted once again to the present moment and enjoy its beauty, fragrance and the surprises within it! -The Totality

To succeed existentially means to live moment-to-moment in utter joy. Logic cannot (does not) allow you. Joy itself appears to logic as illogical. Misery seems to be more logical. – Osho, in his talks compiled as ‘The Silence of the Heart’ *

To tune into our Universe we should become aware, as often as we can, of our breath going in and out; for BREATH IS LIFE and this Awareness is the access door to living life fully –  Gul Malani

The Universe has no restrictions. You place restrictions on the Universe with your expectations – Unknown *

More than 90% of your mental life is subconscious. If you fail to make use of this marvelous power, you condemn yourself to live within very narrow limits – Your Subconscious mind is in touch with Infinite Life and Boundless Wisdom, and its impulses and ideas are always life-ward. The great aspirations, inspirations, and visions for a grander and nobler life spring from the subconscious – Joseph Murphy Ph.D., D.D.

The solution lies within the problem. Every question implies its own answer. The Infinite Intelligence within your subconscious mind knows all and sees all. It has the answer and is revealing it to you now…but you must listen – Joseph Murphy Ph.D., D.D.

We all live a shallow and superficial life at our Ego level due to our ignorance! We can easily live life at a deeper and meaningful level by being aware of our Divinity at all times! Proper Meditation, done daily, takes us to this deeper level and to access our inborn Divinity! – The Creation

A quiet Intellect with a quiet digestive system, a relaxed body with a smile on the face make the best cocktail for living life fully in peace and in happiness – Gul Malani

Rushing through life, trying to fulfill our unending desires and ambitions, we tend to encounter more situations that overwhelm and drown us! Being peaceful and relaxed, while chasing our desires, makes it easy to manage and resurface quickly from most situations! – Malanis *

We all live our life imprisoned by our own self created Ego! To break out of this prison we need to use the tools of ‘Awareness and Acceptance’ to live our life fully by reaching our own ‘True Self’ – Gul Malani *

We all are living our lives in our own individually created virtual world built as per the beliefs of our Ego. We acquire our specific beliefs from our parents, friends, teachers and others whom we love and respect. As we mature, we replace some of our beliefs with actual experiences getting our life more in tune with the reality as it is now! – The Creation

Do not making a living prevent us from living!-Anonymous

Only our own desires and expectations rob us of our peace and happiness and replace them with anxiety, fear, stress and sadness. Whereas Peace and Happiness can always be with each one of us throughout our life if we choose it to be so! Most of us incorrectly blame other persons or situations for the loss of our peace and happiness! – Gul Malani

When Breath stops and Desire remains, that is Death….and when Desires stop and Breath remains, that is Moksha (Liberation) – attributed to Buddha

When your desire is motivated by love-and nourished by love-it has the highest likelihood of manifestation. In the process of co-creation, love is the single most valuable thing you can contribute that is in harmony with all that is. – Carnelian Sage in her book ‘The Greatest Manifestation Principle in the World’

You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity in each moment-Thoreau

It seems that time stands still when our Intellect is in the present moment – Gul Malani

Many of us have an amazing capability of bringing into the present moment, our imagined fear of the future or pain that we think can happen to us in the future or the pain we have experienced in the past! This unfortunately takes away from us, the good living we can do in the present moment! If we just become aware of this interesting capability, that robs us of something very special in our life, we can start living our life fully!– Gul Malani

Being Spiritual is all about living in the present moment; being Religious is all about living in our past or in our future – Gul Malani

We must become as little children before we can enter into the realm of truth – S. Radhakrishnan, Former President of India

Whatever is happening to you, allow it. Never catch hold of it………..mind (Ego) is a hoarder, mind is very greedy – whenever something beautiful happens it immediately wants to catch hold of it. It immediately wants to become a master of it, so that it can reproduce it again and again whenever it wants. – Osho, in his talks compiled in the book ‘The Silence of the Heart’ *

A casual and detached attitude to our Ego’s achievements or non achievements is required to live life fully – Gul Malani

The Ego (Devil) hath no peace. It is always busy and overworked to achieve something in the future – Gul Malani

Quality of our life depends on the choices our Intellect makes, Quantity (material benefits) depends to a little extent on the efforts of our Ego and to a large extent on our luck! – Gul Malani

Difficult situations do bring in suffering, but we can choose to bring in Awakening instead! – Eckhart Tolle as understood by Gul Malani

Even a forced Smile relaxes our Ego and makes seemingly difficult situations easy to handle! Whereas, Anger stresses our Ego and makes difficult situations even more difficult to handle! – Gul Malani

Be yourself; everyone else is already taken!– Oscar Wilde

To be beautiful means to be yourself. You don’t need to be accepted by others. You need to accept yourself. – Thich Nhat Hanh

You only need to find yourself. Everything else can be googled! – Anonymous * 240717

The snow goose need not bathe to make itself white. Neither need you to do anything but be yourself-Lao Tzu

To be someone you are not, is to waste who you are-Loren Slocum

Drop the idea of becoming someone, because you are already a masterpiece – Osho 

He who lives in harmony with himself lives in harmony with the Universe-Marcus Aurelius

Let not other’s perception of us, be either in our agenda or become our business, as perceptions are illusions only- Gul Malani

Do not expect everyone to love you until you start loving and respecting your own self as you are now – Gul Malani

Truly loving others is when we give them independance and freedom to discover their own truths and live their life on their own terms– Gul Malani

While dealing with people we must keep Ice on our head and Sugar in our mouth! – Shekhar Joshi, Waterproofing Contractor *

We have to learn to be more tolerant of other people’s behaviour, as poor behaviour is the result of unconscious parenting and is difficult to change! – The Creation

When we truly understand and fully accept the other person’s point of view, then we are using the Universal Infinite Intelligence buried in us below our Ego’s limited Intelligence! Similarly when we fully accept the present moment as it is now, we are using the Universal Infinite Intelligence! – The Creation *

