Day by day
... When Buddha brought to an end the meditation which culminated in final enlightenment, dawn was just breaking…
15.23.8.203, ExcerptListen 1 Jun 2015When a man has reached this stage, where his will and life are surrendered and his mind and heart are aware of divine presences, he learns that it is practical wisdom not to decide his future in advance but rather to let it grow out of itself like corn out of seed.
12.18.4.288Listen 2 Jun 2015It is a good master who is ego-free enough to recognize that his work is done, and it is a faithful disciple who will accept the fact and let him go. The master knows that however helpful he himself was in the past, his presence will henceforth be a hindrance. The disciple knows that it will now be better to depend upon his own intuitive self and work out his own salvation.
16.25.5.283Listen 3 Jun 2015... The democratic abolishment of class status and exclusive groups, which will be a distinctive feature of the coming age, should also show itself in the circles of mystical and philosophic students. If they have any superiority over others, let them display it by a superiority of conduct …
13.20.1.18, ExcerptListen 4 Jun 2015The ”I” gets angry when someone provokes it, then remembers it must gain self-control, and thus forms a higher and calmer state for itself but one which is still within the personal ego-sphere. It has not escaped from itself but only replaced a negative emotion by a positive feeling.
6.8.3.40Listen 5 Jun 2015... The more we believe in the oneness of life, the less we ought to herd ourselves behind barriers. To add a new cult to the existing list is to multiply the causes of human division and thence of human strife…
13.20.1.18, ExcerptListen 6 Jun 2015A time comes in the intellectual growth of a man when he knows that he must put aside the trivialities of life and come to terms with the demands made upon him by his higher nature.
2.1.1.175Listen 7 Jun 2015Self-surrender does not mean surrender to someone else's ego, but rather to the Overself. Merely giving up one's own will to perform the will of somebody else is personal weakness and not spiritual strength…
12.18.4.57, ExcerptListen 8 Jun 2015What am I? is such an ancient and perennial question only because it has to be answered by each individual for himself. If he finds the true answer, he will find also that he cannot really transfer it to another person but only its idea, its mental shadow. That too may be valuable to others, but it is not the same.
2.1.3.1Listen 9 Jun 2015When he has achieved the capacity or gotten the Grace of sitting in the unbroken stillness of a perfect contemplation, he will feel a loving sweetness indescribable by human words and unmatched by human joys.
15.25.4.151Listen 10 Jun 2015The feeling of a sacred presence during meditation is important in every way. It provides a channel whereby Grace can be given, ideas communicated, and character uplifted.
4.4.1.348Listen 11 Jun 2015It is a fact that in such a man these three passions--anger, lust, and hatred--are stilled forever. There is no temptation which can now have any power over him, no fear which can overcome him, no frustration which can depress him.
16.25.3.237Listen 12 Jun 2015That a truth which is so clear to their own minds could be so obscure to other minds, is easily explicable by the grading processes of reincarnation. Each man's present state and views are the outcome of his past experiences in past lives.
6.9.2.67Listen 13 Jun 2015Just by being himself, without preaching, without trying, the sage may awaken in others whose lives touch his a longing for the higher life.
16.25.4.255Listen 14 Jun 2015The fact of Grace being an unpredictable descent from above does not mean that we are entirely helpless in the matter, that there is nothing we can do about it. We can at least prepare ourselves both to attract Grace and to respond aright when it does come. We can cleanse our hearts, train our minds, discipline our bodies, and foster altruistic service even now. And then every cry we send out to invoke grace will be supported and emphasized by these preparations.
12.18.5.171Listen 15 Jun 2015When activity of any kind, in work or in leisure, takes place in this atmosphere of remembrance, it becomes sacramental even though the ordinary observer may not know it.
15.23.6.243Listen 16 Jun 2015Freed at last from this ever-whirling wheel of birth and death to which he was tied by his own desire-nature, what happens to him can only be an opening up to a new better and indescribable state, and it is so. He, as he was, vanishes, not into complete annihilation and certainly not into the heaven of a perpetuated ego, but into a higher kind of life shrouded in mystery.
16.25.2.194Listen 17 Jun 2015When Grace takes the form of spiritual enlightenment, it may catch him unawares, enter his consciousness unexpectedly, and release him abruptly from the protracted tensions of the quest.
12.18.5.293Listen 18 Jun 2015Out of the continued practice of this inward detachment from his own actions and their results, there develops within him a sense of strength and mastery, a feeling of happy peace and being at ease.
15.24.3.86Listen 19 Jun 2015No other act is so urgent or so important as this, to turn now in thought and remembrance, in love and aspiration, toward the Overself. For if you do not but turn toward that other and worldly act which is so clamant and demanding, you fall into a tension which may lead to error and consequent suffering. But if you do turn toward the Overself first and then act, you rise up to inner calm and consequent wiser judgement.
9.13.2.225Listen 20 Jun 2015Another sign that you have found the right master is when you find that he is the one who inspires you to go more deeply into yourself during meditation than any other.
2.1.6.228Listen 21 Jun 2015Karma comes into play only if the karmic impression is strong enough to survive. In the case of the sage, because he treats life like a dream, because he sees through it as appearance, all his experiences are on the surface only. His deep inner mind remains untouched by them. Therefore he makes no karma from them, therefore he is able when passing out of the body at death to be finished with the round of birth and death forever.
6.9.3.569Listen 22 Jun 2015Enlightenment may come slowly or suddenly but in the second case it has the effect of sunlight bursting through the sky.
16.25.2.66Listen 23 Jun 2015The body is not to be despised with the ascetic nor neglected with the mystic. It is to be understood and rightly used. It is to be cared for as one of the instruments whose total contribution will enable us to fulfil the spiritual purpose of life on earth.
4.5.2.2Listen 24 Jun 2015However harassing a problem may seem to us, if we can give up our egoistic attitude towards it, if we can keep the lower emotions away from it, the best possible solution under the circumstances will develop of its own accord. There is veritable magic in such a change of thinking and feeling. It opens the gate to higher forces and enables them to come to our help.
9.13.2.219Listen 25 Jun 2015... Life in this world is like foam on the sea: it passes all too soon; but the moments given in adoration and obeisance to the Soul count for eternal gain…
12.18.1.5, ExcerptListen 26 Jun 2015If we concentrate attention only on the miseries and distresses which afflict us, then we have to depend on our own intellect to find a way out of them. If, however, we turn concentration in the opposite direction, that of the Overself, and deposit our troubles there, we gain a fresh source of possible help in dealing with them.
12.18.4.24Listen 27 Jun 2015... It is the greatest good fortune to attain such serenity--to be lifted above passion and hatred, prejudice and fear, greed and discontent, and yet to be able to attend effectively and capably to one's worldly duties. It is possible to reach this state. The seeker may have had glimpses of it already. Someday, sometime, if he is patient, he will enter it to stay--and the unimaginably rewarding and perfect purpose of his life, of all his lifetimes, will be fulfilled.
12.18.1.5, ExcerptListen 28 Jun 2015To turn to the Higher Power and to wait patiently for its direction or support is a good practice but it must be remembered that one can only turn to a Higher Power by turning away from the ego.
12.18.4.124Listen 29 Jun 2015When a man has practised the witness exercise for some time and to some competency, he will become repeatedly aware of a curious experience. For a few minutes at most and often only for a few moments, he will seem to have stepped outside his body and to be confronting himself, looking at his own face as though it were someone else's. Or he will seem to be standing behind his own body and seeing his face from a side angle. This is an important and significant experience.
15.23.6.91Listen 30 Jun 2015
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