Towards Spiritual Graduations

Tags

awareness, celebration, graduation, spirituality

As life-defining events go, “graduation” is often considered to be one of the primary ones. For some, it can be a time to celebrate the milestone that has been accomplished, a time to reflect on the journey that has brought one this far, a time to express gratitude to all those who may have helped us along the way, and a time to look ahead to the next milestone. For others, graduation can be a portal, a doorway, an opportunity to begin anew, a new journey and a new phase of life.

My personal journey of formal education gave me many opportunities to graduate, and even though I did not attend any of the ceremonies until the one for my final degree award, they all were significant milestones. Each graduation opened the door to a new learning environment, new teachers and friendships, a breath of fresh ideas, and an awareness that the world was indeed my oyster. All I had to do was accept the opening invitation.

It has been many years since my own graduations, and now, I look forward to experiencing them every year through the eyes and words of my friends’ and relatives’ children. The light in their eyes, their hope to effect change and transformation, their desire for improved equality and justice, and much more, is written large in their essays and stories and actions.

So, how may we, our generation, best serve the graduates of today? If personal example is the best way to demonstrate leadership, then perhaps we can ask — what is our next graduation milestone? What is our (spiritual) curriculum? Who are our friends, our teachers, our guides, our mentors, our confidantes on our (spiritual) journey? Are we going regularly to ‘class’ or are we ‘sleeping in’ more often than not? Are we taking initiative and ‘asking for help’ outside of class when we know we are stuck on a project or assignment? Are we aware of our fellow students’ struggles and lending a listening ear or a book or a song, or providing a gentle nudge when we discern the need?

Yes. Graduation can take on many colors and hues and in this season. Maybe our own progress towards painting our masterpiece is light enough for others to pick up their paint brushes and share with us their strokes of genius.

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join us in our weekly conversation on Twitter – Sunday, June 2 at 9amET / 630pm India, as we continue our journey. I will bring some questions, along with some tea. It is in the journey together, towards graduation, that we can unveil the answer to the grand question – “what is That, knowing which, all else can be known?” Namaste – Kumud

Looking ahead – towards the next horizon, the next graduation…

On Discovering Essence

Tags

awareness, challenges, essence, essentials

What a difference a week makes. Last Saturday, an early morning storm with a lot of rain and electrical activity, tripped the breaker on the sump pump in the basement. The battery backup pump, which I thought was working, but hadn’t tested lately, didn’t work. The result was a minor flood in the finished basement, and a day of phone calls to insurance and restoration companies. Oh well, we needed new flooring and carpeting in the basement anyway.

Later that night, I evaluated how my wife and I responded to this “life event”. In the big scheme of things, we determined that we “got off easy”. Yes, it was inconvenient that our weekend had been disrupted, but at least we were home, and managed to minimize the damage (the main pump kicked right back on after I reset the switch :)). Yes, we needed to reevaluate our emergency systems in the basement and the home in general. And the greatest revelation from the evaluation?

We got a new perspective on what is truly essential, on what it is that defines our essence. There is a lot of ‘old stuff’ in our basement that has been with us through two moves over fifteen years. How much of it is essential to our lives? And, as I delved a bit deeper over the past week, I asked myself some more questions.

What is it that defines my essence? How do I know what is truly essential to me in a physical, mental, emotional and spiritual level? Some of the answers have been filtering through me, and my exploration with the question(s) continues.

On Earth Day (two days after ‘the event’), I went walking my favorite trails. I often find that I have to make a conscious choice to accept the invitation to walk. The call is often so strong that the car seems to self-drive itself to the park on the way to work. So, I deem that walking the forest is essential to me. I have found that there is prose and poetry that flows through me as son as I step onto the trails. Here’s a sample:

Find your trail and walk

She will welcome you with open arms

From the tiniest of flowers hugging crocuses

To the tallest of trees holding birdsong

Her gifts will shower down upon you

Amid the remembrance – that her greatest gift is birth…

So, one way to connect with our essence may be through those actions that bring us face to face with unmitigated peace and joy. The world around us recedes like the floodwaters after the storm, and we can feel the essence of the tiniest of flowers, the freshness of new greenery emerging, the calming presence of tall trees gently swaying in the breeze, the river gurgling by past the boulders in the valley where it has been flowing for millennia.

