Benefits of Meditation (Things I Learned in Taiwan)

Aside from my Monastic Diaries, I also started blogging about my 2-week Life and Ch'an retreat in Taiwan. Below are my favorite quotes and teachings from the seminars I attended presided by Buddhist monks during Day 3 of my Taiwan trip.  I want to share them here with you as you might also find them inspirational.



"No one can help solve the depression within your heart. The only solution is to understand the heart of your depression. Only this way can you let go of your problems. Your environment and those in it is ever-changing. Are you affected by these changes? Are you vexed when things don't go your way?"

Read more: The Power of Meditation and What I Learned in Taiwan

Stillness in My Heart Speaks

It's the middle of the year and I am happy to say that at last, I found peace. Or maybe it's not entirely peace, but having gone through what I had for more than a year now, the emotional roller coaster, the  thoughts of suicide, wanting to end my marriage and all those other negative emotions that ate me up day in and day out no matter how blessed other people see me, it can take its toll on one's heart, mind and soul. And today, my 3rd day of feeling neutral, I realized how much I missed this. I missed the feeling of quiet and peace in my heart. My left brain is arguing that perhaps it's just my hormones finally coming to rest. But my right brain is reveling in it.

Peace and Inner Guidance

The past year, I have not listened to my inner guidance on several occasions because of other seemingly important and urgent matters. It made me resentful, unhappy and even depressed. I hope to change all that and start living in peace and harmony within myself. This new year serves as a very good platform for personal rebirth.

According to the Para-Gram PEACE by Paramahansa Yoganada:

Change yourself and you have done your part in changing the world. Every individual must change his own life if he wants to live in a peaceful world. The world  cannot become peaceful unless and until you yourself begin to work toward peace. It is only by removing hate from our hearts that we can live a Christlike life.

But how does one remove hate within himself? Since its source usually comes from the fact that we are always doing what is expected of us rather than what we really want to do, then it just means that when we change ourselves according to the dictates of our inner voice (that voice being of God's or from something greater than all of us), then we will start achieving peace and divinity within ourselves.

This also resonates with a quote I read by Shakti Gawain:

Every time you don't follow your inner guidance you feel a loss of energy, loss of power, a sense of spiritual deadness.

This is why we easily get tired and lethargic when we do things we feel are not meant for us to do; This is why on occasions that we do listen to our inner voice and follow our own bliss, we feel much more alive, powerful and full of unconditional love. A balance can be attained if we don't want to risk everything just yet for that one thing we want to do. We can enjoy the process and continue learning from it while slowly changing the direction of our lives to our true calling.

I now include these quotes in my daily reading to bring me peace, and to guide me in my quest for creativity. You can also use them if you want to bring to the surface your creative spirit rather than remain as a shadow of your divine artist self the coming years.

CALMNESS - A Paragram by Paramahansa Yogananda

My world seemed kind of "noisy" recently... or at best, it's not as peaceful as I willed it to be in the past. A family member has been staying with us for more or less two weeks now and though a big part of me is happy to be with this person again, her being strong-willed, opinionated and feisty are somewhat draining the lights out of me. Her life decisions made me question my own; her material wealth (like those branded bags she has) made me discontent; basically her presence made mine feel obsolete (like the way I dress myself although I know what she meant). I felt like I want what she has... it made me think for a while that her life was better than mine. I am normally not like this. I easily get happy for other people's blessings and happiness and I normally don't compare myself or my home life to others because truth be told, I am weird and there are not a lot of people who understand my chosen lifestyle. I've already come to accept that. But when my life and my decisions get questioned or challenged, especially by someone I hold dear, little doubts here and there get planted and before I know it, I am a one big ball of mess.

But before I even get to that messy part, I am once again seeking peace from all this noise in my head and around me. I turn to my Para-Grams. And so I drew the card that talks about being calm:

Knowing that you are a child of God, make up your mind to be calm no matter what happens. If your mind is fully identified with your activities, you cannot be conscious of the Lord. But if you are calm and receptive to him within while being active without, you are rightly active. Each time a swarm of worries invades your mind, refuse to be affected; wait calmly while seeking the remedy. Spray the worries with the powerful chemical of your peace. You cannot buy peace; you must know how to manufacture it within, in the stillness of your daily practices in meditation. When you think that you have reached the utmost depth of silence and calmness, go deeper still. In the silence you will receive from God the answers to your life's problems.

