HCa QT X TUMMER DHARLY LING X DOM Q DTR CRSS TO UELL GHSH1s

 

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Karma-phala-tyaga (giving up the fruits of action) is a most frequently recurring idea in the Gita. ‘For a man with body consciousness it is not possible to give up work,’ says Sri Krishna. ‘He who gives up the fruits of the work is indeed a tyagi.’ Not even a fool would act unless prompted by a motive, says the well-known adage. So, how to reconcile between this adage and Sri Krishna’s golden maxim that we have the right only to work, not to the fruits thereof? (2.47) There are motives and motives for work. The more selfish the motive, the more attached we become to work. Selfless work, too, has its inevitable result: purification of mind. We have this much choice while doing work: (1) be anxious about the fruits of work, be attached to the work and be swayed by success or failure in work; or (2) concentrate all our mental energies on the work in hand, certain that the work will bear fruit; and cultivate detachment from work.

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What thing I am I do not know. I wander secluded, burdened by my mind. When the first-born of Truth has come to me I receive a share in that self-same Word. — Rig Veda, I.164.37

 May we not anger you, O God, in our worship By praise that is unworthy or by scanty tribute. — Rig Veda, II.33.4 

May He delight in these my words. — Rig Veda, I.25.18

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dwm 

"The single greatest predictor of a good night's sleep is if I go to bed on an empty stomach."

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The name ‘Hindu’ itself denotes something less, and more, than a set of theological beliefs. In many languages, French and Persian amongst them, the word for ‘Indian’ is ‘Hindu’. Originally, Hindu simply meant the people beyond the River Sindhu, or Indus.  and to make matters worse, the word ‘Hindu’ did not exist in any Indian language till its use by foreigners gave Indians a term for self-definition. Hindus, in other words, call themselves by a label that they didn’t invent themselves in any of their own languages, but adopted cheerfully when others began to refer to them by that word. (Of course, many prefer a different term altogether—Sanatana Dharma, or eternal faith,

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PET SQUIRREL DTH

Sleep now little one, God’s brightest star. Your light in our life will never dim. Our memories of you is strong in our hearts. Forever we’ll remember how you like to play and pull out daddy’s hair until he’s bald. Chewing his ears makes you happy and him playfully mad. Sleepy time was mommy time for sweet lullabies, cuddles and kisses. Then a treat before we tuck you in your cozy warm little bed. We miss you so much our beloved TumTum. Saving you from Hurricane Irma was the best thing we’ve ever done. Our heart is broken that you were taken from us. But we would never want you to suffer any pain. Our baby passed away from odontoid tumor. His vet was kind enough to ease his passing so he didn’t suffer needlessly. He was a very loving and intelligent boy. Most impressive about him is his ability to answer and shake his head No. He lived a life full of love and cage free. Rest now little one and know that you are loved now and forever.

TumTum’s final resting place will be beside Bernie ( my cat and beloved bright white angel) at Beaches Memorial Park with my mom, dad and brother

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Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”

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LOTUS POND ON A STARRY NIGHT

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PSY Clinically depressed people can find it hard to tell the difference between their own negative emotions, like anger, guilt and frustration.

This could be part of the reason that depression is so hard to deal with.

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 The mood of the Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavas is that they are not interested in associating with people who worship anyone other than Śrīmatī Rādhikā. They will not even look at Kṛṣṇa without Her. ❞

— Srimad Narayana Goswami Maharaj

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D SHAI

Do you lose your awareness in deep sleep? How was sleep before awakening and how is it after your awakening?

This was the shock of my life.

A story of relative me: several years ago I was obsessed with figuring out the truth. I was listening to non-dual teachers and studying ACIM at the time, that kept repeating “there is no world.” One night, after so much struggle to understand it, I went to sleep and before waking observed this:

1. No knowing or not knowing, no experience, no awareness
2. Awareness
3. Spirit
4. The world

What blew me away… the shock of my life at the time… was that the world was an appearance. I was baffled that it wasn’t real, wasn’t solid; that is was inconsequential. That day was a strange day, digesting what no one had EVER taught me. Even though non-dual teachings pointed to it, seeing it for myself was entirely different: The world wasn’t real! All my teachers who taught me were themselves not real. I felt totally alone, and this was pointing me towards true non-duality. It was still a relative understanding, though.

I’m talking about how I experienced it then. Telling a story, in which the world seemed like a cherry on top of a cake — it was very small relative to my being.

Let me now explain the 4 levels I wrote down.