What is the essence of our mental state? Is it our intellect? Is it intelligence and our power of discernment? We all have thoughts that swirl like eddies, or the thoughts are stirred by fresh emotions that cause highs and lows? The temporary nature of their existence surely means that they cannot be essential, right?

Awareness of our mental and emotional essence can be unfolded for us in physical stillness. Being still is not easy for many of us. Stillness is an essential that often needs to be cultivated. That which makes us still gives us the opportunity to connect to higher awareness – we can become observers of our mental and emotional states. As observers, we can then find our essential That by saying – it is not this, it is not this.

Allow me to posit that once we have found the trail to our physical, mental and emotional essences, and know how to (re)connect with them, our heart is ready to receive the spiritual essence. The invitation to receive then comes through clearly. We then awaken every morning, ready to receive the essence with joy, peace, silence and stillness, as we watch the source of light reveal itself to us in our heart filled with love.

We arrive at the awareness that the same spiritual essence energizes all of us, gives us life, and yes, a return to a dry basement…

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join us Sunday, April 28 at 9amET as we resume our weekly twitter chat in #SpiritChat ~ I will bring the essential tea and cookies. I invite you to bring your favorite flavor of essence. Namaste – Kumud

Spiritual Hospitality by @llake

Tags

awareness, hospitality, spiritual practice, spirituality

 It’s 9:00 am. The toddlers are fed and playing quietly. The entire house is spotless. I look around and feel very accomplished. Time for a shower! Dinner guests are coming tonight. I want the evening to be extra special. My plan is perfect, and I’m on schedule. 

I skoosh down to talk to my kids to let them know I’m going in the shower and I’ll be out in 5 mins. (moms and dads have this down to a science) I ask them to please play quietly, and we’ll have snack time when I get out. 

I head into the shower feeling excited and confident that tonight will be epic! I get out of the shower. Dry off. Dress. And then the surprise hits. 

I look into the dining room, and indeed all three wee ones are playing quietly and happily. My son had gotten out his matchbox cars, bull dozers, and backhoes, and all three (under the age of 5) were playing in the dirt from around my large elephant tree. They had spread the dirt from one side of the hardwood floored room to the other. Inside I was extremely upset. I quietly (this is how my kids always knew I was really mad) told the elder two to go to their rooms. I didn’t want to see them. We would talk “later.” The littlest one I picked up and put in her highchair. I told her I didn’t want to hear one word. Not one. 

I wanted to cry. How in the world would I get this room clean again? I still had dinner to make. And how would I ever have time to get those kids cleaned up? 

Most of us have been in a relatable situation. We extend aninvitation. It feels right. Then when the day gets closer, we wonder “what was I thinking?” My house is dirty! What will I make for dinner? We begin to feel unaccomplished and “not enough.” Where is the joy?

Isn’t there supposed to be joy in offering hospitality? Isn’t hospitality supposed to be about serving others? Sharing what we have that others may also feel joy? 

In the moment of seeing dirt spread across the room, I was not feeling joyful. But wait. 

“Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling.” 1 Peter 4:9 (NIV)

I remembered the looks on my babies’ faces as they looked up at me gleefully and showed me what they had done. After all, I had asked them to play quietly. The road configuration they had created was a masterpiece! 

My heart softened.

Hospitality is mentioned numerous times in the Bible. Every religion or spiritual guidance mentions hospitality and ways of ceremoniously expressing our joy by sharing with others. Why? What do we miss about being hospitable when we become obsessed with the “Pinterest” version of sharing what we have instead of the spirituality behind being hospitable? 

The truth is we don’t have to be in a specific location or have specific food – although, both add to the moment and it’s a nice gesture. The menu does not have to be spectacular. Our homes do not have to be the “Better Homes and Gardens” version of shiny and spectacular.

