Fearlessness – possessing or displaying courage; able to face and deal with danger or fear without flinching.

Being fearless in doing the correct thing, it is easy to be fearless in situations where you want or want to enjoy something even if it might be a wrong thing to do.
Purity of Heart – a happiness that will never harm anyone. – Put others before ourselves. Only a person with a pure heart can actually begin to understand and experience true happiness.
Steadfastness in the Yoga of Wisdom – Firmly loyal or constant; unswerving.

Single minded determination to stand-by and apply the True Wisdom in life.
Charitable – Generous in giving money or other help to the needy. Mild or tolerant in judging others; lenient.

Unselfish behaviour in helping others in their time of need. Because what goes around comes around, that is true for both good and evil things in life.
Self-restraint – Restraint of one’s emotions, desires, or inclinations; self-control.

Controlling over one’s desires can one control the mind, and control of the mind is no ordinary feat.
Sacrifice – Forfeiture of something highly valued for the sake of one considered to have a greater value or claim. From practical life everyone knows there is no gain without any pain. To achieve something important more than a few dear things in life need to be sacrificed.
Austerity – Strict or severe in discipline; ascetic

Without proper discipline the mind wavers and a wavering mind is always an enemy of one’s goals.
Straightforwardness – Not circuitous or evasive; honest and frank. Free from ambiguity or pretense; plain and open.
Non-Injury – A pacifist
Absence of Anger – Not that the person does not show anger but rather does not get angry at all, total control of the mind and the emotions stirring within.
Renunciation – Non-attached behaviour towards possessions and relations.
Peacefulness – Again total calmness and peacefulness and control over ones senses and mind.
Absence of Crookedness – It is easier to do things using wicked means. Character of a person is proven when he/she does things that are right and not easy.
Compassion to all living beings – Humans think they are superior, but their true colours can only be judged on how they treat the less superior beings.
Non-Covetousness – Being greedy to have what others have is not a sign of a strong being. What others have can not be yours. You should work hard to have your own possessions.
Self-explanatory qualities:
Gentleness
Modesty
Absence of Fickleness
Vigour
Forgiveness
Fortitude
Purity – In thoughts, words, and actions.
Absence of Hatred
Absence of Pride

A couple of weeks ago I asked a Spiritual Master to give me a short message so that I could write something from my knowledge, wisdom and experiences. I wrote something from whatever I knew, and from my intuitions. It was more of a test for myself than anything. A lot of the things are not explained completely, it is left for the reader to decide what to understand from the message provided. Here is…..

A simple message from Beyond

“To be natural is to be Spiritual.”

Joy. What brings us joy and happiness? Is it what we have studied at a prestigious university, how much money we have, or how long we can live? Is it how many things we possess, or how much pleasure we obtain from the worldly indulgences? Is it not how we put our knowledge and understanding to use for the betterment of our lives and the lives of the people around us? Is it not how we live, no matter how long? Is it not that we have a good family and a great home, instead of how large our house is? Is it not that we can love and have compassion for every living being, rather than only focus on what we can gain from a fellow being? What brings us joy? Each individual has a different answer to that, only you can answer the question for yourself. However, in most cases, unless you have not yet tapped into the wisdom of the experiences of life, your answer would be to live a simple life with love and compassion for everyone, without expecting much in return. Expectation from others is one of the simplest reasons for the cause of unhappiness in life. A child expects pampering and fulfilling of demands from parents; parents expect from the children to listen to them all the time and fulfil the dreams they have for them; a life partner expects a complete focus and expects you to change according to what they want you to be. Everyone expects something from you and you need to change yourself accordingly, yes, it is true in the practical world, life is like that today.

However, actual happiness comes from accepting people the way they are, whether they expect anything from you or not. Each person is a unique gift to this world, if everyone were to be the same then there would be only one type of music, one type of food, one type of dance, and no JOY. Human nature over the centuries has changed so much that violence comes to the forefront of the mind before forgiveness or discussions; egos get hurt before seeing that the person has the right to decide whatever he/she chooses for himself/herself. Humans follow whatever is taught to them from the beginning by the society without questioning their reasons for existence. Nevertheless, we forget that the true nature of any living being is to be in a state of joy and happiness, that is why we all seek happiness. By belonging to something or someone, by having a good family, by working hard to fulfil our goals and dreams, but what we do not pay attention to is how we acquire this happiness in the current era. We try push and shove people around to get our way, we cut the progress of others because of jealousy or greed, and we snatch from someone to feed our own family. Will this bring us true happiness? Many would argue that this is the way of the world now and that we get only one life to live, so why not we live it for ourselves and stop caring about others. An opposing argument to this can be that since we assume that we get only one life to live why not live it properly with love and compassion, and honourably too. Otherwise, there would be hardly any difference between animals and humans. If we are to consider ourselves as a better species than the rest, we better start acting like it and take responsibility of the power we have at our disposal – the power of the human mind – and use it wisely. To find an end to the infinite cycle of birth, disease, old age, and death, to find the true nature of the Self; understand that Life is eternal, and to exist only in a state of pure Bliss and be surrounded by unconditional Love.

