Meditation Changes your Attitude

Effect Of Meditation

The word "meditation" is a misnomer. Meditation is a polymorphic in nature meant to result in to different things for different people. 
Meditation begins with sitting silently but ends in change of the person. Till some point meditation is to sit at a place and do some kriya but after some point it is all about the change it bought in you.
So what does Meditation change in anyone?
It changes your outlook or attitude towards life. The life is still the same, people you deal with are same, the change is in your attitude.
The world as they say is reflection of yourself. So meditation changes the attitude from within.
The real measure of meditation lies in the outcome of it. 
If there is no change, meditation is a temporary feel good phenomena which you enjoyed for that time. Even that is powerful enough I believe.
I believe every meditation changes a person from within, it may be slow but it does change.
So it is very important to meditate on one's self. Meditation makes you introvert.
Here is what meditation has taught me -
1. In any circumstances, see your reaction not others.
2. Be hard to yourself and soft to others (exception - Your Children who are born through you ;))
3. If you are sad, you will be alone and vice-versa. Rather when you are sad, be alone till it passes out. Do not pass on sadness or Anger.
4. The joy in giving.
5. The joy of cooking for your dear ones.
6. Acceptance of things as they are.
7. Fearlessness - Especially ability to speak truth.
8. Appreciate and it will grow. criticize and that will grow too.
9. Rise in awareness and grounding.
These changes are subtle in nature.
All in all, it makes your life easy. It is the same life but your response to life has changed and that makes it easy.
Anger, Anxiety, Fear will still remain, they won't go away. Your ability to deal with them will be better externally and their effect will be dimming internally.

Remember - "Go to the temples outside, worship the god inside."

Living or Doing?

I was having a conversation with myself about building a high networth company while bathing. Suddenly a realization came to me that in process of doing it, I am not enjoying the process of reaching that goal. I have been told so many times that journey is important and not the destination. I could relate it to "life" now.
Same morning - I told my wife that you are "waiting" for the morning "work" to get over, and she said "yes".
Above is the root cause of our stress. We try to get over with our "work". we are not living our "work". It is a duty rather then "living".
I suggested that her main purpose is "food". To make it interesting she should focus on new recipes rather then cooking same good again. It is the routine which is making her mind think it as "work" rather then enjoy it.
It is same with our way of earning money which causes the famous "monday morning blues". I think we should enjoy monday and not hate the monday. People give different reason for success, I feel the only criteria for success (in business or job) are the ones who have passion for their work not just wanting to finish the day. This is typically the reason of getting old in life.

Relating this to our family vacation, we decide a few destinations we want to cover, plan travel, hotel, food and head out. I now realize that I reached the destination after few or more hours of travel but I never "lived" those moments of "travel". I waited to reach the destination. There were cards to play, stuff to eat and so on but my mind was on the destination and not the journey. I think everyone can relate to above.
This also makes me realize the difference in thinking from the heart and head. Head says reach the goal, heart says live the way to the goal ;)

So are you living the present moment?

Note - All of the above is philosophy, theory which has no meaning unless it becomes part of life.

The notion of freedom

We were on a trip to raigad. This is probably 3 years back. We had a stop over and the entire group was having vada pav. I don't eat potatoes and green chillies. Now having known me for so many years, one of them asked me "tereko mann nahee hota khane ka". I said "No".
After so many years, I realized that the incidence in some way is connected to "notion of freedom". Freedom does not mean freedom to do anything and everything. If it was, militants and not monks would be more free ;)
Freedom means ability to choose. For e.g. We all love pani puri (i mean 95% of us do). We probably also know that pani puri is not healthy. Now how many of us choose to not eat it willingly (I am not saying to restrict, thats why willingly).
This ability to choose with awareness is one of the aspects of "being free".
While I say this, at times, I may choose to eat something unhealthy. It is the choice I have made but most of us in all honesty know that we just ate because we cannot resist or we just followed the crowd or that is the only thing which was available.
Mind is free when it is watchful. You got to watch your mind. Everyone gets angry. It's okay to be angry as long as you know you are angry. As soon as you know, it drops ;)
Now you can choose to be angry, this anger will have it's purpose and only you will know it.
Rising of conciousness means to be aware and watchful. You just have to go beyond your mind otherwise you are trapped.
You are aware of your state of mind when your conciousness rises.
A simple way to understand the whole thing is -
" You choose to eat the pizza or pizza chose that you eat it".

 

Are you waiting your turn to be Happy?

Father Said "Once my daughter is married, I will be happy"
Mother said "Once my son becomes doctor, I will be happy"
Student said "I will enjoy once the exams get over"
Software Developer said "I will have blast once this project is delivered"
Pregnant Women said "I will be happy once I get a healthy Baby"
Enterpreneur said "Let's party when we get funded"
Businessmen said "This deal must go through and then we will be happy"
House Wife said "Once my morning work is over, I will be happy"
Bagpacker said "My trip to Leh was the happiest moment of my life"
Husband said "I really enjoyed my bachelor life"
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Buddha said "I am happy here now".

