Life is a perinnially beffling, insoluble enigma.  We
have gathered enough of bricks but have no time to
erect an edifice which shelters us.  We continue to
collect more and more bricks and continue the art of
construction.  So the scorching heat of the sun
continues.  The modern-disease of materialism does not
spare children also.  Now a modern child is more in
love with TV than with her mummy.  The child says she
can survive without mother but not without TV.  Filial
love has vanished from the hearts of the most of the
modern sons and daughters.  All parental affection has
disappeared (exceptions apart).  Only the infection of
'idiot-box' remains.

There is no proper diagnosis of the modern man's
psychic disease.  What is astonishing is his
unwillingness to approach the doctor.  He blissfully
wants to continue as a patient.  This is, exactly, the
reason why the modern man, though surrounded by a bevy
of beauties whose faces are more lovely than the
monarch of the sky, though rolling on the soft bed of
reputation, though gets garlanded and incurably falls
in love with his own face on TV, though enviably
occupies a high pedestal of power, though his riches
rush onward like a roaring stream, though gets buried
under the heap of encomiums and though, in a
word,becomes an inexhaustible source of jealousy for
other, in the deep, silent depths of his heart,
experiences excriciating pain, sheds many invisible
tears; discontent, restlessness - restlesly knock on
the 'inverted bowls of bone, we call skulls,' gets
shrivelled up into inner loneliness and then there
begins the deadly dance of disenchantment on his
furrowed face which is ocassionally beautified by
synthetic smiles, stemming from celluloid contraction
of lips.

Dismantled dreams, like splinters of glass, pierce
into the psychic-flesh; blood unendingly oozes,
refusing to coagulate.  All his efforts to drown his
sorrow in wine and women prove to be futile.  Raging
frustration threatens his sanity.

Modern man's tentative, apparent coolness is like the
lull before the storm, or the ominious silnce before
eruption.  Blueness of the sea and the sky decieve
him.  In an effort to filter the blueness of the sea
he finds himself in the jaws of the sharks.

Thus, his loneliness continues, restlessness
continues; spiritual barenness continues; but his
dreams do not cease.  With tear-filled eyes, he
unsuccesfully collects the broken-pieces of his dreams
and piously hopes that the tantalizing 'tomorrow'
cements them.  A thousand tomorrows roll by.  We still
find him hanging his embroidered hopes on the peg
without credulous trust in tomorrow.  Nothing has
deceived him so much as 'tomorrow' did.  But
ironically nothing commands so much respect from him
as 'tomorrow' does.

to be cont'd

Dear friends,

Today is the 50th installment of this wisdom quotes.
Honestly i never expected this would go on so far.  In
my busy schedule i thought i would never get time, but
then God has been kind, HE  wanted me probably to
continue this service.  Hope you are all reaping its
benefits.

with love
suresh krissna

SPIRITUAL QUOTES FROM A MASTER

Good book teaches us how to be good at the art of
living.  They heal the inner wounds of our life and
prevent us from 'falling upon the thorns of life'.  If
one wants to dethrone discontenment from one's life
this seems to be the best way.

Bees not only have stings but also the vocal strings
which can sing.  So are our adversities.  One should
know the art of taking advantage of adversity.  For
instance, some 'bee-keepers' have the skill of tending
hives without getting stung.  'They seldom put their
veils of their faces or wear protective clothing, yet
they can go from hive to hive and still escape
unharmed. The explanation for this is simple.  They
remain calm and deliberate in their movements.  Even
though a bee comes directly towards them or settles on
their exposed skin, they make no effort to protect
themselves.'

Likewise, how one faces difficulties in life is
extremely important.

Many of us have been in similiar situations, for
troubles seldom come one at a time  Instead, they buzz
around and threaten us from all sides.  If we fret and
rebel under testing, we aggravate our problems and are
sure to feel the pain of defeat.  On the other hand,
calmly expressing our faith in God through praise and
prayer will bring us the sweetness of new grace and
power.

When the bees of adversity descend on you, don't
panic. Calmly trust the Lord.  Then you will escape
the stings of worry and realize the joy of victory!!

Death is painful but an inevitable dramatic
requirement of "Cosmic-play". "Every calamity bring
with itself an unseen spritual compensation."

One may question "Why does Death exist?"  The right
answer would be that death is there because God wants
to enhance the beauty of life. Though paradoxical,
death is the only Cosmic and cosmetic brush that
beautifies life.  God has given us sorrow only to
deepen our joy.  Though unbelievable, sorrow is the
only potent apparatus that enlarges the horizons of
happiness.

It is wrong to say that one dies.  One should say that
he or she dies into life.  Death is the door to
immortality.  Death is in no way inferior to birth.
The very process of living is the process of dying.
We die while living; we are in love with life while
dying.

Life is not just the birth - sorrow - and death as it
is wrongly supposed to be; life is the birth -birth
into bliss - death into life.

We must weep over the dead man, not because he is dead
but because we are still alive; and not yet dead.

EVERY TIME ONE DOOR CLOSES, ANOTHER DOOR OPENS.
EVERY SUNSET IS A MOVE CLOSER TO SUNRISE.  DEATH IS
ALWAYS THE PRELUDE TO RESURRECTION.

Thus to put everything in a nutsheel, death is a
Cosmically induced attempt to recapture childhood.
The spiritual heights one has scaled depend on how
happily one embraces death.  Let us take a glance at
the one who prepares for sleep.  He first lays out his
bed and then he lies upon it, blissfully forgetting
the world and awaiting the tender fingers of sleep to
touch his eyelids.  Despite knowing fully well that
sleep will take away the world of wakeful state and
that he will be hurled into a strange world of dreams,
one prepares for the unimaginable, unknown to escape
the agonizing fatige of the day.

