Swami Sukhabodhananda Husband tells his wife, “I am missing you. How will I bear your absence?”
Wife replies, “Is it the whisky or you, which is speaking?”
Husband replies, “I am speaking to the whisky.”
People have become witty but not wise. To be wise is to lead a wise life and not just speaking words of wisdom.
“Let the earth meet the sky,” is a saying that is commonly used in India. In other words, let the ordinary situations in life (which is earth) meet the sky. It means let every situation in life, representing an experience, reach the peak.
Be in the question of how to maximize experience rather than minimizing the experience. Maximizing experience is not in quantity but in quality. For example you are eating a slice of bread. You can do that with gratitude, with joy, with love. When you eat that way, you optimize the experience of eating and also peak the experience of eating.
On the other hand, imagine a situation where you are eating a variety of dishes, which are a delicacy, but with anger and a disturbed mind. Then you minimize the experience of eating. So, honestly it is not what you have which matters, but how you use what you have that matters.
“I am still not clear how to optimize or maximize an experience”
Instead of expecting me to give an answer, please be in the question and deeply enquire. From such deep enquiry, slowly an answer will emerge. That is called insight.
Let me illustrate through another example. A group of people went to the Himalayas. Some experienced immense joy and sheer bliss in seeing the majestic Himalayan beauty. Some did not experience such a joy or bliss. What is it due to? If you observe, such people might have been worrying or upset about something. In such a state of mind, they can’t experience the beauty of what they are seeing. So, a mind filled with worry or anger can never optimize any experience.
Minimizing an experience or maximizing an experience is not dependent on experience. It is undoubtedly dependent on one’s attitude to the experience. Bring in the attitude of joy, of learning, of love and then you can peak most of the experiences. Hence, the expression “Let the earth meet the sky.”
A mother’s only child passed away, and she felt terribly miserable. She went and met a wise soul, Buddha. She requested him to solve her misery by bringing the dead child alive.
Buddha said, “Go get mustard seeds from a house. But make sure no one in their family should have gone through death. She went around seeking mustard seed. She found out that though every household was willing to give mustard seeds, yet they could not because someone or the other had died in their family.
She went back to Buddha but with the deep understanding. Understanding that death is inevitable, one has to learn how to be in harmony with death rather than asking the dead to come back to life. Thus, the experience of death made her wise, and she became the student of Buddha and later, also became enlightened. Even death became a fantastic experience of inner awakening.
www.swamisukhabodhananda.org
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