Robert Steven Goldstein is an author who lives in San Francisco. His latest novel, Golda’s Hutch, was released in March 2025. Here he explores the relationship between the Eastern and Western practices of knowledge, yoga, and meditation, and discovers that they are not really different in concept.

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Robert Steven Goldstein

<h4 style="text-align:justify;">ROBERT STEVEN GOLDSTEIN is an author who lives in San Francisco. His latest novel, Golda’s Hutch, was released in March 2025. Here he explores the relationship between the Eastern and Western practices of knowledge, yoga, and meditation, and discovers that they are not really different in concept.</h4>“But of the tree of knowledge… thou shalt not eat of it.” —The Book of GenesisThe spiritual discipline I cobbled together for myself in my late teens, and which has sustained me now for well over fifty years, has four major components: yoga, <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/how-does-meditation-help-hindi" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">meditation</a>, vegetarianism, and a code of behavior that comprises compassion and harmlessness, a concept known to Hindus, Buddhists, and Jains as Ahimsa.It wasn’t until long after I had pieced these things together that I came to understand that long ago, in places like India, the single term “yoga” actually encompassed these, and many other precepts. Today, though, especially in the West, yoga has come to connote primarily a set of postures and breathing exercises, devoid of other considerations.Of the four components that have become the foundation of my personal spiritual practice, the one that proved most difficult for me initially was meditation. I remember first encountering the term “meditation” in old yoga books, when I was still a a boy. These brief references to meditation alluded only to its benefits, they mentioned nothing about how it was actually practiced.<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">Humans desperately require knowledge,&nbsp; but also need to know how to turn it off at times.</h4><hr>So meditation seemed to me, then, something utterly mysterious and alluring. Here was a way of manipulating the mind so that I could see God. But how, I wondered, was this accomplished? In my musings, I imagined that meditation must consist of extraordinarily complex mental convolutions and gyrations—labyrinthine cerebral reckoning akin to that of advanced physics or calculus—to achieve such an unfathomable feat as spiritual awakening.But when I investigated further, and learned that meditation was, in fact, exactly the opposite of what I had envisioned—that it sought to still the mind of thoughts—to make it an empty vessel, so to speak, to be then filled with mystical energy—I was dumbfounded.Just stop thinking?That simple trick was all there was to this powerful and obscure practice called <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/meditation-health-part-2" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">meditation</a>?It seemed absurd. I honestly couldn’t believe it. It appeared far too easy.Until I tried. And found it nearly impossible.I was a gifted student—I’d been thrown into advanced classes and had even skipped a grade—but now, no matter how hard I worked at it, I couldn’t pause those pesky thoughts (thoughts for which I’d been so richly rewarded and praised in school) for even a few seconds. Why was it so difficult?Eventually, not with the sheer force of will with which I tried at first, but with patience and calm and a great deal of practice, I learned to meditate. And as I became able to sink into the mystical mindset on a regular basis, the experiential aspect of the spiritual discipline manifested, and the practice became even more real and intrinsic for me.But the tug of the Judeo-Christian religions in which I and all my friends had been raised, lingered inside me—not so much viscerally, but intellectually. Why were these beliefs so meaningful to so many people? Why did they not resonate with me at all? Was there some connection I could find, between them, and the path that I had chosen? If there was, the gestalt would make more sense to me.In college, I majored in English Literature and Creative Writing, and threw together an informal, undeclared minor in Religious Studies. I sought out classes anywhere I could find them. I discovered comparative religion classes offered in the Philosophy, Sociology, Anthropology, and Psychology departments. The German department taught the novels of Hermann Hesse in translation. Perhaps my favorite of these classes was in the English department: The Bible as Literature.My first breakthrough meditation experience occurred during the summer when I was nineteen years old, and I took the Bible as Literature class almost immediately after it, when I returned to school for the first semester of my junior year.<figure class="image"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/tree_of_knowledge2_b67201e7de.webp" alt="tree-of-knowledge2.webp"></figure>It was in the first week of class, as we examined the creation myths and the story of Adam and Eve in Genesis, that a profound link between the Eastern and Western approaches to spirituality became evident.And it seemed appropriate that this essential shared truth should be presented in the very first story of the Old Testament, the foundation upon which the entire Bible would then be built.Once Eve and Adam ate of the tree of knowledge, they were expelled from the Garden of Eden.That, it seemed to me, seized upon the philosophical dilemma that all humans face in seeking spirituality. But none of the standard interpretations we were offered in class were in line with what the story meant to me personally.Our professor had suggested that the fact that the Bible referred to it as the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil should not be taken too literally, because in that time, “good and evil” was a colloquial way of referring to “everything” or “all things.” The tree symbolized knowledge in general.As we pored through scholarly tracts on why God would seek to prevent humans from seeking knowledge, none of them postulated what now appeared obvious to me as someone who meditated: Our cerebral activity—our constant thoughts—block us from experiencing the spiritual aspect of the cosmos. Knowledge, thinking, is the impediment, not the vehicle, to attaining the mystical sensibility.But knowledge and thinking still remain vital and something to be sought after and cherished. So, humans desperately require knowledge, but also need to know how to turn it off at times.As always seems to be the case, it is a duality—it demands that we carefully balance and calibrate to find our equilibrium.But more than that, we are, in fact, capable of achieving a mindset where this duality is erased—where the material and mystical realms meld into a unified and powerful gestalt.This is the goal of a lifelong spiritual discipline.&nbsp;&nbsp;

The tree of knowledge

Rosalind lives in Abingdon near Oxford, UK, and has worked with groups of all ages during her working life. She has always been interested in how we can change and transform. In recent years she has been teaching psychotherapy and qualitative research and is a Heartfulness trainer.

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Rosalind Pearmain

<h4 style=" margin-bottom: 32px;">ROSALIND PEARMAIN shares her experience of tuning in to others.</h4>

Think of the heart as an infinitely expanding space. Can anyone limit their capacity to love or care about others or nature or animals? This is the most special surprise about the heart. Mystics have always told us that it is an infinite space that can contain the universe. Now we can all make the same discovery quite easily.
Start by simply bringing consciousness to the area of the heart in our chest. Suppose that the Source of Light of our existence, of our real essence, is there. Open up a space to find a soft, deep, safe place inside so that you feel a bit more space and ease. Then it is possible to feel the same with others.
Feel attuned to your heart and you will quite naturally feel more harmony with others too.

<h4 style="text-align: justify;">Try an experiment:</h4>
First look at people with your mind’s eye. Then imagine you are seeing them with your heart. Feel the difference. You will discover a simple common humanity between you.
The word ‘tolerance’ has a root meaning about simply about making space for others to co-exist. The heart is always there to create such a space.
How can we start to feel this kind of inner space and warmth?
What about the other bit of me that judges, that closes down, that shuts others out and keeps me separate from others, especially if they are different?
Much of the time we react because we feel vulnerable or nervous.
We feel exposed and insecure.
We want others to make us feel good.
But inside we feel lacking or inadequate.
All of these thoughts and feelings can be traced to experiences we have had in our lives. They are engraved on our system, programs in our make up, and they often lead us to negative repetitive life choices in which we feel stuck. They create barriers and layers like cobwebs around our soul. Over time, we lose that sense of simple and soft, deep connection with our Source inside our heart.


<hr>

<h5 style="text-align: center;">Feel attuned to your heart
and you will quite naturally feel
more harmony with others too.</h5>

<hr>
Yogic Transmission nourishes and relaxes us from within, like a permanent inner stream of light. It also simply dissolves the barriers very subtly and gently.
At the end of each day we remove all the weight and pressure of the day, leave us feeling like vapour, filled with a source of light. Over time, slowly and surely, we feel free of limiting patterns. We find a new kind of lightness and balance that keeps us afloat in the midst of chaos and stress.
We emanate the same feeling to others. They feel our calmness and ease and relax.
Does this all sound too good to be true? For once it is not.
Of course, we have ups and downs. Change is never linear. But over the years we stick with it because it reliably brings us deep joy, continuing discoveries, and real beauty that you cannot imagine. Simply try it for yourself.



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<h4 style="text-align: center;">Article by ROSALIND PEARMAIN</h4>

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Lightness & balance in relationships

<h4>ROSALIND PEARMAIN shares her appreciation of the Quakers, their principles and their
 way of living.</h4>
The big test in following any spiritual way is to really know what is our inner truth or
 guidance. Second, how do we bring that awareness into everyday existence, so that we walk the talk, we embody our
 inner knowing in every moment?
There is one group in the world – sometimes described as “the longest lasting leaderless
 group” – whose high reputation for integrity is founded in centering their whole lives on inner discernment. The
 Religious Society of Friends, otherwise known as the Quakers, has been going since the seventeenth century. I have
 come to appreciate that it is through a courageous adherence to inner discernment and practical expression that their
 impact in the world has been so transformative and powerful. It is carried through into every aspect of life, every
 day, in relation to the whole of humanity and creation.
If you have come across Oxfam, Amnesty International, Greenpeace, Cadbury chocolate,
 Rowntree’s sweets and Clarks shoes, these organizations were originally founded out of Quaker inner guidance and
 consideration for what was needed in organizing business. In the nineteenth century, drinking chocolate was seen to be
 a good alternative to alcohol!
The Quakers also have a permanent presence in the UN, in conflict resolution in wars,
 and in conflict zones, helping refugees. They started the Kindertransport during the 1930s, which saved many lives.
 They befriend the outcast of society, and so have been very involved with prisoners and with prison reform.
Here is the key principle for their approach, which you can find on their UK website:

Quakers try to live according to the
 deepest truth we know, and we connect most deeply to this in the stillness of worship. This means speaking the truth at all times, including to people in positions of power.
 As we are guided by integrity, so we expect to see it in public life. 
We believe that, as Quakers, we should
 put our whole lives under the guidance of the Spirit.
The Quaker movement started during the ferment of change during the 17th century in
 England. George Fox was born to strictly religious parents in 1621, and underwent a profound spiritual crisis at the
 age of 19. He was appalled by the schism between religious beliefs and the actual behaviors of those who should be
 exemplars. He left his home and job and, in despair, sought for years for spiritual solace.
Eventually, inspired by his own visions and mystical leadings, he came to the
 understanding that everyone could have a direct, personal experience of God, which he called “the inner light”. He
 then started traveling all over the country spreading this message. Those who took it up were called ‘Friends of the
 Light’. They were persecuted a great deal and imprisoned, but by 1660 there were 50,000 followers. He traveled to
 Europe, the West Indies and America to spread the message, as did his wife, Margaret Fell. These early Friends or
 Quakers were all young people in their twenties and thirties.
Quakers turned against organized religion and churches. Fox argued that Jesus should not
 be sought in a stable but in people’s hearts. They met in silence with the idea that in this silence they could wait
 for divine light or the presence of God in the gathered meeting. If someone felt inspired to share an inner discovery
 they were free to do so, and the ‘quaking’ could be a part of the feeling of this! Basically they felt that there was
 no need for priests, for special buildings, even for special days. Every day was the Lord’s day. Everyone had God
 within them.
This core principle of faith, where each person waits for the inner light to guide them,
 is the central ground of Quaker belief and practice. Out of this central principle came a commitment to an unshakeable
 integrity of being in every area of life. For example, it was a principle to refuse to swear on the Bible in legal
 proceedings, because of the utter commitment to truth and honesty that was fundamental to being a Quaker.
Another core value has been simplicity:
We try to live simply and to find space for the things that
 really matter: the people around us, the natural world, and our experience of stillness.
Needless to say such a radical view did not go down well with the political and
 religious power structures of the times. Quakers were persecuted, imprisoned, and had their businesses destroyed
For Quakers, truth is not fixed. It has to be discerned, felt and known as an inner
 experience. It continues to unfold and be revealed. It can express in living values in different ways, which are
 called testimonies. This means there is no fixed text for Quakers. There is a book called Faith and Practice, which
 continues to evolve with new wisdom and discoveries. For this approach to be honored, to be lived, it requires another
 value, a commitment to listen for the truth in other’s ideas and philosophies, to be humble, open and fundamentally
 tolerant of others and difference.
The unity we seek depends on the willingness of us all to
 seek the truth in each other’s utterances.
Holding dearly the idea that God is in everyone, Quakers work in the world at all times
 to affirm equality in every sphere of life, to embrace peace, simplicity and justice. They are pacifists, and many are
 willing to go to prison if their beliefs go against the laws of the land – for example not supporting taxes to pay for
 weapons of destruction.
Quakers are perhaps best known for their peace testimony, which is based on believing
 that love is at the center of existence and that all human life is of equal worth. As pacifists, Quakers were
 conscientious objectors during the world wars but they also worked extensively for peace and for refugees. They are
 currently very much focused on sustainability.
Here are a few of the suggested guidances from the book, Faith and Practice. Many of the
 suggestions come in a form of enquiry inviting personal reflection.
<img class="has-img-center"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/quarker2_ad67f2e6dd.jpg?updated_at=2023-03-30T09:48:17.885Z">

Seek to know an inner stillness, even
 amid the activities of daily life.
Take time to learn about other
 people’s experiences of the light.
Spiritual learning continues
 throughout life and often in unexpected ways. Are you open to new life, from whatever source it may come? 

Do you work gladly with other
 religious groups in the pursuit of common goals? While remaining faithful to Quaker insights, try to enter
 imaginatively into the life and witness of other communities of faith, creating together the bonds of friendship.
 
Live adventurously. When choices
 arise, do you take the way that offers the fullest opportunity for the use of your gifts in the service of God and
 the community? Let your life speak. When decisions have to be made, are you ready to join with others in seeking
 clearness, asking for God’s guidance and offering counsel to one another? 
Try to live simply. A simple lifestyle
 freely chosen is a source of strength. Do not be persuaded into buying what you do not need or cannot afford.
 
We do not own the world, and its
 riches are not ours to dispose of at will. Show a loving consideration for all creatures, and seek to maintain the
 beauty and variety of the world. Work to ensure that our increasing power over nature is used responsibly, with
 reverence for life. Rejoice in the splendour of God’s continuing creation.
Of course, having all these noble principles is not always easy. So Quakers aim to
 encourage and support each other in trying to live their inner truth faithfully. It is also not always easy to be the
 partner of a Quaker with their predilection for direct honest talk! I know very well from my many years of marriage to
 someone born into a Quaker family. More fundamentally though, I have always found Quakers to be sincerely open to
 listening and learning from others. I am deeply grateful and inspired by their presence in the world.

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<h4 style="text-align: center;">Article by ROSALIND PEARMAIN</h4>

