Learning to Be Happy With Less

TMO 

The Path Towards Self-Realization: Part VII

TASK #3: Learn to be happy with less. Find the good in unpleasant situations, but most of all, appreciate all you have, and learn not to need unnecessary things. Drink water from the river of life one cup at a time.

Gain a broader perspective in order not to be overwhelmed by the vastness of life. What you are learning is making you more and more aware of how much there is to learn! It can be really frightening to look at the vastness of the universe and the minuteness of yourself. One can’t help but wonder, “What’s the use? My existences is inconsequential to the universe!” But you must have faith in what your inner voice is telling you, what the universal spirit is telling you through the voice of Psyche – that there is a reason for your existence, because you were born.

Everyone has a purpose which they learn upon giving up their false ego and hearing the true voice of the spirit. You have a place in this world, and you are inseparable from this world. Don’t let life in the world be a prison. Let it be a door to even greater things! You are beautiful because you are a part of this grand scheme of the universe. It is a wonderful thing to discover, and worth all the pain and agony.

TASK #4: This is your hardest part of the journey. The last dry stretch of land! [insert warning about loss of friends.] It defies all rational thought. Understand that, and go on. Do not attempt this last task until you have completed the first 3 tasks [See Journey Towards Self-Realization: Part VI] as best as you possibly can. You will know when you are ready for the fourth task.

First, it is a very good idea to find a pillar of strength to guide you. A religion, a book such as “Siddhartha,” Mohammad, the Bible, a prophet or guru of some sort. Someone pure, whom you can trust absolutely. Someone who has already gone through it.

As hard as it might be, concentrate all of your energy on the inner journey. You’re ALMOST there! Though others may need your help now, it is better to finish this quest first, and then go back and help them. Don’t try to pull in others with you, or try to convert them to your way of thinking. This is your journey, and it will be your treasure, which you can share with them.

Give up control over your fate. Whatever happens is destined to happen. The universe is like a big clock, and the voice which guides you will guide you correctly. Have faith in it; absolute trust, for if you let go of it, you’ve lost your lifeline.

Meditate, journey into the labyrinth of your mind, remembering, accepting, remembering, shuddering, remembering! Don’t stay too long in the underworld or you’ll stay there forever. Stay until you have what you need, and get out again. The voice will guide you.

Then – you will find it. The thing that will rip you apart, shatter your old self – no longer will you be the same! You will experience incredible suffering, because the wound is now exposed: Don’t give in! Expose every bit of it and cling to your faith and love of life and the wisdom you’ve gained through your other tasks.

You will be utterly demolished and weak, and terribly, terribly uncertain and afraid. Don’t worry. Sit, and wait. Meditate calmly. Now you are trying to heal the wound.

Let your feminine and masculine traits act together to create a new birth inside you. Create art, let compassion flow from within you. It may be hard to get started, but once it’s going it is like rain falling on the desert! Flowers bloom, the parched earth begins to heal once more.

Now, the same aspects of your personality, whose struggling imprisoned the Psyche before, can act as life-savers. They can give you strength to go on. No longer is there separation, but peace within. There is meaning and harmony in all that you see. A love for the universe which is indestructible.

Compassion, selfless giving is the healing river, which smooths out all the rocks and jagged stones. Let it flow – through you and motivate you, for in this love there is strength and beauty. There is a balance inside you as long as you are going, flowing on the river, knowing what is important and worthwhile, giving and loving a symphony of life and nature!

If you want this truth, it is yours. If your true desire is to be set free from the prison of your self, you will be liberated.

It’s never an easy path, but remember the first step is to say: “I am a seeker.”

Acknowledge that you want this something, and that you are willing to go through pain to find yourself. Your true self. The rest will follow. The Lord provides for those who seek.

The Path Towards Self-Realization: Part IV

 TMO 

Our Defenses: Intellect

People have many reactions and defenses to keep from realizing truths about themselves. One thing we do a lot is rationalize: to twist the truth around so that we see only what we feel like looking at. Another thing we do is project the blame at another person: the age-old, “But he started it!”

With our intellect, we deny our Psyche the chance to speak. We deny the existence of anything we cannot see or touch with our hands. Intellectual reasoning is definitely necessary in order to function in this world, but because it is limited to obvious, tangible evidence, we must be able to go beyond it! There are truths which we cannot grasp with our intellect alone. The unconscious has nothing to do with rational thought. (Just take a look at your dreams!) The Psyche speaks in riddles, which can only be solved with an open mind that can accept intuition as reality. Sometimes, when you stop trying to figure it all out, and just let it be, then you will suddenly understand!

