It will pass

We will always see the divine in the form we have been taught all our lives in our places of study and worship or in our literature and art.  
If that should happen, then we should know that we are not experiencing the divine. 

The human mind is so powerful that it easily fools even us ourselves. When we desperately long for something, our mind is easily capable of conjuring it up for us. 

Our minds are very powerful, therefore it projects whatever we desperately seek. We feel we are conscious but in reality we hallucinate.

It is not necessary for us to seek the truth, like insects we can be born and like insects we can die. However if we wish to be truly happy and liberated, then to the core of our being we must travel.

Answers we will not find outside of ourselves, but only within.  
To travel inwards we must get rid of all that is superfluous to our being. 
What are these superfluous elements?

Its important note that anything that comes and goes is not us. 
Our possessions, attachments, desires, and anger, they are things that will come and go. We believe that they are us, but they are not. They are mere acquisitions. These are the things that will not permit us to journey within ourselves.

Then there is the ego, the 'I'.  
As long as the 'I' exists it inhibits us from discovering the truth. When we let go of the ego 
As the Guru explains, the truth is realised not by seeking but by letting go. Because we do not enter the divine, but make ourselves open to let the divine emerge from within us. 

Letting go will occur when we realise that all existence is an illusion or what the ancients call "Maya'. This realisation can come to us when we achieve great success, great failure, great anguish, sorrow, or exhilaration which leads us to meditation.

Meditating because we are merely seeking or because we are bored will produce what the student discovered, that it too will pass and we are back right we started from. 

___________________

About Gurvinder Singh

Post a comment on my website
Engage with Gurvinder Singh

Facebook - Twitter - linkedin - SikhNet - Instagram

To achieve individual peace

One can be truly happy and content, only when we are at peace with ourselves. That peace which comes from a freedom discovered in solitude.

~ Gurvinder Singh

                               

One may ask, 'How can one be in solitude when so much has to be done and achieved?'

Sure food and shelter has to be arranged, security ensured, Families particularly children and the elderly need to be cared for.  Development and learning have to be pursued, and a thousand other things need to done. bills have to be paid, So what?

We do what we must , but what if we are not there tomorrow? Surely, they will still get done, but by others. We hold ourselves in far greater importance than does the universe. 

                 

Imagine our individual lives as being drawn into a cyclone. 

Lives and things, problems and opportunities, work and responsibilities etc. A multitude of factors are constantly swirling around us, in this cyclone where peace eludes us.

We can choose to be in the swirl where everything is a noisy blur . Those living in the swirl seem to live exciting and extremely active lives, dodging, running from fears and towards wants. However being active merely for its own sake, achieves little, while nourishing the ego. We land up living mostly feelingless, flowerless and hence fruitless lives. 

We cannot escape this cyclone called life, so where can we find individual peace?

There is a place. We can choose to be at the centre of the cyclone where everything is peaceful and silent. Everything is clear and we do what we must, when we must without being attached to anyone or anything. Active only as and when needed. 

This may appear selfish but its not so, for  we act with awareness and meaning. In India we have a word for it called 'Sw-arth' coming from two Sanskrit words 'Swayam' for 'the self', and 'Arth' for  'meaning'. Translated it is 'meaning of one's existence'. 

Religion, politics, family, society, and rulers/government and now employers ordain the meaning of ourselves to us. Treating us all as identical. That is not desirable even if it were possible, but these forces have almost total domination over our existence. That is why individuals always rebel against these forces sometimes openly but usually clandestinely. The individual rarely discovers the meaning of his or her own life. 

When we learn to silence these forces by travelling within ourselves where each one of us is absolute master of his her life, we learn who and what we are, we discover our 'Swa-Arth'. Once we discover that meaning of oneself, freedom is natural.

This is why all great masters have always advocated silence, contemplation and finally meditation. Life goes on we live a meaningful existence, not in the uncontrollable swirling mess but in control and in total awareness right in the peaceful eye of the storm.

To live peacefully with the world its necessary for us to be at peace with ourselves.

Talk to me about God.

