15. Drop The Dead!

The past is dead! Not only is it dead, it is also a dead weight upon our being.

Living in the past is like living with the dead. Do we live with dead bodies in our home? Not only will it occupy space, it will also begin to rot and becomes a health hazard.

Here is another example. Do we plan a journey based on last years train timetable? If we use last years train time table this year, where do we end up? Be clear! Older the time table, the less is its benefit for our journey now.

It is not different when it comes to our mind. Our mind is either living in the past or in the future. It never really lives in the present, in the moment. This is the root cause for all our frustrations, tensions and worry.

We foster the dead in our life and drive away the living! Understand this! If we practice something, anything, without the necessary insight and understanding, we are following dead rules. When we have the understanding, any rule will become a tool, a technique to lead a happy life. How many of us can say this is true in our lives?

Another way we invite death in our life is to live in guilt. Guilt kills intelligence. Guilt is the greatest sin a human being can commit to himself. All other sins will punish us only after our death. Guilt will punish us when we are alive. Guilt will kill us when we are still alive. We will be walking, talking, breathing, but inside we are dead. We will be living dead, when guilt takes over our life.

Guilt takes us back into our past. It hurts us over and over again for an incident that has no role in our present life.

Meditate on breathing to break free of this guilt. Meditate with concentration on breathe, not the thoughts. Focus completely on the breathing. Feel the nostrils flare, feel the lungs fill with air. Feel the breathing stop, pause. Feel that silence. In that brief instant, we have entered a no-thought zone. We are in Samadhi or deep meditation. When this silence gradually blossoms, it leads to enlightenment. Watch for breathe during exhaling. Repeat this cycle.

This simple meditation technique can be practiced everywhere. When we concentrate on our breathing, we are actually breaking away from the past. We live in the present, in the moment.

That moment has tremendous potentialities and opportunities. Live it!