Necessity for self discipline

like all other species,human beings are also part of the nature.But in one point they differ from others.The task of fulfilling life's mission is done automatically in others life, but human beings can reach the goal of their lives only with lots of self effort and self discipline.Flowers blossom to spread fragrance, fruits ripe to satisfy hunger, and river flows to enrich life of others.At the end of its journey,lovingly it dissolves it's own identity by being one with the ocean.This noble task is done so gracefully, that it seems, that they come only to fulfill their life's mission joyfully.
Mission of human life is also the same. With a help of an analogy, Buddha explained it beautifully.He said,when we like a flower,we pluck it, when we love a flower, we water it daily.Selfless service for well being of all,can be performed, only when one realizes that the same life force is throbbing in every heart, and we are all connected.As Dalai Lama said,"In my limited experience I have found that the more we care for the happiness of others, the greater is our own sense of well being."
But often our spiritual loving nature gets repressed by our uncontrolled senses.They react quickly to out side stimuli.As a result,instead of being guided by our spiritual consciousness,we get trapped by basic survival instincts, which make life self centered and stressful.
Awakened souls of ancient India realized,emotional stability and well being can be established,only by controlling the out going nature of our senses. So rishi Patanjali prescribed ten eternal and ethical values in his "Yoga Sutra " , which are supposed to be practiced from childhood.With sincere practice, they help to change our negative attitudes, clear up mental pollutions , and gives us power to control senses to lead them in right directions.
These disciplines are known as Yama and Niyama( self control and self discipline). Yama includes five basic ethical values. They are Ahimsa (non harming), Satya(truthfulness),Asteya (non stealing),Brahmacharya (celibacy) and Aparigraha (non greediness).All these values teach us to interact with life,s situations more harmoniously. By practicing non-hurting attitude,one learns to develop loving kindness towards all life.Following the path of truth,one never gets lost in life,because truth is the ultimate winner in every situation of life.By practicing the virtue of non-stealing one stays away from karmic bondage and is also respected by all.Celibacy teaches,not to waste personal energy by misuse of senses.Development of non greediness is very much needed in today's consumerist culture.It helps to keep life free from unnecessary accumulations.
Niyama includes,Sauch(cleanliness),Santosh(contentment), Tapas (spiritual practice), Svadhya(self study),and Ishwar Pranidhan,surrendering to God.To advance in the spiritual path,necessity to keep body and mind free from all pollutions is very necessary.Also one should safe guard against bad company, unhealthy food and polluted environment, they affect life negatively.Other three qualities, contentment,religious practices, and self study are also equally important in life.Finally Ishwar Pranidhan means to offer every moment of life in remembrance of God and to bring His glory through actions,speech and thoughts in life.All these ten values bring out our divine nature.As Swamy Vivekananda truly said, "each soul is potentially divine, and the goal is to manifest this divinity within by controlling nature external and internal."

Destiny.