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Living inner truth

<h5>Miriam Hanid and Jamie Drew live in Suffolk, UK, and have been involved in meditation and music since their teenage years. They met in a heavy metal club ‘in their reckless youth’! Miriam played wind instruments and piano before coming to the Brazilian drums, but it is singing that she enjoys the most. Jamie has played guitar but now focuses on drums. They currently play in a local band called Janifour.</h5><h5>Miriam is also an extraordinary silversmith who has been selected for many awards and commissions. She had a solo exhibition in Edinburgh in this year’s festival. Many of her works are inspired by water.</h5><hr><img class="image_resized" style="width:auto;" src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/silver_and_water_1_ae2fa8c6ed.jpg?updated_at=2023-03-31T05:20:58.542Z" alt="Spiritual-work">I use water as a metaphor for the divine current of energy flowing through all forms of life. I record the ever-changing element of water in drawings and photographs. Rough sketches are transferred to the silver, informing the visual framework. The silver’s form then changes rapidly throughout the making process.<h5>How did you come across Heartfulness meditation?</h5><h5 style="text-align:justify;">Jamie</h5><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/silver_and_water_2img_f5aa9fa3c0.jpg?updated_at=2023-03-31T05:21:39.143Z" alt="Spiritual-work">It was through a close friend of mine that I came to know about Heartfulness but I had for a while sensed there was a greater purpose to life. When I first met Miriam 14 years ago we talked a lot about spirituality and meditation without really understanding it. Nevertheless, the sense of purpose and wonder were there and Miriam was and still is a great inspiration.Also my father deserves a mention, as he has been a massive influence, sharing crucial books such as The Power of Now and Buddhism Plain and Simple, and of course his own experience. I remember a time when we were in Heathrow airport on our way to Thailand, accompanied by two close friends of mine, and he gave the most inspirational talk. We were 19 at the time and were totally transfixed as he spoke about awakening to one’s true self. I asked him what had triggered this initial response and he said, “I just didn’t want to be the person who didn’t know.”That struck a massive chord in me as I thought of all the disasters that could happen here on earth, to sort of stumble through life blindfolded, thinking that consumerism is all there is would be the greatest mistake.These were the people who either directly or inadvertently guided me towards Heartfulness and, out of all the practices of meditation I have tried, I settled with this because of the transmission.<h5 style="text-align:justify;">Miriam</h5>I started Heartfulness meditation practice after Jamie went to India for two months and returned as a changed person, after meditating daily. I instantly wanted to join and was able to learn it while I was at University.<h5 style="text-align:justify;">How has it affected your lives?</h5><h5 style="text-align:justify;">Miriam</h5>From the moment I started meditating regularly, I was more focused doing my degree work, had a larger perspective on life, and felt really grounded in my own experience of meditation. I met literally hundreds of amazing people who inspired me at seminars and centres in India, Germany, Denmark and the UK.<img class="image_resized" style="width:auto;" src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/silver_and_water_3_304147ccf3.jpg?updated_at=2023-03-31T05:22:15.504Z" alt="Spiritual-work">To describe how Heartfulness has affected my life is really too vast a subject to put into words, but perhaps an attempt at this would be to say that the start of my journey led me to a small iceberg. Over the years, like a diver in a vast ocean, I have discovered that the iceberg is getting bigger and bigger and I am still only at the beginning. What is describable in words is really only a tiny portion of the immensity of the journey of the heart.I have been very fortunate to have been guided along this path, and the support of having a heart-centered approach has been invaluable to my life, work, family and relationships.It has made my life a lot more cherished and meaningful, being more attentive to the language of the heart, and I feel I am more determined in all areas with a strong will implanted in my mind to achieve the best. Even if I can’t always achieve everything I wish for, I feel that the determination is what counts.<h5 style="text-align:justify;">Jamie</h5>Heartfulness has without doubt deepened my understanding of life. I would say to go beyond your own self-proposed limitations, to see things in a new way, is to be in touch with your inner Self. This in turn opens your mind and develops a better understanding of people because ultimately you understand yourself at a deeper level. This is the process going on within me and it is certainly a result of meditation. I have felt a depth of peace and joy, which has been at times insurmountable and even a sense of eternity.I’ve recognised that its okay that there is an existence greater than my ego and that I’m part of a greater whole. If this life has given me an opportunity to even glimpse that through the practice of Heartfulness, then what a miracle it all truly is.<h5 style="text-align:justify;">How does it come into your music?</h5><img class="image_resized" style="width:auto;" src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/silver_and_water_4_3ecf54b963.jpg?updated_at=2023-03-31T05:22:51.065Z" alt="Spiritual-work">If spirituality has something to do with going beyond the limitations of your ego then every musician out there has had a spiritual experience, whether they claim to be spiritual or not. When you are able to get out of the way and lose yourself in your instrument, then you can truly become a vehicle through which the music can flow.If you can be totally absorbed and unmindful of yourself, you often play things which you didn’t know you could play and feel things in a new way. This is really where the magic happens and every musician knowingly or unknowingly strives for it.Of course there are techniques you need to develop, but technique alone is not the pinnacle of importance. The most captivating music arises when we let go and become in touch with our true nature, and then the music will reflect such a condition. This is the great challenge when playing live. Then we have the responsibility of performing, so it is no longer just the other band members and myself, but also the collective attention of a hopefully receptive audience.Once again, if you can get lost and lose any bodily tensions and any fear, then the audience will sense this and respond accordingly.<h5 style="text-align:justify;"><img class="image_resized" style="width:auto;" src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/silver_and_water_5_b6f1a8c7c2.jpg?updated_at=2023-03-31T05:23:44.158Z" alt="Spiritual-work">Miriam</h5>Music to me now is a journey of sharing. Sharing the process of creating music with others, sharing my voice and connection with others, and sharing a creative process in the experience rather than the results. Music can also be encrypted with feeling and emotion, which is something the audience feels when listening to it, and meaning is inherent in the artists’ lives and timing of writing a piece of music.<h5 style="text-align:justify;">How do you integrate the culture of playing in a band at gigs with spirituality?</h5><h5 style="text-align:justify;">Jamie</h5><img class="image_resized" style="width:auto;" src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/silver_and_water_6_c7c48fd281.jpg?updated_at=2023-03-31T05:24:24.446Z" alt="Spiritual-work">I feel life is a spiritual dimension rather than spirituality being something you ‘do’ in life. A lot of people have questioned how I can meditate one minute but then listen to rock music. For me that is the same as asking, “How can you meditate and then watch action movies packed with violence?” Some of the most spiritual movies ever made have also contained violence. The Matrix, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings: there’s a great deal of truth within the plots of these movies, but I guess it is a case of becoming conscious of why you are watching them. Rock music reaches out to a massive audience, so if you can weave a spiritual message within it then it too becomes a great medium.<h5 style="text-align:justify;">Miriam</h5>I use subtle suggestion, imagining that the whole room is filled with people who are becoming lighter and brighter in their hearts while listening to our music, that their problems of life and struggle are removed for the duration of the gig, and we are all on the same level of consciousness in the music.<h5 style="text-align:justify;">What are the challenges and advantages of being young and living a spiritually focused life?</h5><h5 style="text-align:justify;">Miriam</h5><h5 style="text-align:justify;"><img class="image_resized" style="width:auto;" src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/silver_and_water_7_1d9c928b6c.jpg?updated_at=2023-03-31T05:24:55.281Z" alt="Spiritual-work"></h5>One advantage of being ‘kind of’ young is that I have lots of ideas on how to integrate spirituality into my working life; a challenge is having time to implement them all! I am also able to connect with a variety of people from different backgrounds through the medium of my work, which broadens my perspective and makes me appreciate my role as an artist in today’s world.<h5 style="text-align:justify;">How has Heartfulness impacted on you as a silversmith?</h5>I started meditation before I started my business in silversmithing, so in a sense it has always been part of my life as a silversmith. I think one of the main factors is that I feel like I’m capturing my connection to spirituality through my silver pieces, and this is reaching people in a particular way. The tactile quality of the silver pieces has always been something that collectors and clients particularly admire, and as the pieces are made with that in mind I feel that is where the connection is. I could be wrong, but that is my feeling. The visual themes of movement in the silver also speak to the people who buy my work, and I feel this is evocative of the connection that flows from artist to buyer.<h5 style="text-align:justify;">What is it you feel you want to express through your art?</h5><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/silver_and_water_2_c35b6ae5eb.jpg?updated_at=2023-03-31T05:25:33.182Z" alt="Spiritual-work">I draw on a range of themes and inspirations, but essentially I try to make objects that inspire and encourage people to look deeper to discover subtleties that may not be visible to the naked eye. The visual aspect of my work is only one part of it. As soon as a person picks up a piece, there are instantly the qualities of touch, temperature, weight, shape and size which travel through the nerves, send signals to the brain and ultimately are transformed into an emotion or feeling. It is this that I am expressing through my work.Metal interwoven with light a glimpse of sun inherent on earth from the bounds of the deep ground.The hands that work a material so bright must capture a gentleness, a cradle of the earths graceful hold.Make me into a vessel to hold the quietest sounds to comfort, to nurture and bring out your subtlest thoughts.Make me into a river to carry the flow of life through generations of souls.I know you have a vision which lends its joyful and bright lustre to the hands of men .Poem written at the Heartfulness Retreat Center in Jutland, Denmark, October 2015&nbsp;<hr><h5 style="text-align:center;">Interview by ROSALIND PEARMAIN</h5><hr>

Silver and Water

<h4>ROSALIND PEARMAIN shares some observations and insights into how our minds work in day-to-day life, and the quality of consciousness that results from calming the mind.</h4><hr>As soon as we wake up in the morning, our attention goes somewhere. Like a radar system, our minds pick up whatever seems to be loudest in their field of sensitivity. They might go to uncomfortable thoughts about the day ahead. They might focus on the question of how tired we still feel, or how drained we are, or how we can motivate ourselves to leave the snug invisibility of the duvet realm! Our attention might go of course to the dreams from which we have just awakened. Our focus might be seized by our nearest and dearest, our problems at work, our pets demanding attention, or our children needing help. It could also be that our direction of mind goes towards something to which we are looking forward.So each day, we start the waking hours with mind activity that also has physical experience and emotions mixed with it. If you think about it, very often the first impressions of the day are shaped by the kinds of thoughts, sensations and emotions that arise when we wake. They affect the day that unfolds, like a filter or haze or particular tune playing across the course of the day. This is like a quality of consciousness.There can be so much variation in how we feel when we wake up. We can feel down or up, energised and fresh or tired and depressed. Children seem always to wake up with some kind of zest for the new day. I was surprised once when I interviewed Heartfulness meditators and heard a few say that the practice made a difference to how they felt in the morning. They felt a kind of joy for the adventure of the new day ahead. It reminded them of how they had felt as a child.There are two different threads of awareness weaving together here. It seems that there is a part of us that is always aware of something, as if we are making a map with our experience, through our brain and nervous system, telling us what is going on from moment to moment as it keeps changing. So we have a sense of being here in an environment and time, being alert to what is going on and vigilant in spotting new things happening. On the other hand, we can get in the car to drive a familiar route and find that we do not even notice where we are until we realise we have gone into autopilot and taken a turn that is not the one we wanted on this occasion! So our attention has gone somewhere else – perhaps to the challenging situation we will face at the end of the journey. Our awareness of where we are, here and now, is not very conscious at all. But if we look more closely, we discover that there is another part of us that is watching the flow. It is like a part of us stands on the riverbank and watches the flow of the water go by, the flow of stuff in our body-mind, but is also apart from it. It might suddenly alert us to the fact that we have taken the usual turning instead of the one we really want this time round.<hr>… if we look more closely, we discover that there is another part of us that is watching the flow. It is like a part of us stands on the riverbank and watches the flow of the water go by, the flow of stuff in our body-mind, but is also apart from it.<hr>Considering how vast the processing capacity of our brains and nervous systems are, we are hardly using much of it most of the time. “The human brain consists of about one billion neurons. Each neuron forms about one thousand connections to other neurons, amounting to more than a trillion connections… Yet neurons combine so that each one helps with many memories at a time, exponentially increasing the brain’s memory storage capacity to something closer to around 2.5 petabytes (or a million gigabytes).”Reber P., Scientific American, May/June 2010, ‘Mind and Brain’<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/consciousness_img2_b7e7cb3fd2.jpg" alt="self-being-consciousness">So we have been given a phenomenal capacity to work with many dimensions of experience and consciousness of living in this vast universe. Yet, most of the time, if we are honest, what preoccupies our minds are all kinds of rather small and limiting thoughts, ideas, emotions and obsessions, as a kind of undercurrent bubbling away. Our minds seem to run away from us and bother us with relentless activity.Alternatively, we might feel a bit empty and bored, and desperately seek to find something to fill our attention, such as food or distractions – our smart phones, computer games, TV shows or music. Our radar systems seems to be easily attuned to emotional and turbulent feeling experiences. Our awareness or consciousness is often taken by the more dramatic waveforms of emotion than the more harmonious ones of calm.What shifts us out of these patterns? Physical activity or relaxation can help us feel connected to ourselves in a whole and immediate way, and also present and grounded in the moment. When we feel especially close to others, this can also release us from all the drama in our minds so that we can let go. Being in nature can suddenly awaken us to the simple and direct enjoyment of sun on skin or the flooding of colour from the greenness of nature. Immersion in water is the chance to feel even more sensation, as well as a quality of cleaning and refreshment, a kind of resetting of self into balance.Over thousands of years, human beings have struggled with the same problems while facing life and adversity. Usually, painfully, there is no way to escape the givens of our existence. The only option we have is in our attitude towards facing them. We have choices in how our mind-body works with the struggles of living, but to be aware of these choices we have to look at how our likes and dislikes keep us spinning in the same wheel like a hamster.&nbsp; Have you ever observed how your mind repeats the same thoughts and patterns and feelings, so that there does not seem to be a way out? Our radar system can be trained to focus somewhere else, less noisy and clamouring. We can find ways to interrupt or change the ceaseless chuntering of our mental flow.<hr>Our radar system can be trained to focus somewhere else, less noisy and clamouring. We can find ways to interrupt or change the ceaseless chuntering of our mental flow.<hr>So the practice of meditation came about in a myriad of forms. It gave a rocky but stable base on which our radar system could rest in the middle of a&nbsp; turbulent ocean of life. This tool for opening our mind and our consciousness from its prison gives us the main chance we have for transformation and for discovering the ingredients for a harmonious, inspiring and fulfilling life.<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">Article by ROSALIND PEARMAIN</h4><hr>

Consciousness

<h4>Have you noticed how happiness affects your ability to communicate? ROSALIND PEARMAIN shares some ideas on how we
 connect with others through the different dimensions of the heart.</h4>


Every day we are involved in countless meetings with others – as we pass acquaintances or neighbors in the street, as we
are with family or friends, as we work or play. If you pay attention, you can discover that your heart is always
involved somehow in these encounters. There are three different dimensions of the heart that help us connect with each
other. They are like aspects of most musical instruments:
<h3>Tuning in</h3>
<img class="img-float-right has-img-center-in-mobile" src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/art_connection_heart_every_moment_meeting_2_920fafee70.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-02T05:48:36.578Z"
 alt="spiritual-relationship" width="426" height="350" />The first is how we join in a song or a dance or music
 making – or even play with a baby. We have to catch the same note, the same intensity or shape of movement, the same
 phrasing. We tune in and join with the person. Sometimes we can feel this is absolutely perfect and in tune, and
 immediately both of us feel glad to be meeting. At difficult times, it is the opposite: we make an upbeat approach
 when they are flat or distracted or sad. Then our meeting can feel off-key and jarring. But if we wait, listen and
 feel a bit more, and keep trying to attune with our heart radar, then we are able to find a way of joining and
 connecting as we go along. It is just like tuning into a radio station.

<h3 style="text-align: justify;">Creating space - amplifying</h3>
The second goes a bit further than tuning. Our hearts need to be open, to receive the
 other person’s being, their feelings and experience. We drop our focus on our own preoccupations. We let go of our own
 needs being heard, and make as big a space as possible to accompany the person in front of us. Here we are using the
 infinite space of the heart to care for others, to hold them, to love them. We can expand this beautiful quality of
 receiving and of compassion to really give attention and love to the person. It is as if we literally give them space
 to be, to exist. So they feel safer and more at home.

<h3 style="text-align: justify;">Resonating and connecting</h3>
The third is like a kind of sounding board in a musical instrument. When we receive the
 other person’s news or feelings or concerns, we find a kind of resonance within us, we join them in sharing the
 experience, like humming. Our heart is moved and stirred. Then the other person feels felt by us and their hearts are
 touched too and it is as if it goes back and forth. Have you noticed that when you feel really well and happy, and
 your heart is open, all these steps of this arc of meeting flow into a beautiful movement towards others without
 effort? And, in contrast, when you are affected by negative thoughts or moods, do you feel a bit constricted and
 stuck? One more thought. If you put these three elements together, of opening, expanding and resonating, they are like
 the sacred sound of A-U-M.

<h6 style="text-align: justify; margin-bottom:15px;">Based on the book, The Heart of Listening: Attentional
 Qualities in Psychotherapy and Counseling, published by Sage Continuum.</h6>
<hr class="vertical-space1">
<hr />

<h4 style="text-align: center;">Article by ROSALIND PEARMAIN</h4>
<hr />

The art of connection: how our heart is in every moment of meeting

<h4>ROSALIND PEARMAIN looks at the emotional issues facing young people today, and
 shares her research findings on the importance of feeling safe and grounding ourselves in the inner shelter of the
 heart.</h4>
It seems as though there is a strong human feeling towards old and tall trees as if we
 want them to keep growing and expanding onwards into the sky. We are drawn to look up wondrously. How do they manage
 to do this without falling over? Perhaps there is an echo of our own longing towards transcendence and the expansion
 of our consciousness.
As one of the ’60s and ’70s generation, I realize that we had that yearning to go beyond
 limits, to experience as many different kinds of mind-expanding opportunities as possible. We wanted to disrupt and
 change things that seemed limiting. Did we also undermine the roots of our societies that had allowed this heady
 growth to evolve? Perhaps we made it harder for our children and even more so for our grandchildren to find
 stability and an inner base of support?
When my son was 18, his best friend died in a tragic accident, falling out of a car. Within a short period of time,
 another friend fell off a balcony at a party and also died. One more later fell out of a tree. Needless to say, this
 shocking loss of poignant, youthful promise had a deep rippling impact on many. Symbolically, they alerted me to the
 question of how we fall out of our lives, ourselves, so easily in our youth in different ways.
At present, we are aware of the escalating problems of young people around the world,
 who are often depressed, lonely, despairing, anxious. They are on the front line of a world that we have created and
 they are showing us that it is not working for them. We fall out of ourselves often as teenagers trying to fit with
 outside demands and pressures from others. We may feel that we have to hide ourselves away to fit in. We lose faith
 with our own inner self. Can we ever find a way to fall back inside?
<img decoding="async" class="lazyload img-float-left has-img-center-in-mobile"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/heartroots2_255f20fccf.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-04T13:49:30.438Z">

At the time of these deaths, I wanted to do something constructive. Having observed the
 transformative effect of Quaker summer schools for teenagers for my own children, I wondered if they could be
 offered far more widely. Finding an American model based on creative arts, I worked as an adult volunteer in both. I
 also visited a summer program for teenagers run by Heartfulness in Europe. From a small piece of qualitative
 research carried out in each, I discovered that the most significant aspect for the young people was the sense of
 safety they got from all of these structures which had ground rules of inclusion and encouragement for everyone
 equally.
“I had never felt so safe,” said one. “I cried when I had to leave.” It was a bit of a
 shock to hear how these young people felt so unsafe to be themselves. They felt a lack of supportive acceptance from
 their parents and peers. They felt a level of conditional love, dependant on pleasing their parents. They also
 experienced exclusion and denigration from peers and constant pressure from expectations in the education system.
 Some experienced far more dangerous conditions in urban settings from crime and gangs. Ten years later, the
 situation appears to be worsening. The pressure of social media now adds to the feeling of shame and self-hatred
 that young people may feel in comparison with an illusory ideal projected outside and beyond reach.
Another small piece of research emerged in my doctoral study: Heartfulness meditators
 experienced far higher levels of a deep sense of safety at some time in their experiences of meditation than another
 comparison group.
All the studies of attachment and neuroscience show us that we cannot learn and
 integrate information if we are feeling anxious or under threat. This can be aroused from our own inner self-attack
 as much as from others. So how can we fall back inside to the inner shelter of our heart, the source of love and our
 true being?
I had thought it was the deep taproot in a tree that anchored it so securely. But on
 further investigation, it seems that it is a system of shallow, thin horizontal roots that give trees their
 stability. These roots spread two or three times as wide as the height of the tree. Thin delicate roots mix with
 other fungi and fibrous material and put down vertical shoots as well. So it is the small horizontal roots that
 reach out and support the tree in its connection with the earth and other organisms.


