All Comments By Jagdish P Dave

Everything changes. Seasons change. Weather changes. Climate changes. Our body changes. Our mind changes. Our relaships change. Our energy changes. There is rhythum of change. The challenege is how do we relate to the wheel of changes. Acceptance of changes without resistance is a healthy and growth promoting way of coping with the changes. Taking a stand firmly, not rigidly, is another way of relating to and working on it without resisting and fighting against change. Denying, resisting, fighting, suppresing or giving up is not the wholesome way of realitng to change. And that way we become agents of change. Life is a journey. In my life journey, I have encountered many small and big challenges. Some challenges were very difficult to go through. Changes like deaths of people whom I loved and admired. I distinctly remeber the evening when I heard on the radio the announcement of Mahtma Gandhi's assasination. I was 21 yeras old. I was shocked, porfoundly saddened and very worried. Since then I have witnessed deaths of many people whom I loved dearly. The serenity prayer has helped me go through ups and downs of life. Practicing mindfulness meditation has been very helpful to me for workong on my pain and suffering. Implementing the three steps recommened by by Dr. Rick Hanson in his book Making Great Relationships are also very helpful to me. The three steps are: Let In. Let Be. Let Go. Allow distressing emotions come. Process them mindfully and be free from them by leeting them go. Another way that helps me go through twtsts and turns of my life is not to be bound by my expectations. It is like freeing myself from myself and by myself. Namaste. Jagdish P Dave

We are looking for the Reality or the Truth using our outer eyes and feel disappinted or lost. We keep on seraching and seeking for somehing which inside ourselves. It's a futile and and never ending search. When we consciously let go of such seeking and striving and when we look within with inner eyes we instantly and effortlessly find what was already residing in our heart. It is a paradox: by letting go we get it. There have been times in my life when by surrendering my ego I have experienced profound love, nourishment and fulfillment. I remember what my father used to say, "Look within and you will find what you're for. Look without and you will lose it." As I grew up I could see the wisdom in what he was saying. I regularly practice meditation to listen to my inner voice. Introspecting, looking within, is also very helpful to me to saty rooted in the inner view. Namaste. Jagdish P Dave

Who am I? Am I my authntic self?Am I my real self? Do I know myself and reveal myself as I am ? Or I am projecting my image to be liked, appreciated or admired by others? I value myself as I am. Integraty is core of my being. Integrity is the corre quality of my being. It is the important fiberr of my being. I do not have difficulty in accepting myself as I am. There have been times when I keep quiet about speaking the truth because I do not want to hurt feelings of people close to me. I am learning how to tell the truth without sugarcoating it. It's a challenge to tell the truth as it is without hurting the other person. I have learned to tell the truth in an empathic and compassionate way. I speak the truth gently and softly. Namste! Jagdish P Dave

It is indeed an irony that we lose ourseleves by our ownseleves. We lose our own freedom by letting our hands be tied by our own addictions to certain objects and experiences that can never bring deep and lasting satisfactios in our life. We are chasing the shadows to find our original self. I love what Rumi says, " How long we fill our pockets like children with dirt and stones? Let the world go. Holding it, we never know ourselves, never are airborne." It is difficult to wake up and see the light. It is difficult to break the chain of addictions or unwholsome attachments to things and experiences that bring superficail and short lived pleasures. I have been working on my self to get rid of those temptations and to be from those self-limiting attachments. Recognizing and accepting my own limitations and working on them to overcome has been very helpful to me. Seeing the rays of light diminishes the self-created darkness. Such awakening and awareness removes the dust covering my vision to see the purity and treasure of my original nature. Daily practice of minfulness meditation has been one of the most effective and helpful ways for me to break the self-created chain of attachments to objects and experiences. Daily practice of meditation helps me dscover the treasure of original nature and be airborne and free. Nmaste! Jagdish P Dave

Usually we are in the world filled with agenda of what to do. We hardly find a space of aloneness, a place of noiselessness and a place of quietness. We live in the world of having more, doing more, talking more, hearing more and going after more. There is hardly any place where the mind is not buzzing and where the mind is empty and is in the present moment. I love to be in a place where the wordly noises fade away and there is the presence of the present moment. Head is for intellectual knowing and heart is for emotional being. We need both, head and heart. We need to have a dynamic balance between head and heart. When I want to know something new, something unknown I use my head. When it comes to genuine caring either for myself or for others I get connected with my heart. Intellect is the languge of the head. Loving and caring is the language of the heart. When I read something new I use my nind to get it. When I listen to poems or music or walk in nature or see the smile of a child I feel joyful feelings and a sense of deep connctedness. When I meditate I feel the flow of blissful energy or blossoming of a flower. or hear the sound of silence. Namaste! Jagdish P. Dave

I like what Dr. Dale Turner used to hand out little green cards with two simple words printed on them: "Extend yourself." Going beyond oneslf and helping someone who needs help without any expectation in return is kindness. Kindness comes from the caring heart. Being nice is superficial and not deep like kindness. It is easy to be nice. It does not require genuine efforts to be nice. In kindness, we offer our hand to somone to lighten his heavy emotional buden and soften his heavy heart. We all go through suffering. When I see agony of pain and suffering in someone's eyes I compassionately listen to him and reach out to do whatever I can do to reduce his suffering. Such actions enrich my heart with deep gratification. I would like to conclude my reflection with the words of the author Donna Cameron:" That's when the need is greatest and transformation dances on the edge of possibility. That is the time to take a deep breath and invite kindness to dance" Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

I love the way James O'Dea expresses the spiritual way of filling the empty well of original or Divine bliss. As Gautam Buddha announces his awakening and attaining the original bliss: Gate, gate, paragate, parasangate, Bodhi swaha: Gone beyond, gone beyond, gone beyonnd the beyond. What an awakening? What a bliss? When we go beyond what binds us to the material things and what we get attached to , we taste the freedom, unconditional love, and bliss. I have learned the for Noble Truths of Buddha's teachings. The first noble truth is suffering. The second noble truth is there is a cause of suffering. The third noble truth is that suffering is transitory. It comes and goes. The fourth noble truth is there ia way to end suffering and be liberated. Whenever I have gone through deep emotional suffering I have accepted it with self-compassion and self-work. This way I have gone through darkness and go beyond it to be blessed by the Divine Light. In that light I see the oneness where nothing and everything are one. It is where the self becomes the Self. Where individual consciousness becomes Unitive Consciousness. Namste! Jagdish P Dave

Who is running your life chiken or you? Are you like a chiken running around with your head cut off or you are a head running around with your chicken cut off? Who runs your life? Does your desire run your life or your thinking clear mind runs your life? From my own experience whan I let my desire run my life I get into trouble. This is the way I relate to the metaphor of chicken and head. My nervous system gets disturbed when my desire, intention and action are not in harmony or in sink with my thinking. I do not like this tug of war within myself. Life teaches us lesson if we are aware and open to see when I get off the track. I know I am not perfect. I have learned not to get imprisoned by my unrealisic desire and that way suffer. Since I am not fighting with my own self I feel more free and do the best I can. I do not want to be my own enemy. I want to be my friend and live in harmony, in accord with my desire, intellect and actions. Self-examination and following the inner voice of wisdom have helped me live a harmonious life. Namste. Jagdish P. Dave May I live in harmony

I like the way the mother of the three yeras old daughter relates to her dauhter welcoming the strangers. She is supporting her open-mindedness and open heartedness. She is also concerened about strangers taking advantage of her daughter's welcoming the strangers. Her concern is valid as we know there are people who may take advantage of her innocence. She came up with a comprromise. She found a way to teach her to "read" the room inside her heart, to tap into her natural intuition to sense real safety versus real danger. I trust my intuition for making the right choices in relating to strangers in my life. I do not either knively trust strangers or shun them and stay away from them. I become aware of what kinds of vibrations I feel in my body and mind and act accordigly. Have I been always successful in relating to strangers? Of course not. My philosophy of relating to strangers with an open mind and an open heart has caused suffering in me. I have learned valuable lessons from my suffering: Not to trust strangers blindly. I trust my intuition in relating to strangers and it has helped me to enrich my life. Authenticity, intuition, open mindedness and open heatedness have helped me to truly welcome the stranger at the door of my heart with no strings or judgements attached. There is a joy in welcoming strangers. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

I expect success or good results from what I do. The same way I expect success or good results from what others do. There are times when my expectations from me amd from others were not realized. When my expectations from me and from others were realized I felt happy and gratified. And when they were not realized I felt disappointed and unhappy. What have I learned from my reflections on my satisfaction and dissatisfaction is to have realsitic expectations from me and from others. This is better than being bound by my expectations from me and from others. However, the best way is to do the best I can without expectations of any kind. To do what I can do without being attached to the expectations of my own actions or the expectations of other's actions. This way of living brings fulfillmemt, peace and happiness. It helps me to live in actuality and in freedom. Namaste!

Where there is no fear, no doubt, no hesitation, no conditions there is love. Such love unites us and creates unbroken and undivided oneness. As I understand from my own experience such love creates unity and oneness within and without, personal and interpersonal. My mother used to tell me, "You cannot love others if you not love yourself." She was a living example of such deep, pure, truthful and blissful love. My mother planted the seeds of such pure love and the seeds and they grew into a fragrant and flowering plant. I have been blessed to be with people who has opened their arms to welome me with deep affection and love. Mind can be our friend and mind can be our foe. When I use my mind to understand what causes disunity and what causes unity, my mind is my friend. I also have come to understand the power of heart, the power of kindness, compassion and love. We need three H's to live fully: Head, Heart and Hands. We need to cultivate intellect, love, and skillful hands to live a life of selfless service, uncondional love and purity of heart. These are the foundations of intraperonal, interpersonal and communal wellbeing. And we all can do this. Namaste! Jagdush P Davee

I love to read and re-read this beautiful poem Look Around In Wonder by Davis Griswold. It's a song of Wonderment, a song of Wow. The Wow experiences are happening in the Outside Natural World as well as in the Inside World, the world of the Mental, Emotional, and Spiritual dimensions. Both worlds offer gifts of surprise, wonderment and inspiration. It's a dynamic world with its own rhyme and rythm. The follwing four lines of the peom touch my heart and inspire me to live a life of wonderment: Look above and look below And look at last within. You'll see a river there, And when you do, jump in. The inner river is the river of delightful surprises, amazement, and fulfillmemt. I have been blessed to have such wow moments when I am in the midst of nature deeply enjoying the wonderful Divine creation and in the company of loving and caring people. It happens when I am walking on the spiritual path, receiving and offering gifts of unconditional love. Wonderment happens when I do not live in the past or worry about the future. Past is gone and future has yet to arrrive. Living in the prsesnt moment minfully with an open heart and practicing meditation regulatly keeps the flame of curiosity amd wonderment alive and unflickering. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

To me vigilance is to remain awake and aware of the reality unfolding ritght in front of my outword and inword eyes. When I keep my outword and inward eyes clear I make wise choices. Light of vigilance helps me see things as they are and not to be deluded. It is very important to me to remain awakened and aware of the physical, mental, emotional, behavioral and relational dimensions of my life. When I am vigilant abou how I relate to these dimensions of my life everyday lifivin becomes joyful and blissful. As I have mentioned before awakening and awareness helps me live blissfully. Light of vigilance helps me to live mindfully and fully. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

Gamble On Humanity written by Ayisha Suddika presents a bold, brave, and courageous perspective on dealing with serious problems we have been facing in the world: problems like social injustice, racial and other forms of discrimination , and world wide pollution. There are different ways of dealing with such problems. Such as ignoring them, having an 'ostrich mentality', or taking revengeful actions. Great contemporary leaders like Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr, Dalai Lama and a few others have taken a different route: a route of non-violence, demonstrations, compassion, service, and uncondional love. Such leaders have taken road less traveled even at the risk the of being assasisnated. Under the leadersip of Mahatma Gandhi India followed the path of civil disobedince and non-violence. He took a gamble, a bold innovative step. We followed his path of non-cooperation and no-viloence and got liberated from the grip of the British rule. I have been following this path in dealing with social and political injustice. Building my "house" on this fondation and living in it with firm determination helps me commit to "Life unto life." Let me conclude with the words of wisdom spoken by Mahatma Gandhi : "Eye for an eye will make the whole world bind." Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

