The elixir of immortal life

What are meditation, contemplation and prayer? Simply ways of nourishing ourselves. Thanks to them we taste a heavenly food, ambro­sia, the food of immortality. It is an ethereal food, but it also corresponds to something on the physical plane. Alchemists have called it the elixir of immortal life. This elixir is dispersed throughout nature, and it is the sun that distributes it.

If we go to watch the sunrise in spring and summer, it is precisely in order to drink this quintessence of life that the sun distributes throughout the universe, particles of which are received by rocks, plants, animals and humans. All living beings capture these particles unconsciously, but humans can learn to capture them consciously in the fluidic matter of sunlight.

-Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

Thought

"Why are you so wary of thought?" said the philosopher. "Thought is the one tool we have for organizing the world."

"True. But thought can organize the world so well that you are no longer able to see it."

To his disciples he later said, "A thought is a screen, not a mirror; that is why you live in a thought envelope, untouched by Reality."

-Anthony de Mello, S.J.

Intensity of feeling in prayer

Prayer can draw in grace by a spiritual attunement of one's being in the intensity of feeling, which is the motive power behind prayer. Feelings that rise from the deepest recesses of one's heart can produce immediate results, because of their proximity to reality.

- Swami Krishnananda

It is not the physical body that needs love

What people call love cannot, in truth, find complete satisfaction on the physical plane. For it is not the physical body that needs love but the heart and, beyond that, the soul and the spirit. Those who stop at the physical body can only experience a few sensations, a few pleasant emotions, which often turn into jealousy, aggression and even hate. In love, as in many other domains, you must see the body not as the goal but purely as an instrument.

All couples who live together without making the effort to seek something beyond physical pleasure gradually turn their lives into a hell, for they end up seeing only each other's negative points. If they really try to make their love an exchange at the level of the soul and spirit, they will taste renewed happiness each day. Even when they have grown old, they will never stop rediscovering each other and enjoying each other's company. For it's not the envelope - the receptacle, the body - that one loves but what it contains: the spiritual principle, born of the one, inexhaustible Source.

-Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

Become like the flute in the Lord's hands

You must become like the flute in the Lord's hands. Let the breath of the Lord pass through you, producing delightful music that melts the hearts of everyone. Surrender yourself to Him; become hollow, i.e., egoless; then He will Himself come and pick you up caressingly and apply you, the flute, to His lips and blow His sweet breath through you. Allow Him to play whatever song He likes.

-Sai Baba

The significance of the enemy determines the importance of the person

Each one has his enemy. The significance of the enemy determines the importance of the person, just as a shadow depends on the size of the object. One should not concern oneself especially about the enemies, nor should one regard them with disdain. There exists no man without his shadow.

Akbar, called Great, regarded his enemies with care. His favorite councilor kept the list of enemies. Akbar often inquired, "Has not some worthy name appeared on the list? When I shall see a worthy name, I will send my greeting to the friend in disguise." Further spoke Akbar, "I rejoice that I could apply in life the sacred Teaching, that I could give people contentment, and that I was brought into light by the shade of great enemies." Thus spoke Akbar, knowing the value of enemies. Never was a Teaching elevated by its friends. If an enemy is a shadow, then slander is the trumpet call.

-Agni Yoga, Para. 270

Let them throw their curses

Let them throw their curses.

If inside, I am connected
to what's true, my soul
stays quiet and clear.

Do you think Shiva worries
what people say!

If a few ashes fall on a mirror,
use them to polish it.

- Lalla
14th Century North Indian mystic

Outlook or in look? Out query or inquiry?

Turn the key to right, it is un-locked. Turn to God and righteousness, the lock opens, the chain falls away. Turn it to the left, you become bound; the bolt falls in; the chain holds fast. It is just a question of the point of view - outlook or in look? out query or inquiry?

Some persons advise you to watch each step of the mind and note down all the false steps and evil intentions it encountered. No, that is a dangerous practice. Do not pay attention to its vagaries; strive for what you need and not for what you have to avoid. Count the false steps and you will be led to commit them again. Resolve to walk right and your steps will not falter or fail. Be like the tongue in midst of the teeth, carefully, confidentially, courageously going about its task, without getting bitten.

-Sai Baba 

Source: Sai Veda (Sathya Sai Advises Inspires Vivifies Educates Dispels All doubts)

True creation

The creative instinct is deeply rooted in all human beings. But if they have not developed the faculties that allow them to contact the higher worlds, their works will be mere copies, reproductions, not true creations. Just as when fathers and mothers reproduce their own weaknesses and deficiencies in their children and call it creation, when in reality it's just a reproduction!

True creation calls upon elements of a spiritual nature. Artists who wish to create must surpass themselves, excel themselves; in other words, they must rise to the heavenly regions through prayer, meditation and contemplation in order to capture elements for use in their work. Only on this condition will their works of art possess elements that will surpass the ordinary level of awareness and truly deserve the name of 'creation'.

-Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

How to increase our love

Love is a Being, a great Magnet, a great Energy Who out of His own substance created everything that exists. This is a fact which is not well-known, although many philosophers and disciples have hinted about it throughout the ages.

The more love you express, the closer you come to that great Creative Power in the Universe.  As you increase your love, you become a co-worker of that Great Power.  If you decrease your love, you become a contradictory force against that Being.