Love is an emotion of our Ego, so it is self centered, Peace is a state of our True Self, so it is universal! If it is possible, we should always remain in a state of peace – Gul Malani

Fear and Anger disconnects us from other humans, Love and Peace connects us to everyone! -Gul Malani

Sex is a physical relationship between two people which lasts for a short while, love is an emotional relationship we have with few people and it lasts a little longer, Peace is a connection we can have with the whole human race and our Universe and it can last forever! – Gul Malani

To be content with what one has, is the greatest and truest of riches-Cicero

Uncertainty is the only certainty there is, and knowing how to live with insecurity is the only security. ~ John Allen Paulos

Do not let the behaviour of others destroy your inner peace-Dalai Lama

We really do not need the help of other people or situations to make our life miserable! Our illusory self (Ego) can do it single handedly! – Gul Malani

When our Intellect remains peaceful despite all the antics of its own creation, our Ego,  then we are truly living our life fully! – Gul Malani

Our own life is the instrument with which we experiment with the truth. ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

Amid the vastness of things among which we live, the existence of nothingness holds the first place – Leonardo da Vinci

Our life itself is a Miracle! We need not look for miracles as we are the biggest miracle! So, treat yourself with all the respect and love you are capable of! – Gul Malani

Nothing can trouble you but your own imagination (negative). ~ Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

Impossibilities are merely things which we have not yet learned. ~ Charles W. Chesnutt

Follow what you are genuinely passionate about and let that guide you to your destination-Diane Sawyer

We enjoy any work we are doing if we think it is for own good! When we think the work we are doing is not doing any good to us, then work becomes a burden and distressful! – Gul Malani

When you are inspired…dormant forces, faculties, and talents become alive, and you discover yourself to be a greater person by far than you ever dreamed yourself to be. – Patanjali * 230717

We are prone to over estimate how much we understand of the world and to under estimate the role of chance in events! Over confidence is fed by the illusory certainty of hindsight!-Daniel Kahneman

Goal oriented people exist in a state of continuous pre success failure at best, and permanent failure at worst if things never work out – Scott Adams

Our efforts can only find success if they are substantially helped by the Forces of the Universe, also called Luck, also called God! – Gul Malani

This is the beauty of this world of God: when you rush after desires you remain a beggar; when you stop rushing, all that you have been rushing for starts coming to you of its own accord. When you ask, it is not given. When you don’t ask, it showers on you. – Osho, in his talks compiled in the book ‘The Silence of the Heart’

If you are happy, more happiness comes to you. If you are joyous, you attract more joyousness. Like attracts like. If you are miserable, more misery starts moving towards you. – Osho, in his talks compiled in the book ‘The Silence of the Heart’ *

It (Energy) will remain ignorance – because the energy is focussed on the object, it is going outward, it is extrovert. If the energy is freed from the object, where will it go? It will start falling into the subject, into your inner source. And energy falling back into the the source becomes understanding, becomes awareness. – Osho, in his talks compiled in the book ‘The Silence of the Heart’ *

Nothing is predetermined or foreordained. Your mental attitude-the way you think, feel, and believe-determines your destiny – Joseph Murphy Ph.D.,D.D.

When we grow up we take ourselves way too seriously, and sometimes we become a heart attack waiting to happen. ~ Tom Asacker

Happiness is the natural state for most people whenever they feel healthy, have flexible schedules, and expect the future to be good………The primary culprit in your bad moods is a deficit in one of the big five: flexible schedule, imagination, sleep, diet, and exercise – Scott Adams

Life is simple if our Intellect is in the state of Pure Awareness and Full Acceptance, that is being in the present moment! Instead, it remains complicated as our default operating mode is with our Intellect in the Ego state which keeps us mostly worried about our future or upset about our past! –Gul Malani

Only after we discover our own ‘True Identity’, our Ego can laugh at what it thinks, says and does – Gul Malani

The best environment for our body to heal itself is to be truly in the present moment when we automatically become stress free which leads to self curing! – Gul Malani

A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new. ~ Albert Einstein

Activity should not be a means to an end! The activity itself is to be enjoyed – Eckhart Tolle as understood by Gul Malani

Make your life a masterpiece; imagine no limitations on what you can be, have or do. ~ Brian Tracy

Just as a picture is drawn by an artist, surroundings are created by the activities of the mind. ~ Buddha

We have all a better guide in ourselves, if we would attend to it, than any other person can be. ~ Jane Austen

You cannot travel the path until you have become the path itself. ~ Buddha

Discovering our own self and the peace within us, is a very lonely activity, as we have to do it all by ourselves only and if we look around we will not find company easily as everyone is busy accumulating wealth, power, control, knowledge, honour, respect and other worldly possessions – Gul Malani

The survival of our humanity depends on us sacrificing our Ego at the alter of Divinity or Totality – The Divinity *

