FALLING IN LOVE WITH REFLECTIONS

When we meet a person do we really meet the person that he is? I believe we simply meet the reflection of our own self in him. Have you ever met any body or just your own reflections? Your own interpretation. When you meet a person we immediately start interpreting that person. We start creating an image about him. That image is ours. The person is not important, what is important to us is just our image of that person. More and more the image becomes clear the person is forgotten. And then we live with this image. When we talk to that person we talk to our image of that person not to the person he is. Let us take your example. If I ask you tell me about your self? You will come up with your qualification, your work, your lively hood, your interests, your spiritual nature etc. Now ask the same question about your self to your parents, spouses, children, friends, associate. They all will have their own version of you.

When you meet a man or women and fall in love. Do you think you are falling in love with the other person? No, you are falling in love with the image that you have created around the other. And the other is also falling in love with the image that she or he has created around you. Whenever two person fall in love at least four person are there and then there is trouble. Because you never fall in love with the person, you fall in love with your own image. And he or she is not there to fulfill your image. Sooner or later the reality comes out. A conflict arises between your dream and the real, between your image and the real person, who is there absolutely unknown. And then there is clash. Every love affair shatters on the rock. Deeper the love intense the feeling sooner it shatters on the rock. It has to happen because two person fall in love with there own images. How can they be together? Those images will be always in between them and those images will be false. Real person is totally different. He is not your image and he is not there to fulfill your expectation, neither are you there to fulfill anybodies expectation. A real person is real, he has his own destiny. You have your own destiny. If you can walk together hand in hand for few moments on the path. So far so good. But you cannot expect that you do this and don’t do that. Once you start expecting you are bringing your image in. love is almost dead. What remains is a dead relation. That is why people get married so many times and divorce so many times. They seek true love which they never get because they do the same mistake of falling in love with the image that they have created of others.

To be in love is a totally different affair; it’s an affair of the heart. The conflicts of the images are there but there are few who have overcome all the odds. Who have found the real meaning of love, they have learned that to be in love is all about sharing, giving, understanding, and adjusting. They have learned to love the person as he or she is and not the image that they have of the other person. These are the people who don’t ‘fall in love’, but ‘rise in love’.

Open your eyes look around your self, look at people as they are and not as you want them to be, strip the image you have created about them. You will find a new world the real world. This world is full of happiness and possibilities. Welcome to this new world.

Are you infected with the "FEAR OF FAILURE?"

Fear of failure is one of the greatest fears people have. Fear of failure is closely related to fear of criticism and fear of rejection. Successful people overcome their fear of failure. Fear incapacitates unsuccessful people.

The Law of Feedback states: there is no failure; there is only feedback. Successful people look at mistakes as outcomes or results, not as failure. Unsuccessful people look at mistakes as permanent and personal.

Buckminster Fuller wrote, “Whatever humans have learned had to be learned as a consequence only of trial and error experience. Humans have learned only through mistakes.”

Most people self-limit themselves. Most people do not achieve a fraction of what they are capable of achieving because they are afraid to try because they are afraid they will fail.

Take these steps to overcome your fear of failure and move yourself forward to getting the result you desire:

Step One: TAKE ACTION. Bold, decisive action. Do something scary. Fear of failure immobilizes you. To overcome this fear, you must act. When you act, act boldly.
Action gives you the power to change the circumstances or the situation. You must overcome the inertia by doing something. Dr. Robert Schuller asks, “What would you do if you knew you could not fail?” What could you achieve? Be brave and just do it. If it doesn’t work out the way you want, then do something else. But DO SOMETHING NOW.

Step Two: PERSIST. Successful people just don’t give up. They keep trying different approaches to achieving their outcomes until they finally get the results they want. Unsuccessful people try one thing that doesn’t work and then give up. Often people give up when they are on the threshold of succeeding.

Step Three: DON'T TAKE FAILURE PERSONALLY. Failure is about behavior, outcomes, and results. Failure is not a personality characteristic. Although what you do may not give you the result you wanted, it doesn’t mean you are a failure. Because you made a mistake, doesn’t mean that you are a failure.

Step Four: DO THINGS DIFFERENTLY. If what you are doing isn’t working, do something else. There is an old saying, “if you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you always got.” If you’re not getting the results you want, then you must do something different. Most people stop doing anything at all, and this guarantees they won’t be successful.