In the same sense, when you increase your love, you become capable of cooperating with the Plan and Purpose of that Great One.  If you are lacking in love, you cannot fit yourself to the rhythm of the Plan and the Purpose.

God is love, and if everything is created by Him, it means that everything He created is love.  When people hate each other, they cannot be in harmony with the Creator; they divide themselves.  When love is divided, man suffers.  All suffering, disturbances, sicknesses, cleavages, wars and revolutions in the world are the result of the lack of love.

Similarly, man is love in his essence.  As he loves, his essence comes into existence.  We are living as bodies, emotions, thoughts, but essentially we are love, hidden within our form.  When we start to express love, our essence starts to manifest.  As we love, we externalize ourselves.

This is the process of creativity, the process of externalizing yourself.  Creativity, heroism, and all great actions in life come into being because of love in the process of manifestation.  You become a great talent or genius in any field because your True Self is coming into existence.  When you come into existence, you become a God in manifestation, a son of God in manifestation. You become like your Father.  As your Father created the Universe and the galaxies, you create your own galaxies—poems, music, books, paintings, relationships, great activities, and organizations.  All these are the result of the manifestation of your True Self.

Creativity is nothing else but a process of building a mirror and watching yourself in it.  In creativity you build an outer image which exists within your inner being, and you bring that inner image out and look at it.

The more you love, the more you become yourself. And the more you become yourself, the more mastery you gain over your weaknesses.  Everything that is ugly, limiting, disharmonious, or contradictory within you is not you.  It is the not-self.  As you become yourself through love, you conquer everything that is the notself. This is why we say that love leads to self-actualization.

Every beauty created in the Universe is the result of an act of love.  If there is love in your home, there is beauty there.  If there is love in your nation, then peace, creativity, achievement, and fulfillment are there in your nation.

Love does not mean sentimentalism or feelings.

Real love has three branches—intellect, compassion, and power.

The first branch of love is pure intellect, light.  This is why a great disciple once said, “Whoever loves has light.  Whoever hates has darkness in him.”

If you have real love, you understand people.  You read their motives and intentions.  If you have real love, nobody can deceive you.  This is a very important idea. Whenever people manipulate you or cheat you, it means that you have a certain degree of lack of love in you.

Love is not “goody-goodyness.” Many people think that if you have love, everyone can use you, sexually, physically, emotionally, and mentally, and then throw you away like rubbish.  This is not real love.  Real love cannot be exploited.  Love is not a surrender to the devil or to a self-destructive process.

Light means penetration and even Intuition.  If you love someone, your love opens the door of his heart and tells you what is going on in its depths, no matter what the surface appears to be.  Love, compassion, and power work together.

Compassion means unconditional care, understanding, and help.  Compassion is not emotional sentimentalism; it is unconditional help.  Whenever you help someone unconditionally, you do not help an individualized form, but you help the divinity or the Divine Presence within him.

Love and compassion are sources of power.  Whoever has love and compassion has power.  The power of the Great Ones originates from Their love and compassion.

No one can defeat you unless you have hatred, jealousy, greed, anger, separatism, or ugliness in your heart. These things create holes in your aura through which the dark forces can penetrate and defeat you.  But if you have love, you have a shield around you.  The Teaching says, “God is your shield.” God is love, and His love is a shield around you.

Our Teachers in the monastery told us many times that when a dangerous animal approached us in the forest we should “love, love, love him.…” We tried it and it worked; they actually ran away from us!

When you love, you create eight positive effects in your life:

1. Through love you heal your physical, emotional, and mental illnesses.  When you start expressing love, you radiate that innermost radioactivity which cleans you physically, emotionally, and mentally, creating tremendous magnetism and joy within you.  This is why we say that joy heals.

Whenever you have some weakness physically, emotionally, or mentally, go back and observe yourself and you will find that you yielded yourself to some wave of darkness—hatred, criticism, gossip, etc. When you do these things, you weaken yourself and germs can penetrate into you.  We are even advised to love our body when we become sick.

The great Masters are called “Masters of Love and Wisdom.” Love is the essence of harmony.  Increase the love in your life, and you will see that miraculously all illnesses and disharmonies will disappear from your life.

One day I wanted to create some music, but it was not coming out the way I wanted it to.  Suddenly I said, “Let me think about love.” Then I forgave and blessed all those I really didn’t like.  I created great love and forgiveness in my heart, and suddenly something clicked inside of me and I could create my music.  Love integrated me and created harmony in me.

2. Love heals not only you, but your friends as well. You can try this experiment with your own friends: If you have a friend who is sad because his girlfriend left him, show him love, send him loving thoughts; and you will see how his grief disappears.

3. Love brings right human relations and goodwill. Hate someone and you will see how he increases his own ill will and plans to harm you.

One day I visited a home and the little boy there was acting so nastily—creating trouble, showing off, trying to get attention.  I asked his mother, “Why is he like that?” His mother said, “He is always like that.” I went to him and said, “What a beautiful boy you are!” I shook his hand and played with him for 10-15 minutes.... Later I talked with his parents for two or three hours and that boy sat quietly at my feet without speaking a word!

If a person is acting in a nasty or obnoxious way, check his life and you will probably find that he has a lack of love in his life.  Give love to that person, and you will see him creating right relations with you.

