OM NAMAH SHIVAYA 2013

OM NAMAH SHIVAYA

The Ardha Narasherwar roop of Lord Shiva. Is the embodiment of the Shiv and Shakti. The surrenderer and the conqueror,  the feminine and the masculine, the giver and the receiver. The unfathomed and the fathomable.   The need and the desire.  The flow and the obstruction.  The see-er and the doer.  The only  aspect of the whole in all its power and glory. The acceptance of  all of you.   The good and the evil the nice and the not so nice aspects. The ones you claim as you and the ones you discard. The Swaroop is the full embodiment of this  aspect of accepting all that you are.  The rough with the smooth and the fierce with the gentle.  

When we do it, accept the wholeness of ourselves, all aspects that make us. That is when we are one with the universe, because in nature the hunter and the hunted coexist with out ever feeling I am superior to the other, with out comparing their abilities and their skill sets. Each is an unique creation and so play a part in the whole of creation. Each is just that one tile which makes the whole picture beautiful. If even one tile is missing we would look at that gap and wonder, what happened to that tile, was it red, blue of some other color, how did it fit to complete the picture. One tile missing brings in so much of enquiry, so many questions and so many answers in the form of speculations.

Now seeing our lives we see so many tiles missing from our pictures. No wonder we speculate so much, we ask so many questions, we investigate where we are from and we need to go. But if we accept that we have a lot of tiles missing and we will find those tiles with confidence and belief, then the missing tiles don’t matter. We are on our journey to discovering those tiles and those aspects which are missing within us. We start on this journey of self discovery.  The discovery of the Shiv within us and the Shakti. The ‘poorna swaroop’ of ourselves.

Here’s hoping that this New Year 2013 brings us close to that whole we are searching for ourselves.

Happy New Year

The Shiv

As I was watching a program of Lord Shiv on TV. I got to understand the need for Shiv's energy in our lives. Shiv is called Bholenath - meaning an innocent. It stuck me that a persona being innocent can achieve what Shiv has achieved. Innocence is when we discover knowledge the first time. We are so propelled by it and we feel such joy at its discovery. We try to use this new knowledge almost immediately in all spheres of our lives. Once we have used it for a week or ten days it becomes a known knowledge and we seek some more new knowledge. Our quest moves on.
But here we call Shiv Bholenath  cause the knowledge does not become old in any format it is reused new every time. The innocence of this is what true innocence is about.
It is amazing when we look at it from a different perspective. 

Venus Transits the Sun

Today as I saw the Venus transit, I thought that Venus being the planet of beauty is transiting the Sun, your personality/Self. So as Venus, beauty is seen once in 100 yrs across the self/personality. We also see, enhance and accept the beauty within us. Embrace it and accept it. Remembering that The Sun- Self/Personality is much bigger than the Venus-Beauty. Beauty is a small part of our whole personality, we have to concentrate on the other aspects of our personality equally. So paying too much emphasis on beauty will cause self deviations. Keep the perspective right. 

The truth behind the truth

It's interesting to see two people argue about their truths. Each is saying their version of the truth is the "Truth", and the other's is a lie. But who is to judge which is the 'Truth' and which is not. Each persons perspective and his logic makes him believe that is version is the 'Truth'. We are the sum total of our experiences lived and observed. So that makes us feel this is the truth observed, experienced by me and so it is. But the other is also a sum total of his experiences lived and observed. He feels his truth should prevail. He has not lived and experienced your life and observed the life the way you have, so he has no inkling of what you have perceived.

The 'Truth' here remains a perception of us at a given moment in time. Do we base all our decisions on this one moment perception, or do we step back and logically and dispassionately view each moment as it is now and not view it from our past perception curtains.

The Power of Now is this, viewing, experiencing each moment in that moment and not carrying it beyond that moment. Have we the will to live like that?

Illusions that capture your reality

We all live in the illusions we create in our lives. The day to day drama of our life is the illusion we have created. The very aspect that we want so much drama is in itself a cry for attention.

At any given moment we want a lot of things, we imagine these and thoughts form. The thought that captures our attention is the one we pursue. We put in a lot of effort to make that thought concrete. It takes some time for the thought to manifest in our lives. By that time we have already moved on to other thoughts and other imaginations that have caught our fancy.

When these thoughts manifest we thing where did this come from, why now? I don’t want it now, cause now I am dealing with other thought and putting my effort in those. But the effort put by us, even half hearted one’s still have the force of our conviction and our will behind them. So they manifest, and we wonder why?

We live all our daily lives creating such illusions and when the real manifestation into reality happens we question it, because we have forgotten we had the thought and we have created this illusion.

If we step back and look at the illusion (the drama) and say ok, I created it let me enjoy it. We are not at cross-purpose with it, we are in sync with the flow. We do not have to put so much effort to swim against it, we can flow with it. We will be able to sustain it and find our banks. Isn’t that a better way.

