The world is beating to a new rhythm. Do you feel it too?
Perhaps you've also noticed, that the rules of the game of
life, as we have known them so far, have changed. Most of
the knowledge we have accumulated in the past centuries,
in particular the lessons and the training we received in the
past decades, are antiquated and inadequate. Equipped
with an open mind and sensitive to the super natural, some
individuals have been aware of this change for some time
now. Free of fear they are able to embrace the new and to
meet the challenges they face. They are quick to pick up the
new vibrations and quick to adapt to the new rules that have
not as yet been defined clearly. Those who resist change
and the unknown as a rule, are in for a rude awakening.
One can't help but notice how change is accelerating and is
affecting our lives globally and individually. Nothing,
absolutely nothing is certain any more.
Here's a big welcome to the Age of Independent Thinking;
The Information Age; the Age of Communication and the
Age of Consciousness Awareness. Global, Group and
Individual Consciousness. The individual who is quick to
learn, quick to adapt, intuitive and creative is in now in great
demand. Most wanted is the individual who can think out of
the box. The challenges of our time are such that the
industrial era thinker is threatened with extinction. The inept
individual with an over inflated ego driven by selfish motives
belongs to the dinosaur age. The new individual feels
comfortable with new technology and with the different
cultures of the world. The new individual is balanced
physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually. The new
individual is family, group, community, nation orientated and
above all globally aware.
Narrow views such as intelligence is fixed at birth and IQ
intelligence tests are out. Today we talk about multiple
intelligence. Psychologist Howard Gardner for example,
in his book 'Frames of Mind', introduced seven measurable
intelligences and later documented over twenty five sub-
intelligences. I personally believe that intelligence cannot be
measured. Ninety five percent of what we know about the
brain has been discovered in the past decade. We know
today that intelligence can be developed regardless of age.
We know that our brain is multidimensional and more
flexible than any computer invented and can improve with
age if exercised properly. We also know that each human
being is unique and is gifted at birth with unlimited potential
for learning. The foundation for global, nation, organization
and group consciousness is the individual consciousness.
In this essay which includes an excerpt from my book
'Visions Unusual' I focus on the individual consciousness
and in particular on 'mind' consciousness. Mind training
has been known in Indian Psychology as Raja Yoga for
thousands of years, according to the widely known
teachings of the sage Pantajali. Pantajali introduced a
mental training technique, where by the individual learns to
develop the higher mind, which is the door to the source of
all power, the Universal Mind.
About half a century ago the Metaphysician and Scientist,
P.D.Ouspensky wrote: 'To know and to understand are two
different things and you must learn to distinguish between
them.' Independent thinking is still very rare and has to do
with a developed mind. We now begin to recognize that the
mind is the sixth sense that mankind is to fully develop in
the new age. The mind is invisible and manifests itself
through the brain. In other words, the brain is a tool of the
mind. To express life there must be mind, but mind is static
unless put in motion. God created the world but he
endowed man with a mind and the capacity to direct energy,
by the power of the mind through thought. The spiritual
Master Oamraan Michael Aiivanhov tells us: 'When mankind
begin to use their mind consciously and take command of
their instincts, when they begin to purify and add the spiritual
element to that level of being, then they become powerful
factors capable of changing their destiny.'
The mind is a complex and a wondrous tool and like
everything else it can be used or misused. It can be used for
simple unimportant tasks or it can be used intelligently. It
can be passive and just store the messages that our five
senses supply, the data of what we see, hear, taste, touch
and feel. Our emotional perceptions and thoughts supply
the rest of the data about our external and internal reality.
Mind can also be active, it can interpret and attract and
create. It can discriminate between various qualities of
information received, it chooses what is important and
discards what is unimportant. It has the power to
discriminate. You are free to create your own picture of
reality and to choose your perceptions. You are free to
choose what you want to believe or disbelieve. Knowledge
for the mind, like food for the body, is intended to feed and
help to growth, but it requires to be well digested and the
more thoroughly and slowly this process is carried out, the
better both for body and mind. Most people are unaware of
and, therefore, do not exercise this ability. They accept
everything as it is presented to them, and become slaves of
their environments. Each one of us has the same power to
perceive, to experience and to learn. What we learn differs,
our perceptions differ, and our applications of our powers
differ. If we change our ideas, we change our actions.
Consciousness can be studied and the best thing we can
do is to begin with studying our own consciousness. Our
conceptual reality is a result of our ongoing method of
thinking. It is through our thinking that we influence
consciousness and our consciousness creates our reality.
The key is to understand the two major components of our
mind, the conscious and the subconscious. The value of the
subconscious is enormous, it inspires us, it warms us, it
furnishes us with names, facts and scenes from the
storehouse of memory. It directs our thoughts, tastes and
accomplishes tasks so intricate that no conscious mind,
even if it had the power, has the capacity for them. The
subconscious mind never sleeps, never rests any more
than does your heart or your blood. Stating specific things to
the subconscious mind to be accomplished, forces are set
in operation that lead to the result desired. All of this is
governed by a natural universal law known as The Law of
Attraction.
We are related to the world without by the objective mind.