The spirituality of hospitality – the true meaning of hospitality – is when we put our guest first and be present with them. We focus on them. We love on them. We cause them to feel joyful in knowing they are appreciated and are special. They relax. Their pressures melt away. Love in action.  

– Lillian

Lillian is a Maine-based writer and compassion consultantwhose topics explore everything related to food, human trafficking, and caregiving. She is patiently honing three writing projects – a “love of home” cookbook, a collection of interviews with caregivers of all ages, and inspirational cards for children. In the summer of 2018, she swam a total of 2 miles to rescue a 70 yr old kayaker and push him and his kayak back to shore.

Editors Note: I am excited and honored to invite you to join Lillian Lake (@llake) as she hosts our weekly #SpiritChat on Twitter, Sunday March 3rd at 9amET / 730pm India. Please do join, and enjoy her wonderful heart-filled hospitality. Come. Sit. Stay. Namaste – Kumud

Common Ground Spirituality

Tags

action, awareness, healing, relationships, spirituality

Common ground, like common sense, is becoming increasingly difficult to find. It isn’t that common ground doesn’t exist any more – it is perhaps that it has become buried under the layers of our increasingly fragmented lives – like the bulbs we planted in autumn, biding their time waiting to spring from underneath the layers of snow and frozen earth.

When we may think we have reached the end of the line, and that we have nothing more left in common, perhaps we can dig a little wider. We can step back, take a walk, or even sit in morning meditation and ask – what is it that we may have ignored or overlooked? And the answers may surprise us…

Commonality of backgrounds (immigrants from different continents), forgotten common interests, overlap in family values, shared beliefs (in goodness and kindness), common celebratory practices (food!) – even agreement in things we disagree about, things that annoy us, our shared dislikes, and much more….

Such was the invitation this week… to (re)discover, uncover common ground. To (re)search for it and renew it yet again. And the more I stepped back and looked with fresh eyes of the heart’s light, the more I found it in my close and distant relationships, even some faded and forgotten friendships, and particularly among the few that are especially close to me.

I discovered that it is perhaps in retraversing that common ground that the heart can find new paths, and find reasons to do some (not so) random acts of kindness. It is beneath frozen lakes and lagoons that the lighted waters flow again from the spring thaw in the heart. It is tending to common ground that enables us to repair the bridges that have grown algae because they haven’t been tenderly paused on, gently walked on, lovingly talked to and softly sung to for so long…

But why would we bother to do the work to find common ground in the first place? To assuage our guilt? Or to save, heal, being back to thriving, that which is worth keeping? And why is it worth healing? Because we have invested so much in it and come so far? Or whether we still see the potential for future growth, success and expansion – the spark that can kindle a thousand more micro explosions of joy when given the proper conditions of pressure, temperature, timing and ideal mix of fuel and air in the combustion chamber that is called common ground?

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join us in our weekly twitter chat, Sunday Feb 24 at 9amET / 730pm India – walk and share some common ground (over tea and cookies) with us. Namaste – Kumud.

Visiting some ‘common ground’ bridges and pathways… as spring broke through briefly (Friday, Feb 22 2019)

On Breathing Light

Tags

awareness, breathing, celebration, healing, light, remembrance

The journey began Monday evening, when the iPad which had gone dark over the past few weeks, and refused to start up inspite of my best attempts of geekery, decided to come to life. I went searching in the library app for something good to read, and an incredible journey into breath began when I downloaded, and read, that same evening, from cover to cover – WBBA – but more about that a bit later….

Breath has come into the forefront for me this week. There is a story in the Upanishads where the student asks the teacher – who among sight, speech, hearing, touch and breath, is the most powerful in life? The teacher says – ask each of them to leave, one at a time, and you shall know. When it comes the turn of breath to leave, the student’s question is answered…

I have been led to work with, observe it, and develop a greater awareness of the physical act of breathing this week. When the emotions rise, when I feel the stress level change, I have tried to pause and check my breathing pattern and cadence. The interesting thing about breath is that it is easy to observe, because it is always with us, even when it is temporarily is taken away. My observations have been quite a revelation. It is no surprise that I have discerned a direct correlation between feeling stressed and the disturbance in my breathing pattern.

