"I say, drop all your defenses. Anyone can make a mistake — even you. Do not defend your mistakes; just accept them and move on. When you are totally defenseless, that is when you will be completely strong."
-Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
“Forget the past. Human conduct is ever unreliable until man is anchored in the Divine.
Everything in the future will improve if you are making a spiritual effort now."
-Sri Yukteswar
"You have to make it sink deep into you that you are the source of your misery, you are the source of your Joy, nobody else, nobody else at all, nothing else at all but you.”
-Sadguru
“Stop chasing what is running away.
What is meant for you will come in its own time.”
-Rumi
Today may have been one of the worst days of my life. Then I saw this quote:
“God sees, God knows and God will fix everything.”
-Neem Karoli Baba
I like to believe the next message I needed came when I needed it.
“Three things are rare and attained only by grace: human birth, desire for liberation, and association with the wise.”
-Adi Shankaracharya
"Be quiet in your mind, quiet in your senses, and also quiet in your body. Then, when all these are quiet, don't do anything. In that state truth will reveal itself to you."
-Kabir
I wish I knew the link to that talk. I can’t tell it like he did and that’s about the best I have.
“You can plan for a hundred years. But you don’t know what will happen the next moment.”
-Neem Karoli Baba
Yes, he told the story so well. He was still wearing his Indian clothes and as he ate the ribs a man came up and asked him about his spiritual practices. He saw Maharajji’s hand in this.
Ram Dass talked about this once. He’d been a practicing yogi and born Jewish so at one point back in America he decided he needed to bring his models on diet. He thought to break both backgrounds at once and went to a Chinese restaurant and had pork spare ribs. He tells the story so well.
In my beliefs nothing can always be “always”. Sometimes we face these conundrums to teach us something. Everything ultimately seems to point to non-attachment to anything; even the things we hold most dear. Furthermore, we each have our own path to walk. We can walk no one else’s.
I struggle when I try to justify this change based on my spiritual beliefs. Perhaps this is part of why I needed to do this. I was too attached to rules.
I’m sure it wasn’t personal.
I felt that way for a long time. I’ve cooked it for others but never even tasted it for years. I could handle that but the thought of eating it was unpleasant. Once this inner voice told me I should to break attachment it was easier to do.
Mostly ok. Physically body didn’t handle it as well as I’d like but to be expected. Spiritually/emotionally I’ve negative thoughts about it but trying to remind myself that I listened to my inner voice and did what seemed right even if it broke a lot of models of good and bad.
Monochrome photo of a rugged forest river flowing down a mountainous rocky scene with deep green pine trees Image pinterest
A river does not force its way to the sea.
It does not worry about the rocks in its path.
It does not stop flowing
because the terrain gets difficult.
It simply moves.
It finds the path of least resistance,
and follows it.
Not because it is lazy.
But because it trusts the landscape to guide it.
I’ve really gotten into Ashtavakra as of late. Really some wisdom there.
“You are ever free, yet you live as if bound by thought and form - who taught you this limitation?”
-Ashtavakra Gita
“Jesus is ideal and wonderful, but you Christians - you are not like him.”
-Mahatma Gandhi
I’m glad I shared something new. Read up on Ashtavakra. Seems to have been a unique character.
“Thoughts appear without your command and disappear without your consent - why then call them yours?”
-Ashtavakra Gita
Sorry so many quotes from Ashtavakra lately. A new discovery for me and finding so much of value.
Even when we know better it’s easy to suppress our own feelings. Feelings are just what they are. We should neither deny nor solidify them.
“Meditation is not an act you perform, but the recognition of the awareness in which all acts arise and dissolve.”
-Ashtavakra Gita
The models we cling to, even the most noble of them, separate us from liberation.
Can you imagine the uproar if it was Biden or Obama’s family member during their presidencies?
This week I ate meat for the first time in years. I did so because I feared I’d become attached to my sense of righteousness through it and to release attachment to a model I was trapped in. Thought of this:
“You can’t push away the world. You have to enter it fully to become free.”
-Ram Dass
There are so many moments when I need to remind myself of this truth.
“Within the spiritual journey, you understand that suffering becomes something that has been given to you to show you where your mind is still stuck.”
-Ram Dass
“Live without attachment, without resistance, and without the burden of I am the doer, and you will know true ease.”
-Ashtavakra Gita