Step Five: DON'T BE SO HARD ON YOURSELF. Hey, if nothing else, you know what doesn’t work. Failure is a judgement or evaluation of behavior. Look at failure as an event or a happening, not as a person.

Step Six: TREAT THE EXPERIENCE AS AN OPPORTUNITY TO LEARN. Think of failure as a learning experience. What did you learn from the experience that will help you in the future? How can you use the experience to improve yourself or your situation? Ask yourself these questions:
What was the mistake?
Why did it happen?
How could it have been prevented?
How can I do better next time?
Then use what you learned from the experience to do things differently so you get different results next time. Learn from the experience or ignore it.

Step Seven: LOOK FOR POSSIBLE OPPORTUNITIES THAT RESULT FROM THE EXPERIENCE. Napoleon Hill, author of Think and Grow Rich, says “every adversity, every failure and every heartache carries with it the seed of an equivalent or a greater benefit.” Look for the opportunity and the benefit.

Step Eight: FAIL FORWARD FAST. Tom Peters, the management guru, says that in today’s business world, companies must fail forward fast. What he means is that the way we learn is by making mistakes. So if we want to learn at a faster pace, we must make mistakes at a faster pace. The key is that you must learn from the mistakes you make so you don’t repeat them.
Although we all make mistakes, fear of failure doesn’t have to cripple you. As self-help author Susan Jeffers says, “feel the fear and do it anyway.”

Step nine: BURN THE BOATS. (This is one of my Favorite. I have used this step in most of my projects and in my personal life too. It has always worked for me.) When ancient Greek armies traveled across the sea to do battle, the first thing they would do after landing was to burn the boats, leaving them stranded. With no way to make it home besides victory, the resolve of the soldiers was strengthened. When success and failure are the only options, you have no choice but to follow through.

If you have a goal, but are afraid to commit, force yourself into action by burning the boats. Register for an exam in advance if you want to go back to school. Set a deadline to move to a new city without signing a lease. Fear of failure disappears when you realize it can’t save you.

And The Tree Speaks

Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life.

A tree says: A kernel is hidden in me, a spark, a thought, I am life from eternal life. The attempt and the risk that the eternal mother took with me is unique, unique the form and veins of my skin, unique the smallest play of leaves in my branches and the smallest scar on my bark. I was made to form and reveal the eternal in my smallest special detail.

A tree says: My strength is trust. I know nothing about my fathers, I know nothing about the thousand children that every year spring out of me. I live out the secret of my seed to the very end, and I care for nothing else. I trust that God is in me. I trust that my labor is holy. Out of this trust I live.

When we are stricken and cannot bear our lives any longer, then a tree has something to say to us: Be still! Be still! Look at me! Life is not easy, life is not difficult. Those are childish thoughts. Let God speak within you, and your thoughts will grow silent. You are anxious because your path leads away from mother and home. But every step and every day lead you back again to the mother. Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all.

A longing to wander tears my heart when I hear trees rustling in the wind at evening. If one listens to them silently for a long time, this longing reveals its kernel, its meaning. It is not so much a matter of escaping from one's suffering, though it may seem to be so. It is a longing for home, for a memory of the mother, for new metaphors for life. It leads home. Every path leads homeward, every step is birth, every step is death, every grave is mother.

So the tree rustles in the evening, when we stand uneasy before our own childish thoughts: Trees have long thoughts, long-breathing and restful, just as they have longer lives than ours. They are wiser than we are, as long as we do not listen to them. But when we have learned how to listen to trees, then the brevity and the quickness and the childlike hastiness of our thoughts achieve an incomparable joy. Whoever has learned how to listen to trees no longer wants to be a tree. He wants to be nothing except what he is. That is home. That is happiness.”

When was the last time your family sat down and enjoyed a meal together?

"Come and get it!" It may be dinnertime, but when was the last time your family sat down and enjoyed a meal together? With music lessons, cricket practice, play rehearsal, and work schedules, it can be tough. Rounding up the troops for an evening meal can be almost impossible! However, research is beginning to show that eating as a family has great benefits for your children and teenagers. Here are 8 more reasons why you should try to sit down together 5-6 times a week, whether for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Reason #1: Communication and Well-Being
Conversations during the meal provide opportunities for the family to bond, plan, connect, and learn from one another. It’s a chance to share information and news of the day, as well as give extra attention to your children and teens. Family meals foster warmth, security and love, as well as feelings of belonging. It can be a unifying experience for all.