One of the instructions for life from the great Dalai Lama is “Judge your success by what you had to give up in getting it”. In addition, one of the first lines from a book titled “Spring of Inspiration” is “Success is what you achieve without violating the rights of others”. Would happiness achieved by deceiving others or by sacrificing your own moral grounds have any importance? People mistake pleasure for happiness. Once a survey on CNN showed that, the country with the happiest people in the world was Bangladesh. Surprised? What do they have that other countries do not? Happiness does not come from creating tall structures, or showing your brain and muscle power to the world, that would last for a few years, maybe decades, but would ruin a whole lot in that time. Bangladeshis are content with what they have, that makes them happy, being close to their true nature rather than chasing some ambitious plan of developing rapidly without direction, is what has given them joy. They are satisfied with what they have achieved slowly and surely rather than being greedy and becoming unhappy. This is also true for every country whose people have not fallen to the temptations of making quick money and gaining power to intimidate other countries.

Yes, aims should be high. Yes, there should be deadlines, but not at an expense of the future generation, we give in to temptations without thinking what effects can that have on our children and their future, the other living beings, and the planet itself. People tend to get so impatient and are in fear that they are losing time, that they forget the true nature of the journey of their life. Is it more important for you to give your children material things or give them strong values? Only strong values like humility, discipline, understanding, integrity, decency, respect, honesty, and hard work will be able to help and guide a person through tough as well as easy phases of life. These qualities should not be given only to your own children but to every child you possibly come to know. If these qualities were instilled in the children during their upbringing, those parents would be the least worried people on the planet for them; instead of this, parents today want to see their dreams come true through their children, rather than asking them what they want from life. Once a modestly wealthy family had fallen to dire circumstances with too less money to afford anything pleasurable with time the circumstances changed and they could afford many more things now. The father wanted to gift his son a very good portable music device simply because he could afford it, but since the son had been instilled with better values than just to worry about showing off what he had and what he could afford, he argued with him that the device, no matter how good, will only play the music that he puts into it, so why should he not settle for a less expensive yet good device. When we get what we want only gives us a temporary state of pleasure, but if what we want is, also the same thing as what we need and we achieve it that brings us true happiness. Happiness, joy, and unconditional love are felt from deep within; these are the only emotions that are connected directly to the soul of any being.

Another important message from the Dalai Lama is “Great Achievements and great love involve great risks”. Most of the time the universe gives us not what we want, but what we need. It is up to us whether we find satisfaction and happiness with what we have received or we choose to create a new higher aim for ourselves and put at risk that we already have. Either way it is all a part of destiny, no matter how good or bad a person is in the end the person achieves what he/she is destined to achieve. However, in many cases, even destiny can be changed, but none of the rules of the physical world applies in changing the course of destiny.

Most of us are destined to spend all of our life on a planet in a solar system where almost no other planet is capable of sustaining life. Science believes that in the beginning of the universe only one element was in existence, hydrogen. From this massive clouds of hydrogen formed stars over a course of millions of years, some stars were as large as our Sun some were even larger. Stars like the Sun convert hydrogen to helium and in the process release a very large amount of energy. The larger stars have the potential to fuse together the atoms of hydrogen to form heavier elements like carbon, nitrogen, oxygen – the most basic elements for organic life forms. These stars are so massive that they wilt under their own gravity and in one brilliant explosion of mass and energy – called the supernova; blast these heavy elements in all directions, forming large clouds of gases. These atoms of heavier elements along with hydrogen slow down and gather around to form another large cloud of gases, called the nebula – the birth place of a star; these again form a solar system with planets rotating around a star almost the size of the sun and with any luck one of the planets in this solar system would have a sufficient amount of liquid water, oxygen, and other life-sustaining characteristics to chemically bundle together the first form of organic life. This simplest of life forms then evolves into something more complex and in time humans (bodily form) come into existence. At least one large star has died billions of years ago to bring us into existence on this tiny planet we call Earth – thus all of us are basically made up of star-dust. Now, if the current science is to be believed (yes, modern science keeps changing the theories, but it is still in its youth and doing best what it can, in a good way to make lives simpler in the physical world.), the total number of stars, in the galaxies of the universe, is around 10²² so there is a very good probability, that our planet is not the only place in this vast universe where life exists – as also noted by the brilliant mind of Dr. Stephen Hawking recently. Is this all by chance or by design? But if it is possible to create life chemically via a random chain of events that have happened at different places and times in the universe, the next question that pops up in our mind is how and from where this life (physical form) gets the intelligence, the identity, and the emotions? This is where the science starts to reach its limits, if it tries to answer using only physical world methods – the methods that involve the understanding of the world, which can be perceived by the six senses namely touch, sight, smell, taste, sound, and equilibrium. The metaphysical sides of science have to be explored in order to understand what life really is and what its true nature and purpose is.

