Freedom and Suffering

What is Freedom? What is Suffering?
A spiritual guru can only teach you a lesson from his or her experience. So my belief is that spiritual awakening is experiential and unique for every individual.

A moment of spiritual enlightenment is like a snowflake or a fingerprint… no two are alike and is unique only to the individual who has experienced it.

Assuming that You are seeking a sense of personal well-being in your life, what questions have arisen in your mind, your thoughts, your body and emotions?

We all think, feel and want to be heard and understood.

It is easy to pick up a book by your favorite spiritual guru/feel-good-author-of-the-month and hear them say things like, “You are not your thoughts!”, “You are not your emotions”, “You are not your ego”, “Be Present in the Now!” etc. etc. etc.

Here is where we have to start turning inward and looking into ourselves for answers. Only we know the answers we need in our lives. A spiritual guru can only teach you a lesson from his or her experience. So my belief is that spiritual awakening is experiential and unique for every individual. A moment of spiritual enlightenment is like a snowflake or a fingerprint… no two are alike and is unique only to the individual who has experienced it.

Meditation is a way of turning inward and listening to the stillness in our hearts that speaks a thousand years worth of wisdom.

Corny? Yeah it is, but try sitting in quiet for about an hour and see how long you can hold out before you have to go looking for your iPod… or start thinking of what you’re going to do after the sitting is over and done with.

Can you sit in stillness, in quiet, where no one is around and no one sees you or knows what you are doing?

Can you sit in stillness and quiet knowing that there will be absolutely no goal to achieve, no reward to gain, no money to be made, no debate to win and no desire to be filled?

Can you sit in that stillness and quiet and live with yourself?

This stillness and quiet is where Freedom begins and Suffering ends. It is the awakening spoken of by so many spiritual hosts that have walked the Earth in the past.

Where do we begin to experience stillness, when our hearts, minds, bodies and lives are full of such a loud wind that it seems we are in the midst of a hurricane and just looking for something to hold onto?

We have to understand that stillness is not an easy task. It is one of the most difficult things to work for in our lives. Make a commitment starting today, that you will work for stillness, for quiet in your life.

We begin by training… martial art training can be a useful tool for someone on a meditative path. Training releases an enormous amount of nervous energy from the mind and the body. It also is a method to tune-up for concentration skills and develop more focus.

Bodhidharma, the Indian saint who introduced Chan (Zen) meditation to China, taught martial arts to the monks living in the Shaolin Temple. Before Bodhidharma taught them the physical exercises (Hatha Yoga), the monks lacked focus and the endurance/agility to spend several hours in meditation each day.