Grace and Spiritual Practice

A Course in Tranquility – Lesson 5 of 14 – Grace and Spiritual Practice

“First meditate and feel the divine Presence; then do your work saturated with the
consciousness of God. If you do this you will never become tired. If you work for your
Divine Beloved, your life will be filled with love and strength.”
-Paramahansa Yogananda

Your body and your life are filled with grace. I would even go so far as to say
they are pure grace. Many people are not aware of this truth. They struggle and search
and pray and beg to feel and to know grace. All the while, the same grace they are
searching for, is the very thing that holds their form together and is the very essence of
their being.

We meditate to become more fully aware of this presence of Grace within our life.
It is always there, but we have forgotten how to feel and experience it. We listen to our
minds and the thoughts of others, and we become enamored with the chase and pursuit of
happiness, then we miss what is primary. We forget that we are just playing a game of cat
and mouse with happiness, and that when we don’t feel like playing the game anymore
we can stop chasing it, and just accept it.

Through meditation what we are doing is learning to restrain our restless striving
for something better. We are training our attention to stay still. For we can only
experience that which we are. Once we have learned to be still, then we know stillness.
Once we can learn to be an instrument of grace in the world, then we learn to experience
grace directly. Grace is always active remember, but only in stillness can we perceive it,
for it is subtle, and the noise of the world can easily drown out the sensation of its
presence.

One very powerful way to experience the divine presence and grace in your life is
to quit thinking of your self and give your full attention to serving others without thought
of reward. Now some of you may say that you have done this, and that it has worn you
down, and made you bitter because you were not appreciated for your efforts. The
problem is that you were hoping for appreciation. This is not how the divine works. It
gives love unconditionally to the sinner, the saint, the beggar, the rich person, the clerk,
the president, the drug addict, the murderer, the meditator, or the pencil maker. They are
all the same.

To know grace, which is to know the divine, requires that we completely forget
our selves. This self of which I am referring is the little you that has its story, its likes and
dislikes, its preferences, etc. That self is fiction any way. When we give our attention to
the fiction, we experience limitation. If we can learn to turn our attention to the unlimited
divine, then that is what we experience. Working as the divine, we can never know
bitterness or resentment or tiredness, because we have all the energy we need, because we
are all the energy we need.

We are not here to save up all our love and grace for a rainy day, but to learn to
spend it freely, and give it away. Then we realize we are the very river of grace that we
have always been, and grace no longer becomes a question, it becomes its own reality. In
this way, we learn to exist as a transcendent being. We can be in the world when we
chose, playing our role, whatever that may entail. We can also pull pack from our
personality and function as our immortal spiritual nature, free of limitation, clouded
judgments, or lack of resources.

Exercise #1 – Give Up The Fruits of Your Actions
Over the next several days, make a commitment every night before you go to bed
and every morning when you wake up, that no matter what activity you have to perform
throughout the day, you are doing it as an offering to your concept of the Divine. You are
not doing it for money, or for thanks, or for appreciation, you are creating a gift for the
Divine by means of your actions.

Imagine that you are truly creating something, a gift, for the Divine Presence. I
know if I were preparing a gift for God, I would give it my fullest attention. I would
imbue it with love, I would smile as I worked, because God can feel the intentions sent
into any object by way of our thinking. So no matter what you are doing, give it your
fullest attention and do your best to imbue it with presence, love, care, and peace. Even if
you can only do that poorly at first, in this regard, it truly is the thought that counts
If you have to perform an activity for a coworker, spouse, child, friend, motherin-
law, keep the thought in the back of your mind, that the divine is animator of the
personality of this person. Do not perform the actions for the personality, do it for the
divine presence behind the personality. See only the divine in everyone you work for. No
discrimination allowed. Their actions, whether you judge them to be excellent, poor,
good or bad, is just the role God is playing through them. Ignore that. See only the light
behind their eyes, even if you have to try exceptionally hard to imagine that.