I always value a balance between talking and remaing silent; a balance between open mouth and closed mouth. I apply this principle in my communication with people in my dail life. When I do not have such balance, my communication with people becomes shallow, superficial, and inauthentic. In order to have a deep and authentic communication, we need to learn to listen attentively, to be silent to process our ideas, thoughts and feelings. Between stimulus and resonse, there is a gap and in that gap of silence, deep and genuine communication is born. Silence, reflecion and empathic unnderstanding are the core ingrediants of deep and genuine communication. I have learned to create dynamic balance between talking and maintainig alive silence. In my couple counseling sessions, I teach this balance and I see how this practice helps the couple to be engaged with each other in deep and meaninful ways. When and why seeking sloitude is very important. The purpose of seeking solitude is not avoid engagement with each other. The purpose is to take time out to have a quiet space to reflect deeply on what works and what diesn't work in remaining engaged with each other. This way seeking solitude is not a trap but to enrich relaionnships. It is a blessinng. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

There are two sides of the Self: selfish and selfless; greedy and genreous; sinful and sinless. When we are born There is pure self. As we grow we are conditioned by outside sources which create an imbalace between me and the other. The innate oneness and wholeness is fractured or divided. So we wresle with ourselves, between the wrong side of ourselves and the right side of ourselves. We live in a divided inner house which drains our energy. When we wake up and see the light we see our Real Self-beyond dualism, beyond boundaries. And that's who we are. We become ' mewe'. Life is a journey with ups and downs. There have been times in my life when I lost the dynamic balance and harmony in my interpersonal relationships and cause suffering in me and in others who loved me. I learnt the right, the whlesome way of relating to me and to others close to me. There is HOPE for evolution and transformation. It is an intrapersonal and an inetrpresonal dynamics in relationships. Look within with open, clear, and unbiased eyes to discover our True Self, our pure consciousness and live life in accord with our True Self. Daily uninterruped practice called nirantara abhaysa and non-attachment called anasakti, and of remaing awake and aware of my thoughts, emotions and actions helps me walk on the path of liberation and peace. Namsate! Jagdish P Dave is

Relationships give birth. Relationships nourish life. Relationships connect us. How do we relate to each other makes a big difference. Relationships unite us. Relationships divide us. Re become a freind. Reltionships can be an enemy. Healthy relationships create oneness. In wholesome relationships me becomes you, you becomes me. There is no dualism in healthy relationships. There is Divine union. Our True Identity, our True Nature has no divisiveness. Body and mind have forms. Soul is formless. When we perceive the Realty this way it becomes a gift. Life becomes a blessing. I felt oneness between me and my parents, me and my spouse, between me and my friends, between me and a stranger, between me and nature. In such realtionships, I felt oneness. Daily meditations have opened the door of Oneness for me. When we do weekly satsanga we feel such oneness. In such experiences the individual self becomes the universal Infinite Self. It is an experience of Unitive Consciousness. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

As the author Carrie Newcomer says, either "overwork ( the most revered attention in our culture) or a selfless form of not taking care of myself (a revered spiritual misconception in our culture). " Living this way creates perpetual imbalance in our life. It creates and perpetuates an energy draining cycle. According to me, a wise way of living is creating a dynamic balance in my life. Another lesson I learned from this story is how to connect with the deeper inner part of my being. As Thomas Merton calls the "True Self" or as the Quaker calls "The Inner Light" or as the Vedic sages call "The Light Within." All of us have the inner trusted "spirutual good bones". We are born with this inner gift. And all of us have some trusted outer resources. A wise way of living a happy, creative, and peacful life is creating a dynamic between these two trusted resources. We need to wake up from our sleep to see the inner light and remain awakened. Like any other being, there have been times in my life when I have made harmful choices, creating suffering in me and in people close to me. I learned valuable lessons from my sufferring. I woke up and saw "The Inner Light", my "True Self". We create our own internal messiness and we create our own burden. What helps me to end my suffering and be free from it is introspection, compassionate mindfulness, and remaining awake. Living my life this way reqires selfwork: patience, endurance, open-mindedness, and open-heartedness. When I live this way my life becomes a blessing to me. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

Reading this passage by Danusha Lameris reminds me of two of my favorite authors: F.F.Schumacher who wrote 'Small Is Beautiful' and Mother Teresa who wrote 'Be Kind Anyway'. Kindness done from our loving heart opens the door to Divinty, "the true dwelling of the holy." We get many opprtunities to receive and express gifts of small acts of kindness everyday of our life. Such gifts bring joy and happiness to the giver and the receiver. It creates holy or spiritual connections regardless of outward differences-financial, political, racial, or religious. I was born and raised in a relatively poor family. Financially we were poor, but inwardly we were affulent. I saw my parents giving small amounts of food to hungry people. Seeing them happy by these small acts of kindness was a blessing to us. This gift of giving has opened my heart and has made me very happy and enriched. I am blessed to have such parents for teaching me the value of acts of kindness. They provided good modeling and I am very grateful to them for giving me the gift of kindness. May we all do small acts of kindness in whatever way we can. Namaste!

I love the story of the two stonemasons. When it comes to choosing and doing a job, my fundamental question is teleological: How the work I choose to do fulfills the purpose of my life? Do I love to do this work? Does this work fill the cup of my life with joy and happiness? Does this work serve a higher pupose besides paying my bills? Is this work a part of something bigger than the job I am doing? Is my work a labor of love and selfless service? After I graduated from a college I chose to teach not only for bread butter but my teaching brings a lot of joy and fulfillment in my life. My father's advice was very simple but very profound: Follow your heart. Love what you do. With this attitude work becomes worship. I have been following his adivce and it has brought deep satisfaction and joy. Listening to my inner voice and following it has created golden light of deep fulfillment, happiness and joy in my life. May we all find the purpose of living and live our life fully! Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

Addiction to hope or any other thing causes suffering. When I am addiced to hope for creating changes internally as well as externally, I am paving the path of disappoinement. Addiction is like clinging to hope for changing what I hope to change. Sadly, such clinging or being attached to even a worthy cause results in suffering. I want to change, I hope to change but I am afraid to change. What if things don't go right? What if I lose in my efforts to create change? As the author Margaret Whitney says hope is bipolar. Hope and fear are two sides of the same dynamic. When I have unrealistic hope and when I get addicted to it I cause my own suffereing. I have realized that my addiction to hope creates misery. Freeing myself from the addiction to hope is a wise way of living. I create my own suffering and I can be free from my own suffering. We cultivate skills of being rooted in the ground so that the winds of change and hope may not uproot us. Practicing the skill of awareness has helped me to be free from Hopium. May we all be free from Hopium! Namste. Jagdish P Dave

Cultivation of emapthy for me, for others and the world depends on the way I perceive. If the lenses of my perception are narrrow, clouded and selfcentered, my realization of the reality will refect my perception. As I know the Reality is One but it is perceived differently by different people according to their ways of looking at it. About 5000 years ago IndianSages have proclaimed "Ekam sat vipraha bahudha vadanti"-The Reality is One and is seen differently by diiferent seers. It is my realization that there is Oneness in Manyness. I need to go beyond my personal narrowbrand to broadbrand. If I don't expand my vision my empathic realtionship with me, with others and the world will be limited. When I was young my mental model was narrow and rigid brand. Over the time my mental model has become more brand. By pratcing Mindulness Meditation and cultivating and sustaing an attitude of nonjudgemal awareness and loving kindness I have been able to see the word as ' a complex yet beautiful spectrrum of colors.' Namaste. Jagdish P Dave

I love this passage authored by Srikumar Rao. All wisdom traditions teach us that happiness lies within us. All of us regardless of outward differences have the potential to blossom like a rose that blossoms in the world is not a whit less than the flower that blooms in a show garden. Our job as a flower is to let it bloom. Our fulfillment lies in letting the flower bloom. We all are children of God and we let ourseves grow as we are. When we live this way, we do not let our joy and happiness controlled by the spigot of other people's attention, appreciation, acclaim, and admiration. Living this way, as the author says, "We construct a prision around us and hand that person the key." Living this way, we let our worth defined extrinsically and that way we create unhappiness in our life. When we value our worth intrinsically then nobody can diminish it. So, it is all upto us to be happy and fulfilled by being ourseles. Namste! Jagdish P Dave

Am I paying my full attention to what I am thinking, feelig and doing? Is my attention fully focused, whole -mindedly and whole- heartedly? Am I mindful and aware of what is happening externally and interanlly? If and when I am not aware of it then my attention will be hijacked. Without paying full attenation to what is happening outside of me and inside of me I am getting my own mind imprisioned by myself. I find William Jame's recommendation of bringing the wandering mind over and over again very helpful. Doing it enriches my mind, my learning, my physical, mental, emotional, relational and spiritual well-being. If I don't do that my life becomes fragmented and it has a strong impact on a variety of functions of my life. It boils down to wise choice making. Right Knowing is Right Being. It is difficult for the mind to be one-poined, non-flickering like the unflickering flame in a windless place as our mind wanders and gets scattered 30 to 50 percent of our waking moments. There are times when my mind flickers and gets kidnepped by external pleasant sounds, by pleasnt sensory objects and by going back to the past events or thinking about future outcomes. Instead of deyning what's happening in my mand I rgecognize it, accept it, and bring my mind back to what I am thinking, feeling and doing. This way my mind remains focused on the stream of here and now consciousness. This way I free myself from the grip of wandering attention. It becomes easy to relate to the present moment fully. This is the art of living. May we cutivate this skill of paying attention to fill the cup of life with wonderment, joy and fulfillment. Jagdish P Dave Namaste!

There is a wise saying: Prevention is better than cure. This wise saying can be applicable to physical pain as well as to mental and emotional pain. When we have physical pain we take pills to reduce the physical pain. A better way to deal with the physical pain is to find out what cuases physical pain and to take actions to prevent it coming by taking preventive measures to create physical immunity. Likewise, we can prevent or avoid our mental and emotional pain by knowing what cuases difficult and destructive thoughts and emotions. And that way we cultivate our mental immunity. I have been suffering from physical pain for quite some time. In order to reduce my physical pain I take pain reducing pills. I also have consulted experts to discover the cause of physical pain and do whatever is prescibed to reduce the physical pain. I also apply other ways for managing my physical pain such as relaxing breathing and Yogic stretchings. I have learned not to dwell on painful thoughts and not to get obsessed with these thoughts. The same way I deal with menatal and emotional suffering. I follow three steps: Recognize and accept suffering. Inquire the cause of suffering with a kind , loving and compassionate attitude, and repond, not to react.. How do I relate to my suffering makes a vital difference I have learnt no to react but to reapond and do wahtever I can to create a calm and nourishing environment in my body-mind complex. Awareness, acceptance, creating a kind and compassionate attitude, patience and practicing non-judgmental mindfulness and meditation help me create a healthy mentaldisposition. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

On the outer surface we all are different in shape, size, strength and in many other ways. On that level some may join hands with us in friendsip and some may punch us, beat us or even kill us. But when we go deeper we can see the Reality, the oneness, Christ consciousness, the unitive consciousness, the cosmic consciousness. In that state the egoic mind which creates division within us and between us gets disolved and we become children of God. That is essentially who we are. In that state there is no trace of fear or intention to harm. Sadly, most of us live on the surface and create walls of divisiveness and fight like cats and dogs. Once I was driving with my family to do a workshop for counselors. It was a rainy day. I had to stop at a gas station for filling up gas. As I was about to get out of my car, there were two guys who seemed to be very angry and hateful. One guy came out of the car, cursed me and poinetd his gun towars me. Something happened in my heart and felt for the guy pointing gun towards me. He must have picked up that feeling in me. He waved at me and left me unharmed. Awareness of the situation and remaining centerd calmed him down. How I relate to the situation makes the difference. I responded to him with empathic awareness and did noy react to him. With practice of mindfulness I have been able to relate to difficult and sometimes dangerous situations successfully. From a spiritual perspective the outward differences fade away and a deeper sense of Reality of oneness shines within me. I have realized that treating others with loving awareness and kindness transforms us. I pray that we relate to others with the deeper understanding of our true nature. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

