Monthly Archives: December 2022

The (Real) Meaning of Christmas

 

Quaerite Et Invenietis  “Seek and you will find”

 

“There is nothing hidden that will not be revealed”

 

“Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before! What if Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store? What if Christmas… perhaps… means a little bit more!”

-Dr. Seuss,  ‘How the Grinch Stole Christmas’

 

“The main reason Santa is so jolly is because he knows where all the bad girls live.”

-George Carlin

 

Merry Christmas to all on this most wonderful day of the year! This morning children everywhere will rise early in anticipation of opening their gifts, brought the night before by Santa Clause. Families will be together to share the joy and love of the Christmas Spirit. Christmas is celebrated in different ways all over the globe on or around December 25th.

Here in the U.S., families decorate the outside of their homes with festive lights and displays. Inside, stockings are hung over the fireplace to be filled with goodies and the Christmas tree is adorned with lights and decorations, and surrounded by gifts to be opened on Christmas morning. Later – the family, gathered together from far and wide – have a traditional turkey feast. But how did we come to celebrate Christmas the way we do?

We know that Christmas is an annual festival solemnizing the birth of Jesus Christ (or Jesus the Christ). It’s a religious and cultural celebration observed by billions around the world.

The gospels of Luke and Matthew state that Jesus was born in Bethlehem to the Virgin Mary. The pregnant Mary and her companion Joseph traveled from Nazareth to Bethlehem for the census, Jesus being born there. The Angels then heralded him as a Savior for the world.

Although no date is given in the Bible, early Christians connected Jesus to the Sun with such phrases as “Sun (not Son) of righteousness.” The Romans marked the Winter Solstice on December 25th, consequently, the first recorded Christmas celebration was held in Rome on that date in 336 A.D.

The word Christmas is a shortened form of “Christ’s Mass.” The word is recorded as Christesmaesse in 1038 and Cristes-messe in 1131. Christ is from the Greek Khristos, a translation of Hebrew Masiah or Messiah, meaning “anointed.”

The abbreviation ‘X-mas’ is based on the first letter Chi (x) in Greek Khristos. Christmas has been known by various names throughout history. Anglo-Saxons referred to the feast as “Mid-Winter”. In Old English Geola (Yule) referred to the period corresponding to December and January which eventually became Christian Christmas. Noel (or Nowel) entered English in the late 14th century from Old French Nael, ultimately from Latin Natalis, meaning ‘birth’.

Christmas is celebrated in many countries around the world including many non-Christian countries due to periods of colonial rule, for example; Hong Kong. Another reason would have been  because of a countries Christian minorities, Japan is one such country, where Christmas is popular despite a small number of Christians. Many of these countries have adopted Christmas traditions such as gift-giving and decorating Christmas trees.

So that is the History of Christmas, but what about the true meaning of Christmas. I know sometimes here in the U.S. we forget what it is really about. Almost everybody here celebrates; even the atheists. It has become  more of  a commercial holiday, with the television news reporting more on how much Americans spent on the holidays than on stories about the real meaning.

We all know the real meaning of Christmas is to celebrate the birth of a great man whose life was dedicated to spreading a message of love and peace. We should remember that the tradition of gift-giving is about the act of giving,  not receiving.

I love this quote from American author Steve Maraboli:

“Want to keep Christ in Christmas? Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, forgive the guilty, welcome the unwanted, care for the ill, love your enemies, and do unto others as you would have done unto you.”

Let’s try to remember what it is all about this holiday season. Try to spread joy and love to those you encounter, and remember, it’s about a man two thousand years ago who just wanted us to all get along. Peace. In the words of Dickens’ Tiny Tim – “God bless us, everyone!

Merry Christmas

Joyeux Noel

Frohe Weinachten

Feliz Navidad

Buon Natale

Feliz Natal

Vrolijk Kerstfeest

Craciun Fericit

Wesolych Swiat Bozego Narcdzenia

God Jul

Vesele Vanoce

Heri Ya Krismasi

Sheng Dan Kuai Le

Nollaig Shona Dhuit

Gozhgg Keshmish

*Please forgive any misspelling

 

May God bless and protect you and…

May you always be

Healthy, Happy

Safe and Comfortable

 

Kelly Curtis

 

 

Advertisement

The Wisdom of Robert Adams #42

Robert Adams: T-57, “You Have to Have Bhakti” :

S: Robert, I want to ask you a question. Is it possible to realize the Self through a Jnani (one possessing wisdom) without a body?

