New Human Race on Earth : In Contact with " Cosmic Consciousness "

Dr. Richard Maurice Bucke (18 March 1837 - 19 February 1902) (often called Maurice Bucke) was an important Canadian progressive psychiatrist in the late nineteenth century. An adventurer in his youth, he went on to study medicine, practice psychiatry, and befriend several noted men of letters. In addition to writing and delivering professional papers, Bucke wrote three book-length studies: Man's Moral Nature, Walt Whitman, and – his best known work – Cosmic Consciousness, a classic in the modern study of mystical experience.

Dr. R.M. Bucke believes that cosmic consciousness is a natural faculty of man, and that a future race of men on this earth will be born with this faculty well developed and not merely latent as it is now. Bucke's theory is that , just as man advanced from the state of simple consciousness, which he shared with animal kingdom, into a state of self-consciouness, peculiar to man alone, and marked by the development of language, so he must ineveitable come into a higher state of consciouness, distiniguished by a cosmic or universal understanding.

One selection from his book " Cosmic Consciousness " :

In contact with the flux of Cosmic Consciousness all religions known and named today will be melted down. The human soul will be revolutionized. Religion will absolutely dominate the race. It will not be believed and disbelieved.

It will not be part of life, belonging to certain hours, times, occasions. It will not be in sacred books nor in the mouths of priests. It will not dwell in churches and meetings and forms and days. Its life will not be in prayers, hymns nor discourses. It will not depend on special revelations, on the words of gods who came down to teach, nor any Bible or Bibles. It will have no mission to save men from their sins or secure them entrance into heaven. It will not teach a future immortality nor future glories, for immortality and all glory will exist in here and now. The evidence of immortality will live in every heart as sight in every eye. Doubt of God and of eternal life will be as impossible as now doubt of existance; the evidence of each will be the same. Religion will govern every minute of every day of all life. Churches, priests, forms, creeds, prayers, all agents, all intermediaries between the individual man and God will be permanantly replaced by direct unmistakable intercourse. Sin will no longer exist nor will salvation be desired. Men will not worry about death or future, about the kingdom of heaven., about what may come with and after cessation of life of the present body. Each soul will feel and know itself to be immortal, will feel and know that the entire universe with all its good and with all its beauty is for it and belongs to it forever. The world peopled by men possessing cosmic consciousness will be as far removed from the world of today as this is from the world as it was before the advent of self-consciouness ... This new race is in the act of being born from us, and in the near future it will occupy and possess the earth.

An Abstract Representation of Creation and Evolution of Mankind

It's a painting (very intelligently created) representing the "Creation of Universe" & "Evolution of Mankind."

The painting depicts:
1. Seven Epoch of Divine Era
2. Creation of the Divine Spirit
3. Creation of the Universe
4. Creation of a Human Spirit Pattern
5. Materilization of Humans
6. Materialistic Desires and Progress
7. Desire for Power and Love
8. Appearance of Saints, Religion and Philosophy flourishes
9. Material centred science
10. Degeneration of Spiritual impurities
11. Great convulsion of Nature
12. Baptism by Fire
13. Spiritual centred civilization
14. Humankind becomes divine
15. Towards an age of higher theocracy.

Source: From Dato Lai's (famous Malaysian architect) beautiful home

A Scripture of Love

By Paramahansa Yogananda from the book "The Divine Romance".

The Lord ever silently whispers to you:

I am Love. But to experience the giving and the gift of love, I divided Myself into thre; love, lover, and beloved. My love is beautiful, pure, eternally joyous, and I taste in many ways, through many forms.

As father I drink reverential love from the spring of my child's heart. As mother I drink the nectar of unconditional love from the soul-cup of the tiny baby. As child I imbibe the protecting love of the father's righteous reason. As infant I drink ceaseless love from the holy grail of material attraction. As master I drink the sympathetic love from the flask of the servant's thoughtfullness. As servant I sip respectful love from the goblet of the master's appreciation. As guru-preceptor I enjoy purest love from the chalice of the desciple's all-surrendering devotion. As friend I drink from the self-bubbling fountains of spontaneous love. As a divine friend, I quaff crystal waters of cosmic love from the reservoir of God-adoring hearts.

I am in love with Love alone, but I allow myself to be deluded when as father or mother I think and feel only for the child; when as the lover I care only for the beloved; when as servant I live only for the master. But because I love Love alone, I ultimately break this delusion of My myriad human Selves. It is for this reason that I transfer the father into the astral land when he forgets that it is My love, not his, that protects the child. I lift the babe from the mother's breast, that she might learn it is my love she adored in him. I spirit away the beloved from the lover who imagines it is she whom he loves, rather than My love responding in her.