Like the one happily preparing for sleep one must
prepare for death.  Death is like the drop of dew
vanishing from the petal of rose; death is like the
rose fading away to fall into the dust below.

If death takes away happiness, it also takes away
sorrow, if it extinguishes the flame of joy; it also
lights the flame of hope.  Death reveals us that there
is life beyond it, just like there was life before it.

Just as the gardener waters both the rose flower and
the thorns, so also God's Grace is felt both in birth
and death.  Both are equally potential transcendental
instruments in understanding the non-dualistic essence
of life.

Whatsoever you are doing - walking, sitting, eating,
or if you are not doing anything, just breathing,
resting, in the grass - never forget that you are a
watcher.

You will forget it again and again.  You will get
involved in some thought, some feeling, some emotion,
some sentiment - anything will distract you from the
watcher.  Remember, and run back to your center of
watching.

Make it an inner process, continously ... you will be
surprised at how life changes its whole quality.  I
can move my hand without any watchfulness, and I can
also move my hand absolutely watching from inside the
whole movememnt.  The movements are totally different.
The first movement is a robot movememnt, mechanical.
The second movement is a conscious movement.  And when
you are conscious, you feel that hand from within;
when you are not conscious, you only know the hand
from without.

You have know your face only in the mirror, from the
without, because you are not a watcher.  If you start
watching, you will feel your face from within - and
that is such an experience, to watch yourself from
within.  Then slowly, strange things start happening.
Thoughts disappear, feelings disappear, emotions
disappear, and there is a silence surrounding you.
You are just like an isand in the middle of the ocean
of silence ... just a watcher, as if a flame of light
is at the center of your being, radiating the whole of
your being.

In the beginning it will only be an inner experience.
Slowly you will see that radiation spreading out of
your body, those rays reaching other people.  You will
be surprised and shocked that other people, if they
are a little bit sensitive, will immediately become
aware that something has touched them , which was not
visisble.  For example, if you are watching yourself,
just walk behind somebody, watching yourself, and it
is almost certain the person will turn and look back
suddenly, for no reason.  When you are watching
yourself, you watchfulness starts radiating, and it is
bound to touch the person who is ahead of you.  And if
he touched by something that is invisible, he is going
to look back : "what is the matter?" And you are so
away you cannot even touch him with your hand.

You can try an experiment; somebody is sleeping and
you can sit by their side, just watching yourself, and
the person will suddenly wake up, open his eyes, and
look all around as if somebody has touched him.

Slowly you will also become able to feel the touch
through the rays.  That is what is called the vibe.
It is not a nonexistential thing.  The other person
feels it; you wil also feel that you have touched the
other person.

The English term, being 'touched', is used very
significantly.  You may without understanding what it
means when you say 'i was touched' by the person.  He
may not have said a single word to you.  He may just
have passed by.  He may just have looked once at your
eyes, and "touched" by the person.  He may not have
said a single word to you.  He may just have passed
by.  He may just have looked once at your eyes, and
you feel "touched" by the person.  It is not just a
word- it actually happens.  And then those rays go on
spreading to people, to animals, to trees, to rocks
... and one day you will, you are touching the whole
universe from within.

Each action that you do, or even think about has is
own ways of persisting again and again, because it
creates a channel in your being.  It starts absorbing
energy from you.  You are angry, and then you think
you are angry no more - then you miss the point.  When
the mood has gone, nothing has happened; only the
wheel has moved and the spoke that was up has gone
down.

The anger was there on the surface a few minutes ago;
the anger has now gone down into the unconscious, into
the depth of your being.  It will wait for its time to
come again.  If you have acted according to it, you
have renforced it.  Then you have again given a lease
for its life.  You have given it again a power, an
energy.  It is throbbing lke a seed under the soil,
waiting for the right opportunity and season, then it
will sprout.

Every action is self-perpeutating, every thought is
self-perpeutating. Once you cooperate with it you are
giving energy to it.  Sooner or later it will become
habitual.

You will do it but you will not be the doer; you will
do it just because of the force of habit. People say
habit is second - this is not exagerration.  On the
contrary this is an understatement!  Infact habit
finally become first nature and nature becomes
secondary. Nature becomes just like an appendix or
footnotes in a book, and habit becomes the main body
of the book.

You live through the habit - that means that habit
lives through you basically.  The habit itself
persists, it has an energy of its own.  of course it
takes the energy from you, but you coperated with it
in the past and you are coperating in the present.  By
and by the habit will become the master and you will
be just a servant, a shadow.The habit will give the
commandment and you will be just an obedient servant.
You will have to follow it.

It is within you.  Sometimes, suddenly saddness comes
for no apparent reason at all. And sometimes one feels
happy, sometimes one feels euphoric, ecstatic.  A man
deprived of all social relationships, isolated in
total comfort, supplied with every need, moves through
all the mood that you move through in relationship.
That means something comes from within, and you hang
it on somebody else.  That is just a rationalization.

You feel good, you feel bad, and these feelings are
bubbling from your own unconsciouness, from you own
past.  Nobody can make you angry, and nobody can make
you happy.  You becomes happy on your own, you become
angry on your own, and you become sad on your own.
Unless you realize this, you will always remain a
slave.

The mastery of one's self comes when one realizes, "I
am absolutely responsible for whatsoever happens to
me, Whatsoever happens, unconditionally - I am
absoltely responsible."