The brain is the organ of this mind and the cerebrospinal
system of nerves puts us in conscious communication with
every part of the body. This system of nerves responds to
every sensation we perceive with our five senses. We are
related to the world within by the subconscious mind. The
sympathetic system of nerves presides over all subjective
sensations such as love, joy, imagination, fear, hate,
respiration and all other subconscious phenomena. It is
through the subconscious mind that we are connected to
the universal mind. When we can bring the objective and the
subjective minds into conscious cooperation thereby
coordinating the finite and the infinite, we can then control
our life from within. The Zen Master Thuong Chieu wrote: 'If
the practitioner knows his own mind clearly he will obtain
results with little effort. But if he does not know anything
about his own mind, all of his efforts will be wasted.'
Quantum physics has shown that matter is simply a certain
vibratory rate of energy. Matter is attracted to other matter
and we call this the 'Law of Gravity'. All energies therefore
will gravitate to other energies of the same or similar
vibratory rates. All beliefs thoughts especially when they are
accompanied by strong emotional currents vibrate at a
certain frequency of energy. And so all people, events and
ideas that vibrate harmoniously will gravitate to each other.
Actions do not produce themselves. When we can see that
and understand it, we can see that law does not operate
itself. It is we that cause actions and experience their
reactions. It is we who set up causes and feel their effects.
There is no action unless there is a being to make it and to
feel its effects. This law rules on every plane of being and
every being of every grade is under this law. We never act
alone, we always act on and in connection with others,
affecting them for good or evil and we get the necessary
reactions from the causes set in motion by ourselves. This
presents to us the idea of absolute justice for under such a
conception of law each being exactly gets what he set in
motion.
We are told that the student of 'Raja Yoga' or mental
training, has to realize that the mind is intended to be an
organ of perception. The process to be followed is first to
gain right control of the thinking principle. Second is to
stabilize the mind so that it can be used as an organ of
vision, a sixth sense, and the synthesis of all the other five
senses. This will result with correct knowledge and the right
use of the perceiving faculty, so that the new field of
knowledge which is now contacted is seen as it is. That
which is perceived is rightly interpreted, through the
subsequent assent of intuition and reason. Right
transmission to the physical brain of that which has been
perceived, the testimony of the sixth sense is correctly
interpreted, and the evidence as transmitted with occult
accuracy. Result is correct reaction of the physical brain to
the transmitted knowledge.
The entire Raja Yoga, is based upon an understanding of
the nature, purpose and function of the mind. The ability of
the mind to attract, is also under your control. You can chose
your beliefs and thoughts and information will be attracted to
support them. In other words you think success, you attract
success. You think doubt, or fear and you attract failure. You
think wealth and you attract wealth. You think health and you
attract health. You think ill health and you attract ill health.
You think love and you attract love. This is the reason for
repeating positive affirmations to yourself. Through the
repetition of affirmations you can influence and reprogram
your subconscious. Your mind has the ability to create
information and therefore to create circumstances. Many
people still do not understand the importance for the use of
affirmations. The idea is that as you repeat the affirmations
to yourself, your thought through your concentration, is
occupied with that particular affirmation and, therefore,
cannot fall into the trap of a negative thought. In time the
positive affirmation which you are repeating consciously, will
get impregnated into the subconscious pushing out and
replacing the old habit of the negative thought.
If for example you have a financial problem, the more you
worry and think about your problem, the worse your problem
will become. The reason is because you are adding fuel to
the fire, by feeding the problem more energy to keep it alive.
When you, however, ignore it, and concentrate on imagining
money flowing in to you, having trust in the abundance of the
universe and in your mind see yourself doing better,
eventually the problem will turn around. At the same time, it
is important that you engage yourself to do whatever is
within your power to do, in order to help the situation on the
physical level. Remember the saying 'God help those who
help themselves'. If you remember that thoughts are energy
vibrations and if you do not feed the negative with more
energy, eventually it will disappear because you have
unplugged the source, the fuel to keep it alive.
This process works for everything. To know your mind,
observe and recognize everything about it. To the untrained
mind, also known as concrete or lower mind and the myopic
consciousness, life is a startlingly endless succession of
the minute of non essentials. The lower mind loves
exactness and definiteness. Its chief characteristic action is
in discrimination and in assessing relative values. It tends
to analyze and separate, to break down and
compartmentalize, to categorize all that it perceives, to rank
its preferences and to judge and criticize. The small minded
intellectual sorts everything out as wise or foolish, good or
bad, useful or non useful. This attitude has been typical of
humanity in the Piscean age. It gets stuck in the little
unnecessary details and is incapable of a wider view of life.
The Buddha warned us that the untrained mind is a slayer
of the truth.
The universal mind, is the all pervading undistributed
Creative Power. It is your choice to tap into this Infinite
Power. It is in abundance as everything else in the universe.