Destiny is a mysterious and controversial topic.Some believe that,life's events are predetermined by God, and we can not do anything about it.There is also another rational view, according to which ,neither stars nor God hold our destiny. We are the maker of our own fate.Destiny is nothing but the result of our own karma, which we choose to do with our own free will.
We always get influenced by old habits and attitudes, and tend to attract the same type of destiny again and again.It will best, if we can learn from our mistakes.But according to Bhagawat Gita, by letting the mind dwell too long on a selfish desire erases the lessons we should have learn from prior experiences.
We all want to start a new destiny and want to free from old karmic bondage. That path, by which we can be free from karma,was shown by many enlightened souls through the ages.
Buddha said," No one saves us, but ourselves, and we must walk the path." The path,which he asked to follow,was the path of awareness.Every moment we must be aware of our mind and attitude.If they are unselfish and wholesome,then the results of righteous actions will surely be beneficial to all.
There is a deep connection between karma and fate, and that law is based on the universal law of cause and effect.In simple language,what we sow we reap.What we give to life,life gives back in ten fold, and that is what we call destiny. Another factor which influences our destiny is the inter connectedness between all life.As human nature often over values short term gain and undervalues the long term,he tends to deprive others in many ways to fulfill his own selfish desires and cravings.In Bhagawad Gita,Shri Krishna warned and said,"you work against your best interests when you let unbridled cravings control you"( chapter 3/verse 37-41).
Often an ignorant mind,breaks that cosmic law, and does not hesitate to inflict pain to others,in obtaining his short term gain.But results of such actions in a long run can not be profitable,neither for us nor for our future generations.Then we may not remember,that the cause was created by us, but the cosmic law can not be broken by any body.The universe is like a mirror,it reflects exactly the same in life,what we show through actions.
The arrival of  results of action may vary, it may be immediate,it may take moderate time or a longer time.Like by putting finger in the fire, effect of burning will immediate.Or ill health,like obesity,heart disease etc may be caused after a moderate time of 15/20 years,due to wrong eating or lead a sedentary life.And some results of our karma germinate much later, in this life or in next life.We must know,that good or bad,whatever we find in our present life,is nothing but the results of our past karma.
Life is a golden opportunity for all of us to cultivate good destiny by doing good karma.ParamHansa Yogananda said "Real strength comes,when in silence and seclusion,we meditate on true source of origin.Then we realize,we are of divine consciousness, and are not limited in the fragile cage of this body made of flesh,bones and senses.
The famous philosopher Descartes also believed that,all individuals possess the natural light of reason, and has capacity to discover the truth.We all have divine potentiality in us, we are all capable in changing our destiny and roasting the seeds of bad karma by doing good karma, and by bringing light of wisdom with self effort and determination in life.Aristotle's quotation summarizes karma theory beautifully.He said, "excellence is never an accident.It is always the result of high intention,sincere effort, and intelligent execution,it represents the wise choice of many alternatives choice,not chance determines your destiny."

Edited by Prodeep Bose.

Power of compassion

It was a pleasant surprise for me to visit a beautiful Buddist meditation center in a small town in the Hamptons. My son Prodeep, his wife Louisa and two dogs drove me there, and left me to attend two hours meditation session on a Sunday morning. A small group of people were attending the session. One kind looking American lady gave a brief guided meditation course , to make our mind still and receptive. After that she spoke about Buddha's teachings on compassion. We all know that, compassion is a great virtue,which wipes away tears of many suffering souls, and also helps to open our hearts, and broaden it with love, compassion and forgiveness toward others.But in today's hectic life,we want everything instant,we have no time to stop and reflect.So the tender flower of compassion which blossoms with love, torlerance and forgiveness is drying up in life.But now the time has come,to be inspired and learn to deal with life,more meaningfully,by being compassionate and kind to others; to our family,society and the whole world.Enlightened souls like Buddha,Christ,Gandhi,Mother Teressa,they showed the power of compassion through their self less service.They felt others sufferings as their own and dedicated their life for wellbeing of others. Young prince Siddhath,left his kingdom and family,went through austerities as a renunciate,just to know, how to end sufferings of life.He found his answer in giving unselfish love and compassion. Our love and compassions are generally tinged with our selfish desires,they are not unconditional.So when our expectations are not met,we feel frustrated and angry.Then leaving the path tolerance and forgiveness,we take the path of violence and aggressiveness.Our myopic vision,can not see life through a larger frame.The problem starts,when we ignore our kinship with others.The moment we train our mind to see our interconnectedness,our hearts open up, and then we can no more hurt others.We realize that,all life trembles at violence,and if we put ourselves in another's plannce,we can not be violent to others. Compassion and love cannot grow on the soil of anger,hatred or selfishness.Unless we nurture loving tolerance,we can neither be happy,nor can make others happy.We are all playing our different roles,in the temporary drama called "life".So it is important to learn from life,and try to give back to life,as much as we can, through our good will and good deeds.Sowing the seeds of compassion and love,we can all leave a permanent mark in this impermanent life. Actually when we encounter difficult people or situations in life,we should thank them from our hearts to give us a great opportunity to develop our patience,loving tolerance and to do good karma.Bhagawad Gita says,only brave can forgive, and return love for hatered.It says ,who is detached,remains undisturbed in pleasure and pain,same with friend and foe, is dear to God. When unexpected stormy moments appear in life, we get rattled, loose our cool,and react aggressively to others. But we can get a lesson from Buddha's story.Once when Buddha was sitting in his usual meditative mood, one of his jealous cousins came and started berating Buddha, for no reason. But as Buddha stayed unruffled, he left after some time.Buddha's disciple Ananda asked, "Lord, why did you allow him to speak such lies, you did not not even protest".Buddha answered , when some body wants to give a gift, and it is not accepted, it goes back to the giver.Buddha's compassion extended even to those, who were abusive to him. But even if we can not oblige undue demand, we should not shout back or insult a person.We may reject undue demand being calm and dignified. Bhagawad Gita says, by controlling our anger and impulsiveness we can make our own self our friend. I will end with another beautiful story called "Bishop's candle stand ", which I read in my school days. The story goes like this...,on a stormy night a much respected Bishop was all alone at home, when an exconvict came by seeking shelter. The kind Bishop called him friend, and offered him food and shelter. After some time, when the Bishop went to bed , the convict stole his silver candle stands, and ran away.But soon he was caught and brought back to Bishop by local police. The compassionate Bishop pardoned the convict, and asked the police to go back, and told them, that they were not stolen, they were gifted by him to his friend . Kind compassion of Bishop touched the heart of the convict, and gave him a new life.His path of sin was washed away for ever by his tears of repentance, and he became a new man to travel in a new path, again in life.