Questions to ask our own self to uncover the Truth

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  • Does God truly exist for us humans, animals, birds and plants? Or is God existing in the imagination of human’s Ego, which itself is an illusion created by our Intellect?
  • Does it help to pray and worship and visit places of prayer and worship regularly?
  • Is it necessary to follow rituals and ceremonies handed out to us by our parents and their ancestors?
  • When a person dies, are the rituals and prayers done to bring peace and liberation to the Soul (Atman) of the dead person, or are they meant to bring peace in the Ego’s of the surviving relatives?
  • Do we need to question our Ego’s conditioning and programming acquired from our parents, teachers, friends, and others who in turn have acquired their conditioning from their parents, teachers and others too? Such conditionings have been going on since time immemorial?
  •  Is there any constructive role our Ego plays? Does our Ego help or hurt us? *
  • Why should we be worried what our Ego thinks and does or what other Egos think and do, when the reality is that the present moment is a creation of The Totality and not of the Egos?  *
  • Why should our Ego be afraid to do something or to do nothing when it knows that only The Totality determines every present moment situation? *     040717
  • As our Ego is not capable of correctly predicting the future, why is it afraid of the future? *
  • Why should we plan our future when we can neither predict it correctly nor we can control it? *
  • Why do we let our Ego to gnaw and consume away our precious present moments? *
  • Should we be guided by our Ego and react, jump to conclusions, make impulsive and emotional decisions or should we use  our Intellect in the state of ‘Awareness and Acceptance’ most of the time?
  • When the whole Universe is present in each of our bodies, why do we rely on our micro-micro-microscopic Ego (a minuscule download of knowledge and learning from our parents, teacher, friends, society and the environment) to guide us through our life, reacting to almost everyone and to almost all situations? Why don’t we learn to accept everyone and our situations in the now fully, without any reactions, implying that we trust the Universe fully? And then we coolly act instead of reacting!  161017
  • Why do we want to succeed every time and are afraid of even a single failure?
  • Why do we have to believe that everything that happens, happens for our good only? Why do we not accept happenings or situations as they are, regardless of whether they are beneficial to us or not? *
  • Why do we choose to get lost in the wilderness of our Ego (Illusory Self), when our Awareness can keep us in the peace, comfort and steadiness of our True Self?
  • Do we need to question and experience our beliefs & superstitions which have been transferred to us by others, including our parents, teachers, friends and society?
  • Is there such a thing as re-incarnation and previous life’s karmas (activities) that affect our present life?
  • Is there someone on this planet who can constantly correctly predict the future? Or, is the future really unpredictable and seemingly random?
  • Do we need to carry the burden of our past for the rest of our lives and waste our present moment reacting to it; a past which cannot be changed as it is dead and gone but is retained in our memory? Does it help in any way to carry this burden, to spend time on it, to discuss it? Or, is it better to forgive and move on?
  • Can our present and our future be fully as per our Ego’s expectations and desires?
  • Should we live our life as beggars, begging God for financial success and good health and begging others to give us love & respect?  *

It is a waste of our time to…

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It is a sheer waste of our scarce and precious time to …

… acquire knowledge without understanding it through our own experiences!

… believe that we will be peaceful and happy in the future when we are not peaceful or happy in the present moment!

… to try and be at peace with others and our external situations when we have not yet discovered the peace within our own self!

… expect others to understand, recognise and appreciate us for what we are!

… force our close family members and others to fulfill our desires instead of fulfilling their own desires!

… imagine and worry about our future which is most unpredictable, as zillions of forces and situations have to come together in the future to make our present moment then!

… predict the future or to try and control it *

… waste our time trying to force others to change (their Ego), when we know quite well that it is very difficult to change our own self (Ego)! It is better for us to accept others as they are, as they are also doing the right thing as per their present level of understanding!

… to listen and be in dialogue with our own Ego most of the time, when there is so much more we can learn from other’s Egos and from the Universe

… give advice. It is better to ask questions so that the other person finds his/her own answers!

…make decisions for any one else as only that person knows what is best for him/her. This is because, only he/she understands himself/herself well and his/her situation fully and as best as he/she can! Strangely, this applies to children as well, who are very capable of making good decisions. We should allow our very young children also to make decisions for their own growth, except where it may involve their safety.

… judge others as it is based on our perceptions, which again are based on our norms that we automatically prepare, beliefs, the limited knowledge, experience and skills we have acquired!

… to chase the pot of gold at the end of a rainbow!

Flashes of Wisdom

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Be Aware-This is the key to living life fully, be aware of the present moment! It unlocks our full potential for great living! It is really unnecessary and waste of the precious present moments to know the why, where, when, how of each and every situation, as every situation is caused by numerous factors which are still unknown to the human Intellect! All we need to do is to truly and fully accept the present situations that are within us as well as outside us!

Divinity– We are all Divine and complete in all aspects! But our Ego believes it is incomplete so it is continually under fear, anxiety and worry seeking love and respect from others, and possessions and wealth from the external world. By becoming aware of this incompleteness of our Ego, we free ourself to live life fully now!

Inspiration – We should be inspired to replace the noise and rattle of our Ego in our Intellect by the deep peace and tranquility of Divinity. * 210718

Limitation- We all have been conditioned or programmed to limit ourself to our body and Ego, whereas each one of us is The Limitless Universe or The Totality. * 080817

We are already there– Each one of us is already where we should be now! Unfortunately our Ego, our programming, does not accept the present situation fully and is always goading us to change our situation. We are all busy doing that and in the meantime good and meaningful life is going past us without our engagement with it! 310118

We adults are a combination of Superconsciousness and Ego (both Conscious Mind and Subconscious Mind). The proportion varies in each of us with Superconsciousness increasing as we evolve and become more aware of our own self.  010218

The Truth is that we are not the Ego we have assimilated in our Conscious Intellect as we grew up. We are the Divinity that we were born with. Unfortunately our Divinity has been displaced from our Conscious Intellect by our Ego  and now resides in our Subconscious Intellect! Living life fully is when we have brought back the awareness of our Divinity into our Conscious Intellect and we remain aware of our Divinity at all times!

