I'm All Right, Right Now Part One
Author: Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami
Description: Everything is perfect; this is a wonderful planet. There is not even one thing in this world that is not perfect. Ask yourself: Am I not all right right now? Change your perspective; reprogram negative habit patterns in the subconscious mind. Use affirmation to switch to positive visualizations. claim your spiritual heritage, lean on your own spine, not on others. The spiritual energy in the spine is pure, powerful, blissful. Then the guru will be of some help to you. you will go crashing through into deeper states of meditation and beautiful things will begin to happen to you in the exterior world. Shum: simshumbisi. Mamsani: simshumbisi, niimf, kaif. "Master Course Trilogy”, “Merging with Siva”, lessons 106-107
Transcription:
Good morning everyone.
Today we are starting in chapter, "Merging with Siva" chapter sixteen which is entitled “I'm All Right, Right Now.” It is drawn from "The 1972 Master Course".
And then we start a new chapter, we get an excerpt from "Guru Chronicles" roughly around that time it was written. So we're back in 1972, 74.
Gurudeva told of those days, this is reading from the inner planes.
"The early revelations were enjoyed by mathavasis at the monastery and shared with others at our branch monasteries via an in-house teletype network, named 'biniba' in Shum, our language
of meditation. As the flow continued week after week, mathavasis in San Francisco and in Virginia City, Nevada, gathered around to read the spellbinding messages being clacked out on the piano-size communication devices. The monks were able to type questions to me (meaning Gurudeva) and receive my responses in real time from Hawaii, thousands of miles away. We enjoyed many philosophical discussions in this way. (So this is way before the internet.) As each volume finally drew to completion, it was typed up by the scribe on an electric IBM typewriter, from which a dozen or so copies were made and cased in plain, white, softcover binding. One chapter was read daily at the meditation sessions to mold a new standard of selfless living in my monasteries. The devas said in their writings that there were many more books to be read; but once the "Saivite Shastras" had been completed, Gurudeva found it much more difficult to access the library of Lord Subramaniam on the screen of his inner vision. He struggled, in the face of external distractions, to keep this inner world open to him.
Then we get our lesson, 106.
"Everything Is Perfect
"Nowadays meditation is becoming very popular. Everyone is talking about being centered. If you’re right in the center of yourself, you don’t hear any of the noise or activity. You’re just peaceful within yourself. It’s only when we come into the cross-section, the cross-fire of life, that we feel we’re not all right. Then we begin living in the great lie of the universe, the great fear that if we die we might be gone forever. We forget all of the wonderful philosophy and beautiful teachings that we’ve been studying, and we’re just not all right.
"My satguru, Yogaswami, made the very bold statement once, “There is not even one thing in this world that is not perfect!” (Oru pollappum illai.) You have to take a master like that very seriously. He was satguru for over fifty years in a very orthodox area of the world. “There is not even one thing in this world that is not perfect,” he said. Some of us look around at the world, and we find plenty of things that are wrong with it. I never have. I have always thought this is a wonderful planet wouldn’t have missed it for anything. It is a great time now to be alive, even though some of us don’t think so, even though the planet is somewhat polluted, and some people have myriad complaints. Meditation is not an escape from the exterior world. We have to straighten ourselves out in the exterior world first before meditation and inner life can really be successful. (So that's a very good point, that sometimes individuals who are new to meditation think they can just not think about the external world and they'll be okay in meditation but as Gurudeva says: "We have to straighten the external world out first to be successful in meditation." Otherwise we sit there and we're constantly thinking about what we haven't straightened out in the external world.) Sometimes we worry about our job, our business, our family or even that we are not living as spiritually as we think we should.
"This is my advice: gain the perspective first that it is a wonderful world, that there is nothing wrong in the world at all. Then ask yourself this question: “Am I not all right, right now, right this instant?” And answer, “I’m all right, right now.” Declare that. Then a minute later in another now ask again, “Am I all right, right now?” Just keep asking this one question for the rest of your life, and you will always feel positive, self-assured and fine. This attitude eliminates fear, worry and doubt.
"I discovered this formula when I was seven years of age and it came to me from the inside one day when I was worried about missing my favorite radio program. (Well that was the big thing back then, before television was the weekly radio program, different series.) We were on our way home in a snow storm at Lake Tahoe, and I was afraid we might get stuck and I’d miss the program. I saw my mind, awareness, go off into the future, and I brought it back by telling myself, “I’m all right, right now. It hasn’t happened yet.” As it turned out, we didn’t get stuck in the snow and I did get to listen to Captain Midnight.
(Very important for a 7 year old, Captain Midnight.)
