This article is going to be outside the average LinkedIn reader's experience. However, there are definite rewards if you settle in to read here. A tale from afar, and yet from right here. And completely applicable to your life and your career. It has stories and songs and small tales of journeys.
Enlightenment is contagious, says Brian Lottman. It's not an instant process, of course, but he says,
the more you hang around with gurus, the more like a guru you become.
It makes sense no matter which angle you look at it.
- If you think of a guru as a positive, uplifting person, you learn more uplifting words and how to spread more positivity yourself.
- If you think of a guru as someone with a lot of knowledge, the more time you apprentice with them, the more you'll learn.
- If you think of a guru as a great problem-solver, the more you are present while they solve problems, the better you'll get at navigating difficulties yourself.
Really, we tend to take on the characteristics and habits of whoever we spend our time with -- whether those people are negative or positive.
So Brian Lottman is a travelling guru... well, I don't think he would call himself a guru, he's just a guy travelling around sharing spiritual stories, mantras, and wisdom, a guy whose spiritual leader told him to go out and spread the light. In India and the spiritual wisdom traditions from there, "guru" is generally a pretty high title. Maybe Brian would only consider himself a guru-in-training. But he's sure teaching a lot meanwhile.
Three years ago his spiritual leader asked him to leave his successful business and comfortable home in the United States, and to travel to share his light with a wider range of people. So he is doing this. He's a wonderful story teller, recounting ancient tales of Hindu gods and goddesses, mythology, religion, and philosophy, and his singing voice fills you with... well, light. Light and peace. He's one of many... thousands? Hundreds of thousands? of disciples in the traditions of India over thousands of years who have travelled and shared wisdom and light this way. If one comes through your town, make time to go see them!
I've been lucky enough to have been to several sessions (called satsangs) of Brian's while he's in my city. Each one is different, depending on the audience and the mood of the day. He draws on a vast store of stories, traditions, knowledge, and, of course, mantras. He has a wonderful flowing style. He'll be talking about his journey or someone that he met, and that will easily segue into a story from ancient India about a god born 5,000 years ago, which of course might lead to the lullaby an ancient goddess sang to her children, so that they would be englightened.
Suddhosi Buddhosi
Niranjanosi Sansara
Maya Parivarjitosi
Samsara Sapna Taja Moja Nidram.
My child, you are pure. You are enlightened. Wake up out of this illusion and realize your True Self.
No idea how to pronounce that?! There's a pretty nice recording of that song here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylizMw6iw9s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylizMw6iw9s
And of course, that lullaby leads to a story of a guru who renounced his kingdom and wandered the forest for decades until he found an abandoned tiger cub. He raised the cub on cow's milk and sang it the lullaby of enlightenment. One day, he decided to go to the city with the tiger, and people brought a cow to challenge the idea that this tiger could possibly be enlightened.
So the guru had them bring some grass for the cow, and some milk for the tiger, and he sat between them in meditation while they peaced out with the milk and the grass.
So the guru had them bring some grass for the cow, and some milk for the tiger, and he sat between them in meditation while they peaced out with the milk and the grass.
You might not believe the tale. Indeed, many people don't believe a lot of the tales in the Christian Bible, either. The point is, they're a metaphor. Maybe they really happened, or maybe they didn't, but the point is, if you believe you can see the light inside a tiger, you can tame it.
(Here's a video of some Masai guys doing something similar, but different, with lions. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/self-confidence-how-steal-from-lions-christa-bedwin Clearly energy medicine (or as North Americans call it, "attitude") is at work there too.
(Personally, my faith is such that I do believe a guru could sit between a tame tiger and a cow, but you can decide for yourself. You can get value from the story in any case, if you choose to.)
One day, he told us about Hanuman, the Monkey god, flying to Sri Lanka to defeat the demon king. An excellent tale with some profound consequences about what happens when you believe in yourself -- and when you don't.
My favourite quote from Brian is this:
People wake up and spend their whole day fighting for water and food.
And at the end of their lives, when they're dying, do they say, "boy, I'm sure glad I got enough water and food this life."?
Gurus shine light on things, don't they? When you look at the worries of many of the people in your city, don't they really come down to that? Scrabbling over food and water and shiny things? How does this little idea change your ideas about your life?