<hr>
<h5 style="text-align: center;">It anchors us into the environment of our true
 Self, 
 our ground of being, and into the earth and&nbsp;connection with others. 
 We can be sheltered in our divine source&nbsp;as well as connected 
 with the world.&nbsp;This is
 Heartfulness. 
 It is a way to fall back inside ourselves 
 and never fall out again.
</h5>
<hr>
This is a beautiful metaphor for the working of the heart. It anchors us into the
 environment of our true Self, our ground of being, and into the earth and connection with others. We can be
 sheltered in our divine source as well as connected with the world. This is Heartfulness. It is a way to fall back
 inside ourselves and never fall out again.
<hr>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">Article by ROSALIND PEARMAIN</h4>
<hr>

Heart roots

<h4>ROSALIND PEARMAIN shares feelings and experiences about how consciousness evolves in the heart through human life, and how meditation allows us to access those subtler states of fluid being we knew as children.</h4>When we see our natural world in documentary films, we are stunned and awed by the exquisite beauty of form, process and intricate complexity in biological systems. I wonder if we could see the unfolding of consciousness within human beings, we would be even more deeply moved. It could be something more dimensional than a tree growing, a crystal forming, a choir or symphony in harmony, and all in its formation creating such a beautiful wave form, a vibration, a mellifluous cadence to enhance the whole universe.I imagine that we come from a fluid and entirely connecting flow of being-love. At birth, our soul flower enters into the density of our human vehicle of sentience. It affords a solid shock of sensory waves – the new field for our consciousness to re explore.This field of consciousness is our shimmering, vibrant space of many felt domains that reveal our world to us.The sphere of heart mind manifests the embodied experience of the present moment.There are many embodied and visceral sources of experience and knowing that unfold through our awareness each day.For a baby, they are merged into a unity of senses, feelings, emotions and the gathering grasp of meaning – always within a relational connectivity.As language slowly offers a shorthand for these moments, we are able to exercise a more instrumental grasp of our consciousness and share this with others. At the same time, increasing coordination and motor skills open up possibilities of spatial experience in speed, in trajectory, in weight and lightness, and emerging control and direction.Also our intellect gathers increasing discernment to apply to understanding.Meanwhile, our sense of self is becoming more sharply edged. It is also sensed as a vulnerable, small craft floating in a vast ocean of life and the universe. It seeks to feel more secure and more solid to face its unfolding challenges.Reflecting on this wondrous journey through childhood, we can be very moved by the openness and curiosity in children, without judgment, and the sense of their consciousness offering a space of such expansion, discovery, joy and intensity. Being immersed in the present moment allows for loss of self in the action of the game or the story.Knowing is about body experience; moving as a snake or a bear is the most immediate way for young children to access consciousness of the experience of the animal through their heart-minds.Yet it is a field of depth and feeling. There are terrifying monsters as well as benevolent heroes, and there are many limitations and disappointments to face as well as fun to enjoy.<hr>Reflecting on this wondrous journey through childhood, we can be very moved by the openness and curiosity in children, without judgment, and the sense of their consciousness offering a space of such expansion, discovery, joy and intensity.<hr>As adults, increasingly we have learnt to use our shorthand maps to navigate life experiences. As left-brain devices, they give us abstract, cognitive schemas to shape and organize our present experience into predictable patterns. But the vaguer, felt, implicit background of the present moment of consciousness is often increasingly ignored in the rush of life pressures. Yet these implicit, tacit areas of consciousness are our underlying ground of relation, of meaning and depth to our evolving sense of being. They are just as important as the linear flow of doing, thinking and reacting. These moments of being may be tasted in nature, in rest, in connection with each other, and in response to music and beauty.Meditation starts to reverse some of these processes. It allows us to put to one side the automatic categorizing and naming of the contents of our awareness into words and concepts. It allows us to sink through and dissolve the fixed patternings and shapings of our experience into more subtle and precise feelings and qualities. Different sensory experiences may be far more synaesthetic and intertwined during meditation – as they were in our infancy. We rediscover an openness and feeling base to our field of consciousness. The exquisite and mysterious heart as the subtle organ of perception and consciousness is central to this field of consciousness. It seems to operate both as a radar system and an organizing and synthesizing matrix. It integrates and brings our field of awareness into a coherent and resonant equilibrium. Its dynamic spaciousness contains everything, whether positive or negative. We are reminded of the joy of that present centered mode of awareness that we tasted as children.As we open ourselves to this deeper, subtler ground of awareness of the heart, we start to resonate with our divine Source within. With Heartfulness Meditation, the frequency of Transmission helps to purify our heart and dissolve layers that have obscured this presence from our conscious awareness. As the sense of self becomes less hard-edged and more diffuse in this being-feeling-sensing state, we intrinsically feel nature more directly. We feel a kinship of humanness through heart connections rather than mind thoughts. We are part of things like a wave rather than a particle. Our field of feeling consciousness expands – with loving prayers and suggestions, and in meditative gatherings across the world.This process has a quality of beauty that calls us further. It is more transparent, more delicate, more refined; reminiscent of the world we came from perhaps. Many of us recall special moments as children, where we were transported in awareness by pools of stillness, depth or wonder unexpectedly opening in nature; or in moments of worship; or in the atmosphere created by pious people with whom we came in contact. Some children’s storybooks provide a taste of these ethereal and more transparent worlds in the realms of the Faery and other magical places. We find wonderful transformational elements, such as a fire of roses in The Princess and Curdie by George MacDonald, or Lothlórien in Lord of the Rings. Music is also an element that transports us to more subtle landscapes within the heart mind field.<hr>Many of us recall special moments as children, where we were transported in awareness by pools of stillness, depth or wonder unexpectedly opening in nature; or in moments of worship; or in the atmosphere created by pious people with whom we came in contact.<hr>There are also the different myths and stories from different cultures that illustrate deep spiritual themes, inspiring heroics and ennobling struggles. They offer a colorful play of the human drama through the ages. They give a rich psychic ground for our symbols, imagination and intuition.There is a kind of tension in life’s journey between the earlier eagerness to embrace the total experience of being embodied and alive and the later one of savoring simpler, subtler, beautiful essences. This is very well understood in the approach to Japanese Noh theatre.Something inspires us to follow a spiritual way, where we direct our consciousness more and more towards the deeper, softer and plainer sense of being within our core. Something attracts us towards finer feelings and increasing balance, away from the turbulent waters we have encountered in our consciousness. We seek resonance with our inner Beloved and a larger field of consciousness is revealed by that presence at the most subtle level felt by our hearts. This can be radiated around us to include the whole field of our heart-mind consciousness.<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/Consciousness2_ac0b1a1f2e.jpeg?updated_at=2023-04-06T12:42:44.476Z" alt="Consciousness2">We are no longer an isolated particle in a sea of energy. Instead we feel deeply connected with the Source of creation, with the hearts of others, with nature, and both the suffering and inspiration of humanity.There may be glimpses of a higher perspective – how within a meditation group each one’s field of consciousness is combined to create a higher frequency of love. This can affect the whole world like a circling necklace of jewels.Each human gift can grow and contribute to a heightened resource of synergy, more and more aligned with the divine Source. And the resulting higher vibrational frequency affects not only this world but others, too, where the laws of space and time are perhaps in a different key and there are different joys and illuminations.How extraordinary to be afloat in this cosmic sea of consciousness, guided by our beloved, wise and revered teachers and sages, deeply grateful for life, for being within our heart Source, for being in this unfolding mystery.<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">Article by ROSALIND PEARMAIN</h4><hr>

The beauty of unfolding consciousness

<h4>ROSALIND PEARMAIN has been a Heartfulness practitioner for over 40 years. Here
 she shares some tips from her own experience that can help deepen meditation and take us further on the journey of
 evolution.</h4>
A true spiritual practice does not impose dogma or an authoritarian approach&nbsp; to
 spiritual exploration. This places the responsibility on each one of us to sustain a constant interest and
 motivation in our experience and to try to increase our capacity to perceive subtle changes in our evolution. Our
 consciousness is able to stay attuned to inner sources of nourishment during Heartfulness Meditation because of the
 Transmission we receive.
The focus is to become one with the Source, with the beloved within, with love itself,
 and to disentangle ourselves from the complexities of wishes, desires and deep tendencies, which create resistance
 and reaction to change and to our harmonious relations with others around us. Everything can teach us more, help us
 learn more, change ourselves and enable us to give more.
We can change our prejudices, reactive patterns and negative emotions. A wonderful tool
 is a diary to record everything that we observe in meditation and daily life, with a curious, open and honest
 approach, like a mirror for ourselves over time. The Heartfulness approach completely embraces living in the midst
 of life, accepting partners and families, work and community, facing all manner of challenges.
<h4 style="color: #e8788c; text-align: justify;"><img decoding="async" alt=""
 class="lazyload w-100"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/steadywork2_1ffba1ce75.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-10T04:23:22.725Z">
</h4>
Here are some practical ideas that may
 support a deepening of your experience in meditation. You can also discover your own to share. The most
 important key is just to take interest:
Pray for help if you feel stuck or unmotivated.
If it is a difficult day, bring this also into your meditation.
Find some inspiration from messages, books or talks, perhaps in just one sentence. Read
 and absorb and then bring this quality into your meditation and see what happens.
Cultivate an inner loving and truthful witness of yourself within.
Take time to be grateful and appreciative of what you have received or learned.
Take time at the end of the meditation to note how are you feeling, and try to keep it
 as a whole sense to which you can refer during the day.
Experiment with keeping attention in your heart during the day and observing thoughts
 vigilantly.
Approach each meditation as an entirely new experience rather than one that you expect
 to be in a certain familiar pattern.
Write down in your diary whatever you discover as a pioneer researcher.
Include in your prayer at night a request for a deeper meditation in the morning.
Take a good amount of time to find and feel your heart. Don’t rush. Then, after a while,
 make the suggestion that the Light is already present in your heart, and slowly focus awareness on this with
 openness, waiting to receive gladly whatever comes.
Try recalling the profound core of longing in your soul that has brought you to this
 moment and opportunity.
Try consciously putting your heart completely wholeheartedly into the meditation.
Try anticipating your opportunity to meet the Divine within with joy and eagerness and a
 sense of discovery and wonder.
<hr>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">Article by ROSALIND PEARMAIN</h4>
<hr>

The steady work of evolution

<h4>ROSALIND PEARMAIN shares her experience of what brings meaning, depth and purpose to everyday living.</h4>
Like so many precious projects on our Earth, in a local small town there exists a wonderful venture that helps young people who have been homeless and are having problems rebuilding their lives. I was invited to participate in a regular session of sharing some experience on what gives meaning to life. What to say?
I could talk about a heart-based meditation called Heartfulness, but what then? On reflection, I am realizing that what has been most important about meditating on the heart has been to steadily discover more ways to feel life and living.
Many people have the idea that meditation leads us into a rather dull state of calm and withdrawal or detachment. Cartoonists often depict meditators as zoning out and floating on a cloud. Suppose it is the very opposite!
The first time I noticed an increased feeling effect, was on my return from a visit to my first teacher in this Heartfulness approach – a man called Babuji. On the plane, I plugged in the most basic kind of earphones of the ’70s, and listened in rapture to the music playing. Today sound systems are marketed and sold like temples to music, the electronics endlessly refined and housed within the most exquisite wooden casings, like sculptural masterpieces. But at the end of the day, what good is the most perfect sound system if the person listening has inner distortion created by the turbulence of the stuff of everyday life?
The effect is to muffle and distort our inner ability to listen. It is difficult to be in a pure enough state to really feel and savor beautiful music. It is not easy to find the capacity to tune in, to expand an inner space to receive, to let the music flow directly and touch us deeply. Yet this is exactly what I found had changed as a result of meditating for a few days and receiving the help of my beloved teacher in cleaning my heart.
When we are moved or touched it can be as if our heart hurts or vibrates. The hardest aspect of being human is that we are faced with such deeply sad or overwhelmingly painful experiences at times. In the short term, we can close our hearts and withdraw from the risk of that pain being repeated. We can go numb or hard or distract ourselves or hide away and try and disappear. I am sure I learned to do all those things to some degree in my earlier life.

<hr>
<h5 style="text-align: center;">Listening to this extraordinary 
 feeling-heart instrument 
 we can know precisely and subtly 
 what is going on. 
 Everything that seems outside of us 
 in space and time can be felt 
 very precisely within our heart 
 as it affects and impacts us. </h5>

<hr>
Today, it is the very echo of those very painful moments in my heart that helps me connect and resonate every day with other human beings and with life on this planet. A lot more space has been made through the cleaning process. But it is not really empty space – it is a space of resonance. It is like a rock wall of a cave that has been carved out by water and ice and heat and pressure so that it is worn away and smoothed down. Now I feel that the human heart is big enough to hold everything, and to hold it all in compassion and kindness so that it is more bear-able. It is a place of feeling to hold feeling, to allow it to mean more and more, and to stir us more and more deeply. This is the best source of inspiration and creation.
Everything can be felt more – the sky, clouds, trees, colors, light, seasons, forms, living systems, changes, the elements of water, air, earth and fire, children, the presence of loved ones, conversations and moving about all fill me with a very simple delight and enjoyment. That is, if I keep a daily sense of freshness and newness coming with the meditation practice. They can also be a source of much more subdued softness and comfort in bleaker times. It seems to be a way that the heart is tuned into Nature. There is a simple level of joy or ordinary relief in feeling connected with the world. The heart feels this even in dark times. We are more connected through suffering than anything else.
It is not here a matter of lists of ‘favorite things’ like the song in The Sound of Music. Instead, through meditation, our heart shows us that it is like a very extraordinary musical instrument, through which we attune to and amplify the sounds of everyday life. Daaji has described the heart as the center of all the spiritual centers and sub-centers in the human system and field of existence.
It seems then that all reflection and experience can be gathered in the heart and felt more and more deeply and widely. In deepening the resonance of any experience we feel more and more stirred, moved and inspired. It is a process of creativity in slow motion as life moves through our field of awareness. Through our heart center we feel its meaning and connection more and more like a song. This can keep reverberating on and on. It can go on being refined and understood, shared and expressed, in each moment. It is our quintessential source of intelligence through refined feeling.
Listening to this extraordinary feeling-heart instrument we can know precisely and subtly what is going on. Everything that seems outside of us in space and time can be felt very precisely within our heart as it affects and impacts us. It is as if the heart gathers the information from the different senses and distills them into a specific sound, a vibration that is moving and meaningful, connecting us to the universal Source of all.
In meditation, the heart feels what it receives from the Source and responds to new notes, new soundless music and infinite beauty from deeper dimensions and worlds… And so it goes on.
That is what gives meaning to life for me.

<hr>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">Article by ROSALIND PEARMAIN</h4>

<hr>

What gives meaning to life?