"After that, I would say to myself, “I’m all right, right now,” every time something came up that stretched my imagination into the future, into worry, or into the past when something disturbing lingered in my memory patterns that I did yesterday that maybe I shouldn’t have done. Each time that happened I would say, “I’m all right, right now, am I not?” And I would have to always answer, “Of course, yes.” I started doing this at the age of seven, and still today I am convinced that I am all right, right now!"
Then we get lesson 107:
"Lean On Your Own Spine
"How can we stabilize the path on those days when it’s just plain rough? The first thing to do on the path is to change our perspective of looking at life. Initially, as we come onto the inner path, we look at the map of the journey, we read books. A book is a map. We then make up our mind whether or not we want to make a change in our lifestyle and our perspective. Once we decide that we do wish to go on, a good way to begin is to reprogram the clay-like subconscious mind. Reprogram the negative habit patterns by firmly believing that you’re really all right."
So then here's my commentary, this is a second approach, doesn't replace "I'm all right right now" but it works in some situations in a complementary way.
On of the times people are more likely to worry is when faced with an unexpected challenge. For example, you were recently laid off from your accounting job, thus you regularly worry about finding a new job. When you find yourself worrying about finding a new job, switch instead to a positive visualization of yourself being hired. Develop an affirmation that utilizes the same visualization and repeat it every day as well. For example: “I have a new job as an accountant for an excellent company." So that's good in certain situations such as this, compliment saying: "I'm all right right now."
Back to the lesson.
"The second thing to accomplish is to learn to lean on your own spine. Everyone nowadays wants to lean on someone else. We lean on our families until they push us out into the world. Then we lean on our friends until they can’t help us anymore. But still we keep on leaning. Then we lean on our therapist until we run out of money. This attitude of leaning on another is not the foundation needed for the delicate states of deep meditation to be sustained. We have to lean on our own spine. But first we have to claim our spiritual heritage and feel “I’m all right, right now.” By saying this and believing it, we pull the energies in just a little and become centered again. When we ask ourselves point blank, “Am I all right, right now?” we have to come up with a “Yes.” Lean on your own spine. Feel the power in the spine. Feel the energy in the spine. (This of course is the spiritual energy, not the physical energy.) The energy in the spine is not concerned with any fear or worry or doubt not at all. It is a pure, powerful, blissful energy. Lean on it, and you will go crashing through into inner states of meditation. Things in the world will also work out right for you. You will be in the flow of life. You will have perfect timing. Beautiful things will begin to happen to you in the exterior world. Opportunities will open up for you where there were no opportunities before. People will become nice to you who ordinarily would not. All this and more begins to happen because mentally you are leaning on yourself, and people in general like you to do this. Don’t lean on a philosophy. Don’t lean on a guru. Don’t lean on a teacher. Lean on your own spine and that power within it. Then the guru can be some help to you, for you will obey his directions when he speaks. The philosophy begins to come alive in you, for you can complement it with your own inner knowing."
And my commentary. As we know the Shum words that relates to this is:
simshumbisi
Feeling the actinic energy within the spine; (being spiritual energy) the pure life force, yellow in color, flowing through the spine and out into the nerve system.
So as we talked about before visualization can lead to experience, right? So we can visualize a yellow light within the spine, a yellow energy and that can help us experience it. That, we always have to remember that visualization is not the experience it's just helping us actually have the experience.
And in Gurudeva's May Mamsani he expands upon the idea of feeling the spiritual energy of the spine.
One of our most powerful mamsani is simshumbisi, niimf, kaif. The wavy line represents awareness flowing iimf. Awareness flowing from one area of the mind to another is called niimf. Here it flows from the fourth dimension, where simshumbisi is, into the seventh dimension, where awareness is completely aware of itself, kaif. This mamsani you can live with all of the time. Carry it with you on a little card in your pocket all month long. It’s the easiest one, the most vital one and one of the most powerful. Feel the power within your own spine when you meditate on simshumbisi.
The mambashum tells us that until we are aware of being aware in the beautiful bliss of kaif where awareness does not move, because it is so centered within itself, we must constantly be centered in simshumbisi. Whenever you are not feeling quite up to par, remember this mamsani and move awareness into simshumbisi. Sit, breathe, become aware of simply being aware of these inner energies deep within the spine. These energies come from the central source of it all. Then feel yourself going in and in and in, into the seventh-dimensional area of the mind, kaif, being aware of simply being aware.This state is not beyond your reach. It does take a little bit of quieting down, however; but not a great deal of spiritual unfoldment is needed. It is very easy to attain kaif. Just try. You will see for yourself just how easy it can be.
Gurudeva says elsewhere, the experience of kaif is not hard to attain, what's hard is to sustain. So, we can get it for a while but to sit there and hold it for a longer period of time is more challenging.
Thank you very mu
ch. Have a wonderful day.
[End of transcript.]