Emotions

Another thing we try to do with our intellectual defenses is to stifle our emotions. That won’t work either! When suppressed, emotions blow totally out of proportion until they become unmanageable. Being overwhelmed with emotion, be it pleasant or unpleasant, drains you of all objectivity and clarity of thought. For example: When you are in a bad mood, it is impossible to think of anything as positive, and likewise – if you are in a good mood, you have to ignore everything negative in order to stay in your bubble.

With all this struggling going on inside you – between your intellect and emotions, between your ego and the egos of others, between what you are and what you wish you were… it is very important just to sit quietly and feel what’s going on inside.

But instead of doing this, a lot of people try to drown out all these struggling voices by adding other voices on top of them! They are simply terrified to be alone with themselves. They surround themselves with company, they listen to loud music, or they watch TV constantly – violent programs to feed their aggression, or soap operas to help them ignore their own problems by worrying about the lives of fictional characters.

The best thing to do is, once in a while, turn off the TV, turn off the music, sit by yourself and listen to the birds chirping, and the wind rustling through the trees. Because underneath all of this struggling lies Psyche, your soul, and the answers to your problems. She is deep inside you, waiting patiently for all the voices to quiet so that she can speak clearly, tell you what you need to do, and give you the strength to do it.

What is Meditation?

A lot of people, when they hear the word “meditation,” think of people with shaved heads chanting “ommmmm.” Certainly this is one way to meditate, but meditation is really just finding the peace inside oneself and residing in it. Meditation is important to combat stress and mental fatigue, as well as a way to bring unrealized truths out from within you.

Like sleep is to the body, so is meditation to the mind. It rests and revitalizes the spirit, and you come out feeling stronger, calmer, and better able to handle stressful situations.  Don’t expect to have out-of-body experiences or revelations from God – though you might, but that’s not the main point of meditation – just as your dreams are not the main reason for sleeping!

A good way to meditate is to sit peacefully and listen to the rain pattering on the roof, but people find meditation through exercise, or manual labor such as gardening, shoveling snow, cooking or cleaning. Others find peace by doing artwork or chanting on beads. The best thing to do is whatever comes naturally to you, maybe something you’ve enjoyed doing as a child, such as hunting for four-leaf clovers or flying a kite. If you do most any activity with spiritual intention, with the higher purpose of cleansing and resting your spirit, the benefits from the activity will be multiplied.

Sitting Meditation

A beautiful spiritual practice is sitting meditation. In the west, it is also known as quiet contemplation. It often follows prayer and chanting exercises. Sit comfortably (with the back straight is healthiest) and listen to your breath going in and out. Your breath came with you into this life, carries you through each moment in life, and leaves you as you go out of this life. So, your breath is very important for concentration in meditation.

The goal of sitting meditation is to have complete silence in your mind, but this does not happen immediately. In fact, it may take several periods of meditation before you can attain even one moment free of thoughts. But that moment is really beautiful!

Don’t try not to think, because that is a thought in itself. Picture yourself as a mountain, and all your thoughts as clouds drifting by. Don’t cling to them, just watch them go by, and then bring your focused attention back to your breathing again. If you begin to doze or drift off into daydreams or worries, just gently bring yourself back into consciousness. One good way to help yourself to not drift off, is right before you start, make a little vow to yourself to sit quietly and focused for ten minutes or whatever amount of time you wish to meditate. In time, your thoughts will slow down automatically, gradually becoming less and less, until all you hear is the crystal silence inside yourself.

You can also practice meditation while doing chores or walking to school, or sitting on the bus. Do whatever you’re doing with focused attention on your breath, and be at one with whatever task you are performing. Not only will this give you peace of mind, but you will find that your work becomes much more pleasant this way, and gets done more carefully. Be awake at each moment. Not only when you are doing sitting meditation, but with everything you do, be aware and conscious of what you are doing.

When meditating, it is important to be a witness of yourself. Watch yourself breathing. If you are a witness to yourself, you will be less likely to be carried away by thoughts and daydreams. If you feel discomfort, just be a witness of it, don’t start getting involved with it. For instance, instead of thinking, “My leg is asleep! Oh it feels so strange! What should I do?”, just be aware that your leg is asleep, and don’t be bothered by it; or, should it become too uncomfortable to bear, simply move your leg, still with attention focused on breathing, deal with the situation calmly and purposefully until it is resolved.

Developing the strength to become a witness of yourself will positively affect every aspect of how you handle life.