“Each moment is an open door
To invite either
Aspiring and illumining thoughts
Or desiring and binding thoughts.”
– Sri Chinmoy
We meditate not just to have a good experience during meditation; we meditate to transform our consciousness, to intensify, expand and elevate our life experience, 24 hours a day.
As our meditation affects the quality of our life outside of meditation, so does our life outside of meditation impinge on the quality of our meditation.
It is useless to follow a strict diet for 2 hours each day, if we consume junk food for the remaining 22. Strictly disciplining our thoughts during meditation cannot be of much help, unless we carefully monitor and control our flow of thoughts while we are not meditating.
Thoughts are hugely influential in shaping the consciousness we radiate and offer to the world from moment to moment. Our thoughts are 100 per cent our responsibility. As we choose our clothes according to how we wish to present to ourselves and the world, so must we be careful and wise in selecting the wardrobe of thoughts we inhabit, wear and display.
As dust settles and weeds grow, so thoughts will occupy our every idle or distracted moment. To outpace unwanted thoughts, remain always active and dynamic, ever striving for a goal – for aspiration and dynamism give positive focus and form to our thoughts.
Thoughts are the food and currency of our limited and limiting mind; to escape the mind is to escape the corrosive influence of thoughts.
Our spiritual heart is our saviour and refuge. The more we can be in our heart, the better. Humility, gratitude, selflessness and humour are magnets that draw us into our thought-proof heart. Immerse yourself in these qualities: the thought-monster will gradually weaken and eventually surrender.