Laughter

It is said laughter is the best medicine of life.It increases longevity, improves relationships ,and makes one feel and look good. A child's laughter always brings heavenly joy to all. It reflects children's inner purity, unconditional love and complete trust to all. As we grow old, we loose that precious magnetic smile, which bridges the gap between all adversities. Our mechanical smile becomes sometimes commercial, calculating or even sarcastic to inflict pain to others. As we are all aware of the health benefit factors of a good laugh, we do not want to loose it either. Medical research proves, many serious ailments are caused by our bottled up emotions.So to release such emotions, often people join laughing clubs, where they practice loud belly laughter every morning. Though I am not very sure about it's positive effect, but surely such hilarious laughter can cause much damage to the eardrums of a passerby. I remember, my dog used to protest it vehemently with his equally louder barking every morning. Narrating the method of how to retain our sunshine smile, Paramhansa Yogananda said, the remedy lies in reforming our own attitude. He said, harbor no anger, or malice of any form in your mind. Others meanness should not affect our resolution to be kind. We do not need others certificate to be cheerful.He said, the best way to be ever happy is to seek God,s love through meditation.Then all enmity dissolves, we can love every body and can have a sincere smile always on our face. It reminds me of a king,s story,who had all the wealth, but had no smile on his face. When no medicine or funny story could cure him, an advice came from an old man. He said, A King must wear a shirt of a happy man, to charge his depleted energy, and then only his smile will be back on his face. So immediately the kings men were active in searching for a truly happy man. They saw some people were interacting with others very cheerfully in a busy market. They stopped and asked them the cause of their cheerful smile, they truthfully said,their smile is commercial, which helps to catch customers , and they can make good money. Being disappointed when the kings men were about to return, suddenly they noticed a strange looking, bare bodied sadhu with a beaming smile, sitting on a rock and was resting. With much hesitation, the kings men stopped, and asked, sir, you look a very happy soul. Our sad King has been asked to put on a happy man,s shirt to be cured from his melancholic nature.So will you please lend him one of your shirts? The sadhu had a good laugh, and said, I wish I could give one, but sorry, I do not have any shirt. The story ends, but puts us in a dilemma. The dilemma is how to retain our million dollar smile, which nobody can rob.The answer is very simple. Paramhansa Yogananda said,resurrect yourself from the littleness of life. Let your mind wonder in the pure and simple thoughts and be with the infinite. Then the magnetic smile will be ever with you, and will bring sparks of joy in every heart.