This is what we are lacking in our world life.  We think we can solve our problems with guns, by demonstrating with force that we are a great nation.  This may create a temporary solution, but then it creates reactions and greater problems that are even harder to solve. Why to spend all that money?  Demonstrate love; find ways and means to express love.  When you love people, they will surrender to you.

Napoleon once said that with all his armies he could not conquer a little part of Europe, but one naked man with twelve disciples could conquer the whole world. Christ’s power was love.

4. Love increases creativity.  If your creativity is becoming more shallow or stuck on one level, love a little more and you will see that you are making a breakthrough in your creativity.

Once I knew a girl who was a beautiful singer.  She came to me one day for advice because she felt there was something lacking in her singing.  I told her, “Yes, something is lacking.  You need love.  You need to love somebody.” “Well, I have my boyfriend…,” she said.

“Not like that.  You must have a love that will touch your heart and bring the real fire out.” A few months later she came and told me about a book she had found and how she loved the man who wrote it.  (It was written by The Great Sage) I went to one of her rehearsals.  She sang so beautifully.… I asked her how she did it and she said, “I was singing for Him, not for the audience.”

5. Through loving, you increase your intellectual light and your Intuition.

6. Through loving, you build communication with the Higher Worlds.  When you start loving, your instruments become very sensitive to the creative waves that are flying around you in space.  You don’t need a magnet to attract them because your magnet is your aura.  If your aura is purified by love, you can attract these creative energies, ideas, visions, revelations, and inspirations.

7. In loving, you increase your sensitivity to higher spatial impressions from the Subtle Worlds.  We are divided here.  We live in the human level, but millions and billions of people are living in a different dimension, and we do not have contact with them.  Love puts you in contact with them and makes it possible for you to start receiving guidance, light, help, and inspiration from them.

8. In loving, you eventually become a co-worker of the Great Ones.  Once I was reading about a Master Who would not accept a certain disciple into His Ashram. “But why not?” the others asked Him.  “He is so beautiful. He wrote many articles.  He is a great leader.  He has many scientific inventions.…” The Master refused to accept him because he was not increasing in love.

Knowledge in the hands of a person whose love is not increasing becomes a dangerous weapon.  Without love, such a person will misuse everything he has, he is, and he knows.

When the love in your heart increases, you feel that the power of your observation also increases.  You handle people in a way that they do not hurt themselves and their future, and, also, they do not create complications in your life.

Many people have sentimentality but not real love, and because of that, in the name of love, people manipulate each other and eventually complicate each others’ lives.

Love not only attracts friends but also repulses those who have darkness in their heart.  The period of repulsion can be a period in which the dangerous elements of the repulsed ones can come under control.  Love acts as an agent of purification.  Love cannot grow in darkness.

How can we increase our love?

1. Learn not to speak evil about anyone.  Gossip, malice, and slander are like poison in your aura.  Whenever you do these things, they increases like microbes and cover your whole aura with their poison and contamination.

Do not speak ill about friends, even in jest.  One day a girl came to see me because she was having some troubles with her husband and she could not find any cause for it.  “Can I ask you something?” I said.  “Do you sometimes criticize or talk ill about your husband, even for the sake of fun?” “Oh, yes, I do that a lot.” “That’s it.  You are weakening your whole relationship. With your little words, you are putting one drop of poison into a barrel of pure water and contaminating the whole barrel of water.”

Whenever you speak ill against a friend, you will find there is a wall built between you and him.  This wall must be eliminated if you want to increase your love.

2. If you hurt anyone, ask his forgiveness.  Do not think that you are becoming smaller by asking for forgiveness.  On the contrary, you are building your love. It does not matter whether the other person did something wrong, too.  If you were wrong, ask for forgiveness. Actually, it does not matter who is wrong or right. If you know that you hurt someone, ask for his forgiveness. Forgiveness can change the whole atmosphere of your family, office, church, or group.

3. Meditate on the fact that people are different from each other, but God is one within them.  Think about the oneness in all living forms.  We are separate individuals, but within us, God is one.

4. Help those who are in need.  This will create tremendous love within you.  Once I was visiting a household and the fourteen-year-old son was struggling with his algebra.  He had an exam the next morning, and he needed help.  I sat and worked with him until three o’clock in the morning.  I was the most happy man; I went home full of love—because the boy was now enlightened about his algebra problems.

5. Daily, monthly, and yearly share something with others.

6. Never carry the thought that you are better than others.  This is the greatest human weakness and a feeling that really defeats you.

7. Rejoice for those who do something for humanity. This greatly increases your joy.  Sometimes I see someone in the United Nations or Senate speaking so beautifully on television and I shout from my chair, “Good for you!  That’s so beautiful!” It is so important to encourage people.

What if we would start printing in the headlines the beautiful things that people are doing to help others, instead of printing headlines about crimes and murders? We must go in the right direction—which is toward increasing love.

8. Do not kill, and do not make others kill.  The commandment, “Do not kill,” was given to us 6000 years ago, and still we do not understand it.  It was Buddha who added the second part, “And don’t make others kill,” when He saw people claiming they were not killing while they were making other people kill for them.

