Obituary To Our Beloved Brother

Vasu
We lived in hope. We prayed in vain
That God would make you well again.
But God decided we must part,
We watched you depart with a broken heart.

God has taken you away from us,
And taken you to rest,
It's not for us to understand,
He only takes the best.

The family chain is broken now
And nothing seems the same,
But as God takes us one by one,
That chain will link again.

A Darling Brother Departed Early To protect people from Agony and Pain because he is a doctor.

When You Are Struck By Lightning

By: Kishor Kulkarni
A lightning ‘arrester’ is installed in a tall building to protect it from lightning strikes. The lightning arrester is a long rod made of a good conductor of electricity like copper, with its one end being buried under the earth and the other one jutting out of the top of the house. The lightning arrester provides a path of least resistance for the lightning if and when it strikes the house. So, the lightning safely passes through the arrester down into the earth without damaging the house.

There is a parallel to this concept in the spiritual realm. We keep receiving one or more of the five sensory inputs from the external world, through our eyes, ears, nose, tongue and skin, every waking moment. These sensory inputs cause transformations of our mind which are called as vikaaras. Essentially, they are the agitations of mind in the form of our six enemies – desire, anger, greed, attachment, pride and jealousy. Thus, our mind can be seen as a house and the sensory inputs from the external world as frequent lightning strikes.

However, we can install a lightning arrester in our mind in the form of a spiritual attitude whose bed rock consists of vairagya bhav or asceticism, lack of ego, non-doership and non-duality. When I have a spiritual attitude, I am convinced that everything happens for a reason as part of the big picture for the Divine. So, nothing can disturb the equanimity of my mind. I have no likes or dislikes and hence am able to take life as it comes. I do not see any duality between myself and the rest of the world. Thus the spiritual attitude tackles the external stimulus and makes it pass harmlessly without affecting the mind one bit.

For example, when I smell a spicy hot dosa at a roadside stall, I am able to pause and tell myself that I don’t quite need to go for it if I am not really hungry. The vairagya bhav in me has helped me overcome the desire. When my car is hit by another vehicle at the rear, I do not get angry because I do not see any duality between the driver of that other vehicle and myself. It is like my eye not getting angry when I accidentally put my finger in my eye because eye and finger are both parts of the same body.

I am no more greedy to earn more and more money because vairagya bhav is firmly established in me. I do not feel sad when my daughter or son gets married and leaves home to make a new home of their own because I have no feelings of “me and mine”. If I get praised for some good work done by me in my office, I do not feel any sense of pride because I know I am not the doer and it is the Divine that has acted through me. I do not feel jealous if I miss a promotion and a colleague of mine gets it because I have faith in the divine scheme of things and am disinterested in worldly things.

Many of us lack a spiritual attitude. Later, some of us realise that external stimuli are like lightning, damaging our peace of mind. Then we start exploring the various ways and means of protecting our mind against these lightning strikes. This effort, spiritual sadhana, when appropriately guided by a true guru appearing before us at the right time, becomes a lightning arrester for our mind.

The Power Of Youth And Vivekananda

By: Mithun Dey
The youth of India have great creative energy with the positive potential to take them to spiritual heights. If human creativity is a special quality, then the “Never say die!” spirit is its apex. Demographically, today’s India is at its youngest best and has the power to meet any challenge with the collective consciousness and effort of all people, especially young people.

This is the perfect time when youth is alert and aware and provoked by the environment and lack of values. India is a nation facing incredible challenges. This is evident from the utter lack of safety and security for the girl child and women anywhere in the country and the impunity with which monstrous elements like rapists heap violence on girl children and women.

On the one hand, people can see such huge wealth and on the other, more than one-third of the people go without a second meal every day. We have examples of the very affluent as well as the extremely poor. And millions of our children have no access to education, even at the primary level. And we are still grappling with the issue of child labour.

Swami Vivekananda delivered a lecture on the issue of difficulties in life. He made the plea for the need for nationwide renovation with the ideals of ‘tyaga’ or sacrifice and ‘seva,’ selfless service, the most imperative aspects of shaping the life of young people. The monk made the point that this way of life is what can be called ‘spiritual pursuit’. The brevity of human triumph and the impermanence of material wealth were of serious thought to this philosophy. What he challenged us to do was to give ourselves a noble reason to live, a lofty ideal to live for and a higher state to reach within the boundaries of human existence.