Our whole Universe is the Truth, every creation, everyone of us, every object is the Truth. Nothing exists other than the Truth. Unfortunately, our Ego is incapable of understanding this! Only our Intellect can recognise this Truth! *

Identification – Totality is like an immense and infinite white paper and our Ego-Body combination is like an infinitesimally small black dot on this paper. Unfortunately, instead of identifying our own self with The Totality or the huge white paper, we identify our self with the miniscule, tiny black dot, our Ego-Body combination. This wrong identification is the cause of all our misery! *

Break Out – Like the chicken that hatches out of it’s hard shell, we also have to break out of our hard shell of our Ego-Body combination to be in real Freedom and Bliss! We can do this by becoming aware and experiencing the present moment fully at all times or as often as we can. This will help build a deep understanding of life and it’s meaning and purpose allowing us to live life to our full potential. *

Action & Inaction – Bhagavat Gita states ‘See inaction in action and action in inaction’. This can be interpreted as follows; when our Ego does any action, see inaction in it, implying that we should not expect any specific results of our Ego’s action. And in the seeming inaction of Superconsciousness or God, we should see action as all that happens is because of the Superconsciousness or God. * 010218

Being Peaceful – We have to relearn to remain peaceful and keep our body relaxed at all times, even when our external world is going topsy turvy. Only then, can we have access to the immense power and intelligence within us to resolve our external situations!

Replace – thinking with peace with the help of meditation, awareness and/or understanding, to live life fully. *061217

Ideal living is when we vibrate at the extremely low frequency as Totality, when we are completely blended with Totality, the present moment. Our inspiration and motivation should arise from This Totality, the present moment, and not from our Ego, which is always vibrating at a high frequency due to constant impact of our past memories and fear based imagined future.

Merging with the Totality or being Infinite once again is easily done when we drop all our conditionings. *

Activities – Totality is to just BE. Whereas, universal thinking and responding to the situation in the now is the activity of our Intellect. Self centered thinking and reacting to the situation in the now, thinking about our future and past are activities of our Ego. *

Action – Put your heart, mind and soul into even your smallest acts. This does not ensure success, but it ensures good, wholesome and fulfilling activity! * 311217

Desires – Desires limit us to specific segments or areas of life, whereas being free of desires allows us to live life fully as all aspects of life remain open for our access and ingress!

As long as we have desires, we are living in the future! We are not living and experiencing the present moment fully!

Roller Coaster – Life is a Roller Coaster for most of us. Often we are headed downwards. Sooner or later we all hit the rock bottom and turn around. A lot has to do with the Divine Forces operating within and around us. Truly, we are helpless regarding what is happening to each one of us, as these Divine Forces are extremely large as compared to our Ego, or our self effort. We only have the choice to either respond or react to the situation we are facing. Responding, instead of reacting, helps us as well as those around us. Whereas, reacting hurts us as well as those around us. An immense amount of awareness and patience is required for us to respond rather than react.  210718

Choice – Our Ego, which takes over total control of our Intellect, is the hot bed of the reactive disruptive forces that upset the smoothness of the flow of our life. Our life then becomes quite turbulent at times. However, if our Intellect embraces The Totality, it will  help to lovingly confine our Ego and release its total control over our life. Then, we will once again experience life in all its fullness and smoothness. So, we do have a choice; to let our Ego take control and live a turbulent life or to embrace Totality and live life smoothly and fully!

Our Ego has been programmed to be unhappy when it’s desires or expectations are not fulfilled, when it dislikes something or someone, when it is disrespected or when our beliefs do not come true! Whereas, our Intellect can choose to remain happy despite such adverse situations. This is certainly in our hands and we can easily take charge to be happy at all times. * 130817

We can and should exercise our choices to always remain healthy and happy as achieving these are mostly internal processes. Whereas, becoming rich, successful and powerful, are not only internal but to a greater extent external processes, and so these require tremendous support from forces which are beyond our area of influence; the enormous, dynamic and rapidly changing forces of The Totality! *170917

Biggest Burden – The heaviest and the biggest burden we all carry throughout our life are the regrets of the past, our desires, expectations and plans for the future!

Beware-of appreciation, praise, patting of the back, winning awards as they inflate our Ego, much like pressurised air inflates the balloon or the heat that makes the water boil! Inflated Egos generally hurt themselves as well as others sooner or later!

Being Insane-is to spend most of our time thinking and worrying about our past or being anxious or worried about our future when we can spend our time fully experiencing, living and enjoying the beautiful present moment! When our Ego clasps on to the dead past or the future as we imagine it to be, we are allowing the beautiful present moments to slip through our fingers like dry sand does when we clench our fist! Unfortunately we cannot retrieve the present which has slipped away from us!

Beliefs-are thoughts we have fully accepted, which become our truths and are stored in our memory. Our Beliefs guide our actions and make our internal and external life what it is! Change our beliefs and watch how our internal life of Health, Happiness, Harmony and our success in external life change automatically!

For most of our important beliefs we have no evidence at all, except that people we love and trust hold these beliefs. Confidence in our beliefs is really preposterous as we have no real experience to back them up! Unfortunately, our beliefs play a big role in our choices and decision making!

Syncing – When our Intellect is in sync in the present moment with the ever changing and dynamic forces of the universe, only then we can live our lives fully and happily. Whereas, most of us are living life with our Intellect in sync with our programming, our Ego, and so we end up living a very limited life and frequently unhappy too! *300917

Present Moment – We only have the present moment. The next moment is a mystery and certainly not in the control of our Ego. *241017

Beautiful Living-Our Ego imagines that situations detrimental to us will happen in the future, thereby robbing us of peaceful, good and beautiful living we all can do in the present!

Living Life fully–When we are at peace with our own self as well as with the situation in the present moment, only then we live our life fully! It is a state of complete mental and physical relaxation! It means that we are not escaping our present moment by remaining either in our past or going into our future!

Living is not about business transactions where we give something and get something more back in return. It is just pure living in the moment.

Why do we have to react, think or deliberate on the situation in the present moment when it is definitely going to change in the next moment? Why do we have to think, deliberate and plan for the future when the future is unpredictable? And why do we have to think, deliberate and analyse our past as it is dead and gone? Instead, we can and should live life fully in the present moment dropping all our Egoistic reactions, thinking, deliberations and analysis! * 150817

Inspiration-When we are inspired by the present moment situation and not by our Ego, then we think and act in tune with totality for the greater good of mankind and our beautiful Universe! *

Game – If we drop our seriousness about life and view life as a game of winning and losing honour, respect, wealth as well as good health, then we can enjoy and experience life fully!

