Gurudev Chitrabhanu
Every thought, word, and action goes into the universe: There is universal recorder
Friends. Today we will concentrate on the question, "How do I put divine energy --- which is in me --- into creative action"...
If our energy is guided by love and intelligence, the human dimension becomes the foundation of the spiritual. Physical and spiritual are not contrary: they are complementary dimensions.
Human and divine also are not contrary, but complementary. We must make the human support the divine. When our actions are guided by love and intelligence, matter helps spirit fulfill its aspirations.
Our actions create our destiny. This life is in our hands. In this life, our time and energy are limited to this journey. We want to fulfill ourselves: to use, and not misuse, our talents and energies. We can never find a better time than now. There may be a New Age ahead, but now is our time. We are here; this hour is for our unfoldment and fulfillment. And tomorrow is not separate from today. Tomorrow, friends, is constructed today.
Atman is soul, and atom is matter. Life is the partnership of the two. The Essence looks through our eyes, and hears with our ears and speaks with our lips, and learns and acts with our whole being. Behind the visible is the invisible, that gives it function. Also, experience has to be digested, as well as food. We do not want thoughts, words, deeds --- this human trinity --- to create negativity. We withdraw from the world during meditation, in order to know who we are and how we can help the Cosmos; and we return brimming and overflowing with positive energy, energy in the hands of love and intelligence.
Through the qualities of his loving and his knowing, man is constantly being born. He is giving rebirth to himself, a rebirth in which he becomes conscious of the causes and consequences of his assumptions and actions. He evaluates, judges what he has been doing, chooses a new option, and explores and develops the new possibility. In this way, he moves toward the fuller realization of his essence, his divinity.... The day dawns for him who is awake.
Growth and progress are not instant, but the fact of human ascent is discernible. Take a moment and think --- Is man not a miracle?... From a single cell we have grown to the point where we can observe the moon, the sun, light rays. But do we learn anything by observing our own interactions Many centuries ago in China, Mo-Tzu said: “If it is a crime to rob or kill one man, how much greater a crime to rob or kill a nation of men." Now at last, even though military appropriations in-crease, many people all over the world are rejecting war. The soul which discovered the power of the atom can also discern between its constructive and destructive use. We can use creative energy, which is within us, to choose life.
We are not, in essence, the destroyer of ourselves or others. The destruction we bring about is not from the soul, the Atman. It is from helplessness, ignorance, unbelief, armored in pride and ego. Under the armor is always a soft being who wants to give and receive love, and who aspires to emancipation.... Energy must flow into acts of love. Unless we love, books do not educate us. If the heart is dry, without love, inside us nothing grows. Knowledge from the brain is barren. As a poet said, “The heart has the reasons which reason cannot define." Love is a fountain of energy. If you love yourself and others, you live. If you hate yourself and others, you die. You must feel that “I am energy --- and responsible for the use of that energy and of all physical energy." At that time you will recognize your true self.
Friends, how much energy is poured into pastimes, into petty self-gratifications, and self-indulgence, in-to wasting time, and into the world's hurly-burly --- into lust, driving nowhere in fast cars, drinking, taking drugs to relax. We waste energy in worry. Let go of guilt --- say, “That time I was ignorant, and now I know“
Don't compare yourself with others. Gandhi was small in body, and if he had compared himself with others he might have doubted whether he was impressive enough to lead a nation. All night we thrash, turn, consume energy meant for the morning. The cure for this disease lies hidden in the heart of the illness. The essence of these states of excitement, of these emotional whirlwinds, is energy. Instead of the problems we now cause ourselves, we can learn to transmute destructive actions into constructive energy.
Today, friends, in this age of a global society which is also the nuclear age, we need to use meditation to find the divinity within, in order to find meaning in life. If we find the divinity within, we will want the well-being of all.
There are two kinds of meditation. One is meditation with the eyes lowered, or closed. The other is meditation with the eyes wide open.
When we meditate with our eyes closed, we go within to the subconscious and superconscious, the essence, the divinity. Lust is transformed into love. Self-centeredness and indifference become transform-ed into compassion and the desire to serve mankind. Apathy and doubt, skepticism and cynicism become transformed into living and intelligent action.... Energy bubbles and pulsates.