You are the Master of your thoughts and actions. You are the
Master of your life and what happens to you. Thoughts are
energy and energy follows thought. If you spend your time
thinking and living in the past, plotting revenge, being
unhappy or angry, or feeling sorry for yourself and blaming
others for your problems, or day dreaming about a future,
then you are not only wasting energy but your thoughts
cannot possibly attract anything good to you. Thoughts
attract other thoughts that are comparable to them in
accordance with the Law of Attraction. Through
concentration you can train your mind to influence and
change your thought patterns. Even Winnie the Poof has
some insight for us: 'Down through the centuries, man has
developed a mind that separates him from the world of
reality, the world of a natural laws. This mind tries too hard,
wears itself out, and ends up weak and sloppy. Such a
mind, even of a high intelligence, is inefficient. It goes here
and there, backwards and forwards, and fails to concentrate
on what it's doing at the moment. It drives down the street in
a fast moving car and think it's at the store, going over a
grocery list. Then it wonders why accidents occur.'
The secret of power is a perfect understanding of our
relationship to the Universal Mind. 'Thinking' is dealing with
the magical power of thought and consciousness. When
you begin to perceive that the essence of the universe is
within you - you begin to feel the inner power and you begin
to do things. It is the fuel which fires the imagination, the fuel
which lights the torch of inspiration. It gives vitality to your
thoughts which enable you to connect with all the invisible of
the universe. Experiencing this within you, you are able to
plan fearlessly and to execute masterfully.
In the west much emphasis is laid on the intellect which is
important, except that there is a great danger, as there is in
all things, when the golden middle line is crossed. The
danger is having an over developed intellect. Often an over
developed intellect is mistaken for intelligence. Intellect is
acquired knowledge from outside sources. It is using the
brain, it is ability, it is genius, it is propensity but it is also
most definitely partiality. In contrast Intelligence is reason,
understanding, sense, penetration, mentality, distinction,
discrimination and refinement. In other words intelligence
goes a step further and deeper than intellect, it goes into
reason and understanding. This we reach when we
combine a harmony of intellect and love, the heart aspect.
Or intellect with spirit. The knowledge is taken intellectually
and reflected on an inner deeper level bringing the heart
love aspect into it in order to shed a different light upon it, to
make visible other deeper aspects, giving a wider and more
holistic view.
With an overdeveloped intellect the heart aspect is not
included. Everything happens in the head area, it gives only
a partial view of the whole. No deep thought or reflection is
exercised any more, and facts are accepted and stated as
read or taken from an external material source. Anything
else that does not fit in is flatly rejected. An intellect has no
compassion nor deeper understanding that penetrates
through the physical and the obvious. The inner balance
and harmony is lost when one has an over inflated intellect.
Intelligence, in comparison, is based on deep reflection with
an open mind and a compassionate heart. Intelligence
embraces versus an over developed intellect that
separates. The danger in an over developed intellect is that
it can block the mind, the heart and the intuition and what
more in its rigidity can lead to mental illness.
Here is a beautiful example given to us by Swami
Vivekanda from Inana Yoga, the Yoga of Knowledge, to give
us a simple and clear picture to make us understand, the
difference. Picture this: 'A chariot (the physical body), the
charioteer (the mind), the rider (the Inner Self), the reigns
(the intellect) and the horses (the five senses). Only the
charioteer can communicate with the rider, i.e. the Mind with
the Inner Self. When the horses are well trained, and the
reigns strong and kept well in the hands of the charioteer,
the rider reaches the goal set. But when the horses are not
controlled, and the reigns too weak and not well managed,
then the horses run wild and lead all including the rider to
destruction.' This is the reason for self development and
mind training. The goal through the journey of life, is to
develop and to refine the Inner Self. The self is on the plane
of intuition. A developed mind is necessary in order to
establish communication with the self within, the source of
all things, and to bring out the Omnipresent in you. That is
your power. Mind is synonymous with understanding.
Ouspensky tells us another important truth: 'You can
understand other people only as much as you can
understand yourself and only on the level of your own being'.
Mind consciousness is important to understand oneself.
Margo Kirtikar Ph.D.
August 2000
References
The Psychology of Man's possible Evolution by P.D.
Ouspensky
The Miracle of Mindfulness by Thich Nhat Hanh.
The Power of the Mind by Master Oamraan Michael
Aiivanhov
The Mind and Its Functions by Gesche Rabten
The Tao of Winnie the Pooh by Benjamin Hoff.
Visions Unusual by Margo Kirtikar Ph.D.
For comments or questions please contact:
Margo Kirtikar is founder and creator of Visions Unusual Zurich 1995. She has lived, studied and worked in the Middle East, Europe and the United States. She is an avid believer in continued adult education, self-growth, self transformation, fine tuning of the personality and the refinement and the soul. As an entrepreneur, she pursued a career in international business for over 25 years and raised a family. In 1991 she began her new career as coach, helping clients through counseling, transpersonal psychology and spiritual healing. Margo has a Ph.D. in the philosophy of Metaphysics. She also has a BA in Business and Economics, degrees in Leadership, Organizational Management, Banking, Psychology and Eastern healing techniques both Indian and Chinese. Her background includes Energy healing, Acupressure, Huna healing, Sufism mysticism, Raja Yoga or the mental kingly yoga, meditation and breathing therapy. Margo travels to lecture, gives workshops and coaches individuals. http://www.visionsunusual.com
mk@visionsunusual.com
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