The Library
It is not merely an intellectual exercise. All the piety and reverence and worship gained from religion are needed here too. We must pray constantly to the Soul to reveal itself.
4.4.4.5Listen When thinking has done its best work, reached its loftiest point, it should relax and cease its activity. If all else has prepared the way, the mind will be ready to enter the silence, to accept a take-over by the Overself.
4.4.4.6Listen This habit of persistent daily reflection on the great verities, of thinking about the nature or attributes of the Overself, is a very rewarding one. From being mere intellectual ideas, they begin to take on warmth, life, and power.
4.4.4.17Listen The Overself takes his thoughts about it, limited and remote though they are, and guides them closer and closer to its own high level. Such illumined thinking is not the same as ordinary thinking. Its qualitative height and mystical depth are immensely superior. But when his thoughts can go no farther, the Overself's Grace touches and silences them. In that moment he knows.
4.4.4.18Listen The books which live are those written out of this deep union with the true self by men who had overcome the false self. One such book is worth a thousand written out of the intellect alone or the false ego alone. It will do more good to more people for more years. The student may use such a work, therefore, as a basis for a meditation exercise. Its statements, its ideas, should be taken one by one, put into focus for his mind to work on.
4.4.4.19Listen The thought of the Overself may easily open the gate which enters into its awareness.
4.4.4.28Listen Thoughts may be a hindrance to meditation merely by their presence or, if of the proper kind, a help to it. And the only proper kind is that which leads them to look toward the consciousness which transcends them.
4.4.4.31Listen ... You will begin by asking yourself ”Who am I?” and, when you comprehend that the lower nature cannot be the real you, go on to asking the further question: ”What am I?” By such frequent self-studies and self-discriminations, you will come closer and closer to the truth.
4.4.4.36,Listen … What am I? is a simple question with a complex answer. In this exercise you will repeatedly think of what you really are as distinct from what you seem to be …
4.4.4.36,Listen In one sense all attempts to meditate on spiritual themes are attempts to awaken intuition. For they achieve success only when the activity of the thinking intellect is stilled and the consciousness enters into that deep silence wherefrom the voice of intuition itself issues forth.
4.4.4.38Listen Every time a thought rears its head, evaluate it for what it is and then push it aside. Every time an emotion rushes up, recognize it, too, for what it is and detach yourself from it. This is the path of Self-Enquiry, for as you do these things hold the will directed towards finding the centre of your being…
4.4.4.50,Listen Some imaginative minds can make profitable use of the vastness of the ocean or the immensity of space as topics on which to meditate in the advanced stages.
4.4.4.51Listen The kind of meditation in which the meditator ponders persistently what his source is, what the I really is, has the eventual effect of de-hypnotizing him from these false and limiting identifications with the body, the desires, and the intellect.
4.4.4.56Listen The more he practises at such times a thinking that is sense-free and beyond the physical — that is, metaphysical in the truest sense — the better will he be prepared to receive the intuitive influx from the Overself.
4.4.4.58Listen Concentration keeps the mind implanted on a particular thought, or line of thought, by keeping off the other ones. Meditation removes the single thought and keeps the mind quiet. This is an excellent state, but not enough for those who seek the Real. It must be complemented by knowledge of what is and is not the Real.
4.4.4.62Listen After he has entered on the Short Path, fit themes for his meditation will be those which turn him away from the personal ego. He can meditate on the glorious attributes of God, or on the essential perfection of the cosmos, or on the utter serenity of his Overself, for instance.
4.4.4.65Listen The more we use our thoughts to get the deep understanding of ourselves, of God, and the world, and the more we still the thoughts to get them out of the way when the divine is ready to speak to us, the more successful will our search become, and the more will we awaken from the dream of an unreal materiality.
4.4.4.67Listen When he is so sunk in abstraction that he does not notice even the presence of another person, his meditation has gone as deep as it ought to.
4.4.4.85Listen We need to meditate more often on these reminding statements of the sages, to become more concerned with our higher interests.
4.4.4.99Listen Meditation is not achieved if the concentrated mind is directed toward a subject of personal and worldly nature. Reflecting on the subject will give a deeper knowledge of it and a fuller perception of its meaning, but it will not give anything more. However concentrated the mind may become, it will not escape from the ego, nor does it seek to do so. Meditation is achieved if the concentrated mind is used to reflect on the Overself or the way to it.
