Category: Merging With Siva

Affirmation Is a Power

The power of affirmation changes and remolds the putty-like substance that makes up the subconscious areas of the mind. For years we have repeated sayings and statements, attached meaning to them in our thoughts and through listening to ourselves speak. This has helped form our life as we know it today, for the subconscious brings into manifestation the impressions we put into it. Therefore, to change the subconscious pattern and increase the spinning velocity of it, we must remold with new ideas and new concepts its magnetic forces. This can be done through the power of affirmation.

Affirmation, when used in wisdom for spiritual reasons, is a power, and should be understood through meditation. Before beginning to work with an affirmation, we must understand completely from within what we are doing, being sure that when our subconscious has been remolded we can take the added responsibilities, the new adventures and challenges that will manifest as a result of breaking out of one force field and entering into another. Only when we face and accept fully the new effects of our effort should we proceed with an affirmation. First we must understand the nature of this power.

An affirmation is a series of positive words repeated time and time again in line with a visual concept. Such a statement can be repeated mentally or, preferably, verbally. Words in themselves, without a pictorial understanding, make a very poor affirmation. To choose the affirmation best suited to our needs, first we must realize what we do not want, and then we must take steps to change it, in the very same way we would discriminate in giving away or throwing away our possessions in order to purchase new ones. Whether one is dealing with home and possessions, thoughts and concepts, self-created inhibitions or blocks and barriers of the subconscious, the principle is basically the same. If one feels, “I can’t,” he cannot. If he is always criticizing himself and lamenting over what he cannot do, then he has to reverse this pattern and change the flow of magnetic mental force, enliven its intensity by saying orally and feeling through all the pores of his body, “I can. I will. I am able to accomplish what I plan.”

In applying this tantra, begin by repeating the affirmation fifty or a hundred times a day. In watching your reactions, you may find that the subconscious will not accept these three statements, “I can. I will. I am able.” You may still have feelings of “I can’t. I won’t. I am not able.” This then begins a period to live through where the mind’s magnetic forces fight with one another, in a sense. The aggressive forces of your nature are trying to take over and reprogram the passive ones that have been in charge for so many years. Of course, the aggressive forces will win if you will persist with your verbal and visual affirmation. You must not give up saying, “I can. I will. I am able,” until you find the subconscious structure actually creating situations for you in which you can and are able to be successful, happy and acquire what you need, be it temporal goods or un­fold­ment on the inner path.

Finding Time For a Break

People who live under tension all of the time are like a machine. They are a product of the material world. Only when they release that tension may they become creative again, products of the soul. In a relaxed state, happiness is found, and the qualities of the soul shine forth. Selfish, greedy people are tense, concerned, often inhibited. Tension breeds negative thinking. Relaxation gives birth to positive creations. If you have little or no control over your mind, it will be difficult for you to find even five minutes during your day in which to place your body in a prone position. Watch then the tendency of your mind to live over and recreate the circumstances that were occupying your mind before you began your yoga break. If you are going to relive the details of your day during your five-minute yoga break, neither your body nor your mind will relax enough to allow the inrush of spiritual energy that should be yours. And if you cannot take even five minutes out of your day to enjoy the relaxation of a yoga break, if you are so wound up and so busy, you may be headed for an illness of some kind. A nervous disorder may finally catch up with you as the years go by, because the physical forces cannot stand constant tension.

The best time to take a yoga break is when you feel that you have the least time. If your world were suddenly to fall down around you, leaving you standing alone with no one to lean on, no finances, no family, no friends, where would your power come from? You would have to, in that moment, reexperience the same power that you felt flooding through you as you lay concentrated and relaxed upon the floor. That effulgent, rejuvenating power is the Self, the real You, flowing through “your” mind and “your” body.

Freedom from worldly tensions is only achieved to the degree in which people are able to control the forces of their own mind. In this control they are able to lean upon the power of their own inner security, found in the eternity of the moment. In that moment, your inner strength is found. So, take your yoga break whenever you feel even a little tired physically, a little nervous, a little distraught. That is the time, not when you have time.