The only qualification that Swamiji looked for in youngsters was to cultivate and nurture the ability to ‘feel’. He offered his potential ‘mantra’ and desired to take solid action so that those who wanted to go beyond just feeling could do so. The most influential P’s are: Purity, Patience and Perseverance. The P’s are the great traits that the youth of today are rich in and this is evident from their keenness to be part of positive change that will have impact on entire society.

Purity is of thought and achievement. Patience is to understand the dynamic form and need to focus on the area for improvement. Today’s youth needs enormous perseverance to take part in the multifaceted challenges we face in today’s society. They need to place their efforts in the realities of livelihood, societal stages and political variety. And for these attempts to seriously address socio-political and ethical-moral issues, they need great perseverance. If not, one could easily get drained and unmotivated.

Swami Vivekananda believed that working for any social change required massive energy and spirit. Hence, he requested the youth to amplify both their mental energies and physical fitness. What Vivekananda wanted from the youth were ‘muscles of iron’ and ‘nerves of steel’. Today, the youth are exceptionally responsive and they just need to be encouraged in their quest for justice for common benefit. Swami Vivekananda was and is not only the medium; he is himself the message as well for the youth of India.
Jan 12, Swami Vivekananda’s birthday, is celebrated as National Youth Day. It is his 150th birth anniversary this year.

You Can Transform Failure Into Success

By: Dada J P Vaswani

The most successful people are those with the most interesting pictures in their minds. If you consciously paint a picture of yourself as a successful person, success will come to you. But if you are convinced that you are a failure, you will fail. If you think of scarcity, scarcity will befall you. If you imagine abundance, abundance will flow into you.
Consciousness is built of three layers – the conscious, the subconscious and the super conscious. Tap the powers of the super conscious and the subconscious and turn failure into success.
The conscious self that thinks feels and takes decisions is a very tiny part of our consciousness, like the tip of an iceberg floating above water. The subconscious is much vaster, like the larger portion of an iceberg immersed in the water. The subconscious cannot think for itself; it cannot decide what is right and what is wrong. If you believe that you cannot achieve something, the subconscious will take up your belief. Its job is to see that it proves your beliefs. Whatever you will believe in, your subconscious will create conditions, so that your beliefs are proved. Whatever you picture for yourself, the subconscious will prove that picture as true.
If a fat man believes that he cannot grow slim, he will never grow slim. He may go on a crash diet, but when he is off guard, something will happen; the subconscious will create circumstances so that he is caught in the trap unawares and gains weight.
Subconscious Is Good Servant, Bad Master
To achieve success you must believe in success, and paint a picture of yourself succeeding. The conscious and the subconscious must cooperate with each other to create success. Success is not produced only by the conscious self. It is done with the help of the subconscious. The subconscious is there to obey you; it is an obedient servant who takes orders from his master. You have to decide. Its beliefs are to be programmed by you.
The subconscious cannot think for itself; it cannot decide what is right and what is wrong. It can only obey. It is like the autopilot in an aircraft. If you set the autopilot to take the plane eastwards, the plane will keep on flying eastward. Only when you resume manual control you can change the direction of the plane. Therefore you have to be very careful of the thoughts you think, the affirmations you make, especially when you fall asleep. There are tremendous potentialities open to every one of us. If only we make use of the right affirmations at the right time, we can work wonders.
Speaking to your subconscious with magnetic determination is known as affirmation. Whatever you wish to affirm, affirm it over and over again. First, affirm to draw the attention of your own thoughts. Then, softly re-affirm to draw the interest of your thoughts. Finally, whisper the affirmation as though you are coaxing your subconscious to cooperate. First affirm loudly, then a little softly and lastly, in a whisper.
For greater effectiveness, your affirmations must be rhythmic. Repeat the affirmation as if you were singing. Secondly, it must be positive. For instance, if you wish to give up smoking, don't say, "I shall never smoke again". Rather, tell yourself, "I have given up smoking". Affirm this, as if you have done it already, as if you are free from this habit. Positive thoughts induce magnetism; negative thoughts weaken your magnetism.