R: Yes.

S: It is?

R: Yes, it is. Because the Jnani is all-pervading. And if you focus your attention on his presence, you’ll make contact, if you are sincere enough.

S: So even at a distance one could just focus on your picture for example.

R: It doesn’t make any difference.
The only difference is your mind.
Your mind will tell you all sorts of stories.
But if you do not listen to your mind, then the Jnani is everywhere.

People are still getting healings from Ramana Maharshi.
And they claim that he comes into their lives and solves their problems.

For a Jnani there’s no time and space.
That’s been obliterated.
There is only the Self as omnipresence, so he or she is everywhere.

Of course it’s up to you to exude the right energy from yourself, so you make contact.

It’s just like grace.
Gods grace is everywhere, but it’s up to you to make contact with it.

And of course the easiest way is through devotion, through love.

*****

May God bless and protect you

Seth Kelly Curtis

Spiritual Essays #104

Suffering and its Solutions in Indian Mysticism

by Jayaram V

Suffering arises when the organs of the body are used in selfish pursuits. Jayaram V

Living solely for yourself ignoring your obligations to others and to God is the source of all misery. Jayaram V

Imagine life in the Indian subcontinent five or six thousand years ago. The land was cut off from the rest of the world and was surrounded by sea on three sides. It had a varied climatic zone, with unpredictable and erratic weather conditions. Geographically, it stretched from the world’s highest mountains in the North to the world’s largest ocean in the South, and forest covered hilly tracts in the East to semi-arid lands and sand dunes in the West. There were swamps, arid zones, deserts and impenetrable forests. Hardly, a million or two million people lived in that region. They practiced different professions and belonged to diverse social and racial backgrounds. Most of them were new immigrants and adventurers in search of a new life and a new beginning. Life was tough and brutal in a land that was shaping itself as the home to an emerging multiethnic, pluralistic society.

The land was covered with thick tropical forests, inhabited by some of the world’s most dangerous predators such as tigers, lions, bears, hyenas, most poisonous snakes, crocodiles, and cheetahs. Traveling through them was like inviting death. Death was so common that people hardly lived beyond the age of 50. Infant mortality was probably the highest as there were no effective cures for many illnesses and diseases. Frequent wars, invasions, mass migrations, robberies, diseases and natural calamities took a heavy toll on the lives of common people and their peace and happiness. They lived in fear and saw the dance of death everywhere. Suffering was acute and an integral part of their daily lives.

Indian religions, philosophy, and mysticism originated in such circumstances, where people had a little respite from suffering and the fear of imminent death. It was the time when common people suffered from the cruelty of Nature and of humans and made sacrificial offerings and prayers to gods in search of peace and happiness, while wise minds, having retired from the obligations of worldly life and freeing their minds from the temptations of sensuous pleasures began looking for lasting solutions to the problem of suffering and finding freedom from it. They were not much interested in mere speculative ideas and the subtleties of elitism, but for real and practical solutions which could be validated through human experience.

They were mystics of great wisdom the world had never seen before, as if they were directly born from the mind of Brahma, the creator of the world and the source of the Vedas. Driven by a cause which was greater than themselves, attuning themselves to the highest and the purest of the universal consciousness, they wanted to help people escape from the hardships of life without disturbing the orderly progression of society or avoiding their duties and responsibilities. They wanted people to be free from the bonds of life, without being rigid and dogmatic. Their pioneering effort led to an explosion of spiritual and religious thought in ancient India, whose echoes still reverberate in the country. It was a unique event in the history of the world, whose spiritual and transformative value only a few enlightened and awakened people can truly understand.

