Power OR Love...!

Today let us listen to another story that preaches

The Power of Love...

A mighty King was marching home after being victorious in a gruesome battle. He had captured the crown prince of the neighbouring kingdom and killed the King. The King was crossing through a jungle. He wanted to rest.

The army halted there for the evening. Nearby was a hermitage. The king decided to pay his respects to the sage there. He sent his Minister and some soldiers to seek an audience. They told the disciples there, "Maharaj wants to meet the sage." The disciples said, "Guruji has retired for the day, you can come tomorrow."

The next morning the King came to the hermitage dressed in his royal finery, accompanied by his ministers and attendants. The sage was sitting under a tree and scattering bajra seeds all around. Hundreds of birds of different kinds were eating and the sound of their twittering filled the air.

The King walked up to the sage. The sage did not look up.
The king said, "Pranam, Guruji!" No answer.
He spoke louder, "Pranam, Guruji!" Still, no answer.
"Guruji, I said Pranam!" he said in an angry voice.

The sage looked up and said, "Stop shouting, you are scaring the birds."

That made the king even more furious. "Do you know who I am?" he shouted. The sage said calmly, "Yes, I do. You are the one who kills for the love of power. You are the one who knows not that this power is temporary. One day another King shall kill you in the same way. The love of power shall bring about your downfall."

The king was beside himself with rage. He said, "Your impertinence is intolerable. I shall behead you just now!" He drew out his sword and raised it to strike the sage.

In an instant, hundreds of birds flew up and attacked the king. They poked their beaks into his face, his eyes and his arms and all over. The king moved his arms up and around to ward off the birds. But the birds wouldn't leave him. The sage said, "Leave him! Leave him! Come to me my dears!"

All at once, the birds quietened down and sat meekly at the feet of the sage.

The sage said, "All I ever gave these birds is love. Oh King! Realize the power of love. The love of power has blinded you and brought you to the level of a killer. These birds would have killed you, but that's because they love me. I rule over them like a king too, but the only power I ever exercise over them is the power of love and it is greatest power on this Earth."

It's not what you gather, but what you scatter
that tells what kind of life you have lived!

Attachment...!?!

Okay, this is a story from Buddha, the greatest life philosopher the world has witnessed. See if you can relate to the prior posts of ‘Worrying’ and if not, at least try to get rid of your pile of dung…!

There is a wonderful little story about two monks who lived together in a monastery for many years; they were great friends. Then they died within a few months of one another. One of them got reborn in the heaven realms, the other monk got reborn as a worm in a dung pile.

The one up in the heaven realms was having a wonderful time, enjoying all the heavenly pleasures. But he started thinking about his friend, "I wonder where my old mate has gone?" So he scanned all of the heaven realms, but could not find a trace of his friend. Then he scanned the realm of human beings, but he could not see any trace of his friend there, so he looked in the realm of animals and then of insects.

Finally he found him, reborn as a worm in a dung pile... Wow! He thought: "I am going to help my friend. I am going to go down there to that dung pile and take him up to the heavenly realm so he too can enjoy the heavenly pleasures and bliss of living in these wonderful realms."

So he went down to the dung pile and called his mate. And the little worm wriggled out and said: "Who are you?", "I am your friend. We used to be monks together in a past life, and I have come up to take you to the heaven realms where life is wonderful and blissful." But the worm said: "Go away, get lost!"

"But I am your friend, and I live in the heaven realms," and he described the heaven realms to him. But the worm said: "No thank you, I am quite happy here in my dung pile. Please go away." Then the heavenly being thought: "Well if I could only just grab hold of him and take him up to the heaven realms, he could see for himself." So he grabbed hold of the worm and started tugging at him; and the harder he tugged, the harder that worm clung to his pile of dung.

Do you get the moral of the story? How many of us are attached to our pile of dung?

Stay tuned and we will try to discover the T-R-U-T-H…!

Present...!

All right! We have reached the concluding part of this. Today we will discover the last but not the least means of keeping worry at bay…!

5. Tomorrow will come anyway. Live and fully enjoy here and now.

“Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow, it only saps today of its joy.”
Leo F. Buscaglia

It may sometimes seem that by worrying we can less the sorrow of tomorrow. But it never works. It only sucks the life out of today and this moment. To be able to live better today and to be able to take that action to prevent the possible sorrow it’s important to learn to live in the present moment. Because it’s there that you can do things in the best possible way with your focus fully on what you are doing.