<hr><h4>ROSALIND PEARMAIN, Ph.D., has been integrating the fields of psychology, <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/the-superpower-of-listening" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">psychotherapy</a>, and spirituality, through both practical and philosophical approaches, for over 40 years. Here she explores the way a spiritual practice opens up levels of feeling and sensitivity as we expand into deeper and deeper levels of consciousness, and how our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual bodies are integrated through the heart.</h4><hr>The great divide between scientific and mystical views of reality lands on the question of our subjective awareness. Measures can be made of physiological and behavioural effects of meditation practices, but it is much harder to demonstrate objectively the transformative experiences that a seeker may undergo in a disciplined practice over years.Ultimately it comes down to how someone feels. This domain of feeling is so extraordinary and intricate in our subjectivity, and yet it has often been quite disregarded as the source of our capacity to orientate and connect with our environment. The word “feeling” is ambiguous in the English language. It includes both emotions and the more diffuse area of perception. In its medieval origins it meant the physical sensation of touch through experience or perception. Touch remains the most helpful way of capturing the lived experience of feeling as we encounter daily life. The domain of feeling is continuously flowing through a shifting synthesis of qualities and textures as an overall array of diffuse meaning coloring and sculpting our responses and moods.Music is a primordial expression of such feeling. Within our current dominant scientific discourse, the fact that such a feeling array is informing us of much more than our physical and mental state is not yet articulated. Yet from the perspective of perennial philosophies, within the experience of feeling are all the domains of our subtle fields of consciousness.<h4 style="text-align:justify;">Touch as a Core Sense</h4>According to the philosophy of Rudolph Steiner, we have twelve senses in our makeup. The sense of touch is core. Through touch we are woken up to the world, and through the radiation of touch information throughout our system we are enlivened. We are reminded of our primordial separateness and our wish to connect through touch. Steiner said that without touch we would never become conscious of the Divine. When we touch something we are both so close and so far from it.Sensitivity is our radar system. In the confusion of different information pathways in which we are ceaselessly immersed, sensitivity is our capacity to fine tune, to touch as it were, significant elements from the whole. So sensitivity is expressed in our fields of perception, and our capacity to notice – and further to notice what we notice. This perceptual capacity continues to develop throughout life. Specialists in any field become hyper-conscious of such elements as electric fields, or the way that patients’ skin color denotes subtle changes in health, or the way that plants signal malaise, or if notes played are off key.<h4 style="text-align:justify;">Discernment</h4>The distinction to be made between scientific and metaphysical approaches to knowledge has been in the discernment of information. Spiritual traditions have confronted this issue by evolving specific protocols of practice, of directing attention, of cultivating a stringent observer and witness, and of purifying the filters of attachment and desires and egotism that cloud the lens of perception. Within Vedic philosophy, the higher realms of human consciousness involve a shift from thinking consciousness to a more direct feeling consciousness.In the Heartfulness tradition of meditative practices, all the teachers have proposed that the realm of the divine is known through feeling, and this feeling connects the divine Reality with the whole field of humanity. It is an unimaginable realm. We can only conceive it as a kind of enormous filigree network of intensity which is absolutely soft and fine. It is at the most subtle level of our existence. One clear sign of a spiritually evolved person, a truly human person, is one who is consistently alert and sensitive to situations and others. So from this point of view, the journey of spiritual evolution is one of increasingly refining our tools of perception, our capacity to feel the faintest trace of something, and to glimpse its meaning directly.<hr>&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;<h4 style="text-align:center;">In the Heartfulness tradition of meditative practices, all the teachers have proposed that the realm of the divine is known through feeling, and this feeling connects the divine Reality with the whole field of humanity. It is an unimaginable realm. We can only conceive it as a kind of enormous filigree network of intensity which is absolutely soft and fine.</h4>&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;<hr><h4 style="text-align:justify;">Mind as Embodied Cognition</h4>In Eastern philosophies, “mind” is not seen as identical with “intellect” in the way that we may view it in the West. In fact, it is more equivalent to the entire field of sensibility in which we are immersed. Within this model, and especially in the Yogic and Sufi traditions, the heart is understood to be the base of mind. In a sense, it is the primary port of call for our sense of being and aliveness. It is equivalent to the entire nervous system within us. The heart is the field for the mind. The heart is the place of sensitivity to all the feedback from the entire array of sensory input: the whole bodily landscape.As the meeting place of all the subtle fields of sentience within us, the heart has the capacity to integrate awareness into a core understanding. Within spiritual evolution, the task is to refine knowing – to rely on feeling more than thinking, because it is less constrained by concept. The mystic’s quest to know the Divine cannot be based on an intellectual process. As Jung said, “We do not do well to look at the sky with the intellect. It is neither adequate for the knowledge of the psyche.”&nbsp;<hr><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/Feeling_sensitivity2_c16a462097.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-12T12:01:41.469Z">&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;<h4 style="text-align:justify;">The Feeling of What Happens</h4>Antonio Damasio is a neuroscientist whose research and thinking has challenged the separation of mind and feeling. He offers a model of consciousness and a sense of self which is rooted in a more global conception of bodily and affective experiencing. In his work, The Feeling of What Happens, he proposes that thought and consciousness in fact derive from feeling: apart from specific emotions, we can be aware of a continuous flow of background feeling within our consciousness. Damasio suggests that background feeling is the way that the brain minds the body. Through the different systems involving the endocrine system, the internal milieu, the visceral, vestibular and muscoskeletal systems, our sense of self in relation to experience continuously re-orientates and adapts. Background feeling is the way that current information is mapped through our sensory and nervous systems.From these observations, he suggests that there are two kinds of consciousness – one would be core, and the other elaborated or autobiographical. These also correspond with two senses of self. A core sense of self is ceaselessly created with every moment of experiencing. Damasio suggests that two parallel mappings of body states are going on. So as I sit here at my computer, my brain is mapping the physical location of my body, the activity in my fingers, the words I am thinking about and typing through the keyboard, and all the related events and surroundings in which all of this happens. However, at the same time, there is a more subtle presenced feeling going on to accompany all of this; it is not just fingers typing and a body sitting here, it is a sense of visceral closeness and intimacy, a kind of touch to all of this, which I feel as my self.<hr>&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;<h4 style="text-align:center;">As the meeting place of all the subtle fields of sentience within us, the heart has the capacity to integrate awareness into a core understanding.</h4>&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;<hr>This results from the secondary mapping process, how this background sense is subtly modified by each new moment experienced as a bodily felt sensing. It is this to which we can often have direct access during meditation or reverie. It is a direct cognition and would include a mental flow of images which are continuously unfolding and are not limited to visual representations. Images involve a synthesis of sensory modalities, sensory and affective elements.Damasio proposes that consciousness originates when this kind of wordless knowledge, representing what is perceived, is experienced also as creating a change within the organism. Such perception arises from the additional sensory motor and affective responses. Wordless knowledge arises in its simplest form at a mental level as a “feeling of knowing.” Therefore, the original basis of consciousness is the feeling of what happens when any form of perceiving is going on. It is this particular accompanying feeling that gives rise to us claiming the experience as belonging to us personally as a sense of self.Our culture is visually dominated. It attributes objectivity to what can be seen rather than what can be felt. Damasio wonders whether in less complex societies, human beings were naturally more aware of these inner processes of self than we are today. This interesting observation also links the contemporary and perennial perspectives. The latter continually urge us to bring our attention inward rather than allow ourselves to be fragmented by the pull on our senses toward so many external influences. This brings us back to the heart of all of this.In yogic science, there is the notion that we have inner senses, known as indriyas, which can discern a more profound awareness of being. When our attention is overly focused on external experience, we tend to identify increasingly with a bodily oriented and bound sense of self. But when we increasingly learn to discern through our more subtle perceptual systems, then we become closer to the deeper Self within. Paradoxically, this Self feels more than the bodily-oriented self. As we go deeper, we utilize the resources of our subtle bodies at finer and finer levels of vibration, each yielding a different kind of reality.If the realm of the divine is at the subtlest level, then the task in evolution is to develop the sensitivity of mind to perceive and become one with this subtlest level of existence. Once we start to imagine this, we realize that this kind of perception is based on the capacity to pick up fainter and fainter cues, to feel and to be increasingly sensitive to almost “soundless notes.” This is how rishis in ancient times were able to hear and “know” extraordinary philosophical truths. We may experience these kinds of perceptions as a more diffuse synthesis, like a texture or quality, which are refined and often convey to us very beautiful intimations of aliveness and feelings beyond words.<hr>&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;<h4 style="text-align:center;">If the realm of the divine is at the subtlest level, then the task in evolution is&nbsp;to develop the sensitivity of mind to perceive and become one with this subtlest level of existence.</h4>&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;&nbsp;<hr><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/Feeling_sensitivity3_5d4c10e05e.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-12T12:03:48.050Z">&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;<h4 style="text-align:justify;">The Role of the Heart</h4>In most human societies, a person will point to their heart when they refer to themselves. Focusing attention on the heart brings our sense of self inward to a central core location. Both in the East and the West, the heart is regarded as the place of soul, of love, of knowledge and wisdom. These come through feeling rather than intellectual construct. From recent research carried out by Pearsall, the HeartMath organization, and others, the heart is the largest oscillator within our system, which can entrain others if it is tuned into coherent wave forms. These occur when a person is feeling loving and calm. So the heart can connect with others. This results in more and more attunement to the feelings of others and an increase in capacity for empathy.In the Heartfulness Way, a modern form of Raja Yoga, and in Sufi practices, the heart is gradually purified of background impressions that restrict perception and cognition, so that there is a clearer field of experiencing and feeling. The heart carries these impressions of experience. If consciousness is based on feeling, and the heart center is the base of this, then spiritual practice is the task of refining the “mirror or lens of the heart” so that what is discerned in the midst of awareness is less and less determined by accumulated impressions and tendencies. Ram Chandra, the second Heartfulness Guide in the lineage, once said, “The heart is the field for the mind to work, and this is the instrument by which we develop the discriminating faculty.”This refining process is central to spiritual practice, so that we can become perfect instruments – as if we could play divine music. Like any instrument, the heart’s capacity to resonate truly can be distorted by the influence of other dissonances. It is through an attuned sentience and the heart’s refinement that the spiritual aspects within us can be felt and glimpsed. In <a href="https://www.heartfulnessmagazine.com/space-time-creation-universe/">2016</a>, Daaji emphasized that the purpose of life is to facilitate expansion of consciousness to its fullest potential. This expansion eventually takes us to a state of lightness and joy where the subtle body is pure, simple and refined. Then, there is no longer any separation between the heart and the mind – they are one. The heart is the field of action for the mind and vice versa. He says that this integrated, holistic state of being is known as Yoga.<hr>&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;<h4 style="text-align:center;">It is through an attuned sentience and the heart’s refinement that the spiritual aspects within us can be felt and glimpsed.</h4>&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;The heart can reflect the profound qualities of humanness, love, compassion, sharing, peace, a deeper sense of relatedness, as well as other qualities of infinite variation. In purifying the heart center, openness to experience is increased with a simultaneous openness to compassion.From all of these perspectives, it can be argued that in order to “know” something we need to be able to feel. In spiritual evolution, this capacity for feeling needs to be refined to increasingly subtle levels to go beyond our patterns of attachment, desire and fear. If we are able to refine feeling, we are closer to the most profound depths of the divine Self and the divine field of existence, which is centered in the heart. So, in this way, feeling is the base of our connection with a unified ground of existence and our true identity. This leads to a divine humanness that is infinitely soft, infinitely simple and close to nature.Here is an image that may capture such a beautiful state of being: We need to be as soft as cotton, so that a needle can pass through without touching. Only then, through this infinite realm of feeling, do we become one with the Source of all existence.References Childre, D. et al., 2016. Heart Intelligence: Connecting with the Intuitive Guidance of the Heart. Waterfront Digital Publications. Damasio A., 2000. The Feeling of What Happens: Body, Emotion and the Making of Consciousness. William Heineman, London, UK. Helminski K., 1999. The Knowing Heart: A Sufi Path of Transformation. Shambhala, Boston, USA. Jung C.G., 1993. The Practice of Psychotherapy. Routledge and Kegan, London, UK. Patel, K.D., 2016. Space, Time and the Creation of the Universe. Heartfulness Magazine, Vol. 1, 8: pp. 35-40. <a href="https://www.heartfulnessmagazine.com/space-time-creation-universe/">https://www.heartfulnessmagazine.com/space-time-creation-universe/</a>. Pearmain R., 2001. The Heart of Listening: Attentional Qualities in Psychotherapy. Sage, London, UK. Pearsall P., 1998. The Heart’s Code. Thorsons, London, UK. Rajagopalachari, P., 1994. Heart to Heart, Vol. 3. Shri Ram Chandra Mission, USA. Ram Chandra, 2020. Reality at Dawn. Sahaj Marg Spirituality Foundation, India. Schmidt, S. and H. Walach, 2014. Introduction: Laying out the field of Meditation, in Research in Meditation – Neuroscientific Approaches and Philosphical Implications. Studies in Neuroscience, Consciousness and Spirituality,Vol. 2. Eds. S. Schmidt and H. Walach. Springer Press, Switzerland. Skolimowski H., 1994. The Participatory Mind: A New Theory of Knowledge and of the Universe. Penguin Books, London, UK. Soesman A., 2001. Our Twelve Senses: Wellsprings of the Soul. Hawthorn Press, USA.<hr>&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;<h4 style="text-align:center;">Article by ROSALIND PEARMAIN</h4>&nbsp;<hr>

Feeling, sensitivity, and consciousness

<h4>ROSALIND PEARMAIN challenges our current worldview on research methodology, and the relative importance of left-brain and right-brain processes in human understanding and consciousness studies. She references the ground-breaking work of Iain McGilchrist, whose thesis has debunked the old paradigms of the human brain.</h4><hr>We may not all be creating sophisticated experimental designs and calculating how significant results might be, yet each of us encounters new situations each day with our family, colleagues, organizations, and communities. We bring our understanding and our hypotheses, and we modify them as they may be challenged or altered by the response of others.We keep learning. Life gives us many opportunities to re-search, and to challenge outworn assumptions, not least the kind of unknowns we have faced through the pandemic.For most of my life, I have been curious about the realms of experiencing, feeling, the non-verbal, and the implicit realms of knowledge. How do we understand the different qualities felt in the presence of women? What elements contribute to change in experiential learning and groups? How does attending sensitively to the relational process support therapeutic change? What is so transformative for young people about some summer school programs? How does meditation contribute to change and growth?When we hear music, dance, spend time in nature, and meditate, we find ourselves in a flow of feeling alive that is immediate and meaningful. Yet somehow, all this subjective experience is often missing from the way we value knowledge.&nbsp;On one level, they are felt and known realities, which we can describe and name. They are also vital in the field of psychotherapeutic learning and training. On another level, they are perceived as occupying a zone of impressionistic and unreliable qualitative feeling. Our culture prefers to make “things” out of experiences, and apply measures and models very fast.<hr><hr><h4>When we hear music, dance, spend time in nature, and meditate,&nbsp; we find ourselves in a flow of feeling alive&nbsp; that is immediate and meaningful.</h4><hr><hr>So, I would like to introduce you to the extraordinary work of Iain McGilchrist, a psychiatrist and neuroscientist, and previously Professor of Literature at Oxford University. He has spent the last 10 years writing a 3-volume work illuminating this dilemma. It is based on an earlier book, The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World.1His research is based on various sources and disciplines, including the observation of patients with injuries to either hemisphere of the brain. It is also founded on very wide scholarship. His book is an inquiry into the asymmetry of the brain, and the differences between left and right hemispheres that occur not only in humans but other species, such as birds. He dismisses the simplistic, outdated, and popular notions of this asymmetry from the 1960s. He observes how birds need to keep part of their attention on finding small seeds in a small area, while at the same time keeping their awareness vigilant and broad to spot possible threats, mates, or other environmental occurrences.<hr><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/we_are_all_reasearchers2_c485a21b5c.jpg" alt=""><hr>This kind of distinction is also true for us. There is a purpose in having two hemispheres. Both are needed:“Both attend to the world and bring the world into being for us in two largely opposing ways; the left hemisphere paying narrowly targeted attention to a detail that we need to manipulate; the right hemisphere paying broad, open, sustained, vigilant, uncommitted attention to the rest of the world while we focus on our desired detail.&nbsp; This means that each hemisphere brings into being a world that has different qualities. In the case of the left hemisphere, a world of&nbsp;things&nbsp;that are familiar, certain, fixed, isolated, explicit, abstracted from context, disembodied, general in nature, quantifiable, known by their parts, and inanimate.&nbsp;In the case of the right hemisphere, a world of&nbsp;Gestalten, forms, and processes that are never reducible to the already known or certain, never accounted for by dissolution into parts, but always understood as wholes that both incorporate and are incorporated into other wholes, unique, always changing and flowing, interconnected, implicit, understood only in context, embodied, and animate.&nbsp;The left hemisphere is a world of atomistic elements; the right hemisphere one of relationships. Most importantly the world of the right hemisphere is the world that&nbsp;presences&nbsp;to us, that of the left hemisphere a&nbsp;re-presentation: the left hemisphere a map, the right hemisphere the world of experience that is mapped.”2McGilchrist has undertaken this project from both historical and current observations, and from a concern that our culture appears to be increasingly imbalanced towards the left hemispheric sphere of bringing reality into being. The left hemisphere is a closed system not functioning in present time. It is valuable in helping us grasp tools, make maps, and find words. It represents elements as fragments and parts, and tends towards a decontextualized and abstract kind of machine model of experience, which facilitates our manipulation of the world and our stress on technical approaches. It tends toward an absolute right or wrong mode of knowing something.“The left hemisphere is principally concerned with manipulation of the world. The left hemisphere deals preferentially with detail, the local, what is central and in the foreground and easily grasped.”3However, it is the right hemisphere that presents us with the relational, embodied, pre-conceptual, changing, empathic and present-time holistic grasp of reality, which is more fluid.“The right hemisphere is concerned with the whole picture, including the periphery or background and all that is not immediately graspable. It is essential for understanding the other’s point of view, essential for empathy. The right hemisphere is concerned with understanding the world as a whole, and how to relate to it.”4<hr><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/we_are_all_reasearchers3_700x274_7ab67c0a02.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-13T09:22:58.192Z" alt=""><hr>He also says:“I believe that nowadays we live no longer in the presence of the world, but rather a re-presentation of it. This re-presentation has all the qualities of a virtual image; an infinitely thin, immobile fragment.”5Consider here how often people express things as mathematical concepts, with computer analogies, or as algorithms.Most spiritual traditions and approaches to meditation have techniques to help us suspend or ignore some of the left hemispheric processes of categorizing and applying maps to experience. In different ways, they focus attention on the embodied and present moment elements of experience as it unfolds and flows, such as breathing or a following a specific focus in awareness.McGilchrist suggests that the right hemispheric mode of knowing is more reliable than the left. He quotes Einstein who said that “the intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant.” He raises the question, “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFs9WO2B8uI">What if our society has forgotten this gift?</a>“Most essentially, McGilchrist proposes:“It is true we can see the world only partially, but we still each see the world directly. It is not a re-presentation, but a real presence: there isn’t a wall between us and the world.“The nature of the attention we bring to bear is of critical importance here. A maximally open, patient, and attentive response to whatever-it-is is better at disclosing or discerning reality than a response that is peremptory, insensitive, or – above all – shrouded in dogma.”6<hr><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/we_are_all_reasearchers4_0f80a0de2e.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-13T09:24:56.624Z" alt=""><hr>“It [consciousness] is not fixable in space, or quantitative, but qualitative and experienced in the flow of time. And if things turn out to be interconnected, not atomistic – and they are – each consciousness has its impact on the universe that cannot be quantified. Within my experience of the world, very much can be changed by my response to whatever-it-is; in a sense everything can be changed.”7What do I take from all this? A simple, humble, patient, open attention will help us be more encompassing in our understanding, and in our relating to each other and the world. Everything is more fluid and more interrelated than we can know, though we may feel it. And these perceptions are real and precious in our relation with each other and the world we hope to sustain and help flourish.<hr><hr>References:1. The story that led to this title is this:&nbsp; Once a wise spiritual Master was a ruler of a country that flourished. As it flourished it grew and he needed to trust emissaries to act on his behalf in far flung regions. Eventually, one of these decided to advance himself instead of representing the Master. He saw his master’s tolerance as weakness not wisdom and became contemptuous of him. In this way the Master was overcome by his emissary. People were tricked, the country became a tyranny, and eventually it fell apart in ruins.2. McGilchrist, I., 2021. Consciousness as Relational,Science of Consciousness.<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fciCsq0uBUI">Essentia Foundation</a>.3. McGilchrist, I., 2021.The Matter with Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World, Vol. 1.Perspectiva Press London4. Ibid.5. Ibid6. McGilchrist, I., 2021. Consciousness as Relational, Science of Consciousness. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fciCsq0uBUI">Essentia Foundation</a>.7. McGilchrist, I., 2021. The Matter with Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World, Vol. 1. Perspectiva Press London<hr><hr><h4>Illustrations by JASMEE MUDGAL</h4><hr>

We are all researchers

<hr class="vertical-space1" />

<h4>
 ROSALIND
 PEARMAIN
 explores the notion of losing balance and restoring it, and how we
 have to lose our old balance in order to find a new one.
</h4>

<hr class="vertical-space1" />


 A Pilates teacher once suggested that if you ever suffer an ankle injury
 it helps to practice standing on that foot alone (when it is
 sufficiently recovered)as often as you can. Why? Because the nerves are
 also injured in sprains and the neural connectivity between the foot and
 the brain is undermined. Standing on one leg restores the passage of
 information from the ankle to the brain so that your balance and
 movement become more resilient again.



 I find this a good metaphor. Balance is a shifting and dynamic notion;
 not about achieving a static point but sustaining dynamic equilibrium,
 which is far more fluid in living systems. It tells me that what is
 important with balance is opening and restoring the flow of information.
 We could say that we become imbalanced whenever we block or close down
 to a wider understanding of our situation, our relation, and our
 context. We lose the ground upon which we stand and substitute for more
 abstract thoughts and memories. It is as if we literally lose our
 under-standing.



 This happens for me when I fall back on old patterns and get stuck. It
 could happen when I repeat past judgments and ideas about a person or
 situation that has changed, and get into conflict. We can see this
 happen with our friends, families, bosses, and also in political
 situations all the time.



 It seems that we have to apparently lose our balance, our old stance, in
 order to find a new one. We have to sometimes let go of what we hold on
 to in order to keep our sense of upright strength, in order to move
 forward and explore new territory. Is this what we do every time we take
 a step and walk forward?



