Stay inside.
No, not inside your house... inside your soul.
After going through the wonderful course on Inner Peace at ananda.org (click here for more info), I came to understand some real deep truths about peace and stability. I also see similar teachings radiating in Yogananda's teachings found in the book, "How to achieve Courage, Calmness and Confidence."
Inner Peace is being centered. When we think of ourselves as a tree, the branches radiating out are various desires and aspects of our life. Some branches are family, jobs, finances... others can be drinking, smoking, lust, desire. When we live in the branches, we loose our center. Branches break and snap. The strength of the tree is it's center.
According to the teachings of Yogananda - Nature has it's ebbs and flows. It's ups and downs. It's unavoidable. The crest of a hill, has a trough on the other side. But, the GOOD NEWS is that, by going inward, we are not effected by the ups and downs of nature - why?
BECAUSE THE SOUL IS NOT SUBJECT TO THIS.
Joy experienced in the soul, has no opposite. Whereas, emotional joy is a branch.. you're reaching out to the branches for that. that causes off center movement, which has it's own reverberation. Back and forth we go... emotional joy - then emotional frustration - then emotional joy... back and forth. BUT in the soul, there is no reaction.
From the Inner Peace course's teachings:
When joy is experienced in the soul, then there is no opposite to it. This is true joy. Emotional joy, on the other hand, involves reaching outside of yourself. When you reach out into the world to grab your joy, you will find that it will always be followed by a sadness or depression. There always has to be some kind of compensation. We think that if we push further and further, it will become more real and permanent —that in pushing the limit of our joy as far as we can, we'll break away from the whole pattern of unhappiness and get into total joy. We keep hoping and trying but none of it ends up lasting. The more you push towards finding joy outside yourself, the more you have to experience just as intensely the opposite pain.
The natural world is dualistic. As it's taught in the course, and quite interestingly true - every poisonous plant has it's own antidote growing nearby. But the soul doesn't have this dualistic nature.
Keep flowing
Keep that energy flowing upwards. Be aware of the energy inside, and keep moving it up.
From the Inner Peace course at Ananda.org:
When the thought of self-indulgence in sense pleasures and taking for oneself
predominates, the energy moves downward rather than upward. The more sense-oriented
and selfish an experience, the more it deadens one’s spiritual sensitivity.
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