So My love is playing hide-and-seek in all human hearts, that each might learn to discover and worship, not the temporal human receptacles of My love, but My love itself, dancing from one heart to another.

I am the love that dances human puppets on the strings of emotions and instincts, to play the drama of love on the stage of life. My love is beautiful and endlessly enjoyable when you love it alone; but the lifeline of your peace and joy is cut when instead you become entangled in human emotions and attachment.

Realize, My children, it is My love for which you yearn!

Righ Attitude: Harnesing Life's Difficulties for Positive Achievements

Excerpts from a talk given by Sri Daya Mata, President & Sangha Mata of Self-Realization Fellowship/YSS of India. Today (Jan 31) is Sri Daya Mataji's birthday. Wish you a very happy birthday, Ma ! :)

Love and understanding, wisdom, health, security, lasting joy - these every person is seeking. Those of us on the spiritual path share the conviction that by communingwith God we will attain these goals.

When visited by hard times, our bad habit of believing we are mortal beings makes it easy to succumb to wrong thinking - "Why me? What did I do to deserve this?" - or to feel resentment or anger over the way life treats us. Cultivating right attitude helps us to see those circumstances, no matter how seemingly "unfair", as oppertunities - created by our own personal karma, yet blessed with the underlying grace of God for the specific purpose of hastening the unfoldment of our souls.

Progress is aligned to our understanding that our difficulties come not from other people, not fro outer conditions, not from any source but God through His cosmic laws. If we can but hold to the truth we can use what happens for our ultimate and highest good, we will feel God's ever-present hand of blessing and will find that our troubles cannot touch us inwardly.

This is why it is so important to have the right attitude toward the circumstances we encounter. I would even go so far as to say that attitude is the basis of everything on the spiritual path. How we face life, how we react to difficulties, how we respond to the inevitable challenges to our well-being and evenmindedness, how we engage in our spiritual practices - these determine how close we draw to the Divine, and how quickly.

So long as we exist on this material plane, there is one thing of which we can be of certain: the uncertainity of change. This we cannot avoid in a world of duality in which we are incessantly presented with the fluctutions of maya: light and darkness, health and ill health, life and death. Their inconstancy must not cow us down with fear or hopelessness - never! Their purpose is to teach us the lesson of our own transcendent, blissful nature. They are a prod to make us exert the effort to be free of these ceaseless ups and downs. The way to rise above the law of duality is by contacting God - the unchangeable Reality beyond the realm of changes.

Be Nourished by the Soul : Balancing, Simplifying, Making Time for God

Excerpts from an article by Sri Daya Mata, President of Self-Realization Fellowship/YSS of India.

Humanity today is suffering from spiritual malnutrition. People in parts of the world suffering from physical starvation, but millions in all nations are suffering from spiritual starvation. Science has given the means to feed everyone on this planet; it is man's spiritual poverty that makes him cling to selfishness and small-minded prejudices, thereby preventing him from eradicating hunger and other forms of deprivation.

The life anchored in truth, in wisdom, in God, is a balanced life. It starts with meditation. That is the emphasis of the routine established by Paramahansa Yogananda... The way of life he taught us consists of mediation in the morning, before we begin our duties, and at intervals through out the day; at noon, and again in the early evening when we have finished our daily work, and once more late at night ...before retiring.

It is the spiritually balanced individual who is truly successful. I am not referring monetary success; it has little meaning. That has been my(Daya Mata) experience, as it was Master's(Paramahansa Yogananda); I have met scores of materially successful human beings who have been emotional and spiritual failures - stressful; lacking inner peace and the ability to give and receive love; unable to relate harmoniously to their families, or to other human beings, or to God. A person's success cannot be measured by what he has, only by what he is and what he is able to give of himself to others.

Meditation helps us to align our outer life with inner values of the soul as nothing else in this world can.It does not take away from family life or relationships with others. On the contrary, it makes us more loving, more understanding - it makes us want to serve our husband, our wife, our children, our neighbours. Real spirituality begins when we include others in our wish for well-being, when we expand our thoughts beyond"I and me and mine."

Most shun meditation not because they truly have no time, but because they do not want to face themselves - a definite result of the interiorization of meditation. There is too much they do not like in themselves, so they would rather keep the mind on externals, never thinking too deeply about the self-improvements they need to make. Get away from such mental laziness.