Freedom – When our Ego becomes wise through sensitivity, awareness and experiences, then it releases it’s shackles and lets us live life fully and in freedom!

Happiness & Bliss– Happiness happens to us for a short while, when any one of the desires of our Ego gets fulfilled. Bliss is the eternal state we can be in, if our Ego fully dissolves into The Totality, a state free of all desires. *

Being Rich-We are truly rich and wealthy when we live our lives fully in the present moment! *

Treasures – Beneath the thick outer crust of our Ego with its limited knowledge lies a huge treasure, namely, Limitless Divine Wisdom. Discovering this treasure leads us to a full and a very meaningful life wherein we exude peace and pure, unconditional Divine Love to everyone!

True Identity-Whenever we have no desires or expectations, then all our thoughts disappear, we enter our unlimited ocean of Peace and our True Identity reappears!

Thoughts-When we are in our active default ‘Ego’ state, then we have thoughts of our past or our future only and they remain with us for long time leading to emotions like fear, anxiety, worry, regret, anger, happiness, and others. This continuous thinking of our past or future and the resultant emotions block or reduce the capacity and capabilities of our Intellect! Whereas, in the state of ‘Pure Awareness’, thoughts are extremely short lived; instead of emotions we are peaceful and so our Intellect is free for Intuitive, Creative and Effective activities. Luckily, the choice is ours to make as to which active state is our default state, ‘Ego’ or ‘Pure Awareness’! Unfortunately most of us are unaware that this choice is ours to make and so the default active state for most of us is the ‘Ego’ state!

Further, in the passive state of ‘Being’ we have a singular thought of ‘I am’. At the end of meditation is our deepest passive state of ‘Samadhi’, when we are totally thoughtless!

Emotions-We have emotions only when our Intellect is in the active ‘Ego’ state! Whereas in the active state of ‘Pure Awareness & Full Acceptance’ there are no emotions. There is only Peace!

If a specific emotion increases our psychological & physical energy we call it a positive emotion. If it drains our psychological & physical energy we call it a negative emotion! Happiness, Love, Calmness, Passion are positive emotions whereas Sadness, Anger, Fear, Anxiety, Worry, Regret are negative emotions. Negative emotions not only drain our energy in the short term but they also have a bad influence on our long term health!

Most Gurus and Spiritual teachers suggest we replace negative emotions with positive ones to live a better life! In effect, we have to ask our Ego to control itself! But when our Ego tries to do this, it succeeds only temporarily and so most of us revert back to our old situation very soon! Relief from all emotions can only be ours if we remain in the active state of ‘Pure Awareness and Full Acceptance’ most of the time. Then unlimited and undefined Peace replaces all our emotions! Happiness – is a transient emotion of our Ego. It lasts for a brief period after any of our desires or expectations are fulfilled. Whereas Peace is with us all the time when we are in the state of ‘Being’ or when we are in deep sleep!

Smile-even if we force our muscles to smile, it brings in cognitive ease and ease of retrieving information from our memory which is necessary for good decision making! It helps build strong relationships! It also helps our auto immune system to keep us healthy!

There is always something we can find in every situation to smile about. Try and find this, instead of being overwhelmed by the situation, to maximise our happy living as well as our good health. * 230718

Fragrance-People, who remain in pure awareness and full acceptance most of the time, have a positive and magnetic aura around them. There is a sweet fragrance emanating from them and other people feel comfortable and love to be in their company!

Flowing Through-Let all our thoughts, emotions (like grief, fear, anxiety, regret, anger, compassion, happiness  etc) and bodily pain flow freely in our body and out from our body into the Universe! Let us not control, dam or bottle them within our own body! That is real freedom as well as gives a fine feeling of lightness and good health!

Peace and Harmony within us get lost when we are in competition with others; when we have desires to be better, smarter, richer, more popular than someone else! They also get lost when we have expectations from others and when they are not fulfilled; and when we are trying to hide somethings from others! All we have to do is to be our own self to be at peace and harmony!

Peace with others can happen only when are at peace with and within our own self!

Completeness – Our Ego keeps us feeling incomplete at all times, seeking inputs from the external world to make us complete. The reality is that each one of us is complete within our own self at all times!

Problems- Situations are not problems by themselves. Situations just are! Only when our Ego does not accept the situations fully, situations become problems.  Our Ego does not accept the situations fully when the situations do not fulfil it’s desires and expectations! Once our Ego becomes aware of it’s many desires and expectations, there will be easier and quicker acceptance of the situations and the mirages of problems disappear. What will remain are the situations which can be easily handled and managed! *

When we transcend our Ego and it’s desires, our problems vanish and life becomes a celebration! *

Worry – is the unnecessary thinking our Ego does out of fear of an imagined bad future. Experience will show that the imagined bad future does not really happen most of the time! So, worry is a meaningless waste of time for our Intellect which can be used in many better ways when our Ego accepts the present situation as it is now and our Intellect is peaceful! *

Help – Our Ego actually prevents God from helping us through the Forces of our Universe!

Prayer – True Praying is done when our Intellect is completely empty and is not asking for anything; that is, when it is totally free from the Ego it has created!

The war and conflict within our Ego gets resolved immediately when we surrender unconditionally to the Forces of the Universe also called God; when we accept the present situation fully!

Life becomes very pleasant and fulfilling when we are in either of the two emotional states of Love & Passion; which, strange as it may seem, are also part of our Ego!

Life implies beneficial situations & difficult situations, successes & failures, gains & losses, good decisions & bad decisions, perfection as well as making mistakes. This is like two sides of a coin. There is no exclusivity! We cannot just have beneficial situations, successes, gains, good decisions and perfection all the time! We have to accept the two opposite aspects of life totally if we want to live this life fully!

