Hari Om
Each 'Choose-day' we will investigate the process by which we can reassess our activity and interaction with the world of plurality and become more congruent within our personality.
MANAGING THE MANAGER Cont'd (Swami Swaroopananda)
Mind Submits to the Higher.
Integrate the mind to follow the intellect's discipline. Try to master it by giving arguments, logic, discrimination and knowledge. Yet the mind is extremely powerful; it may understand but it will not listen. The mind submits only to one power - the power of Love. When there is Love for something higher, a higher goal or a higher principle, a power is developed and the mind finds it easy to sacrifice anything at the altar of Love. It is not a compromise. Sacrifice is a joyful giving-up due to growth; compromise is a reluctant giving-up due to suppression. The mind gravitates towards that which it loves and which gives it pleasure. When it is exposed to higher, subtler and purer joys, it easily gives up the lower.
For example; a person wants to give up smoking. The intellect admonishes that it is harmful for the body, it pollutes the air, that it harms others as well as oneself; but the mind says "who cares?!" A little later a son is born who has asthma. How many fathers have given up smoking for the well-being of their children? If their Love is pure, they will find no difficulty in it.
If the mind always lives in inspiration, the petty, paltry pleasures of the world do not distract it. Therefore, first keep the right company. Do not hear and see things that divert the mind and keep it immersed in some higher form of Love.
The mind is like a monkey, going after whatever it likes. There is the story of the old man whose spectacles are whisked away by a mischievous monkey. It skipped through the window and on up through the trees. The old fellow tried to follow and threw stones to try and get the monkey to drop those specs back to him. He grew angry and frustrated. Then he saw a holy man and begged him to perform some magic to catch the culprit.
'I will get you the glasses. Just bring a banana.'
'Maharaj, I will give you all the fruits I have!!!'
'Only the banana; it is for the monkey.'
'For the monkey?! He has taken my spectacles and you would give him my banana too?!!'
The sadhu took the banana, peeled it a little and placed it under the tree. The monkey saw it and came down to take it. He wanted to keep both it and the specs; but one hand was needed to climb back up the tree. He decided that, as entertaining as the spectacles might be, they were no substitute for the tasty banana - so dropped the glasses.
Give the mind a greater venue, a purer field and a nobler experience to enjoy; it will renounce the lower.
Therefore, in order to sublimate the mind, first of all, one has to detect the negative forces; secondly negate them by asserting the intellect; and thirdly, one should offer something 'tastier'; give the mind greater visions and higher Love in place of the short-lived and unnourishing distractions of the spectacle of the world.
MANAGING THE MANAGER Cont'd (Swami Swaroopananda)
Mind Submits to the Higher.
Integrate the mind to follow the intellect's discipline. Try to master it by giving arguments, logic, discrimination and knowledge. Yet the mind is extremely powerful; it may understand but it will not listen. The mind submits only to one power - the power of Love. When there is Love for something higher, a higher goal or a higher principle, a power is developed and the mind finds it easy to sacrifice anything at the altar of Love. It is not a compromise. Sacrifice is a joyful giving-up due to growth; compromise is a reluctant giving-up due to suppression. The mind gravitates towards that which it loves and which gives it pleasure. When it is exposed to higher, subtler and purer joys, it easily gives up the lower.
For example; a person wants to give up smoking. The intellect admonishes that it is harmful for the body, it pollutes the air, that it harms others as well as oneself; but the mind says "who cares?!" A little later a son is born who has asthma. How many fathers have given up smoking for the well-being of their children? If their Love is pure, they will find no difficulty in it.
If the mind always lives in inspiration, the petty, paltry pleasures of the world do not distract it. Therefore, first keep the right company. Do not hear and see things that divert the mind and keep it immersed in some higher form of Love.
The mind is like a monkey, going after whatever it likes. There is the story of the old man whose spectacles are whisked away by a mischievous monkey. It skipped through the window and on up through the trees. The old fellow tried to follow and threw stones to try and get the monkey to drop those specs back to him. He grew angry and frustrated. Then he saw a holy man and begged him to perform some magic to catch the culprit.'I will get you the glasses. Just bring a banana.'
'Maharaj, I will give you all the fruits I have!!!'
'Only the banana; it is for the monkey.'
'For the monkey?! He has taken my spectacles and you would give him my banana too?!!'
The sadhu took the banana, peeled it a little and placed it under the tree. The monkey saw it and came down to take it. He wanted to keep both it and the specs; but one hand was needed to climb back up the tree. He decided that, as entertaining as the spectacles might be, they were no substitute for the tasty banana - so dropped the glasses.
Give the mind a greater venue, a purer field and a nobler experience to enjoy; it will renounce the lower.
Therefore, in order to sublimate the mind, first of all, one has to detect the negative forces; secondly negate them by asserting the intellect; and thirdly, one should offer something 'tastier'; give the mind greater visions and higher Love in place of the short-lived and unnourishing distractions of the spectacle of the world.