What is consciousness? Do we reside in individual consciousness or universal consciousness? What happens when we break the intrinsic connection of oneness between our individual consciousness and universal consciousness? What blocks or breaks our perception and connection between our indivudual consciousness and universal consciousness? These are profound philosophical, spiritual, and scientific questions. According to my understanding and experience, both individaul and universal consciousness are the same. We do not see and experience this union when we see ourselves and others including the environnent with physical, mental, emotional and social lenses or filters. I experience such Reality, such Truth or my True Nature when i get deeply conneced with the Upanisadic Hindu prayer mentioned by Judith Blackstance. This prayer is an invocation to the Divinity or luminous light within to lead us from Illusion to Reality, from Darkness to Light. The paryer is in words. Experincing the truth of the prayer removes the darkness of ignorance and separation and unites me with light of Divinity. As mentioned before, invoking the light of Divinity by daily morning prayers helps me stay on the path. Practicing Mindfulness Meditation and remaining mindful with loving awareness have been very helpful to me to know my real and true nature and stay on the spiritual path. Namaste! Jagdish O

It is my experience and understanding that unconditional love can solve world's mutiple problems on different dimensions of life: physical, mental, emotional, relational, natural and environmental. Love unites people regardless of external or outward differences. Love is sharing. Love is giving. Love is offering. Love is serving and nurturing. Love is connecting. In the world we live in there is a lot of divsivenes. We need to find a common ground based on emapathic underrstanding and compassion to respect people with different ideologies without fighting and hating.If we do not wake up the future looks very dismal and dark. Love can remove that darkness. I have friends with different political and religious ideologies. We have been able to maintain our friendship by having an emapthic and open-minded and open-hearted stance. Differences do not create distances by empathy and compassion-the core components of love. It is not always easy to maintain equnimity and balance. If we do not maintain that stand life becomes a battlefield, causing a lot of interanl emotional damage. I have learned not to give up but to persist with compassion and humbleness. What helps me stay rooted in love? As I have mentioned before, open- mindedness and open- heartedness, empathic understanding and compassion and humbleness help me stay rooted in love. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

My slavery or freedom depennds on the state of my mind. My mind binds me, my mind frees me. Who controls my sesnses and my thoughts and feelings? My mind. Who is driving my life? My mind or my senses? If and when I let my senses be my master, my sesnses will pull me down into the ditch of all kinds of pain and suffering, If I let my mind be the master, I will be able to make wise and right choices. And this way I will be free from my compulsive thoughts and actions. Have I fallen into the ditch and emotionally hurt myself and others close to me? You bet! Being a humanbeing I have fallem down and ethically done wrong things called sins for which I have paid the price for suffering. I have learned from my downfall and have learned how to rise up. I woke up from my dark and gloomy sleep. I am mindful of not repeating the same hurtful cycle of misery. There is always inner light for guidung me on the right path. I need to keep my inner eyes open. I need to remain awakened. What helps me develop an intelligence that goes beyond the senses and thoughts? The light of awareness keeps me awakened. Regular practice of mindfulness mediation helps my mind to be calm and clear. Reading, inquiring, reflecting, and implementing the wise teachings from spiritual resources and the weekly satsanga meetings have been very helpful to mefor staying on the path of awakening. There is always hope, hope for finding and staying on the Divine Path! Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

Wonder Increases As Growth Deceases makes me think slowly and deeply. I wonder how many times I slow down to see the sun rising and setting, the birds churping in my backyard, or the flowers changing colors. We live in a fast moving world with a sign I Don't Have Time. I used to slow down and relate to nature and human beings without rushing. I would pay my undivided attention to what was happening in the present moment and embrace it with wonderment. Walking on the fast moving lane I miss seeing the wonderful unfolding of natural beauty. Wonder decreases as speed increases. I need to slow down to appreciate what David Haskell says " Wonder Increases As Speed Decreases." I have been learning the art of living, living fully in the present moment. Living this way I enjoy the wonderment of the present moment unbound by the past and the future. Daily practice of sitting quietly and letting revealed the joy and light of the now consciousness helps me to live fully. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

This is a great Birthday Kevine! There are many wonderful lessons cited by Kevin and that makes it difficult for me to choose a couple of leassons. The one that applies to me is " Don't wait for the storms to pass; dance in the rain." This statement took me back to my my little home town in Gujarat where I was born. On a hot summer day we were eagerly waitning for the dark clouds to show up and rain for hours. It was the right day and time for us to dance. And we keep on dancing until we got tired. Now I am old and I relate to this satement differently. I see the value of living fully in the present moment fully and joyfully. The present is the real time. Not to dwell on the past and be anxious about to morrow. Now is the real time. The second lesson "Your growth as a conscious being is measured by the number of uncomfotrable conversations you are willing to have. " I find it rather difficult to relate to conersation with people who have rigid and fixed different posiotins in politics and religion and are unwilling to keep their minds and hearts open. I try to remain open with them but it is hard to walk on one way street. I like to be astonished and that's a great way of aging wisely and gracefully. And such "wow" moments happen frequently for me. I see two little children running around in a grocery store near their mother. I look at them and smile. They return thier smile to a stranger! Seeing a variety of colorful flowers in my backyatd and birds singing song fills my mind with wonder and heart with delight. I have been practicing and teaching Mindfulnessness Meditaion in my Zoom classes. Living mindfully offers many opportunites to us to view and relate to life as dancing in the falling rain. When we are not living in the present momemt we miss seeing the rain falling, flowers blooming, children smyling and seasons of life cahanging. May we be aware of the power of presence, the only dance there is! Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

There are two ways of learning and knowing. One way is reading, talking, and discussing and reflecting. The other way is knowing by doing, by experimenting and by experiencing. I use both ways. However I know from my own expereince that real and deep learning happens by doing, by deeply reflecting with an unclouded and quiet mind. When I learn with an open, clear and quiet mind I learn from myself and by myself. Such learning has helped me walk in the right direction and that helps me how to "fish", how to get what is really precious and how to enrich my inner life. I have learnt from my expereinces the way how to relate to life. Such learning requires an open and unbiassed mind. It reqires quiet and clear mind and an earnest desire to let go what binds me and blinds me. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

We all need relationships to learn and grow. According to my understanding, there are two kinds of relationship: intrapersonal and interpersonal. How do I cultivate my realationship with me and my reationship with others? I mindfully attend to my inner world of thoughts, feelings and emotions and examine them with an open mind which helps me to arise and lift me up and what brings me down. In that way I face myself and learn from myself. The same way I keep my mind and heart open to receive feedback from others. This is the way I learn and grow. When I was participating in an encounter group, I learned about what blocks me from expanding my consciousness. There have been times I when I am blind to my inner world and actions. In the encounter group I saw my own blindness and that helped me to see the light. Open mindedness has been very helpful to me. Awareness what is happening in my mind and heart also helps me. I know this is an ongoing process and that helps me continue growing. Namaste!

These are wise words of wisdom. I am with you my Native American Indians.

Faith is like a strong tree rooted in solid ground. It is firm and steady. Belief is like a fragile leaf blown away by the touch of strong wind. Faith is like an anchor that keeps us grounded and balanced. Beliefs are like clouds. They float around and change. Faith is like the clear sky. My beliefs change as I age. Faith is changeless. I may believe in someone for some time in some situations but disbelieve in other situations. I have faith in my folks and friends who love me unconditoinally and selflessly. I also love people who help others selflessly, who relate to others without any strings of self-will and selfishness. This is Karma Yoga, a divine way of living. I trust them, respect them, and bow to them. Living this way fills the cup of my life with deep satisfaction, contentment, serenity, and bliss. May we all cultivate the divine way of living, living truthfully, faithfully and gracefully! Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

Faith is like roots of a tree. It is firm and steady, unwavering. Belief is like aleaf of a tree. It gets swept away by external forces and change colors according to seasons. Faith is like an anchor that keeps me grounded, steady and balanced in the midst of small and big changes in me life. Beliefs change as they are do not have firm roots. I may believe in some body in certian sit but not in all situations. I may believe in some one for some time and disbelieve and doubt at other times. I have faith in people in my life who love me unconditionally with no strings attached. I love folks in my life who serve people selflessly. This is divine way of living in this world. I have unwavering faith in them. And when I love them unconditionally they have faith in me. This is the divine way of living. and living this way fills the cup of my life joyfully and spiritually. May we all cultivate the divine way of living, living truthfully and faithfully. Namsye! Jagdish P Dave

Faith is the foundation of life in scular life as well as in spiritual life. Faith is an anchor that keeps me steady, centered, and balanced.

Reading this passage authored by Natureza Gabriel Kram reminds me of Adi Sankarachrya the enlightened Vedantic teacherborn 1500 hundred years ago. He describes four states of consciosness: normal state of wakefulness-Jagrati, dream state of consciousness-Swapna, Sushupti -sound sleep state of consciousness, and Turiya-Transcendental or Unitive state of consciousness. The first three states of consciousness are like liquid, solid, and steamy states of consciousness and water going through the first three states of consiosness without being bound by liquid, solid, and steamy states of consciousness. When our contemplative practices go deeper we realize the Trancedental or Unitive Conscousness. And that is Self, our True Nature. This is the defining charecteristic of a Self-realzed being with no divisive boundaries and barriers, beyond time and space. When my meditative state goes deeper I experience Turiya, the Trancendental Consciousness. In that state the egoic mind, the little self fades away and this is an experince of Transcendental or Unitive Consiousness. I come "home", a home of harmony, openess and oneness. In this state I experienc profound peace, deep contentment and bliss. Arriving at home takes time, pateince, persistence and perceiverance. This is a spiritual journey, an inward journey, an inner work, sadhana. I have been on this journey for along time and I am not in a rush to reach my destnation, moksha, liberation, slavation. I bow to all who are on this spiritual path, my fellow voyagers. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave Namaste

Reading this passage reminds me of the chant I do before I do my daily medition : "OM asato ma sadgamaya, tamso ma jyotir gamaya, mrityor ma amritam gamaya. OM shantihi, shantihi, shantihi. Om! Lead me from the unreal to the Real, from darkness to Light, from death to Immortality. OM.Shantihi, Shnatihi, Shantihi. Peace. Peace, Peace. We are looking for eternal peace. It is my understanding that real peace comes from inside, not from outside. It comes from silence when all the external and internal noises fade away. Peace is already and forever dwells in Silence. I hear the voice of Peace when my mind is silent. In the silence I hear the sound of Peace within me, without me, without then, without there but in the Presence, Here, and Now. It is like the clear sky with no clouds. It is in the present moment. When I meditate, when my mind is not enaged in the past and the future, but in the now and here consciousness I abide in the flow of full and clear consciousness, and that is I. As long as the flame in my mind is flickering I cannot see the ligh within me, the light of awareness of pure or transcental consciousness which is always present, always free. I havebe been learning the power of "now consciousness" by practicing Mindfulness Meditation regularly. Practincing Mindfulness Meditaion regularly helps me see and disperse the clouds of ignorance and delusion and that way I see the luminous light that shines within us for ever. I also live mindfully so that I do not reside in the self-created prision in me. Practing mindfulness and living mindfully helps me to be liberated from myself-created bondage. May we all get awakened and get connected with the Divine light of awareness. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave.