You cannot destroy what God built.  If you kill somebody, that same person may eventually kill you in another life.  This is the Law of Karma: whatever you sow you are going to reap.  How can we make people listen to this advice?

9. The less you hurt people, the more love you have.  When you hurt people, you really destroy the reservoirs of your love.  Do not waste your love by hurting others.

10. Increase gratitude within you.  This increases your love.

11. Do not condemn people but understand them.

12. Sometimes do the following exercise for two to three minutes: Visualize a closed, golden lotus behind your shoulder blades.  Then visualize it opening with golden petals and a blue light manifesting.

When you increase your love, you increase your life.  When you increase your life, you become more creative and more useful for the One Life.

The light of the One Life shines in the heart of every true disciple.

-Torkom Saraydarian

Education as Transformation, Volume II, Chapter 18

Love binds and wisdom unbinds

Wisdom enlightens us; it allows us to distinguish between good and evil and so take the necessary steps to repel evil. But even our friends will not remain with us for long if we only ever call upon wisdom. Of course, wisdom attracts, because it shines and can be seen from far away, but it is cold, and people don't much like staying next to a cold light. That is why sages are often solitary beings, whereas those who are less wise but full of warmth are surrounded by friends.

So what should we do? Is it better to neglect wisdom in order to avoid being alone? No, of course not, for those who allow themselves to be guided only by love risk being at the beck and call of others and end up being devoured.

Love binds and wisdom unbinds. That is why we must learn to harmonize the two currents within ourselves: to know when it is better to manifest love and when wisdom.

-Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

Misconceptions about safety and material security

Supermundane I, 45. Urusvati has overcome all the earthly misconceptions about safety and material security. Neither exists in earthly conditions, yet this dark mirage seduces multitudes of people. They dream of building towers where they might be sheltered in complete safety. They dream of accumulating treasures that would provide security, forgetting that they can reach such a stronghold only beyond earthly conditions. 

Do We wish to plunge humanity into despair? One must realize that it is only when one is beyond the range of all danger that invulnerability become possible. Only by acknowledging the vanity of earthly treasures are we able to receive our heritage of everlasting wealth. Let us not regard these Teachings as abstract moralizing. Only by looking at it from a purely scientific point of view can one be convinced that a true knowledge of earthly reality gives freedom of consciousness and perfectment to humanity.

-Agni Yoga

The Greatest Sacrifice

The old woman approached Buddha staggering on her legs, and offered to him the pomegranate fruit. Buddha took it and immediately sounded the little drum. The Maharaja asked Buddha: "I offered so much wealth to you. You did not sound the drum. But you rattled it after receiving a small fruit. Is this a great sacrifice?"

Buddha replied: "Maharaja! In sacrifice, it is not quantity that counts, it is the quality of sacrifice that matters. It is natural for a Maharaja to offer gold. But what great sacrifice is made when a hungry old woman offers the pomegranate fruit to the Guru despite her hunger. She did not care even for her life and gave the fruit. What greater sacrifice can there be? It is not sacrifice to offer what is superfluous for you. True sacrifice means giving up that which is most dear to you, that which you value most."

Source : Sanathana Sarathi, July 1998

Why do so many remarkable people arouse terrible hostility?

Why do so many remarkable people arouse terrible hostility? Because the dark forces they have expelled from their inner world return to attack them through other people who are disturbed by their qualities, virtues and force of character. By contrast, people who lead an ordinary life disturb no one, and everyone is happy with them.

But even though it's not easy to face external enemies, these are less dangerous than inner ones, and you have to use love, gentleness and patience with them. With inner enemies, on the other hand, you have to use firmness, authority and severity. Unfortunately, humans more often than not do the opposite: they show patience and indulgence towards their inner enemies, and towards their outer enemies they are extremely severe. So is it surprising if they're forever struggling with problems from which they cannot free themselves?

-Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

Choosing your mental diet

Have you ever given thought to the diet of your mind? Of course, our physical diet and our emotional diet are also diets of the mind, because they affect our consciousness. But let's now consider the intellectual processes. How much information, how many facts is it necessary and healthy for us to ingest in a single day? It's a good idea for a devotee to budget his reading, to choose and discriminate what he wants to make a part of himself through the process of mental digestion. We have to discriminate to the nth degree whether or not we will have the time and the capacity to digest everything that we desire to place in our minds. For instance, quickly reading an article in a newspaper might stir your mind and emotions. If it is not properly digested, it could conceivably upset your whole day. In the realm of intellect, the commonsense rule "Don't eat when you are already full" also applies.

You may read a book of philosophy, and if you have time to digest it, well and good, but many people don't and suffer from philosophical indigestion. They have read so many things and only digested a small part of what has passed through the window of the mind. Then again, it is one thing to digest something, and it is still another to assimilate it and make it a part of you, for when it becomes fully a part of you, you have a hunger and room for something more.

Many people come to lectures and then tune themselves out and simply benefit from the vibration created by the teacher and others in the room. They tune themselves out so that what is said is not absorbed consciously, but rather subconsciously. This is a good method for those who are still digesting material received from previous lectures. Another practice that makes for a very good mental indigestion pill is that of opening a spiritual book and allowing your eye to fall upon a random sentence on the page. Often you will find it will accent ideas that you are currently concerned with.

-Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami

http://www.himalayanacademy.com/study/mc/daily_lesson_html/lesson_73.shtml

Your real enemy

The senses are your real foes. They draw you out and disturb your peace of mind. Do not keep company with them. Subdue them. Restrain them. Curb them just as you would curb your enemies on the battlefield. This is not the work of a day. It wants patient and protracted sadhana (practice) for a very long time. Control of the senses is really control of the mind. All the ten senses must be controlled. Starve them to death. Do not give them what they want. Then they will obey your orders implicitly. All worldly-minded persons are slaves of their senses, though they are educated, though they possess immense wealth, though they hold judicial and executive powers. If you are a slave of meat-eating, for instance, you will begin to exercise control of your tongue the moment you give up the meat-eating habit entirely for six months. You will consciously feel that you have gained a little supremacy over this troublesome sense of taste which began to revolt against you sometime ago.

Worldly pleasures intensify the desire for enjoying greater pleasures. Hence the minds of worldlings are very restless. There is no satisfaction, and mental peace is absent. The mind can never be satisfied, whatever amount of pleasure you may store up for it. The more it enjoys the pleasures, the more it wants them. So people are exceedingly troubled and vexed by their own minds. They are tired of their minds. Hence, in order to remove these botherations and troubles, the rsis (sages) thought it best to deprive the mind of all sensual pleasures. When the mind has been concentrated or made extinct, it cannot force one to seek for further pleasure, and all botherations and troubles are removed for ever and the person attains real peace.

-

The mind can do nothing without the help of the senses. And the senses cannot do anything without the help of the mind. Desire moves the mind and the senses and makes it outgoing. Abandon desires and control the mind. Thinking means externalisation or objectification. Thinking is samsara. Thinking causes identification with the body, with `I-ness', `mine-ness', time and space.

Stop this thinking through vairagya (dispassion) and abhyasa (practice). Merge yourself in pure consciousness where there is no thinking. This is the absolution; this is jivanmukta (liberation).

-Swami Sivananda

The futile attempt to fill the black hole

You see the wheel of maya spinning round, so fast that those who do not want to touch the real fall off. They fall off because they are content to fill the black hole within. Fill it with money, power, relationships, scholarship. But you know that this empty hole cannot be filled because that is what the human is. An empty black hole. Misery and attachment to the lower self is the result of this futile attempt to fill the black hole. 

-Babaji

Your real nature

Do you know who you are? I shall tell you. Hear me. You are the master of the body and the senses and the mind. You are the master of your life. All power is within you. You have to know this and manifest it.

How can the mind torment you? How can despair overcome you? Despair is a quality of the mind and the mind is your servant. You are all bliss, all light, all strength, all knowledge. You are divinity. You are above and beyond both body and mind. You are immortal satchidananda (existence - knowledge - bliss absolute).

The important thing to know clearly is that you are not the slave of the mind and the senses. You have got into the habit of thinking that their craving is your craving. Now get out of this habit, by constantly reminding yourself that you have nothing to do with the mischievous mind and senses. Remember constantly that you are not this perishable body. You are not this perishable, changing mind. You are the all-pervading consciousness. You are the eternal seer. You are the eternal witness. Therefore be ever free and blissful.

Intensify your spiritual life. Seek the light of vedanta. Be a flame of the light of the Upanishads. Ever meditate on: "I am the immortal, all-pervading Brahman." Om is the bow, the soul is the arrow and Brahman is the target.

When you realise the effulgent supreme being you shake off all evil and attain the supreme stainless unity. Devote yourself to the holy quest of truth. Devote yourself to the discovery of the ultimate spiritual essence that is all-pervading and interpenetrating.

Withdraw the senses. Look within and search your heart. Dive deep into the recesses of your heart, through deep meditation on the innermost self, the inner ruler. You will doubtless realise your identity with Brahman and get to the heart of the infinite - the heart of infinite joy and bliss.

-Swami Sivananda

Children of rich families

Even if it is impossible for them to be completely unaware of the fact, it is better for children of very rich families not to know the extent of the fortune they will one day inherit. Children who count on their future inheritance believe they are naturally exempt from having to make any effort or from learning to get by on their own. They become lazy, capricious and good for nothing. And that is how the parents' fortune is the cause of their children's moral decline. Parents should therefore leave their children in ignorance of their future inheritance for as long as possible. Once they have acquired good work habits and self-control, there will be no danger in them being made aware of it.

How does the Lord act with humans? As he is the greatest of all teachers, the greatest pedagogue, he does not immediately show them the inheritance that awaits them in the heavenly mansions on high. So, believing themselves poor and wretched, they work and sweat. And when, after all their tears and suffering, they prove themselves worthy of their inheritance, their heavenly Father will reveal all the treasures he has amassed for them.

-Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

To love the endlessness of labor

Heart, 79. If the heart is an accumulator and transmuter of energies, there must also be better conditions for arousing and attracting these energies. The most fundamental condition is labor, labor in thought as well as physical labor. By this act are gathered the energies from space. But one must understand labor as the natural saturation of life. Thus, each labor is a bliss, but the sophistry of inaction is the most harmful in the cosmic sense.

To love the endlessness of labor is already an initiation of considerable order; it prepares one for the conquest of time. The state of conquest of time guarantees a step in the Subtle World, where labor is an absolute condition, just as it is in the body. A complaint against labor can only come from slaves of the body.

