Tuesday, August 25, 2009

HOW TO OVERCOME TEMPTATIONS – 8


HOW TO OVERCOME TEMPTATIONS – 8


Practical suggestion number eight:

Take care of your food. See that your food is satvic, pure, earned by honest means, without doing violence to anyone.

Practical suggestion number nine:

Take care of your breathing: breathing has a direct influence upon the mind. Let your breathing be deep and rhythmic. Some day, perhaps, I shall speak to you in detail concerning these two important factors of life, food and breathing.

Practical suggestion number ten:

Never succumb to temptation. Try to overcome it but, in spite of your best efforts, if you fail, you must not think any more about it. When a little child learns to walk, not unoften, he stumbles and falls. But immediately, the mother comes and lifts him up and asks him to walk again. When you fall, pay no attention to it, but immediately rise and move on, ever onward, forward, Godward!

Practical suggestion number eleven:

You can not overcome temptation by fighting it, in the ordinary sense of the term. The more you fight it, the more you direct your attention to it. The stream of life flows in the direction of attention. If you direct your attention to temptation, forces of life will tend to flow towards temptation, and will only strengthen it. This will increase your troubles.

To give an illustration, when the body suffers from pain, the more we think of pain, the greater it grows. But when we forget it by absorbing our attention in some other activity, such as painting, or music, pain completely vanishes,

It is the same with temptation. The less we think of it, the better for us. On the other hand, we must not thoughtlessly yield to temptation. We must be sinless. To be sinless, our lower self must be cleansed, washed, purified. The lower self must be transmuted into the Higher Self.

This leads us to practical suggestion number twelve:

Whenever we are assailed by temptation, let us turn to God. What is meant by turning to God? Turning to God means directing one’s attention to a Power, Intelligence, Wisdom, Love greater by far than my own. Turning to God means directing one’s attention to a Being who is ever above, beyond, transcendent, and yet who is also closer to us than breathing, nearer to us than the nip of our neck.

How may this turning to God be accomplished? Through the top of the head or the point a little behind and between the eyebrows. When we turn our attention to the top of the head, or to the point between the eyebrows, we rise above the physical and the psychic, and contact the spiritual, and divine forces begin to flow in and through us. The light and wisdom and power of God flow into us and help us in living the new life. Everyone who seeks to contact God will find his own way of doing so. The way I have found helpful is this. I close my eyelids and turn the eyes in their sockets upward, to a point above the apex of the head and, immediately, I feel the divine forces flowing into me, strengthening me, washing me, cleansing me, making my heart pure and clear. Or I turn the eyes in their sockets to a point a little behind and between the eyebrows, and, again, have the same experience. Try this experiment and you will find wonderful things happened to you.

Practical suggestion number thirteen:

In our language "thirteen" is "tera". And "tera" is also means "thine". Say to God: "O Lord, I am Thine, completely Thine, utterly Thine! O Lord, I come to thee, as I am. I come to Thee with all my faults and failings, weaknesses and imperfections. Thou wilt mend my broken life. Thou wilt make me new! I cannot do it by myself. I have tried to straighten my life. I have tried to renounce evil ways, I have tried hard, and failed. Now I come to Thee as I am. Lead me to the Other Shore! I hand myself over to Thee, knowing that by myself I can do nothing. I am nothing. Thou art the All. Thou alone canst deliver! Thou alone canst save! I place my trust in Thee!"

He who hands himself over to God, temptations can have no power over him.

I read concerning a man in America. He was driving his Ford car, when suddenly, something went wrong. He got out and looked at the engine, but could detect no fault. Helplessly, he stood there, when from a distance he saw another car approaching: he waved to it for help. It was a brand new Ford car. Out of it stepped a tall, friendly man who asked: "Well, what’s the trouble?"

"The engine suddenly stopped" was the reply. "And it will not start again."

The stranger made a few adjustments under the bonnet, then said: "Now start the car!"

When the motor started, its grateful owner introduced himself and asked: "What is your name, sir?"

"My name," answered the stranger, "is Henry Ford."

The man who made the Ford car knew how to make it run. God has made us and He alone knows how to run our lives. All we are required to do is to completely surrender ourselves to Him, call Him by what name we will, Krishna, Rama, Buddha, Jesus, Muhammad, Mahavira, Nanak, Zarathustra, Buha’u’alla. Call Him by what name we will, without Him we can make a complete wreck of our lives. When we surrender ourselves to Him, all goes well. When we cut ourselves off from Him, we can do nothing. Therefore, say to Him, again and again and still again: "O Lord! I come to Thee as I am. Take me to the Other Shore!"

To have the true joy of life, you must be in continuous contact with the source of joy, with God who is the Spirit of Ananda; unbroken bliss. Once you have contacted God, nothing, no one will be able to take away your joy from you. It may appear as though you are living a life of poverty and destitution, your spirits will keep soaring the skies.

There was a poor man. His clothes were soiled and torn. His feet were covered with mud. Yet there was a beautiful smile on his lips and a spring in his steps as he walked. Someone said to him: "Good Morning!"

"I have never had a bad morning" answered the poor man.

"That sounds strange" said the man to him. "I pray that you may always be so fortunate."


Quickly answered the poor man: "I have never been unfortunate."

"May you always be happy", said the man to him.

"I have never been unhappy", answered the poor man.

"I do not understand", said the man. "Will you kindly explain the paradox?"

"I have never had a bad morning," said the poor man. "For every morning, I praise the Lord. The day may be bright or dull, the weather may be pleasant or otherwise, I am still thankful to God. You wished that I might be always fortunate, but I cannot be unfortunate for I rejoice in everything that the will of God brings to me. I believe that whatever God sends me is good! You wished me happiness, but I cannot be unhappy so long as I rejoice in the will of God, and as long as his peace rules in my heart."

Yes, praise the Lord in everything that happens, and you will be amongst the happiest of men on earth. You will have the true joy of life and you will keep radiating it wherever you go!



(Concluded: Author: Sri. J.P. Vaswani)