 Within psychology, there are many different ways to make sense of how we
 lose balance in our relationship with the world:


<ul>
 <li>
 For those with painful beginnings, we can understandably become fixed
 on trying to mend early wounds and sufferings with all those we meet.
 This means we are not really connecting with the present situation and
 its requirements at all.
 </li>

 <li>
 We can become totally preoccupied by our fears, anxieties, and
 sometimes wishes for others – this often happens when we become
 parents.
 </li>

 <li>
 In severe situations, the inner self is so fragile that all efforts
 are extended to protecting it from suffering ever again – such as we
 see in narcissistic responses. With this attempt to protect the self,
 huge efforts are made to ward off any information that is not the same
 as we feel and want to hold on to. It is experienced as threatening.
 We can all feel something of this with our vulnerable egos.
 </li>

 <li>
 There are some situations, like trying to reach an airport to catch a
 plane or be in time for a meeting, when transport breaks down, when
 our focus and sense of balance are reduced to a very fragile thread
 like crossing a high wire!
 </li>

 <li>
 Jung described the complex of powerful archetypes that we all share in
 our deep unconscious selves, that also weave together with our
 personal psychological history. In this way, we can become
 hyper-sensitized to specific themes, e.g. the abandoned child, the
 martyr, the good or bad mother, the oppressive authority, the
 revolutionary overthrower. They can dominate our responses to
 situations in such a way we do not allow other information to come in.
 </li>

 <li>
 We can also sometimes over-identify with roles that we play at work or
 in our family, and lose contact with the wider and deeper aspects of
 our being in the world.
 </li>
</ul>

How can we restore
 balance?
</h>


 Taoism is a way of wisdom based on the notion of intrinsic balance
 within the dynamic flow and interplay of opposites. It requires us to
 recognize ceaseless movement in living systems, and to resist fixing
 ideas or attachments to one side of a situation. By not doing,
 everything is accomplished. By seeking only one side of things we make
 the other more solid and rigid.


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<div class="block-image">
 <figure>
 <img width="700" height="577" alt="lose-balance2" class="lazyload has-img-center"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/lose_balance2_700x577_1b20794583.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-26T07:09:23.171Z" />
 </figure>
</div>

<hr class="vertical-space1" />


 In my very limited exposure to practices such as Tai Chi, I found you
 have to keep your knees bent. You have to be able to bend with pressure.
 It is a helpful metaphor to notice the moment of stiffening against and
 resisting information coming to us, and to mentally relax and move with
 it.



 Sometimes there needs to be time and compassion and healing for our own
 wounds before we can let ourselves consider those of others.



 Pausing and breathing in any situation, taking a step back, and focusing
 entirely on the present moment are very helpful. In a few minutes we can
 monitor all the sensory information coming in at this moment: the feel
 of surfaces meeting the body and feet, the temperature and scent of the
 air, the sounds we hear, the kind of light and sky that is unfolding,
 the sense of being alive. Enjoying that moment can then help us be open
 to exploring what we are feeling in a deeper way.



 It can be interesting to consider how many others have been involved in
 our being in this moment so far today? Those involved in power
 distribution, manufacture of objects, the cultivation and provision of
 food, etc.



 Doing something physical, being in nature, and talking to someone else
 also help us to regain a sense of perspective, a right relation with
 what is going on.



 Finally, meditation is a practice that is especially helpful in
 restoring balance. It can help us find an inner ground that supports us
 through harsh winds and shocks. We feel more anchored and rooted to a
 very deep reality that transcends this small moment.



 We need to feel safe to risk being open. “Under-standing” is a wonderful
 word. I am thinking of it like the roots connecting trees, nourishing
 and supporting growth among them.


<hr class="vertical-space1" />

<div class="block-image">
 <figure>
 <img width="700" height="697" alt="lose-balance3" class="lazyloaded has-img-center"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/lose_balance3_700x697_6913af66e3.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-26T07:10:06.580Z" />
 </figure>
</div>

<hr class="vertical-space1" />

<hr />

<h4 class="has-text-align-center">
 Meditation is a practice
 that is especially helpful in restoring
 balance. It can help us find an inner ground that supports us
 through harsh winds and shocks. We feel more anchored and
 rooted to a very deep reality that transcends this small
 moment.
</h4>

<hr />

<hr class="vertical-space1" />


 For Equilibrium, a Blessing: Like the joy of the sea coming
 home to shore, May the relief of laughter rinse through your
 soul. As the wind loves to call things to dance, May your
 gravity by lightened by grace. Like the dignity of moonlight
 restoring the earth, May your thoughts incline with reverence and
 respect. As water takes whatever shape it is in, So free may
 you be about who you become. As silence smiles on the other side of
 what’s said, May your sense of irony bring perspective. As
 time remains free of all that it frames, May your mind stay clear
 of all it names. May your prayer of listening deepen enough to
 hear in the depths the laughter of god. – John O’Donohue


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<hr />

<h4 class="has-text-align-center">
 Illustrations by ANANYA PATEL
</h4>

<hr />

What does it mean to lose balance?

<h4>ROSALIND PEARMAIN explores the reasons we meditate, and how they evolve over time. As we expand our awareness, we move from the mundane to the sublime, and experience more of our humanity and our inner Being.</h4>This is a question that keeps unfolding like a set of nesting Russian dolls. Imagine you are new to the whole idea and are asking such a question. Meditation may promise you better focus, relaxation, refreshment. Or you may want to meditate to enjoy being quiet and still, and listen to something that feels safe and loving in your heart. You may simply be curious or interested in a new experience of being. You may wish to meditate to become closer to your Higher Self, the Ground of Being within.But how does <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/the-tree-of-knowledge" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">meditation</a> help with any of these? In a simple way, meditation utilizes our capacity to rest consciousness with a focus, like a beam of light. Babies like to throw objects and see what happens. Suddenly, something that we could see, feel, and hold in our baby hand can move somewhere else and be different. With luck it might be returned by someone who speaks or smiles or adds something that changes it all again. So the baby throwing game goes on, helping us to learn about the space beyond and surrounding and within our awareness...Through development we go on “throwing” objects into different spaces. We meet and receive those of others through our attachments, our intentions, play, actions, sounds, feelings, words, games, ideas, stories, art, music, and the complex intellectual mysteries of the material world – all expanding and changing while we keep re-orientating our grasp on it all. We keep moving. Life seems to keep expanding.<a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/meditation-health-part-2" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Meditation</a> helps us to pause; to focus a piece of our consciousness like a pebble and cast it into the open space of our heart-mind awareness, the ocean. At the beginning, it may be caught up in swirls of currents and weeds caused by our emotions and mental distractions; it may seem to float or get stuck on the surface of the water. Yet still it reflects back something of who we are and helps us to be more transparent to ourselves.&nbsp;When we are able to clear these blockages and whirlpools, steadily, with the help of a Guide and transmission, with patience, the pebble of awareness can drop deeper and deeper each time. We can allow our consciousness to gradually sink toward the center of our existence and the reality within our heart.This inner world is increasingly subtle and formless, known by feelings that become increasingly precious and fine. <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/finding-peace" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Meditation</a> becomes a heart pathway of focused feeling – we could say love – to touch the intimations of this deepest source. It is beloved, and it is the Beloved. There is the promise of becoming one with the Beloved so all separation across space can disappear.From far across the vast spaces of many lives, we have been throwing out our search beam to reacquaint ourselves with this source, this original home. Gradually, with more practice of Heartfulness meditation and increased intensity in longing and waiting, the solid walls of separateness start melting and disappearing. We feel permeated by the presence of the beloved in our daily lives. We feel as if we are meditating all the time in this presence of love. Such a state of being radiates love far beyond our small self.Why then do we meditate? We have a spark of the divine realm within us that seeks to know itself and become one with its origin. It is a vast mystery.&nbsp;In human existence, we are seemingly cast into space and time, and we throw out our search beam to find our original source. Yet this seed core is exquisitely close, deeply sheltered in the subtlest particles of our heart. Only when our consciousness is refined sufficiently to feel its softest expression, to be softness itself, can it touch and merge with such a state of vibration and harmony. Perhaps then, it can “breathe” such a love into the entire atmosphere of the Earth and even other worlds.<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">We can allow our consciousness to gradually sink toward the center of our existence and the reality within our heart. &nbsp;</h4><hr><figure class="image image_resized" style="width:50%;"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/how_meditation_help2_0fcc49ac00.webp" alt="how-meditation-help2.webp" srcset="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/thumbnail_how_meditation_help2_0fcc49ac00.webp 114w,https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/small_how_meditation_help2_0fcc49ac00.webp 365w," sizes="100vw"></figure>

How does meditation help?

<h4 style="text-align:justify;">ROSALIND PEARMAIN speaks of the attitude of softness, the world of the senses—of hard and soft, force and forcelessness, warmth and cold—and how we harken to a more profound and beautiful world at the core of our being through the heart.</h4>&nbsp;We are living in a time of hardening edges, of ever harsher decisions affecting millions of our fellow human beings.On the other hand, Babuji stressed from the very origins of Heartfulness that it was fundamentally based on a forceless force—on softness.Another Heartfulness Guide. Chariji, often reminded us of the strength of a tiny plant root in breaking up rocks:“What is this miracle, you see, that the softest thing can penetrate the deepest, hardest substance known? Whereas a hard thing can only up a hard thing. Can you break water by bashing it with a crowbar?“It was a tremendous risk that the Masters took, Lalaji and Babuji. Because it’s like building a house of butter and then asking the people who come in to have torches in their hands. The whole thing would melt. But they had this almost nonsensical stupid faith, that a soft thing can never be broken.“And we have also, in our fairy tales, that when the wind blew, all the hard trees which would not bend were just blown down, and the soft things which were willing to bend, bent almost to the Earth, recovered. It is the soft which wins the battle always. Not the hard, you see; the hard is broken. It survives until it meets something harder than itself. But the soft, nothing in the universe can break it. Nothing in the universe can destroy it.”<h4 style="text-align:justify;">Our journey in forceless force</h4>It seems that as human beings our souls choose to inhabit a specific existence in time and space as it unfolds on our planet and in relation to all creation.So we find ourselves inhabiting a field of feeling unique to each. Is it woven from DNA and patternings that have been transferred into this lifetime? This field of feeling has many layers and dimensions and knots that we perceive through different sensory gateways. They could be in terms of color or light, density and heaviness, warmth and cold, sound, or as qualities of touch. With the help of a being who is attuned to subtlest dimensions, we can harken to a more profound and beautiful world that is ours at the core, and long to return to this original part of creation.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/the_power_of_softness2_6da4490505.webp" alt="the-power-of-softness2.webp"></figure>&nbsp;The core of this sensibility is in the organ of the heart which integrates energetic information from the nervous system, from the organs, from viscera, from the brain, from soul. Furthermore our heart can be seen as a kind of organ of sensibility and perception whose intelligence can refine throughout life as it links with the capacity of the mind to focus <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/lack-of-awareness" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">awareness</a> with the array of feeling at the most subtle levels.In this vein, then, our existence is a field of vibratory exchange with environment, with all sentient life forms, with human beings. This vibratory array is like a glimmering or a shimmering, sometimes soothing sometimes discordant, similar to the domain of music.It seems to me that the <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/spirituality-in-daily-life" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">spiritual journey</a> can bring us closer and deeper to the source of all manifestation of life, as a sound of love resonating through all creation. It is potentially experienced by us in layers of a kind of infinite softness that absorbs and transforms and brings everything into a larger field of connectivity which can keep expanding and softening as it moves towards a steady flow of coherence that can integrate increasing complexities within evolving life.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/the_power_of_softness3_b5a40fe2a1.webp" alt="the-power-of-softness3.webp"></figure>&nbsp;<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">It seems to me that the <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/i-am" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">spiritual journey</a> can bring us closer and deeper to the source of all manifestation of life, as a sound of love resonating through all creation.</h4><hr>Heartfulness gives us a resource emanating from the most profound and subtle level of vibration; the very original stir, in which to be reminded through a silent soft intimation felt within the heart of our source. This awakens our dormant longing to be dissolved into this field, and resonate in harmony with a nameless and marvelous ultimate. It is in the service of coherence, beauty, truth, and infinite love that we feel our longings for this return to our origin. Our individual journey is shaped by our intrinsic uniqueness and the kinds of samskaras and tendencies that need to be dissolved and reconciled with this core longing.<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">Illustrations by ANANYA PATEL</h4><hr>

The power of softness

Roswita

Roy T. Bennett

What you can create

Ruben Montagnoli

<h4>In La Thuile, Italy, the Audi FIS Alpine Ski World Cup was held from 29 February to 1 March 2020. Here, SYLVIE BERTI ROSSI and RUBEN MONTAGNOLI share their experience as Heartfulness trainers at the event.</h4><hr><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/ski_world_300x179_1_54ccc78e64.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:05:49.639Z">In the heart of the Alps, a few minutes from Mont Blanc’s shining glaciers, the Heartfulness team gathered for three days of snow and joy in La Thuile, a town in the Aosta Valley of northern Italy. We were supporting the athletes, teams, and the general public at the Alpine Ski World Cup, as an official partner, in what turned out to be a special time in the history of international ski events.We provided special support for the ski teams in their hotels, offering the experience of Heartfulness Relaxation and Meditation practices. We were also able to present Heartfulness activities and values through various press conferences and presentations, social activities, and interactions with the public.Some of the athletes had been practicing Heartfulness for some time. One of them, Frederica Brignone, the winner of the FIS Alpine Ski World Cup 2020, shared her positive experience in an interview published in the newspaper La Stampa on 12 March. She said that thanks to this meditation she had reached a state of grace that made her more conscious.<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/ski_world3_8909bcf1f7.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:06:54.698Z"> The shadow of COVID-19 virus threatened to impact the World Cup event one week beforehand, so the organizing committee, along with the regional authorities and the International Ski Federation, opted for a safety protocol imposing a reduction in the number of people in and around the event.Despite these restrictions, 66 athletes from 24 countries gathered late on Friday afternoon to compete on the most technically challenging ski slope of the circuit of the women’s World Cup. Neither the virus nor fifty centimeters of new snowfall could stop the competition on Saturday morning, when the Austrian rookie Nina Ortlieb won all the races, taking the lead from the local champion, Federica Brignone of Italy. Later, Corinne Suter of Switzerland went on to win the Crystal Globe in the downhill category.Meanwhile, around 30 volunteers offered Heartfulness practices in the local hotels for both tourists and fans. In the stadium, the Heartfulness Lounge was situated at the finishing line of the course, and VIPs from the corporate world were able to experience what Heartfulness can offer individuals and organizations. Despite the difficult conditions, the adaptability, flexibility, and calm approach of our volunteers exemplified our social media tag for the event, #howwedocalm.Our volunteer <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/the-preconditions-for-love" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">trainers</a> were able to teach Heartfulness practices to athletes, journalists, coaches, physiotherapists, staff, and teams, as well as to members of the organizing committee, thousands of fans, skiers and tourists, and the Heartfulness Corporate Team shared a daily meditation program with VIP guests, including partners and sponsors, helping them to deepen their experience.As an official partner of the event, we also presented the newly released Italian version of The Heartfulness Way (published by Mondadori) to the media and guests gathered in the Montana Lodge Hotel.<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/ski_world6_8553ad7a29.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:08:07.393Z">Alain Desvigne, President of the Heartfulness Institute, France, spoke about the link between sport and meditation: “Although at first view, meditation and sport don’t seem directly connected, as meditation is about ‘not doing’ and sport is about perfect action, today the link between meditation and sport is well established. Sporting teams and athletes are turning increasingly to meditation and Yoga to help improve their performance. Indeed they need to increase their focus and emotional balance amidst the pressures of highly competitive environments. Meditation also helps them to integrate all aspects of their busy, often stressful lives, supporting them before, during, and after the race.<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/ski_world4_74d0c86686.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:09:57.285Z">“Athletes have to prepare their minds in order to reach their peak performance. Heartfulness meditative practices are easy to learn, and help people develop an effortlessly focused mind. In fact, the goal of meditation is to create a permanent meditative state, whatever the circumstances.“That brings us to the second step, the race. Meditation is basically a technique which helps to create a state where the mind is focused without effort. You are 100% present in the here and now. If you watched the women who were racing today closely on the screen, the level of presence they had when they were racing is exactly that meditative state. When you race down a slope at 130 km/hour, you don’t have time to analyze. It is the inner stillness with full focus that allows you to grasp the situation.<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/ski_world5_831a31737f.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:11:57.849Z">“And the third step, after the race, we call the recovery period. The body is exhausted. And this is where we find another benefit of meditation: It gives you the ability to reconnect, to recover, to refresh, revitalize and rejuvenate yourself, so as to regain inner strength.“Heartfulness offers meditation on the heart; and there is a direct link between the inner condition of the heart and our state of mind. As we say, ‘When the heart is at peace, the mind is at rest.’ Heartfulness allows the mind and the heart to be in tune and work together.“Why are we here, in this context of sport? It’s not only to help athletes reach their peak performance. In fact, the core values of sport are very close to the values of Heartfulness. If you look back at the original spirit of the Olympic Games, it was about creating a peaceful world, a better world, a harmonious world. It was about bringing everyone together. That’s where sport and Heartfulness meet.”<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">Article by SYLVIE BERTI ROSSI and RUBEN MONTAGNOLI</h4><hr>

The Audi FIS alpine ski world cup

Ruby is a Heartfulness trainer, tutor, mentor, and sometimes writer. She has an M.Ed. in Education and Psychology from the University of Cambridge, and has worked in community and mental health. She is passionate about volunteering, service, meditation, languages, and finding beauty in the world around her.

Ruby-Carmen.jpg

Ruby Carmen

<hr class="vertical-space1" />
<h4>
 All around the world, we are in lockdown in a bid to slow down the spread
 of the COVID-19 virus. And we are coming to terms with this collective
 experience. Here, RUBY CARMEN shares
 some insights, inspirations and suggestions for coping well in this
 extraordinary time.
</h4>
<h3 style="text-align: center">
 Tips for coping
</h3>
<h4>DEVELOP STRUCTURE AND ROUTINE</h4>

 In lockdown, many of us have been given the gift of time. In a recent
 article published in the
 <a
 style="color: #b56d6d"
 href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/21/opinion/scott-kelly-coronavirus-isolation.htmlhttps://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/21/opinion/scott-kelly-coronavirus-isolation.html"
 target="_blank"
 rel="noopener noreferrer"
 >New York Times</a
 >, astronaut Scott Kelly offers some excellent advice on putting structure
 and routine into your day, including fixing a time to get up and go to bed.
 Having structure is helpful for well-being and can offer a sense of purpose
 for both adults and children. There is an element of security and safety in
 routine. Where possible, create some boundaries of work space and home
 space, and allow yourself and your children time off.
 

