Aum Shanti and good evening.
And so this is Rose from the Brahma Kamares in Glasgow and we are going to look at the fitness of the soul,
Soul fitness.
And we can look at body fitness and we can see how we have strength or weakness or feel good or don't feel so good but we don't often think about how fit is the energy that's running the whole thing which is the soul.
And so if I understand the benefits of soul fitness then this is quite an advantage.
This is essential actually if you want to make spiritual progress you need to understand I the soul and when you know what's ahead then you can keep going with training the self to be so conscious more and more and more so conscious.
So this is our motivation and as well as motivation actually we require strength and when we feel weak and fearful then it's hard to accept that the soul is an incredibly powerful energy because we're so used to looking at what's wrong what's happening and we look at the weakness of the body actually and forget that the soul is the energy.
There are some simple exercises you can do to increase inner strength and faith in yourself.
If you look at all the examples of times that you have been courageous or have overcome a difficult situation then you know that you have power,
You have strength but what we did not know at that time was that it was our energy of the soul that brought us through those situations.
We thought it was us the physical so now we're re-educating ourselves to see where our energy is coming from.
It's coming from I the soul.
So to strengthen our understanding of the self meditation and time and silence is very vital and to reconnect with the source of power and love also gives me more and more strength and understanding of the self.
So that is the strength of the soul.
I can encourage the strength of the self and then we look at flexibility.
I'm sure in life we found ourselves to be quite flexible at times,
Physically flexible but we need now to look at our nature of flexibility.
How flexible am I in my way of thinking and accepting and understanding because life is all about relationship and meditation helps us to be aware of all the different personalities and to be wise enough to dance with care in each situation because relationships are tricky but they're also very very important because we always live within relationships.
And so that was flexibility and again in flexibility is not always trying to be or prove that I'm always right that I'm the one no no you have to listen to me I'm the one that's always right.
I have to learn to accept others as they are and feel loving and accepting of all souls.
When I fully accept myself as unique I know I'm still learning and growing and so to to realize it's good to be kind to others wherever they are on their journey.
And this brings us to something we do need is to have endurance.
And I talk for myself here the best advice that I give myself regularly is to keep going.
Whatever happens even it's very daunting and you think oh for goodness sake where do I go from here it's like just get back up and keep going don't allow anything to dishearten you or make you think it's too hard or impossible or difficult just keep going.
That's really very very important.
So when I can start to practice this for myself it gives us mass.
It's a self-respect actually because I've found that when I keep going it works it works out.
It doesn't always work out with big big ringing bells and flags and wow and balloons and that was great sometimes it doesn't but it keeps going and I come into a calmness and well we've passed through that and it was okay.
Because you need a lot of common sense when it comes to endurance.
There's so many things that come to dishearten the soul.
So many obstacles come and so when we start to sign up to be soul conscious we become aware of that very quickly and that's why this just keep going it's really really powerful and really really useful.
But once we've realized that it's a special time for spiritual transformation then there's no giving up.
I teach myself that you can't give up because you give up you just still have to go through it at some point because that situation is not going to go away.
It will keep coming again and again until I say okay okay I'll keep going.
So it's very very good advice and it's very very powerful and it gives us masses and masses of self-respect because I think I can do this or I did this and then I can do the same again and again and again and everything is the benefit for the soul.
It's teaching me that I am the power the living energy within this body and everything then becomes a learning opportunity.
Could you say something more about endurance and how to make sure I'm not forcing like using violence on the self in order to make that spiritual effort?
You know I was thinking about in physical fitness you know there's a lot of force often in fact they actually damage their muscles in order to grow them so spiritually for soul fitness there's a lot of determination.
Could you say something about that?
Well it can sometimes take a while depends where you're at in the learning of this but it is so easy actually and the word endurance after a while you're not going to even look at that word.
At first you might feel you have to endure because we look at the timetable and it's taking time out to sit and stillness and silence and we might think that I'm too busy I've got this I've got that but you need to put this first because without this you're not of much use to anyone else because they're all worried they're all concerned and you're not practicing that which could be useful to everyone including yourself and it's the energy of peace is what gives you endurance.
To sit quietly and feel filled with peace and love and happiness gives you endurance and so you don't have to sort of do those exercises and strengthen your muscles and go through the pain that you get through the exercise no it's nothing like that the endurance is just for you to begin to understand yourself and keep yourself motivated and keep going that actually is spiritual endurance.
Could you say something more about motivation then because I was thinking it's one thing to know all the benefits or the potential benefits so when I look at motivation how do I understand the benefits but also what I would become if I didn't go on the journey?
