pinkhairthing

Normally, yoga stuff pretty well pisses me off, but this I can get behind.
Om mahni padme hum, etc.

ON WAR & VIOLENCE
An excerpt from Beyond Words
By Sri Swami Satchidananda

Your first duty is to find the peace in you. If you root yourself in your peace and then lend your hand, you will certainly bring peace. If not, you will only add more and more to the peaceless condition.

Violence cannot stop violence. A war can never really be won be violence alone. The mind must be changed. A violent victory only means that you have handicapped your enemy. He is still your enemy and the peace is only temporary. You have covered the fire so it doesn’t show now, but it is still inside and one day it will flare up again.

When you win a war with your power, your enemy simply retreats and waits for an opportunity to strike back at you. You have won the war but not the heart. Real victory is to win the heart, not just the land or the political power.

Yoga tells you that your own peaceful thoughts will bring results. In the name of Yoga, we try to collect the mind and send out peaceful vibrations. A sincere thought will travel all over the world. It is more than an atomic bomb, it’s more than a missile.

Even if you don’t believe in God or prayer, sit and say, “Let there be peace. Let the minds of the people who want war be changed.” We believe in thought force. Because it is the very same thought force that creates war. Remember that. It is the human mind that creates all these bombs, all these wars.

If you still want a war, fight it against undesirable thinking, not against a nation of people. And to fight such a war, you have to send out beautiful thoughts. Make every thought a powerful anti missile. Sit quietly and send out powerful peaceful thoughts. I’m not joking-it is possible. Even one minute spent in peace is valuable. Don’t think, “When our brother are dying, how can we sit quietly and think of peace?” This crazy world is, in a way, stabilized because of people sitting for a few minutes in meditation every day. Know that.

Don’t ever think that by raising your hand or throwing a bomb or shouting something you can help the situation. Do it in a nonviolent way. Don’t hurt anybody, don’t hate anybody. As long as you have hatred in your mind, you are unfit to talk of peace.

I wish this piece ended on a cheerier note, so, I love you all! Good night, Manhattan, and thank you, Bottom Line.