Fear and overcoming fear
We do not know where we come from. We do not know where we go after death.
We are also not sure what are we supposed to do while we are here on earth! So, there are many uncertainties. And because of that, there are also different fears, which are crucially influencing our lives.
OIDA-therapy is an attempt to help people to find peace of mind and stability. It is a tool for learning how to stand the challenges of life and how to find positive engagement.
We are trying to convey knowledge about the nature of this world, positive engagement and good association, which will help people to stand strong against their fears.
We are steeped in gross and subtle fears. Seeing that injustice and competition is controlling the world, and that criminals and megalomaniacs are taking advantage of the weaknesses of others, we become fearful.
Nowadays fear is often promoted by governments through various types of media. The purpose is to increase the spending of the citizen, or to create a pretext for them, to do anything they want. Should we be afraid of people who manipulate the fear in others without any real reason? Should we be afraid of our own ignorance? Yes.
The solution is to find somebody who can tell us the truth about manipulation and ignorance. We should not subscribe to irrational fears, but we should be afraid of faulty activities and egotistically motivated conclusions.
Besides these global reasons, there are many things happening within our own body and mind, which are beyond our control, and which are further reasons for fear. We are afraid of becoming sick, to eat the wrong foods or that the person we love may not respond to our feelings. We are afraid that we do not look good enough, and we are also afraid of destiny.
We also fear that we will not get any support for what we wish to do. We have fear and mistrust in people who are guiding us. Sometimes we become afraid by simply following the vox populi, without feeling any satisfaction inside of us, because we blindly commit the same mistakes others are doing, and we have not evaluated our activities with the appropriate advice.
The natural purpose of fear is to protect us from doing the wrong thing.
On the other hand there are also rather irrational fears, which torture people in this world. Take the paranoid person, who feels persecuted all the time, by fictional enemies, or take the case of those, who are simply afraid of doing anything, without recognized reason, and thus develop neurotic symptoms.
All of them are suffering usually due to their feeling of being extremely insecure.
They also may have fear of subtle entities, influences which are not visible to the naked eye, but can be felt by them. Fear is also an indicator of need.
People often search for liberation. Entire mystical traditions speak about liberation. But what do they mean? Liberation from what? They mean liberation from suffering.
People are so afraid
of suffering that they are ready to give up their individuality. Some people want to kill their body hoping to escape their physical and mental pain, whereas others aspire for a state of being in which they are no longer individually conscious. They are afraid that another type of suffering may appear, if they preserve their individual awareness. They renounce their own individual existence, and the chance to eternally love, in exchange for never having to suffer again the pains of dual existence.
Western psychology analyzes lengthily the causes of fear. The Vedantists instead encourage the person to go ahead and to forget the past that sleeps. Their recommendation is to overcome all difficulties by increased enthusiasm and a positive vision of the future.
We have to understand, that negativity is caused by previous deeds. Fear is one of those negative experiences of life. I must have done things wrong in the past – in this or in previous lives - which causes the negative experiences in the present. In this way we have to learn that we are always held responsible for what we are doing. Therefore we should develop determination to learn what is beneficial or unbeneficial to do. If we create problems, we will live in problems. If we create fear, we will live in fear.
The answer to overcome fear is awareness of the truth and acceptance of things as they are.
We suppose that there is a wonderful truth which can be realized and achieved. For those who have no faith in such a possibility – life becomes a kind of count-down, and they reach death with a fatalistic worldview wherein fear is nothing but a natural side-effect.
The teachings of the Vedas stress the phenomena of positive and progressive immortality, in other words, the eternal loving relationship. Pure consciousness is the experience of eternity, knowledge and bliss. Fear covers this pure state of consciousness. The most prominent fear and causal fear is the fear of death. The root for this fear is our identification with the gross body, and the cause is all devouring time. As time goes on we are getting closer to our death, but when we understand and realize that we are eternal souls, then we can overcome this fear. There is no contamination or disturbance in pure consciousness. Therefore we say: It is positive, it is progressive and it is eternal. It is created by love, it is being governed by love and exists only for the purpose of love. As we all hope for love, we can find fulfillment in this pure state of consciousness. Love is the medication for fear. The goal o
f life is love and the method to reach there is love.