Step 1- Every night before you go to sleep, have a talk with your self. Talk about all the
ways you will to serve the divine tomorrow, by writing that report, meeting with that
patient, paying that bill, scrubbing that floor, etc. If you have to work with unpleasant
people, give your self a pep talk about how you are going to change your perceptions, and
no matter how hard it might be, you are going to see the light of God behind the
personality and work only for that, not for the personality.
Step 2- When you wake up in the morning, before you even get out of bed, reaffirm your
commitment to this process. If you have to, tell your self, that you are not a child, and
that you know this is good for you (at least if you want to experience tranquility and
grace in your life), and that “you are going to do it and you are going to like it!”
Step 3- Get out of bed, and keep your attention, as best you can, on every action. Begin
your work creating Gifts for the Divine as often as you can. As you shower, you are
bathing the body of the divine. As you eat, you are recharging the body to do the work
ahead. As you drive, you are driving through the divine presence.

Remember, we become what we think about. If we turn every thought of every
action to the Divine, what will you become? Let me know when you find out.
I know it would be great if all of this was easy, and maybe it is for you, but I’ll
admit it wasn’t for me, and its not for a lot of people. Why? Because unless you are born
with an unyielding sense of optimism and joy, it can be hard to maintain these kinds of
exercises, when we see what goes in the world. So it takes work. But you see, when we
have recreated our ‘incarnated’ self to experience this kind of living, then we have the
power to continue creating in this way, and we have the power to remain in Grace,
because it was by our own efforts that we turned towards grace. We were not wantonly
blown into an experience of the divine by fate, we built up our divine muscles and said,
“I’m going to climb that mountain!” And now you know how to climb it, so if you ever
fall off, or go down to the village for a while, you still know how to climb it!

Going to Heaven, Hell or Beyond? You Decide.
Many yogic spiritual texts affirm the assertion that heaven and hell is not a
permanent state we go to for our failures or successes. They say that heaven is just the
accumulation of our past intentions to experience a heaven like state, and hell is an
accumulation of our misdeeds that will allow us, at some point, to experience that state.

After the energy behind our intentions to experience heaven and hell loses momentum,
we come back to where we started! This is why, yogic texts express the release of
cravings and hopes and fears, so that we may no longer give attention to the temptations
of heaven, and the sufferings of hell. We go beyond them. Neither do we yearn for what
we consider fantastic, nor do we run away from that which bothers us. We do what is
appropriate in the moment, and then we are free to act consciously, in Divine Grace, to
do what needs to be done.

Here are a few formulas you may find useful in this regard:
• If you want to go to heaven after death or have a heaven like experience on earth,
be happy right now. Work unflinchingly for the benefit of others. Do not think
about your self beyond providing for your basic and moderate needs. Live every
day for God.
• If you want to experience (or continue experiencing) hell after death or on earth,
remain in an attitude of resentment towards your past. Nurture the past wrongs
and hurts you have endured and inflicted on others. Steal. Hurt people. Think
only of what you can get out of every experience.
• If you want to go beyond heaven and hell and know your true unconditioned
eternal nature, and the need to maintain a certain state to experience peace and
tranquility, give up your fears and your desires. Let go of the concepts of heaven
and hell. Practice a spiritual technique that quiets your being. Learn to exist in
that stillness in meditation and as you go about your duties in the world. Learn to
do what is appropriate in the moment, beyond your judgment of good and bad. In
this way your karma will exhaust itself, and no matter where you find your self in
eternity, you can smile, free of the fears of losing your reason to smile, and you
can smile, free of the attachment to smiling!

Now, in most cases, you would first focus on experiencing the heaven like state as
mentioned above and let go of the hell-like state and the actions that take you there. Then
once you are stable in that state of consciousness, you move beyond it to transcending
attachments to both heaven and hell. However, as mentioned before, I don’t like to waste
time, and this isn’t a course on getting into heaven, and I’d like to advise pursuing the last
bullet point above. Why? Because once again, once you are in a state of grace, it doesn’t
matter what happens on the “outside” because you know you are just playing your role in
the divine drama. Once established in that grace beyond fear and desire, you can take off
and put on the mask of your personality as often as you like. You are then free. Once you
are free, you can relax, and be tranquil, because you know what you are beyond all
conditioning. You are then a transcendent being!

Exercise #2 – Help Me Help You Understand
Answer the following questions. (Submit any serious inquiries as a comment on this blog post.)
1) What do you think about all of this? How does it sit with you?
2) What makes sense about it? What doesn’t make sense?
3) Can you imagine being completely free? Why might you want to remain attached to
your current role? How useful is from the perspective of Infinity?
4) What fears and desires can you admit that you are tenaciously attached to? Why? Can
you entertain the thought of letting them go? If so, how would things be different for you?

