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Soul Sustenance 15-05-2013
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The Cyclic Functioning Of The Three Faculties Of The Soul
The soul consists of three faculties – the mind, intellect and sanskaras.
They work together in a cyclic fashion. How they work together can be illustrated
by looking at how habits or sanskaras are formed e.g. if you are used to scolding
your children to get them to do their homework, here is what happens when you visit
a friend’s place and watch, for the first time, how your friend is doing the same
to his/her child, you might think (done by the mind): ‘I should adopt the
same method to discipline my children, they never listen to me '. Your intellect
discriminates and judges whether that thought is right or not. Seeing others using
the same method, and also seeing that the children are not being affected in any
negative way (at least in the short term, not realizing the long term harm) and
also seeing them get the desired result, you make a decision to do the same, which
leads to the action of scolding your children. This creates an impression or memory
within the soul, somewhat like cutting a groove in a piece of wood. This groove
in the soul becomes a characteristic of your personality and is known as a sanskara.
Within the groove is recorded the memory of, firstly, the action of scolding the
children and, secondly, the desired result from the action. Now, whenever your child
disobeys you even a little bit, this sanskara is activated and the memory
of the action and result associated with it emerge in the mind triggering a thought:
'Let me scold my child, that’s the best way to get him to do things'. The intellect
judges the thought, remembering the proof of the scolding, based on past experience,
and then makes the decision that it is alright to using anger as a weapon to discipline
the child. In this way, the sanskara keeps getting deeper and deeper. The cyclic
process explained above, applies to all habits, whether physical or non-physical.
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Message for the day 15-05-2013
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Detachment adds quality to each and every action.
Projection: When we are detached, we will not be bound by the action itself,
but will perform the action in a detached way. This means that we perform the action,
yet we are not dependent on the fruits of the action. This automatically increases
its quality. Then we would be free and uninfluenced by the bondage of the action.
Solution: In any situation where we find ourselves doing a lot yet with a
feeling of not attaining anything, we should ask ourselves if we are attached to
the task at hand. The more we are attached, the quantity of work that we put in
increases at the cost of the quality. When we are detached we are able to give our
best in all that we do.
In Spiritual Service,
Brahma Kumaris