The reality is that life situations happen to us; the illusion is that we make life situations happen!

Life is Divine internally as well as externally. Externally, we have to also enjoy and experience the Divine game of success and failure, respect and disrespect, good health and sickness knowing that each aspect does not last for ever! *

Almost all of us are living a life of discontent and unhappiness most of the time except for few short intervals of contentment and happiness when our Ego’s desires are fulfilled by The Totality! *

Death – is a sad event as per the social norms and conditioning of our Ego. It has to be grieved! Whereas the reality is that, Death is the passage back to our original sublime and peaceful un-manifested state from where our body and Intellect originated. It really should be celebrated as our Ego’s separateness from The Totality has ended and we are once again one with The Grand Totality! *                         140717

Civilised – A characteristic of being civilised is that our Ego does not accept the present moment as it is now, driving us to lead a stressful life of always planning and working to change the present situation. Unfortunately, this only happens at the cost of our happiness and living life fully! Perhaps, people untouched by civilisation, like tribals and those living in remote areas, are living life fully and happily in the present moment! *

Selfless Action-Most of our actions are carried by our Intellect while it is in its Ego state! Such actions are totally self centered. Like an Ostrich buries its head in the sand to avoid a sand storm, most of us fail to become aware that our actions are really self centered and not in service of others as we tend to imagine and believe! Only when our Intellect is in the Pure Awareness and Full Acceptance state, when we respond, not react, to the situation in the present moment, then our actions are truly selfless!

Actions done with deep understanding of our True Self are free from success or failure in fulfillment of the desires of our Ego. Such actions are perfect and noble! *

Unconditional Love cannot be given by us mortals who have not fully discovered our own self! If and when we discover our inner peace or are immersed in the emptiness within our own self, then unconditional love or peace radiates from us to everyone without being selective! Our unconditional love or peace envelopes even those who hate us including our enemies!

Relationships-As most of us have not yet fully discovered our own self, our relationships are always one of give and take. You give me this and I will give you that! All our relationships are like business transactions wherein we exchange money, goods or services. Additionally, in personal relationships, services also include giving and taking love, respect, looking after and caring, compassion and understanding, etc. It may appear ridiculous, that even our relationships with our parents or children are based on transactions of give and take! We only need to become aware of this, to have a pleasant environment at home and not be under the false impression that either our parents, children or we are giving unconditional love to others!

Best relationships are sustained when we become capable of giving unconditional love to the other person or persons all the time as well as our full attention to that person or persons whenever they require it!

More on Relationships –Even a single unfulfilled desire or expectation from the other person can bring in frost (barrier) in our relationship! Whereas, if our Ego drops all desires and expectations from the other person, then the relationship becomes very blissful – The Totality *

When one person wants the other person to change to meet it’s values, perceptions or beliefs, then the relationship is on the brink of failure or collapse. Good relationships are based on full acceptance of the other as she/he is now. We can do this when we become aware that our values, perceptions and beliefs are based on the limited personal experience and knowledge we have gathered in our memory. The other person’s values, perceptions and beliefs are based on her/his limited experiences, and knowledge she/he has gathered in it’s memory. These are bound to be different. So, it makes good sense to accept everyone as they are now which will enhance relationships and bring more happiness in both person’s lives – emanated from the Universe 100620 *

Spouses Relationship – Spouses should be sufficiently similar to understand each other easily and adequately different to surprise each other and make life very interesting!

Sex – is an integral part of life! Unfortunately, we are conditioned from childhood by parents, religions and society to deny it, avoid  talking about it within the family, suppress our sexual desires resulting in unnatural way of stressful living resulting in major imbalances! Better way is to be open for any discussion on sex with any of our family members and at the proper time help the young family members to understand sex, and the resultant procreation activity!

Maximising our Potential – We maximise our Intelligence, capabilities, happiness as well as our health when our Intellect is fully involved with the present moment!

Achievements – A good part of our Ego is the conditioning and programming of our Intellect to achieve personal or financial success in this life! So, our Ego continuously makes new and many fixed and rigid goals for achievement and drives itself very hard to achieve these goals regardless of what the Forces of the Universe will allow us to achieve. We are lucky when our goals are in tune with these Forces. If not, then there are disappointments, sadness and psychological damage when we do not achieve!

Awareness brings us in tune with the Forces of the Universe and then we do achieve but with flexible goals. It is quite possible that in Awareness we may start with a flexible goal to become an Engineer and end up becoming a very successful doctor!

Responsibilities & Duties – These are conditionings or programmings which are either acquired by our Intellect or imposed on it by our parents, friends, teachers, society or the Constitution of the Nation and are retained as part of our Ego! They generally are a burden unless we fulfill them out of love or as a response to the situation in the present moment!

Perfection – Every aspect of our wonderful Universe is perfect. If we drop all our desires, then we will know and experience this perfection *

Being a Perfectionist-This is also a conditioning or programming which is either acquired by our Intellect or imposed on it by a parent, friend, teacher or a Guru. This characteristic is a part of our Ego! It creates immense amount of stress within us while doing any work or getting any work done by others. Stress does not help either our body or our intellect! Instead, the better option is to do the best we can or get the best done in the time available to us! Also, understand that our standards of perfection are never the same as anyone else’s standard. There is no absolute perfection and we do not see it in nature either! Nature is imperfectly beautiful! So, can we be!

Making Mistakes – Mistakes like accidents happen, they are generally not made! Freedom to make mistakes releases us from unnecessary stress and gives us the capabilities to take risks and try new activities and experiments with life. *

Underperformance – Most of us are conditioned or programmed to have Desires and Expectations as material success is the goal of the human race! This automatically gives rise to fear or anger that our desires and expectations may not be fulfilled which creates stress within our Intellect.  Stress is also created when we do not accept the present as it is now. This results in our underperformance! In order for us to perform to the best of our ability we have to be relatively stress free. This can be done when our Intellect is in the Pure Awareness and Full Acceptance state, when we do accept our present moment as is, and enjoy and love what we are doing keeping our own desires and expectations aside!