4.4.4.102Listen He should from time to time pass in analytic review the important events, the experiences, and the attitudes of his past. It is not the good but the evil emotions and deeds, their origins and consequences, that he should particularly attend to, mentally picture, and examine from the perspective of his higher self. But unless this is done with perfect honesty in an impersonal unconcerned detached and self-critical spirit, unless it is approached with a self-imposed austerity of emotion, it will not yield the desired results. It is not enough to mourn over his errors. He should carefully learn whatever lessons they teach.
4.4.4.109Listen He should develop the sense of self-criticism to a high and even painful degree. He cannot any longer afford to protect his ego, as he did in the past, or to seek excuses for its sorry frailties and foolishnesses.
4.4.4.121Listen He will need to develop the ability to stand back periodically from the personal self and survey its life, fortunes, character, and doings quite impartially. During this exercise, he should adopt the attitude of a disinterested spectator seeking to know the truth about it. Hence, he should study it calmly and not take sides with it emotionally.
4.4.4.123Listen It may be easy to get the worldly, the practical message of particular experiences, but it is not so easy to get the higher, the spiritual message they contain. This is because we habitually look at them from the ego's standpoint, especially when personal feelings are strongly involved…
4.4.4.131,Listen To observe himself correctly, a man must do so impartially, coolly, dispassionately, and not leniently, conceitedly, excitedly. He must also do it justly, with the whole of his being…
4.4.4.135,Listen To unwrap his inner self of thoughts, emotions, desires, motives, and passions; to decide what is worth keeping and what needs cutting out in it, this is his first task.
4.4.4.142Listen ... The improvement of character and the elevation of moral condition are the foundation of all spiritual work.
4.4.4.143,Listen He notes his characteristics as if they were outside him, belonging to another man and not inside him. He studies his weaknesses to understand them thoroughly. They do not dismay him for he also recognizes his strengths.
4.4.4.146Listen The hour for retirement at night should also be the hour for recalling the day's happenings, deeds, and talks in memory, at the same time making an appraisal of their character from the higher point of view. But when the exercise has come to an end, the aspirant should deliberately turn his mind utterly away from all worldly experience, all personal matters, and let the hushed silence of pure devotional worship fall upon him.
4.4.4.150Listen He should try to put himself into the future and look back on this present period.
4.4.4.158Listen He must search himself for the real motives behind his conduct, which are not always the same as those he announces to other persons or even to himself.
4.4.4.166Listen Philosophy does not encourage a morbid dwelling over past sins, lost opportunities, or errors committed. That merely wastes time and saps power. The analysis finished, the lesson learned, the amendment made, what is left over must be left behind. Why burden memory and darken conscience with the irreparable if no good can be done by it?
4.4.4.176Listen He has to stand aside from himself and observe the chief events of his life with philosophic detachment. Some of them may fill him with emotions of regret or shame, others with pride and satisfaction, but all should be considered with the least possible egoism and the greatest possible impartiality. In this way experience is converted into wisdom and faults are extracted from character.
4.4.4.189Listen The labour on himself does not mean a moral labour only: although that will be included, it is only preparatory. It means also, and much more, giving attention to his attention, noting where his thoughts are going, training them to come back into himself and thus, at the end, to come to rest at their source--undisturbed Consciousness.
4.4.4.206Listen He who develops along these lines through the creative power of meditation, will eventually find that his instinct will spontaneously reject the promptings of his lower self and immediately accept the intuitions of his higher self.
4.4.4.210Listen Meditation should be begun with a short, silent prayer to the Overself, humbly beseeching guidance and Grace…
4.4.4.219,Listen He should be prepared to devote years to intense efforts in self-examination and self-improvement. This is the foundation for the later work. Once the character has been ennobled, the way to receiving guidance and Grace will be unobstructed.
4.4.4.219Listen Creative Meditation Exercise: He may think of probable meetings during the next day, if he is practising at night, or of the coming day if at morn, of events that are likely to happen then, and of places where he may have to go. Alongside of that he may imagine how he ought to conduct himself, how to think and talk under those circumstances. And always, if the exercise is to prove its worth, he should take the standpoint of his better, nobler, wiser self, of the Overself.
4.4.4.229Listen Right reflection about past experiences, together with determination to take himself in hand, will lead the student to a more worthwhile future and smooth the path ahead.
4.4.4.241Listen The value of taking this kind of a backward look at the day just finished is far more than it seems. For everything in him will benefit—his character, his destiny, and even his after-death experience.
4.4.4.243Listen
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