Genuine or true life is not scripted in advance by somebody. It is spoantaneous and growing from the source within. Life is like a garden. It has its own roots. Its own source. It needs nurturing that comes from within. When parents raise their children they naturally provide nurturients to thier childrren. They love them unconditionally. They do not write their children's scripts. As the children grow and learn from their expereinces they write their own scripts, They find their own destination. They become their authentic selves. I have learnt from my experiences that there aree different paths to self-realization. As the Rigveda says, there are different paths to know the Truth. And that is freedom. I learned this truth by being with people with different religious orentations without imposing their belief system on others who are different from their religious orientatons. I have also met people who believe that thieir religious orientatin is superior to others' religious orientations. Sadly there have been religous wars in wich thousands of people have been kiled and holy places have been destroyed. How do we relate to the mother earth makes a big difference. Do we relate to the earth as source or as resource? When we relate to the earth as source we relate to it as a source of nuturing like our mother. But if we relate to the earth as a resource we exploit it for our own gains. This way of relating to the earth has caused huge problems. Sadly we are exploting many natural resources for our own benefits without realizing that we are a part of nature and not apart from nature. Hurting nature is hurting ourselves. It is time to wake up and see the truth. And we all need to join our hands to save and preserve our mother earth. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

How do I see the realty, the truth, depends on the quality of my lenses. Seeeing the reality blurred by the dust of isms like racism , sexism, classism and religionism causes and sustains our blindness. I need to clean and clear my lenses to see the reality just as it is, tathata as the Buddha, the awkened one says. Neurologically speaking, we overvalue the functiong of the left hemispere of the brain in our schools, in our homes and in our society at the cost of the right hemisphere of the brain, the emotional brain. We become lopsided of balance lacking in empathy, compasion and connectedness. I like the word sweeping mentiond by the author Zenju Earthlyn Manuel. It stands for cleaning the mental lense, opening the door of heart. What do I accomplish and how do I perceive my accoplishments is very important. I got my dotoral degree. I got acedemic awards. I felt proud of my accoplishments. I had learned that the capital I, my Real Self is not defined by my credentials, my achevements and my possesions. The egotististicself is the small self. Such knowing helps me to be humble and helps me realize the oneness in manyness. Awareness of my inner world of thoughts, emotions, desires, and aspirations and actions helps me walk steadily on the path of freedom. I remain spiritually awake. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

I like the title of this passage The Self Is Not A Thing, But A Process. A process is fluid. It is flowing. The body- mind complex creates obstacles in the flow of the unitive consciousness where I and You or you and me get dissolved. What makes the "I" making the descision and "I" receiving the decision different, not the same? According to my understanding it is the ego that creates the split between I and you. When I become free from the grip of my ego I am in the flow of the Unitive Consciousness or Self-realization. In this spiritual realm we become one with us and with others. In this spiritual realm the apparent distinctions of I and you, and mine and yours, fade away and the Light of Oneness shines. There are many occasions in my life when I have gone beyond myself. Serving others without any selfish motive and loving people in my life unconditionally have enriched my life. What is nobody? When I know who I am and let the light of that awareness shine within me, I realize that we all are one. This is True Love, my True Nature. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

Freedom from grasping or averting our desire is a challenge for all of us. We all have desires. There is nothing wrong in having desires.How do we relate to our desires determines our well-being. Unwise reactivity to our desires causes dukkha, suffering, bondage. Our mind gets contracted and stuck. We create our own suffering. I am learning as I am aging. There have been times in my life when my selfish desires took control of my mind and led me on to the path of suffering. Recognizing and accepting my suffering helped me to be free from my self-created suffering. Life is an ongoing journey with ups and downs. Learning from the downs has helped me to stay on the path of my well-being. When I remain open to myself, aware of what is happening in my mind and heart I do not get fixated and stuck and become a victim of the vicious cycle. I have learnt to create a gap between the stmulus and response, take deep breaths, become mindful of what is binding me and walk on the path of wellness. Living this way the space of my life expands and deepens. Namste! Jagdish P Dave

This passage by Kerri Lake reminds me of what I learned from my dad: Yatha dristi tatha sristi. The world appears as you see it. If my sight is clear the world looks clear. When I look at the world with eyes filled with" me against you "or "what is there for me ", my life shrinks and I get disconnected with the essence of life which I call unitive consciousness or my true nature. All of us have two eyes to see the outer world and to be connected with outer world and for survival. We also have an invisible third eye-trinertra- to see the light within that liberates us from self-created conflict, darkness and bondage. As a human being I do have a need to survive and be safe physically, mentally, emotionally and relationally. When I do not get stuck with the survival level and go beyond that level I feel the vastness of the clear sky with no restricting boundaries. It is an experience of onenees, of freedom and living life fully. To me life is a journey, an onging process of learning, growing and developing. This is the way i get connected with essence of life. I know who I am and that's a blessing. Namste! Jagdish P Dave

There are three levels of happiness. In the first level of happiness I feel happy from any kind of pleasant sensual experiences, from nose, eyes, ears, tongue and touch. Such experiences are fragile. They come and go. In the second level of happiness, I derive happiness in the mind and heart, from pleasant thoughts and feelings. But they are also transitory and fragile. The highest and enduring kind of happiness comes from deep contentedness, deep fulfillment, and peace- from an awakening that brings peace even among the vicissitudes of life. I feel free from the bonds that enslave me. It is the ultimate happiness. In Buddhism it is called nirvana. It is a state where suffering is extinguished. I have glimpsess of such happiness that lean into a contentedness beyond changing circumstances. When I operate from my loving heart and quiet mind I feel the supreme happiness-a deep sense of love and oneness. The small individual self is transformed into the universal Self. It is a state of unitive consciousness. When I come out of my self-centeredness and relate to the world unselfishly and love all forms of life unconditionally, I feel oneness going beyond man made differences and divisiveness. Awakening helps me to walk on this path. Awareness helps me to stay on this path. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

How do I relate to the earth makes a significant difference in living my life. If I view the earth as a collection of matter to be used for my personal selfish gain the future looks very dismal and dark both for the human and the earth. I was reised to relate to the earth as our mother, matrubumi. Viewing the earth this way changes my relationshp with the earth. The relationship becomes sacred and that way opening to greater life. With the rise of industrialization and commercialization, our earth is exploited and polluted. In the midst of such darkness there is an awakening and hopefulness. There is a chance for opening to a greater life. In that sense, I feel spirit of optimism like the author Thomas Berry. I hope more people get awakened to save the earth, to save the human kind, recover the sense of the sacred in the human-earth relationship. I stay on this path by seeing the sacred realationship between the human and earth. I have a spiritual orientation to life. To me life is sacred and the eargth is sacred. May we listen to the optimistic andinspiring call of Thomas Berry when he says "Tell them something new is happening...a new sacred story is coming into being in the transition from one era to another.

For living authentically and fully, we need to be quiet , clear and open to see and relate to the beauty and receive the blessings of life, to hear the silnce of sound. If I keep myself bound by the fear of the unkown I restrict my growth and development. If I keep myself bound by the self created threshold and refuse to go beyond the threshold, my life will be stagnant. I do not need to hide my face behind the veil. I need to remove the veil to see the beauty of the unknown. Fear of the unkown and reluctance and restanace to go beyond the known keeps me bound and stagnant.I nee to remove the veil to see the splendor and beauty shining right in front of me. There have been times in my life when I was reluctant and hesistant to go beyond the known and familiar landscape. I felt this fear of the unknown when I came to this land called America. It was hard for me to go beyond the threshold to relate to the new and different world-different in climate, food, culture, and relgion. What helped me go beyond the threshold is my curiosity, courage, open mindedeness and open heartedness. Whenever I am at a threshold and whenever I am reluctant to cross it, I gain my inner strength by quieting and clearing up mind so that I can see the light to walk on the unkown and untraveled path. Life is a blessing if I keep my mind and heart open to receive it. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

We all go through dark times. And we all want to see the light and be free from the pain of suffering. Who creates darkness within? Who can dispell this darkness? Who creates this prison and who can release us from this prison? Me is my answer. I am the binder and I am the releaser. Self illumination comes from within, self healing comes from within. As Saint Kabir sings: Do not look for God outside of you. God lives within. As a human being I have gone through dark times in my life and have caused suffering in me and have caused pain in the hearts of people who love me. I felt lost and didn't know how to find myself. I did not feel pity for me. The wise saying "To err is human. To forgive is Divine." It is my conviction that we all have Divine Light within us. I remove my self-created blinder I can see that light within. I am that light. I am the very agent of illumination. This is my way of self illumination, self liberation. Light of self awreness and daily practice of mindfulness meditation helps me to see the light within. Let me conclude with the illuminating words of Elizabeth Gilbert:" In fact, I believe this is the only way the world will ever be illuminated, one bright act of grace at a time, all the way to the river." Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

I love this short parable. I teaches us that under the duality there is oneness. The salt doll realizes that oneness by dissolving the separarateness. Our persoanl ego-based identity does not realize Universal identity as long as it holds onto ego bound identity. Selfrealization is the realizaion of my Real Self which is universal. It is anexpeirence of oneness regardless of appaternt differences. The wave is the ocean. I have had many glimpses of my real or trueself. When I am fully absorbed in meditation I lose my individual identity. Individual consciousness becomes universal consciousness. There have been times when I have expreinced oneness with nature. I have exprienced such oneness in unconditional love relationships. They are spiritual experiences for me. Such experiences have enriched my life and have made me a better person Namaste! Jagdish P Dave.  

In my relatively long life journey ( I am 96 years old) I have encountered many ups and downs and there were a few times I felt groundlessness, a sense of sinking down without bottom, darkness without rays of hope. In such dark times of my life I felt and saw the light of based on the ground of unvaering faith. Faith is the light that hardly gets extingwished. I felt dense darkness and groundlessness during the second stage of my lie. I felt helplessness and hopelessness. They were dark periods of my life. Light of Faith in the higher power helped me go through dense darkness and see the light. Keeping my mind open and curious, accepting myself as imperfect, mindfully reducing the noise in my mind, and being grateful to my family and friends for holding my hands when I was falli ng down have been very helful to me. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

Yes. " Heartbreak comes with the territory called being human." as Parker Palmer says in this passge. As human beings we all go through all kinds of sufferings-physical, mental, emotional and relational. Our challenge is how do we turn the power of suffering toward new life. Trying to numb the pain of suffering as anesthetics deepens our suffering. Keeping our heart suppressed and closed and making it hard and inflexible creates more suffering. When I relate to my suffering and or someone's suffering with an open, subtle and compassionate heart, I develop greater capacity to take in my sorrows and joys. This is spiritual alchemy. I have encountered many losses in my life causing a lot of emotional pain. And I have learned how to relate to my painful experiences by keeping my heart open and processing my pain with loving kindness. This is the way I relate to "life's little death" without numbing and suppressing my pain without an anesthetics. Namaste. Jagdish P Dave

We are a multidimentional human being. Science helps understand the body-mind complex, the physical, mental and emotional dimensions of us as human beings. Its approach is objective. There is something beyond the ojective frame of reference. It is personal and subjective. It is the inner world of unconditional love or divine love. It is personal world yet it is transpersonal and universal. I keep my mind open and free to understand and apprecaite the world of Science and the worrld of Spirituality. This way of living has helped me to apprecate both types of world. Namaste. Jagdish P Dave

As I am reading this artcle written by Pema Chodran I remember the words of wisdom by J Krishnamurti " choiceless awareness" and "Be Here Now" by Ramdass. Our mind has a tendency of wandering from past to future. It is focused and remains focused on the present when I am deeply engrossed in doing what I am doing. My mind is open and centered on the present moment. I love the way Pema Chodran offers three guidelines, the three-fold purity for being here and now. 1. Observe what is happening nonjudgementally without expectations. 2. Don't make your meditation a project or a special event. 3. Be fully here and now. This is the only dance there is. I daily practice Mindful Medtation and practice Mindfulness Living. I let myself be fully present without being bound by my expectations. This is liberating my self from my self by myself. Practicing meditation regularly and living mindfully helps me living peacefully and freely. Light of awreness guides me for remaing fully present where I am. Reading and reflecting on such articles helps me walk steadily in the journey of my life. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

