Spiritual practice in ordinary life in many ways is actually the most favorable and beneficial approach … It is a common observation that it is one thing to be pure and holy in an isolated, safe place, but another to remain committed in the world of endless temptations and confrontations.
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Devotional Contemplation
Whereas the goal of the ego/mind is primarily to do, act, acquire, or perform, the intention of contemplation is to “become.” While the intellect wants to know “about,” contemplation seeks Knowingness itself and autonomous wisdom. Rational thinking is time related, sequential, and linear, whereas contemplation occurs outside of sequential time. It is nonlinear and related to comprehension of essence. Devotional contemplation is a way or style of being in the world whereby one’s life becomes a prayer.
True Happiness
True happiness arises from the nonlinear. With relinquishment of dependence on the experiencer for pleasure and happiness, one discovers that the source of happiness is one’s own existence, and the realization of the Self is happiness itself.
The Strength of Courage
The critical key to moving into the strength of courage is the acceptance of personal responsibility and accountability. This major move requires relinquishment of a victim/perpetrator dualistic fallacy that socially undermines integrity via blame and excuses based on dualistic, moral, and social relativistic fallacies and theories by which an external ‘cause’ or social condition replaces integrous personal autonomy and self-honesty. Thus, courage also includes rising above identification with the rationalizations that characterize social belief systems… that calibrate based on presumptions of blame and excuses. Even if there is or has been an external ‘cause’, it still behooves the individual to rise above it. Society is rife with well-publicized examples of such invocation of courage, even in the face of severe calamities… Courage does not mean absence of fear but the willingness to surmount it, which, when accomplished, reveals hidden strength and the capacity for fortitude. Fear of failure is diminished by realizing that one is responsible for the intention and effort but not the result, which is dependent on many other conditions and factors that are nonpersonal.
Strong intention plus dedication assisted by inspiration surprisingly can bring success despite prior failures. This reveals the inner capacity for bravery and fortitude that greatly increases self-esteem and confidence. Many of life’s travails can only be traversed by ‘white-knuckling it’, which builds self-confidence.
Consciousness is the Source of Life
It is of considerable importance to appreciate that it is consciousness itself which is the source of life, and that innate to that consciousness are the qualities of creative growth and evolution which appear to seek a return to its Source. Although consciousness evolves from the ‘bottom up’ in evolution, it was sourced from ‘above to below’. An analogy is sunlight that pours energy onto the Earth upon which life progresses upward from the simplest to the most complex, and finally, through man who, through enlightenment, again returns to the Source of Life itself.