So most of us are always happy either in the past or future and need a reason to be happy. Being happy is simple in present. 
There is no reason needed to be happy. There are going to be problems  but problems should never be related to your happiness. Easier said then done.
So be happy here now, put on a smile ;)

State of Mind

On the trip to delhi -

I was on a trip to Delhi and on the way back to airport took a cab. Our cab was just slowed down by a cycle rickshaw, the cab driver shouted and then literally hit the cycle rickshaw from behind.
The Cycle rickshaw guy protested that he needs time to give side then the cab driver just got off with all bad words, ready to hit the cycle rickshaw guy.
Above is an event triggered reaction (1).

Yesterday -
A chevrolet spark was hit by a pick up van in our building. The lady in chevrolet spark got wild and hit the guy, broke his mirror. After a while the owner of the pick up van came and settled the matter in some way. The scratch fix would have costed about INR5000 approximately or less. This is again event triggered reaction (2)

Back to the trip to Delhi -
I was with owner of a mid size company in almost brand new Hyundai Verna. On the way to his office, while we were stationary, a qualis taking a turn scratched his bumper. The guy pulled down the mirror and said "Bhai saab, jara dekhe ke turn maro". The other fellow replied "traffic tha galti se ho gaya". The guy quickly rolled up the mirror and told me that there is nothing much you can do even if you fight with the other guy irrespective of who was at fault.
 This is event triggered reaching (3).
The realization I had was that the guy who spend minimum time  fighting knew that it is not worth his time spending on it and he was the richest guy of all 3 in the above incidences.
The realization is that your reactions has potential to decide your fate.
We face such situations in your daily life at work place, home, travelling and so on. The knowing of your reaction and a subtle control (control is no the right word) is real spritiualism. It is this awareness that is above and beyond the natural reaction. Knowing your reaction is changing the default to defined.
If the taxi guy had not got down to hit the other fellow, we would not have lost the time.
If the lady had just calmly asked that this needs to be fixed by your owner, neither driver or lady should have to spend the time fighting (in turn mental imbalance) for it and reaching the same result.

The panic Button

FlashBack -
Checking email on my phone from my team -
"We are stuck at this point, some dependencies are not getting resolved and the critical project is blocked"
Hit the panic button and call back. The first reaction is "shit, now we are screwed"
Second reaction is to start calling the team and try to figure out a solution (which of course they are already doing).
A realization hits me and I stop thinking about the "problem".
Reached the office and discuss overall strategy for the project and bringing clarity to the road map.
All this while no focus on the problem nor any anxiety about it.
Few hours before the end of day, the issue was resolved in some way.

Now the point here is the "panic button". All of us have a panic button which we hit under different circumstances. We do not realize that this is going to stay "only till it is resolved" ;)

Q: Where is the focus?
A: On the problem

Q: Where should be the focus?
A: On the solution

Learning - When you get hit by a problem, focus on the solution.
One more thing I learned today was "Problems are temporary, Solutions are permanent".

Note to the self

The life passes by while you are asleep. If you realize this, the journey has begun.
You evolvle if you are aware that something is wrong in the mechanical world and that we have become emotional machines of earning money.
The life has just begun for me as I watch ego fool me and fail me. If I am aware the ego is shattered. It most definitely does not like it. So It tries to fool me by using my patterns and old habits. I am no monk as it also be identification of the ego. I don not want to be identified good, bad or ugly. At that point, I think the life will begin. Like water in the jug, it takes shape of the jug. My ego may be fooling me even now, making me feel closer to reality then I may be. Right now I do not care much about it as life will give me the feedback. That's an advantage of living in the matrix. You can see for yourself if you are really able to live in the world but not of it!

Making a difference

I truly have great people in my life and around me. I am surrounded by a whole lot of good people in some way or the other.
Recently, I went for a 2 day shibir at lonavala organised by nira multiversity (http://niramultiversity.org/) and again met a really good fellow sadhaks.
It was a small group but each of them was determined to change his own life and make a better today and thus tomorrow. It was "age no bar", in fact old ones appreciated the teachings of the modern day unlike our general experience that it's difficult to change mind set of the old people.
This has bought a different perspective to me and that is "make a difference" by changing yourself and also guiding right people to right place at right time.
These shibirs are amazing ground for "experiencing" new things in life with a very light weight approach.
Remember, we are surrounded by a world of information and logic where we start loving complexity and challenges. And thus these things follow us.
I have seen so many young people always saying that they love "challenges in life". Probably I used to as well, but now with better sense of things, I now love "simplicity in life". I have simplified myself and my life a great deal. Simple life, simple food, simple prayers.
I am in love with the words "simple", "easy", "peaceful", "grace", "great", "heal" and "pray".
From Here on, life will be simple, beautiful and bountiful. I recommend doing the shibirs time and again to many people. But I have noticed that the ones who are really ready for the change are able to make it, rest will only read the blog and move on. Please realize that reading anything is not going to make your life any better then it was yesterday if you do not learn and apply it in your life.
Reading positive and good things certainly help momentarily, shibirs help you transform and follow ups keeps you going on the right track.
Wrapping up this post with a lot of gratitude for having such good life, unsaid, untold grace on me always!