Three of my favourite techniques for drawing me back to the now are these (the first one is the one I use most often right now):

a) Focus on what’s right in front of you… Or around you... Use your senses. Just look at what’s right in front of you right now. Listen to the sounds around you. Feel the fabric of your clothes and focus on how they feel. Cognize the ambience around you. Think of ways to improve your atmosphere, your universe. Find things to do and get involved wholeheartedly. Be still right there and just take in the world around you.

b) Pick up the vibe from present people... If you know someone that is more present than most people then you can pick his/her vibe of presence (just like you can pick up positivity or enthusiasm from people). If you don’t know someone like that then I have often recommended listening/watching to inspirational, motivational and positive stuff of your choice. I can sure recommend some books or videos but as they say ‘what is medicine for one could be poison for the other’, I don’t want to take chances…!

c) Yoga and Meditation… There is loads of material available about Yoga and meditation for your experiment and, who knows, it may become the favourite way for reconnecting with the present. You can just relax and listen to the soothing relaxation tracks. Afterwards you will feel relaxed and energized and your loud thinking will shut down or decrease significantly for maybe half a day. This makes it a lot easier to be in the present moment and just focus on what is going on right now. There are several ways of relaxation and meditation but again for the reasons of personification I would not recommend mine. Everybody should explore and find its own…

That was all about worry for now. Try and practice all these ways and when you rediscover yourself please feel free to add your comments here…

Tomorrow we will listen to a story. Till then… Bye and Stay tuned…!

Solution...!

Okay, today we will shift our Focus from analysis to Solution. This is the fourth most important step in fighting habit of worrying because according to the law of physics the sum total mass has to remain same; we need something to replace worry...! Isn't it...!?! How about a S-O-L-U-T-I-O-N...

4. Focus on a solution.

“There is a great difference between worry and concern. A worried person sees a problem, and a concerned person sees a solution.”
Harold Stephen

“The reason why worry kills more people than work is that more people worry than work.”
Robert Frost

”You can’t wring your hands and roll up your sleeves at the same time.”
Pat Schroeder

To move out of worry it’s very helpful to just start moving and taking action to solve what you are concerned about. Two tips that have helped me to take action more consistently are:

Using a morning routine.

This is perhaps the most powerful tip I have found so far in this area. You simply set up a routine in the morning that you do as soon as you wake up. This works so well because what you do early in the day often sets the context for your day. As humans we have a strong tendency to want to be consistent with what we have done before. That’s one big reason why a bad start often leads to a bad day and a good start often leads to a good day. That's the reason I send those inspiring 'Daily Mails' in the morning. (If you are not on my list, send me a request on amookbhartiya@gmail.com and you will start receiving them with immediate effect)

Focusing on and taking responsibility for the process, not the potential results.

I use this when I workout. I don’t take responsibility for the results in my mind. I take responsibility for showing up and doing my workout. The results have come anyway from that consistent action. And this makes it easier for me to take this action when I know that is all I need to focus on. Instead of using half of the energy and focus I have available on hoping that I “reach my goal real, real soon”.

Focus on the process and you will be a lot more relaxed and prone to continue than if you stare yourself blind on the potential results that never come as quickly as you want to and puts you on an emotional rollercoaster from day to day.

Nobody would ever be sure of the results of what he/she is upto. So prepare for the worst, hope for the best and give your best is the mantra of practice. By the way the most eminent professional including Doctors and Consultants call PRACTICE to what they do...!

Try this picture to practice FOCUS and we will see the Fifth step tomorrow, stay tuned...!

Comfort-zone...!?!

The next important and easier said than done step of quitting worrying is what popularly referred as Comfort Zone. Yes, it could be the ease you don’t want to loose that is posing a danger of making you worried all the time and has potential of turning you into a filthy-worrying-couch-potato. Beware…!

3. Let go of that familiarity and certainty.

“Worry is like a rocking chair–it gives you something to do but it doesn’t get you anywhere.”

Unknown

”People become attached to their burdens sometimes more than the burdens are attached to them.”

George Bernard Shaw

They say that if you put a frog into a pot of boiling water, it will leap out right away to escape the danger. But, if you put a frog in a kettle that is filled with water that is cool and pleasant, and then you gradually heat the kettle until it starts boiling, the frog will not become aware of the threat until it is too late. The frog's survival instincts are geared towards detecting sudden changes.
The Boiled Frog

Whatever you have been doing perhaps for decades feels familiar and comfortable. Even it could be something destructive as worrying. Taking a leap of faith and going into the unknown, making a change that may turn out to be positive, can feel scarier and more uncomfortable than what you are used to. Even if what you are used to is worse in the long run.

But at some point you have to make up your mind to start letting go of that old familiar part of yourself. You have to fill up the space that entire worrying used take up with new thinking. It may feel uncomfortable. It is not as intimately familiar as your past thoughts.