Nature offers many wonderful gifts in our hands everyday and we say"Wow!" I get up early in the morning watching the sun rising and I say "Wow!" I hear the birds chirping and feeding their little babies and the words come out from my mouth, "Wow!" When I see the older brother taking care of the little younger brother my heart is filled with joy and I hear myself saying "Wow!" There is an old saying in Sanskrit like" ksane kasne yaha upeti navatam tadeva rupam ramaniyayata." Beauty brings joy every moment. When I keep my mind and heart open to perceive and expereince it fully each moment, my heart is filled with wonderment. I experience such Aha moments when I fully live in the pressent moment. When I was a child I had more "Wow!" moments. As I got older I beacme more thought minded and rational than heartminded and emotional which to some extent dried the flow of my heartfeltness. As I am growing older I have been able to create a dynamic balance between head and heart. This is one of the ways I have reconciled wonder with rationality. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

According to my understanding, Hubert Benoit prestents two ways of making choices in life: one way liberates us from the bondage of ignorance, impulsivity, and reactivity. This way helps both- the giver and the reveiver. When I encounter a situation where I need to make a wise choice that would help both the giver and the receiver, I follow that path. When I follow this path both the the giver and receiver feel a deep sense of fulfillment and inner abundance, Pesevering the practice of mindfuness medition and practicing mindfuness in every walk of my life curbs the natural automatisms of the imagination. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

Memnnoon is a request that blesses the one who is asked. There are two ways I can respond to the memnoon-moment. If I perceive the request genuine I gratefully resonnd to it. Such a response brings a lot of joy in my heart. In this situation memnoon becomes a gift for me. By giving I receive. If I perceive it as a manipulative request I will decine it. If I do not respond to it that way I will feel resentment in my heart. At such times I need to empathise with me and be authentic. When I encounter such situations I use discretion in making my choice. Basically I am an empathic and compassionate person. I need to act wisely. I am blessed to get many opportunites for helping others. When I see someone struggling for making wholesome choices in his life my heart goes for that person. Someone going through suffering touches my heart. I reach out to hold his hand and be instrumenatal in easing his pain. I feel enriched in my heart by giving an uncndional gift to the person going through pain. Awareness of the suffering a person is going through, feeling his pain and relating to that person nonjudgementally and compassionately helps me to tap into my power and freedom to be helpful to others who go through suffering. I practice Karma Yoga. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

To me gift means my internal authentic spiritual qwailities such kindness, empathy, compassion, flexibility, open-mindedness, connectedness, affection, love, mercy, forgiveness and grattitude. Icultivate such innate qualities. When I apply this inner wealth in relating to others as if they are my brothers and sisters, the branches of the same tree of life, I feel like I am gifted, I am offering my inner gift unconditionally. We sometimes confuse the notion of gifts with the notion of privige. and we lose ourselves in games of blame and shame, getting caught up in debates about external conditions in which a person arrives. Gifts on the other hand are inner qualities, talents, and predilections that we embody regardless of where we happen to be on external conditions. I look within with uncoditional mind and heart state. Autheic identity to me is my real uncondional self, not caught up in me against you, I am holier than you and such other self-glorifying and and other- downing mind set. I remain awake, aware and alert when my mind is hijacked by me against you mental stance or I am better and holier than you mindset. Practicing such an uplifting mindset enriches my life inwardly and it cultivates good will accompanied by good actions. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

"Somewhere someone needs help. Send love. It matters." writes Carrie Newcomer. Yes. We all sometimes need love to sustain life. When someone needs my loving and supportive hand I feel compassion for that person and I do whatever I can. When I offer my hand uncnditionally to the other my heart is filled with love and joy. I believe all of us are endowed with the gift of love. When I send love to someone who needs help I experince oneness with the other person. It is fulfilling and joyful. It is a spiritual experince , an experience of untive consciousness. We are witnessing a horrible war in Ukraine causing property and human destruction, innocent people suffering and dying. "Somewhere someone needs help." I deeply feel for people going through such suffering. I have chosen to breathe in the weight of their suffering. I pray for them and make financial contrbutions to help them. I know there are many obstacles the Ukrainians are facing at this time. I know I am not capable of bringing change in this situation. I recognize it. They are still in my mind and heart. I breathe in and do whatever I can to be helpful to them. I breathe out knowing and accepting what I cannot change and do not add more emotional pain in me. I do what I can and let go what I can't do. Awareness keeps me awake to do what I can do and intelligence and discretion to know what I cannot. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

We all are interbeings. The face of intrabeing is also the face of interbeing. What I do has an impact on the other and what the other has also an impact on me. We all are intertwined. If I am aware of my wrong doing and do not defend it and ask for forgiveness I get redeemed of my wrong doing. Every moment of offense carries within it the grace of redemption. We all are facing the wave of COVID19 virus. If I do not take precautions such as taking vaccines and a booster it may have an impact on others who come in contact with me. We do not live on an isolated island. We all are connected with others. As I am 96 years old I am more susceptible to getting the virus. By taking vaccinations and a booster shot I am protecting myself and also protecting others coming in contact with me. Resposibility is the other side of the face of freedom. In that way my freedom is in your hand of responsibily and your freedom is in my hand of responsibility. Sadly for some people freedom is a one way street. Free but not resposible. Knowing that we all are interconnected and remaing aware and implementing that knowledge in every walk of my life helps me act wisely. I know my freedom is in your hands and your freedom is in my hands. My fate is in your hands and your fate is my hands. We are interconnected. We are not an isolated island. May we all have this awakened state of mind. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

As humans we all go through painful emotions like fear, worry, anxietty, grief, anger, and sadness. Sometimes we divert our mind, avoid facing and going through painful emotins. We use a variety of strategies such as avoidnace, rationalization, suppresion, repression or denail. This may help us for a while but it will bounce back with more vigor and force. Instead of facing and working through difficult emotion we may Cognitively Bypass by detouring into cognitive ideas or beliefs. When my wife passed away it was difficult for me to face my grief and go throuh it. It was too much for me to bear the burden of the loss of my dear one. Instead of denying my grief I embraced my grief mindfully. It took some time for me to heal my emotional pain. I have been practicing Mindfulness Meditation for quite some time. It has helped me to act wisely. There are four interrealated four components if Mindfulness: Focused attention, Loving Awareness, Acknoledgement and Compasssion and loving Kindness. Practicing mindfulness transforms my negative and harmful energy loop into constructive and healing energy loop. May we all learn how to face adversity and pain lovingly and kindly. Namaste. Jagdish P Dave

When I look out from the eyes, the seer is looking out, the witness consciousness is looking out untouched by what is being seen. What is being seen changes but not the seer or the witness. I like what Ken Wilber says, " There is only One State, within which different states arise. There is only One Taste, through which various different tastes flow." Though we see diiferent selves, there is only One Self. When we realise this Truth, "the heartbeat of compssion will resound. A constant cloud of caring will rain on every parade." as Ken Wiber says. When I am in deep meditative state the self-created walls of divisiveness and fragmenation melt away and I experience unitive state of consciousness, only One Taste. By practicing Meditation, this state of unitive consiosness stays longer and longer and that's a blessing. The heartbeat of compassion and caring continues resounding. Clouds clear up and in the vast pure Emptiness I experience fullness. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

How to build, sustain, and strengen the bridge of relationships between two people with the same goal but different or opposite approaches? This is a big challenge for sustaining and flourishing interpersonal relationships. It is important to understand not only what but more importantly WHY behind the actions. Empathic understanding of each other is the building block of thriving and peaceful relationships. I love Saint Francis of Assisi's words of wisdom when he shows the importance of seeking to understand rather than to be understood. I love to spend time everyday with my grandson exploring spiritual ways of living life. There are certain ideas of living a spiritual life are basically different from each other. We respectfully differ and listen to each other emapthically and compassionately. This way of relating to each other with an open mind blossoms our relationships. Differences do not create distances between both of us. I deeply value Viktor Frankle's words of wisdom: "Between a stimulus and a response, there is space and in that space there is freedom and power." When I have a different perspective or stance on an issue from the other person, I pause, breathe and create a space in me and empathically and kindly understand the other person's perspective-the WHY- and respond wisely. I also follow the same approach when it happens to me. Let me conclude with Rumi's words of wisdom: "Out beyond ideas of right and wrong, there is a field. I will meet you there."

I live on many dimentions of life which are time and space bound. Pains and pleasures come and go. Mind is filled with thouhts and worries. Nirvana means extinction of all notions and concepts such as birth and death, being, nonbeing, coming and going. Nirvana is the ultimate dimension of life, a state of goodness, peace, and joy. When I am fully present with the flow of the present moment I feel "nirvanized". It feels like living in the clear sky ubound by space and time. When I am fully present to the present moment with deep awareness I am in the ultimate dimension of reality. I feel the fullness of breath coming and going. I feel centered. When my mind wanders I know I have lost my connection with the everflowing present. Remaining aware of my in breath and out breath helps me live each moment deeply. I am flowing with isness. Conscious and nonjudgmenatl breathing helps me live each moment deeply. If pain arises, I do not fight or cover up or run away from pain. I embrace pain tenderely-no fighting, no escape. I reconize it and and embrace pain tenderly. Trnasormation takes place. From the mud of pain grows the lotus flower. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

Accoding to my undersatnding, arriving at enlightenmnt means finding my true nature of mind, the basic ground of reality in progress. True nature of mind is emptiness-empty of craving and clinging, free from judging mind, free from selfishness and self-will, free of all my projections. Such a pure mind is replte with wisdom, joy, compassion, peace and enlightenment. I remember a story in which a Zen master was asked a question "What is Enlighenment?" To which the Zen master responded: "I drink water when I am thirsty. I eat food when I am hungry. I sleep when I am tired." When our attachment to material and spiritaul strivings and struggles ceases, our mind gets deep joy and peace. We are free. We are Enlightened In my spiritual journey I have been learning that the true inner freedom arises not by sruggling to achive freedom, joy, peace, compassion and enlighenment but by sitting down letting go of my cravings and attachments. I put in action three words in my daily journey of spiritual life: Mindfulness, Awakening and Meditation. Applying these these three spirtual values in my everyday transactions helps me reconcile not striving with other dictums of continuous improvement. Namate! Jagdish P Dave

According to my understanding mercy is one the most outstanding spiritual virtues. Mercy is diiferent from fogiveness. When sombody does something wrong to me I forgive that person. I do not counteract and I do not hold onto it. I let go. In mercy I act and and offer my helping hands to help the person with kindness in my heart. Mercy involes forgiveness but it goes byond forgiveness. Mercy has three elements: Paying attention, having empathy, and acting-taking steps to help the person who did somthing wrong. My heart was deeply hurt by somone whom I deeply and passonately loved. She did not show empathy when I was deeply suffering. It was a very painful exprience for me to go through. I needed time to recover and heal. I did not hold on to my pain. I worked on it mindfully. I have let go of my resentment and I am realting to the person who caused pain in me with in a loving and kind way. I feelt peace in me . Showing mercy to onelf and to others heals wounds of oneself and others. Mercy can be cultivated and sustained by emptahy, kindness and compassion and that's how I deal with suffering caused to others by me and by others to me. May we relate to ourselves and others in our life with loving kindness! Jagdish P Dave

Every thought arises in mind. Mind is the birthplace of all kinds thoughts and emotions good, ugly and bad. If I get attached to them and get stuck with them they occupy my clear and empty space. In other words I become possesed by my thouhts and emotions. Thoughts and emotions are ephimeral. They come and go unless I hold on to them adding more and more Karmik patterns and I get bound by such patterns. If I do not hold on to them they will be eventually dissolved. My mind will have emptiness like a clear sky with no clouds. In the empty and clear sky of mind uncondional love and compassion naturally arise giving birth to joy, peace and fufillment. It takes time to wake up depending how long I have been sleeping. Practicing awareness has helped me not to go back to sleep but to remain awake. Practicing mindfulness in everyday life keeps me awake and free from the grip of craving and and grasping. Candid reflctions on getting stuck with self-created bondage helps me make wholesome decisions. This is the way I relate to what Dilgo Khyentse Rinpocha wries about thouhts, Thoughts Are No Thoughts. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

