A Wisdom Archive on Spiritual Inspiration

India needs rejuvenation. This rejuvenation will come only with the revival of our great Indian ideals. India needs shakti. For this, extensive re-building needs to be initiated for the country to acquire physical, mental and spiritual strength.
 
For creating this stupendous energy, India needs a new spiritual awakening. A new direction. The inspiration for such an awakening could come from a prophet of peace, for instance, someone like Guru Nanak, who proclaimed: "Love the saints of every faith, Put away the pride! The essence of religion is Humility, service, and sympathy.  Not fine clothes, Not the yogi'sgarb and ashes, Not the blowing of horn, Not the shaven head, Not long prayers...".

 
(See also: Peace on Earth, Peace of Mind, Love and Happiness, Life and Beyond, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Peace on Earth: Situation Vacant - Saviour Wanted

Chanting mantras inspires the body to heal itself, the mind to become calm and the soul to grow strong. Chanting makes room for divine energies. Mantras are vibrations - they unlock hidden centres and help to dissolve the ego; they help us build invisible tools for shaping a better life. We start discovering resources within.
 
A young farmer, simple and ego-less, was rearing goats. One day a realised soul in ordinary attire visited him. The poor farmer welcomed him with respect without knowing that he was a great guru. Affectionately, he offered goat milk to the visitor. The guru left after some time. His blessings created a great spiritual armour around the farmer, unbeknownst to him.

 
(See also: Peace on Earth, Peace of Mind, Love and Happiness, Life and Beyond, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Mantra Yoga: Transform Yourself With Mantra Yoga

Vedanta literally means culmination of knowledge. Veda means knowledge, anta means end. You are aware of the body, mind and intellect, but not your real Self. Vedanta helps you discover the true nature of your inherent Being.

 
(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Life and Death: Liberating Role of Vedantic Thought

Scriptures by themselves cannot make a person enlightened. They give knowledge, not wisdom. But the Ashtavakra Gita is different. This scripture negates every facet of life, except supreme consciousness.
 
Sage Ashtavakra says to Janaka: "My son, you recite or listen to countless scriptures, but you will not be established within until you can forget everything"(16.1). He stresses the import of knowing one's own self. A person may quote extensively from the Bhagavad Gita or the Upanishads. But only through self-knowledge can he even begin to discover the stainless truth.

 
(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Life and Death: All that Exists is Total Awareness

Destiny and the dynamics of living often remove us from the place we belong to, from what we refer to as our hometown. Living away, we tend to get "hometown-sick".
 
We split ourselves, and suffer a 'body here, mind there' syndrome. Interestingly, this can happen not just to an individual or a family, but even collectively to a whole people.

 
(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Life and Death: Freedom From Exile  

There are two key Indian myths: Moksha and Maya. Within these two spheres the whole invisible world of gods, heroes, quests, and powers are contained.
 
Moksha speaks to the primacy of consciousness as the stuff from which all reality is created. Maya is the distraction that keeps us constantly in search of truth. Paleo-linguists tell us that the word 'maya' is not correctly understood as "illusion" but as "measurement", and from this we get the terms matter, meter, mother, mata, matrix, matrika, music and myth itself.
 
 

 
(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Life and Death: Great Indian Myths: Moksha and Maya

If you look up in the sky during the day, you see the Sun. That becomes the most dominant in your experience. In the night, if you look up, the stars become very dominant in your experience, but both the Sun and the stars - in fact, the Sun happens to be a star, too - look like puny little things when compared to the immense vastness of the sky. Generally, though, the sky is never in your conscious perception.
 
So, true existence can be likened to the vastness of the sky. The Sun, the stars, you and me, are all just small happenings, very brief happenings, really

 
(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Life and Death: Life's a Bubble, It Could Burst  

It can happen to anyone. Destiny can strike suddenly, changing your life forever. God has plans for everyone.
 
The wisdom and kindness of God is beyond our minds' reach. We can only try to understand it if we surrender totally to God and have deep faith. The way to deal with crisis and life-threatening situations is to resolve to do our best and let God do the rest...

 
(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Life and Death: The Way to Overcome Sorrow

Often what you call success is judged by others as failure. This was G D Birla's philosophical reply to reporters who asked him to comment on his success in building one of the largest business houses in the country.
 
When you look back and attempt to analyse what you really achieved in life and whether you could call yourself successful, you will find that you are unable to define "success". That's because with every new stage in life, your perception of success changes.

 
(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Life and Death: Assess Success With Internal Auditing

Followers of Advaita philosophy say that the soul and the Divine are one. But, when a soul takes birth encased in a physical body, its new physical identity after birth and the process of socialisation overtake and even obliterate the memory of its connection with the Divine.
 
As the external identity strengthens with a first name, family name, religion, caste, and the "mine and thine" tendency, the ego strengthens and the world and everything in it begin to appear real.

 
(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Life and Death: Don't Rock Your Boat On the Sea of Life

The most well-known mystery in Christianity is the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. It is said that three men died on crosses in occupied Palestine sometime during the fourth decade of the Christian era. The carrying out of a death sentence in this manner was a relatively routine matter. In this case, all three were convicted as disturbers of the Roman peace.

 
(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Life and Death: Central Mystery of Christian Faith

Art is a great healer. By supplanting apprehension with inspiration and trading stress for relaxation, it tempers human physiology and attitude.
 
Scientifically speaking, it improvises human brainwave pattern, autonomic nervous system, hormonal balance, brain neurotransmitters, immune system, and blood flow to various organs. Through self-expression, it rejuvenates the creator with an enlightened perception of within and without.

 
(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Life and Death: Life Must Imitate Creative Art

Bhakti is not kamayamana or desire-driven; it is nirodh , a check on desire. When attained, bhakti makes a person into siddha , perfect and trupta , satisfied. Such a person thereafter has neither desire nor worry, hate, pleasure or excitement. Does it imply dullness? No, it implies fulfilment born of antar-aarama or inner harmony, which could so suffuse the mind as to make the bhakta look inebriated or matta . Does attaining such a state imply stagnation?

(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul)

Read more here: » Life and Death: Bhakti as a Way of Daily Life

The one principle that should be at the core of any religious belief is ahimsa or non-violence - not to hurt any life, human or otherwise.
 
Killing is not right. Killing animals to eat them is not a civilised thing to do, but carnivores exist in nature and in many places, humans have to subsist on non-vegetarian food for reasons beyond their control. But wherever possible, vegetarianism must be practised.

 
(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Life and Death: An Agnostic's View Of Life and Death

The Bhagavad Gita or the Lord's Song is one of the world's great literary works. The felicity of its verses, composed in the anusthubh metre, is more than matched by their philosophical profundity. "In comparison, our modern world and its literature seem puny and trivial", wrote Henry David Thoreau.

(See also: Life and Death, Life and Beyond, Death and Dying, Body Mind and Soul)

Read more here: » Life and Death: Science of Gita's Nishkamya Karma