<hr class="vertical-space1" />

 <img
 class="w-100 lazyload"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/one_Human_family2_d5818d772f.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-10T04:15:52.707Z"
 alt="one_Human_family2_d5818d772f"
 />
 

<hr class="vertical-space1" />

<h4>JOY AND PLAY</h4>

 Allow time for joy and play. This feature of the human condition has
 manifested in the exponential growth of online kindness groups springing up
 like flowers, and the outpouring of multiform and multimedia creative
 outlets and ways of expression – online singing and music making, art
 classes, ukulele playing classes, and meditation sessions across the globe.
 New possibilities continue to arise, as human beings endeavor to express
 themselves and connect with each other.
 

<h4>
 COMMUNICATE AND CONNECT 
</h4>

 Share stories. This is an opportunity to connect deeply with our loved
 ones. If we are not with them, video calls are indeed a gift. In the absence
 of technology, children can write letters, and send drawings to their
 grandparents, cousins, uncles and aunts. Limit talking about the lockdown
 and the virus. In particular, avoid talking about it in worried, anxious
 ways in the presence of young children, who in turn will model anxious adult
 behavior.
 

<h4>
 ACCEPT AND ACKNOWLEDGE 
</h4>

 Work towards accepting how you truly feel. On the days you feel sad, angry
 or frustrated, sit with those feelings for a little while. Give yourself a
 hug. And when you are ready, let go. Diary writing or journaling is another
 option, in particular on the difficult days where you feel you have had
 enough. Both our physical and mental well-being need to be prioritized,
 especially under our current circumstances.
 

<h4>BE INSPIRED</h4>

 Look for inspiration in each day. Take time to observe the exceptional
 courage, bravery and self-sacrifice of others: Nurses, doctors, paramedics,
 those who deliver food, serve in stores, pharmacists, and those who continue
 to keep communal spaces clean. The heart fills up with gratitude that cannot
 be truly expressed in words. The Italian children who drew pictures of
 rainbows with the caption “Everything will be alright,” the opera singers on
 balconies who are so touching and truly inspirational. Imagine all these
 acts of human kindness that we have witnessed, and those that are hidden. We
 are sharing a collective experience of hope for our human family, realizing
 the innate goodness of the human heart.
 

<hr class="vertical-space1" />
<h4>
 <img
 class="w-100 lazyload"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/one_Human_family3_f502e9b140.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-10T04:17:31.644Z"
 alt="one_Human_family3_f502e9b140"
 />
</h4>
<h4><hr class="vertical-space1" /></h4>
<h4>COMMUNITY</h4>

 Plug into your local and global communities. There are neighborhood
 WhatsApp groups, online coffee meetings, parent support groups etc. The list
 is endless. Forums exist to help and support the needy in our communities.
 Depending on our skills we can offer practical support to others. One
 example, provided by the Heartfulness community, of which I am a part, gives
 me a unique sense of unity and oneness. Daily and weekly, we are sitting in
 our homes meditating together virtually.It is wondrous to witness the human
 ability to adapt and find creative solutions, thriving under difficult and
 restricted circumstances. To instill a sense of meaning, we can look to
 create more structure in our daily lives, allowing time for joyful, playful
 activities. We may also recognize the importance of communication and our
 ability to connect in whatever forms are available to us. Perhaps, above all
 else, we can exercise greater acceptance of how we feel from day to day, and
 allow ourselves time to process it. This could be through diary writing, the
 experience of silence, or the practice of meditation. Find inspiration in
 each day and reach out to local and global communities. We are one human
 family living in extraordinary times.
 

<hr class="vertical-space1" />
OTHER RESOURCES: 

 <a
 href="https://childdevelopmentinfo.com/coronavirus/helping-parents-and-kids-stay-cool-and-collected-during-the-covid-19-outbreak/"
 target="_blank"
 rel="noopener noreferrer"
 >https://childdevelopmentinfo.com/coronavirus/helping-parents-and-kids-stay-cool-and-collected-during-the-covid-19-outbreak/</a
 > 
 Guided visualisations and relaxation for children at
 <a
 href="https://www.heartfulness.uk/primaryschools/"
 target="_blank"
 rel="noopener noreferrer"
 >https://www.heartfulness.uk/primaryschools/</a
 > 
 <a
 href="http://www.heartfulness.org"
 target="_blank"
 rel="noopener noreferrer"
 >www.heartfulness.org</a
 >
 and
 <a
 href="http://www.heartfulness.org"
 target="_blank"
 rel="noopener noreferrer"
 >www.heartfulnessinstitute.org</a
 > 
 <a
 href="https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/coronavirus-and-your-wellbeing/"
 target="_blank"
 rel="noopener noreferrer"
 >https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/coronavirus-and-your-wellbeing/</a
 > 
 <a
 href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/21/opinion/scott-kelly-coronavirus-isolation.html"
 target="_blank"
 rel="noopener noreferrer"
 >https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/21/opinion/scott-kelly-coronavirus-isolation.html</a
 >

<hr class="vertical-space1" />
&nbsp;

<hr />
<h4 style="text-align: center">
 Article by RUBY CARMEN 
 Illustrations by ANANYA PATEL 
 
</h4>

<hr />

One human family

<h4>&nbsp;</h4><h2>How communication changes lives</h2><hr>“Compassion is not a relationship between&nbsp; the healer and the wounded.&nbsp; It’s a relationship between equals.&nbsp; Only when we know our own darkness well&nbsp; can we be present with the darkness of others.&nbsp; Compassion becomes real when&nbsp; we recognize our shared humanity.”—Pema Chödrön<hr>Compassion – just one word – seems so relevant in this moment, in particular in the grieving, loss-filled times we are living in.It is not always easy to define or capture the true meaning of the word, but we can certainly feel it, and sometimes its absence. One more literal definition of compassion is “to suffer together,” and although not an exact translation, in Hindi and Urdu we have the word hamdardi – our (shared) pain.Researchers in the field of positive psychology and emotions describe compassion as the feeling that comes when faced with the suffering of another, accompanied by the need to relieve that suffering.So, how can we relieve the suffering of others, especially when everything seems too much? People often talk of compassion fatigue, but we also know that we can clearly be compassionate and empathic, mirror neurons being considered the cornerstone of human empathy (V.S. Ramachandran et al, 2007). How then? We can listen with our hearts, and listen with our whole being, our whole undivided attention and presence.<hr><hr><h5>Empathic listening can allow the speaker&nbsp; to release and let go of so much,&nbsp; easing their emotional burdens&nbsp; and feel “met,” cherished, human. In doing so,&nbsp; we remember our beautiful&nbsp; and sometimes bruised humanity&nbsp; in all its colors of joy and sorrow. Our oneness.</h5><hr><hr>And what is this “presence”? When we are there completely for that other person, friend, family member, lover, sister, brother, or even a stranger. No judgment; instead, non-judgment. No covering over the awkward silences with our words; instead, embracing the silence and holding that space for others, honoring that and allowing whatever needs to be said, even unsaid. Offering our pure, unconditional attention, where we hear and feel the feelings behind the words, if possible with love, without any underlying intention.<hr><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/our_shared_humanity2_fd1e5a0dab.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-11T12:47:44.602Z" alt=""><hr>In that moment of compassion and empathic listening, the listener can even forget themselves completely. It is an experience akin to the dissolution of the ego, of “no self.” Empathic listening can allow the speaker to release and let go of so much, easing their emotional burdens and feel “met,” cherished, human. In doing so, we remember our beautiful and sometimes bruised humanity in all its colors of joy and sorrow. Our oneness.<hr>

Our shared humanity

<h4>RUBY CARMEN explores the often repressed emotion of grief, and shares some ways we can accept it, value the meaning behind it, and integrate it into our being as an expression of love.</h4>“Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give, but cannot.&nbsp; All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat,&nbsp; and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.”—Jamie AndersonGrief, it seems, is often unsaid, unexpressed, and avoided at all costs, until we are overwhelmed and it looms large and can no longer be denied.&nbsp; Since the pandemic, grief has been an undercurrent, and at times the feeling is palpable. It seems that there is little space for it to be expressed, never mind honored.&nbsp;Grief is understood as a natural human response to loss, and in particular to loved ones. It covers so many situations, not only death or separation; it can be the loss of a dream or a friendship; it can be a divorce, a miscarriage, unemployment, or even retirement.1 Needless to say, the pain of the loss can be overpowering, bringing us to our knees, both literally and metaphorically.&nbsp;From a personal viewpoint, I am able to name a number of life situations that have triggered grief in me that can be felt in the heart and in a way demand to be processed rather than pushed aside until a more convenient moment.&nbsp;Grief can take the form of a cycle, that is to say denial, anger, depression, bargaining, and acceptance. Not necessarily in a set order, one after the next; it can move in circles, leap frogging over one element, even a mix of one or more of these elements. These stages were conceptualized by the Swiss-American psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross in her book On Death and Dying (1991). She is considered a pioneer in the West for end-of-life care and near-death studies.&nbsp;What has become apparent to me personally, and also while witnessing friends and dear ones come to terms with loss, is the impact of religion, spirituality, culture, and societal norms on the form in which grief is permissible. What comes to me is that we could do better. Are our coping mechanisms enough?&nbsp;Oftentimes, grief is hidden, buried deep in our hearts. It can be like an old wound that remains inside, nameless, formless, and then something in the present touches on it and we are reminded that it is still there, sitting silently, waiting.<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">Oftentimes, grief is hidden, buried deep in our hearts. It can be like an old wound that remains inside, nameless, formless,&nbsp; and then something in the present touches on it&nbsp; and we are reminded that it is still there, sitting silently, waiting.</h4><hr><figure class="image image-style-align-center"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/talking_with_grief2_8f75e8b095.jpg"></figure>One approach that came into my field of consciousness was to “talk” to the grief and, in doing so, recognize that it exists rather than pretending it is not there, that it has been dealt with, processed in whatever way we might explain it away to ourselves. In order to “survive,” our emotions, especially big, heavy ones, get stored away under the category of “I will come back to this later,” or “I can’t deal with this right now, I have a job to do,” and other such rationalizations. In the busy modern world, it seems there is no time or appropriate space to deal with grief or loss.&nbsp;Talking to grief goes like this:&nbsp;Me: Oh, it’s you?&nbsp; I thought you had gone.&nbsp; Grief: No, I am still here, I never left you.&nbsp; Me: It hurts and I keep thinking that you might go away, and leave me in peace.&nbsp; Grief: Well, it doesn’t seem to work that way, you know. I am part of you, not separate. In fact, you are holding onto me, not the other way round.&nbsp; Me: (Laughing) You don’t say. So tell me, grief, what do I do? How can I get through this grief that reappears especially when I least expect it.&nbsp; Grief: Get through?&nbsp; Me: Yes.&nbsp; Grief: You know about acceptance?&nbsp; Me: Yes. Sometimes this acceptance business is hard to actually do. It can happen at a mental or intellectual level, and then all of a sudden, it is so overwhelming and difficult. It needs to be at the level of the heart.&nbsp; Grief: Your heart, yes, and also self-compassion. To grieve is a natural thing. It tells you that you are human and capable of loving, of love.&nbsp; Me: So, accepting that I feel grief and that it hurts bad, not to mention giving myself some compassion, can help, right?&nbsp; Grief: That’s right. It can help release the pain of the loss, and it can dissolve in your tears and in the sharing of your grieving pains.&nbsp;This is the conversation thus far. Grief need not be an enemy or “avoided like the plague,” as the English expression goes. Instead, at an individual and collective level, we can embrace it and ask how we can allow ourselves to feel grief and grow from it rather than be overwhelmed by it. And we can consider reaching out to empathic elders, dear ones, therapists, counsellors, and support groups wherever there is a safe space to give voice to grief.<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">Grief need not be an enemy or “avoided like the plague,” as the English expression goes. Instead, at an individual and collective level, we can embrace it and ask how we can allow ourselves to feel grief and grow from it rather than be overwhelmed by it.</h4><hr><a href="https://www.helpguide.org/articles/grief/coping-with-grief-and-loss.htm">1 https://www.helpguide.org/articles/grief/coping-with-grief-and-loss.htm</a>&nbsp;

Talking with my grief

<h3 style="text-align:center;">The Listening Heart King Solomon’s Gift and Judgment</h3><figure class="image image_resized" style="width:25%;"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/listening_heart2_57f670c555.webp" alt="listening-heart2.webp"></figure><h4>RUBY CARMEN retells the biblical story of King Solomon, who asked God for a listening heart and became known for his exceptional wisdom.</h4>&nbsp;<figure class="image image_resized" style="width:50%;"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/listening_heart3_a921e2f8e4.webp" alt="listening-heart3.webp"></figure>&nbsp;Many centuries ago, in the ancient kingdom of the Israelites, there lived King Solomon, the beloved son of King David and Queen Bathsheba. When Solomon was born, Nathan the prophet blessed him with the special name “Jedidiah,” meaning “Beloved of the Lord.” As King David’s life drew to a close, he called his son to him. Holding Solomon’s hands, he spoke softly and with urgency, “Listen to me, my son! My time to leave this world has come. Be strong, be brave, be courageous, and be devoted to the Lord completely. Remember to walk with the Lord every moment of your life, with all your heart and all your soul. The Lord will lead you and your people to peace and prosperity.”After King David’s death, Solomon became King. King Solomon and his royal advisors went to offer prayers in the city of Gibeon. In prayer, being both humble and sincere of heart, Solomon sought divine guidance as to how he could best rule his people and the land. That night, the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream and said to him, “My child, ask me for whatever your heart desires.” In the presence of the Divine, Solomon was deeply moved and felt <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/women-spirituality" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">spiritually</a> uplifted. He knew that the Divine had appeared before him for a greater, higher purpose and responded to the Lord with special attention.In an attitude of humility, Solomon spoke, “O Lord, I am blessed to receive your love and generosity. Your divine grace was showered on my Father until his last moments, and now you have chosen me to sit on the throne and rule over your people. How may I fulfill this task when I am nothing but an inexperienced and immature child? How can I meet the needs of my people and solve their problems?” King Solomon recognized that only the Lord has the ability to realize the needs of every soul.Humbly, Solomon voiced his heart’s desire to the Divine: “O Lord, give me a listening heart so that I may follow your path, so that I may serve you and humanity. May I have the ability to hear the real voice, which is found in the depths of the heart—the real voice, that small still voice that tries to make itself heard but often cannot because of the noise and clutter of the mind.”&nbsp;<figure class="image image_resized" style="width:50%;"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/listening_heart4_354b9a946d.webp" alt="listening-heart4.webp"></figure>&nbsp;On hearing Solomon’s words, the Lord was pleased. “You could have asked me for riches, for more land, for fame and glory, for a long life, for victory over your enemies, but you did not. You asked me for a listening heart. With great joy, I grant you this wish: a listening heart, a heart that seeks wisdom and knowledge that may know right from wrong.” The Lord continued, “You have asked for a listening heart, not for yourself but so that you can serve me and do my work. Solomon, you will be the wisest among men! Never before was there a human being as wise as you, and never will there be anyone to compare to you. The people will remember you for years to come.”&nbsp;<figure class="image image_resized" style="width:50%;"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/listening_heart5_49b2327d10.webp" alt="listening-heart5.webp"></figure>&nbsp;<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">“O Lord, give me a listening heart so that I may follow your path,&nbsp; so that I may serve you and humanity.&nbsp; May I have the ability to hear the real voice,&nbsp; which is found in the depths of the heart— the real voice, that small still voice that tries to make itself heard&nbsp; but often cannot because of the noise and clutter of the mind.” &nbsp;</h4><hr>&nbsp;The divine gift soon revealed its power. One day in the royal court, the King was approached by two mothers seeking justice. Each held a baby in her arms—one alive, the other dead. The first woman addressed the King, “Your Majesty! May I speak? We live in the same house. We were alone when I gave birth to my child.” With tears pouring down her face, she continued, “Three days after my baby was born, at midnight, this woman (pointing at the other) gave birth to her child. When I awoke the next morning, she told me that my baby had died in his sleep and that her baby was healthy.” She went on, “Seeing the baby in my bed had died, I was brokenhearted. Then I looked closely at the face of the baby and realized it was not mine! The child she is holding in her arms is mine. She must have taken my baby from me in my sleep, and now I have this dead child.”King Solomon looked closely at the other woman with piercing, questioning eyes. The second woman spoke, denying what the first woman had said and claiming that the opposite was true. She declared that the first woman was, in fact, a liar, that she was simply trying to take her baby from her. There stood in the royal court two mothers, both in tears, each calling the other a liar. With no witnesses and no evidence, how could the King determine who the real mother was? It seemed to be an impossible task.&nbsp;<figure class="image image_resized" style="width:50%;"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/listening_heart6_0d141e7aea.webp" alt="listening-heart6.webp"></figure>&nbsp;The King called on his guard for a sword, announcing to all in the royal court, “There is only one child and two mothers. How can I give a child to one mother and then deny the other?” Summoning his guard, in a sad and solemn voice, he gave the order, “Cut the living boy in half now, and give one half to the first woman and the other to the second!” Almost immediately, as the guard took the baby boy to carry out the order, the first woman cried out, “Please, please, stop! Do not kill this child! I confess! The child is not mine, please let him live and be with his natural mother!”The other woman stood unmoved as if she were made of stone and said, “Your Majesty, your judgment is correct. Cut the child in two, if I cannot have the child, then she cannot have the child either!”The wise King stood up from his throne and swiftly made his way towards the guard holding the baby. Solomon roared, “Put the sword down now! By Divine Grace, I have heard the voice of the true mother!” In the royal court, there was a stunned silence at the King’s announcement. King Solomon spoke surely, “No mother would ever agree to have her child killed and cut in two. A mother’s love is a selfless love. The first woman was willing to give up her child so that he could live. She is the real mother!” The King declared. Let the child be given back to her!” The first woman, the real mother, was joyfully reunited with her baby. &nbsp;<figure class="image image_resized" style="width:25%;"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/listening_heart7_f71d863565.webp" alt="listening-heart7.webp"></figure>