I relate to the three groups conceptually - the group of people born in harsh and hard conditions that extingwish the phycal spark of their life that lasts for a brief period of life. The second group is enormous composed of people born to survive. The thid group is tiny composed of people who are born to thrive. I have spent many years of my life in the second group and a few years in the third group. Sadly we have been living in this tripartite world for a very very longtime. Attempts have been made to create a better world by people who belive in communism, socialism, democratic socialism, democracy and spiritualism. We need to go the roots of the system of inequality, apathy, injustice and discrimination. Freedom without responsibilty, equality, humanism and spirutual values is not enough. As mentioned before I have spent a great amount of my life time in the second world. I kow how difficult it is to survive. Thankfully, I had parents who taught me how to live with dignity and with empathy and compassion for the down trodden people. Personal experiences, right kind of education, role models, and a strong spiritual foundation have been very helpful to me in investing my time and energy for the welfare of three groups mentioned in this passge authored by Charles Gibbs. Namaste! Jagdish P Dave

We are born with a capacity to love. It is like a seed in the soil. And the seed needs to be watered to grow. When a child is born, that child has an innate capacity to love. The child needs to be nurtured so that the child's innate capacity to love blossoms. I was born in a family inwhich there were four brothers and three sisters. We all looked different and we all have different dispositions, aptitudes and attitudes. We never felt discriminated and were never treated diffrently. We were accepted as we were. Where does love exist? it exists and thrives in our hearts. And like a seed it needs loving kindness, compassion and support from the significant otheres in our family and from the community we live in. Sadly, the world is broken down that us-and-them binary is a part of the work of love. I am cognizant of the binary. I recgnize it without being bound by this divisiveness. I have refused to go along with this mentality and I have cultivated loving kindness in me. This way of thinking and living has enkindled the light of seeing oneness in manyness. Such a way of living fills my herat with courage, compassion and love. At times dicrimination is beaming in my direction because of ignorance and conditioned mindset. I have learned not to wear the clothes that do not belong to them without reacting to other's discriminatory behaviors. May we cultivate seeds of love, courage and compassion for those who throw stones of hatred and discrimination at me. This is what Jesus the Christ and the compassionate Buddha have taught us. Namaste! Jagdiosh P Dave

As I was reading this writing by The Gnostic Writer my mind was fully present with what I was reading. My awareness of being fully present with what I was reading is an example of being here and now. Being here and now is the existential reality. My mind is not split by going to the past or thinking about the future. I am in the awakened mindset. My mind is not hijacked either by the past or the future. My father compared such a here-and-now mindset with clear sky with no clouds. As I am reading this passage my mind is fully present with what I am reading. My mind is not wandering. It is focused. It feels like I am in the flow without any pull or push coming from the past or the future. I am in the fully awakened state of my mind and heart. Not sleeping mentally or dreaming about the future keeps me anchored in the flow of awareness-awareness of here and now. Do I remain in this state all the time? I wish I could. The monkey mind wanders. Mindfulness of the monkey mind brings me back to the flow of here and now. And that is an awakened mind focused on the here and now consciouness. May we all cultiwate skills of mindfulness to be in the here-and-now consciousness! Namaste! Jagdish P Dave .

Facing the unknown with an open mind and an open heart is exciting with a little terpedation and uncertainty of what will be unfolding. Here is the place for unflinching faith. When I place my self in the hands of the unkown and unseen noble forces with faith something will emerge that will heal my emotional scars and will make me whole. Whenever I have felt cracks in my life I have placed myself in the forgiving and saving hands of the Divine Being by letting go of my ego-built house. It has not been easy to let go of my attachments and to let my heart open with the hope and faith in the advent, coming of the liberating hands of the Divine. The unshaken shraddha otr faith dispel my self-created darkness and wakes me up to see the rays of Divine light. What helps me wake up from my slumber of ignorance is faith or shraddha in the everpresent and never forsaking light of the Divinity within me. and all around me. It gets manifested when I become still and open to receive blessings coming from noble beings and noble forces. Such forces help me remain still,awake and focused. Namste! Jagdish P Dave

How do we see ourselves and others in relationship without the psychological lenses of the past and the future, the images of myself and others, is a challenge for realizing love and beauty. If I view myself and others with the blinders of the past and future, there is neither love nor beauty. Love and beauty has no dividing lines within me and without me. I call it pure beauty and pure love or Oneness. And that indeed is the art of living. When I am present in the present moment I expereince Oneness with nature and the people around me and with me. This kind of presence is beyond striving and stuggling. In that way, it is effortless. It is natural. An image of myself and the other is time and space bound. It does not exist beyond time and space. It is bound by time and space. When my mind is still and quiet, I see myself and the other clearly, like the sky without self-created clouds. And that is real freedom from the known, freedom from projections, freedom from the inner shadows. May we have inner clarity and inner freedom to live in the world with love and beauty! Namste! Jagdish P Dave 

There are many faces of love. The most common is conditional love. It has "if" and "then". What Ram Dass is talking about is unconditional love. To put it in Ram Dass's words," It's a part of our inner being. It's love for no reason, love without an object...This is an entrance to Oneness." This is an accurate description of unconditional love. Do I love me unconditionally? Do I love the other unconditionally? When and how? My answer is Yes . All the time? Most of the time. It is a state of being, not having and doing. In Such a state I feel Oneness within me and beyond me. Walls of outward differences melt away and I breathe the pure air of love filling my heart with unbound joy and fulfillment.

My first experience of such unconditional love was with my mother
whose face was shining with unconditional love. As I grew up I often experiencedsuch love when I used to chant with my father. And the same kind of love I experienced with my beloved better half. I still feel the glow of that love though she is no more physically with me. Last night we had a Thanksgiving gathering at my daughter's house. She had put her heart in making preparations for such a joyful thankful event. She radiated the light of unconditional love. My grandson saw the tired face his mother. He left the company of his friends and went to the sink to clean pots and pans joyfully. Such acts of love and kindness divinize our daily living.

Keeping my heart open for giving and receiving unconditional love, and being grateful for such divine gifts helps me to stay on the path of Being.
Namaste.
Jagdish P Dave




What helps me

We all break precious items and we may feel anger, hurt, regret and despair. We create scars in us and in others. How do we deal with the broken parts of ourselves? Do we boil with anger or accept the scars and heal them? Do we hold on to the scars or let them go? I like to work on the wounds with a kind, compassionate and creative approach. I learn from the broken bowl of life. I repair it, protect it, and restore its wholeness. Dreams of life get broken. Relationships get broken. I believe in restoring it with loving and kind awareness. Suffering opens the door of healing.
During my relatively long life my bowl of life has been broken. My heart has been wounded. I wentthrough a depressive cycle. I felthopeless. The tender touch of my mother's loving hands brought life back to my life. Enkindled the light of hope. Helped me bounce back to the path of hope and lifted me from the pit of despair and misery. I leaned the power of resilience.
Life is like a web with different colors and shapes. As I have mentioned before the web of life gets entangled and I feel caught up and tied. I have learned how to untangle my web by awareness and compassion. The entanglementhelped me realize my own inner strength and taught me how to create a flow in my life. Life teaches lessons. We need to be good learners.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

I believe in telling the truth and living the truth. I believe truth liberates us from the prison of manipulations. But it is not easy to tell the truth and live by the truth. It causes pain and suffering. It is hard but hardship is a pathway to truth. It involves letting go of the darkness of lies and manipulations. It requires sacrifice of self-serving orientation. But I believe that is the right thing to do. I do not want to buildcastles of falsehood of lies in the air and live in them. Living in such castles may bring temporary illusory pleasures but it causes deep pit halls.

Choosing the right path and following is not always easy. I know what's the right thing to do but may not do it. I know what is the wrong thing to do but I may do it. Following the right path is not easy. It may involve losing. it requires courage to follow it. In the path of my life journey I have at times follow the wrong path and have gone through suffering. I have blamed others for causing my suffering. From my sufferings I have learned lessons of walking on the right path.

Whathas helped me from causingharm to me and to othersis self-awareness. Recognizing the existence of suffering, the causes of suffering, and knowing how to be free from them has helped me to walk on the right path. When I go on the wrong path and suffer, I compassionately relate to it and begin to walk on the right path. There is a saying in Sanskrit my spiritual tradition: Satyameva jayate,
nanrutam. Truth trimphs, not lie. And that is my expareince.
Namste!
Jagdsih P Dave

To live fully in the present moment without dwelling in the past or worry about the future is a wise way of living. Be here and now is the enlightened way of living. Going with the flow of life and not flowing against it the way living life fully. When I engage myself in any activity I get fully absorbed in it. My mind is not drifting but is fully rooted in the present moment. This way of living my daily life is a blessing for me. I complete my assignment fully and thatway I do not get an incomplete grade. I love the way Rosie Bell puts it. We become "so lost in a plan for the future that I forget to crawl into the beautiful, imperfect present and make the most of it.This is the way I relate to Conscious Completion. Living each moment fully is the way of living with unburdened freedom from space and time. These are of the "moments of the giant miracles."

When I meditate I feel the presence of conscious completion. When I listen to chanting, relate to nature and be with someone I deeply love I feel the presence of the flow of consciousness. When my mind is distracted I crawl into the present.

Self-awareness is the master key for me for entering in the house of conscious completion.The light of awareness brings me back to the path of living fully in the present moment. Living this way requires conscious determination, patience, perseverance, compassion and devotion. Such way of living creates giant miracles in living.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

We are social beings. Our life is connected with each other. We are all in secret kinship with each other. However, we may not always recognize it. It is like an underground stream which nourishes the tree of our life,quenches our thirst for an in-between connectedness. There have been times when I have felt disconnected with me and with others, when I felt lonely and depressed. At such time what helped me was empathic and kind words and actions from people who cared for me, who felt compassion for me and extended their helping hands to me. And there have been times when I felt theirpainand I have extendedmy hands to them. Such experiences have deepened and enriched our relationships.

I was raised in a relatively poor family. There were times when we did not have enough food to eat. There were kind neighborswho felt for us and showed theirlove and kindness byextending their helping hands. They embodied the teaching of Jesus Christ: Love thy neighbor like thyself. All such experienceshave enriched my life. And I feel deep gratitude for them.These are precious lessons I have learned in my life. They have taught me how to extend my helping hands when someone is going throughhard times. It is by giving we receive as Saint Francis of Assisi taught us. Renounce and rejoice as the ancient book of wisdom Ishavasya Upanishadataught us.

Being honest and open, being empathic and compassionate, serving others when they need my help, asking for help when I need it and being grateful to them for their kindnesshelps me to stay on the path. Receiving and giving are the two wings of the bird of life.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

Self-compassion is kindness to ourselves. We all go through suffering and delightfulness.. There are two ways of relating to our suffering and joyfulness: accepting our joys and sorrows compassionately without comparing ourselves with others and that way feeling up and down. There are two components of compassion: self-empathy and self-kindness. As we all know that we are not perfect. Whenwe compare ourselveswith others and feel higher or lower than others we get disconnected with ourselves and others. Such a perspective causes disconnection, separation and isolation.

When I was studyingat the University of Chicago my self-esteem was somewhat wounded when I compared myself with other students who were brighter than me. I felt a sense of inferiority. My self-esteem was affected by what was going on in my mind, thoughts of not-good enough. When I developed friendship with aforeign studentwho felt compassion for me. I felt his empathic understanding and kindness for me. His compassion for me enkindled the light of self-compassion and self acceptance in me. I am very grateful to him for bringing me out of the dark period of my life.

