A life of spiritual practice involves the dedication of all acts to God, the offering of whatever one does or thinks or speaks at the Feet of God. You can do this only when you are aware always of the Presence of God, in and around you. Your awareness must not deviate for a moment from God. The mind must revolve round one centre, God. Your concentration must be strong and steady. You are now able to attain concentration when you walk, talk, write or cycle along. But, you say you are helpless when it is a question of concentrating on God. Why have you to struggle to acquire it?
The reason is: you have no yearning, no fond attachment, no Love towards God. But, carry on with the endeavor. By means of continuous culture, it is possible to acquire it.
-> How can we let our personalities blossom?
God incarnates to foster saintly people, it is said. By saintly people, they do not mean the dwellers in Himalayan retreats; they mean the virtuous person who forms the inner reality of every one of you, the outer appearance being but a mask which is worn to delude yourself into esteem. Every one is a saint, for he/she is an embodiment of bliss, peace and immortality. But, by allowing the crust of ego to grow thick and fast, the real nature is tarnished. By the action of satsang (the company of God-minded persons), by systematic attention to self-control and self-improvement, man can overcome the delusion that makes him identify himself with the body and its needs and cravings.
->How can we unburden ourselves of the day's troubles?
Life today is filled with sorrow; it is beset with fear and despair. The only time you can forget these thoughts and strengthen yourself to meet the hard times is when you contact the Source of all strength, God. You cannot get that peace and joy while you bend under the burden of daily life. You are carrying a huge load of worry all day; keep that aside for an hour every evening and spend that time with God who can make your shoulders strong and your burden light.
->How can we derive maximum joy from our lives?
Help others so that you may repay the service that you received. Do not look on, when you find some one in pain or grief. As far as possible, relieve the pain, console the grief-stricken. A man who works for wages, calculates the reward at so much per hour, receives his wages and quits. But, when one works as part of his worship, glad that he is given the chance to serve as long and as gladly as he can, he derives maximum Aananda (joy).
->How can small acts of service help us?
Little acts of service can confer on you great spiritual benefit. Firstly, it will destroy your egoism. Pride will transform friends into enemies, will keep even kinsmen afar, and will defeat all good schemes. Service will develop in you the quality of humility. And humility will enable you to work in happy unison with others.
->What is the easiest path of be happy?
Just think for a moment whether the rich, the strong, the highly educated or the clever are happy. No one is happy, you will find. If you must be happy, one of two things must happen. All your desires must be fulfilled, or you should not have any desire. Of these, the reduction of desire is the easier path.
2 comments:
Hi Madhuri,
The article is very nice. It looks like you can shed some more light on "CONCENTRATION ON GOD". The reason which you have given for the same is very much true.Since our childhood, people around, made us to believe that there is a GOD who would be administering everything that we can see, sense and feel.But human brain would always tend to believe things only when it sees something happening repeatitively.Of course, there are good number of live examples in the form of GREAT Rishis, Prophets and Spiritual teachers to believe a super natural power called GOD which is the cause for every movement of every atom in this universe.But, as a normal human being, I can feel the Love, Fond attachment and Strong Yearning when there is a time to serve the needy, express the compassion on all the living beings and exhibit all the loving gestures with all my loving beings.I am not an athiest but still when it comes to concentration on GOD, it is really almost impossible.In the first place, what is the necessity for a life of spiritual practice? I think, the fundamental purpose for the same would be, to attain the purity in everything we do.To attain the PURITY, there is no need to concentrate on something which we do not know.I do agree that by means of continuous culture, it is possible to acquire the CONCENTRATION ON GOD.But to have that concentration, one need to understand the importance to concentrate and also need to understand the ways one can attain the same.So I would just request you to edit this article so that one can get the importance to concentrate on GOD and also the better ways to attain the same.That effort would be very much appreciated.
I really appreciate you for the kind of topic that you have taken up, especially in this age of global uncertainity and complete mechanical way of human life style.
Hi Madhuri,
Thank you so much for your prompt response and this is what exactly I am looking for.
Once again thanks a lot and hopefully one may find many good articles like these from you in the future.
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