Soul Sustenance

Reliving The Memories Of The Past (Part 2) 

When advised by a spiritual teacher whom you might encounter (as spiritualism makes its inroads at a very fast pace into the mainstream of society) that remaining in the present is the ideal way of living, some might suggest to the spiritual wisdom carrying teacher that perhaps it is easy for you’ll since you’ll have the company of the Supreme Being and meditation is a practice which you’ll have been doing since a very long period of time, even in some cases since early years. But how do we, as corporate professionals and housewives, live a life without the past influencing our present life situations and our perceptions or our way of looking at the same. 

Also, some people say its fine not to think about the failures of the past but it is unrealistic to not ponder about past successes, because they are positive events and attainments. Some people are so tied up with past success stories of their lives and are so attached to it that it slowly takes the form of a type of ego which then starts reflecting negatively in their present behaviour and relationships. Suppose, I have been very good at my studies and I was one of the best in school and college, in excelling in my education. So, do I forget that or remember it because doing that gives me joy? When a joy out of a positive past event exceeds the sphere of necessary feelings and enters the sphere of unnecessary and waste feelings, the joy turns into a negative emotion of impure pride or ego after violating the limits of pure pride or self-esteem. Speaking about past successes to each one we meet can easily be seen by others as an exaggeration or unnecessary utterance and some people don’t prefer listening to success events of others beyond a certain point as it’s very clear in these cases that the other person does not have an intention of informing only. Ask any person off-handedly about how they felt after having listened to others’ success stories repeatedly and they will give you a frank opinion that it was more of a boast. People will always like people who are authoritative in mentioning their successes but at the same time they are humble and remain incognito in not mentioning them repeatedly. That is for speaking about past events of a positive nature. The same applies to thinking about them. 

(To be continued tomorrow …)