Now, we need to understand that our illusions, our thoughts, our speech, all create a reality we live in. And that reality is our day to day life.

My goal in life

What is it that makes us want something? What is it that makes us desire something? What is it that drives us to go and achieve what we desire and want? Is this true living, just doing and achieving what we want and desire, or is there some purpose to our living on earth? What is that purpose? How do we know what we are supposed to do? What is our goal in life and what we have to finish before we exit? Who is to answer all these questions for us?

Why is it so difficult for us to understand our goals? If we know what we are supposed to do, most of us would get down to doing it. How can we recognize that this is what we need to do in this life time?

Too many questions, too little answers.

So help me find these answers.

What is it that makes us want something? – Desire

What is it that makes us desire something? – Greed

What is it that drives us to go and achieve what we desire and want? – Ego

Is this true living? – No                                           

What is that purpose? – Finding your true self

How do we know what we are supposed to do? – Self-knowledge

What is our goal in life and what have we to finish before we exit? – Knowing your self, your weaknesses and your strengths, not by someone else’s analysis but your own.

Who is to answer all these questions?- We ourselves when we sit in quititude.

Why is it so difficult for us to understand our goals? – We do not listen to our inner voice we ask for others opinions and there take on things we do. How can they tell us, when they are not  ‘me’?

How can we recognize that this is what we need to do in this life time? – When it is the easiest thing you can do with no effort on your part.

Dussehara

Today on Dussehara day, I realize the importance of this day in all our lives. We celebrate Dussehara, as Vijay dasami, the return of  victorious Lord Ram & Sita back to Ayodhya. The victory of Lord Ram over the Demon lord Ravan, is well documented. But what we fail to realize is that the 10 headed demon is with in all of us. Thus Dus-hara, the 10 demons we need to defeat, to become Ram.

The 10 Demons are related to the life and actions of Ravan.

1.    Wanting what is not intrinsically his own, i.e. Sita. Sita was the wife of Ram. Greed of that which you cannot have. Most of us have to recognize this demon, when we want something which is not ours but we let this demon rule, and drive us to get/acquire that which is not intrinsically our own. This could be a post, a skill, a job, a car, a house anything which we try to acquire, when we see it with the other, and get jealous and try to get the same for ourselves.

2.     Keeping her in his kingdom against her will. Taking her choices of where and whom she wants to live with. Trying to dominate her choices, this is what many fail to see when they try to take control of others lives, especially in a responsible position in a corporate office. We see this demon showing its face very often.

3.     Forcing his will on her. Ravan wanted Sita to submit her-self to him. Freewill is given to every human being, and any who forces another’s will is using this demon. And will also have to face the consequence of it in later life, when his will, will be taken away from him, either in form of a jail sentence, or a disease which makes him depend on others.

4.    When a peace messenger in the form of Hanuman was sent then, then trying to kill the messenger. That’s where the saying comes from, ‘don’t kill the messenger’. This is the demon which we see when we encounter a Ravan- harsh negotiator. When we do not allow for even the messenger to bring in an alternative solution.

5.   Ravan tried to prove that he was right by in his act of kidnapping Sita and keeping her against her will. When you are in the wrong, then trying to prove the wrong as right is not going to make things right. This demon we are all familiar with when we know we are in the wrong but try to prove ourselves right.

6.    Challenging Ram on unequal terms. Ravan was on home ground and had a vast army and Ram was a exiled king. The demon of inequality is what we have seen in all the wars on earth. That’s why challenges should be on equal ground. Level playing field.

7.    When his brother ‘Vibhishan’ tried to mediate, Ravan exiled his own brother. This is an act of not listening to one’s own sane advice, here the demon is within, each of us knows what is the sane voice saying to us, and we all sometimes don’t listen and have to deal with the consequences later, and regret it.

8.     Waging a war where the people suffer, when Ram offered a peaceful solution by saying that he would just leave if Sita was released. The demon of not opting for a win for the other, and thus not opting one for self too, for a win-win solution. Only wanting that I should win and the other lose.

9.     Ravan used all his skill as a magician, as he created illusions to deceive Ram during the war. His own skills as a Shiv bhakt, and the shakti he obtained by means of prayer, and then to use for personal gains, which were not in the nature of things, Sita was not his, nor did she choose him. Using the most powerful forces of nature against Ram. Who is also a part of nature. When one uses nature for the good, it has a multiplying effect. Same when one uses nature for the bad of all, it too has a multiplying effect of which we have innumerable example. When the intent behind anything we do is right for the others, we always reap dividends.

10. Last but not the least, making his Ego so big that he could not see anything beyond it. He allowed the Ego demon to dominate him. He became blind to any advice and any counsel. He had no one to turn to because his Ego personality had completely taken over. We see this happening in offices very often.