How does this work?
If we love somebody in this world, sometimes we do not even fear placing ourselves in danger in order to protect that beloved person. That is a practical example of how powerful love is, to counteract fear.
We see thus, how effective love is. Even on the physical level of every average person.
Then you can imagine the sacrifice made out of love by mystics who are motivated by their love to help others. They have undergone torture and hardship without repenting their decision. This means that they must have overcome fear to a high degree.
The recovery from fear works also the other way around – means, when we feel that we are loved. Then our hope increases. Therefore it is also important to be in the association where we feel loved and protected.
The company of like-minded individuals with the same spiritual goals provides this type of love and support which some people cannot get even from their own families.
Selfishness and selflessness
Through the spiritual understanding of OIDA-therapy we can comprehend in a scientific way that we are spirit souls; that we are individual conscious beings and that there is a world designed by a higher intelligence.
The world has been designed with great forces behind it, in it and around it, and we are all interrelated with those forces and with each other. We are all part and parcels of God, experiencing and participating actively in the transformation of His various energies. Even though the creation is too big and complicated to understand, we can in brief explain the active principle of life as selfishness versus selflessness. Life means activity and every activity must be characterized by one of those two attitudes. Selfishness means placing ourselves and our interest as the prime focus of everything. We tend to oblige others, either voluntarily or involuntarily, and to manipulate and exploit each and everyone, to fulfill our interests. It is exactly this selfishness which ties us to the mundane sphere.
If we are selfish, we will destroy our own body for our pleasure. We will destroy the planet for our pleasure. We will destroy the dignity of others for our pleasure. We will abuse others for our pleasure. We will lie for our pleasure. We will steal for our pleasure. We will remain within the materialistic concept, because that promises pleasure to our senses. And we will reject any kind of teachings which tells us that we should give up selfishness and that we should be giving and loving.
We feel that if we give up selfishness, our own quantity of material enjoyment is going to diminish. Therefore we are very much disinclined to listen to anything what accuses our selfishness of being the cause of all our problems as well as the problems of others and of the whole world. Here we may ask ourselves, how our selfishness can be the cause of the problems of the world. Even t
hough we have the tendency to consider ourselves important, when we are confronted with such an accusation, i.e. that we are causing the problems of the world, then immediately we start thinking that we are too small and insignificant. So how can we be the cause of the problems of the world? Well, if we are selfish, we belong to the group of living entities who are acting in a destructive way in this world. Using others and their behavior as excuse we act in a way that is self-centered. We may think: “If I do not take advantage of others, of the natural resources and of the different situations of life, others may take advantage of me or I may suffer a lost.” So we start struggling for our interest. At the same time our behavior is an excuse for others to act in a selfish way. So this is a chain reaction and we are part of it. We are part of the problem and in this way we are responsible for the situation of this world.
We are generally focused on I, Me and Mine. We are trying to use everyone. Sometimes however we are ready to include others in our considerations. We are ready to sacrifice something for them. But how does this happen? Take an example of the child. We may say: “These are my children”; “These c
hildren are coming from me, therefore they must be something special.” In other words, even if we are ready to commit to someone or something and act in a seemingly selfless way, still there is somewhere the hidden desire to get pleasure. In the mentioned example, we hope that our children will make us happy. We hope that they will become respected individuals. Or at least we hope that they will take care of us, when we become old. This hope is very prominent in poor countries, where there is no social security, insurance or any of this type of facilities.
Selfishness also sometimes extends towards one’s religion. Be careful! Dogmatic selfish religion is not religion at all. It is not the way back home to God. It is not the way to become purified or full of goodness. Selfish religion means: “My Lord, my savior, my master - He is the all in all and now, because I’m His servant or I’m His this or that, give me what I need, if you want to please Him. Or even worse, give me an army and the military force and I will save the whole world and submit to my religion and to my savior. Whoever doesn’t do I say, they will have the choice of either losing their
head or bowing down to my feet.