Reason #2: Model Manners (and more)
Family mealtime is the perfect opportunity to display appropriate table manners, meal etiquette, and social skills. Keep the mood light, relaxed, and loving. Try not to instruct or criticize—lead by example.

Reason # 3: Expand Their World…One Food at a Time
Encourage your children to try new foods, without forcing, coercing, or bribing. Introduce a new food along with some of the stand-by favorites. Remember that it can take 8-10 exposures to a new food before it is accepted, so be patient. Trying a new food is like starting a new hobby. It expands your child’s knowledge, experience, and skill.
Include foods from other cultures and countries.
Select a new vegetable from a local farmer’s market.
Have your child select a new recipe from a cookbook, web site, newspaper, magazine.

Reason #4: Nourish
Meals prepared and eaten at home are usually more nutritious and healthy. They contain more fruits, vegetables, and dairy products along with additional nutrients such as fiber, calcium, vitamins A and C, and folate. Home cooked meals are usually not fried or highly salted, plus soda and sweetened beverage consumption is usually lower at the dinner table.

Reason #5: Become Self-Sufficient
Children today are missing out on the importance of knowing how to plan and prepare meals. Basic cooking, baking, and food preparation are necessities for being self-sufficient. Involve your family in menu planning, grocery shopping, and food preparation. Preschoolers can tear lettuce, cut bananas, and set the table. Older children can pour milk, peel vegetables, and mix batter. Teenagers can dice, chop, bake, and grill. Working as a team puts the meal on the table faster, as well as makes everyone more responsible and accepting of the outcome. Improved eating habits come with "ownership" of a meal.

Reason #6: Prevent Destructive Behaviors
Research shows that frequent family dinners (five or more a week), are associated with lower rates of smoking, drinking, and illegal drug use in pre-teens and teenagers when compared to families that eat together two or fewer times per week. Even as older children’s schedules get more complicated, it is important to make an effort to eat meals together. Scheduling is a must.

Reason #7: Improve Grades
Children do better in school when they eat more meals with their parents and family. Teenagers who eat dinner four or more times per week with their families have higher academic performance compared with teenagers who eat with their families two or fewer times per week.

Reason # 8: Save Money
Meals purchased away from home cost two to four times more than meals prepared at home. At present time the restaurant industry’s share of the total food dollar is more than 46%. Due to scheduling, commitments, and activities, families eat out several times each week.

It is time to bring the "family" back to the dinner table. Sharing dinner together gives everyone a sense of identity. It can help ease day-to-day conflicts, as well as establish traditions and memories that can last a lifetime.

WHAT I WANTED TO BE WHEN I GREW UP?

When I was 5 years old,
My Dad always told me that
happiness was the key to life.
When I went to school,
they asked me what I wanted to be
when I grew up.
I wrote down “HAPPY.”
They told me I didn’t
understand the assignment.

Now I know for sure they didn’t
understand life....

THE MOUSE TRAP

A mouse looked through the crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife open a package. “What food might this contain?” the mouse wondered. He was devastated to discover it was a mousetrap.

Retreating to the farmyard, the mouse proclaimed the warning: “There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!”

The chicken clucked and scratched, raised her head and said “Mr. Mouse, I can tell this is a grave concern to you, but it is of no consequence to me. I cannot be bothered by it.”

The mouse turned to the pig and told him “There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!” The pig sympathized, but said “I am so very sorry, Mr. Mouse, but there is nothing I can do about it but pray. Be assured you are in my prayers.”

The mouse turned to the cow and said “There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!” The cow said “Wow, Mr. Mouse. I’m sorry for you, but it’s no skin off my nose.”

So, the mouse returned to the house, head down and dejected, to face the farmer’s mousetrap alone.

That very night a sound was heard throughout the house – like the sound of a mousetrap catching its prey. The farmer’s wife rushed to see what was caught. In the darkness, she did not see it was a venomous snake whose tail the trap had caught. The snake bit the farmer’s wife. The farmer rushed her to the hospital and she returned home with a fever.