So, how do I plan to use this breath awareness? I believe that, with practice, one could modulate, if not to some degree even consciously control, the autonomous breath and the nervous system connected to it. When our new breathing practice becomes habit, we shall find an emergence of new patterns, new pathways, new possibilities.

For when breath remains, all is possible in the field of possibilities, and then some… is it not?

What began on Monday evening, came to a head this morning. I share with you, my entry from my meditation journal:

There was a such a surge… a wave as high as me… in the final ten minutes… that it literally seemed to push me sideways… the intensity and breadth of the light was such as if it became like the air around me and that I was breathing it with every breath… it held no force, it’s nature was gentleness and pure being, and I was awash in its wholeness… it felt that the white light was energizing every single alveoli in the lungs… cleaning, cleansing, oxygenating, healing, liberating, and filling me with the life force that travels between every channel of the many layers of my being… it felt like the same way that I might have felt in my first awareness of being born into this physical world… the aggregated energy of all the prayers she might have said from the instant that the was aware of me, until her last… and with that breath of first new light, I felt such immense gratitude for the experience that I was led to celebrate the breath of light and life with you… and I hope… no, it’s more than hope… it is a knowing that every breath you breathe is also filled with light… and that you are enough light in this moment, and you will be enough in the next moment… and when the breath stops and leaves, the aggregate of the light you breathed and shared would also have been enough…

for when we add or subtract the infinite from the infinite, the infinite breath of love and light still remains… and that, breath, in life and what we call death, is worthy of celebration… so, let that celebration of love continue… even when breath becomes air….

Thank you. For awareness. For breath and light. For breathing light into me.

– Kumud

P. S. Join us Sunday, Feb 17 at 9am ET / 730 pm IST as we celebrate, breath, light and breathing light. Namaste – Kumud

Breathing light during one of my walks…

The one who took eternal breath, Feb 17 2016…

Why Spirituality – I Wonder

Tags

awakening, awareness, happiness, joy, spirituality, wonder

For those of us who have been in and around the weekly conversations with the #spiritchat community on topics related to spirituality and spiritual practice, the answer to “why spirituality” may be plain as daylight. Many of us may even think the question to be irrelevant, or take the answer for granted.

Yet, I have been wondering about this question over the past few days, with a sense of wonder, with a sense and spirit of inquisitive, curious, scientific examination.

So, let me share my sense of wonder with you, and ask the short question – “why spirituality”? What is it about your ‘spiritual practice(s)’ that sets them apart from the rest of your daily life? How do you integrate the results and outcomes of your spirituality into solving the challenges of life and living? Has your approach to ‘spirituality’ changed as your life situation(s) have changed? If yes, how so?

I have often found that the answer to the question, particularly the question that is borne of wonder instead of being borne out of doubt, is already present in our awareness. Over the past few weeks, in preparation for spring, I have been doing some ‘house cleaning’ of my books, media, music and notebooks. During one such episode this week, I came across a few books that were given to be by my mother over my past few visits to India.

As I was sorting through them, one of the ‘bookmarks’ that I came across was a trifold brochure called ‘why spirituality’! The brochure, published in 2011, contains a few quotes from the then leader (Chariji) of the ‘Sahaj Marg’ foundation (http://sahajmarg.org). It contained not one, but a few answers to my sense of wonder. Let me share some of them with you in the quotes below – maybe one or more of them will resonate with you.

“Spirituality is the need for an inner existence. The whole idea of spirituality is to revive in us that which is sleeping in us – the true inner being, the Self”

Why Spirituality? It is a path to an awakening within. It is a yearning for something more than the routine of daily, worldly life. In spirituality, life becomes a wondrous journey to uncover that inner Self. Wonder leads to a wondrous journey. Yes!