It can be scary and exciting at the same time because now you are not just someone who sees him/herself as worrier and that uses some techniques to lessen that. You are instead making a deep change to who you are, to how you view yourself. You are letting go of something that has been a big part of you and are leaving it at the side of the road.

One great tip that I have learned for making it easier to let go is to first accept it then to let it go. When you accept something instead of resisting it you stop feeding more energy into your problem and making it even bigger. A bit counterintuitive…!

This is useful when it comes to letting go. If you first accept what you want to let go you aren’t so emotionally attached to it and still feeding it with your focus and energy. And so it becomes less powerful and easier to just drop. As long as you resist it then it will be hard to let it go. All that worrying in your past may not have been very accurate at all, so perhaps it’s a smart choice to let go of that habit?

We will find out some more ways to lead a worry-free life...

Stay tuned...!

Exaggeration...!

Yesterday we tried to understand the ineffectiveness of worrying and even learnt the First Corrective Measure to overcome the fatal habit of nagging or worrying.

Today let’s try and cognize why it is important to call a spade a spade and stop beating around the bush dramatizing an anaconda for a small piece of fiber.

2. Don’t make mountains out of molehills.

“Worry often gives a small thing a big shadow.”
Swedish Proverb

“Worry is a thin stream of fear trickling through the mind. If encouraged, it cuts a channel into which all other thoughts are drained.”
Arthur Somers Roche

“If you treat every situation as a life and death matter, you’ll die a lot of times.”
Dean Smith

It’s very easy to fall into the habit of making mountains out of molehills. You think and think about a small problem until it becomes something that you believe may ruin your life. So why do we do it? Why don’t strive to make things easy and simple?

Well, one reason I believe is protection from pain. By making the problem huge can you can invent a helpful excuse to convince yourself to not take action.

Another reason is that the ego wants more. It wants to feel better or worse than someone else. By making things more complicated than they need to be you can make them feel very important. And since you are involved in these important things, since you have these BIG problems, well, then you have to be important too, right? Plus, by doing so you can get a lot of attention and comfort from other people.

So how do you get out of the habit of making mountains of molehills? Three tips:

• Zoom out. Ask questions that widen your current perspective. Questions like: “Does someone have it worse on the planet?” The answer may not result in positive thoughts, but it can sure snap you of a somewhat childish “poor, poor me…” attitude pretty quickly. This question changes the perspective from a narrow, self-centred one into a much wider one and helps me to lighten up about my situation and to be grateful about my life.
• Bring awareness to you own thought patterns. Ask yourself questions like: “Honestly, am I overcomplicating this?” and “What is the simplest and most straightforward solution to my problem that I may be avoiding to protect myself from pain?”
• Realize that much of this is in your head. Your relationships to what you want to achieve are – just like your relationships to people – to a large extent just in your head. Think that something is easy and simple instead of “heavy” and complicated and your perception of that external thing you want to achieve tends to change too. Experiment and find healthy and effective relationships to what you want to achieve instead of just seeing something like many people may do.
  

Tomorrow we will see one more technique for getting rid of this dreadful habit. Meanwhile you can start practicing what is learned...!

Stay tuned...!

Worrying...!

Starting today, we will deal with 'Worrying' for the next week.
We will try to understand the reasoning, process and ways to overcome the most fatal psychological disease of the modern living - Worrying, in the following pages...

”Do not anticipate trouble or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight.”
Benjamin Franklin

“The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.”
Elbert Hubbard

“If you ask what is the single most important key to longevity, I would have to say it is avoiding worry, stress and tension. And if you didn’t ask me, I’d still have to say it.”
George F. Burns

Worries... They can circle around and around in your head. Becoming louder and louder as they sap your strength and make you feel you weaker. It’s no fun. So what can you do about it? We are about to discover five timeless thoughts to help us overcome or at least lessen the worries in our lives. I hope you find something helpful...

1. 80-90 percent of what you fear will happen never really come into reality.

“When I look back on all these worries, I remember the story of the old man who said on his deathbed that he had had a lot of trouble in his life, most of which had never happened.”
Winston Churchill

“If you want to test your memory, try to recall what you were worrying about one year ago today.”
E. Joseph Cossman

This is a big one but one that is easy to forget about. Most things you fear will happen never happen. They are just monsters in your own mind. And if they happen then they will most often not be as painful or bad as you expected. Worrying is most often just a waste of time. This is of course easy to say. But if you remind yourself of how little of what you feared throughout your life that has actually happened you can start to release more and more of that worry from your thoughts.

Stay tuned and we will continue learning these wondereful insights...!!