-Agni Yoga

Working to purify the spiritual atmosphere

You are walking down the street, or you have to wait at the doctor's, at a ticket office, on a railway platform or in the underground. Instead of allowing your mind to wander, try to bring it under control and use it to create an atmosphere that is fraternal and harmonious, so that one day the earth will become a place where all human beings live happily.

But where are the enlightened beings who will commit to this work? When they are not concentrating on a particular activity, most people allow themselves to ruminate on their desires, lusts and grudges: how they are going to teach this one a lesson, oust that one or take revenge on him. And these ruminations are extremely costly for humanity as a whole, for the entire atmosphere is filled with chaotic and unhealthy vibrations.

When there are enough enlightened beings in the world who are working to purify the spiritual atmosphere by the way they live and think, many others, gradually won over by their example, will follow.

-Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

What are the Characteristics of New Age Women?

The first characteristic is inclusiveness. An intelligent woman realizes that inclusiveness is the path of survival, that her children will be killed century after century if we follow the old ways of separatism.

We must have inclusiveness in our thinking, our speech, our manners, our plans, our decisions, and our ways of living. Everything that is against inclusiveness must be renounced if we want to create harmony between ourselves and the coming New Age waves of energies. One of these energies is inclusiveness....

The serious woman realizes that all people are her children. How can she bring these children together in harmony so that she creates a symphony, instead of clashes, hatred, anger, jealousy, revenge, greed, destruction? This is the job of the New Age woman….

If women stand together, they have the greatest force in the world. In twenty to fifty years time, we will see that women will speak with one voice - if they are not trapped in sexual license, in prostitution, in vices, drugs, and selfishness. Negative forces are working to make women slaves and thus prevent improvement in the quality of living that women will make when they are truly free.

If you watch the mass media, you will see that many traps are made to keep women slaves of materialism. The image of woman is misused in television, radio, newspapers, and magazines. Her image is used to make money; that is all. If they put a naked woman in a magazine, it is because they want to sell products.

By destroying the morality of woman, they can build empires of materialism. But every time woman is humiliated and her beauty is not recognized on a higher level, that civilization or country falls. If we read carefully the history of humanity, we can see the signals of destruction that appeared in every great nation before it collapsed. The first signal was that women began to decline in their values, standards, and goals. Women can end the destruction of civilizations if they stand together, demanding the highest for all life....

The history of a nation can be seen clearly if we observe and analyze our own life or the life of a person who is becoming successful, then expanding, then going downhill. Why is this happening? A nation is the reflection of individuals.

An interesting phenomenon happens in the mind and brain when a new idea is given and emphasized. Suddenly one can see the formation of a great army. In the brain and mind, all separative thoughts that are accumulated in the genes through the ages, immediately dress as if in a drama and then perform. They surface and say, "I am this; I am that," and fight over the new idea.

If a person is born for the New Age - meaning that for ages this person has been striving for virtue and for new and greater ideas - then for him discovering New Age ideas will be like finding an old jewel that was lost. There will be no negative reaction.

When you find many reactions surfacing in your mind, it means that you have not prepared for the New Age, and you were the victim of society, of separative persuasions, of separative and destructive thoughts. Those who victimized you take your brain and beat it repeatedly, eventually making you dumb and accepting of everything they say to you.

Once you search for the flower of inclusiveness, it will start to grow within you. Try to develop that flower in your garden instead of the weeds of separatism….

The second characteristic of women in the New Age is an urge and ability to create peace. International peace, national peace, home peace, and personal peace can be developed artistically and intelligently in conversations, in writings, in relationships, and in emotional responses and reactions.

Women must have inner peace and not be irritated. When one irritates a woman, he destroys that woman. An irritated mother cannot be a good mother; an irritated mother destroys her children. If an irritated mother breast-feeds her child, she poisons his mind, heart, and body. If an irritated woman goes to the office, she will react negatively under pressure. When one irritates a woman and agitates her emotions, he creates troubles in her home and business, which can affect the family income, the health of the children, and the woman's social relationships. Women must be peaceful as much as possible. It is peaceful women who bring peace into the family and into the world.

Women must come together and create peace within themselves, among themselves, and in their families. If they see that men are totally out of their senses, women must bring them back to their senses with the graceful means they have within….

Women who manage their homes practically by making the home a happy and peaceful place, when they are ready, can also step into politics and inspire the leaders of nations to think in terms of peace, cooperation, and the future. Women learn many political techniques through creating peaceful, cooperative relations in their homes.

In all her expressions, a New Age woman emphasizes inclusiveness and peace. These energies are fundamental for the survival of the world.

There should be courses in universities about inclusiveness and peace, New Age women will learn and teach these principles. When we teach engineering, we have engineers. When we teach inclusiveness and peace, we have people who will take on the responsibility of living a life of inclusiveness and peace and work for a peaceful world.

The third characteristic of New Age women is illumination, enlightenment. In many cultures of the passing age, a woman was considered a slave, a puppet who dressed and danced and otherwise performed to satisfy the sexual urges of man and to bear children and raise them. Most women were kept ignorant, and their freedom was very limited. Women are still in slavery today whenever they are used for advertisement and prostitution, or as machines to give birth to and raise children against their will.

