Gratitude

 

Someone has rightly said that success without planning is luck. And success with effort and struggle is an achievement. Envy therefore, has no value. All of us can create our own goals and work hard to achieve them. There is no other way, unless the credit balance of your “punya” gives you a place you perhaps did not “earn” like, being born into a wealthy family.

One really has to reflect very seriously and deeply on where one’s journey is each moment. And how much one is capable of in terms of truthfully assessing the self. We do tend to block what we don’t intrinsically like about ourselves, but cannot change.

New experiences need courage. Comfort and repetitive living will keep you from growth. One way to start the process of growth is to question everything we think, say and do. The weeds need to be pulled out, however painful, for the plant to grow in a healthy way.

Every year, we make resolutions. Some of us fall back into tested patterns and achieve more stagnation of the mind. Unable to heal our hurts and complexes, understanding that we can start afresh from the day the realization dawns that our thinking is not growth oriented.

There are so many accents on self-help today. We need to make an intention and immerse ourselves in this attempt while doing our usual routine. As they say, anything, even a mundane chore, can be done in different ways and joy derived from it. All we need is a simple mind with a clear intention.

And let us not forget the people who have nurtured us, even if it was a ” cruel to be kind” attitude in an attempt to teach us the right values.  Respect for all forms of life is imminent in our journey to find ourselves. Because it is linked with how much we respect ourselves. So, love and compassion are the two most vital prerequisites for personal evolution. For us and otgers. They start with gratitude and blessings for one and all.

Surekha Kothari

www.BodyMindSoulCentre.com

surekhakothari.wordpress.com

Speakingtree Blog: www.speakingtree.in/public/surekhakothari

Dharma by design

 

Perspectives

 Studying Vedanta over a period of time changes your perspectives big time.

Above all, it brings a realization of all negativity as a drama conjured up by our ego and mind and hence, the suffering.

The ignorance in us is the most insufferable actually because, the day the light of knowledge dawns, it removes the ignorance and our blindness.

This is the same mind that, misleading us today, can show us the right parh also. Of course, our effort is prime! Cleaning the mind vessel daily is mandatory. It gives us the opportunity to start over, slowly and steadily. It needs a constant reminder unfortunately, of where it should lead us. And we must rein it in every day.

Cleaning the mind naturally means cleaning our thoughts. All clouds appear in the mind with attachment. Detaching and letting go, which seems as intense an experience as when we may die, must be done in this lifetime. Otherwise, we may never move forward towards spiritual goals. Our attachments will always pull us back.

Time flies and life will snuff out before we know it! We need to make use of it, starting yesterday.

Surekha Kothari

www.BodyMindSoulCentre.com

surekhakothari.wordpress.com

Speakingtree Blog: www.speakingtree.in/public/surekhakothari

Dharma by Design

 

Qualities

 One of the greatest maladies of our existence today is the superficiality with which we deal with people. Relationships have become “contacts”. External image has become prime! We have classes and professionals in all aspects of external grooming and image building. And a great source of income , too! Because only that is accepted in society and work places.

“Family “spirit is gradually dying out. More families are at feud than ever before. And more “friends” are being cultivated. It is a classic case of giving your best to friends and becoming intolerant of family members.

Have we thought why? It is a jumbled up mess: of self-seeking, avarice, ambition, popularity and very little ethics. Also of distances. If Manipulations and hypocrisy work, why would anyone be foolish enough to practice virtue?

Today, we just WANT and WANT and WANT: contacts we can use, money, power everything! And to hell with anything that smacks of old values!

Do we remember how sacred the vedic marriage rituals were? The depth of the core of living? Or the code of respect? Nope! We are losing it all.

I understand that lifestyle dictates values. But ethics dictates your spiritual journey. The latter however, mostly loses to self-aggrandizement.

Controlling and more controls spell power, whether of wealth or people. Or anything else….

We are so busy pointing out the weaknesses of others that we forget, that however successful you are, you need to be a good human. Also, that it is wiser to look at yourself as you are and work on your dark spots than feel happy pointing at others. This will not light up your darkness anyway.

Qualities like compassion need time to understand connectivity. We are so divided today that connectivity is not up for discussion.

Praise be for spiritual teachers who are trying to reverse these trends through imparting the right knowledge. And hope there will be practitioners instead of critics.

Surekha Kothari

www.BodyMindSoulCentre.com

surekhakothari.wordpress.com

Speakingtree Blog: www.speakingtree.in/public/surekhakothari

Quote of the day

 

Quote of the day

 

Quote of the day

 

The Acts of Benevolence

 

How fickle are we if we change every moment, being good with good people and nasty and petty with those whose reactions and behavior towards us is unacceptable to us! Generally, because we WANT love and caring but are too weak to give in return what we are looking for. It should not make us feel good when others are criticized. Because it does not mean that WE are accepted. And we won’t be, until we look within and accept who we are.

Like it is said… you can dish it out but you can’t take it! On a deeper level, this really damages us. No one else is affected adversely but us. We are unable to bear ourselves when we bare ourselves to ourselves. There is something to be said about being steady and not retaliatory. Like the sun always shines despite the clouds. And the light always illuminates darkness, not worrying about the quality of darkness.

The worst human aberration is expectations. If i want to be a free spirit, why do I want to tie others down with MY expectations? Double standards! And if I don’t know the stories of other people’s lives, what right do I have to judge at all?

There is one more aberration that of taking advantage of people’s goodness. The reason why the human race started doing this is because it lost its simplicity and its spirituality. What went out was trust, with every act of selfishness. And here we do, not know what lies behind the smile and the acts of benevolence.

Surekha Kothari

www.BodyMindSoulCentre.com

surekhakothari.wordpress.com

Speakingtree Blog: www.speakingtree.in/public/surekhakothari

Quote of the day