Just Sit Quietly

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It’s a Matter of Timing

Worth reading from off the web

By Ram Dass

Self AwarenessMany years ago I spent time with a Tibetan teacher, Trungpa Rinpoche. In an interview he suggested a meditation technique in which one expands one’s awareness outward. He suggested we do it together. So we sat facing each other and he said, “Just expand outward.” And I started to expand outward.

After about twenty seconds he said “Ram Dass, are you trying?” And I said, indignantly, “Yes!” He said, “Don’t try, just expand outward.” And it absolutely blew my mind. Really. That was an exquisite teaching at that moment. Don’t try, just do it. That’s really what right effort is about. I think the key to right effort is timing.I used to go to meditation courses and I hated every minute. But I thought, “It’s good for me.” And I would squirm and my legs would hurt and I’d day-dream. I’d count the hours and days until I could get out. And I felt so righteous about doing it. And then I thought to myself “Do you think this is really getting you liberated?”

I mean I’d come out so neurotic and just waiting for a steak and a milk shake. I would have fantasies during the meditation course of what I was going to eat the first day and how I’d drive in the country and how free I’d feel. But I kept going to these courses because I was feeling it was “good for me”. I felt I had to do good in order to be good. Then I decided if this was the only way to liberation, I guess I wasn’t going to make it. So I gave up.

And after a few years I noticed that I started to yearn to just sit quietly. And it was a whole different ball game. An Indian Saint, Ramama Maharshi, once said, “I didn’t eat and they said I was fasting.” Same thing!

It has to do with timing. It’s as if our minds see in advance where we’re going, and then our mind-overkill makes us imitate where we think we’re going, which doesn’t give us a chance for our intuition to get us moving in a timely manner. Somebody came up to me the other day and said, “You know, I’m just tired of being ‘should upon’.” Me too!

Mainly I was doing it to myself. You know, “You should do this, you really should.” I almost distrusted that I had a true yearning for God. And that’s where the ‘shoulds’ were coming from, that lack of faith. The more I trusted myself and said, “Well, okay, I’ll just be what I am”, the more I began to feel this deep pull towards God. And these methods which could help me, such as meditation started to be a joy rather than a mountain to be climbed. It’s just a matter of timing.

-Ram Dass

Posted May 23, 2012 at:

https://www.ramdass.org/its-just-a-matter-of-timing-2-2/

Awareness Beyond the Tip of the Iceberg

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Unlock the Power of your Subconscious Mind –

Worth reading! From off the web

subconscious-and-conscious-mind

The tip of the iceberg represents the conscious mind and the part under water represents our unconscious

 

 

 

The subconscious mind is the store room with an unlimited capacity; all your memories, past experiences, deepest beliefs, everything that has ever happened to you is permanently stored. In simple terms, the subconscious is a part of you that is outside of your conscious awareness, that creates automatic programs to make functioning easier in life, without having to pay attention on everything you are doing.

Like driving a car, a beginner who is still learning to drive would be completely focused on driving, without engaging in a conversation with anybody in the car. But after few weeks or months of practice, that person would be at ease while driving, since its become a habit and is registered in the subconscious mind.

Subconscious is active all day and night, whether you act upon it or not. Neuroscience has recognized that the subconscious controls 95 percent of our lives. The first six years of your life is when the subconscious mind is programmed and it is much more powerful than your conscious mind.

Its job is to ensure that you respond exactly the way you are programmed. Your subconscious mind makes everything you say and do fit a pattern consistent with your self-concept, your “master program.” That’s why it’s important that you filter what is embedded in it.

If the subconscious mind is so powerful, how does one reprogram it to make positive changes in one’s life? You can reprogram your conditioned thinking, which might be pulling you down from living the life you always wanted.

Breaking Down Neural Pathways using Positive Affirmations

To change our lives, we need to do more than change our thoughts, we have to go deeper than that and change our programming. To program your subconscious mind, with the present “conscious” understanding that you’ve gained takes time, because it involves bringing down the old neural pathways and creating new connections in your brain.

But the good thing is that the subconscious learns through repetition. That’s how it picked up the negative patterns or bad habits in the first place. By spending time each day affirming your new beliefs/programming or thought pattern, you can effectively change your life and reality.

Take time every day sowing the seeds of your new programming. Repeating mantras or positive affirmations have the power to raise your vibrations and make a lasting impression in your subconscious mind.

According to Paramahansa Yogananda, “Loud or silent repetition of inspiring words has been found effective in various systems of psychotherapy; the secret lies in stepping up the mind’s vibratory rate.”

Affirmations to consider –

-“I love and respect myself.”
– “I am filled with peace, harmony and joy.”
– “I attract good things into my life.”
– “My positive thoughts produce positive things.”

It’s not just repeating the same thing again and again, you have to break the barrier that prevents certain thoughts from entering the subconscious mind. If you feed good thoughts to your brain continuously, it will enter your subconscious mind. Feed only what you desire and not what you don’t want. In the process if you experience negative thoughts, sadness, anxiety, frustration etc., don’t try to resist those thoughts but acknowledge them and accept them in your conscious mind, and it will eventually fade away.

Meditation
Meditation takes you to deeper realms of consciousness, that allows you to access your subconscious mind. In normal waking consciousness, our brain is functioning in ‘beta’ pattern. This state is associated with alertness, but also with stress, anger and anxiety. In meditation, your brain patterns slow down and move first to alpha and then to theta and, in deep meditation, delta patterns.
react-same-old-way-deepak-chopra
It sounds difficult at first, but with regular practice, you will become an observer of your thoughts, instead of getting distracted by it. Allow you thoughts to flow and not react to them. This is when you begin to reap the benefits of accessing your subconscious mind through meditation.

Get Creative
Let your creative juices flow, take up artistic expression like painting, drawing, cooking, decorating, sculpting, pottery and so on. Nurturing your creativity can help you be more authentic and in closer touch with your subconscious self.

 

“Your visions will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.” ― C.G. Jung

From Fractal Enlightenment, by  http://fractalenlightenment.com/30792/life/unlock-the-power-of-your-subconscious-mind