A whisper from the autumn Leaves

A whisper from the autumn Leaves

I love to see autumn leaves falling to the ground. A sudden gust of wind makes them rise and fall like a little tornado, rustling together as they do. While green, they draw life energy from the sun to nourish the tree. And when their task is done, they depart gracefully without a fuss. Then again, with the arrival of spring, new leaves come to adorn the empty branches with fresh green. 

Old leaves fall to bring new leaves, flowers blossoms to give birth to fruits. The tree gives shelter and shade to so many homeless birds and tired travelers. While standing in the sun, rain and cold, all through, they do their duty silently, as it their life’s mission is only to give not to take. This silent yet constant cycle of coming and going in nature inspires me to do life’s duty silently, and without any expectation of appreciation from anyone.

Ancient Indian scriptures compared human life with nature - a tree with its fruits, branches and flowers. In Bhagwat Gita’s 15th chapter, we find a unique and unusual metaphor of an inverted Ashvatta tree, which is upside down with the roots above and branches and leaves below.

In reality, such a tree does not exist, but it can be seen as the reflection of a real tree on the calm surface of a lake. The metaphor is for itself, whose physical manifestation is a reflection of a deeper self, the roots. Through this metaphor, physical life – leaves and branches are shown as a reflection of the source of creation, the roots, and making that connection, as the eternal purpose of life. Both theists and atheists have expressed the same understanding in different ways. Tagore, the modernist voice of Indian spiritualism describes his connection to God in is poems from Gitanjali; “Your wish resonates in my life in strange manifestations. Despite being king of kings… you came in various guise of captivating manifestations.” On the other end of the spectrum Stephen Hawking, the late renowned physicist says; “We are just an advanced breed of monkeys on a minor planet of a very average star. But we can understand the Universe. That makes us something very special.” 

All worldly manifestations that we perceive with our senses look so real. We spend our life, to get permanent happiness and security from this impermanent world and soon to realize the empty hollowness of it. So Bhawat Gita says; “remove the ignorance of taking unreal as real, by cutting the make believe reflection with the sword of knowledge, detachment and determination.”

Yogananda said; “though this cosmic movie of delusion came from God, but He did not intend that we take it as real.” He also said; “just as the worldly man living under the thick leaved tree of sense pleasure and egotism does not perceive the skies of liberating cosmic consciousness, a sincere devotee by discrimination and the practice of yoga strikes a mortal blow to material desires.”

Our karmic entanglements that brings us back to the circle of life and death, again and again, are beautifully compared with the lower branches of the Asvatta tree, which when touching the ground make become the roots for another new plant. Leaves that draw energy from the sunlight compared with Vedic hymns, which can show us the path of liberation, and enlightenment. 

But surely, life is a journey that has a purpose. One that can create joy and lead us to the right destination when one learns to understand the connection of the present with the eternal purpose of being. The river must flow to meet the ocean but all through its journey it helps plant life blossom, quenches the thirst of all creatures, and enriches life for those who encounter it on both its banks.