“As a bird needs two wings to fly, a human being needs the two wings of existence, the spiritual and the material, to lead a natural and harmonious life”

Why Spirituality? For harmony, for the restoration of balance. Balance is restored by integrating a spiritual practice into daily life. A practice that blends into our daily living like sugar dissolves into tea.

“Happiness is the natural inner condition that we will reach when we have removed all unnecessary things”

Why Spirituality? Spiritual practice leads us to find true happiness and love. Joy is the quality of the inner Self, and is nurtured in spirituality, along with other qualities of the heart – courage, hope, faith, wonder, compassion, tolerance and, most of all, universal love. By following a spiritual practice, we have the possibility to experience universal love, the divine essence, within our own heart.

The brochure holds more wondrous messages. I shared the thoughts above with you, so that perhaps, you too shall wonder with a sense of inquiry – why spirituality? What is this spiritual path that I walk in my practice? How does my spirituality grow my heart and its inherent qualities, and the sense of joy and love within it?

Let the wondering begin. Let us share our wonder, our heart, and our joy and universal love with each other. And I will keep cleaning, exploring, practicing, uncovering more wonder. Namaste.

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join the #spiritchat community in our weekly twitter conversation – Sunday, Feb 10 at 9amET / 730pm India. Bring your sense of wonder with you, as we share the answers to ‘why spirituality’, over a cup of tea. Thank you!

After the storm, a double rainbow outside my door…

Holistic Awareness by Janet Nestor

Tags

awareness, health, holistic, spirituality

Holistic Awareness is a choice and a way of life. It is present moment living that allows connection and awareness of our body, mind, emotions, our energy field and flow, our spirit, and our environment. Holistic Awareness is a way to feel vital and alive – to feel free and limitless – to find contentment.

Holistic awareness is not a mental activity, yet we have a better perception. There is a greater awareness and ability to use the information provided through our sense of touch, smell, sight, sound, and taste. Holistic awareness allows us to “talk” with our body and sense into our environment. It enriches our self-knowledge, self-understanding and allows interaction with our inner nature and the nature of creation.

Awareness and Childhood

As children, most of us need not be taught how to stay in touch with our own inner nature.
We are born connected to ourselves and the divine. We have present moment holistic awareness and instinctively know when we are hungry, sleepy, when our diaper needs changing, and when we are uncomfortable in our environment. We sense who loves us and we develop a connection with them that includes trust. But our culture expects us to learn certain things and most of them lead us away from our most precious gifts.

As we grow older, we are urged to wait a minute or deny our needs. We are asked to repress our hunger until a certain time, to sit still when we need to move, or eat when we are not hungry or sleep when we are not tired. Some of us have been urged to accept someone (caregiver or family member) who frightens us. Because our instincts are not honored on a regular basis, we learn not to trust them. Gradually we learn to live in our heads and from our thoughts.

Our Return to Awareness

A growing holistic awareness is essential to our well-being, and it is the key to our personal growth and our physical and emotional healing. It is how we learn to connect to our own divinity and the universal wisdom that makes everything possible. As adults, we have to overcome our lifelong conditioning and learn to trust the messages that constantly come from our body and environment. We even have to learn to trust our own divine nature.

The moment our holistic journey begins, we change the way we perceive ourselves and the way we perceive life and the world. As our awareness blossoms we slowly (or suddenly in an ah-ha moment) notice the hidden parts of our inner being and the realities of mother nature and our communities. The journey provides opportunities for us to know and understand our beliefs, our emotions, our memories (good and bad), and ask the most fundamental question: Why am I here now, with this family, with this job, with these life issues, with this body I’m not totally satisfied with, and with the health issues that plague my life or the life of someone I love.

Practical Ways of Choosing Awareness

Many of us choose holistic awareness and want to begin a spiritual journey, but we don’t know how. But we can seek answers and join groups like #SpiritChat. Here are four suggestions that might enrich your journey.

