Cheltenham Group 28/10/10 - A question about habits

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Rumpelteazer
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Cheltenham Group 28/10/10 - A question about habits

Postby Rumpelteazer » Fri Oct 29, 2010 6:10 pm

The first half of this meeting consisted of a review of last week's exercise to read the Bhagavad Gita. (See the third post in this thread for the report.)

Our meeting taker brought the following question of her own for the group to discuss, and also some quotations from HH and Dr Roles (attached):
It's a question/comment about surrendering habits, those that stand in the way of Self-Realisation. How do we recognise them in ourselves? If we observe, some seem quite trivial and easier to relinquish, but what about others that may be more deep-seated, perhaps related to our samskars/upbringing/education? We might even be in ignorance of what some of them are and surely that requires a deeper vigilance in observing in order to recognise and understand them? Or is it more the practice of observing who we aren't, by following the light of the teachings and our meditation and in our daily lives? Or does it involve both ways?

Examples were given of a ‘physical’ habit of switching on the radio at certain times of day, and a mental habit of allowing inner conversations during meditation.

One person remembered how self-observation was always considered important many years ago but has not been mentioned much since. Another suggested that it is very difficult to see one’s own deep-seated habits so the only solution is for other people to point them out.

But which habits need to be removed? Two members of the group (one of whom had spent 2 years in SES) said they felt that the superficial changes in behaviour imposed by SES were pointless. Discipline must come from within. There was an interesting comparison between the behaviour of women in the Indian ashrams and the women from SES. The former looked lovely and feminine in flowing saris and had a natural, graceful and gentle manner. The latter wore long skirts and behaved in a submissive, soft and quiet way that seemed forced and unnatural.

Perhaps we don’t need to make huge changes. Many of our habitual ways of behaving are perfectly OK and are not hindrances to self-realisation, so there’s no need to change them. If we practise self-observation and non-attachment then many of the habits that are unhelpful just naturally drop away. E.g. we might watch less television.

One person felt that any significant change inevitably takes many years, but some people mistakenly expect results very quickly and then get disappointed or frustrated when it doesn’t happen. He gave an example of several years when he was meditating but not very well and he felt it was having no effect. Then, when his wife died, he found he had actually accumulated a large amount of sattva to draw on.

The conversation then turned to negative emotions. One member of the group said she didn’t really understand about them, why we need to get rid of them. She couldn’t relate to this part of the teaching. Someone pointed out that both Ouspensky and HH said that it was important not to have negative emotions. Another said he thought that it didn’t really matter – people relate to different parts of the teaching. You can just take what seems right to you. Spending too much time looking at the negative aspects of oneself could cause problems. For one group member, not having negative emotions is very important – it was the one part of the teaching that particularly appealed to him. Another said that the Tempest workshop had been very helpful. Philip Marvin had explained that we can see all the characters of the play within ourselves, from the dreadful Caliban to the lovely Miranda, and this had enabled her to see both the positive and negative aspects of herself from a distance - as characters on the stage. As with Prospero, mercy and forgiveness then became possible. (Audio recordings of the Tempest workshop are available for download here.)

For one member of the group, attention seemed to be the only solution to vikshepa or inner conversations. Someone asked whether some people are better at attention than others. The answer was "yes - it needs practice, an understanding of why attention is important, and a desire to do it!"

We decided on the following exercise (from E group paper 10/20) for the coming week. It's not compulsory - just for those who find exercises helpful:

Take up a position in which to remain still for 3 or 4 minutes. Relax, especially face, eyes, lips, jaws.
Bring to mind the strong intention that you want to notice the inner impression that will take you away
from stillness. Drop that thought and just be present. Let the mind be momentarily still. Seven times a
day would be good.
Attachments
Quotations about control of the mind.doc
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