Spiritual practice is not a crisis intervention to use only when we are in trouble. It is to bring us to peace not only for a moment but for all time. So we practice and get to a state of peace and then we go about the business of life. When we walk into the world somehow we lose this peace. How can we maintain it? This is the question so many of us have.
If we just let go to a nebulous state with no consciousness, we will be lost quickly. However, if we are able to reach this peace with an awareness of going to the core of our being, to the Heart, and use our will to stay there, we can then engage with the world and not lose ourselves.
Sahaj Samadhi is the state of being in the Heart and acting in the world simultaneously. We live then from the Heart. We are conscious of acting from the Heart and respond to the world rather than react to it. Again our will has to be honed to keep our awareness in the Heart. This is the work at hand.
We tend to find peace and then go back to normal, not aware we can maintain the state we had in the wonderful meditation. What did Ido in that meditation? What did I do internally to be at peace. I let go of my attachments and rested. Who was aware of that stillness? I was. Where was that I and am I willing to consciously remain there? What did my five senses do during this time? They were inverted toward this I awareness. Can I engage in the world and keep the senses restrained, looking in and yet functioning? Can I keep my mind and attention turned inward and yet still relate with the world? Yes.
So the consciousness when we are at peace is disentangled and deep within. Our vehicles are turned inward to maintain restraint, and then we relate with the world from there. We come to ourselves in our practice and then never stop practicing. It is the practice that is so important: knowing what to do and then doing it all the time. Are we multitasking then? Looking in and out simultaneously. Or are we moving closer to Home and relating from there?
The Katha Upanishad uses the image of a chariot to make the practice clear. The Self is the lord of the chariot. The chariot is the body. The intellect is the charioteer and the reins are the mind. The senses are the horses, and where the horse goes is the objects of the senses. The body, the senses, the mind and any other venue from which to experience are all just vehicles for the Self. Without imbibing this understanding we live the life of one with no restraint.
To live in peace we have to practice and live where peace actually comes from. We must return to the Self and rest there. Resting and living in the Heart, we then can act from there. Peace is then the awareness of our daily life.
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