1. Become aware that you are becoming aware; learn to be a witness of your own actions and thoughts. Self evaluate without judgment or criticism. Allow your perception to expand.
2. Accept your life as it is now. Acceptance is the beginning of all change.
3. Realize that you are limitless and free and that you have choices and the ability to positively change your life.
4. Allow your mind to become peaceful, quiet, still, and unencumbered through meditation, spending time in nature, or sitting in silent contemplation. The result will be a reality-based communication and an increased sense of being part of the world around you.

-Janet

Author’s Note: This post is adapted from Revolutionize Your Health, a new book I co-authored with Cornelia Merk. The book is a seven-year collaboration that is filled with lots of researched information, deep soul searching, and personal stories from ourselves and others. It is interesting to know that Connie and I have never met in person. Social Media and fate brought us together in 2012. On that first phone call we were so synergistic that we agreed to merge our previous writing into what we thought would be an eBook. That eBook turned into chapters, we hired an editor, and a new book was born. Our book launches on January 22, 2019.

Editor’s Note: Please join me as I host our long-time friend, supporter, participant and advisor to the #SpiritChat community, Janet Nestor (@JanetNestor). We will gather on Sunday, December 16 at 9amET / 730pm India on twitter. Thank you – Kumud @AjmaniK

Janet Nestor of Revolutionize Your Health

On Awareness and Flow

Tags

awareness, flow, guide, guru

A Nature Walk with ‘Sheila’

There are those who are the salt of the Earth. They may not look outwardly prosperous or ‘wealthy’, but their wealth lies in their empathy, compassion, resilience, and sense of awareness. You feel the flow of their life-force when you are around them, and in their presence, some droplets from the stream of their innerspring of spirit get sprinkled onto you! 

Our guide for the nature walk at the resort today was “Sheila”. Of ‘Native American’ descent, we found out very quickly that this was not just an ordinary ‘walk’ for her. She gave us a bit of the history of the area, and patiently educated us about almost every tree, shrub and flower that we walked by. Her eyes would light up, her step would quicken, her voice would rise in pride when we came across native species – palms, palmettos, spiders, butterflies, alligators, and more. 

The highlight of the walk – as she told me after it was over – was the ‘calling of the owls’. It was the first time that she had been able to attract not one or two, but four or five owls with her calling. As she explained it, the call went something like “who. who. who cooks for you.” To watch a ‘barred owl’ in full flight is a thing of beauty. To hear Sheila interact and engage with them with her voice was like having premium seating at nature’s orchestra performance with a master conductor. 

There were conversations about bullfrogs, cicadas, all kinds of water fowl, swans, snakes, armadillos, wolves, deer, bobcats, and of course, alligators. There were woodpecker and finch sightings, the Florida ‘state butterfly’ (zebra longwing, horizontal black and yellow stripes), and even a monarch butterfly or two. 

Yes, she was knowledgeable about her environment, about the land, the plants, and the animals. More than that, What transpired in those two plus hours of ‘walking’ with this wonderfully graceful, grey-haired, ‘salt of the earth’ spirit-guide of a human-being was the realization that I was walking with a deeply caring individual whose entire mind, body, spirit and soul lives in awareness and flow. It brought the realization to me that our guides, our gurus, our mentors, are available to us at many of life’s turns – though we may to make a bit of an effort and walk into their presence with an open heart.

No, not an effort to actively go ‘seek’ them, but to make ourselves available to be led “off the beaten pathways” of our everyday lives into unfamiliar territory. And sometimes, that ‘effort’ may mean that we may have to awaken at 6:30am on a “vacation day” – to go discover our spirit-guide, to bring ourselves into their field of awareness, and discover our flow in That serendipity. 

Namaste,

Kumud

P.S. Join us in our weekly twitter chat, with hashtag #SpiritChat ~ Sunday August 2nd at 9amET/1pmUTC. We will discuss “Awareness and Flow”. If you have some favorite ‘flow’ experiences, particularly those that came about as a result of serendipity, please do share. Thank you, and Namaste 🙂

On Awareness and Action

Tags

action, awareness, spiritchat, spirituality

I have been traveling for the past three weeks – to and from India, and extensively within India. It was a trip that turned into a long-in-the-coming family reunion, visits with old friends, making of new friends, and discovering some new places, thoughts and ideas. It was also a trip which helped me to see some ‘familiar’ places with new eyes, tear down some long-held misconceptions, and renew some of my beliefs and values.