Do everything with relative ease and comfort as this will bring out the best in us. Leave the results to Totality as the results not only depend on our effort but in a big way on the multitude of universal forces of Totality in operation at every moment of time. *

Understanding–Whenever we encounter any unusual situation our Ego drives us immediately to a lot of thinking and analysis to understand the situation very quickly. Our Ego is always in a hurry to understand everything quickly. Unfortunately our Ego’s desires, beliefs, biases and prejudices, insecurities, limited knowledge & experience may drive our thinking and analysis in the wrong direction and what we may understand may be very far from reality!

The question is, do we need to understand everything quickly? Or do we need to accept everything as it is now, quickly!

Let us first accept the situation fully and let the understanding come at its own time! This understanding will be closer to the truth! In the meantime, we are free to live life fully in the present moments!

Universal Knowledge & Understanding are accessible to everyone when we are at complete peace with our inner and outer worlds, i.e. our own self and the present moment situations! This is our state of ‘True Self’! Then we become aware of the limitations of the knowledge, experience, skills of our Ego along with the resultant faulty decisions we make often based on these limitations. We also become aware of the damage our reactive emotions are doing to our life and preventing us from good living! *

Logic and Reasoning are thinking tools created by human Intellect to make a common platform for thinking, analysis and decision making for orderly functioning of our human race! However, it has its limitations and does not apply to the Forces of our Universe as we still do not have good quality and reliable evidence on how our Universe and its Forces function!

Change-Our parents, teachers and Gurus preach regularly that we change for the better. This implies that they have not accepted us as we are now and as a result of which, even we do not accept ourselves as we are at present. So most of us spend our present moments in trying to change, thereby losing out on the fine living we can do in the present moment! Instead, let us live our life fully in the present moment and be aware and accept fully who and what we are; then the changes, if the Universal forces require, will happen automatically within us!

Control–Similarly, we have been preached to control our thoughts, emotions and actions! Control is an activity of our Ego and it gets strengthened when it starts controlling! Control requires much effort and energy. So, it results in building up of stress within our Intellect and Body and then we may need stress management workshops to free us from the stress we have built within our own self! Once again, it is better to become aware of our thoughts, emotions and actions and let this awareness lead us to experience, understanding, acceptance and subsequent automatic change in our thoughts, emotions and actions instead of immediate stressful control of the same!

Effort-Our individual effort is an essential part of our destiny! We cannot win a lottery unless we make the effort to buy a lottery ticket! What happens in the future is highly unpredictable as multitude of activities, not in our control, have to take place before any result happens! Perhaps that is why, Bhagavad Gita states that, we should not be attached to the fruits of our action!

Illusion-Indian Scriptures state that ‘this world is an illusion‘ (Maya). The bigger illusion is our Ego, that we have ourselves created, which perceives it own created reality and runs our life within the confines of this reality which is normally far from the truth! Quite often our Ego ruins our life instead of running it!!

Attachment-Indian Scriptures ask us to practice ‘Vairagya’, detachment from this world. The most important detachment, we need to have, is the detachment of our Intellect from our Ego (which also means our possessions)! This is easily done by being in the present moment when our Intellect surfaces into a state of Pure Awareness and our desires and expectations disappears!

Soul (Atman)-Another misconception with most of the the Priests is that our Soul (Atman) needs to be connected to God during our lifetime. The heuristic (discovery by experience) is that individual Soul cannot be separated from the Universal Soul. It is the Ego that we create, that separates us from the rest of the Universe! It is our Ego that is always restless and without peace! At death, our body as well as our Ego dies and with it our restlessness dies too! So, truly no prayers, rituals, ceremonies are required to bring peace to our Soul as it is always peaceful and one with the Universal Soul! The prayers, ritual and ceremonies are really meant for bringing peace in the Egos of the surviving near and dear ones!

Learning is best done when we are in the present moment with the help of our Intellect in the Pure Awareness state. When we are truly and fully in the present moment, our Ego disappears so it can not limit our learning or interfere with the observing and learning process!

Most Important Activity is what we are doing in the present moment be it washing, bathing, eating, studying, singing, painting, doing sudoku, gaming, playing, blogging, teaching, preaching, managing, organising and even planning. Everything we do, should be done with full Awareness. What we do in the present moment and how we do it, molds our future! Once Buddha was asked by his disciple as to why he had raised his hand twice to touch his forehead in quick succession? Buddha explained that the first time he was not aware of what he had done so he repeated it; the second time with awareness! Fortunately, the positive aspects and benefits of Pure Awareness can be experienced by all of us in no time!

Pilgrimage-Many of us spend quite a bit of time, energy and life in planning pilgrimages to holy places and to take dips in holy rivers or visit holy places to wash off our sins! There is a much better and easier way! This is of our Ego, Intellect and Body taking frequent dips in the ocean of inner peace or being fully immersed in our own ‘True Self’! We can do it anytime and as often as we want to! The Sparkle returns quickly within us after this cleansing process!

Program – We all have been unconsciously programmed by our parents, teachers and society to not accept our own self as we are now and not accept the present moment as it is now. This results in our life’s futile continuous struggles to change our own self and to change others and the external environment. *

Freedom – We have put our own self in heavy chains with the conditioning or programming we have done of our Intellect with the help of our parents, teachers & society. We call this conditioning or programming as our Ego. We can be fully free if we can become aware of the limitations our Ego has kept us in. Slowly the imaginary chains holding us back will disintegrate and disappear leaving us in True Freedom to live life fully. – The Totality *

Present – Our life is a present from The Totality. We can choose to live it fully as we receive it in the present moments, or we can let the present moments of life slip by, waiting for a better life, as defined by our Ego, to arrive in the future! *

Only the Present Moment is real and is created by Divinity! Both the past as well as the future are unreal and are a creation of our Conscious Intellect, our Ego!

