The best way to open the higher centers

Sometimes Hatha Yogis or different yogis give you meditation and you sit down and imagine your head center or heart center or throat center to make them unfold. There is nothing worse than that because you are forcing something for which it is not ready.

 

The best way to open the higher centers is to develop virtues through creative imagination and visualization and try to actualize these virtues in your life. The degree to which these virtues are actualized in your life, to that degree your higher centers become active. Higher centers unfold when their energies, in the form of virtues, manifest in the life and relationships of the person.

 

-Torkom Saraydarian

Imagination & Visualization, p.135

Only living with pure motives will destroy our karma

Only living with pure motives will destroy our karma and expand our consciousness. We have no way of knowing what our specific karmic debts are. There is no computer that will show us the obnoxious things we did in the past. Only in the Akashic Records does this exist, and we do not have access to them. Because we cannot know what we did and do not need to know, we must increase our givingness and service. If we increase in Beauty, Goodness, Truth, Joy and Freedom, suddenly one day we will receive a letter from the bank of life that says our mortgage has been paid off.

If we want to know what bad karma is in general, we have only to visit an asylum or hospital. A visit to an asylum can make you laugh, it can make you depressed, or it can make you cry. What did such people do in the past that they are paying for now by being mentally ill? A visit to an asylum tells you that what you sow, you will reap.

Only the way of pure motive will destroy our karma and pay our debts. Only if we learn to live for others will we be able to build a strong foundation both in this life and in the life to come.


-Torkom Saraydarian
Virtues & Values vol.2

Seven steps to destroy karma

There are seven steps to take to destroy karma:

1. The first step is to learn the science of giving. A book needs to be written about the science of giving. If we sit down and think about it, we can see that what, how, when, and to whom we give is a part of a great science. We often give ourselves physically, emotionally, mentally, and even spiritually without understanding at all about the laws and principles of right giving. When we give wrongly, we only create more karma. To give or not to give is based on a scientific understanding of the situation and persons involved. It should not be based on emotional reactions or prejudiced thinking.

2. The second step to destroy karma is to heal people. The techniques for healing vary widely according to the need. Some wounds are healed by applying a soothing balm, but others require painful and drastic surgery. Healing takes many forms, but if our intention is to heal people, our karma will dissolve.

3. The third step to destroy karma is to educate people. To educate someone means to lead him to an expansion of consciousness. Education also means to create discipline. If you can create self-discipline in someone, you help him raise his level and expand his consciousness. He may hate you for it, and that is your reward. But as you continue to create discipline in others, your reward will increase. One day your reward will stand between you and a car that is about to run over you, and the accident will be prevented.

4. The fourth way to destroy karma is to protect people from themselves. We try to protect each other, but that is not the answer. The real problem is to protect people from themselves. It takes courage to do this. Can we tell people when they need protection from themselves that they are destroying themselves? Can we find the way to tell them so that they are able to listen?

5. The fifth step to take to destroy karma is to keep silent. There are times when refusing to talk with someone is the right thing to do. Sometimes it is only our silence that can annihilate karma.

6. The sixth step to destroy karma is to think good thoughts. When we think low thoughts and criticize others, we add to our karmic debt.

7. The seventh step to destroy karma is to speak in goodness. Right speech eliminates karma, while harmful and thoughtless words increase karma.


-Torkom Saraydarian
Virtues & Values vol.2

Good leaders

The Tibetan master says that if a person can solve his family problems, he can solve the problems of his city. A President must not have a lot of trash in his past. He must have a good family life. A decent family man can be a decent president. Miss America must be the embodiment of purity and beauty.

Our consciousness is looking for good leaders. These leaders will come from those who are good to themselves, good to their families, good to their society and Nature. If a person does not create a mess in his personal life, it is unlikely that he will create a mess on a larger scale. That is why it is said that family life is a very good training place for initiates because it is the first Ashram. It can then be replaced by group life, or friendship.


-Torkom Saraydarian
Ashrams

Our worst tendency is to thoroughly cover ourselves

Our worst tendency as human beings is to thoroughly cover ourselves. We cover ourselves with diplomas, positions, titles, and pleasant smiles. We hide from others, but the worst thing is that we hide from ourselves. This cover-up has to stop if we want to have a real foundation in life.

Unless we learn the technique of self-revelation, we can never progress because the very nature of the ego is to hide itself. Do we not see this in moments of clarity? Do we not observe the ego busily weaving its covers of rationalizations, justifications, reasoning, and logic? These make us hide our faces from ourselves. As long as we continue to hide, no matter what books we read or what position we attain, there is no spiritual progress at all.

The truth is that everyone covers himself in relations with others. Unless a person has a Teacher who is able to remove the coverings so that he has the chance to know what is hidden, or he learns to do this for himself, there is no way to change. As long as the concealment continues, there is no hope for transformation.

One cannot be sincere with others before he becomes sincere with himself.


-Torkom Saraydarian
Virtues & Values vol.2

A disciple is a person who is conscious in every situation

A disciple is a person who is conscious in every situation and knows the inner motive and character of the people he deals with. A disciple’s progress in life depends on his understanding of who he is and what he is, and who and what other people are. Spiritual advancement does not depend on speculation about how many and what kind of angels are in heaven, or what short of harp-playing is going on in paradise. If this is what is going on in heaven, we will find out about it when we get there. In the meantime, we are here. What about understanding where we are?

-Torkom Saraydarian
Virtues & Values vol.2