Everyone knows you treat a fever with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer took his hatchet to the farmyard for the soup’s main ingredient. But his wife’s sickness continued, so friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock. To feed them, the farmer butchered the pig. The farmer’s wife did not get well; she died. So many! people came for her funeral, the farmer had the cow slaughtered to provide enough meat for all of them.

The mouse looked upon it all from his crack in the wall with great sadness. So, the next time you hear someone is facing a problem and think it doesn’t concern you, remember: when one of us is threatened, we are all at risk. We are all involved in this journey called life. We must keep an eye out for one another and make an extra effort to encourage one another. Each of us is a vital thread in another person’s tapestry.

BRING LOVE IN YOUR PRAYER

I will like to share a small story written by Leo Tolstoy: In a certain part of old Russia there was a lake, and it became famous because of three saints. The whole country became interested. Thousands of people were journeying to the lake to see those three saints.

The high priest of the country became afraid: what is happening? He had never heard of these “saints” and they had not been certified by the church; Who has made them saints?

But the people were going wild, and much news was coming that miracles were happening, so the priest had to go and evaluate the situation. He went in a boat to the island where those three poor people lived; they were simply poor, but very happy and rich in their own ways- because their is only one poverty, ‘A heart that cannot love.’

They were happy sitting under a tree, laughing, enjoying, de-lighting. Seeing the priest they bowed down, and the priest asked “What are you doing here? There are rumors that you are great saints. Do you know how to pray?”- Because seeing the three person the priest could immediately sense that they were completely uneducated, a little idiotic- happy but foolish.

So looking at each other they said,” sorry sir we don’t know right prayers authorized by the church because we are ignorant. But we have created one prayer of our own- it is home made. If you won’t feel offended we can show it to you.”

So the priest said, “Ok, show it to me. The three saints said, “We tried and thought and thought- but we are not great thinkers, we are foolish people, ignorant villagers. Then we decided upon a single prayer. In Christianity god is thought of as a trinity, three: God the father, the son, and the Holy Ghost. And we are also three. So we decided on a prayer: ‘you are three, we are three, have mercy on us.’ This is our prayer.”

The priest was extremely angry. He said,” What nonsense! We have never heard any prayer like this. Stop it! This way you cannot be saints. You are simply stupid. The three saints fell at his feet and said. “you teach us the real, the authentic prayer.”

So the priest told them the authorized version of the prayer of the Russian Orthodox Church. It was long, complicated, big words, bombastic. Those three saints looked at each other- it seemed impossible, the door of heaven was closed for them. They said, “you please tell us once more, because it is long, and we are uneducated.” The priest said it again. They said, “once more sir, because we will forget” so the priest told it again. They thanked him heartily, and the priest felt very good that he had done a good deed by bringing three foolish people back to church.

The priest sailed off in his boat. Just in the middle of the lake he could not believe his eyes-those 3 saints, those foolish people, were coming running on the water! They said, Wait… once more … we have forgotten!.”

Now this was impossible to believe! The priest fell at their feet and said, “Forgive me. You continue your prayer.”

Religions, organized churches, temples have destroyed it. They have given us ready made prayers. Prayer is a spontaneous feeling. Remember this story when you pray. Let our prayers be a spontaneous phenomenon. If with god we have to be ready made, then how will we be authentic and true and natural?

Let’s say things that we want to say. Talk to god as we would talk to a wise friend. But let’s not bring formalities in. A formal relationship is not a relationship at all. How can we be formal to god? We will miss all spontaneousness.

LETS BRING LOVE IN OUR PRAYER. Then we can talk! Then our prayer will be a beautiful thing, a dialogue with the universe.

Prayer is to be in love- to be in love with the whole. And some times we get angry with the whole and we don’t pray. Some times we drop praying completely, because we go on praying and god is not listening. It is a relationship with deep involvement in it, we get angry. Some times we feel good, feel thankful; some times we feel put off. But let it be a living relationship. Then prayer is true. If we just go on like a gramophone and repeat the same thing every day, it is not prayer.

Prayer should be a lived experience, a heart to heart dialogue. And soon if the prayer comes from our heart we will find the response. Our prayers will be answered. The whole existence is ready to respond once our heart is open.

Insights for a new way of living-OSHO