“Take up one idea. Make that one idea your life – think of it, dream of it, live on that idea. Let the brain, muscles, nerves, every part of your body, be full of that idea, and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success. This is the way great spiritual giants are produced.”
~ Swami Vivekananda
Hello Monday! I’m feeling energized from a restful Sunday, and ready to get back at it. I ran across the above quote by Swami V last week, and it really stuck with me.
I first learned about Swami last fall, when I was writing my final paper for my yoga certification, entitled “How Yoga is Represented in the Western World.”
Swami is pretty much credited with bringing yoga to Europe and America in the 1890s, and with raising interfaith awareness.
Swami wrote:
Swami also observed that humans could be classified into four categories:
1. those who were in constant activity, or the worker;
2. those who were driven by their inner urge, or the emotional;
3. those who tended to analyze the working of their minds, or the mystical;
4. and those who weighed everything with reason, or the rational.
And he offers four ways of worship, or styles of yoga, which could aid the various types of dispositions (which I found very interesting):
1. Karma yoga for the worker,
2. Bhakti yoga for the emotional,
3. Raja yoga for the mystical,
4. and Jnana yoga for the rational.
By the way, I’m classified as the mystical 🙂 ….
Anyway, until today, I had not really spent much more time reading about Swami. I am simply amazed by the beauty of many of his quotes as I read through them this morning. I look forward to sharing some more of them with you in the weeks and months to come!
I hope you have a wonderful week. And whether it is one-pointed focus in meditation on the divine, or one-pointed focus on the tasks you have at hand, I wish you much success ♥
