 |
| Saturday, May 17, 2003 |
|
|
I follow this advice: next to acquiring good friends, the best acquisition is that of good books. In Tune with the Infinite (Ralph Walds Trine) is memorable to me for two reasons. I stumbled on it, figuratively, at a pavement "book shop" in Sector 15, Chandigarh, when I was looking for the back number of a magazine which had carried an article of mine. Two, I haggled for it. I asked. "How much?" "Twenty rupees." "Ten." "Take it." He said. No wonder. It is not a text book! It was a prize, like a trophy that a champion brings home proudly. With eager
expectation, I began rushing through its contents. I found it
astonishingly modern from a psychological as well as spiritual point
of view. It is as fresh as it was when it was written many decades
ago. Though my copy is soiled and dog-eared, it is a magnificent mine
of positive thinking. |
|
Visualisation and realisation are vital to the attainment of life aims. Castles in the air are necessary before we can have castles on the ground. Vision must be worked at and worked out. Are any youngsters reading? Negative thoughts clog the channels of the life-force and make the body sick. Sick thoughts and murky moods are the rich ground in which sickness and diasphoria thrive. Thoughts of hope and happiness open the doors to peace and poise. Kindness, love, benevolence and goodwill stimulate healthy, purifying and life-giving flow of bodily secretions. Thoughts are things. They are vital forces which attract their like. We get the great message that various mental states, emotions and passions have their own effects on the body. Inner thought connects us with a similar thought from without. If it is bright, hopeful and cheerful, we connect ourselves with a current of thought of similar nature. If it is dark, and despondent, this is the thought we connect ourselves with. The question is: Why talk of sickness and disease? By talking of these, we adversely affect ourselves and those we live with. This is emotional infection. But the optimist sees life in its right perspective. In doing so, he is not only making his own heaven but making one also for the people in his own short world. And, this matters more than the universe! This is, in a way, the psychosomatic teaching of our own time. Emotions affect physical conditions as much as the latter do the former. This means that the physician today does not medicate the body of the "patient" so much as his mind with principles. The physician teaches the patient to cultivate cheerfulness, goodwill and kindness. He gives him a health tonic, a heart tonic and a head tonic. Parents should thus teach children to assuage anger, hatred and malice with love. They are the family psychiatrists. Any parents reading? I feel elevated and elated. A feeling of deep satisfaction pervades my thought-stream. I feel a fuller person. Thanks to a dirty-looking book which proves that rare diamonds lie in coals. However, a regret gnaws my mind — why
did I not get it earlier in my life when I could have benefited more
from it? But this is offset by the thought that now I have a
"lighthouse" in my small shabby study. And a sage on my
book-shelf.
|
 |
|
