Bringing inspiration into our daily lives

[Guest guest]

Dear Friends,

 

Our lives can often seem mundane and tediously the same, day after day. Why,

when we have the whole of creation around us to ignite our sense of wonder, do

we feel like this? What is it that drags us down to this level of experience

and, more importantly, what is it that will reverse this process? These are

questions that will assist us to come to a new understanding of what it means to

serve. It is not enough to pay lip service to the concept of service, stating

Yes, I am serving people all the time, yet going through the tasks mechanically,

without any sense of exploration as to what we are really doing. It is not

enough to be in the so-called helping professions, and yet be stressed and

grumpy all the time. Yet so many of us are. So many of us go through the daily

routine as if it were merely passing time, anxious to get home to pass more time

there! So the pattern is established and there seems little that we can do once

it becomes set.

 

How wrong we are.

 

SAI - See Always Inside

 

The key to understanding how this state of affairs comes about is to look

inside. If we are always looking outside ourselves for the meaning of what we

are doing, our experience will always be governed by the external circumstances.

The answer lies inside, not outside. The answer is always there, we just havent

asked the right question. The answer is not to be found in any other place than

the Self.

 

How does this relate to our work? Simply put, if our work is an extension of our

exploration of the answer, then it opens up a whole realm of possibilities,

which are ever exciting, fresh and new. When work becomes a part of our journey,

then it no longer has the ability to drag us down, or to turn us into

automatons. Work becomes endlessly fascinating because it throws up new

possibilities all the time. Work becomes an integral part of our spiritual

journey because it has the potential to reveal the workings of the higher Self,

within a context of interaction with the creative flow.

 

Work is Worship

 

Sai says Work is Worship. This simple statement contains so much wisdom. Let us

examine it to begin to understand what He means. We consider worship as a sacred

activity. It is an activity we set often aside time for, special time. This time

we focus on God. This time we dedicate to God. But, in doing that, have we not

made a separation between this time and all other times? Yet, how much are we

really focused on God during this time if we examine ourselves honestly? We may

sit with the intention to meditate, but thoughts immediately creep in. What

occurs to me is that, if we can make the total focus of our lives God, then

there will be no problem to keep that focus when we come to silent sitting. In

Sais most recent Christmas discourse He states, Japa (chanting), Tapa (penance),

Dhyana (meditation), Yoga (communion with God), etc., do not constitute true

Sadhana. Whatever you consider to be real is in fact unreal. Whatever is unreal

has to be given up. This truth has to be understood in the first instance. He

mentions this in terms of bodily attachment, and this has to be understood in

the light of the work that we undertake.

 

The Roles We Play

 

If we undertake work for reward, we are attached to that reward. This is a

bodily attachment. If we undertake the work as a worship, an offering to God

(whether it be in a dualistic sense, offering to the Lord of Creation, or

whether it be in a non-dualistic sense, offering to the Divinity that we truly

are), then the work no longer accrues attachment. So often this attachment comes

to us in the form of identification with the roles that we play. I say that I am

a boss. This engenders a form of egoism that is identified with being the boss.

I become, not only identified, but I become proud in my role. I am the boss,

therefore I take a greater salary, I have a nicer house, a flash car, a boat,

holidays overseas, etc., etc. We say that I am a mere worker. We become

identified with being a mere worker. This is also a form of egoism, for we make

a distinction between us and other kinds of workers. We do not have a nice

house, a fine car, a

boat, or take expensive holidays, but we would like to! The desires are still

there. The boss believes that it is his or her own abilities, qualifications,

etc. that have enabled them to become the boss. The worker believes that it is

the lack of those things that have kept them as a humble worker. The truth is

that both are deluded. What is the nature of this delusion?

Whatever role we are given, that is given from God. In fact, that role is God.

To see this, to understand it and then to experience it, is the goal of all

life, all spiritual practice. Whether we be the Boss or the Worker is, in the

end, irrelevant, it is the Divinity in the situation that is the true relevance,

for it is in experiencing that, where we will be set free from the binding ropes

of egoism and desire.

 

Inspired by the Divine

 

As we begin to follow this path of work as worship, we begin to find that we are

becoming the instrument for something greater than the little i. That something

moves us more and more and this is the beginning of inspiration. Inspiration

comes from the Divinity within. Work inspired by ideas and ideals that are the

product of the mind, will change with the mind. What is a great idea on one day,

will quickly become yesterdays news. However, those works that are lasting have

always been inspired by something beyond the petty desires of the moment. We

think of the works that have inspired people down through the ages. In general

they have a basis in religion or spirituality. Examples are: the Pyramids of

Egypt, the great Temples of India and South-East Asia, the Mosques of the middle

east, the Gothic cathedrals of Europe, the standing stones and mounds found

throughout the world, the scriptural works of all religions, the stories of the

lives of

Saints and sages. The list goes on. Why is this? It is because our ultimate

inspiration derives from that which is unchanging and permanent. This can only

be the ex-pression of Divinity through us.

Let us draw more and more from that inspiration to enable the work we do to

become a true ex-pression of Divinity. That is the path of Karma Yoga, the path

of selfless, pure work.

 

Now let's hear Swami directly on who we really are:

 

" You as body, mind or soul are a dream, but what you really are, is Existence -

Knowledge - Bliss. You are the God of the Universe. You are creating the whole

Universe and drawing it in. To gain the Infinite Universal identity, the

miserable little prison of individuality must go. Bhakthi (devotion) is no

crying nor any other negative condition. It is recognizing the One in all that

we see.

It is the heart that takes you to the goal. So, follow your heart. A pure heart

seeks beyond the intellect and gets inspired. Whatever we do will react upon us.

If we do good, we shall have happiness and if evil, unhappiness. Within you is

the mighty ocean of nectar divine. Seek it within you, feel it, free it. It is

the Self; not the body, no mind or intellect. It is neither the desire, nor the

desiring, and not even the object of desire.

You are above all these, which are just manifestations. You must appear as a

smiling flower or twinkling star. What is there in the world which makes you

desire it? "

 

With Blessings and Love,

Sri Sathya Sai Baba