How marvelously different and fulfilling is the balanced life in God shown us by Master: "Divine Mother, teach me to live with delight. May I enjoy my earthly duties and the countless beauties of creation. Help me to train my senses and appreciate Thy wondrous world of Nature. Let me savour with Thy zest all innocent pleasures. Save me from negation and unwarranted kill-joy attitudes."

Today in Western civilization people do not know how to enjoy simple things.They have become so jaded in their tastes that nothing satisfies: overstimulated outwardly, starved and empty inwardly, they take to drink or drugs to escape.

Let us go back to the simple pleasures of life. Have you ever on your day off, for example, taken a drive up into the mountains, or out into the desert or some other quiet place, had a picnic, sat quietly, and thought about God? These are real pleasures. What joy they bring once you have cultivated the sensitivity of appreciating the Lord's presence in the beauty of nature.

You might say, "Well, it would be terribly boring." But just try it once instead of going to a movie, from which you usually return restless and moody. You wanted to enjoy it, but it did not make you happy. Instead, seek natural places of beauty and solitude and listen to the still voice of God speaking through His creation. What peace it will bring to you!

One who is seeking God must practice more stillness in his life - for at least a short time each day in meditation; for a few hours on the weekend, perhaps when you get out in nature; and for several days or a week every so often.

The Sound of Music and Plants

Article from Self-Realization Fellowship Magazine. Issue: Spring 1979

If plants could talk, one can not help but wonder what they would tell us about their likes and dislikes. In The Sound of Music and Plants, Mrs.Retallack gives the reader an insight into the emotional reaction of plants to music. Jazz, pop, country, rock, ragas, Berg, Bernstein, or Bach - which type do they most enjoy? To find out, the author, a professional musician and wife of a medical doctor, conducted scientific experiments while working on her B.A. degree at Tempel Buell College(now Colorado Women's College).

The results were so interesting that her work received worldwide recognition through the news media - articles appeared in over 500 news papers and magazines, including the New york Times, Harper's Science Digest, and Reader's Digest. In addition CBS television filmed the experiments on time-lapse camera for a special feature on Cronkite News.

What is so novel about these experiments? It is not that this type of research is new; experimentation with the effect of music on plants has been going on for years.

The experimentation of the author has unique twist. She writes: "Although others have done experiments for reasons of better production, bigger flowers, and so on, apparently I was the first in US to do scientifically controlled experiments purely to see how plants react to different types of music." By carefully setting up controlled music chambers with all factors constant except the music, placing a speaker at one end of each sound chamber and various types of vegetable, flowering, and leafy plants in the middle, she set the stage for observing the plants' reaction to the sound of music.

She watched in dismay as one group drooped, faded, and turned away from the sound source. What is more, after eighteen days, they died. Only six feet away, in another sound chamber, the drama was strikingly different: "At the 14th day, the plants nearest speaker were leaning at 60-degree angle so as to almost embrace the speaker. The growth was noticeably lush and abundant, as were the roots." The difference? The first group has been listening to "acid rock" ( the term used to define a highly percussive, heavily rhythmic kind of rock music), and the second to East Indian devotional music. The evidence gathered from this experiment led to an intriguing theory.

"Of all the various kinds of music used," the author explains, "there were three kinds, apparently different in every way, that the plants responded to most favourably: East Indian devotional, Bach's 'Orgelbuchlein(Preludes based on Hymn Tunes of the Church Year), and jazz.

The author appeals to mankind to listen to what plants are trying to say and to consciously develop music as means of inspiration and upliftment of all forms of life - as a "bridge to Infinite."

The highest mission of music is to serve as a bridge between man and God.

Click the link below for more information on the experiments:

http://www.dovesong.com/positive_music/plant_experiments.asp

Enriching Your Life Through Solitude and Silence

An article from " Self-Realization Fellowship Magazine"
by Susan Smith Jones, Ph.D

Noise certainly seems to be part of our everyday lives - from the alarm clock in the morning , to the traffic outside, to the never-ending sound of voices, radio and television. Our bodies and minds appear to acclimate to these outside intrusions. Or do they?

Two decades ago, the Committee on Environmental Quality of the Federal Council of Science and Technology found that "growing number of researchers fear the dangerous and hazardous effects of intense noise on human health are seriously underestimated."