The Listening Heart

<h4>RUBY CARMEN explores Zen as a path of meditation, breath awareness, and “empty cup” openness, inviting us to meet the mind in a new way.</h4>The word “Zen” has entered the vernacular; it has seeped into everyday life without a full understanding of what “Zen” is.In everyday speech, “Zen” has come to mean a feeling of peace and relaxation, even a state of “coolness” and a “laid-back” approach to life.Zen is a form of sitting meditation and derives from the Chinese word Chán. While Zen can be understood as a form of <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/a-lovers-journey" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Buddhism</a>, it places a strong emphasis on meditation and on perfection, meaning the perfection of the person, of one’s own self.<h4 style="text-align:justify;">Gateless Gate</h4>Zen is defined as a way of life rather than an ideology, and this is true of many spiritual paths and systems. It has no fixed doctrines or dogmas and little emphasis on written teaching, which has given it a strong appeal for many who feel disenchanted with organized religion.To practice Zen, it helps to understand its three-step process: the body, the breath, and the mind. The method is sometimes described with the Zen term practice-realization, emphasizing the need for practice rather than reliance on words and letters—what we would call theory or philosophy.Regarding the body element, the practitioner needs to adjust the body for meditation, which means maintaining a proper diet, engaging in physical exercise, and avoiding habits that would negatively impact the body-mind connection. In Zen, the optimal meditation posture is the lotus or half-lotus position.Concerning the breath element, there is an exercise of counting one’s breaths. The purpose of this breathing exercise is to refresh the body and mind, infusing the mind-body with energy and releasing toxins and negative energy. During this process, the mind may wander—this is often what happens to all of us who begin a meditation practice. Current concerns, fears, worries, and memories may arise during this process, and this is accepted as a feature of a wandering mind. We could ask if there is any other kind of mind! Different methods and paths offer the meditator a focus, an anchor, an object upon which to rest the mind.In Zen, it is suggested that counting the breaths helps us train the unconscious mind and supports the training, or taming, of emotions. Many paths and traditions have emphasized the relationship between the breath and a person’s emotional state. For example, we can compare our breathing when we are in a peaceful state to when we are furiously angry!&nbsp;<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">The purpose of this breathing exercise is to refresh the body and mind, infusing the mind-body with energy and releasing toxins and negative energy.</h4><hr><h4 style="text-align:justify;">Mind and no-mind</h4>Now, we come to the mind element. What to say of the mind? How can we use the mind to adjust the mind? A Zen practitioner prepares their mind for meditation, consciously moving into that meditative state or condition. Again, how? There is a conscious disengagement with the daily concerns of life. The posture and the breathing, this counting of the breaths helps with this, as there is only the breath. Meditation trains us to come face to face with ourselves. In doing so, it trains us to be “with” our own self. It creates a form of psychological stillness, even isolation, to offer an inner environment for this self-study or introspection. Through meditation, we have a window of opportunity to enter the world of the inner psyche. Again, in meditation, we are invited to learn the art of becoming an observer of the canvas of the mind with all the colors, including ideas, desires, and prejudices, that may appear on the surface of the mind. We learn to observe them, without becoming involved in them or over-identifying with them. As consciousness levels change, the ego's power diminishes; in essence, it becomes weaker.In Zen, through years of practice and meditation, a practitioner can reach a state of “no-mind,” transcending the duality of the mind. In other meditative traditions, it is also referred to as “nothingness” or “zero,” or, in Heartfulness, as the “Center.” Some explanation of the “no-mind state might be needed here. What it means is that the mind is no longer fixed or preoccupied with any particular thought or emotion; instead, the mind is open to everything. In fact, there is a Zen expression, “mind without mind,” which means just that: the mind is open to everything and free of mind-attachment.&nbsp;In modern-day <a href="https://heartfulness.org/magazine/the-heart-is-where-we-experience-connection" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">mindfulness practices</a>, which have drawn on Zen and other Buddhist practices, there is the teaching of non-identification, “I am not my thoughts,” “thoughts are just thoughts”—they are not “me.”&nbsp;<figure class="image image_resized" style="width:75%;"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/all_zen_now2_44d354a498.webp" alt="all-zen-now2.webp"></figure><hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">In meditation, we are invited to learn&nbsp; the art of becoming an observer—the canvas of the mind&nbsp; with all the colors, including ideas, desires, and prejudices, may appear on the surface of the mind.&nbsp; We learn to observe them,&nbsp; without becoming involved in them&nbsp; or over-identifying with them.&nbsp; As the level of consciousness changes,&nbsp; the ego's power diminishes;&nbsp; in essence, it becomes weaker.</h4><hr><h4 style="text-align:justify;">Empty Cup</h4>In these words, an attempt to touch on the essence of Zen, from what has been written before, it is very clear that Zen, or any other spiritual practice for that matter, needs to be experienced first-hand. In Zen, to know or understand reality, that is one’s own nature and the nature of the physical world, one must experience it and even transcend it.There is a famous story of the Empty Cup, and it goes like this:One day, a student came to visit the Zen master seeking advice. He asked. “I have come to ask you to teach me about Zen.”After a short time, it became clear that the student was full of his own opinions and knowledge. Repeatedly, he would interrupt the master with his own stories and did not listen to what the Zen master had to say. The master calmly suggested that they have some tea.So, the master poured the tea into his cup. The cup was full, yet he kept pouring until the tea overflowed onto the table, onto the floor, and everywhere. The student cried out, “Stop! The cup is full. Can’t you see?”“Exactly,” the Zen master replied with a smile. “You are like this cup—so full of ideas that nothing more will fit in…. Come back to me with an empty cup!”&nbsp;<figure class="image image_resized" style="width:75%;"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/all_zen_now3_60ddd09a0a.webp" alt="all-zen-now3.webp"></figure><hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">..the Zen master replied with a smile.&nbsp; “You are like this cup—so full of ideas&nbsp; that nothing more will fit in….&nbsp; Come back to me with an empty cup!” &nbsp;</h4><hr>&nbsp;

All Zen Now

rumi.webp

Rumi

What is your myth?

What you love

Do things from your soul

Connection

From your soul

Trust that

The waters of purity

The Beloved is All 

An award-winning industrial designer and innovator who founded Publicolor, a long-term youth development program, to educate disadvantaged youth and prepare them for jobs: publicolor.org.

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Ruth Lande Shuman

<h4 style="text-align:center;">AN ART ESSAY &amp; INTERVIEW</h4>Volunteers are the lifeblood of Publicolor. In 2000 we won one of our country’s highest honors, the President’s Service Award, from President Clinton for our work with volunteers in the community.Every year over 1000 volunteers join us as painters on Saturdays in under-resourced schools and community sites. We transform these sites through warm color and thoughtful design. Publicolor paints dignity, respect, inspiration and safety in low-income neighborhoods.Corporations love to send their employees to paint alongside our students as they see this as a great team-building opportunity. It’s also a special way for corporate employees to participate in their company’s philanthropy. Publicolor students consistently mention Saturdays as their favorite part of Publicolor, citing getting to meet new people as most special. They cherish learning about new job options and what it takes to succeed. Publicolor’s volunteers are treasured role models!<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor2_a4d5c84881.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:44:56.128Z" alt="publicolor2"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor3_0f88c82378.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:45:48.000Z" alt="publicolor3">Academic tutors also join us as volunteer leaders of our weekly career exposure workshops, and as mentors for our high school seniors and college freshmen. With the help of our volunteer painters, Publicolor has transformed about 500 sites. With the help of our tutors, 85% of Publicolor students enter college not needing remediation versus 19% of their school peers. Thanks to our mentors, 98% have stayed in college after their freshman year versus 66% at the City University of New York. Since most of Publicolor students are the first in their family to go to college, the encouragement and guidance they receive from our volunteers is invaluable.For all these reasons, Publicolor treasures our volunteers. We couldn’t do what we do without them!<h3 style="text-align:center;">Interview with Ruth Lande Shuman, founder of Publicolor</h3>Q: Please share with us the mission of Publicolor.RLS: The mission of Publicolor is to creatively engage high risk, low-income students in their education and prepare them to be productive in the workplace.Q: How did the organization form?RLS:&nbsp;I was very concerned back in the late ’80s about the rising dropout rate. All I could think of was the horrible impact that would be on the future of our economy. In another life I had helped develop the Big Apple Circus and was a founding board member. I got to see a lot of schools that had our arts and education program, and many of them were in east Harlem. All of them looked and felt like prisons.I thought to myself: It’s no wonder that kids are dropping out; it’s no wonder that parents aren’t showing up for parent teacher conferences; I wouldn’t go to such a hostile environment. And it’s no wonder teachers are burning out. That was the lightbulb moment!<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor4_d26c9bb1c0.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:46:24.411Z" alt="publicolor4">At the same time I had just finished a masters in industrial design at Pratt with a specialty in the psychological effects of color. Color has a huge effect on our attitudes and behaviour. So I thought about putting a paintbrush in the hands of disaffected students – the ones who are at high risk of dropping out. I wanted to teach them the marketable skill of commercial painting, and teach them strong and transferable work habits. And along the way, they would develop a sense of pride and ownership of their school, and start attending school more regularly. Also, if they spend any time with me, they’ll get to understand the importance of education and how that’s going to be their path out of poverty.So I mentioned the idea to the woman who ran the circus’ arts and education program. She also ran an educational complex in East Harlem, and she said to me, “Come on in. I want you to paint my whole school.” It was a city square block school of five storeys. The project was a huge success. Estee Lauder had wanted to do something in that school and the principal suggested that they meet with me. They loved the idea and they volunteered. We did a lot of prepping with the kids during the week and on weekends. We primed all the hallways, all the stairwells, and then drew thousands of linesm because I had a rather complicated design. Literally, within one day, from Estee Lauder, my friends, the teachers and the principal, we had 350 volunteers and we painted all the public spaces of the school.&nbsp;It was rather extraordinary.<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor5_6302b79294.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:47:00.971Z" alt="publicolor5">&nbsp;<hr>&nbsp;Then the school’s Chancellor came by and pulled me aside and said, “This is a catalyst for change. I want you in my schools. I’ll send out an RFP for a school beautification program.” So I filled out the application with the Department of Education and we won the contract. I took a little time off to set us up as a non profit organization, and then we were!Then I met with the Deputy Chancellor for Operations who asked me which school did I want, and I told him I wanted his lowest performing school. In the contract I was very specific that I wanted their lowest performing schools. That’s how it got started.<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor6_dbcb775d4d.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:47:39.957Z" alt="publicolor6">Q: That’s a beautiful story. What were some of the reactions after these drastic changes to the schools?RLS:&nbsp;There was one father who said that it was as if Santa Claus had come and left this gift. It was just so gorgeous. He said something about Santa and his elves, because when he arrived on Monday to drop his son, he couldn’t believe what he saw. The whole school was completely transformed. The kids love it.I have learned – and at first it hurt my feelings – that change is very difficult for many people. For some, their initial reaction was not fantastic. But what I have understood is to give them two weeks to adjust, and almost everybody ends up loving the change. And there are always going to be a few who don’t like yellow, or don’t like the blue that I chose for the doors. In the end, if we’ve used any color that the kids and the principal don’t particularly like, then we change it.<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor7_78af02b117.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:48:27.019Z" alt="publicolor7">Q: Is there a student who stood out as being especially enabled by the transformation or the mentoring program?RLS:&nbsp;Oh, that’s hard, as there are so many. One comes to mind. One of my students is a girl called Cecile, whose mother was very, very sick when she joined our continuum program. She claims it was because of us that she stayed in school and didn’t drop out, and she really didn’t want to drop out. She went on to college and said that she would have dropped out again after her first year because her mother was so sick. But we gave her a lot of support and explained why college was so important for her and how it would make her mother proud. Her mother passed away after her sophomore year, and she had a mentor who encouraged her to stay in school. She went to one of the top culinary schools in the country and she now has a job working in food services for Google. She also works for us on Saturdays as a site staff member.<img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor8_74de447413.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:49:06.856Z" alt="publicolor8">There’s just one more thing: I remember once we replicated in Pittsburgh and there was a guy at Carnegie who did a study on volunteerism and wrote a piece about Publicolor. What he and I uncovered is just how much better an employee feels about their company after they’ve participated in a volunteer program. They take great pride in the fact that their company is volunteering to help X, Y or Z. What we’ve noticed apart from the pride factor is also the magnificent team building opportunity. We have a lot of feedback about that from volunteers.Q: Thank you so much for your time.RLS:&nbsp;Thank you, my pleasure.<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">Art Essay by PUBLICOLOR Interview by EMMA IVATURI</h4><hr>

The lifeblood of Publicolor

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Ryunosuke Satoro

Drop in the ocean

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Saint Francis of Assisi

Become prayer

Sairam is Co-founder and Director of Research at UrbanKisaan, dedicated to environmentally safe and sustainable agricultural technologies. He has published over 30 articles in international journals, and received multiple awards. He was listed in the top 10 leaders in the Agriculture Industry for the year 2021.

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Sairam Reddy Palicherla

<h4>SAIRAM REDDY PALICHERLA is one of the founders of UrbanKisaan, creating a sustainable and safe future using hydroponics. They are creating local micro farms, with a low carbon-footprint, and igniting agri-entrepreneurs to bring positive change for humanity and the planet. Here he speaks with LEAH RICH about the work UrbanKisaan is doing, and Kanha Shanti Vanam as a model for feeding a whole community.</h4><hr>Q: Good morning Dr. Sairam. Thank you for taking the time to speak about hydroponics with us. Let’s jump right in. To start, what got you interested in hydroponics?SR: The interest here at Kanha was led by Daaji. He wanted to explore various non-conventional and sustainable ways of growing food. He has been doing this for the last twenty years, in his backyard in the US. This has been his passion – exploring alternative ways of growing food.Prior to seventy years ago, food was nutritious and safe, but the quantity was not enough to feed the people of the world. There was a desperate need to increase the productivity, so fertilizers, pesticides and hybrid crops were introduced. This is also when the needs of the trader came into the picture – transportability, storability, shelf life, and packing in boxes became the focus. This happened at the expense of the nutrient content of the food and the needs of the consumer.In the last seventy years, there’s been a complete shift in food growing. Now we satisfy our hunger but not our nutritional needs. That is where the challenges come. It’s time to shift back to local food production – I call it micro farming.Q: So how does hydroponics fit in? I thought the nutrients in our produce come through the soil, but in hydroponics there is no soil. Can you explain?SR: Our understanding of the source of a plant’s nutrition is also limited. When testing the nutrition content of crops grown in soil and the same crops grown hydroponically, is there any difference?When we measure vitamins, minerals, macro nutrients, protein, carbohydrate and fat, research shows that plants can take up these nutrients equally well from soil and the liquid formula used in hydroponics. A large body of research shows that there is no difference.<hr><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/Hydroponics2_db9786ceb2.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-11T13:14:09.630Z" alt="">&nbsp;<hr>Q: How do you ensure the required nutrients are in the hydroponic formula?SR: There are three groups of minerals that a plant uses to meet its basic needs: macro minerals, micro minerals and major minerals. These are all present in the hydroponic formula. The rest happens inside the plant. Vitamins are manufactured inside the plant. Plants also require light and sufficient carbon dioxide to grow.Q: So, what about meeting the need for light for plants grown hydroponically?SR: There are two systems of hydroponics. One uses natural sunlight, for example, a hydroponic tower on a balcony, or a green house. The other type is for growing crops indoors, using artificial light. Typically, LED lights are used. They are low power consuming light sources and the beauty of LED is you can define the spectrum of light that they emit.Plants require different spectra of light for different purposes. For example, photosynthetic activity requires red light. Hormonal activity requires blue and yellow. We can measure how much light a plant needs for a particular spectrum and provide it using LED lights.<hr><hr><h4>Now we satisfy our hunger but not our nutritional needs.&nbsp; That is where the challenges come.&nbsp; It’s time to shift back to local food production&nbsp; – I call it micro farming.</h4><hr><hr>Q: Coming to the individual level, why do you feel is it important for households to grow food hydroponically?SR: Six or seven years ago, I came across a news article that was published by an agriculture university, showing the levels of pesticides and heavy metals in the food we consume. They went around the city of Hyderabad and collected samples of vegetables from organic stores, supermarkets, roadside shops, and farmer’s markets. They analyzed the samples in their laboratory,and to my surprise and agony, all the vegetables were heavily contaminated with heavy metals. 45% of the produce from organic stores was contaminated with pesticides, and 100% was contaminated with heavy metals.This is because the areas where food was grown were near polluting industries. And the surrounding soil and water body in every city, whether it be a reservoir or a canal is being contaminated by the toxic effluents. This contaminated soil and water is being used to produce the crops we are consuming. So even if produce is grown using an organic methodology, without chemical pesticides and fertilizers, the soil and water used to grow them is polluted. It’s impossible to avoid heavy metals like arsenic and lead.This is where I see a huge need for home growers. And hydroponics is one method we can all use. I call our home growers micro farmers.<hr><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/Hydroponics3_9221eb8abb.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-11T13:16:04.875Z" alt="">&nbsp;<hr>Q: What are the advantages of hydroponics? Can you offer some tips and guidelines for people who are reading this and interested in starting a small hydroponics system at home?SR: It requires very little water, and you can automate it. If you go away on vacation, your crops can be watered while you are away. It doesn’t need much space. You can easily grow the leafy greens required for your household. All you need is a roof top or balcony that receives three to four hours of direct sunlight per day. You need four by five feet of space. If outdoor space is not possible, you can use an indoor kit with LED lights.Now, expanding this to the community level, at Kanha we have enough hydroponically grown produce to meet the demands of the community.Q: Are you aware of other communities setting up similar operations?SR: This is a growing field. People are overcoming their doubts about hydroponically grown vegetables, as they learn about it and taste the produce. In Singapore, for example, where they have very little land to grow vegetables, they use rooftops to grow their vegetables hydroponically. We call them rooftop farms.Q: This seems like a replicable model in urban areas worldwide.SR: Yes, definitely. It is being well accepted worldwide.On the commercial side, our first farm at Urban Kisaan was a rooftop farm in the heart of the city of Hyderabad. This is where we demonstrated that it can be part of smart city planning.At Kanha, we have built six rooftop greenhouses. Different systems are being used to grow different types of food. We’re growing many types of leafy greens, tomatoes, eggplants, capsicums, and hot peppers. We can grow anything we wish.The cost of the setup is an investment, but I’m sure in the near future governments will offer incentives and subsidies.<hr><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/Hydroponics4_13fbb14f24.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-11T13:17:24.975Z" alt="">&nbsp;<hr>Q: What about universities and corporations?SR: University hostels are asking for vertical farms to be installed. And corporates are asking them for their employee restaurants. Generally, they prepare fresh food, such as salads.Supermarkets are also interested. The indoor kits are being installed in the supermarkets so that consumers harvest directly from there.In terms of environmental impact, these initiatives are doing two very important things:<ol><li>They are cutting off the logistics component of food production. This reduces the carbon emissions as there is no transportation involved.</li><li>There is no wastage either. In typical farming operations, up to 40% of the food grown is wasted before it reaches the consumer.</li></ol>Hydroponics is reducing both carbon emissions and wastage.Earlier we had backyard farming. That is becoming more difficult these days as we don’t have much time to devote to it, and there is a lack of space in our urban areas. If you have the space and the time, there is nothing like it. But if you don’t, you can try hydroponics as a micro farming option.It’s time to promote micro farming,to decentralize farming. Micro farming cuts down wastage, and allows you to grow safe, nutritious food even in urban high-rise environments.Q: Dr. Sairam, thank you so much for this eye-opening conversation.<hr><hr><h4>Photographs courtesy of URBAN KISAAN</h4><hr>

Hydroponics

Saki F. Santorelli, EdD, MA, is an educator, author and clinician. He retired as Executive Director of the UMass Medical School Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care and Society. A professor of medicine, he was the very first intern at Dr Jon Kabat Zinn's Stress Reduction Clinic, from where Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) originated. His entire career has been dedicated to the integration of mindfulness into public health and well-being, propelled by his recognition of and trust in the innate goodness of human beings.