Whathelps me make space for Self-compassion? I find the idea offered by KristinNeffquite helpful. As she writes, " Instead of endlessly chasing self-esteem, we embrace ourselves with kindness."Being empathic and compassionate to myself is very helpful to me to cultivate self-compassion. Practicing mindfulness meditation and non-judgmental self-awarenesshave been a blessing to me.

May we cultivate self-compassion and compassion for others as we are going through tough times in our life!

The world we live in and also our life has three qualities: tamas, rajas, and sattva.Tamas makes us passive-static, rajas makes us active-dynamic and sattvacreates a balance. When I go to the extremeposition I become lethargic and lazy, and go into deep slumber. When I take an extremedynamicor action-oriented position I get exhausted. When I avoid extreme positions and take the proverbial Buddhist middlepath I am in a sattvik state, a balanced state. Living in a sattvik state makes me act wisely. I know what to do, how to do, and then do it. Not just to know and think about it. According me this is a sattvikway of living.
I try to follow this sattvikpath of living in every walk of my life. When I talk, when I listen, When I eat, when I sleep, when I work and when I exercise. When I have not followedthis balanced way of living I go through physical, mental, emotional and relational suffering. Suffering is my teacher. I do not hit my head when I suffer and I do not hit the other person'shead for my self-created suffering. I wake up, rise from my downfall , make a U-turn and go back the path of wisdom.
Paying attention to what is going in my mind, becoming aware of it helps me from taking the wrong way which may hurt me and others in my life. I know that it is to say that but difficult to do it. Patience, perseveranceand practice are my best allies. Introspection and meditation are also very helpful to me.Theyshow me the path of light in my journey of life.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

Can acceptance and change join hands together? Can light and shadow walk together? Can silence and voice sing together? Acceptance of what is and makingessential changes is a balancing act. Changes do take place. They need to be faced creatively and wisely. Otherwise life doesn't flow. It gets stagnant and stinks. In the dynamic world we live in, both 'fight for change' and 'lead to improve' are necessary. Change needs to make in the the right way in right direction. This is the way I am embracing life. I see the value of both frames of references. I maintain the fluidity of living without getting blocked by 'eitheror' mental stance.
Life has given me many opportunities to learnfrom my personalexperiences. When I experiencepain in my belly I relate to my belly pain mindfully.I recognize it and investigate the cause of my physical pain and learn from it and do not eatpain -causing food. The same way I relate to my relational painI become aware of what happened that triggered my anger, anxiety or despair, accept it and learn from it and put it into practiceto avoid the aches I created in me and the other person my life.
I have learned from my own personal experienceswhat causes light in me and what causes darkness in me. Self-awareness, introspection, courage to recognize my shadow have been very helpful to me to know myself and work on myself. Life presents challenges to face and gives us opportunities for transformation.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

I like the difference between oldindividualsand elders as shown by the author Suzzane Simard. As the author says not all individual are elders nor all elders are old. The marking sign of an elder is wisdom, not just knowledge. People may have knowledge but not wisdom. Wisdom grows like a Mother Tree connecting, nurturingand protecting the young plants. As an elderly and old member of the family and my community I help the young members of my family and the community at large when they need guidance from me. My heart gets richer when I help, guide and nurture those who need help and support.

As I was growing up I needed help, support, empathyand emotional nurturingin my life. I was blessed to have some elderly folks in my life to provide guidance, empathy, love, and nurturing. The elderly people provided shade and support I needed to survive and flourish. They taught me by theirliving example how I can go through the thick and thin in my life. They were my great teachersand they have laid the foundation of living wisely. I am very grateful to them.

My experiencehas the been a great teacherfor me. Only conceptual knowledge is not enough. Deep knowledge comes from living the knowledge, by practicing and wisely applying that knowledge to real life situations.It is organicteaching and organic learning. I have learned thatit is not how long we live but how well we live that matters.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

I like the way Anthony De Mello shows the contrast between WorldlyFeeling and Soul Feeling. Soul feeling arises from within us. is characterizedby joy, intimacy, nourishment, and fulfillment. No body takes away soul feeling from me as it is generated and sustained form within. Worldlyfeeling comes from outside sources such as someonepraising me , admiring me. think highly of me. Such worldly feeling fluctuates as it comes from out side sources. It comes and goes. Self-generated soul feeling is generated from the depth of our being. It endures and gets richer and deeper. It is rooted in our being.

I am a teacher anda counselor I have enduring love affair with teaching and counseling. Teaching and counseling fill the cup of my life. I have been teaching and counseling for the last 75 years. I am not tired, bored and unfulfilled by following my inner voice. When I feel good and great about me by the praise and admiration I receive from others that make me feel good and great, the glorious feeling stays for a while and after sometime it evaporates This week I was invitedas a guest speakerto give a talkat Governors Sate University to undergraduate and gradatestudents majoring in SchoolPsychology. I told them the reason for my being a teacher and a counselor. It has beenmy cup of tea
for all these years.
When I do what I love to do like teaching, counseling and meditating I feel deeply happily. The reward comes from within. It is unending. It is very joyful and fulfilling.I am connected with it and not attached to it. Fulfillment, love and joy are the criteria of soul feeling. Hope and pray we all find our path that creates and sustains inner wealth of joy, excitement and fulfillment in our life.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

For me as a human being, all quests-intellectual, ethical, and spiritual- are important. Intellectual quest without being bound by ego is important for thinking and for processing my thoughts and emotions andto understand me, others and the world. Moral or ethicalquest without "oughts" is important for me to walk on the moral path. The spiritual quest is essentialfor knowing and realizing my true nature, who or what I am.. In this state I do not feel bound by my own self-created"altitude". This is the state of unitive consciousness in which otherstates with "attitude"get dissolved. I feel grounded and connected with existence, the "being".

Spiritual practices keep me grounded in what is and relate to what is rather than my own fabrications of the reality. I feel free fom my self-createdprison and self-ignorance. In deep meditation state I experiencethe distance between me and the ground going away and I realize that at the core of our being, we all are one. As the great theologian Paul Tillich says," the ground of being."

It has taken a good amount time to know who I am. Remaining awake when I go into the sleep of delusion and working on what makes me fall asleep has been very helpful to me. The challenge for me is not to go back to "sleep". Self-awareness is the key to stay on "the ground of being." Getting feedback from my own selfand from others is also helpful to me for walking on the spiritual path.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave'

There have been times when I have been deeply hurt. And there have been times in my life when I have hurt others too. Such experiences have made me realize that we all have the potential to hurtourselves and hurt others close to us. It does not mean we are bad or evil. We do bad or evil things. When I relate to hurt in this sense I feel empathy for me and for others. Such empathic understanding of my own wrongdoings helps me heal my wounds and the wounds I have created to others.

Realizing and accepting the fact that we are human beings prone to doing wrong things and making mistakes. We are not perfect.I hold my wrongdoing hand with empathy and compassion. Being empathic and compassionate to me helps me for my self-redemption and also redemption for the otherperson.
Self-awareness is the guiding light to me and it helps me evolve and grow in the realm of goodness, kindness, love and compassion.
Namste!
JagdishP Dave

Balancing life in all areas of our life is the key to to living wisely. Too much or too littlecan't burn the fire of life. Too much foodot too little food intake has nam impact on our life energy. Hoe much we eat and what kind of food eat has a strong impact not only our physicaland mental health but also on the environmental well-being.Moderation in all areas of our life. Too much of even a good thing, like eating too much good food can create health problems.

Being born and raised in a simple- living family laid the foundation for moderation mi my life. It has taughtme how to to create a balance in different areas of my life. My parents taught me when to talk , what to say,, how to talk and when to be quiet. These are the gifts of life that I have received from my parents and I am very grateful to them for such gifts.

Being mindful of what is going in my mind, talking a pause, and decide what is the right thing to do. It's creating a balance between when to between presence and absence. It is learning when to yes and no. What to take in and what to reject. As I have mentioned before this principle applies in all walks of my life.

May we learn the art of balancing our life for our personal life as well as social life.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave'

In all wisdom traditions that I know of, "Who am I" is the fundamentalquestion raised by spiritual seekers. There are two Selves: Ego-self and the Witnessing -self. The ego-self is a convenient construct to organize all the separate experiences occurring in the mind. I is necessary to relate to the ever-changing world. The challenge thatI face in my dailylife is not to be bound or attached to the world created by the mind. This passage authored by Culadasareminds me of thestory of Two Birds narrated in the ancient bookof wisdom Mandukya Upanishad:"Two birds, inseparable companions, perch on the same tree. One eats the fruit, the other looks on.The first bird is our individual self feeding the pleasures and pains of the deeds. The other is the universal self, silently witnessing all."
To me spiritual growth is a life-long journey with a few ups and downs , pleasures and pains, successes and failures. When my vision is blocked by selfish desires I tumble and I hurt myself and hurt others related to me. Such experienceshave taught to me to beaware of inner mental world and not get bound by my self-serving desires. With mindfulness andself-awareness practice
I have been able to walk on my path without falling down. Like the second bird in the Upanishadic story I relate to the world with witnessing consciousness. This way I live in the world with humilityand gratefulness.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave'

Namaste Angelie. I thank you fro your kind words. I always look forward to getting weekly thought provoking passagesthanks sent by Somik. I learn not only from the weekly passages but also from reflections on the passages by the readers.
Gratefully,
Jagdish Dave'

MullaNasruddin'sbehavior indicates that he had already assumed that his wife Fatima was hard of hearing. On this assumption, he keeps on asking the same question "What are we having for dinner?". The angry tone of his voice was escalating getting louder and louder. He had lost his patience, pushed the door and repeated loudly the same question though he was right there in front of her. He himself behaved as if he was deaf.His misplaced inference made him act foolishly. It was a counterproductive stance. Such a stance caused a lot of headaches and conflicts in close relationships.

I have learned from my personal experiencesto listen to the other person without making inferences in advance about the other person. I have learned not to prejudge the other person's stance but to keep my mind open and receptive. This way I relate to the other person amicably and fruitfully. How do we relate to others who have different philosophies and ideologies without judging them is not always easy but it is worth trying and beneficial.

We all make inferences about other persons in our life. The problem arises when we prejudge them with a closed mind. As we know inferences and prejudgments are born in our mind and we remain stuck with them if we do not examine them and change them for our good and good of others in our life. I usually ask four questions in communicatingwith the other person: What do I want to communicate? How do I communicate? When do I communicate? And where do I communicate? Such questions help me to be engaged with the other person constructively and creatively.
May we cultivate the art of listening and responding to others in our life.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

I appreciate this essay on Four B's of Resilience and Strength authored by Dr. Soul Levine. The application of the four B's-Being(personal), Belonging(social), Believing(Ethical/Spiritual), and Benevolence(a sense of awareness of kindness and generosity) in our daily life.Practicing these four B's in my everyday life I feel myself like a whole person physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually and socially. This way of living has been the foundation of my everyday life. Or like the author says they are the "foundation of our emotional footprint".

My sense of self-worth is shaped and sustained by implementing the four B's in my everyday life. I know I a'm not perfect. Being aware of my faults and limitations and working on my short comings kindlyand compassionatelyhelps me walk on the path of living spiritually.

Self-examination, self-awareness, alertness and vigilance, owning wrong doing,patience, forgiving and correcting are the ingredients of my living a joyful and meaningfullife.
May I remain awake and implement the Four B's in my daily living!
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave'

Silent awareness or witness consciousness is as J Krishnamurti says is"choiceless awareness", or emptiness or suchnessor isness as the Buddha says. Silent awareness is stillness in the mind. In such stillness bodily sensations ariseand go, thoughts arise and go, emotions arise and go.

I experience such silent awareness when I am fully absorbed in doing what I am doing such as reading, listening to music, and meditating. In such experiencesthe observer and the observed become one. The wave becomes the ocean. It is a spiritual union.

What is freedom? Freedom from whom or what? When the subject-object dividing line is dissolved it is an experience of oneness. In such unitive consciousness there is an experience of oneness, the Divine Union. To put it in Non-dual Vedanticterm, it is Self-realization.