Transcendence in Your Daily Life
People who report having transcendent experiences almost always affirm having a
sense of peace and familiarity about the episode. The deep stillness they sense is
described as being something they have known all along, not as something new or
strange or foreign. It feels like coming home.

At first, on the spiritual path, we may be enamored with strange perceptions
during meditation, such as radiant lights or perceptions of astral landscapes, or feelings of
bliss and ecstasy. We may long for visions of Gods, Goddesses, Angels, or Ascended
masters. Our imagination will provide them of course, but in reality, this is entertainment
no different than what you get at the movies or on your computer. Anything that you can
perceive, is “out there”, and we want you to be “in here” existing freely as your Self. We
want you know what you are, rather than searching for interesting phenomena.

As a person goes through the stages of spiritual awakening, it becomes more and
more ordinary. Gone are the desires to seek a sense of completion or fulfillment through
something external. If it is appropriate, a tranquil spiritually aware person can sit for long
periods of time, simply being. To someone hypnotized by the mind and addicted to sense
stimulation, this seems outrageously ludicrous. Isn’t the act of spiritual awakening meant
to lift you out of the human condition and into a divine condition? Yes it is, but the divine
condition is not a glorified human condition, as our minds would like to believe.

Spend some time in nature. Watch the wind blowing through the trees as they
sway back and forth, or how the wind rolls over the long grass of late summer. See how
the sun and moon cross the sky, and the stars shine as if eternally fixated in the heavens.

Nature can show the consistent tranquility of simply being. See how there is no clinging to the past or expectation of the future in nature.
When the rose blooms, it is beautiful. Its scent fills the air. As the season passes, it fades,
and dies. There is no argument. The Spring will come again. Even if it doesn’t for this
particular rose bush, it will for some other plant. There is no need to worry about which
plant. It does not matter what names or forms are given to the rising and falling waves on
the ocean of consciousness, because it is all the same ocean.

The clearer we realize what reality is, the less words we need to direct us there.
The sage Vasistha said that “words are only used to instruct the ignorant [the one who is
spiritually asleep]. Once there is knowledge, words are no longer needed.” This is why
we begin on our spiritual path embracing a specific teaching, teacher or tradition. We
start with a concept of what it is supposed to be like, and then we practice what we are
taught. As we grow, our concepts change, until eventually we outgrow all concepts. Once
we are beyond concepts we are ‘in reality’. The specific practices we adopt are like the
crucible that is used to forge steel. Once the blade made, than it has only to do its job.

I’d like to share a few experiences of how obsession with spiritual practice can
negate the very thing we are trying to accomplish, and block transcendence.

A few years into my discipleship as a Kriya Yogi, I had maintained my zeal for
meditating at least one hour every morning and when possible another hour later in the
day. One Saturday, we were hosting a party on our 13 acre farm. The plan was to have
lots of homemade food, and a large bon fire. I loved to cook and to build big fires. The
party was a good excuse.

That morning I rose and meditated and did a short hatha yoga routine. I then
decided to go out into the cool morning and begin gathering firewood and kindling for
the party. As I tromped through the tall grass, and scoured the forest, I began thinking, “If
I hurry, I can go back inside and meditate for another hour, because that would do me
good.” This thought began to grow, and I became more anxious to go back inside and
meditate.

After I had gathered most of the wood we needed, I stopped breaking the twigs
off of the piece of wood I was working on, and looked up. A cool breeze came across my
face. I saw the sun creating rainbows in the radiant dew drops on the grass. I could smell
the sweet earth. A peace descended on me and I realized that the entire time I had been
worrying about going back in to meditate longer, I could’ve been ‘being’ completely
present in the Divine grace that was all around me. For the rest of the day I remained in
that state, tranquil, internally still, while actively preparing for the nights festivities.

On another occasion, I had been going about my day doing normal self-employed
business office duties. With each action, whether I was writing an email, driving to the
post office, researching a chart, I noticed that I was always waiting and hoping for
something. For what!?! I was waiting for the action I was doing to be over, because I
could be better using my time reading spiritual literature or meditating. I was hoping I
could get everything done so I’d have more time to reflect on life and my relationship to
God. So I could spend more time in the peace of nature. Ridiculous!

