“Today, many will break through the barriers of the past by looking at the blessings of the present. Why not you?”
~ Steve Maraboli
Happy Monday friends. It’s the first Monday of a new month, and I wanted to share another message about re-birth which I ran across this weekend. It’s from a yogic perspective. And it’s a perfect reminder that we have a choice. In the blessing of the present moment, when we remain in mindfulness, right here and now, we can make the choice as to the person that we want to be, or not to be, the things we wish to do, or not to do, the dreams we pursue or don’t pursue.
This life, and the next one to come, this moment, and the next one to come, is of our making.
Begin today to keep your own journal. Begin the mindfulness of becoming increasingly aware of your thoughts. By looking to the past, giving yourself the gift of your own words, you will see how amazingly far you have come in your spiritual journey …
Myself, who began keeping a journal with the reading of Debbie Ford’s “21 Day Consciousness Cleanse” in October of 2009, is barely recognizable to me. I have kept a journal, and made an entry, nearly every day since.
On October 16, 2009, my first entry from the consciousness cleanse was on the topic of Desire. I wrote: “To find, to create, my tribe. To find the path that fully allows me to share my gifts with the world. To receive empathy. To experience uncontained joy without the fear of ridicule for being myself.” And my mantra for the day? “To heed the call of adventure”. I put this in a letter to the Universe.
With God’s blessing, I have healed my own heart. I have found compassion, for others and myself. I am now of spirit ….
Namaste ❤❤
——-
Question:
Does rebirth take place immediately?
And what will I be in the next birth?
Answer by Swami Krishnananda:
Rebirth need not take place immediately.
It can take place immediately if the karma is very intense; otherwise, it may take its own time.
The decision will be taken by the desires which are left at the time of death.
Even now you can know to some extent what you will be in your next birth by analysing your own thoughts.
Today at sunset time you sit quiet.
Go on thinking from the morning onwards till this moment what you have been thinking predominantly.
Of course, you might have been thinking of the academy, kitchen, bath, washing clothes; they are all secondary matters.
But basically, in your subconscious, what have you been thinking all day?
Yesterday what did you think?
The day before yesterday, what did you think?
This is why they say you must keep a spiritual diary – very important.
You cannot remember what you thought ten days ago.
You will not remember.
If you keep a diary and make notes, you can know the balance sheet of thirty days of thinking.
You can say that these are the basic thoughts that occurred to your mind.
This you will become in the next birth, to fulfill that desire.
You can know what you will become in the next birth.
You need not consult any scripture; your thoughts are known to you very well.
What do you want?
Ask your own mind what it wants.
In a classroom of the academy, you will say you want God.
It is not like that.
Go to the road, go to the railway station, go to the marketplace and then see what you are thinking.
Those thoughts are also important.
The essence of all these will be taken out, like butter from milk, and that will condense itself into a body which is called rebirth.
It is not decided by anybody else.
You are deciding your own fate and you create your own rebirth.
Nobody is punishing you.
Your thoughts are your makers, and you can, if you are impartial in judging your own mind, know what you will become in the next birth.
It is not very difficult.
~ From Swami Krishnananda Saraswati’s ‘A Textbook Of Yoga’.
