by Gurani Anjali
If you look at the joints of your fingers, there is a connection there. Each part of your finger would not be there if not for the connections. If you look at every part of your body, there is a little knot, a tie, a lump that holds it all together. Because we are in a human body, we are always held together.
The same is true of our minds. We do not see our thoughts. We do not see our mental processes but we want them to hold together as well. But because the mind is so free and easy, it goes with the wind. The thoughts just go hither and yon. They are so restless. If you look at every physical part of you, you are held together tightly. The mind, however, no one sees. Because it is not seen, there is that restless anxiety as to how you are going to get the things in your life necessary to hold it together. The mind also has a mind of its own. Where are you going to locate it, how are you going to hold on to it, how is it going to be held together?
The mind is held through the breath. It is held with the breath. Besides the work the breath has to do, your intention must be fixed. That takes determination, will power, and a strong desire. When you have that strong desire to hold things together, they are held. The mind cannot be held without desire because it has the power to disperse. Nonetheless, the mind always goes into a place, wherever that place may be. The mind is always wandering, going to one place and returning, coming back and going again, constantly coming and going. Constantly moving, the mind never ceases to be.
How do you stop that? Do you want to stop that? If you stop that process, what would you be stopping? The coming and going, the going and coming? The mind is always going to a place and returning. The only way it finds rest is when it is absorbed. Now to have the mind in a constant state of absorption takes total attention and it takes a totality of desire. But the average mind will say, “Why should I be absorbed? If I become absorbed, I’ll be dead. There will be no life to me. People will look at me and say, he must be mad, she must be crazy.”
As long as you are in the physical body, the physical body has work to do. The physical body has a place. The spiritual body has its place as well. The sacredness of you has its place also. But the mind without the body is no mind. There is no mind without body and no body without mind. Everything is interconnected; created that we may achieve perfection. That is the intention in Yoga. To achieve that state of perfection, you must take everything with you because you are everything; everything is you. But to hold everything in all places, all the time, the total sum of your existence, you must achieve balance.
It might be thought that when you achieve the balance, you appreciate life. But appreciation comes before achieving the balance. To gain appreciation, you first work hard on desire. Desire to understand these words and all the words that you have ever heard. From that desire, understanding arises. And from understanding, appreciation arises. And when appreciation comes, then there is a state of wisdom. From this wisdom there is holding the balance. And when there is holding the balance, there is the desire to be of service, to work without effort. To the one who is observing you, it will seem that you are putting out effort. But to the one who holds the world in balance, there is no effort, there is just action. There is a special doing achieved by that appreciation.
Om shanti.