C. Thinking Positively

This might sound drastic, but thoughts which come from outside are basically garbage, they are useless. The thoughts which come from inside are for our life purpose, they have the quality of the truth, the good and the beautiful. In India it is called SATYAM SHIVAM SUNDARAM. The truth, the good (sacred), the beautiful. Any thought that arises from inside will give us light. Any thought that arises from outside will entangle us and thus give us misery. Before doing any action, start a habit of pausing. Before any action, stop and ask yourself: “Is this action going to lead towards the truth, the good, the beautiful?” All three are connected. This is also a way of identifying our personality type or what is the current dominating factor in our life, is it truth, goodness, or beauty? If we pick anyone out of these three and work on and towards it, then the other two will develop automatically with this.

There is a story of a great poet, Shri Rabindranath Tegor. One time, Mahatma Gandhi, the father of the Indian nation, went to meet Tegor. He was staying at Tegor’s house and it was time for their evening walk. Suddenly Tegor told Gandhi, “Give me a few minutes, I will just comb my hair and then come.” For Gandhi it was just too much, “You comb your hair and come? At this age? You are in your 60s and still combing your hair like this.” He was irritated. He became more irritated as ten minutes had passed and Tegor still was not outside. Gandhi kept looking at his watch and the time for the evening walk was passing. So he goes to Tegor’s room and sees that Tegor is in front of the mirror still doing his hair job. “What’s going on here? Let’s go, it’s getting late, we will miss the evening walk.” Tegor says, “I’m coming, I’m coming.” Finally they got to go for the walk and Gandhi told him, “You don’t need to comb your hair like this at this age.” To which Tegor responded, “When I was young if I didn’t comb my hair it was ok, but now at this age if I don’t comb my hair it’s not good, because my look could make someone not feel good. By taking good care of myself, my persona, the way I look should make the onlooker feel good, and if I make someone feel not good seeing me, that’s not good.”

For someone who thinks this way and the main objective is beauty, he will grow the other aspects too. Not only is he taking care of beauty, he’s also taking care that the other person doesn’t feel bad when looking at him. Speaking untruth is not good. If someone works on one of the three, then he will not speak anything which is untruth. Out of the three, any point we start, the other two will develop automatically. So choose which resonates with you and figure out on which you want to focus on.

The Power of Thoughts

One time, when Swami Ram was living in the Gangotri area in Himalayas from where mother Ganga originates, he was sitting at one place at the banks of Ganga and someone said, “Don’t move! Behind you is a snake.” He heard that and started running from the place and surprisingly, the snake started to go after him. Somehow he managed to escape from that situation. Next day he went up to a Swami and said, “This place is very dangerous, even the snakes follow and go after you.” The Swami answered, “It is because you had a fearful thought in your mind and that thought created an energy frequency, due to that the snake started to go after you.” See how powerful thoughts are. Whatever you wish in life, generate thoughts towards this, it certainly helps. Focus your thoughts and emotions on that which you want. Whatever we don’t want in life, don’t direct thoughts towards it. And if a thought comes then say, “Stop nonsense! You are of no use for me. You don’t serve me.” Mind will start listening and these thoughts will reduce.