1. The absolute absence… does NOT equal non-existence. Existence is never non-existent, it is just unaware that it is.
2. Awareness is the light coming on. The first sense of I. No body, no person, no world, not even Spirit just yet. Just Being.
3. Spirit. So here there is already space and that which fills it (information). This is the level we often experience as dreams. Time and space are not as limited as what we call “the physical”. If it happens that you’re conscious on this level, you become aware of the absence of limitation. As you think it, it happens.
4. The body; the world. Anything to explain?

Through the years I’ve seen that these levels are all always there. They don’t come and go. What I AM simply has Action — which is the the side of presence through which it knows itself; and Stillness, which is the side of absence of any sort of knowing whatsoever, including I (awareness). Two sides to the coin that you are. And they are both present always.

If all 4 levels are always there, that means that the deep deep sleep is here now. That is to say I don’t know what I AM. If I define myself as awareness, I am an object again. Any definition whatsoever cannot be me. Any knowing.
So knowing will be there, but by knowing I don’t know anything. Knowing is simply entertainment, a possibility of mySelf manifested.

When I first saw that the world is a projection (actually this wasn’t the first time, but the most vivid one), I took it personally. That’s why I love Karl Renz who says, “if you wake up, don’t take it personally”. The ‘I’ immediately took over this pure seeing and started to analyze “what does this mean for me?” It always wants to know “what can I get out of this?” It always wants to turn it into an advantage. Again Karl Renz saves the day by saying: “The absolute advantage is being That which never needs an advantage.”
What ‘I’ did at first was be awake IN the dream.
Only years later was that advantage seen as just another way to suffer — because the one who needs an advantage is always in a state of lack. This stance of “I’m awake, you’re asleep” is useless. Still two. So later — in the very illusory relative story — it became being awake as the dream. I Am That I Am.

Lastly, I want to say that these states are NOT special. I don’t know what “awakened sleep” would be because everyone sleeps the same. Nobody remembers deep deep sleep (#1) because there is no memory there. How can there be if there is no knowing nor not-knowing? There is literally nothing to remember. And nobody has ever complained about their absence! Then the level of pure awareness (#2) — again, people just call this “I had no dreams. Slept so good!” Spirit (#3) — like I said is often experienced as dreams. But many of these dreams are another form of you that is less dense, hence spirit.

These levels are simply: (Unspeakable)→ I → I AM → I AM this. I is light. I AM is the context (space and time). I AM this is form. Like a room that is absolutely dark (#1), then a light comes on (#2), then the space of the room is known (#3), then the objects contained in the room are known (#4).

Interestingly people don’t normally make anything of having had dreamless sleep. They know they were there, and yet never inquire into that. What/who was there exactly? And I never hear anyone say “I had dreamless sleep.. there were no forms at all, and still I was. I must not be this form I take myself to be.” How does this never occur to people? I would say because the moment the 4th level — world/body — wakes up, the identification as form/body is there again and most people don’t question it.

If we are to be precise, what you are never sleeps or wakes up. These 4 states pass through it, AS it. That is the meaning of I Am That I Am. Whatever state — I Am That. Because I am not a particular state. No particular position (not even awareness). Sometimes during the day I daydream. Being a past student of Gurdjieff I thought this is ‘bad’ and means I can’t be what I Am… I am not self-remembering, not aware. Luckily, you don’t need anything to be what you can never not be. No state is it. So when I daydream I am as Spirit, and I still am what I am. I Am That I Am. I can never not be me. Many people identify with one of these states, and you will hear them say “I am awareness” / “I am light” (this refers to “I am the light of the world”); or “I am spirit”; or, of course “I am Daniel, this one who was born and will die.” Some may even say “I am the void” or “I am nothing”. But what you are can’t be one thing and not another. That’s separation. What you are is present throughout all of it. It’s the Always. The Uninterrupted. Once you discriminate it’s not it.
So I have no clue what I am, and all these 4 states I am.
The difficulty of this for a seeker is that it is so utterly effortless, the mind can never grab it. It needs nothing from ‘you’. Not even for ‘you’ to be aware. It doesn’t care. Because it doesn’t even need awareness to be.

These 4 levels, by the way, can be detailed further and then you may get the 10 spheres of Kabbalah. These just talk about absolute aspects of the absolute.

In one sentence: awakened or not, I don’t sleep any different. It was always like this. The only thing is once it happened that I paid attention to the shifting from one level to another, namely deep deep sleep to deep dreamless sleep, and the shifting from that to spirit and world. Then I tried to identify with ONE of these states. Then I realized I Am That I Am. That is, I cannot be lost in any of these states. I cannot be lost period.

