Love gives birth to life, nourishes life and connects us with life in all forms. Such love is expressed in compassion for others, in kind and generous acts, wiping the tears of others, feeding the hungry and providing shelter. Sadly, the world created by the Divine hands has been converted into fighting zones, us against you, exploitation and destruction. We have been polluting air, water, food and sky-the sources of life- for our self-serving, profit making ends. These are signs and symptoms of the misuse of intelligence , energy and knowledge.

Total love is needed to bring total revolution. We need to awaken ourselves and others as a humanity from this misery creating slumber. We need to have a balance between being and doing. If our doing is without the being consciousness -compassion, consideration and concerns for the life of others, our actions are going to be destructive, hurting us and others. Tooth for tooth, eye for eye or fire for fire is the mindset of destruction. We need to learn to relate to others not as objects to meet our self-centered needs but as an extension of our selves- from me to we.

We have been blessed to to have people in our lives as models who have reached out and have lovingly touched the lives of others to lift them up. The world is still surviving because of their selfless love and service. In order to create, sustain and flourish such love revolutions, we all have to be a part of it. As the saying goes, charity begins at home but does not end it there. What can we do as parents, neighbors, teachers, students, politicians, social workers, corporate leaders, workers and religious leaders to create an inner environment that is rooted in unconditional love and compassion. This is real spiritual work

I have learned how to create an inner environment for planting and nurturing the seeds of love, peace and service. This is my everyday spiritual practice which brings joy and fulfillment in my life. I share my awakening with school children at my daughter's Montessori school by teaching Mindfulness and Peace Education and Mindfulness Parenting. Work is my service and it brings great joy and happiness to me. I am sure there are many such awakened people who are doing such badly needed work. Our community religious centers and educational institutions need to face and embrace this great universal challenge.

May we wake up, see the light and play our vital role in creating and participating the Total Revolution of Love.
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Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our own response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.- Viktor F. Frankl, author of Man’s Search for Himself

This idea we can learn underneath our emotions, if we feel a sense of guilt, if we feel a sense of  anger, there’s often something that is instructive to us. Now, the very clear distinction here is that our emotions are data, not direction. We can always learn from them or dominated bythem.- Susan David, author of Emotional Agility

Exercise: Take your time to settle down and get centered. Let the strong emotion or feeling you have recently experienced or you’re experiencing now visit you. Be centered and relate to the emotions to be data rather than direction. Listen to your emotions and hear what they are telling you about yourself. You’re learning the art of responding to your emotional experience rather than reacting to your experience. You’re learning how to work through your emotional experience and grow from it.

What is the impact of someone’s unwelcoming or disturbing behavior on you? How do you choose to respond and not react? How can you be the change you want to see in the other person?

"Mindfulness is awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the presentvmoment, nonjudgmentally. It is about knowing what is on your mind.” ~Jon Kabat-Zinn

“ Mindfulness is about being fully awake in our lives. It is about perceiving the exquisite vividness of each moment. We gain immediate access to our own powerful resources for insight, transformation, and healing.” -Jon Kabat-Zinn

Jon Kabat-Zinn is the pioneer of bringing Mindfulness to the main stream in 1979. Since then it has grown by leaps and bounds in U S and in many countries of the world. Mindfulness is a life changing practice. Numerous substantial studies have demonstrated the biological,neurological, mental, emotional and relational benefits of consistently practicing mindfulness.

Mindfulness cultivates and sustains skills for growth and development in our personal life, interpersonal life, family life and in the community at large.

Numerous research studies have demonstrated benefits of regularly practicing mindfulness.

● Reduces Stress. Calms mind, relaxes body and creates a relaxation response.
● Stay Healthy. Reduces pain and inflammation, builds a stronger immune system, lowers blood pressure, recovers faster and conduces better sleep
● Improves Relationships. Helps us shed our defenses and grudges. Creates attunes,spaciousness and gracefulness that bonds us with others.
● Increases Performance. Mindfulness enhances focus, attention, memory, compassion, collaboration and other critical skills for increasing performance.
● Adding Years to Life. Mindfulness changes gene expression. Telomeres grow stronger and longer, correlating with longevity. Mindfulness adds years to life and life to years.
● Awakens and Expands. Mindfulness helps us connect more consciously with our full self and greater callings.

It is never too late to learn new tricks of the trade! Welcome to the journey of Mindfulness!