The time to be inspired by the silent song of nature and live for a greater cause is always now. Cracking the hard shell of self-centeredness, we may follow the path of unity shown by Rig Veda. In the pithy phrase of ‘Sangacchadwam  samvadadwam’ it encapsulates the connection between action, word, and intent; “May you move in harmony, speak in one voice; let your minds be in agreement”

Edited by Prodeep Bose

Mystery of karma

Karma is like an unfathomable tip of an iceberg. Even the doer does not know much about its consequences.We all appear on the life,s stage for a short time to play our roles.According to our different inherent tendencies, we  act differently towards situations and others.Mostly we work to meet our bodily needs and to fulfill our worldly desires and so on.
Leaving the innocent  period of childhood, our active life starts, as we grow up, earn money for a living, to look after our families, and to perform responsibilities towards others in societies etc.Gradually with declining of age, working  ability slows down.We look back, and think about our gain and loss in life.Those thoughts may bring a smile of satisfaction on our lips,  or a sad  repentance, and a few extra wrinkles on our forehead.It all depends on the quality of our thoughts, actions and speech performed in life.There is a beautiful saying," life is to give not to take," I wish this wisdom should strike our head and heart early in life, so that we can remain ever cheerful.
All eastern philosophy, like Hinduism,Buddhism or Jainism, they all believe in deep rooted consequences of karma.They may be called as a cause and effect theory, as law of karma or more scientifically it may be referred as law of attraction.But they all mean  the same, and that is, what we sow we reap.Our karmic ripples never get closed down in  one life.Karmic trends and imprints get carried over from past to present, and from present to future  life also. We may forget about them, but they never  forget us. And  whenever  we are reborn,  our past  karma,past thoughts and habits create our present  physical form and personality  traits, and make our destiny in present and in future also.
We grew up, hearing beautiful proverbs like, speech is like an arrow, once it comes out, it can never be brought back. Or think before you act, not after.They all point out at the unfailing consequences of every action, and warn us to be aware before we act.
Eastern philosophy devides life,s  achievements into four sections. First comes Dharma (moral and ethical values) ,second is Artha(economic prosperity and achievements), third is Kama ( as a householder fulfilling responsibilities, worldly desires, and relationships with others.) .And last comes Moksha, which means to be liberated from karmic bondages, and be a liberated soul.
Dharma , the right conduct is referred first, because it is believed that , life's actions have deeper significance,than just  eat, drink and merry. Though it does not negate the concept  of comfortable good living, but it only says , achieve everything through righteous ways. All actions must be done  in the limit of morality  and decency. Otherwise, when wealth , prosperity , relationships  are gained in an unethical ways , they bring lots of sufferings in this life, and also block our good fortune  in future life, because we can't escape  from  the results of our wrong deeds, and have to pay back to the karmic account with heavy interest.But when life's achievements are gained through right actions,with good  intentions and for well being of  all, then those actions can be the stepping stones for our liberation.
This message is very relevant today.Modern  life  is becoming too unsatisfactory. Too many desires ,more nice cars, new dresses, entertainments and more worries. When we get to much attached  to worldly desires, we create more sufferings for us and for others.
So all realized souls tell us to be free  from those so called necessities. Life is impermanent. Any moment we maybe forced to leave this body by disease or misfortune. We are born alone, die alone, and carry the  consequences  of our  good and bad karma alone, to experience heaven or hell in next life.
Life gives us a free will and an opportunity to purify our mind and to elevate life with good karma. Buddha  showed us the path to make mind peacefull, and how to be aware in present moment through meditation. Peaceful mind acts rightly, but never reacts. When a seed of anger or hatred  comes up in mind , acknowledging its presence, a peaceful soul  can let it go, and watering the seeds of compassion and forgiveness he can do good karma.
Following Buddha,s teachings with conviction , we all can purify our minds and can be free from karmic bondages.
Paramhansa Yogananda summarized the karmic th eory in these few lines."Do not depend on death to liberate you from your imperfections.  You are exactly the same  after death as you were before. Nothing changes.If you are a thief, or a liar, or a cheater before death, you don't become an angel merely by dying. If such were possible, then let us all go and jump in the ocean now, and become angels at once! What ever you have made yourself thus far, so will you be here after. And when you reincarnate, you will bring that same nature with you.To change you have to make an effort. This world is the place to do it . "