Deep deep sleep points to that you don’t even need awareness to be what you are. Even there you are not lost. Every night we are so happy that the multiverse is about to be annihilated. We know it’s peace, even though there is no one there to experience it. And yet… we fear death…

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The absolute absence… does NOT equal non-existence. Existence is never non-existent, it is just unaware that it is.

The above bit is what no one questions & takes for granted and does not even talk about, is the culminating point of all there is: NO-THING !

JUST ONE INFINITE EXISTENCE . NO DIVISIONS IN IT . ONE ONLY .

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Most land in awareness. They take that position. The pointer is: what you are can never not be. There is nothing that needs to be cultivated — including awareness — in order to be what you can never not be. That’s the joke. The ‘I’ thinks it’s a state, a separate state. That’s where it always misses.

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Very interesting. I can't verify the accuracy of what you are saying, and at times cannot understand, but for the most part intuitively I do understand (By understand I think I mean I don't disagree!). It rings true somehow.

Your last sentence, “and yet we fear death.“ made me wonder. I decided then to test that — to see whether i did fear death. So I went within, and searched for that fear, that thought. Sure enough it was there but it didn't bother me. Then I looked down at my wrinkled arms (looking pretty old!) and recalled seeing my father, my sister and my brother after each of them had died. I contemplated their bodies as they lay there. (Three separate occasions) Next I imagined myself dead, and looked at my arms, seeing them dead, and I laughed! Big grin! I'm laughing now.

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God gives and forgives; man gets and forgets.A

QARASTIC OEEDY PPL

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PRMHNSA YGANANDA 

ather and I returned to Bareilly soon after the crematory rites for the well-beloved. Early every morning I made a pathetic memorial-pilgrimage to a large sheoli tree which shaded the smooth, green-gold lawn before our bungalow. In poetical moments, I thought that the white sheoli flowers were strewing themselves with a willing devotion over the grassy altar. Mingling tears with the dew, I often observed a strange other-worldly light emerging from the dawn. Intense pangs of longing for God assailed me. I felt powerfully drawn to the Himalayas.

Picture: 50 Amherst Street home of Yoganandaji’s family in 1904. Yoganandaji’s mother died in this place. Later Master Mahasaya stayed started a school here.

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প্রাক্তনের হাত ছাড়াইয়া নিতে কিছুরই শক্তি নাই। এই প্রাক্তনেই সুখ দুঃখ লাভ লোকসান, ভালমন্দের প্রতিপোষণ করেন। ভাগ্যে যাহা যখন ঘটিবে তখন তাহার জন্য উতালা হইতে নাই।..... যখন প্রারব্ধ ভোগের দন্ড মুক্তির কোন উপায় নাই-ই তখন এই চিন্তা ভুলই। নামে পড়িয়া থাকিবেন। (যেই নাম সেই কৃষ্ণ ভজ নিষ্ঠা করি, নামের সহিত ফিরে আপনি শ্রীহরি।।) নাম বৈ আর কিছুই থাকিতে দেখা যায় না। নামই থাকিবে, নামের সঙ্গে থাকিয়া নামের সেবা পরিচর্য্যা করাই ধর্ম্ম।

-শ্রীশ্রী রামঠাকুর

বেদবানী ২য় খন্ড(৮৩)

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CHITTA VRITTI

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NKB

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EMO PAIN X ACG

The ancient-greek writer Antiphanes believed that “all pain is one malady with many names.” He was right, neurologically speaking. Physical pain activates several parts of the brain, notably the anterior cingulate cortex, or ACC. Neuroscientists have found that our thrifty brains piggyback the experience of emotional pain in the same location. In one example, from 2003, researchers at UCLA and Macquarie University in Sydney conducted an experiment in which participants’ brains were scanned while they played a virtual ball-tossing game. At one point, they were excluded from the game in a way that mimicked social exclusion. Sure enough, their ACCs became active, much as they would if the participants had been experiencing physical pain.

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Physical pain has two basic parts: the sensory component (the physical sensation) and the affective component (the perception of unpleasantness). Mental pain shares this second component, leading researchers to some interesting findings. For example, in 2005 researchers reported the case of a patient with a congenital physical pain insensitivity who experienced an intense headache for the first time in her life only after the unexpected death of her younger brother.

