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| Live each present moment completely and the future will take care of itself. Fully enjoy the wonder and beauty of each instant. |
The Voice of Paramahansa Yogananda |
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Paramahansa Yogananda Quotes
Happiness |
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SELF-REALIZATION
"Self-realization is the knowing – in body, mind, and soul – that we are one with the omnipresence of God; that we do not have to pray that it come to us, that we are not merely near it at all times, but that God's omnipresence is our omnipresence; that we are just as much a part of Him now as we ever will be. All we have to do is improve our knowing."
Truths are not truths to you unless you realize them within yourself. Without realization, they are just ideas. For spiritual perception, spiritual consciousness, lies not in vague theological ideas, but in the acquisition of Self-realization.
The man of Self-realization knows a bliss that cannot be compared to anything in this world. His joy is independent of any object or sensory experience. It is an incomparable happiness that cannot be described in words. Such joy is known as sattvik-ananda (pure bliss).
God-realization is attained only by great effort on the part of the yogi and by divine grace.
God-realization is the most difficult state to reach. Let no one fool himself, nor think that someone else can "give" it to him. Whenever I fell into a state of mental stagnation, my Master could do nothing for me. But I never gave up trying to keep in tune with him by cheerfully performing whatever he asked me to do. "I have come to him for God-realization," I reasoned, "and I must listen to his advice."
DESIRES
Desire is produced by indiscriminate contact with the objects of the senses. Expressing as the likes and dislikes of the ego, desire creeps into the consciousness of one who is not watchful enough in governing the reaction of his feelings to his various experiences in the world. It is a condition the ego imposes on itself, and is therefore detrimental to man's evenmindedness. Whatever has its origin in desire is a disturbing element, for desires are like stones pelted into the calm lake of consciousness. Attachment to pleasure or aversion to pain both destroy the equilibrium of the inner nature.
Fulfillment of a particular desire seems necessary only if one lacks conviction that he can find perfect fulfillment in God. One who is at peace in God is not tortured by unfulfilled earthly desires.
Unfulfilled desires are the root cause of reincarnation. You don’t have to be a king in order to have complete fulfillment. Nor do you end desires by giving up everything and becoming a poor man. You have your own self-created destiny with its lessons to be learned, and you must play well that part for which you were sent here. If everybody on the stage wants to be a king or queen, there will be no play. An actor with even a minor part can ruin the entire production by a poor performance. Every role is important; everyone should interact harmoniously for the success of the play.
I enjoy everything, but I have no desire for anything, so there is never any pain or disappointment from unfulfillment. Whatever I do, wherever I go, I enjoy myself.
The only way to outwit earthly disappointments over prosperity, fame, and happiness is not to feel sorry when you are denied what you think you want.
The world ends for us when we are free from desires. I enjoy everything, but I have no desire for anything, so there is never any pain or disappointment from unfulfillment. Whatever I do, wherever I go, I enjoy myself.
In the name and guise of fulfilling one's needs, ego lures man to continuous seeking of self-satisfaction, resulting in suffering and vexation. What would content the soul is forgotten, and the ego goes on endlessly trying to satisfy its insatiable desires. Kama (lust) is therefore the compelling desire to indulge in sensory temptations. Coercive materialistic desire is the instigator of man's wrong thoughts and actions.
Lust applies to the abuse of any or all of the senses in the pursuit of pleasure or gratification. Through the sense of sight man may lust after material objects; through the sense of hearing, he craves the sweet, slow poison of flattery, and vibratory sounds as of voices and music that rouse his material nature; through the lustful pleasure of smell he is enticed toward wrong environments and actions; lust for food and drink causes him to please his taste at the expense of health; through the sense of touch he lusts after inordinate physical comfort and abuses the creative sex impulse. Lust also seeks gratification in wealth, status, power, domination—all that satisfies the "I, me, mine" in the egotistical man. Lustful desire is egotism, the lowest rung of the ladder of human character evolution. By the force of its insatiable passion, kama [Desire for material pleasures] loves to destroy one's happiness, health, brain power, clarity of thought, memory, and discriminative judgment.
By constant self-indulgence, the ordinary person remains sense-ensnared. He finds himself limited to enjoyments connected only with the surface of the flesh. This sense pleasure yields a fleeting happiness, but shuts off the manifestation of the subtle, more pure and lasting enjoyments—the taste of silent blessedness and the innumerable blissful perceptions that appear whenever the meditating yogi's consciousness is turned from the outer sensory world to the inner cosmos of Spirit. The transient, misleading physical sense emotions are a poor substitute for heaven!
INTROSPECTION
Before you go to bed each night, sit for a short time and review the day. See what you are becoming. Do you like the trend of your life? If not, change it. By self-analysis and constant watching of all your actions and thoughts and moods, you will gradually learn your true nature and how to express if flawlessly.
Everyone should learn to analyze himself dispassionately. Write down your thoughts and aspirations daily. Find out what you are — not what you imagine you are! — because you want to make yourself what you ought to be. Most people don't change because they don't see their own faults.
Never concentrate on your faults. By doing so you identify yourself with them. You are the one who puts the veil of delusion in front of your wisdom’s eyes. Whatsoever you think, that is what you are.
Yesterday I was sitting in my room, looking back over my life, and I realized that everything in the outer world that had promised great happiness had deceived me, but one thing has never deceived me — my inner peace. As I passed through various experiences over the years, that unchanging inner peace has been proof to me of the existence of God.
HEALING
A genuine smile distributes the cosmic current, prana, to every body cell. The happy man is less subject to disease, for happiness actually attracts into the body a greater supply of the universal life energy.
Disease is generally considered a result of external material causes. Few people realize that it comes through the inaction of the Life Force within. Medicine, massage and electricity merely help to stimulate the cells in such a way that the Life Energy is induced to return and resume its work of maintenance and repair.
Absolute, unquestioning faith in God is the greatest method of instantaneous healing.
When modern science will discover how to go deep into the subtle electromagnetic constitution of man, it will be able to correct almost any medical condition in ways that would seem almost miraculous today. In the future, healing will be effected more and more by use of various types of light rays. Light is what we are made of—not gross physical light, but the finer spiritualized light of prana, intelligent life energy. That light is the real essence of everything. This earth is not "earth" as you see it; it is light. But you cannot perceive that until you know the underlying astral world.
There are three kinds of sickness: physical, mental, and spiritual. Physical sickness is due to different forms of toxic conditions, infectious diseases, and accidents. Mental sickness is caused by fear, worry, anger, and similar emotional inharmonies. Soul sickness is due to man's ignorance of his true relationship with God.
Ignorance is the supreme disease. When one banishes ignorance he has also banished the causes of all physical, mental, and spiritual disease.
Self-Realization!
Happiness |
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