It has been the fashion to teach children, that, peace and happiness that we seek  can come only by acquiring increasing wealth or power. In due course of time we discover that this advice is useless. We mistake happiness with temporary excitement from our possessions and our escape to various indulgences be it intoxicants, politics, violence, gambling etc. Most people claim they want to meet and be with God. What the vast majority really want is to be at peace and happy. For them God could possibly be just the best way to achieve that. Therefore believer, agnostic or atheist everyone is curious about God.  Who then or what is God? This is a good question, but what is the answer?  Like most people I talked and listened about God for most of my life. Talk unfortunately is rather cheap, so we indulge in lots of it. The more we talk the more confused we get. Parents, grandparents, siblings, friends, teachers,priests, media and God-men, all just talk and talk of God. Yak, yak, yak, is all we get and more confusion. It is extremely rare for anyone to be satisfied with the answers that we are doled out.  Most people merely accept the situation not daring to believe that the majority could be wrong, so they  accept what is told and move on. It seems that the effort required for comprehending God is so significant that the vast majority simply give up. Many sincerely hope to find the God, but that will have to wait for another time as most of them have more pressing matters to attend to. The challenge is even greater when God is sought to be explained within the boundaries of a religion. All organized religions great and small have been converted into nothing more than social institutions and serve no purpose other than to increase their power and reach.  Our entire society and world is driven by these religious zealots who have enormous political, economical, legal and self authorized moral clout.  They tell us that we can do business with God. So being the self centered fools that many of us are we try to bribe Him or His agents in the hope that our dreams and desires will be fulfilled. The more we go down this route the more cheated we feel. No wonder it is rare for us to speak with  so called religious leaders, because they often do not inspire us much about God. In fact they have ambitious targets and incentives to increase their headcount. They are like farmers, but who harvest souls and bodies. The self appointed agents of God serve only themselves, but we happily oblige them. What is the harm in offering a bribe if He grants me a favour for a minuscule fraction of my wealth?. _________________________________ Does this mean we should give upon God. On the contrary we must embrace Him, but how? Our curiosity often turns to confusion, not because the search for God is wrong but the way we seek to find the answer.  Mere utterances by us or outsourced to priests, rituals, pilgrimages etc. is not of much use except for fooling ourselves.  Knowing that we do not know is the first step in fulfilling our thirst to find God.  This search is an individual journey and I share mine with you.                                  ____________________ The first thing about God is that He can never be understood only experienced. God can be experienced both from within and outside of our beings. God can be experienced by us all the time but we do not realize it because we have lost touch with ourselves. Experiencing God from the outside.  Just look around us and see the wonder of His creation.  We struggle to build minuscule things and manage a few relationships. Just admire the  magnificence of creation and life. Only when in awe can we begin to search for the Creator. The more we connect with nature the closer we will feel ourselves near to God. Unfortunately we live in synthetic worlds and increasingly toxic environment. Rarer it is becoming for us to experience the clean air and water, the birds and the creatures that share our world.  If we want to experience God on the outside we MUST start with respecting creation and live in harmony with our environment. Comforts are required and we should attempt to be comfortable, healthy and safe, but must it be at the cost to the emotional and physical well being of ourselves and with whom we share this world? Experiencing God from within our beings. The greatest confusion is caused by the mind because  we try to logically understand God. God can never be analyzed but He can only be experienced. In addition to Gurus, messiahs, prophets a number of people have experienced God. Their experiences is sometimes outlined in stories, prayers, hymns and their works. However everyone's experience is different. So great is God and so diverse is his many forms and manifestations that each person who experiences Him has a different perspective. When we talk to, or read about or hear about those that have experienced Him we are enthralled and blindly try to copy them.  It is useless, because copying is like trying to merely fill a vessel.  There is no awakening nor is their any enlightenment. No wonder the atheist and the agnostic ridicule the believer and unfortunately their numbers grow especially among the young. Those that seek Him must do so not  with their eyes, ears or tongues but with their hearts. Find a master who will open your own heart to Him and you will discover and meet God. From my experience I can share with you the following; Respect and connect with nature and our surroundings.  Seek harmony with nature, our fellow beings and ourselves. Pause and still the mind by meditating.  Only the stillness we can discover ourselves and connect to the cosmos and God. Only the one who meditates can reach beyond themselves and seek God. It is said; "When we pray we talk to God, but when we meditate God converses with us."When the person is dominated by greed, anger, lust, ego and attachments to worldly things we distance ourselves from God.  All these things are transient and only God is permanent.  When we free ourselves of attachments our being is free to search for God. Be sure we will experience Him.  I should know for I have experienced Him at the height of my  joy and in the depths of despair. As Dada JP Vaswani the great spiritual soul said "Religion lets talk about it less and practice it more." Clinging to our puny egos and our material wealth we fail to realise that God is waiting for us to open the door of our beings to let Him in. It is useful to keep in mind that unlike us humans He is not swayed by mere talk. Wish you all a happy Diwali and a spiritual new year.