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PARACETAMOL FOR MKK

If we experience emotional and physical pain at least partially in the same area of the brain, it’s no wonder that the same substances can blunt them. For example, just as opioids such as morphine and heroin can relieve severe physical pain, they can also mute the distress people feel from social separation. This is likely why people often report that heroin feels like love and why loneliness can lead to higher levels of opioid abuse, especially among women. Similarly, the psychologist C. Nathan DeWall and his colleagues have shown that a daily acetaminophen dose can lower self-reported hurt feelings compared with a placebo by lowering activity in the ACC. (And unlike opioids, this analgesic is not addictive, nor dangerous in ordinary doses.)

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DTHING OLD LION

"We found him lying in the grass, exhausted unable to move. We were no more then five feet from him as he lay dying in the shade of a tree. Dropping my camera we stared at one another locking eyes for what seemed for an eternity. I just wanted him to know that he would not die alone as he struggled to breath, his chest rising only every so often. Then a last twitch of an ear, his last breath, he was gone. The King was dead."

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MENTAL PAIN EQUIVLNT TO EVO SOCIAL OUTCAST FEELING

That’s not to say that maximum blunting is the right solution. Like physical pain, mental pain serves a purpose: It helps us avoid things like social exclusion. DeWall and his colleagues have argued that the fear and bitterness we feel when we’re excluded are remnants of an earlier time in human history when being a social outcast could mean not having the protection of a community, making survival hard or impossible. Now it can be maladapted, making FOMO feel like a toothache. You can know intellectually that being criticized for your opinions is not like being thrown out of your community and being forced to live in the woods alone. But your ACC doesn’t know the difference, giving you a lot of suffering for something you know intellectually is pretty inconsequential.

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A Shortcut for Feeling Just a Little Happier

Mental and physical pain share neurological roots. A simple painkiller can help with both.

By Arthur C. Brooks

Jan Buchczik

AUGUST 25, 2022

“How to Build a Life” is a weekly column by Arthur Brooks, tackling questions of meaning and happiness. Click here to listen to his podcast series on all things happiness, How to Build a Happy Life.

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Lately, my back has been hurting. I did something weird in the gym, resulting in a dull ache, and now I’m taking it easy. I appreciate the feedback the pain provides, because I would like to be able to walk upright for a few more decades and don’t want to risk a more permanent injury. Still, I don’t enjoy it, so I’ve been taking acetaminophen to blunt my discomfort.

Back pain is normal, but a different sort of hurt is even more typical in my life, and probably yours as well: mental suffering. I don’t mean clinical depression or anxiety, which require professional intervention, but rather the routine, chronic grind of conflict, dissatisfaction, and sadness, which often constitute a dull ache in the background of our days. Many philosophers have considered this discomfort to be our natural state. In his Pensées, Blaise Pascal asserted that, at rest, man “feels his nothingness, his loneliness, his insufficiency, his dependence, his weakness, his emptiness.” Maybe that seems a little overstated to you, but research does show that people tend to experience negative or mixed emotions nearly half the time.

Wouldn’t it be nice to have a handy tool to blunt everyday mental pain a bit? Not to become numb to life—just to take the edge off, especially when it is interfering with normal life, the way you can swallow a Tylenol when your back hurts. It turns out that there are safe and healthy methods to do exactly this, including taking the same sort of painkiller for what ails your body and your mind. And that’s only the beginning.

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The ancient-greek writer Antiphanes believed that “all pain is one malady with many names.” He was right, neurologically speaking. Physical pain activates several parts of the brain, notably the anterior cingulate cortex, or ACC. Neuroscientists have found that our thrifty brains piggyback the experience of emotional pain in the same location. In one example, from 2003, researchers at UCLA and Macquarie University in Sydney conducted an experiment in which participants’ brains were scanned while they played a virtual ball-tossing game. At one point, they were excluded from the game in a way that mimicked social exclusion. Sure enough, their ACCs became active, much as they would if the participants had been experiencing physical pain.

Physical pain has two basic parts: the sensory component (the physical sensation) and the affective component (the perception of unpleasantness). Mental pain shares this second component, leading researchers to some interesting findings. For example, in 2005 researchers reported the case of a patient with a congenital physical pain insensitivity who experienced an intense headache for the first time in her life only after the unexpected death of her younger brother.

If we experience emotional and physical pain at least partially in the same area of the brain, it’s no wonder that the same substances can blunt them. For example, just as opioids such as morphine and heroin can relieve severe physical pain, they can also mute the distress people feel from social separation. This is likely why people often report that heroin feels like love and why loneliness can lead to higher levels of opioid abuse, especially among women. Similarly, the psychologist C. Nathan DeWall and his colleagues have shown that a daily acetaminophen dose can lower self-reported hurt feelings compared with a placebo by lowering activity in the ACC. (And unlike opioids, this analgesic is not addictive, nor dangerous in ordinary doses.)