“There comes a time in the lives of many people when they earnestly desire to find an answer to these questions. They would like to know why they are here, what it is all about, and if they can learn to master circumstances instead of continually being a prey to them. They begin to make an individual effort to find out for themselves if there is really any rhyme or reason, any justice in life, anything to hope for or to work for.” – (Alder 1938)

Now, if you are still reading, this is the point where it begins to get interesting and complex. If a human were given only the previously mentioned six senses, would he/she be able to live a normal life? For that reason, the humans are equipped with mind of their own to receive messages perceived by the senses. With the help of the senses, they are able to recognize their surroundings – sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and touches. With the help of the mind, they are able to understand the things gathered by the senses, have desires, be intelligent, reason with the ways of nature; now would the mind alone be enough to have an identity? To have an identity a person has his/her ego. However, would the ego alone be enough to have emotions, a conscience, and consciousness? For that reason, in reality every human being and every living being is a Soul, what we see is a mere physical reflection of the real Entity. In order to know the real purpose of life, or to understand who we really are, there is a need to let the mind take control of the senses, let the ego control the mind, and let the Soul control the ego. Why should this be done? An example, for the mere muscle of 10 centimetres, which can sense and longs for taste, the entire body has to suffer every now and then. When we cannot control the simple urge for the taste of good food until our mind tells us that there is no more space for ingestion, how are we going to control the wilder desires, which the senses play an important role in creating? Without the control of the mind, the Human will remain a primitive animal it once started out as, no matter how developed a civilization becomes. A man imprisoned for 27 years of his life, comes out, and is able to lead his country to freedom and unity in the true sense of the words, but it would not have been possible if not for his control over his mind and keeping the mind out of fear with the control over his Soul. Taking control over your Soul is the best way to control destiny. Without knowing the Soul, It cannot be controlled.

“The Soul is neither born nor does it die at any time. It does not come into being, or cease to exist. It is unborn, eternal, permanent, and primeval. The Soul is not destroyed when the body is destroyed. Weapons do not cut this Soul, fire does not burn it, water does not make it wet, and the wind does not make it dry. Soul cannot be cut, burned, wet, or dried. It is eternal, all pervading, unchanging, immovable, and primeval. The Soul is said to be unexplainable, incomprehensible, and unchanging. Knowing this Soul as such, you should not grieve. Even if you think that this living entity or body takes birth and dies perpetually, even then, O Arjun, you should not grieve like this. Because, death is certain for one who is born, and birth is certain for one who dies.” – [Chapter 2, Srimad Bhagwad Gita (The Song of God)]

This is the Soul, the true Self. The body is a simple vessel that the Soul dwells inside to wander around in the physical world to gain the wisdom from the life’s experiences. The Soul, residing in the highest plane of existence (the Residence of Godhead) that is filled with pure Bliss and unconditional Love, chooses to descend to earth to experience the life in the physical world, soon forgetting the mere purpose of the visit to the planet due to the pleasures he/she chooses to indulge into, and by the Karmic law of cause and effect, he/she dies only to be born again, forgetting the previous birth completely. Only a trained person is capable of recalling memories from the previous birth, but most cannot remember, and that too for a good reason. The mere agony of realising the suffering and loss of disease and old age is too much to cope for an untrained mind. However, soon one day finding the sincere desire to end this endless cycle of birth, disease, old age and death, decides to ask the right questions in order to ascend and transcend beyond the physical world, which is constrained by space-time. Only a well-trained master can accelerate the process of releasing the Soul from the Karmic bonds, and train and show the disciple the path to the Truth. The master makes sure that the disciple does not deviate from the chosen Path for inappropriate reasons.

The question, which arises now though, is why does God allow the Soul to descend to the lower planes of existence in the first place? The answer is quite simple: Unconditional Love. His Love is so unconditional that, if a Soul chooses to leave His Abode and wander across His physical Creation, He allows the Soul to do so. And so does this message presented here, whether you choose to question your existence and try to find your true nature now or take a million other births as humans, birds, animals, sea-creatures, etc. The choice is completely yours, but one thing is for sure, one day you will go back to the Ultimate plane of existence, simply because it is your true nature. To be natural is to be Spiritual.