More recent studies, writes, Michael D. Seidman, M.D., in his terrific book, Save Your Hearing Now, suggest that we pay a price for adopting to noise: higher blood pressure, heart rate, adrenalin secretion; heightened aggression; impaired resistance to disease, a sense of helplessness. Studies indicate that when we control noise, its effects are much less damaging.

I have not been able to find any studies on the effects of quiet in repairing the stress of noise, but I know intuitively that most of us love quiet and need it desperately.We are so used to noise in our lives that silence can sometimes feel awkward and unsettling. On vacation, for instance, when quiet prevails, we may have trouble sleeping. But choosing times of silence can enrich the quality of our lives tremendously. If you find yourself overworked, stressed-out, irritated, or tense, rather than heading for a coffee or snack break, may be all you need is a silence break.

Everyone at some time has experienced the feeling of being overwhelmed by life. Everyone too, has felt the need to escape, to find a quiet, secluded place to experience the peace of Spirit, to be alone with quiet thoughts. Creating time of silence in your life takes commitment and discipline. Most of the time, periods of silence must be scheduled into your day's activities or you will never have any.

May be you can carve out times of silence while at home where you can be without radio, television, telephones, or voices. If you live in a family, may be the best quiet time for you is early in the morning before others arise. In that silence, you can become more aware, more sensitive to your surroundings, feel more in touch with the wholeness of life.

From quiet time or silence, you recognize the importance of solitude. Silence and solitude go hand in hand. In silence and solitude, you reconnect with your self. Solitude helps to clear your channels, fosters peace, and brings spiritual lucidity. When you retreat from outside world to go within, you can be at the very centre of you being and reacquaint yourself with you r spiritual nature - the essence of your being and all life.

Outside noise tends to drown the inner life - the music of soul. Only in silence and solitude can we go within and nurture our spiritual lives. Within each of us there is a silence waiting to be embraced.

How do you feel about being alone? Aloneness is quite different from loneliness. (Loneliness is the pain of being alone. Solitude is the glory of being alone) Loneliness is something you do to yourself. Have you ever expressed being lonely even when you are with other people?

Choose to Make Solitude Your Friend

It is my contention that all the other good things we endeavour to provide for ourselves, including sound nutrition, daily exercise and material wealth, will be of reduced value unless we learn to live in harmony with ourselves, which means knowing ourselves and finding peace in our own company. This peace is natural occurrence of spending time alone in silence. In spending time alone we realize that we are never really alone and that we can live more fully by focusing our inner guidance rather than externalities.

Embrace solitude. Walk in silence among the trees, in the mountains, by the ocean, with the sun and moon as your friends. Be by yourself, and experience a whole new way of celebrating yourself and life. Feel the heartbeat of silence. Bathe in its light and love. Know within yourself that you are a child of God, and in your silence in Heaven.

"When from our better selves we
have too long
been parted by the hurrying
world, and droop,
Sick of its business, of its pleasures tired,
How gracious, how benign, is solitude." --- William Wordsworth

The Divine Art of Erasing Age and Creating Vitality (continued ...)

Healthy Blood Is Necessary For Optimum Vitality

The canals in our bodies carry blood plasma that brings nutrition to all the cells, as well as take away the waste products that are dumped by the cells into the bloodstream. Healthy red blood is of utmost important in order to keep well - and plenty of exercise and fresh air.

Many persons do not exercise at all. Working is not really exercise. Of course any physical activity does some good and is better than sedentary life; but if it does not use all the muscles, you are not truly exercising. Scientific exercise means working the entire muscular system. That charges fresh blood into blood vessels in all parts of the body, and as a result it washes away poisons and gives life-force-laden oxygen and food to cells through out the system.

The red blood corpuscles not only carry oxygen, but also life-force, prana, to the cells. Every corpuscle is a tiny battery of life energy. That is what most people don't know. This is why when you loose blood, energy goes. Unless your body is strong, you should never give your blood; it is a mistake to do so. If you are weak, the loss of even one point of blood may injure you in unsuspected ways by lowering your body's overall life energy. If your body is strong, then it is all right to give blood.

The blood is an amazing thing. It knows how to throw off anything it does not like - anything foreign to the health of the body. Being a vehicle of life-force or prana, it carries the subtle intelligence innate in that creative energy. Some of the chemicals in the medicines are not good for you, with t he result that potent tonics are filtered out rather than absorbed by the blood. The blood takes oxygen readily than anything else.That is why proper breathing is so important to keep your blood charged with vitality. You receive more tonic from oxygen than from anything else - especially if you have good habits of proper breathing.

