Thanks to all of you for responding so earnestly to January’s study of the latest Blue Mountain Journal, in which we discussed how we can contribute to hopefulness for ourselves and others during these trying times. It was really encouraging to hear from so many, and to share a renewed sense of inspiration with one another.
Putting our meditation first enables us to tap into the source of love and wisdom within us, and to become a positive force in the world, a force of unconditional love and respect for all.
This month we’ll continue exploring a theme Christine shared in the last Blue Mountain Journal, of being “a force for peace”. Our focus will be on the many ways in which we can give our best to meditation – both during meditation, and during the rest of the day, too.
One way that Easwaran often suggested going deeper in meditation was to refresh or memorize a new passage. Because “we become what we meditate on”, we wanted to remind you of the many passages in God Makes the Rivers to Flow and available for free on the BMCM website. While all of the passages will help cultivate peace at the deepest levels, here are a few gems that specifically address praying for the peace in the world:
Prayer for Peace by Swami Omkar, page 138
Prayer for the Peace of the World by Hazrat Inayat Khan, page 96
Prayer for Peace by Hazrat Inayat Khan, page 139
The Way to Peace by Swami Sivananda, page 144
We invite you to read each passage simply for the sense of peace and inspiration they impart. Do you already use one during meditation? If so, which one, and do you notice its impact on you? Are you moved to memorize a new one in order to refresh your meditation repertoire? Please share your thoughts in the comments below.
Next Online Workshop: Deepening Meditation
We invite you to join us on Saturday, February 23, for our online workshop on deepening our meditation. We’ll do an interactive reading study together, watch a video clip of Easwaran, and have a chance to meditate (offline) as a world-wide community. You might enjoy taking this opportunity to create a retreat day, either by yourself or with your local spiritual fellowship group.
We’d like to leave Easwaran with the last word to launch us into this month’s topic on deepening our meditation.
This is an excerpt from an article by Easwaran in the Blue Mountain Journal, Summer 2013.
Classical Indian mysticism compares the mind to a lake, which for most of us is continually lashed into waves by the winds of emotional stimulus and response. The real storm winds are four: anger, fear, greed, and self-will. One or another is generally blowing. As a result, the water is in a constant state of agitation. Even when the surface appears calm, murky currents are stirring underneath.
Through meditation and the other powerful allied disciplines, however, the lake of the mind can be made absolutely clear. When not even a ripple disturbs the surface, you can look into the crystal waters of the mind and see the very bottom: the divine ground of existence which is the basis of our personality, which in Sanskrit is called simply Atman, “the Self.”
On the surface level of awareness, everyone seems separate. We look different, wear different clothes, have different speech patterns, different ambitions, different conditioning. This is the physical level of awareness, below which the vast majority of us cannot see because of the agitation of the mind.
Just below the surface is the level of personal, individual consciousness, a comparatively shallow region which is easily stirred by the winds of sense impressions and emotions. The more physically oriented we are – that is, the more we identify with our bodies and feelings – the more caught up we will be in this mind-world of constantly changing forms. In this state it can be quite a chore to get close to other people; all our awareness is caught in the things that make us seem separate from them and unique. Their differences seem to keep getting in our way.
And underlying this level, largely unsuspected, lies the depths of the collective unconscious. There is only one collective unconscious: at bottom, everyone’s unconscious is the same. The deeper we get, the more clearly we shall see that our differences with others are superficial, and that ninety-nine percent of what we are is the same for everyone.
To the extent that we can turn our back on our petty, private mind-world and learn to dive into deeper consciousness, we can free ourselves from the influence of the storms that stir up those shallow waters at the surface. At the same time, as we get deeper, we move closer and closer to other people; we feel closer to life as a whole. This, in effect, is what learning to swim in the unconscious is all about.