Namste!
Jagdish P Dave

An "answer" is definitive with no openness.It has no room for an open endeddiscussion and a dialogue. A responseis an invitation with an open mind and humility for self-examination. A response has an empathic and open-minded understanding of different perspectives instead of close-minded authoritarian stance: My way is the only right way and there is no other away of addressing and working on personal, interpersonal and collective questions and challenges.

Morality is one of the core elements of personal, interpersonal and social well-being. The question is how am I relating to morality in my personal, interpersonal, and social life? Am I relating to morality in a ferocious and arrogant way or with empathy, humility and tenderness? I maintain a balance between being genuine and empathic, candid and kind.This is the way I practice morality in my personal and interpersonal life. There are times when I lose this dynamic balanceand judge myself and otherssomewhat harshly. Such experiences have made me realize that I am fallible and others too.We are not perfect. It is a learning process. We learn from our mistakes, forgive us and maintain the balance.

Light of awareness, practicing mindfulness, maintainingthe balance between moral ferocity and humility and tenderness have been my helping companions.
May we cultivate a balance between moral ferocity and humilityand tenderness.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

As I understand, desire or greed of stealingor non-stealing is born in our mind. When I am aware of what is happening in my mind, my desire or greed for getting something that does not belong to me, I consciously refrain from that selfish grip and move into the non-stealing zone. Non-stealing means being open, honest, free, and truthful with myself and following the inner voice of wisdom. My self-awareness and non-selfish actions keep me rooted in non-stealing state of my consciousness. This process of self-awareness, knowing Asteya, and followingTruth,is an ongoing spiritual journey to me.

Non-judgementalself-awareness, thoughtfulness and humbleness help me walk on this spiritual path. I take time to learn from wisdom traditions, discuss spiritual teachings with like-minded people andembodythe knowingin my life. I have cultivated the attitudeof being patient and persistent in my journey of life. Regular practice of mindfulness meditation helps my mind to be quiet and clear. These practices have been interwoven in my daily life. We call it Sadhana, a spiritual way of living in the world..

May we stay on this path of inner freedom, enlightenment for realizing the Truth, Fulfillment, and Peace!
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

No sane person will deny that things and we as sentient human beings are going to die one day. Seeing somebody dying or knowing that someday I will also die makes me realize that we all have a common thread running through outward differences and we all are interrelated.Death does not treat people differently. The merciless light of death shins on us all. Realizing this merciless truth awakens us to the underlying reality of oneness. Such realization makes us less afraid of outward differences.

Chance, our dog, has been with us for the last 15 years. He has been having severe seizures for a couple of months. He has brain tumor. Seeing him going through the suffering is sadly very painfulto us in our family.Sadly but necessarily we have decided to let him go. Tomorrow the veteran is going to give him heavy sedation to let him die peacefully. The merciless light of death helps us remain awake and aware of the profundity of life. Death is a lighthouse that keeps me awake and aware of how to live fully and spiritually. When I will die is beyond my handsbut how do I live is within my hands.

Self-awareness is the inner light that keeps me awake amd mindful of the transitory nature of life. The wise teachings of the Buddha about the nature of the worldly life has been very helpful to me. The worldly life is continuously changing-anityam, anityam, sarvam anityam. It is also momentary-ksanikam, ksanikam, sarvam ksanikam. Such awakening helps mevalue each moment of life and cherish it and be grateful for it. I keepthe light of awarenessshining to see things as they are.
Namste!
Jagdish P Dave'

I feel deeply grateful to Brother David Steindl-Rastfor giving the great gift of passage. I consider offering this thought provoking passage itself a great gift of passage. It has the three intertwined core concepts of grateful living:: I recognize, I acknowledge, I am grateful. These three concepts create a steady and strong foundation for going through passages of life. Living this way I feel the unity within me and between people in my life regardless of apparent differences like Brother David says unity in multiplicity, oneness in manyness, where giving becomes receiving and receiving becomes giving, an experience of oneness.To me this is living spiritually, living inpure heart and relating to others from pure heart. And this an ongoing journey that creates loving joy and deep fulfillment.
I have been blessed to have many people in my family and many others out of my family who take care of me lovingly regardless of age, gender, nationality and religion. It feels like living in a spiritual community or an ashram. Such experiences happen not on Thanksgiving Day. Everyday becomes a Thanksgiving Day.
As I have mentioned before life is a spiritual journey. In my journey of life there have been times when I have stepped out of the spiritual path and I have hurt me and some people close to me. Recognizing and acknowledgingmy wrong doing and learning from such experiences has always helped me. Practicing Mindfulness Meditation regularly and living mindfully and relating to others unselfishly and compassionately also reinforces my spiritual way of living.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave'

I appreciate the passage Heart Is Not About Emotions authored by Cynthia Bourgealt. According my understanding there are three kinds of perceptibility; mental, emotional, and spiritual. Mental and emotional perceptibilitieshave limitations of their own. Thoughts and emotions change and our perception of reality changes. Our perception is bound by thoughts and emotions and by space and time limitations. Spirituality is not bound by the inner changes of thoughts and emotions and by space and time. It is beyond mental and emotional perceptions. In the culture I was born and raised the heart is considered the abode of devotion or Bhakti. In Bhakti Yoga there is pure love and devotion for the Divine beloved. It is unchanging, profound and beyond space and time limitations.

I experience such DivineRelationship with nature and with my family and friends and even with strangers when my mind is quiet and clear and my heart is filled with unconditional love. In such moments i feel deeply connected and sense the feeling of oneness. This is an example of a deeper spiritual perception.

Regular practice of mindfulness meditation and loving Kindness-meta- meditationand remaining mindful of my thoughts, feelings, emotionsand my actions help me walk on this path of spiritual living. Listening to devotional songs and serving others selflessly are very helpful to me abide in my heart. This the way I relate to the author's wise words " Heart Is Not About Emotions."
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave'

Finding a balance between two extremes is a virtueby itself. In Buddhism it is called the middle path. In Yoga it is called equanimity-Yogahasmattvam uchyate. I use these words of wisdom in almost all walks of life such as eating, working, sleeping, talking and resting and thinking. Following the middle path helps me avoid the vices of deficiency and access. As Adam Grant says," If you want to be resilient, find the right amount of generosity and authenticityand grit." Or to put it differently to find "virtue in balance."

Once one of our friends invited us to celebrate his birthday. It was a wonderful gathering with lots of delicious vegetarianfood items and different kinds of fruit juices. Normally I am careful about what and how much I put into my belly. That day I forgot to eat in moderation. And I paid a heavy price for my indulgence. That was a good lesson for mefor walking and staying on the middle path.

I apply mindfulness in all walks of life. Awareness and alertness of what is going on in my body, mind, emotions and my actions and remaining alert about my actions helps me act wisely. Overdoing as well as under-doing have an adverse effect on the flow of my energy. I have learned how to live a balanced life and that's a blessing.
Namste!
Jagdish P Dave'

When I am fully engaged in what I am doing I feel oneness within me and without me. The line of separationfades away and I feel oneness between the inner and the outer world. The difference between doing and being, having and being slips away. This happens when my mind is calm, clear, and pure. I feel oneness within and without, between the outer and the inner world. It is a non-dualistic experience.

Six of the members of our family were on a pilgrimage to Amarnath, a five thousandshigh peak on the Himalayas.The sun was setting. The sky was clear. There was deep silence. All of us felt the oneness between the outer world and the inner world. It was an unforgettable experience. In deep meditative state I experience such oneness between the inner world and the outer world. I just become a swinging door as ShunryuSuzuki puts it.

To be true to oneself, to be truly oneself, requires consistent trainingof my mind. When my mind gets divided between the inner world and the outer world, I become aware of the truth of oneness of the soul. We all are one
The dualistic mind becomes non-dualistic. The individual self becomes the universal self. When I do selfless service I feel the fullness of living. To me life is a spiritual journey and I need to remain awake if and when I deviate from my spiritual path.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave'

Who am I? What am I? Who is me? What is me? These are important questions about my true and authentic identity. It means taking ownership of me. Ownership of my mind-thoughts and ideas; ownership of my feelings and emotions; ownership of my actions; ownership of my triumphs and failures; ownership of my whole self. I do not hide myself from my own self and also from others. This is Me. When I accept myself as I am I amfree toengineer me; to change me.

Taking ownership of me frees me frommy socially,culturally, and religiously conditioned self. I loved and married the love of my life born and raised in a different caste, class and religion. Both of us followed our inner voice and faced all kinds of challenges together and grew by going through them. Authentic self creates and sustains authentic and flourishingrelationships.

Life presents challenges and puzzles. How do I face them makes a big difference in my life. If I close my eyes to the challenges and puzzles or deny them, I stifle
my own growth and development. I recognize my puzzles. I own my puzzles. I have learned to remain grounded and rooted like atree and derive strength from my authenticself. Relating to challenges and puzzles cultivates strength and courage in me and I do not get uprooted bychallenges and difficulties.
I conclude my reflectionsby quotingVirginia Satire's last line of her poem: "I am Me and I am Okay."
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

There are many reasons I have for working. One of the reasons is for survival and for meeting my and my family's basic needs. There is something more than justsurviving.My core values are fulfillment, deep contentment and joy. I am clear about my purpose and intention for working hard. I engage my energy fully not only to meet my needs and aspirations and my welfare. I also devote my energy for serving others selflessly. This is my way of living spiritually.

I discovered my path of living fully by going through some hard and painful times in my life. I learned valuable lessons from my pain. My pain helped me understand pain of others empathically. My mother used to sing a song thatconveys the way we learn empathy for others. It is by going though our own painmindfullywe can understand the pain of others and cultivate empathy and compassion. The good news is that we are wired for empathy and compassion. Like any other skills we can cultivateempathyand compassion for ourselves and for others.

When I live mindfully I do not have any regrets or remorse for not living fully. Living life mindfully and fully is dying empty. Fullness is emptiness. This is a paradoxical truth.
Namaste!
Jagdish P Dave

The fist sentence of thispassage by Jack Kornfield says it all. "In spiritual life, what matters is simple:We make it certain that our path is connected with our heart. Our spiritual journeyis a journey of caring, love and kindness. It is important to pay our attention when our heart is focused on the core values of our life. Whatwe do is in alignment with our core spiritual values such as kindness, compassion and caring.The three questionsstated by the author are very pertinent for living a spiritual life. " Did I love well?" "Dis I live fully? "Did I learn to let go"
My mother was illiterate. She lived a very simple life. Her hear was full of love
and compassion.She used to say in my mother tongue. When you feed someone who is hungry your heart is filled with abundance and grace. My friends used to come to visit me. They always said to me thatwhatever simple food she my mother made tasted more sweetthan the food they ate their house.. It was the sweetness of her heart that made foodvery sweet. She taught me how to live spiritually.

When I serve others from my heart I feel fulfilled and very happy. The lesson I learned from my mother has beena guiding star for me. She taught me a lesson of how to live fully. She showed methe path with heart.

To me spirituality means relating to life with an open mind and an open heart.It meansfacing life with non-judgmentalawareness. In order to be free from my suffering I need to go through it with compassion. I pay my kind attention to my own suffering without being carried away by distractions. I follow the same way when I relate to someone going through hard times. This is the way we evolve to thrive personally, interpersonally and collectively.
Spiritual evolution tales time. Having someone as a model in spiritual journey has been very helpful to me. In my culture such a person is called a guru. I was blessed to have my parents as my gurus. They not only believedin simple and humble living but they lived that way. Mahatma Gandhi also was model for my father and for me. Seeing people living modestly and humbly and learning from them provided a basis for my spiritual evolution. I am very grateful to them.
Spiritual evolution is an inner work. Reading books and articles like this onewritten by Jack Kornfleld, having a satsangawith like minded people, Introspection, meditation, and practicing mindfulness have been very helpful to me in my spiritual journey, It is a way of living.
Namaste.
Jagdish P Dave