For that is what travel does for us. It heightens our awareness of our surroundings. It may also brings us face to face with situations which implore us to make mental and emotional decisions in a heightened sense of inner awareness. And when travel places us in environments where the energy of love runs excitedly towards us like a river approaching the ocean, it raises the level of our spiritual energy. Our actions flow from an integrated, heightened awareness.

We need not physically travel to distant lands to reap the benefits of a raised awareness. To quote Wikipedia,

Awareness is the state or ability to perceive, to feel, or to be conscious of events, objects, thoughts, emotions, or sensory patterns.

The above definition of awareness holds a lot of promise and potential, for it invokes the actions of perception, of feeling, and of simply being conscious. The objects of these actions are varied, and include events, thoughts, emotions and more. Hence, if we permute the actions with their objects, our interactions with awareness holds forth a lot of possibilities!

So, what are the challenges that our everyday life presents to us, that may block our interactions with awareness, prevent us from performing awareness based actions? We often hear or read about the related term, self-awareness, and are encouraged to raise our levels of the same. We may even be intuitively or experientially aware, that the seeds of actions planted by us in self-awareness, produce the best fruit. Despite this better knowledge, we often find ourselves reacting to the push and pull of emotions, don’t we?

The new calendar year tends to propel many of us with renewed energy to achieve our goals and dreams. It fuels us with the determination to act on our well-made plans, and our daily action steps. Let us take a few moments to pause and reflect. Are we deeply aware of the actions that we are about to take and the results to follow? How will these actions affect our own inner health? The health of our near and dear partners? The health of those who will feel the ripple-effects of our actions over the course of time?

As I was planning this latest trip to India, I had made a commitment to my daughter that we would go see the Taj Mahal. She had never seen it, and I hadn’t seen it in twenty years. So, I was determined to make this visit within a visit happen. In this awareness, I made it abundantly clear to those in the know, that a day-trip to the Taj Mahal was non-negotiable. My actions, based in awareness, fed by past experience, created magic. I share this magic with you. Enjoy! 🙂

Kumud

P.S. I invite you to join me as I resume hosting duties on Jan 4th 2015 at 9am ET in our weekly twitter chat. The topic will be – Awareness and Action. Namaste, and have a wonderful 2015!

On Memory, Ego and Awareness

Tags

awareness, ego, memory

The #SpiritChat conversations over the past two Sundays – Inner Workings of the Mind and Inner Conditioning and Habits – have generated a lot of diverse insights into the mind, its workings, its effect on our inner conditioning, and how ingrained patterns lead to formation of habits. One of the aspects that we haven’t talked about much, is the role of memory, its connection to ego, and its effect on our external and internal awareness.

So, what is memory? One definition is that it is the faculty by which the mind stores and remembers information. We are perhaps born with this faculty, this ability, this skill – some may loosely refer to it as the brain – and as we grow, and our physical brain grows, our ability to gather, store and then remember or retrieve information, also grows. For most people, this faculty (of memory), reaches its peak at a certain age, after which, the process of aging can cause a drop-off of this skill. We may start losing our ability to gather information, to store it, or to retrieve it – or it could be any combination of those three abilities. While a discussion about how these three aspects of memory can affect us is beyond the scope of this conversation, suffice it to say, that a good, well-functioning memory is considered to be a significant quality of life skill, by most people.