Read: Mindfulness hurts. That’s why it works.

That’s not to say that maximum blunting is the right solution. Like physical pain, mental pain serves a purpose: It helps us avoid things like social exclusion. DeWall and his colleagues have argued that the fear and bitterness we feel when we’re excluded are remnants of an earlier time in human history when being a social outcast could mean not having the protection of a community, making survival hard or impossible. Now it can be maladapted, making FOMO feel like a toothache. You can know intellectually that being criticized for your opinions is not like being thrown out of your community and being forced to live in the woods alone. But your ACC doesn’t know the difference, giving you a lot of suffering for something you know intellectually is pretty inconsequential.

Whether it’s a useful warning sign or a pure inconvenience, mental pain can get in the way of our lives. The trick is to safely make it manageable, without erasing it completely, like over-the-counter painkillers do for daily aches. Here’s how.

1. Feel your mental pain physically.

A lot of mental suffering has bodily manifestations. When I am anxious or stressed, for example, I tend to hold my abdominal muscles tight; other people breathe shallowly or clench their fists.

Noticing such physical signs can help you actively manage the feelings causing them. Try to pay attention to when your body tenses up—it is a cue that you have stress to deal with. Purposively relax your shoulders and chest and take deep breaths, and you’ll likely find some instantaneous relief. People who get good at recognizing physical symptoms of emotional issues and taking them on in these simple ways have been found to have superior emotional regulation.

Read: To get out of your head, get out of your house

2. Get spiritual.

A substantial body of evidence suggests that religious and spiritual activity helps alleviate pain. A great number of people experiencing chronic physical pain turn to religious and spiritual practices for coping and relief. Meanwhile, participating in traditional religion can raise the subjective well-being of people suffering from mental pain, such as bereavement. Simple prayer can alleviate stress, as can mindfulness meditation. And no surprise at this point: When researchers look at the brain regions involved in meditation, they find reductions in pain-related activity in the ACC.

The next time you notice a dull ache in your soul, try offering it up in prayer or meditation. Catholics, for example, will mentally join their suffering to that of Christ. Buddhists will use sadness in meditation to understand with compassion the suffering of others. Find your own way, in your own tradition.

3. Don’t suffer by yourself.

Connection to other people is highly protective against all kinds of pain. Experiments have shown that social support alleviates physical pain symptoms; the evidence for emotional pain is even more abundant. In a 2007 study in the journal NeuroImage, researchers tracked people for a 10-day period and assessed their hormonal responses to social stressors. They found that people with more social support had milder responses to the hormone cortisol in the face of stress. Not surprisingly, they also had lower activity in the ACC.

Having family or friends around you—as long as the relationships are healthy—is protective when it comes to the mental pains of life. Cultivating those bonds is like taking a daily vitamin: When you are especially vulnerable, the defenses you’ve built up will offer relief. And you can always “up the dose” by reaching out to these people for support when your suffering is acute.

Read: The type of love that makes people happiest

4. Take a pill.

If all else fails, or you simply need easier relief to make it through a tough day, you always have acetaminophen. I wouldn’t recommend this as your first or only line of self-care, because it doesn’t address the root of your issues, just some symptoms. But in a pinch, it can help.

In one way, mental suffering is entirely unlike its physical counterpart: You can soothe your own pain by soothing that of others. Follow the example of President Abraham Lincoln, who lost one of his dearest friends, William McCullough, in a Civil War battle in Mississippi. In his grief, he reached out to McCullough’s daughter Fanny, who was inconsolable.

In a letter dated December 23, 1862, he wrote, “It is with deep grief that I learn of the death of your kind and brave Father; and, especially, that it is affecting your young heart beyond what is common.” He went on to promise her, based on his own life experience, “You are sure to be happy again … The memory of your dear Father, instead of an agony, will yet be a sad sweet feeling in your heart, of a purer and holier sort than you have known before.”

Read: How to make the baggage of your past easier to carry

The letter was no doubt helpful to Fanny; I strongly suspect that it was also therapy for Lincoln. Studies have consistently shown that helping others in distress leads to better emotional regulation and lowers symptoms of depression. But you probably don’t need a study to remind you that giving love may in fact be the best strategy to reduce pain in this difficult life.

Arthur C. Brooks is a contributing writer at The Atlantic, the William Henry Bloomberg Professor of the Practice of Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School, and a professor of management practice at the Harvard Business School. He’s the host of the podcast series How to Build a Happy Life and the author of From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness, and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life.