Beginning of a New Year doesn’t really mean just the beginning of a new calendar year. For many, it’s time to make new resolutions with renewed energy and start afresh, leaving the past behind. Many make new promises to themselves – to change a bad habit or to develop a good habit. Regardless of making a new resolution, the goal is to improve life with the start of a new year. In short, it’s that time of the year when everyone wants to treasure the jubilant spirit of the moment.
• Wider and Wiser Perception
Life can become a great place to learn and grow. Behind seemingly difficult situations are concealed major lessons. This awareness comes with a wiser perception of life which only spirituality provides. Challenges in a working environment are bound to come but an administrator with a wider and wiser perception will perceive them as the opportunities, to grow as a human being, and not as bad situations. Disguised in routine tasks are the sign boards that point towards truth. Relationships that bring with them repeated scenes of negativity with the same person and for the same reasons show the weaknesses one has to work on. If you have the subtle eyes to see and the courage to go forward, life is a constant experience of reminders and benefits to progress along the road to a higher consciousness.
Disguised in routine tasks are the sign boards that point towards truth. Relationships that bring with them repeated scenes of negativity with the same person and for the same reasons show the weaknesses one has to work on. If you have the subtle eyes to see and the courage to go forward, life is a constant experience of reminders and benefits to progress along the road to a higher consciousness.
As an administrator, one may also want to change many things at their workplace – to improve the working of the organization or the working environment of the office or the behavior of the employees. Improvement in an existing situation or people starts with a new way of thinking. Let New Year be that time of the year to adopt a new approach towards everything. Norman Vincent Peale said “You change your thoughts and you change your world”. But is it that easy to bring about any change in your thinking? The answer is ‘Yes’, only if you are determined to do so.
• Don’t Choose only what you Like, explore hidden capabilities
Anything new starts when we adopt a new attitude towards the same old thing. New attitude means changing our point of view whether it is a new situation/ person or the same old one. This is what is needed to turn things around and bring about the change that we desire. Attitude governs the way you perceive the world and the way the world perceives you. Let’s see this with an example. Usually, we avoid people who we are not comfortable working with. Everyone is happy working with the people whom they like. But if for any reason, or out of choice, someone decides to work with those whom they cannot stand, it can work wonders, because if they every time choose to be with someone they like, it would make them self-limiting as they would be acquainted to deal with only those sorts of people. The chances of realizing the true inner potential would be less which would consequently limit the success of the entire organization, as well. Changing the view point lets us execute and work upon not only that which we like, but also explore that what we may not like but are very much capable of handling.
Many a times we here people tagging the day as ‘Good’ or ‘Bad’ just on the basis of the weather. It may be one of the parameters but is definitely not the deciding factor for the quality of our day! Weather will always change but no matter what the weather condition is, it is up to us to make it a good day. What comes to us is not our business but what we make out of it, is the real outcome of our attitude, which determines our growth and success in any field.
Therefore, it simply depends on our perception whether we see life as a battleground and experience a constant battle from morning to night that may even tire us emotionally and mentally or are we constant seeking and tapping opportunities to make our way through the hurdles of life to eventually be the winner. Complaints would only take us away from the power that we have within to overcome difficulties.
Spirituality unites us with our inner powers and potentials, which show us the ‘real me’ and empower us to walk through the beautiful journey called ‘Life’, not free from obstacles, but unstoppable. It clears up our thinking and re-orients our mind to make it more stable and healthy.
• Mind over Matter
In the materialistic world today, we are slowly becoming more inclined towards matter and losing control over mind. As a result, instead of we guiding the mind and achieving what we aspire to, matter is guiding the mind, making us slaves of our own mind. George Bernard Shaw, a famous Irish writer said, “Progress is impossible without change and those who cannot change their minds, cannot change anything”. So to crack a new beginning, we need to start with the mind.
Mind is quite similar to a computer that can be programmed. We can choose what kind of software to install – productive or unproductive. The inner dialogue is the software that programs our attitude. It may seem difficult but is very much possible to have full control over the programming. Whatever we put into it is reflected in what comes out of it.
There has been a lot of conflicting views in the world about what the mind is and how it works. Many of us often complain and denote mind as devil which conspires against our own peace, positivity and well-being. It behaves like mercury, slippery and not easy to contain. We react or respond towards the same person or situation in differing ways depending on the impulse of the mind. These complaints are only because of lack of understanding and harmony with our own mind.
Mind is the creator of thoughts, feelings, attitudes and emotions. Mind is a faculty of the soul. It is not an organ or part of the body. The difference between body and mind is like a television set and the movies seen on that set. The movies originate in the minds of the directors, not in the television set. The television set is just a medium for displaying the movies. Same is with thoughts, feelings, attitudes and emotions which originate in the non-physical consciousness (mind) and not in the physical brain. The brain is just a processor of these thoughts and the body is a medium via which all the above-mentioned four are displayed or brought as expressions, physical gestures, words and actions.