Well we wouldn't be motivated unless we knew what it was we were about to do you have to know why you wanted to be but something else it's like if you're listening to this you've already picked up some energy feeling you've already felt something and it's to have faith in what you're feeling and then motivate yourself even further into finding out more and more about what's being said when people talk about rajyoka meditation and just teach yourself to understand that it's beneficial beneficial beneficial the benefits of rajyoka meditation the benefits of soul fitness is essential just like you think your body should be fit but your body runs on the energy of the soul and if the soul energy is weak I won't have motivation I won't have understanding I won't be able to make progress I won't know what's ahead I won't understand what's happening around about me I won't do any training I will feel weak all of these things if I don't understand so I would be motivated to feel that I want the best quality of energy in myself for myself this will then affect everything I do and the people around me and it will change my life okay so you've been doing this for a long long time how do you keep that motivation easily you said after a while endurance isn't even in your vocabulary it's not an issue so what is when you wake up in the morning what is the motivation to get up early and sit in silence every single day no I wouldn't want a holiday yes well it didn't happen automatically that but automatically I had to face the challenges which tempted me not to do that because it must do that for everyone but I faced the challenges and even though it wasn't the best time in the morning for me at the beginning it was quite uncomfortable but I kept doing it because something inside me I was motivated in some way but now no matter what's happening with me physically or emotionally I just nothing would stop me I just have to get out of that bed and get as quickly as I can to sit down and get into that space of stillness because it's a time to serve the self but also to serve the world and the more you serve the world the more the world will be more gentle on you because you're giving peaceful power to every soul in the world and you're working in harmony with the one above so you're like a team you have a relationship with the one above which is very real and you would never be late for work if you like so you want to get there on time and get organized and get yourself settled and then get started it's a job it's a job so isn't it but you're giving yourself masses of power and what I find from it for my benefit is because I've sat there for some time pouring out to the best of my ability the energy of the highest one and my own energy and this energy is energy piece which gives you reinstates your own nature of power and it's very subtle I mean it's not that you go boom boom I'm Superman you still were going to get your obstacles you're still going to get your karmic accounts you're still going to get things that come in front of you you've not become a wow but I find that thing that suddenly will dawn on me tiny tiny things that you do that were habitual either don't do them or they're much easier I either think oh why was I doing that silly trivial thing so in a very natural way you're moving away from the mundane and in a very natural way you're feeling stronger but it's not a big super strength it's a subtle subtle more and more feeling of well-being and being the energy that's in charge of your own life that's the thought there of a team because that's very motivating and that you're part of a team because I think sort of solo activities can like talk about physical fitness it could seem a bit of a drudge but when you're in a team it doesn't feel like that you feel supported you feel in harmony so that makes it all sound quite natural so the other thing I think of is that all the other people who are doing this and also in the team if you like so all the souls in the world from all the different countries in the world that are practicing Raj yoga are up and running early in the morning and they're all doing they're giving power to the world and power to themselves and connected with the one above it's really really powerful really nice actually so everything becomes a learning opportunity everything and it's not a struggling endurance to be strong and steadfast and in my aim of reactivating peace love and happiness in the self and in my surroundings really and I'll be a super fit soul I that's I'll get the gold medal which is some shanty I am peace I am a peaceful soul and you really believe that peace and love are that powerful are they just a pleasant hobby do you really think they can be transformative yeah they're healing energies that are natural nature they're hard they're not harmful to any other being and they're not harmful to the physical body and so they're healing to the physical body healing to the disturbances of the mind and healing to relationships so where else you can't buy it can't go out and get it on a bottle and we've forgotten this so we struggle we struggle to go to workshops and find out all about how to get on with people and how to do this how to do that how can I take this medicine what will heal me what will make me feel better all this you know happiness we're gonna find happiness I buy enough stuff I'll feel happy it doesn't work like that the other ways I do things actually brings me sadness because if I haven't got peace I've got disturbance if I haven't got love I've got dislike so if I haven't got happiness I've got sorrow and without peace actually I haven't got strength because peace is our strength okay well where should I put my attention in order to tune in to that piece because I just feel there's so many things screaming for attention on every level well Raja yoga says put aside some time to practice and when you put aside the time for practice do the best you can it takes time sometimes make this really absolutely working great for us but during that time do your best not to think of the chaos of your outside world or anything that's chaotic in the world we think we're being good by sorting out the problems no that's not the time to sort out problems it's the time to become peaceful and empower the self and love the self and soothe the self and be happy with the self and then you'll get gold medal of shanty I am a peaceful soul okay so now we'll do a few minutes of meditation so we'll sit with our eyes open and at this moment in time we'll forget everything of the outside world if we can and the method for that is to focus on the center of the forehead and in the center of the forehead is a tiny point of living life energy which is the soul I the soul I'm a being of peace I'm a being of love I the soul a being of incredibly powerful energy I teach myself to be wise enough to dance with great care in every situation when an interaction with other souls because everyone I meet is a soul I teach myself to understand the benefits of soul fitness and to keep going and when we feel weak and fearful I have to remember who I am and I can teach myself to increase my inner strength and faith and see how courageous kind and friendly and strong and determined I've been on my journey and how I have overcome many many difficult situations and everything becomes an opportunity to teach myself I am a soul I'm the life energy that lives within this body many things come to challenge I the soul when I teach myself not to be disheartened I wish to reactivate my peace love and happiness I the soul I'm that being of peace love and happiness I'm a being of light strength energy in the center of my forehead and this energy is my energy of life this is my energy to activate the physical body I play my role with strength through the strength of I the soul I the soul I'm eternal I am forever it's easy when I think like this to understand the wonder of the one above the one who becomes my companion and together helps me to give light and strength out to the world to my brothers Oh shanti I am a peaceful soul