Listening to the stories feels good. Listening when Brian sings definitely feels good. As I said, his voice just kind of brings light and peace.
Listening to a wandering guru is kind of like going to church, but easier. You just kind of hang around enjoying the light, sound, and stories of a guru, and you get some spiritual lessons and learn some new mantras in the meantime.It's the normal way in India
I know I'm writing this article for a mainstream sort of LinkedIn audience, so perhaps the idea of giving away and/or selling all of your material goods to travel seems unthinkable, strange, against the establishment, and all of that.
However, this tradition is not unusual in India. It makes sense, really. Instead of getting all of your spirituality from the one spiritual leader at the same church all the time, people who stay home get access to a variety of people with spiritual stories and different ways of helping you understand God and your role as a spiritual being in this world. Because these kinds of people travel North America now, you can probably find a guru coming through your town some time soon if you go looking. They sometimes show up at yoga studios. Brian has been travelling through a network of churches and word of mouth.
Travelling preachers are worth going to see, whether they're preaching "your" religion or not. At a professional conference, I love listening to all kinds of sessions. Even if the speaker says something you disagree with completely, it gives you food for thought, doesn't it? I think the same thing of church sermons, and tarot card readers. Listening to all of them gives you something to hang your thoughts from, some idea seeds. You might reject them, or think they're tangential, but they stir your thoughts, and that's great.
A good church community is a wonderful, nourishing thing for comfort, but exposing yourself to a variety of new spiritual ideas is best for growth. Shake it up! If we believe that Jesus was mainly about loving one another, and that we are all one, and that God is pretty much about love, then all the religions say the same thing. It's only when certain sects start applying rules to repress other people that the trouble begins.
How you can be a light guru:
Some people just glow. They may even leave brightness in their wake, a sort of river of light where they've walked, so that you know that they have passed by and you feel infinitesimally happier. A lot of people might not know why they feel a little better, but often, they feel better anyway. How do they do it?
You too can be one of these people. For most of us, we can at least spread light some of the time, despite a reality of feeling dark at other times. By shifting our focus to helping others, and not reacting to what we think/imagine others' behaviour means about us, we can increase the amount of light we spread.
We can increase the percentage of time we feel positive. We can actively choose to replace old, negative tapes with new positive ideas. This is a procedure we can do.
Joan Zwingli, a lady who goes to my church, is well over 80 but she looks about 60. She sings in the choir, she bakes for the after-church snacks, and she is painting her fence this week (I asked if I could help, but she says that she's nearly done). She asked me how I was doing last Sunday, and I didn't quite have the oomph to be extra-cheerful. She reminded me of a strategy that I've often recommended to others, but hadn't applied myself, recently:
I always told my kids when they were down, take out a piece of paper," she said, "and write down everything that is good. Then write down everything that you think is bad.
You will see that the list of things that are good is way longer than the things that are bad.
She stressed think in "that you think is bad," reminding me subtly that nothing is either good or bad but thinking makes it so.
I have had a few pretty dark days recently, and a friend of mine who has called me her mentor, wrote me an e-mail last night with some positive viewpoints on some of the difficult work tasks we have shared. I commented that she was teaching methe positive thinking now, and she said "Well, life is often a relay, isn't it?"
It's true. So don't get even more down on yourself for being down. Accept that all of us (except a few rare highly evolved spiritual masters) are going to be down sometimes. You're on the way to being a little guru if you can turn around and give a hand to someone who once gave you a hand, or to someone else who could use it.
There's a little song I like. I don't know if I picked it up at a church somewhere or I just made it up, but it's nice, so I'll share it.
God within you.
God within me.
God around us.
And within us.
Whatever your vision of God, it seems certain that you have the ability to spread God's love with your own actions. The word of God only lives if we live it. So find light when you can, and spread light when you can.
It doesn't have to be all the time, but you can increase the percent of your day looking at the light in others instead of fretting and worrying over the dark.
(turning off the news is a good start)
You can check Brian out more at his facebook page https://www.facebook.com/brian.lottman (which is the best place to connect and find out where he'll be next), at http://www.wanderfortruth.com, or simply by googling him and finding various videos and interviews.
The appropriate way for me to end this article is to press my hands in prayer position and bow to you, saying,
Namaste,"
which means
the light in me recognizes and honours the light in you."
No comments:
Post a Comment