Dharma, the eternal Wheel of natural order of things

Vedism, Samkhya, Yoga, Vaisheshika, Buddhism, Jainism, Shaivism, Vaishnavism, Shaktism originated in such a climate. Because of their common history and identical features, they can be collectively grouped under the generic title, Dharma or Bharata Dharma1. They all have one common objective, how to escape from pain and suffering and experience peace and happiness in the mortal body. They acknowledge lasting happiness (or bliss) as the highest human goal, believe in its possibility, and prescribe in their individual ways how to achieve it. In their quest for solutions to human suffering they identify its main causes and emphasize the following truths, which are worth examining. Readers may note that many specific details and particularities of each Dharma have been excluded in formulating these generalizations since the nature of this discussion does not permit to include them all.

  1. Higher and subtle forces are at work in the manifestation of life and diversity upon earth. No one can fully understand them, but one can learn a lot about them by understanding the world that exists within each of us. Hence, if you want to explore the truths of the world around you, you must begin it with yourself.
  2. Existence cannot arise from nonexistent causes. It is either Nature or God (Self) or both who are responsible for the manifestation of life upon earth and the worlds above and below. Nature is a set of laws, forces, energies, principles and realities, while God is self-directing pure intelligence.
  3. The purpose of creation is to manifest diversity and establish order and regularity in the created worlds so that life in its diverse forms can progress as ordained by Fate (vidhi) or the Will of God through its natural stages until it reaches its destined culmination.
  4. Rta, or the order and regularity of the world, is in itself Dharma since it is the natural state of existence (sahaja Prakriti), and its upholder is God himself. It ensures that the movement of Time and the functions of the universe and its various components progress in an orderly, and predictable fashion.
  5. It is Dharma, which ensures that the major events of life and creation happen predictably according to their natural rhythm. When Dharma, (the natural state of existence) prevails, order prevails, but when it wobbles, the order is lost and gods and guardians of the worlds lose their control.
  6. Life upon earth was supposed to be orderly and conducive to peace and happiness as exemplified in the Age of Truth (sathya yug). It was when Dharma walked on four legs, when people were truthful, gods were alert, and evil was hidden and asleep in dark caverns.
  7. However, as Time progress through subsequent Ages or epochs, people digress from their ordained paths and become subject to Maya. They ignore or forget the will of God, the virtues of Dharma, and their inseparable unity with him. Thereby, they become selfish and deluded, and fall under the heavy influence of evil desires and selfish actions. When the Dharma of the world declines, darkness spreads, just as darkness spreads when the Sun sinks into the horizon.
  8. With the decline of Dharma as people become ignorant of their essential unity with other beings and treat themselves as separate individuals, they disrupt the order and regularity of the world through their selfish actions and evil desires, which in turn make them vulnerable to karma, suffering, moral degradation, and rebirth.
  9. Therefore, the solution to suffering lies in understanding its causes and the return of beings to their original, pristine, spiritual state from where it all began.

Thus, the ancient Indian seers and spiritual masters observed that the solution to suffering was hidden in the causes of creation and in the ebbing and flowing principles of Dharma. They envisioned Dharma as the eternal wheel of life which revolved like the disc of Vishnu, the Preserver, or the effulgent sun in the sky. It was the source of all light and wisdom. If there was a problem with its functioning and progression, one should fix the wheel of Dharma by practicing virtue and restoring its eternal laws so that the world would move on smoothly like a chariot on a golden path. They also envisaged it as the heart of creation, whose regular beat ensured the order and regularity of the world. When it faltered, it imperiled the whole existence.

The essence of Indian mysticism

Their findings became the crux of the Upanishads, and the moral and philosophical percepts and teachings of the Buddha, the Jain Tirthankaras, Ajivikas, Smartas, Shaktas, Shaivas, Vaishnavas, Tantras, Agamas, Smritis, and numerous other ascetic, teacher and sramanic traditions, most of which were lost or now lay hidden beyond recognition in Hinduism as its very core. It also led to the emergence of Indian mysticism, which is very distinct and unique, and which because of its esoteric nature remains largely unknown and secretive.