European countries have been proceeding in this way for the last five hundred years or more - in the name of God, for God’s sake. This is really the opposite of healing and health and that is what people are confused about today. This is the reason why the majority of people have become atheists. Therefore they are ready to easily accept theories such as Darwin’s, who said: “Well, don’t worry about it. We a
re just the descendents of a monkey and we are just a bit speculative and we make so many mistakes, but don’t worry. We are getting better.”
In this way, it was a relief for the atheists to hear or to think that there is no higher control above us. When they were thinking about a higher control, they were also thinking about higher controllers, which were the ecclesiastical structures, which had been killing and abusing on a large scale. Of course they rejected this.
Every sane person rejects these ecclesiastical structures, which are simply the instruments of power hungry people for oppressing, killing and doing whatever they wish to others.
There is no love and there is no light in this aggression. They are the agents of darkness. They are the absolute representatives of ignorance, aggression, destruction, blood shed, and violence.
This is the upmost level of selfishness. “I will kill you because you don’t want to submit to me. I am just trying to save you by telling you to submit to my savior.” So, due to this situation, we have to immediately and with full attention focus upon the only medicine for this great disease of selfishness.
The medicine is of course the opposite. It is selflessness.
It is the path of dedication, which the messengers of truth and love have reveled and shown by their own examples throughout the history of humanity. Not only now in our present time.
Divine messengers are always contradicting the exploiters and the selfish people of this world. The message of love is not new, because it is the eternal message of the Lord, which He always instills and inspires within our hearts. In OIDA therapy we are strongly stressing the need to use common sense and intuition, as per guidance of the sacred scriptures. Even though common sense and intuition seem to stand for themselves, still the conclusion must be backed by the Holy Scriptures. Otherwise common sense could merely be speculation and intuition could easily become sentimentalism.
Selflessness means t
hat we also love and help those who do not follow your particular belief or faith.
In India many temples give prasadam (in the form of spiritually blessed vegetarian food) to everyone. The Vedas teach us to give our helping hand to everybody; to be kind to everyone; to give people a chance to know about the wonderful values there are to be discovered in the world of selflessness. Selflessness is translated in yoga understanding as spontaneous loving devotional service to the controller and enjoyer of everyone. Service for the spiritual wellbeing of all the other living entities is included in the service to the Supreme Lord. That is the topmost degree of selflessness.
There are of cours
e different grades of selflessness. It is also selfless i.e. to give a donation to someone who is hungry instead of buying a new watch, but this selflessness is on the material platform. It is not yet on the level of transmitting the transcendental message of love. All the mystical traditions have their explanations about the different grades and importance of selflessness. But one thing is clear and in common. Our service has to be without a tinge of selfishness.
The crucial question in this regard is how to learn this service attitude.
How to do it? How to become selfless? How to become lovingly devotionally dedicated to the sweet will of God? How can we benefit all others, independentally of who comes in contact with us? They can be Sikh, Jain, Christian, Muslim, Jew, Aztec or whatever. If they are trying to help others to become happy, and they please the Lord, then they will also get increased grace. God loves everyone and inspires everyone according to their wish and according to their surrender.
That is what we accept and what we can get confirmed, when we compare recommendations with each other.
Therefore we would like to gather and present solutions, as they are given by different mystical traditions. As we have already mentioned in the introduction, at this time, we can only present our Vedic point of view, as we are most familiar with it, and we really hope that in future times other practitioners will join and offer their respective processes according to their faith and belief.
When we see what the traditions of Christian mystics have been, what the traditions of the real spiritual deep thinkers, charitable workers or the servants of humanity have been, we will discover to our great satisfaction, that to a large degree, all of them came to the same conclusion.