Learn and practice this method: First, throw out the breath with a strong double exhalation (one short and one long breath). Then, inhale in a double inhalation (one short and one long breath), filling the lungs as full as is comfortable. Hold the air in the lungs for a few seconds, allowing the oxygen to be fully absorbed and converted into prana. Then repeat the double exhalation, followed by the double inhalation. Practice this method in fresh air 30 times in the morning and 30 times at night. It is very simple. You will be healthier than ever if you follow this. This exercise brings in a great deal of extra life-force; and also decarbonizes your blood, promoting calmness. Remember that. I (Paramahansa Yogananda) want all of you to be healthy and well.

Eating bananas will help to increase the health of your red blood. They are one of the most beneficial of God's foods. Taking half an avocado daily with your meal will also greatly help in giving you the right nutrition. Your body will feel just as strong as if you had meat - and without creating meat's harmful acid conditions.

The foundation of divine healing is to live naturally. This is just not a physical method of healing; it is a divine method. To maintain health you must use nature's laws. Sun, fresh air, pure water, fruits, and vegetables - all these were given to you by God to keep well.

The Divine Art of Erasing Age and Creating Vitality (continued ...)

Cleansing The Body From Within

Health is easy to maintain if you know and practice the laws of keeping the body well, rather than starting the effort to heal yourself only after you become sick.

The first step is to get rid of the poisons that have accumulated in the system.Fasting is an ideal method of accomplishing this - for example, three days on Orange juice and ground almonds, with natural laxative. Repeat this after one month. If you spend time and effort necessary to cleanse the body from within, you will quickly find the truth of what I (Paramahansa Yogananda) am telling you about preserving youth.

Most of you are dying of disease because of overeating day after day, and eating the wrong foods. The less meat you eat the better - especially after you turn forty, because it takes much energy to clean your own blood as well as what you ingest from the animal's, which may carry many toxins or harmful chemicals. Meat has some good qualities, but it is better to eat meat substitutes. Meat takes too long to digest and pass through the body; that undigested protein creates an acid condition in the body that is destructive to kidneys. Many persons have kidney trouble and do not know it; yet the impaired function of these purifying filters inevitably hasten old age. Fruits and vegetables,including raw salads of lettuce and other greens, help to counter act harmful acid-forming foods - as well as aiding elimination.

Make it a habit to eat more fruit. It is made for you by God. It is packed with energy and healing power. You will not have constipation, which is one of the worst enemies of health; and your body will not look haggard. Fruits have definite effect on the mind. Vibrationally, fresh fruits in the diet help to produce spirituality, even more than vegetables. An abundance of fruit will make your mind much more clear and calm. Watermelon, for example, is helpful for those who are cranky. More fruits and vegetables will get rid of whatever headaches and pains and cranky dispositions come because of eating too much meat. Of course, these conditions may also be caused by other factors; but the point is, to remain youthfulness and calmness in body and mind, you should eat those foods that lessen and remove the accumulation of toxins in the body.

Another point is to change the type of meal you take at night. It is best to take the heavier meal at noon, not late in the day. In particular, drop the habit of eating much protein at night. Instead, have more fruits or light vegetable dishes for the evening meal.

(to be continued in next post)

The Divine Art of Erasing Age and Creating Vitality

From " Self-Realization Fellowship Magazine"
A magazine devoted to healing of body, mind and soul

Article by Sri Paramahansa Yogananda

" Cultivating pure love and true wisdom greatly enlivens the heart and brain - physically as well as spiritually. And the harmonization of the Love Principle in the heart and the Wisdom Principle in the brain creates a magnetic force that draws healing energy into the whole body."

To remain in abundant good health is an art that is not known by most people. There are two aspects to this art: the physical methods and the divine methods. The physical ways of looking after the body-machine are numerous; countless books have been written on the subject. Still, that knowledge alone is of limited effectiveness in keeping this machine in perfect condition. We must also know how to apply the divine ways in order to keep ourselves well.

The joy and vitality of youth are not related to one's physical age. God is ever youthful, and He is eternal. But, in the general sense we can say youth is with us until about the age of thirty. After forty, the body-machine begins to change; its natural endowment of vitality and ability to restore itself starts to wane. You can choose to be either the body's doctor or its enemy. To the degree that you can avoid inflicting damage on your body-machine, you can hope to preserve it much longer in a healthy condition. By the right physical, mental and spiritual methods, much of the unwelcome effect of the body's aging can be erased.

