Living Enlightenment – A Personal Report
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Photo by Vanessa PaxtonBy: Tina Su
After 76 days of living in an ashram in a tiny village town East of Bangalore in India, I am home at last.
I still have not found a proper one-liner that concisely answers the common question, “How was it?” A cliché “Good!” seemed appropriate to satisfy the questioner, but it is not the right answer. I’ve tried several answers and nothing seems to accurately conjure what I experienced. “I’ll write about it soon” quickly became my reply… and soon, I started to avoid people all together.
In this article - which is a personal update for those interested - I will attempt to share some slices of experience from my spiritual journey for the past 3 months.
There is so much I want to say, yet there is nothing I feel like saying. I wish to convey my feelings without words, but that isn’t possible over the Internet, so I will do my best with words.
Whenever reminded of my experience, my first instinctual response is to feel an utter space of peace, and sometimes, I feel like crying, tears of Joy and pain which I experienced and overcome, tears of gratitude … grateful for my transformation, grateful for the space of unattached clarity and undisturbed bliss. During this time, I had witnessed many miracles, which are truly beyond words and logic.
Time for a Retreat – Personal Update
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By: Tina Su
(Update 07/08/2009: I’ve decided to extend my stay for two more months, and will be in India until September.)
For the next four weeks, I will be living in an ashram near Bangalore India. I will be attending a meditation and spiritual retreat called Inner Awakening that I have been anticipating for many months now.
It’s an opportunity to learn directly from an enlightened guru in a serene environment, along with several hundred other spiritual seekers from around the world.
I’ve decided not to bring my laptop or cell phone, and to fully emerse myself in the experience. Besides, a month without technology sounds like a really nice cleanse of its own.
During this time, no new articles will be published. However, there are a ton of articles published in the past that you may like, so check them out. I’ve also listed out my favorite articles at the end of this post.
How to Quiet Your Mind
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Photo by Andrea D’Aquino (Germany)By: Tina Su
Do you regularly feel at ease and at peace? Are you continuously overflowing with Joy and Bliss on a daily basis, such that you seem free of problems and emotional pain? If so, go directly to the comment section and share with us your secrets.
If you’re still reading, you are amongst the vast majority of us striving for a better life, yearning for a more peaceful and joyful existence. Yet, it seems like an impossible challenge, where we end up mentally punishing ourselves for failing, concluding that “I’m just not made to live in peace.”
You see, it’s not us, it’s just that we’ve become so easily distracted by the hurrying demands of modern life, that we’ve temporarily lost touch with our natural state of being. But there is a way, if we seek it.
The purpose of this article is to share a simple technique to bring more peace, joy and clarity into your life. Would you like that?
Overcoming a Rough Week
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Photo by Carlos Yepez (flickr stream).We all have bad days, but have you ever had one of those weeks when it seems everything is going wrong?
Monday, your alarm didn’t ring and you were late for work. Tuesday, your car broke down. Wednesday you lost your credit card. Thursday was your annual review and your employer informed you that, due to the economy, the company is not issuing raises this year. By the time Friday arrives and you can see the light at the end of the tunnel, you get a ticket for speeding. How do we handle a series of setbacks and bad news?
I recently had one of those weeks where it seemed that anything that could go wrong - did go wrong. The natural reaction most people have when the walls begin crumbling is to crumble right along with them.
I have developed a habit of not letting outside circumstances consume me. I have learned in the past that the events in your life do not determine the course of your life. Rather, it is your reaction to those events that will determine the quality of your life, and your life direction. In other words, it’s not what happens to you, it’s how you react to what happens to you.
Most of us can experience certain negative events and dismiss them. But when negative events seem to happen simultaneously - as they often do - they feel suffocating and impossible to overcome. This is when thoughts of giving in to that feeling of helplessness seem to evade the mind.
With the state of the economy and many people losing their jobs and homes, many of us feel powerless. But the truth is that there are many things we can do to help us cope with, and even change a bad situation.
Personal Change You Can Measure
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By Scott Young
As we approach mid-year, are there any goals you had set at the start of this year that you want to make progress on? Here is a simple tool that can help you in becoming more productive and effective.
There is an old business adage, “what is measured, improves.” I believe that lesson applies, to not just your business, but also your life. If you measure something, you gain conscious awareness of it. If you gain conscious awareness, you increase your ability to control it.
Today is the third day of a week-long diet log I’m running. My diet log is simply recording everything that I eat for an entire week. Recently, I set a few fitness goals, and I wanted to ensure that my eating habits were matching my plan of action.
I measure more than just what I eat. I record personal expenses, how I use my time, what books I read and many other personal metrics. This may seem a tad obsessive, but I’ve found it greatly helps me in staying productive and reaching my goals. Besides, a little obsessiveness isn’t always a bad thing when it comes to reaching your personal targets.
How to End Suffering
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By Tina Su
“While pain might be inevitable,
the suffering that comes from the pain is not.
Suffering is not a state of life, it is a state of mind.
Suffering is your response to an event.
Whether you suffer or not depends
entirely on your reaction to that situation.”
~ Paramahamsa Nithyananda (Swamiji)Today, I will get (more) personal.
I’ve debated about whether or not to share this information in a post. It was a quiet battle between keeping my personal life somewhat private, and the intense desire to share the lessons from this important chapter of my life. In sharing, I’ve surrendered to my fear of being judged negatively by you - readers of Think Simple Now.
My husband Jeremy was married once before. During the early stages of our romantic courtship, he was simultaneously battling the lingering ends of an unsettling divorce (things got ugly and someday I hope to share the details of this tale with you - perhaps in a book). Suffice it to say, it felt like it was never going to end.
For about six months, my inner stillness was disturbed and stirred up by the negative feelings revolving around this event. My “pain body” came crawling out in full, front-and-center view, and stayed with me while causing unnecessary suffering.
Even when his divorce was finally over, I didn’t feel much better. The feelings of resentment and hate (however subtly in my subconscious) for his ex-wife remained for another three months after the fact - until two weeks ago to be exact.
This article isn’t about forgiveness or complaining about my own self-inflicted pains, but it is about personal freedom. The kind of freedom from the massive mountain of stories we’ve piled onto ourselves that result in suffering.
Are you experiencing anything that is causing you worry, heartache, resentment or stress? If so, continue to read and allow me to share the story of my new found freedom… and how I got there.