Saki-Santorelli.jpg

Saki Santorelli

<h4>SAKI SANTORELLI is interviewed by AMIR IMANI as part of a webinar series about mindfulness, love,
 compassion and the way of the heart.</h4>
Q: Today we are very delighted to have my dear friend, mentor and
 teacher, Dr. Saki Santorelli, with us. Saki was the Executive Director of The Center for Mindfulness in Medicine,
 Health and Society at the University of Massachusetts, USA, for 17 years. I have been a witness to his deep
 contribution to bringing mindfulness to the public and the profession, globally.
Saki has been one of the main pulls for me into the mindfulness
 practice, through his loving presence and brotherly support from afar. He will be speaking to us on love, compassion
 and the heart in this way.
Thank you Saki, and welcome to this session with us.
SS: Thank you so much, Amir and Samaneh. It’s
 lovely to be with all of you.
Today I would like to begin by offering you the deepest sense of gratitude and
 appreciation for the work that you are doing in your part of the world, wherever you are. So how about if we begin
 by, each of us in our own way, setting an intention for what we hope for in this next hour together?
You know there are often surface reasons, then there are deeper reasons, and then there
 are deeper than that reasons. For example, you might feel at a professional level, which is a good thing. But if you
 drop down a little further into your heart: What’s really brought you to this, to give yourself over to this for an
 hour of your life, when you could be doing so many other things? And it’s that deeper seed that I’m suggesting you
 attend to.
People come for a whole range of reasons, but then there is some deeper reason for being
 there as well. For example – we never did a formal study about this – all of the 37 years that I was at the Center
 for Mindfulness, we saw people with cancer and heart disease and a huge range of medical and psychological issues.
 And while they came certainly for some relief from the psychological or physical suffering associated with those
 conditions, the single-most frequently stated goal was peace of mind.
So they knew something deep inside themselves, even in the midst of whatever they were
 suffering with, physically or psychologically, that was quite different than the symptoms that they were
 experiencing. So it’s that deeper reason that I am asking, or suggesting, that you invoke or intend and attend to as
 we continue.
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Even right in this moment I feel that we are dear, dear companions, that we are joined
 together by a certain commitment, a certain dedication, and a certain view of human beings: in some very real way,
 the view that human beings are actually filled with a certain kind of genius. They are capable far more than they
 might imagine or certainly far more than most cultures would suggest is possible. It’s as if there’s a treasure that
 they are, that they have forgotten. You know what I mean? You know that in yourself how easy it is to forget?
So you could say that in a very real way the true and real work of any of us, as
 teachers of mindfulness-based programs, is to remember. And that remembering is deeper than the intervention. In
 fact I don’t even like to call MBSR an intervention; we avoided calling it an intervention from the beginning. And
 we avoided calling it a therapy as well. Rather we said it’s an approach or a path. I don’t know what the word is in
 Farsi, but I think in Arabic it is tareeq; it’s a way.
That doesn’t mean all of the competencies that have been described as central to MBSR or
 MBCT teacher development are not important. They are important. I’d read the paper by my dear colleagues, Rebecca
 Crane and Mark Williams, when it came out years ago, about the competencies, and I asked myself, “Are these
 competencies all an aspect of MBSR?” My answer was yes. Then I asked myself another question, “Will these
 competencies be enough to walk into the classroom and teach?” My answer was no.
That doesn’t make them unimportant. It’s just that the central competency in my view, in
 my experience, is the cultivation of the human heart. And that has everything to do with the quality of embodiment.
 And every one of us will embody it in a different way. And it expresses itself probably universally as a kind of
 sympathetic nature, a kind of tenderness and softness – not passivity, but softness – and a kind of mercy.
So maybe for a moment you can just be attentive to that part of yourself. It’s right
 here. You might say it actually shows up as a kind of assertive kindness, warmth and friendliness towards oneself
 and one’s experience. In a very real way we’re asking the people that we work with to come to our courses or
 classes, to cultivate the same quality towards themselves and their experience.
In that, of course, on one hand we’re talking about the quality of tenderness or
 softness of the heart. On the other hand, you probably know well that that the heart is fierce, it can take
 everything, and it can keep giving. I’m not talking about something romantic, but it takes just that kind of an
 organ, if you will, of sensitivity and sensibility, to actually help people meet and in some way be relieved from
 their own suffering and their own pain.
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So if we look a little more deeply into mindfulness itself, there are two dimensions to
 it. On one hand there is what’s often called the instrumental dimension. It has to do with the development of skills
 and competencies, in a sense of effort and improvement over time. Maybe in our modern vernacular we’d say that has
 to do with acquisitional learning. For example, if I have to learn Farsi, I’d learn from the very beginning. I’d
 have to go very slowly, and I would probably feel like a failure or that I’m not getting it. If learn to play the
 piano, I go slowly. I learn the notes then the scales before I can play any music.
<img decoding="async" alt="" width="223" height="289"
 class="lazyload img-float-left has-img-center-in-mobile"
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 the same with learning to practice mindfulness. It is a practice
 in the sense that it has its own progression, and over time people often report changes. And if you’re a mindfulness
 practitioner, you discover that there are changes that take place over time. And it’s the same with the various
 competencies that have been identified in the development of MBSR teachers: over time people get more skillful at
 those competencies.
Then there is this other dimension of mindfulness practice that is non-instrumental.
 There’s nothing to get. There’s nothing to improve upon. There’s nothing to gain. It’s already complete. And you can
 see that instrumental is nested in the non-instrumental. For example, how could you love another human being if love
 wasn’t already a part of you? How could you appreciate beauty if beauty wasn’t innate? How could you appreciate the
 light of the sun if light wasn’t an innate part of you as a human being? This is what Rumi was talking about,
 several hundred years ago, when he talked about two kinds of intelligence: one acquired, one already complete.
So what’s it like to walk into the classroom knowing that you’re sitting in front of 10
 or 15 geniuses, who are already complete but they don’t know it? You can’t tell them that, you can’t give them a
 lecture about that. You can’t tell them, “Just believe me, because I know.” Our job is to embody that in some way,
 and then help them over time, simply assist them to become familiar with the depth that’s already a part of them.

That’s why I have written – and I continue to know more than simply believe – that the
 central risk in MBSR or MBCT is that we’ll become blinded to the non-instrumental and the instrumental will take
 over.
<hr>
<h5 style="text-align: center;">The central competency in my view, in my experience, 
 is the cultivation of the human heart.</h5>
<hr>
So maybe we’ll take a moment and just sit with this question: How is it inside me to
 hear this, to feel it in some way? Not because I’ve said it, but how is it for you?
This really means that our job is to be students. To listen. To serve. To see if we can
 meet every situation, or many situations, in a way that they provide us with a certain kind of learning, a certain
 kind of insight and understanding. We become kind of intoxicated, so we’re a little drunk. You could say in some
 real way that mindfulness, in its most universal form, expresses itself in a deep and powerful way in remembering
 that we’re actually sober. That our senses serve us. That our mind serves us.
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And then, more centrally, the cultivation and the development of the human heart happen.
 It becomes the central characteristic of mindfulness, because it has everything to do with a slow disillusioning of
 this thing we call ‘myself’. So we move from that position of inhabiting and strengthening the self to recognizing
 that all human beings suffer, all human beings have the capacity to be free and liberated.
So thank you for letting your beauty shine out into the world. We know that there’s a
 lot of uncertainty in the world, a lot of darkness, and a lot of fear. And there’s no value in pretending otherwise.
 But in the middle of all of that, there is the capacity for us to shine forth, to feel this indelible bond between
 us, to touch deeply and know the deep, deep resources that we have within, and that the world has changed through
 very small numbers of people doing very radical things. By radical I mean fundamental. This is fundamental: the
 reality of what mindfulness is in the life of human beings is fundamental.
<hr>
<h5 style="text-align: center;"> 
 There is the capacity for us to shine forth, to feel this 
 indelible bond between us, to touch deeply and know 
 the deep, deep resources that we have
 within.</h5>
<hr>
I would like to end with a few lines of Hafiz, as he’s dear to me. The soil of Iran has
 given the world a universal voice through this human being. At the end of one of his poems he says the following
 lines:
Be strong, Hafiz! 
 Work here inside time, 
 where we fail, catch hold 
 again, and climb.

So that’s what we’re all doing here: working inside time, failing, catching hold again,
 and climbing. And I thank you for climbing. We’ll reach out and help one another.
Q: Thank you, Saki, for showing us how to climb, just by sitting still
 and feeling.
To be continued&nbsp;
<hr>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">Interview by AMIR IMANI</h4>
<hr>

Insight of the heart – part 1

<h4>We continue SAKI SANTORELLI’s interview with AMIR IMANI as part of a webinar series about
 mindfulness, love, compassion and the way of the heart.</h4>
Q: As a student, Saki, what I learnt from
 you is not to be afraid. This is what you taught me in my training – not to be afraid of not knowing and to rest
 in just being. And what you call heart and love, you get the power through that. You get the courage to “not
 know” through loving. I am always amazed to see how science is showing that this is healing. And the clients are
 amazed how they are transformed by just being.
Now, how do the complexities of the mind
 affect your work as a teacher? Say you have a mild depression, for example. Do you need to reach a stage of full
 recovery? Or does this mild depression dissolve through your practice and through your teaching practice?

SS: Well, I would say it depends. If the depression or anxiety is very, very
 strong in the life of the teacher, it could make working with other people more difficult. On the other hand, we all
 have bouts of depression or sadness or anxiety or uncertainty or insecurity. So it seems to me it’s not a question
 that you shouldn’t teach if you feel some depression, but how will you work with that anxiety or depression or
 uncertainty in a way that is real and genuine, and the fact that it’s known to you.
If you develop a relationship with that situation or that condition within yourself, it’s often the way you develop
 what are called the insights of the heart. In some real way your struggles and your sufferings actually have the
 potential to open you and open the people with whom you work with to bring new ways. So it can be a great service to
 you and your teaching, because it makes you so much more sensitive to others, and your work with yourself in those
 situations and conditions will inform you about how to work with other people.
So you don’t have to be completely cured. If that were the case, we wouldn’t do
 anything. We’re all lame!
<hr>
<h5 style="text-align: center;">In some real way your struggles and your sufferings 
 actually have the potential to open you 
 and open the people with whom you work 
 to bring new ways.</h5>
<hr>
Q: Would it help to say, “Keep some pain!
 It may help you in your teaching”?
SS: [Laughing] I wouldn’t say, “Keep it.” I would
 say, “If you’ve got it, you’d better work with it.”
Q: You give an example in your book,
 Healing Thyself, of the wounded healer from Greek mythology, Chiron, who is better able to connect with
 his patients because of his suffering.
SS: Yes, exactly. Those wounds actually help us
 meet other human beings. It is exactly what I was saying before: your sympathy is aroused, your tenderness is
 aroused. Your understanding of the other is informed and aroused.
Q: I remember my early days, Saki, in the
 teacher training, in the Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction (MBSR) course. It is a requirement of the teacher
 training program to be a patient first. I found myself listening to these 35 so-called patients, talking their
 hearts out about their pain, their anguish, and I was feeling nothing. I was baffled: Why am I not feeling the
 pain that they are talking about?
Then I spoke to the teacher of our group
 about this. She hinted that it would come when I opened up to myself. So, starting with my own wound first, and
 then opening to the other – it looks like that for me.
SS: Yes, in a very real way we’ve been taught,
 especially as health care professionals, to separate ourselves from the people we work with, because the view is
 that then we’ll serve them better. My experience is quite the opposite. If I am able to discover some semblance of
 what they’re experiencing within myself, I can serve them far better.
I may not have the same content: somebody may have cancer and I may not have cancer, but
 have I suffered from something else? Yes. I may not be addicted to a substance, but do I experience addiction? Yes.
 And what is that like? What does it do to my body, my mind, and my psyche? What do I know about that in myself? What
 does awareness tell me, show me?
And I then can go to that source and maybe at least be in the “not knowing,” as you
 described it, Amir. I may have some sense of, “Where can I put my first foothold? Where can I put my first
 handhold?” This is exactly what Hafiz is saying in that poem. I don’t have to know the second or third or fourth
 step. I simply have to be present and take the risk of taking the first step. The development of our relationship
 will guide the second step.
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Q: When there are stressful sensitivities
 of life, if mindfulness practices create more sensitivity, should we reduce the length and number of the
 practice sessions? How do we find balance in terms a healthy dosage of practice?
SS: Well, these are all important questions. I
 think in some ways it’s true that mindfulness practice can make us more sensitized, and in some way it is parallel
 to what is happening in the class, in the course for people. For example, sometimes in the early weeks people say,
 “I’m feeling worse than when I started. I thought this was supposed to make me feel better, but I feel worse.”
They’re speaking about the fact that through the development of their attention and
 awareness they are becoming more sensitized to their situation, both externally and internally. And that is a lot to
 comfort in oneself. And they often express frustration because they are more aware of what’s going on, but they
 don’t yet have the capacity to do anything about it. That seems to me to be a normal part of the learning process.
 What begins to happen is turbulence. And their awareness is perturbing their system. It is because there’s the way I
 was, and then there is what I perceive now; and that differential creates a kind of friction or discomfort.
The skill of the teacher becomes really important in that moment, in terms of how do we
 titrate the right dose? Just to keep that, but not too much. Too much is overwhelming; too little, transformation is
 not possible. They’re involved in a kind of alchemy, in the sense that there is a phase of dissolution before
 reintegration.
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So as a teacher and a practitioner of mindfulness, as you said, we’re all involved in
 the same process of how to ascertain the right dose to have some sense of balance. I think that involves getting to
 know oneself better and better. And also, if it’s possible to work with a teacher, it’s helpful as well because the
 teacher can help with that dosage.
<hr>
<h5 style="text-align: center;">So as a teacher and a practitioner of mindfulness, 
 we’re all involved in the same process of how to ascertain 
 the right dose to have some sense of balance. 
 I think that involves getting to know oneself better and better.</h5>
<hr>
You have to be careful not to push yourself so hard that you’re doing yourself harm, and
 at the same time you have to really look deeper into your practice and see if it is being motivated by love and
 kindness. And if there is any sense that you’re pushing too hard, you have to back off.
Often we instrumentalize practice so much, because we want to gain something. And while
 it takes effort to practice, there is a kind of skillful effort, which has a degree of resting in the way things are
 versus pushing too hard against them. And if that’s the case, which is not unusual, then you need to ask yourself
 some really good questions like: Who is pushing so hard? Who wants to breakthrough and to what? And what is
 motivating? They are not necessarily comfortable questions, but they are fruitful. They help us to be with life and
 ourselves as we are and as life is.
So maybe we can make this the last question, Amir.
Q: I think this will be a good one for us.
 We have been keeping the best for last. What is falling in love?
SS: Okay, the best for last!
Well, that question has been asked by human beings since human beings were on the Earth.
 And it’s portrayed in a very particular way in our cultures. Usually it is portrayed as romantic and intoxicating,
 and it’s usually about what we want. It has its beauty and its value and its function, and it’s quite wonderful. It
 doesn’t last though. At least that particular expression of it doesn’t last. And not unusually we go looking for it
 somewhere else; it’s a kind of addiction.
I think, for me, love has a lot of pain in it. In some real way, to be able to even come
 closer to saying “I’m in love” means that we’re actually putting someone else in front of us. Our care for them
 becomes more powerful than our care for ourselves. And in some very real way it portrays a kind of death. And that
 death is not just metaphoric, because it always involves a diminishment of the usual idea of the self. The pleasure
 and the pain of the other become more important than the pain and pleasure of the self.
<hr>
<h5 style="text-align: center;">In some very real way we know we are in love, 
 because in some way we’re becoming bigger in 
 what appears to be our diminishment. So it means 
 that we start to give rather than look to receive. </h5>
<hr>
And that means in some very real way our ego is being slowly dissolved. The kind of
 separation between the self and the other is being eroded. So in some very real way we know we are in love, because
 in some way we’re becoming bigger in what appears to be our diminishment. So it means that we start to give rather
 than look to receive.
It seems a fitting way to end.
Q: And it’s also a beautiful way to begin,
 Saki. The sheer fact of touching our wounds, ourselves, for the first time – however it may be, not pleasant,
 it’s painful even – but the touch, the connection, for the first time is like falling in love for us. And that
 moment we are bigger than before.
SS: Yes, because we begin to discover how big we
 already are. The world is always squeezing us down, and of course awareness is fathomless and boundless, and
 touching that boundlessness is … Love simply arises and is known.
Q: How about rephrasing it to “rising in
 love?”
SS: Yes, I was going to say that!
Q: Thank you so much for raising the
 awareness of this small group. And all this started 20 years ago with a simple act of kindness from your side,
 and it’s amazing that we never forget kindness, especially when it’s not asked for, it’s just given to us. Thank
 you.
SS: Thank you so much. May we continue to travel in
 this caravan together.
<hr>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">Interview by AMIR IMANI</h4>
<hr>

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