(to be continued -
please read the next post to know the methods to erase age and create vitality) :)

The Living God

(a poem by Swami Vivekananda)

He who is in you and outside you,
Who works through all hands,
Who walks on all feet, Whose body are all ye,
Him worship, and break all other idols!

He who is at once the high and low,
The sinner and the saint,
Both God and worm,
Him worship — visible, knowable, real, omnipresent,
Break all other idols!

In whom is neither past life
Nor future, birth nor death,
In whom we always have been
And always shall be one,
Him worship. Break all other idols!

Ye fools! who neglect the living God,
And His infinite reflections with which the world is full.

While ye run after imaginary shadows,
That lead alone to fights and quarrels,
Him worship, the only visible!
Break all other idols!

The Power to Change Your Life

From " Where There Is Light " by Sri Paramahansa Yogananda

We are what we think we are. The habitual inclination of our thoughts determines our talents and abilities, and our personality. Thus, some think they are writers or artists, industrious or lazy, and so on. What if you want to be other than what you presently think you are? You may argue that others have been born with the special talent you lack but desire to have. This is true. But they had to cultivate the habit of that ability some time -- if not in this life, then in a previous one. So whatever you want to be, start to develop that pattern now. You can instill any trend in your consciousness right now, provided you inject a strong thought in your mind; then your actions and whole being will obey that thought.

One must never give up hope of becoming better. A person is old only when he refuses to make the effort to change. That stagnant state is the only "old age" I recognize. When a person says again and again, "I can't change; this is the way I am," then I have to say, "All right, stay that way, since you have made up your mind to be like that."

No matter what his present state, man can change for the better through self-control, discipline, and following proper diet and health laws. Why do you think you cannot change? Mental laziness is the secret cause of all weakness.

Everyone has self-limiting idiosyncrasies. These were not put into your nature by God, but were created by you. These are what you must change -- by remembering that these habits, peculiar to your nature, are nothing but manifestations of your own thoughts.

Note: You can purchase this book at: http://www.srfbooks.com/Item.asp?id=1336

Achieving Your Goals

From " Where There Is Light " by Sri Paramahansa Yogananda

Using Dynamic Will Power

Will is the instrument of the image of God within you. In will lies His limitless power, the power that controls all the forces of nature. As you are made in His image, that power is yours to bring about whatever you desire.

Nothing is impossible, unless you think it is.

When you make up your mind to do good things, you will accomplish them if you use dynamic will power to follow through. No matter what the circumstances are, if you go on trying, God will create the means by which your will shall find its proper reward.... If you continuously use your will power, no matter what reverses come, it will produce success and health and power to help people, and above all, it will produce communion with God.

As a mortal being you are limited, but as a child of God you are unlimited.... Focus your attention on God, and you shall have all the power you want, to use in any direction.

Note: You can purchase this book at: http://www.srfbooks.com/Item.asp?id=1336

Making Time for God in Your Life

From " Where There Is Light " by Sri Paramahansa Yogananda

Mankind is engaged in an eternal quest for that "something else" he hopes will bring him happiness, complete and unending. For those individual souls who have sought and found God, the search is over: He is that Something Else.

Many people may doubt that finding God is the purpose of life; but everyone can accept the idea that the purpose of life is to find happiness. I say that God is Happiness. He is Bliss. He is Love. He is Joy that will never go away from your soul. So why shouldn't you try to acquire that Happiness? No one else can give it to you. You must continuously cultivate it yourself.

Everything has its place, but when you waste time at the cost of your true happiness it is not good. I dropped every unnecessary activity so that I could meditate and try to know God, so that I could day and night be in His divine consciousness.

Very few of us know how much we can put into life if we use it properly, wisely, and economically. Let us economize our time -- lifetimes ebb away before we wake up, and that is why we do not realize the value of the immortal time God has given us.

Do not while away your time in idleness. A great many people occupy themselves with inconsequential activities. Ask them what they have been doing and they will usually say, "Oh, I have been busy every minute!" But they can scarcely remember what they were so busy about!

Yoga is the art of doing everything with the consciousness of God. Not only when you are meditating, but also when you are working, your thoughts should be constantly anchored in Him. If you work with the consciousness that you are doing it to please God, that activity unites you with Him. Therefore do not imagine that you can find God only in meditation. Both meditation and right activity are essential, as the Bhagavad Gita teaches. If you think of God while you perform your duties in this world, you will be mentally united with Him.

Note: You can buy this book at : http://www.srfbooks.com/Item.asp?id=1336