Mind creates different kinds of thoughts to express different kinds of emotions but we sometimes misinterpret the thoughts required to express some kind of emotions. A common example is to interpret worry as care.
• Care without worrying
It’s easy to get caught up in your physical role – your position or designation in the organization. The responsibility of the position may fetch worry or anxiety about certain tasks. Again, one of the incorrect beliefs that we have acquired since childhood is that to worry is to care. Parents are the first source of transmitting this belief to us because we, as spiritual energies, not only transmit or radiate but also absorb energy. As we grow up, this false belief keeps reaching us from everyone on a subtle level. And slowly we start accepting this belief as being completely true. Gradually we lead our lives according to it and even transmit the same to others. That is why it is extremely difficult to find a single person without this belief. Most of us are worrying today for almost everything in life thinking it as an expression of care.
The very difference between worrying and caring is that the former not only weakens ourselves but also the other person/ situation, while the latter enables us to remain stable and strong while extending support and power to the other person. This clearly explains what both of them would lead to. Worry shall not do any better to the person/ situation while care will ease out the efforts to come out of a situation.
Worry is fear or anxiety and care is love or concern, they are two opposite emotions which can never exist together at the same time. To replace worry with love and concern, we need to change the worry consciousness within our mind, which means replacing negative thoughts with positive ones. With this change, the care for others will be better showcased by our behavior becoming more positive and stable leading to strengthened relations.
• Have faith in your team and expect good from them
As an administrator, we want the best of relationships with all those whom we deal with; and others, too, want the same with us. A good work environment leads to high morale, which results in better productivity and subsequently leads to success. When people care about the people they work with, things get done faster. Colleagues and sub-ordinates go the extra mile to get things done; they take ownership of the job and work through it without having the feeling of any burden. There are certain expectations from both sides in a good relationship. The expectations we have of someone, whether negative or positive, do have an effect on the person we are relating to. If these expectations are not met, often the relationship goes sour. At the same time, if we have faith and confidence in our team members or work colleagues, then their performance and the behavior will surely increase for the better. It has been proven through many studies that the teacher’s expectations form one of the most influential factors in the academic performance of their students. If a teacher hopes and expects good results from their students, their performance tends to be much closer to their real capacity than if the teacher is expecting poor results. The same applies to any relationship. Therefore, it’s always wise and good to have faith and expect only good and positive from others.
• Influence the World by smallest efforts possible
There are two ways to exist or experience this world. One way is to get influenced by whatever is happening in the world and the other is to influence the world. The latter seem to be a tall order but we actually can do it. Let’s see how. When we read about a person or a place in the newspaper or are watching the news channel, we tend to start creating the same emotions as the news. If we are watching news of a natural calamity, terrorist attack, accident, disease, financial crisis, then feeling sorrow, fear, anger and hatred seems to be natural. When we create these emotions, it is no more the news of the outer world; it becomes the quality of our inner world. By creating the negative emotions, we too start radiating the same vibration to the people and place involved in the incident thereby adding pain to their existing pain. We believe that feeling the same pain as the victim, is compassion. It is not. Compassion means to understand them and give them what they need. If there is anger and hatred, we need to send love. If there is panic and fear, we need to send peace. While watching or reading the news, if we consciously try to detach ourselves and create positive vibrations which the affected people need then in a way we would be contributing to the overall vibrations of the world which may not be visible but definitely elevate the state of human society. Today, the strife-torn world needs vibrations of unity, compassion, respect, love and peace. For this, it is very important for us to be filled with positive vibrations ourselves so that we are able to distribute the same.
• New Knowledge Every Day
The best time to start something new or revive the old, especially when it is linked with self-progress, is with the beginning of a New Year. It’s not just the New Year which makes us do or think of something new. Daily dose of new and different spiritual knowledge at the start of the day works wonders as far as the newness is concerned. It rekindles our creative spirit. Novelty of thoughts then flows into our feelings, beliefs, attitude, personality, perception, actions and interactions. Unlike other meditation techniques which teach to empty the mind of thoughts, Rajyog Meditation teaches to create positive and constructive thoughts in order to take the mind to experience peace and bliss. Feeding daily spiritual knowledge to the mind is essential for Rajyog Meditation. Then, meditation becomes an interesting, new and creative exercise, instead of a routine affair. New aspects of our personality emerge and life seems to be transformed – forever.
Along with entering into a New Year and leaving behind the old, let us leave behind our old habits of anger, comparison, worry, jealousy… and fill ourselves with the virtues of love, peace, happiness, co-operation..
Wishing everyone a Very Happy and Virtuous New Year 2018.