I like that part where it says I must manufacture my peace within. That particular day when I felt so troubled, as if I woke up on the wrong side of the bed and everything I did just ended in failure, I stopped, closed my eyes and meditated. I quieted my mind and my heart. It was difficult especially with all the self-doubts swimming in my head and in my heart. It took a long while too and realized that I missed it.

With the busyness of my life, I wasn't able to meditate as frequently and as regularly as I did in the past. No wonder I was easily swayed, my emotions were easily stirred and it seemed like I couldn't find my inner voice. I now refuse to be affected by this noise and I promise to continue to live by my own rules of happiness. It's how God made me and I do believe that I should honor that, and not be someone else that I am not.

TRUTH - A Paragram by Paramahansa Yogananda

With my husband being sick for the past week, I was busy playing the role of the dutiful wife. I was rarely online except for work and I barely had the time to take care of my personal and spiritual growth. I know... I know. It shouldn't be the case. If there's one thing I learned during my travel to Vietnam with Jem, it is to start each day with prayer or meditation. I mentioned this on my Wiccan blog and I still believe this practice to be powerful until now.

Unfortunately, this hasn't been the case for me the past week. And without meditation, I lose focus of my center and slowly, stress started creeping in. When that happens, my insecurities set in and it's not a wonderful feeling.

Suffice it to say that this morning, I made it a point to meditate again. Meditation banishes negative feelings and brings back that feeling of awe and contentment. Meditation keeps one grounded while at the same time makes you excited about the great possibilities that can happen in your life. So this morning, I did just that with the help of my Para-Grams. As I was meditating, I picked out the card of TRUTH. It says:

There is no particular section of the world, nor any special group of people, that may claim truth as an exclusive heritage. It is the rightful possession of every person, and constitutes the equality of all souls before God. If you do not make an effort to know truth, to perceive it beneath the veils that hide it, you will not discover your own real nature and will therefore remain at the mercy of outside forces of "circumstances." In meditation, behold the star of divine wisdom, that its rays disclose the truth ever within yourself. "If therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light" (Matthew 6:22). Truth is mighty and shall prevail!

I think this Para-Gram is telling me to stop feeling stressed out and insecure about myself and my life. Life in itself is beautiful and that everything I could possibly need is either already in my possession or within my reach. There is no reason to think of myself as a lesser being just because I'm not like most people. Each one of us is awesome in our own right. My own real nature is beautiful in itself and that I should never have to judge it so harshly. If I don't acknowledge this truth, then I will just be continuously at the mercy of outside forces and circumstances around me like the card says. I am created in the image and likeness of the most Divine, hence, I am already beautiful and complete.

After having this epiphany during my meditation, I felt so much better.

Try doing some meditations too when you feel stressed out or when you're having a crappy day. It doesn't have to be in the morning as long as it's a time you are comfortable at being silent for a little while so you can focus your energies.

PEACE - A Paragram by Paramahansa Yogananda

Change yourself and you have done your part in changing the world. Every individual must change his own life if he wants to live in a peaceful world. The world cannot become peaceful unless and until you yourself begin to work toward peace. It is only by removing hatred from our hearts that we can live a Christlike life.

It's been a long while since I've last written my thoughts here. I've been quite busy but nevertheless, peaceful and content for the most part of this year, thanks to applying everything I have learned so far.

From time to time, I do come back to my previous posts here to remind myself that I am always stronger than I think, and that I have already come to know how to get better when personal tribulations pass me by.

This paragram about PEACE is a reminder that at the bottom of it all, it's this hatred I have for some people/circumstances that I need to forgive so I can further heal myself and move on to a brighter life, and a better me. It's a trying process.

I know I've already forgiven them, but like Oprah said "Forgive, but never forget." And in the process of remembering, sometimes emotions arise that I thought have long been gone, until it suddenly hits me in my gut.

I guess, when that happens, it means that forgiveness hasn't been total, which is what I need to learn. Like what the paragram says, it is only with complete forgiveness that I can be like a real daughter of God, an offspring of the mighty creator.

I am on my way there... Like earlier today, my brother shared some nasty stuff about my step grandmother again. So apparently, she hasn't changed her evil ways. But I won't let that affect me anymore. In fact, I was just neutral and calm the whole time he was telling me about his most recent experiences with her. I've already forgiven her and that's that. I will just not make it a point to be in the same room with her. I'll let her live her life and I'll do mine, praying and hoping the best for her.