Meditation with the eyes open shows us the world around us, and from the world around us --- sun, wind, trees, humanity --- comes energy: the center and the circumference interact. We can meditate walking in the street or by the sea, or sitting in the subway. Around us we see all we have been given: sea and ness, for we could not live without earth, water, fire, air, nor without one another --- including the efforts of millions of strangers. We are dependent on one another for our food, our clothes, our homes, our streets, our vehicles, our boats, our children, our education, our science, our art, our religion. Meditation will show us how to make our interdependence benefit us all, so no one will be advantaged at an-other's expense. Meditation will make us grateful, humble, enthused and united. When there is luminosity at the center, everything is telling us of great mysteries. And we see that since we are living in time and space, nothing is static. Time gives us change, which is a part of evolution, an unfolding and opening out of what is contained within.
When you meditate, there is no fearful distrust, no tense uncertainty, no roughness, no coarseness. Meditation deepens understanding, love and intelligence. The world is full of beautiful things, and of compelling challenges; we are too often not aware of them. It is full of beings that need our compassion, not our constant criticism and condemnation. When we have reached our center through meditation, we will not avoid confrontation with the opposition! opponent. If we deny the humanity of another, we deny our own.
If we are strongly “on center", we can see the foolishness of the fool without being shaken. When the seer meets an angry man, he thinks, “One mad man is enough." Also we cannot always educate the obsessed. Once an angry man harangued Buddha for a long time. When he was finished, Buddha replied, “Keep your words: they are like a bucket of jagged rocks. I have no use for them, so I will not receive them."
In meditation we make sure our actions are directed toward our life's mission. Our mission should not be one imposed on us by our family, or by the impact of our society. We must choose it. In meditation, we can come to be sure our choice is neither impressed from outside, nor an expression of our ego. Then when we know our mission, we have to make our- selves unavailable to all the superficial demands on us that would distract and deplete our energy.
Life can be many-sided: we may have a vocation, family ties and responsibilities; and apart from our vocation, we may want to work for social change. All these aspects of life can enrich us and lead to meaningful actions. If we give ourselves to a life's mission leading to our essence. We will be linked to all the living.
Love and intelligence lead us to recognize each moment in our lives by what we do, as the potter is shaped by the pot he makes. When we discover our mission in each moment, our lives will become transformed.
The world is a guest house where people can co-operate and help each other. Life is a wonderful gift filled with gifts. But why are peace and justice so lacking; Where have truth and beauty gone? We have used zeal and energy for control of physical plane. Now we must use our zeal and energy to bring to all beings the gift of unity and peace and justice. To realize this prospect we will have to delve deep into ourselves.
How can we make the human the foundation of divine? By going to the divine within, purifying our own essence. If our lives combine contemplation and action, the mystical experience will afford us new options. We can never follow old precedents to reach new possibilities.
And if we know our life's mission, we will not be afraid even of death. Think of how many sons have been expected to be willing to die in war for their countries. Then is it any wonder that seers have been willing to live and even to die, if necessary, for mankind? Christ when nailed to the cross said, “Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do."
At death's door he thought of others. Death held no fear for Socrates, who insisted he was not a citizen of Athens but of the world. He drank the hemlock, but for him, poison was no poison. If we know our mission, fire cannot burn us, water cannot drown us, drought cannot desiccate us: we can be calm and and at peace with the fact of physical death.
Karma tells us that every thought, word, and action goes into the universe: there is universal recorder. There is record of every thought, word, and deed influencing the future. Yes these vibrations work like the telephone and radio and television. We have faith in these, but do not realize that our own energies set up vibrations that register in the universe. When we meditate, we give vibrations of love, peace and understanding. And then these impel us to actions. The day will pass: what you give, stays. We live in a dynamic universe. One act can produce a whole chain of actions so the present and the future are both enriched. Let us glide into meditation and discover our creative energy and how to use it more constructively.
THOUGHTS
- Nothing compares to life: it is the greatest miracle in the world.... The day you awake to this is your birthday.
- The combination of meditation and action can open doors to vast insights.... We cannot follow past precedents to reach future possibilities.
- If we converge the rays of the sun, we can light a fire. If we converge our inspired efforts, we can“have life and have it abundantly."