The Present Moment is not created by us (our Ego) but by Totality, the Universal Forces or God! Blaming or crediting our own self is a mistake for which we can suffer psychologically. But we do have a choice on the action we can take based on the situation in the present moment. However, we should be aware that it is nearly impossible for us (our Ego) to predict the future or get our desired results every time.*

The most precious part of our life is The Present Moment. Please do not allow it to slip by without being aware of it and being totally involved with it!

Being in the present moment is the same as having no desires! Only then, we truly and fully enjoy everything than happens in the present moment!

Egoless living is quite simple. Just be in the present moment!*                              250617

Energy– Ego’s desires create thoughts, emotions and actions which consume a lot of emotional and physical energies of our body. Pure Awareness consumes much less energy; Peace, Tranquility and Emptiness consume practically no energy. Meditation and deep sleep at night regenerate our emotional & physical energies!

Cause and Effect – All of us are programmed to quickly identify a single cause for each effect. The reality is that for each effect there are always a multitude of causes; many are still beyond the comprehension of the human mind. Instead of wasting our time and energies identifying the single cause or maybe a few causes, it is better for most of us to move from our past into the present moments and continue living life fully and leave this activity to the research scientists!

History never repeats itself! Each situation is unique as the circumstances are continuously changing. So, every situation needs a new and very specific response. Ready made solutions from our, our parents and other persons past experiences will generally be outdated and invalid to help sort out the present situation!

Managing the Future-Most of us are managing our future with our Ego, manipulating, driving or forcing the situations to meet its expectations! This can often result in poor health or other difficult to handle situations. We also have the choice, that with the help of our Intellect we sail with the wind, like what sailors do in their sail boats! This means doing what is necessary based on the situation in the present moment! Then we are more than likely to come across situations in the future which are much beyond the expectations of our Ego!

Experiences – No experience is a waste, even if it classified as bad by our Ego. Every experience enriches our life by adding more meaning and depth to it! So, continue experiencing life as fully as possible by remaining in the now, the present moment! *

Success & Failure – There is only a 50% chance of succeeding in whatever we do to succeed in our Personal & Business life or even in improving our health! The chances increase considerably if the Forces of the Universe present at the moment help the actions or moves we have made! The reverse is true and we will definitely fail, if the Forces of the Universe do not help or support our actions! Truly, success as well as well as failure are not within our control! Only taking action is possibly within our control! Sometimes, even taking action is prevented by the Forces of the Universe! *

Goals-Having fixed and specific goal is like being on a train which is guided by the rails towards the specific goal or destination. It does not let you discover much other than what comes along the railway track! If we make our goals more general in nature, and subject to revision or change based on the prevailing situation in the present, it will be like riding in an automobile instead, which gives you the flexibility of discovering not only what is ahead, but towards the left or right and even what is behind us!

Like a river racing to the ocean, most of us are rushing towards the goal of success. Our Society’s definition of success is accumulation of only material wealth and possessions; which is having a huge bank balance and lots of expensive and exclusive possessions! Discovering our own self, peace and happiness within us are not considered as success by our Society!

Goalless Achievements-When we look into our past, many of us may find one surprising aspect; that is, we have  had many worldly achievements in the past  for which we never had a Goal! Some of these achievements were life changing! This seems strange, doesn’t it? We need to deliberate on this, as most of us feel that motivation and material success come only from having goals! What about passion, interest and good luck? What role do they play in motivating and helping us? Let us deliberate, discover and experience it!

Seeding or setting Goals – Our Ego is continuously planting seeds, setting new goals! However, the sprouting of the seeds, or achievement of our goals, is dependent on numerous factors which are not within the ambit of our Ego. We can call these factors or forces, The Totality. Some seeds may sprout or none may sprout, depending on The Totality and its enormous forces! Even if some sprout they may not sprout within the time schedule set by our Ego. Surprisingly, our experience can and will show that many sprouts do come up in our life for which the seeds were not planted by our Ego. This will be impossible for most of us to believe that something can be achieved without any effort from our Ego! So, when we plant seeds or set goals, let us do it with this awareness and knowing of The Totality’s enormous power compared with our Ego. This will make our life more specific, meaningful and less stressful. * 240717

Sub-atomic Specks-Amidst the vast Universe of our ‘True Self’, our own and other Egos thoughts, words and actions as well as bodily pains and other conditions are like sub-atomic specks; so very tiny and insignificant that their existence does not cause any ripples or reactions within the Intellect of an aware and evolved person!

Yardstick-Many of us think that we are living our life fully when we are earning lots of money, having high level of power and control, getting recognition and respect, spending much money for entertainment, travelling exclusively and extensively, acquiring exclusive possessions, giving away plenty to others as well as giving to charities etc.!

However, one yardstick for living our life fully can be the amount of love we are giving to others and the number of people beyond our relatives and close friends who are receiving our love! Living becomes even fuller when we start giving limitless love to each and everyone, regardless of their relationship with us, their religion, caste, creed, colour or their economic level, and regardless of getting any love or anything else back in return!

Another yardstick is being one with everyone, a real understanding that no one is either superior or inferior to us!

Most of us live life being our Ego, try being a Zero, when life can be lived fully!

–Gul Malani

Gratitude– There is a widespread idea that we have to express our gratitude essentially to God or Divinity for everything we have at present. Gratitude is a very powerful tool to live our life fully. It keeps us peaceful and happy. The advantage of Gratitude multiplies manifold times if we become grateful also to all the living beings, as well as the non living contents of our Beautiful Universe! – The Divinity 040224 *