HAPPY NEW YEAR
Dear Meditators
Happy New Year to you all, may 2019 bring Joy, Happiness & Abundance in all you do.
The story line for 2018 is over. What will your story be in 2019?
When I look back over 2018, I think of the learning and experiences that changed my life, the experiences that bought me joy, laughter and happiness. I do a mental checklist of things I am still working on. I let go of the past with gratitude and look forward to new year with excitement.
When I first learnt to meditate, I learnt about the word Samskaras which means deep impressions, conditioning from this life and from past lives, samskaras are the residue or imprints from my actions (karma).
These samskaras become imbedded in our minds and become part of our personality that we act on habitually. There are also good samskaras that we act upon and stay with us – they bring happiness, joy and laughter. We also draw on learning experience that have changed the course of life.
Can these imprints be reversed? Yes, they can.
After I learned to meditate, I became more aware of my actions and my samskaras that caused suffering, like negative thinking, my habits, actions and behaviours. I learned to watch them and became familiar with the triggers that set these samskaras off. It took time, but then some of these habits and behaviours started to drop away. Negative thinking and irritations became less and my mind became calmer and free to think situation through more positively. I used the stay and play thinking rather than fight or flee options.
What I learned is that for probably many life times I have repeated the same way of thinking and only when I consciously change these thought patterns is when they began to melt away. I may still have these thought patterns but they don’t take hold because I remember the actions (Karma) that are the consequences of the old patterns.
The English word “Scar” comes from Samskaras.
Two pieces below from my Newsletter in March 2018, they are worth repeating for this New Year’s message.
Also 20 great quotes from Wayne Dyer to live by.
Deepak Chopra gives a great explanation about Samskara’s.
When they tried to understand how the mind traps itself, the ancient Indian sages devised the key concept of samskara (from two Sanskrit word roots that mean "to flow together"). A samskara is a groove in the mind that makes thoughts flow in the same direction. Buddhist psychology makes sophisticated use of the concept by speaking of samskaras as imprints in the mind that have a life of their own. Your personal samskaras, built up from memories of the past, force you to react in the same limited way over and over, robbing you of free choice (i.e., choosing as if for the first time). From The Book of Secrets.
JeffKober - Thought for the day www.jeffkobermeditation.com -writes
Negative thoughts, negative behaviours, negative self-talk--all are the product of the stresses that we have stored throughout the course of our lifetime. The samskaras. They are grooves of feelings, thinking and choices, ruts that can be difficult to climb out of. Meditation daily melts away these stresses and the ruts become progressively less deep until finally, they are no longer there at all. But even then, the old habits of thought can still be there. We must, in fact, teach ourselves new habits. Embrace new thoughts. Thoughts of why it's okay to let go of the old, let go of blame of self and others, and why it's okay to love-- ourselves and others.
Happy New Year
Love & Jai Guru Deva
Liz