Indian mysticism is very complex and diverse since it is an amalgamation of numerous historical processes and dharmic traditions. Western scholars rarely understood it, since to know it you need spiritual practice and inner awakening rather than academic learning and you must have access to the teachers who are willing to teach it. In continuation of a long tradition, generally they do not reveal it unless the students qualify. Although the various mystic traditions of India explored the problem of human suffering in their individual ways, they have a few common features and approaches to transcend the problem of mortality. They are as stated below.

  1. The world is full of suffering. Due to ignorance, delusion and the duality of subject and object, none can escape from it. In reality there is only the subject, or the Self. However due to Maya, the illusion of objectivity arises, and the One becomes many.
  2. You are the subject, the enjoyer of all that arises in the field of your dreamlike experience. You become vulnerable to worldly suffering when you draw yourself into it and move among the objects. Thereby you lose your distinction of being the sole subject and the true enjoyer of all.
  3. Your suffering is therefore of your own making. From a blissful state you fall down into a state of sorrow (vishada yogam) as you lose sight of your essential Dharma (of being God) and become a jarring sound in the music of life, or a dark comet that collides with the order and regularity of other celestial phenomena.
  4. When suffering arises, you have a choice. You can become involved with it and remain a part of it, in which case you will continue to suffer, or you can become detached from it and become its pure observer. In short, instead of endlessly suffering like a lost soul with your blinds on in the dark cave of your own ego, you should become a silent witness to the whole drama and endure it as if it has been happening in the field of your mind and body rather than to you.
  5. Since you cannot easily detach yourself from your suffering and from the objects with which you regularly interact and form an attachment to them because of desires, you have to practice self-purification with the help of yoga, tapas, detachment, renunciation, meditation, mindfulness practice, righteous living, etc. They will help you stabilize your mind and body and experience inner calm.
  6. You are not who you think you are. You are neither your body nor your mind. To know who you are you need to know the distinction between your mind-body consciousness and self-consciousness. When you truly understand the difference, you become a true seer, the seeing one.
  7. Your mind-body consciousness is unstable and a great source of afflictions. It is subject to desires, attachments, modifications, feelings, emotions, instability, ignorance, illusion, delusion, egoism, and such other impurities, which are responsible for your suffering and which keep you in a state of agitation and disturbance. When you are centered in it, you are never free from mental and emotional turmoil and attraction and aversion.
  8. You are not the consciousness that arises from your mind, senses and body, but self-consciousness which represents the witness Self, or the real you. It is pure consciousness, without any of the modifications which are mentioned before. It is your core, the true Self, always there, watching, observing, and enjoying. To experience it, you must withdraw deep into yourself and detach yourself from your mind and body. However, you cannot easily experience it, since you have extended yourself into the objective world and formed numerous attachments with it.
  9. In the silence of your mind, body and senses, you become aware of your self-consciousness. As you become mindful of your mind and body and extend your awareness into the nature of things, you will realize your spiritual nature and who you truly are. You will see for yourself that you are the subject, the seeing one, and everything else is an extension or a projection of you. You become the witness Self, who is uninvolved, undisturbed, untouched, and impervious to the dualities of pain and pleasure.
  10. Liberating your deepest and purest consciousness from the darkness of the mind and body is true liberation (moksha or nirvana). It is becoming the subject, the true seer, the one and only (kaivalya) witness, who is free from the delusion of object and otherness. When you become detached from your egocentric mind consciousness and become fully centered in your self-consciousness you will experience self-absorption (Samadhi). You will attain peace, equanimity, stability and freedom from suffering.

Thus, in essence Indian mysticism is about restoring your internal Dharma (which is to be pure or God like or God himself) to overcome suffering. You can regain your blissful and happy state by remembering and returning to your original Dharma or your essential, natural state of pure consciousness. Liberation is a sudden awakening to a forgotten truth about who you are or have always been. To restore Dharma which you have lost sight of and to destroy the evil that accumulates in you like an impurity, you should become a disinterested observer of your life and the world rather than becoming involved with them. Further, to ensure the order and regularity of the world within and without, you must do your part in the play of God, without taking it for real and without losing yourself in it.

