http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cl8gEg97-w0
Having studied King, Gandhi, Teresa on and off throughout my
life, quite extensively, two things strike me - one, how eminently practical,
feet on the ground, self-reliant, yet open to every bit of help they could be
given, but going to act no matter what.
And on the other hand, how adamant they were in their own ways that
there would be nothing that they could do without prayer. Huh?
Self-reliant, and praying?
It's clear to me what was going on. They understood the one proper use of prayer,
and that's to change oneself. That
conceivably can be done, by - realizing at the same time that, A. I'm praying
for some deity to do something, but B. the purpose of praying that way is to so
focus every part of my being, particularly the heart, on that issue, so that
it's my own resources that are mobilized to the highest degree on that
important issue to me at the time. And
that's not a bad way of getting the most out of our heart, the 80% of our
nervous system that we otherwise don't use.
These were not people that lived their lives asking some external
being to do stuff for them. Yet, Teresa
I recall the most clearly, was emphatic - 'without hours of prayer every day,
without hours of prayer every day I could not do what I do.' She was emphatic. Gandhi was just as emphatic - 'without
prayer I could not do it.' My recollection of Hinduism may be
inaccurate, you may know much better - but I don't recall an intervening 'God'
as central to their beliefs. It
certainly didn't seem to me that Gandhi, in any way, shape or form was looking
for anyone or anything to intervene, except Heart Force.
Speaking for myself, S. Loving, I've not found this in the
records of the great insanely humane warriors throughout history; aside from
prayer, focused reshaping of one's own nervous system, constantly, hours a day,
often; what's needed is rest. The
insanely humane warriors are people of immense mental and spiritual strength -
that's the muscle that they most use, and it fatigues. Used properly it doesn't get tired of what
it's doing, it just gets fatigued by doing what it's doing. And the heart, the 80% of the nervous system
we can't control, needs down time to digest what was learned in the prior day,
what was experienced in the prior day, data that came to it in the prior
day. Certainly the profoundly impactful
Unviolent warriors throughout history, at times they got little rest and little
prayer. But on prayer, they didn't allow
much time to go by, many days to go by, before they got into their prayer
routine to keep their heart straight, in charge, and to get straighter and
deeper.
Speaking for myself, it was many decades before I could see
how spiritually depleted and ineffective I would get without sufficient rest,
and with few exceptions now I have the wisdom, if my body says rest, I
rest. It becomes priority number
one. Whether it's sleeping 14, 15, 16
hours a day when the Heart says to, or just getting off for hours and hours or
days of quiet. I'm extremely sensitive now
to whether it's my head and flesh just saying it wants to recreate, no time for
that, but I listen intently to the needs of the heart, of the spirit, of the
soul, and if sense my sharpness going, I generally have the wisdom to look
first, at what kind of rest I've been getting.
Secondarily, at how my prayer life, life meditation life, Personal Training... life has been going. And when I sense I've not been getting the
rest that I need, that becomes priority number one, and it should yours as well
in your life. Same, when I sense a lack
of sufficient prayer, meditation, ‘Personal Training.’
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