In the New Age, women will change these conditions prevalent in many countries and restore their dignity, value, and beauty. Only through liberated women will the world enter into a cycle of inclusiveness, peace, and enlightenment.

Future generations will profit highly if their mothers are educated, experienced, and enlightened. Education is not enlightenment. Enlightenment is far greater and deeper than education. Education often promotes the will of tradition, politics, and various interests. But enlightenment causes people to see the reality, the cause, and the purpose of education.

An enlightened woman can see those forces that are destructive and that prepare a dark future for her children and for the world. Education often hides reality. But an enlightened person can see beyond the partial interests and see the direction that must be followed.

Enlightenment comes when a woman subjects herself to many - even opposing - currents of ideology, philosophy, and interpretation of world events, and tries to find the real cause of them. "Old Age" women were subject to the imposition of an ideology. In the New Age of liberty, women must study many ways of approach so that they continually choose of their own free will and protect themselves from being used by separative interests.

An enlightened woman will not let her body and beauty be used to sell commodities. She will not be deceived. Her enlightened mind will recognize such traps and their effects and will choose the way of nobility and self-control.

Because of the efforts of enlightened women in the past, we have many women working in very responsible positions in every nation. However, the ratio of women to men in these positions is so small that a great effort must be made to give equal opportunity to women to increase their numbers in responsible positions in every occupation that benefits humanity.

To advance in positions of responsibility, a New Age woman must have a plan that includes all aspects of her life. She must plan for such aspects as:

a. education
b. marriage/relationships/sex
c. work
d. whether or not to have and raise children
e. when and how she will advance on the ladder of society
f. in what field she will serve humanity

All these factors must be clear to her so that she systematically plans her life to step into politics, business, religion, science, economy, arts, or education. If she organizes her life intelligently, she will be able, even if she is married and raising a family, to earn college degrees and prepare herself for larger-scale work when her children are grown.

Women must never stop educating themselves, in any condition, if they want to work in leadership positions in the world. But if they do not plan their lives and accidentally become pregnant when they are not married or not prepared to raise a child, or if they ruin their lives with drugs, alcohol, and premature sex, their liberation will be delayed for many hundreds of years.

The fourth characteristic of New Age women is purity and cleanliness: purity of mind, of speech, of heart; cleanliness of body, clothes, home, and environment. The New Age woman must radiate beauty, and she cannot be beautiful if she does not have purity and cleanliness. One of the greatest lessons she can give to her children is the image of cleanliness and purity in all aspects. If children see how their mother is clean and neat in the kitchen, in the bedroom, in the bathroom, in her dressing, and in her daily affairs, they will remain impressed throughout their lives and will themselves be clean.

The New Age woman understands that she can affect the condition of the world by raising beautiful children who are equipped with New Age ideas and visions.

The fifth characteristic of New Age women is a sense of brotherhood and sisterhood. This sense is related to inclusiveness and is a very practical virtue. Women must study and understand the meaning of this sense and teach it to their children. The sense of brotherhood and sisterhood implies that woman relates herself to the rest of humanity as a sister, as a mother, and tries to teach humanity the beauty of sharing all that is precious on earth and in other human beings. She teaches everyone she meets that the planet is one home and belongs to every one of us - to all animals and trees and to all living forms equally.

The sixth characteristic of New Age women is a love of labor. The New Age woman has a tremendous amount of psychic energy. She never gives up. She is steady on her path, persevering, patient, and focused in labor - labor that brings humanity more beauty, goodness, light, health, joy, and prosperity; labor that leads human beings into harmonious relationships; labor through which she tries to bring into the world New Age values and visions.

A New Age woman never wastes time in her home. She is industrious in society. She is honest in her job. She is honest, positive, and righteous in her relationships. She conquers all obstacles step-by-step through her labor and through the high quality of her understanding and truthfulness....

The seventh characteristic of New Age women is beauty and gracefulness. Gracefulness brings integrity and harmony into the nature of those who experience such a woman. The children and friends of a graceful woman feel an urge to release beauty in their hearts and to live a life of value and dignity.

A graceful wife, sister, mother, daughter, or friend is a fragrant flower of rare quality. A man's heart feels great joy in the presence of a graceful woman.

The eighth characteristic of a New Age woman is striving toward spiritual heights. A New Age woman never gives up. If in the past she was manipulated, beaten, deprived, or led into dark paths of life, she awakens to her real values, stands up, and proceeds toward spiritual heights.

She feels that the present human condition is but a stage of evolution. She feels that she can transcend herself and enter the path of perfection as many Great Ones have done before her, Those Who have testified that it is possible to surpass human evolution altogether and continue a superhuman evolution.

As she advances in her spiritual path - the path of purity, beauty, intuition - she becomes a greater source of wisdom and leadership.

A woman who is in contact with higher intelligences and higher centers of the Universe can inspire humanity with universal and Cosmic values. To bring new values into life, women need to climb greater heights and contact greater light and greater freedom.

The ninth characteristic of New Age women is continuity of consciousness. Women can make this breakthrough faster than men due to their intuitional nature.