What was the result of this waiting and hoping? I was not aware that in every step,
in every breath, in every moment I was experiencing life, I was experiencing Divine
Grace. I was labeling certain actions as spiritual and certain actions as mundane, and
thereby creating a separation in my Self. I had to strive to make more time to do those
spiritual things, while enduring all the useless mundane things I needed to accomplish to
provide for my self. I was creating a strain that didn’t need to be there, and wasting my
energy in useless judgmental thought patterns about what the present “should” be like!

From that point forward I committed my self to allowing each moment to be as it
is, no matter the quality. I would no longer allow myself to waste the precious
experiences of this life wishing them away because they didn’t fit my expectations
exactly as I had planned. I would, of course, keep my intention set on living the life that
was ideal for me. If I found my self in an unpleasant situation, I would remove my self
from it. If action needed to be taken to change an outcome, I would do it. But when
things didn’t work out, no matter the efforts I made, I would relax, pay attention, and let it
pass, as all things will. It was in this way, that Grace became apparent behind all things.

The two experiences mentioned above had the effect of changing my life. I
learned to notice when I was waiting for ‘this moment’, the one I judged as unspiritual, to
be over, that I was really wasting my life. I learned that no matter what I was doing, it
didn’t really matter how I felt about it, it still had to be done. Labeling it as a waste of
time, was just labeling life itself as a waste of time. To think I should be meditating,
when really I should be working or interacting with the world of form, was affirming that
I clearly did not accept the truth that “God is all things, manifest and unmanifest”. I
wanted God, but only in a certain way, and so the grace I experienced in life was just as
limited.

I learned that we make up stories in our heads about what life should be like, and
then when life doesn’t live up to those expectations we are disappointed. I learned to stop
telling my self stories, at least 90 percent of the time, about what I was experiencing, and
to just experience it.

When this happened, life blossomed. Gone were the crushing thoughts of
expectations, false ideas of how things should be. What was left, was every moment, new.
What had the chance to come forth in my awareness was that we live in an eternity and it
doesn’t matter so much if the waves of eternity are constantly perfect. What matters is
that we know how to ride those waves, that we know how to really jump into the amazing
waves, and that we know when and how to lay back and let the so-so ones pass.

Mahavatar Babaji was known to have said, “Few know that the kingdom of
heaven extends fully to this physical world.” Yogananda has said, “Banish the idea that
spiritual and material realities are separate.” I would like to encourage you to do the same.
When it is time to meditate, pray, be with your spiritual teacher, or read inspirational
literature do so. When it is time to work in the world, meet people, wash your car, tell the
bum to get out of your way and that you don’t need your windows washed, or buy
someone pizza, do so. Know that no matter what you are doing, you are in your right
place in the divine drama, and don’t be too attached to the out come. Hold your vision and
your intention and move forward, then let the seeds of grace sprout and grow on their
own time.

Sincerely, Ryan Kurczak 2010

No More Reasons

According to the Yoga Sutras, Chapter 4, Verse 10, “There is no moment of time that can be determined regarding the flow of causes and their effects.”

Do you need a reason for this?

Sometimes we need to understand why something happens, in order to make improvements or to stop an event

from recurring. Sometimes we spend a lot of time trying to figure out the “why” when really, the reason doesn’t matter, we only need to make a firm choice a stance to decide, things will be different.

Our life experiences is responsive to our states of consciousness and mind. If the mind is caught up in looking for reasons for an events occurrence, our life experience will continually create experiences to support that search and analysis. If we, however, decide that it doesn’t matter what has led to such an experience, and that we are going to not entertain that experience any more, our consciousness responds, and we have a window of opportunity to live differently, without any need for a reason.

I was just sent the quote, “Pain pushes you until your vision pulls you.”  Your pain comes from being stuck in past behaviors or karmas, and being pushed around by those past conditionings which no longer serve you. When you are led by vision, this is coming from inspiration and the natural expression of God in the world, which is beyond conditioning.

Let go of the reasons, for why you think you are the way you are, or why your life has turned out the way it has. Learn to sit still and listen to the silence within, asking only for direct experience of your nature as wholeness and divine consciousness, and then ask for the vision you are meant to express in the world.  Be OK, if the vision goes counter to what you have been holding on to, so strongly in the past, or what you have always hoped for.  I once read “hope is the denial of reality”.  So let’s not deny reality, but make friends with it, and learn to love what is real, without reason.