The Yoga Break

The yoga break is a break in time in which one may penetrate the eternity of the moment. It is practiced in this way. If you find yourself nervous, upset, confused, drained of energy, lie down on the nearest flat, hard surface, not a bed or sofa, for they will not offer the proper support to your spine. Stretch out, preferably on the floor, take a deep breath and command your body and your mind to relax, to release, to let go of all thoughts and tensions of the moment. Don’t bother trying to make your mind blank, but simply visualize yourself floating, relaxed on a cloud buoyed up in space, as it were, apart from all the problems and tensions of the Earth. Your eyes are closed, your hands are relaxed by your side, and as you inhale, gently lift the stomach muscles so that the lower part of the lungs fill with air before the upper part of the chest does. Visualize a powerful light flooding into your solar plexus as you breathe in, charging all the batteries of the nervous system, filling your body and mind with energy and positive will. As you exhale, feel this light energy diffusing into every part of your body, filtering down through the legs, through the arms, out through your fingers, up through the top of your head. As this light floods and fills your body while you breathe out, it expels ahead of it all the bothers and tensions of the day. After a few minutes, your breathing will have gained a deep rhythm. You will feel the life force within you build, and you will be regenerated through the lifting of the spiritual force within your own body. With the inrush of new energy you will feel inspiration returning to your mind, for as the body relaxes, so does the mind relax. If you are especially tense before you begin the yoga break, your muscles may relax quickly, and they will sometimes give a little jerk or twitch as the nervous system disentangles itself. By the time five minutes have passed in the supine position, with your mind solely occupied with the rhythm of your breath and the visualization of the physical body floating on a cloud—filling itself with light as it inhales, distributing the light throughout the body as it exhales—you may feel the inrush of energy flooding through you, as if a hose had somewhere been opened. The yoga break gives perspective in the middle of the busy day, when your mind tends to become tensely narrowed by details.

Facing Yourself

So, here we come to a very important state for spiritual un­fold­ment, and that is to face yourself. Have the courage to admit when you are right or the courage to admit when you are wrong. Have the intelligence to know that these are states of mind through which your awareness is passing and they have nothing to do with you at all, because you are pure spirit. The life force within you is pure spirit. It has nothing to do with the turmoil of the mind. And you have the intelligence to know that through the proper handling of your mind, you control your mind.

So, for example, you might face yourself and say, “All right, so I was wrong. I became angry, and for three days before I became angry, I was sort of angling for it, sort of creating the situation and antagonizing the situation to work myself up into that state. Now, I don’t perhaps know why I did that. Perhaps because things were too peaceful and I was bored. So I thought I would create the upset. Of course, I didn’t know I would create such an upset and react and feel so badly, but at least it was a change. Things were too quiet and too peaceful, and the person I became angry at was too happy.” When you begin to face your mind like that, you find out how you create every situation, whether you know it or not.

Mentally look back at the various states of mind through which you have passed. It is like taking a trip in your automobile. Each city and each state has its personality and its experience, and each state of mind through which consciousness has passed has its personality, too, and its experiences. And yet, that You is always the same—the You that lives a little bit behind the conscious mind in which you dwell each day.

You will have this power if you dedicate each Friday or Monday as a holy day. Work for the sake of work if you have to work on Friday or Monday, dedicating the fruits of your labor to the highest within you. Pray on Friday or Monday and dedicate the fruits of your prayers to the highest within you. Sing on Friday or Monday and dedicate your song to the spirit within you that gave you the power to open your mouth in the first place, and you will find that your consciousness will expand. You will be able to solve your problems from your expanded consciousness all through the week, intuitively. That is what the expanded consciousness brings you into, your intuitive mind, your intuitive, super­con­scious mind, which is much nearer to you than you think. The only barriers are the confusion of the subconscious and the state of mind which continues that confusion by not following spiritual principles.

Understanding Other People

Love is the source of understanding. You know intellectually that within you resides the potential, expressed or not, for all human emotion, thought and action. Yet, you no doubt meet or observe people occasionally whose life and actions are repellent or unacceptable to you. The absence of love has created a vacuum of understanding. For the meditating person, there should not be a single human being whose actions, habits, opinions or conduct lies beyond your ability to love and understand.