Through continuity of consciousness, a woman will work not ten to fourteen hours but twenty-four hours a day, even in her so-called sleep. When asleep, she will be able to contact higher intelligences, higher mysteries, and will record them in her brain, bring them down to normal consciousness, and offer them as a gift for humanity.

Through continuity of consciousness, women will serve in the subjective planes; they will teach humanity greater principles and will learn in the Universe. They will be able to travel without their bodies to great distances around the world and deliver the message of beauty, joy, and solemnity.

The tenth characteristic of New Age women is creativity. A New Age woman will not only work in the fields of art and culture, but she will also be creative in her ideas, thoughts, speech, and actions. To be creative means to be able to manifest beauty, to meet the needs of people on all levels, challenging them to live better lives and to bring harmony and cooperation through the light of a great vision.

The eleventh characteristic of New Age women is economy. The New Age woman never wastes her energy, sex, body, time, money, or mind so that she can use them for a great cause, for progress, unity, and synthesis. The New Age woman saves her money, electricity, water, gas, telephone, and food and takes care of her furniture and clothing so that nothing is wasted. To waste means to steal from Nature.

The twelfth characteristic of New Age women is compassion. Compassion is the ability to understand both sides of a question and reach a decision that will bring the highest good for both sides….

Compassion is the ability to balance two extremes and enable them to come to an agreement on the path of righteousness. Women will use compassion, especially in relation to world problems.

Women are a barometer of the success and failure of a nation. If women fall from maternal virtues and cheapen their lives in drugs, prostitution, crime, gambling, and luxury, they symbolize the downfall of the family and the nation.

It is very interesting to observe how women are under more attacks than men. Subjectively, women are the targets of all those who want to exploit humanity because if they conquer women, all on earth will fall into their hands. If women are alert, nothing can be lost.

Women and men of all ages must avoid watching any movie that contains crime, violence, or the prostitution of human morals. When people sleep after watching such movies, their sense of right human relations is less accurate, their intelligence and reasoning are more distorted, and their inner strength or striving is weakened.

Such movies control their minds, emotions, and bodies and build points of association in their vehicles. With such points accumulated within, people become like machines, full of push buttons. Any time a button is pressed, their mood tunes in with the memory of the violence and crime they saw perhaps years before, and the old effect repeats itself, further decreasing their creative intelligence and potential. This has caused widespread crime and violence....

Women's imaginative faculty is far more advanced than men's, and because of this powerful imagination, women create faster results in matter, the body, and the environment. A woman's imagination is almost reality for her. For a man, imagination is a game. But for a woman, imagination is an experience with the object of her imagination….

The New Age woman is an example of morality.

No woman can be sexually healthy if she has no high moral principles. Morality gives her endurance, power, strength, insight, the sense of righteousness, and clarity of mind. It enables her to challenge man into a right direction of life.

Without morality the home cannot stand unified under outside pressure; it falls apart. The morality of a woman, like a great magnet, attracts the man who was wandering on dark paths. The morality of a mother is a great source of inspiration to her children.

The morality of a woman makes her stand against evil and endure during times of great pressure and crisis. The ancients used to say that tension and crises multiply the energies of a virtuous woman. Throughout ages, the greatest and deepest inspirations have come through women.

Woman knows the value of life because she gives birth to life. Woman is sacred because woman is the symbol of future generations. The New Age woman not only gives birth to her child with her highest visions but also nourishes that child with her own milk and love. With beautiful and heroic stories she inspires and leads her child toward great achievement. She is sacred because she is the one who suffers for the continuation of life and for better conditions in the future….

-Torkom Saraydarian

Sex, Family, and the Woman in Society, Ch. 42

Prayers and blessings before meals

When it reaches our kitchen or table, our food is not really ready to be absorbed by our organism. Yes, even when it's been washed, cooked, seasoned and prepared, the food we eat is still a foreign substance: it doesn't vibrate in unison with us, and we must tame it and make it our friend.

Why do you think I insist so much on your eating in silence, with attention, love and gratitude? Because these states of consciousness act on the food. And that is also the reason, in all religions, for having prayers and blessings before meals. These blessings do not add the slightest nutritional value to the food; they are used only to influence the food, so that it's assimilated well by those who eat it and so that it harmonizes with their own vibrations and nourishes their subtle bodies too.

-Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

When you correct yourself, the world too becomes correct

Examine your own conduct and faith. See whether it is sincere and steady. When you sit in the moving train, you find that the trees are moving fast along the line. Do not worry about the trees; see yourself. Examine yourself and then you will find that, it is you that is moving fast. So also, do not blame others, and point out their faults. The faults you find are in you, and when you correct yourself, the world too becomes correct.

People try to reform the world without making any effort to reform themselves; for, it is easier to give advice and admonish others than take advice and advance ourselves. The others are fundamentally reflections, whereas the original, namely you yourself have to improve your shape! Strengthen the inner urges towards virtue and goodness; become impregnable there; then you can set about reforming others.

-Sai Baba

"Do-Be-Do-Be-Do"

Action vs. Inaction:
The Psychologist says "Do."
The Guru says "Be."
Consciousness, taking both positions, says "Do-Be-Do-Be-Do."
But, once again, all change is Go(o)d.
Sooner or later the cosmic kaleidoscope is always re-cycling everything and creating new mandalas.
Same stones.
Different patterns.

- Chuck Hillig