Another definition of Memory may be in the context of something remembered from the past, a recollection. It is this ability, of us to remember, that is crucial for us to develop our discriminative side – the ability to know, and remember, and recall, that touching a hot pan with our fingers leads to pain. The ability to experience, and remember, and recall, that eating vanilla ice-cream with hot chocolate fudge sprinkled with nuts leads to (some degree) of pleasure! So, the accumulated sensations of pain and pleasure, as stored in our memory, shape and influence our mind by creating ingrained patterns (inner conditioning, habits). When faced with an action choice, the mind may ask memory – is this action likely to produce pain or pleasure? Our choice is likely to be based upon an avoidance of pain…

So, how do we break out of ingrained patterns that no longer serve us well? It is hard to break out of them because the memory and the ego are in collusion. Our accumulated memories of pleasure-producing actions are continuously feeding our ego with fear, encouraging the ego to avoid new actions – for there is no record in our memory of what results those new actions will bring. Once the memory bank has had a sufficient deposit of actions/results which had produced ‘pain’ in the past, the mind starts becoming conditioned – and responds with fear, when faced with the mere possibility of a new action. The ego’s response is based on what our memory informs our mind, even before the intellect (our higher intelligence) has a chance to intervene and give its opinion. The biggest casualty of this cycle of conditioning? Self-Awareness.

How do we break out of this pleasure-pain duality that exerts control over our mind through the memory faculty? Which memory vaults need to be ‘cleaned out’ in our lives, for us to improve our mental health, and hence our spiritual health? What is the risk in taking actions which are not influenced by memory? What are the rewards? How do we break this collusion between our memory and our ego (that produces fear), so that we make choices in self-awareness?

If you have read this far, and have some thoughts to share with us, or would like to ‘hear’ the thoughts of the #SpiritChat community on this topic, please join us for our weekly twitter chat on twitter – Sunday, August 31st at 9amET / 2pm UK / 6:30pm India. If you would rather share your thoughts in the comments, please do so, and one of us will be sure to respond.

Namaste, and Be well.

Kumud (@AjmaniK on twitter)

Ready? Q1. #Memory ~ creates a life full of memories… What are some of your choice ones? #SpiritChat http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/506065061862191104

Q2. #Memory can serve us well. What are some instances when it has NOT served you well? #SpiritChat http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/506066875294691328

Q3. “Remembering is easy. It’s forgetting that’s hard”. Agree or disagree? Why or why not? #SpiritChat http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/506068724051619841

Q4. Any specific tools to train the faculty of #memory ~ to weed out what we don’t want any more? #SpiritChat http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/506070948106485761

Q5. Memory informs us of both pain and pleasure. How may we extract value from painful memories? Should we? #SpiritChat http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/506072782581821441

Q6. How does our having a good (or bad) #memory influence our Ego? Our actions? #SpiritChat http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/506074073596952576

Q7. There is a time to hold on, a time to let go. What role does Ego play in this decision? Does it? #SpiritChat http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/506075174496927744

Q8. How can we use the faculty of memory AND our ego – to build self-awareness? Can we? #SpiritChat http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/506076398742941696

Final Q9. This question is yours. What would you like to ask the community about #Memory? #SpiritChat http://twitter.com/AjmaniK/status/506077516894076928

Questions from participants, in response to Q9 ~ Thank you, to all who contributed questions 🙂

@denisebuchman
Q9 How do memories hold us back from forgiveness? #spiritchat https://twitter.com/denisebuchman/status/506078294782275584

@margiebonwick
A9; would you erase it if you could?? #SpiritChat https://twitter.com/margiebonwick/status/506078130008625153

@EmeliaSam
A9 Which of your memories imprison you? How does your life change if you reinterpret it? #spiritchat https://twitter.com/EmeliaSam/status/506078334145421312

@SimonSaysLife
A9.When will you let go of the memories that are holding you back? #spiritchat
https://twitter.com/SimonSaysLife/status/506078455705137152

@Naren_Raykar
A9 if given a choice to have powers to choose your memories, would you like to acquire those powers? #spiritchat
https://twitter.com/Naren_Raykar/status/506078574752063490

@SignyTheSage
A9 How can you use your painful memories to help others who are still there? #spiritchat https://twitter.com/SignyTheSage/status/506078948342898688

@GThakore
A9: Do memories help us in repairing our negativity and ego? #spiritchat https://twitter.com/GThakore/status/506080378377875458

Full Transcript for “Memory, Ego and Awareness #SpiritChat Sunday, August 31st.