mindfulness

Mental Health

| MyWorldWithoutWalls

Healing According to Paramahansa Yogananda

Taking care of one’s mental health becomes a priority in today’s world. When we take care of our own mental health, our physical health automatically improves.

Back in India, even to this day, we do not talk about mental health in our everyday living. We take care of our physical health through purchasing medicines across the counter and adopting a diet that is suited to our physical requirements. We think about mental health and well-being only when some behavioral outburst happens to disrupt our everyday life, such as suicide, physical harm through revenge, or even murder in broad daylight. It is then that we start thinking about mental health and well-being.

Sri Paramhansa Yogananda was way ahead of his time. As part of the daily yogic rituals of self-care, he made his disciples aware of the need for mental care. He writes the following for preventing mental disease:

Cultivate peace and faith in God. Free the mind of all disturbing thoughts and fill it with love and joy. Realize the superiority of mental healing over physical healing. Banish bad habits, which make life miserable. (Scientific Healing Affirmations)

Peace can be cultivated into our own nature with intention, even though we were born with a disturbed mind. Faith in the wonder-working God should be the driving force of our intention to become a peaceful soul. A peaceful person brings love and joy to his relationships. A peaceful person finds solutions to life challenges. A peaceful person seeks hope through trust in God and looks beyond difficult circumstances. A peaceful person has a healthy mind. A peaceful person, in fact, is far from timid but has an inner resilience to face adverse circumstances in life.

Paramhansa Yogananda spoke often about habits and how we can intentionally cultivate good habits ourselves even in the later stages of our lives. We cannot blame our parents and our educational system all the time to escape taking our own responsibility for being who we are.

A certain way of thinking also becomes habitual. We must be willing to discard thought patterns that no longer serve us. These thought patterns are often passed down family lines or picked up from our environment. Developing self-awareness will enable us to discard some age old thought patterns that no longer serve us anymore. This need is especially urgent among migrants who moved from their native place to a place that has promised a better life. However, over and above material comfort, one soon realizes that in order to be truly successful, one needs to cultivate new ways of thinking in order to thrive.

Mental health overall plays a big role in our overall physical health and well-being, especially in the later stages of our lives. Cultivating inner peace through meditation is something we must attempt every day for our overall well-being.

Ancient Wisdom of the sages

| MyWorldWithoutWalls

Understanding Sadhana

It’s an ancient concept prevalent in India. It’s the art and science of repeated practice after invoking the blessings of the higher powers.

This concept is losing ground in our current age with AI and the quick fix of everything. Sadhana negates superficiality. It takes us into deeper contemplation of discovering our true image from the time of our birth. It has benefits even in our current age because it is connected with our very self and our yearning to be our higher self throughout our lives.

I have experienced a remarkable recovery from extensive injuries sustained from an accidental fall caused by a party who tried different ways and means of restraining my financial freedom. A confused mind creates confusion all around when that mind is strong and given free reign. Unchecked this party then started planning ways to end my life by brainwashing and coercing innocent minds.Long story short, in 2013 I embarked on an extraordinary journey of supernatural healing that became available to me from the higher powers.While I lived through it despite encountering close death, I suffered from extensive chronic injuries.I came across Kriya Yoga accidentally after more than a decade of suffering and encountered the benefits of practising ‘sadhana’ in my energization exercise almost daily practice.

Through this unexpected detour in my life journey, I came back to the word and the concept of ‘Sadhana’ which was paramount in my ancestral family teaching passed over generations but distorted when other forms of worldviews crept into our family.My father would pass on the remnant of this divine truth by reminding us that ‘practice makes perfect.’He believed that you must keep on repeating verbally or in the form of practical application what you learned in order to gain success.

One becomes a good singer or an athlete through ‘sadhana,’ through constant practice that leads one to the higher powers for excellence. To me, Sadhana involves first and foremost the surrender of self to the higher powers before attempting anything new in life.Then follows building in the self determination and discipline for focused attention while engaging in the new activity.The singer or the athlete then dedicates his or her entire life to such an activity which then becomes one’s life calling.  This is very different from earning for survival, which is also most necessary for survival and meeting one’s daily needs.

Through Sadhana I managed quite well as a single parent by concentrating on bringing up my children rather than building up my career.For me it had to be one or the other.I simply didn’t have the skills necessary to balance both sides of the scale.Through Sadhana I also succeeded in improving my health steadily with little or no money to spend on costly medical expenses.I simply didn’t have it for various reasons, and it is then that I stepped into the miracle zone being raised to a higher level of awareness.In this zone, I experienced divine love to the uttermost and started experiencing the support that the universe was extending to me in the adverse situations that I repeatedly fell into.

The fruits of ‘sadhana’ are well understood in the western context with the maxim, practice makes one perfect!The power of repetition in learning something new or concentrated daily practice is sadhana.

Daily deep meditation involves touching the divine as well as soul searching regularly in a fast paced world.  Soul searching and making attempts at improving self are essential parts of self cleansing.  

“O Lord, how great are thy works! and thy thoughts are very deep.” Psalm 92:5

Make the concept of Sadhana part and parcel of your life, as this ancient concept will open doorways of greater wisdom and insight in your daily living.Its benefits are multifarious.Practising Kriya Yoga almost daily is now my present Sadhana, and I am now in a season that I have greater peace regarding how I spend each day in deep gratitude for my God-given life, which I cherish so much!