What is this conclusion? Give people food. Give people what they need. Give them information about their spiritual identity and teach them to be responsible for their actions. If people don’t understand that every action has a reaction and that they will get entangled in this world, according to the way they act, then they are not conscious. They are not responsible. Therefore it is one of the foremost things to get spiritual guidance. As human beings we have to accept, that we have full responsibility for what we are doing.
We pray that all of you may become the topmost selfless people in this lifetime - dedicated to the highest ideals, as you may conceive them.
According to our understanding it is the message of the Holy Name, which will free everybody and will give them purification, discrimination and all the other ingredients necessary for raising their soul with the mercy of God towards the level of purity and love.
There is not much more to be said about it. It is just to be done - day by day. Don’t waste your valuable time. Dedicate yourself to the truth and the message of love.
Ego, existence and the meaning of life
Ego means “existence” in the Latin language. We exist, so we have an ego. Or better said, we are ego. Because the person who perceives that they exists, naturally develops a feeling about this existence, which is peculiar or individual.
This identity provides us naturally with many potential scopes. We have to deal with the reality of our existence. Since we are talking about this subject of being born as human being, we can take the approach that I am this body, that my existence is this physical body which I am observing right now, and this mind with which I am thinking right now, and this intelligence, which allows me to compare, evaluate and reject. If I think like that, I will think that my body is the most important. I will think that my body is more important than the bodies of others. With the only exception being that if the others favor me, then I will accept them.
Those of different species I may consider as strange creatures that I shall watch out for or subjugate to my respective capricious ideas and the other human beings I would consider to be less in importance. There is a possibility that I may also treat them like animals, which means that I just watch out for them and try to subjugate them to my ego interest. Here ego touches also upon the concept of “survival of the fittest”, or the natural defense mechanism we all have within us.
So this approach to existenc
e is quite dangerous, because from the very beginning, only those who are the first in subjugating or eliminating the others will survive.
We should also take in consideration, that this body of ours, which we cherish as being an important part of our existence is a mortal coil and always changing. Therefore to identify our existence with the changing body, until we die, really means that we do not have any real identity. Therefore, human beings have naturally searched for higher dimensions for their existence. They cannot but try to do so. It is part of their human condition. They have that spirit of trying to find knowledge about their identity and the belief in a higher existence, even though that realm is no
t visible to the eye.
The search which may continue after the physical ego existence is finished, has been the driving force of human culture since its beginning. It is also a fact that an existence without a meaning and without understanding the cause which brought this existence about is very difficult to cope with. Therefore, human beings throughout the ages have tried to find and to spell out, what is the meaning of our existence.
The Vedas have described the identification with this body as the false ego, ahankara, and the mentality of ex
ploiting others the reason why we are in this material world, and that we have to suffer the reaction for any trouble we have given to any other living entity. The Vedas tell us about our real identity, our real ego, about our existence in a world where there is no more reincarnation, because there is no more death. They have explained that the meaning of life is to reach there.
The desire to reach that state of consciousness will motivate you to always act correctly. That area of consciousness and responsibility, we call “the healing circle” in OIDA therapy.
The higher dim
ensions are divided into different levels of identification. To become indifferent towards worldly pleasures and pains and to simply aspire for liberation and merging into the spiritual energy is a negation of our conscious search for loving relationships in the material existence. All those mystical traditions who have thought about loving God, serving God and having a personal relationship with Him, point to a higher region of our existence, which is the existence imbibed by pure devotion. It is from this type of understanding, that a person who wants to reach his eternal identity, has to be very careful to always be loving and of course correct in his conduct - according to his ability. To be loving and to prepare for an eternal loving existence, is both the medicine and the goal. Whatever mystical tradition can take our consciousness to that awareness is truly the greatest benediction of mankind. (see CD9)
Feminine Principle in OIDA-Therapy
One of the very central points to understand is that the soul is of feminine nature. The Lord, as origin of life is called purusa. Purusa means controller. And the female part of the purusa is called prakriti. So the Lord is the whole and the soul is the subordinate part. Purusa and prakrti or the enjoyer and the enjoyed. We can compare this relationship with the state and the citizens. The state is the whole and the citizens are individual parts of the whole. The state accepts services from the citizens, but this is supposed to be only for the wellbeing of the citizens. In the same way the Lord accepts the service of the souls for their own wellbeing. The only difference in these two examples is that the relationship between the state and the citizen is established by obligation whereas the relationship between the soul and the Lord is governed by love. For those who do not want to have their relationship with the Lord as His servants, the Lord provides this material world. Here they can try to become master and lord over others. This whole material world is being transformed by the action and interaction of different living entities, who are all trying to become lords. In this way they are suffering the reactions of their unnatural behavior. Therefore it is very crucial to understand the feminine principle or the feminine nature of the soul. Trying to compete with the Lord because of envy is the root cause of all our suffering.