Try this. This week look at everyone you meet, and feel, from your fingertips right down to your toes, love welling up from your deepest resources and radiating out to them through every cell of your body and especially through your face. Say to yourself, “I like you”—and really feel it. There are many thousands of things that most people do not understand from their confused states of mind, and they therefore act in unseemly ways, due to the ignorance of past karma. Should their ignorance confuse you? Should it cloud your own understanding? Certainly not! We do not love the flower and hate the muddy roots from which it grew, and we cannot hate the instinctive roots of mankind.

With understanding, a great thing happens—your life becomes even, balanced and sublime. The ups and downs within yourself level out, and you find yourself the same in every circumstance, find yourself big enough to overcome and small enough to understand. Then you can really begin to do something. When emotional ups and downs are allowed, what happens? Your poor nerve system is terribly strained in a constant state of frenzy and uncertainty. All of your energies are then devoted to coping with yourself, and not much is reserved to accomplish creative, productive projects. As your life evens out by using the great power of understanding, the emotional self of you heals and grows strong. Your nervous system, believe it or not, grows, and it grows strong if you feed it correctly by handling your mind. Understanding is the best nourishment for the emotional body.

You must have a basis for understanding your fellow man, and a very good basis is: “I perceive him with my two physical eyes. He appears to be forty years old, but I intuit him to be emotionally a little younger and mentally about sixty—a learned person. I know he is a being of pure awareness going through the experiences he needs to evolve further. Therefore, I shall understand him in this light and make allowances accordingly.” This is not something to think about and appreciate philosophically. It must become as much a part of you as your hands and feet. It’s an easy process if we apply it and a difficult process if we ignore its practice.

Understanding, loving and making allowances—these are the strengths of the soul awakened through sā­dha­na, once the emotional ups and downs and the barriers of the instinctive influences of fear, jealousy, anger, deceit and disappointment are conquered. If you are creative, you will begin to truly create. If you are a mystic, you will have deeper and ever more fulfilling insights in your daily meditations. All of the mysteries of life will unfold before your inner vision once the instinctive mind is mastered in your life.

Emotional Maturity

What is emotional maturity? It certainly is not to be equated with physical age. I know people who are well past middle life and are not yet emotionally mature. Even if the physical body is totally mature, the intellect, as well as the emotional unit, can remain childish and unstable. The mind may have been educated to the nth degree, and yet such a scholar remains vulnerable to depression and discouragement. The very first step toward emotional mastery is recognition coupled with admission that in some areas we are not yet perfect. Only through open admission can we devote ourselves to the sā­dha­na that will balance and lessen the forces, allowing us to strive within ourselves to secure ourselves within ourselves. An emotionally mature man or woman is totally secure within and prepared to tap the greater realms of spiritual being.

We make very little progress when we strive to conquer these baser instincts in a good mood. However, vast strides are possible when we are miserable and work with ourselves to replace our misery with joy and understanding. Therefore, if you are ever disappointed or discouraged, count it a blessing, for you then have the opportunity to conquer the instinctive nature and really stabilize yourself dynamically on the spiritual path.

Often we are disappointed not only with ourselves and our circumstances but with other people as well. We can oversee this and other instinctive responses, such as mental criticism or jealousy, by looking at everyone and saying to ourselves, “I like you. I send you blessings.” We cannot be discouraged or disappointed or jealous when we look our fellow man in the eye and say and simultaneously feel and believe through every atom of our being, “I like you. I send you blessings.” Impossible! Love overcomes all instinctive barriers between people.

There may be certain people or a certain person to whom you can say, “I like you,” but for whom this is hard to believe in your heart. If you look deeper into them, you may find they are emotionally immature, a twelve-year-old emotional body walking around in a thirty-five-year-old physical body. Are you going to dislike a person for that? No, of course not. You are going to understand him or her. I’ve seen people with twenty-two-year-old bodies with the wisdom of an eighty-year old and the emotional stability of a forty-year old. I’ve seen people walking around in a sixty-year-old body with a twelve-year-old emotional body. By learning to understand, we cease to be a personality leaning upon our fellow man and falling into disappointment when he lets us down. No, we must lean on no one but ourselves, our own spine, and not be the reactionary victims of the ups and downs of the world around us or the people around us. Then we will gain our freedom from the instinctive forces we were born into and attain sufficient emotional maturity to love and bless the world, no matter what our circumstances may be.