Mind can bind us and mind can free us. How do we use our mind? If we become aware of our mind, we notice it trapped by thoughts and emotions usually relating to the past or future. Spiritual teachers compare such mind with a wild elephant or a monkey mind. We all know how the wandering mind wanders in the clouds of wishing and craving, worrying and fighting, and holding several negative thoughts and emotions draining our energy. We also know how it affects our physical, mental and emotional health; how it affects our behaviors and our relationships. Wherever we go, we carry our mental and emotional backpacks. 

We all want to make our mind free from the grip of such energy draining thoughts, emotions and feelings. We all want to live in a calm, peaceful, loving and happy home of our mind. How can we attain our goal? How can we befriend our mind? How Can we convert the negative energy into positive energy? How can we free ourselves from ourselves?

One of the ways to attain our inner freedom is to become mindful of our mind spinning the same mental commentary, the same old stuff. Mindfulness is paying our full attention to what is happening in the present moment without judging. There are two wings of our self that help us to be from the the cage of bondage. One is mindfulness and the other is heartfulness.

Mindfulness is allowing the disturbing thoughts and feelings come. It is like inviting guests to our house. As the Sufi poet Rumi says invite all of them, pleasant and pleasant, without discriminating. This is paradoxical or counterintuitive. It is by letting things come, we make them go. As Saint Francis of Assisi says it is by giving we receive. We do this compassionately and kindly. Self compassion creates compassion for others.

Mindfulness and compassion, open mind and loving heart, creates a shift in our consciousness, expands our consciousness, frees us from our constricted consciousness. In order to expand our consciousness and to set our mind from the self -created suffering, we need to practice mindfulness meditation, the practice of letting the clouds of our mind come non-judgmentally and compassionately and letting them go away without pushing them out or trying to tame them. We arrive home, the abode of calmness, peace, clarity, love and joy.

All wisdom traditions emphasize the significance of awakening as we are going through the journey of life. As I child I used to listen to the song my father used to sing every morning. It is in Hindi. “Utha jag musafir bhore bhai, ab rayan kahana tak sovat hai. Jo sovat hai vo khovat hai, jo jagat hai vo pavat hai.” Hey traveler wake up! How long will you sleep? The morning has already dawned. One who awakens gets the blessings. One who keeps on sleeping, loses the gift of life.

Life offers many opportunities for us to wake up. When we are not awake, we stumble, fall down, hurt ourselves and hurt others close to us and around us. We inflict suffering on us and others. If we open our eyes and see us falling down, we stand up and walk on the same path with awareness. Falling down leads us to rising up if we are awake. If we keep our eyes closed, we keep on falling down causing suffering. When we are awake, we hold the hand of someone falling down with kindness and compassion. And this way, we help others to wake up-one lamp lighting the other.

Awakening happens when we are attentive to our footstepping. We are mindful of what is happening within us and around us. We are aware of ourselves and aware of our surroundings-human and natural beings. Awakening is non-judgmental existential awareness-mindfulness, clear consciousness without mental and emotional clouds or chattering. We see things clearly, we hear sounds clearly. Awakening evokes or invokes clear light of knowing and compassionate energy resulting in wise speech and wise actions. Awakening is not a conceptual knowing or conceptual understanding. It is a state of being. Right thinking, right feeling and right doing arise from the ground of being.

Awakening is like the light that shines in every corner of our life. Awakening is like the flower that spreads its fragrance in every corner of our life. In the awakened state of consciousness nothing is missing. There is deep sense of contentment and fullness. The cup of our life is filled with love, compassion and joy. As the sage sings in Ishavasya Upanishada - a book of wisdom-” Purnamadam, Prurnamidam, Purnat Purmaduchyate. Purnasya Purmadaya, Purnamam Avashisyate.” This is full. That is full. If you take the fullness out of the fullness, what remains is the fullness. If you add fullness to the fullness, what remains is the fullness.”

What do we experience when we live in an awakened state of consciousness? What happens when the stream of awakening flows through our everyday living? We feel oneness in everything.The other is me and I am the other. We are not apart from each other and from nature. We are an integral part of each other and of nature. The light of the Divine love shines and we embrace all beings with unconditional love.

We all have the potential to be awakened. We need to be aware of the obstacles created by our unawareness. We need to recognize the bondage we have created by ourselves. With the light of awakened consciousness, we let ourselves be free from the self-created bondage. It is called moksha-liberation and such a person is called muktatma- liberated soul.