You cannot end the suffering in this world, but through detachment and renunciation of desires you can end your reaction to it and your involvement with it. When you are inseparable from your mind, you become the victim of your own egoistic actions, but when you silence the mind, it falls off, whereby you only remain as the pure observer of all that happens. Therefore, the best way to live here is to live like a lotus plant, untouched by the waters of life, yet drawing your nourishment from it, and letting your consciousness bloom like the beautiful, thousand petalled flower with its face turned towards the Sun. The whole process is beautifully explained in the following passage by S.N. Dasgupta. 2

The self is the ultimate principle of pure consciousness, distinct from all mental functions, faculties, powers, or products. By a strange, almost inexplicable, confusion we seem to lose touch with the former so that we consider it as non-existent and characterize the latter with its qualities. It is this confusion which is at the root of all our psychological processes. All mental operations involve this confusion by which they usurp the place of the principle of pure consciousness so that it is only the mind and the mental operations of thought, feeling, willing, which seem to be existing, while the ultimate principle of consciousness is lost sight of. If we call this ultimate principle of consciousness, this true self, “spirit” and designate all our functions of knowing, feeling, and willing collectively as “mind,” then we may say that it is only by a strange confusion of mind with spirit that the mind comes to the forefront and by its activities seems to obscure the true light of the spirit…What is necessary, therefore, is to control the activities of the mind and to stop all mental processes. If we can in this way kill the mind, all logical thought and all sense processes will be killed with it. The light of the spirit will then shine alone by itself unshadowed by the darkening influence of thought.

*****

May God bless and protect you

Seth Kelly Curtis

Nightly Spiritual Quote #376 Mooji

Don’t fight with anything in creation…nothing is wrong with emotion, only don’t tie yourself to good or bad.

Don’t cling to anything.

There is no commandment: ‘Thou shalt not feel.’

Feelings belong to the totality, like everything else in manifestation, they have their place, leave them there.

Even if you could embrace the entire universe, it would not add up to your Self…Nothing does.

Be very clear about this…

*****

Peace and Love

Seth Kelly Curtis

The Twelve Spiritual Laws of The Universe #4

When you think about the spiritual laws of the universe, your mind may go straight to the Law of Attraction. However, it turns out that there is a whole network of interconnected spiritual laws that can impact every aspect of your life.

Even better, although these laws can be used to assist in Law of Attraction work, you don’t need to be working on any particular manifestation goal to benefit here.

Often discussed with reference to the healing practice of Ho’oponopono, the Twelve Spiritual Laws of the Universe each teach you something unique about well-being, happiness, and success. When you have a solid sense of these spiritual laws, you develop a clearer picture of your own place in the world. This guide will explore and summarize all twelve of the laws. Plus, it should help you to understand how they influence you and how your awareness of them can lead to positive change.

The 12 Spiritual Laws Of The Universe

When you don’t understand the connections between the spiritual laws, you naturally encounter obstacles. You may feel lost, frustrated, and confused about your purpose. It may even feel like virtually everything goes wrong for you, no matter how well you think you’ve planned.

In contrast, people who live their lives with an awareness of the interconnected laws typically report feeling more confident, productive, and reflective than ever before. While there is advanced personal work you can do with respect to each law, even starting out with this general grasp of the different laws may make a noticeable difference to the way you feel.

4. Law of Attraction

As you likely already know, the Law of Attraction tells us that like attracts like. So, in order to have the things you desire in life, you have to work out how to vibrate on the same frequency as these things. The more general lesson here is that being positive, proactive, and loving attracts more of the same into your life. Meanwhile, pessimism, fear, and lethargy will lead you to generate more negative experiences in all aspects of life.

By working to live more positively

*****

May God bless and protect you

Seth Kelly Curtis

Nightly Spiritual Quote #375 Science of Mind

“Everything in your mental life proceeds in proper neurological order. If you could have sufficient insight into all the inner and outer parts of your mental life, along with remembrance and intelligence enough to consider all the circumstances and take them into account, you would be a true prophet and visualize the future in the present as in a mirror.”
― Abhijit Naskar

*****

Peace and Love

Seth Kelly Curtis