It is stated in Vedic scriptures that there is one Lord and all the others are servants. In other words, there is the Lord or the one who is maintaining all the others. He is the Lord and we are being maintained. There is no question of competing with Him. This simply means that we are a part of His family. We are part of His entourage. Take the example of the ocean and the drop. The ocean is the whole and the drop is the part. So how can we compare them?
We do not understand that in surrender and love to the Supreme, all our benefits are included. This is because of our ignorance and lack of faith. We do not have to scream for special consideration or for our rights. Feminine in nature means no claim for rights.
Why? Because within the realm of love, there is no need for claiming rights. As soon as we claim rights that becomes the male vanity. Of course, we are not talking here about the relative world and material issues. We are talking about the natural relationship of love. In love we always want the loved one to be well; that they get the medicine; that they get enough before we do. We are ready to reduce our portion to please the other or to help the other to survive.
Isn’t this amazing? That’s the feminine principle and we can see it most prominent in this world in the relationship between mother and child. The mother thinks first about the child and then about herself. But the feminine principle does not stop there. If someone can develop this kind of attitude towards all others, then they must be in the purest consciousness. To think about others and desire to serve others is a very beautiful feature of the soul. It is not a weakness. All this is explained thoroughly in the Vedic scriptures. Being the servant of other, means we are servants of the servant of the servants of the Supreme enjoyer. In other words, service to the parts and parcels of God, or the souls, is actually service to God. God-consciousness means, that we are existing for the pleasure of the Lord and all His parts. Being asked about the foremost of all commands, Lord Jesus Christ answered:
”You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And the second is: “You shall love your neighbor as you love yourself. On these two commandments depend all the laws and the prophets.”
All the prophets and all the laws means that all religions depend on this truth. This is the essence of all religious paths. The soul actually aspires for the spiritual world. It aspires for a spiritual body so that it can serve God in that female form in an utmost degree of surrender. To aspire to that state of being means that we have to give up our male vanity of trying to be the enjoyer and controller of everything. This refers to both the men and women of this world. Having a female body does not mean that one is free from male vanity. The desire to control and be equal with men, will have the result that one will get a male body in the next lifetime. And males who have not shown proper respect towards females, who may have abused them in one of many possible ways, will have to be born in a female body after this lifetime.
So, it is going forth and back and we still can not understand that we are not this body.
I’m not male and I’m not female. I’m someone higher. I have a much higher position to achieve. Of course number one is to be a servant of the truth. To understand, my position is that of a servant. I’m never master. I always have to serve somebody. If I want to reject service to one and all, than I serve my senses. They become the masters. But regardless of how you do it, even if you are the boss of the people in your company, you are still their servant because you are going to make sure that they get their salary. And you also have to be responsible for their well-being. At least it is supposed to be that way. So, you can’t avoid serving others. This is a foolish idea.
Even the Lord himself, who is the master of all, He is rather a servant than a master of all. If we consider that He provides everything what we need and that He preserves what we have – this is just amazing! What does the Lord do for all of us? And on top of that, He is always ready to listen to our prayers. He is delivering special grace upon us. Therefore it would be very natural to accept that we are servants and to make an attempt to do the most wonderful and the best service possible. This should be our sacred ambition. (see CD20)
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