It’s difficult to accept that solutions to complicated problems are very simple. If we feel trapped in a complex world of unhappiness, depression, inability to function at nearly our creative potential, laziness, etc., it’s easy to sit back and blame the world for everything that’s wrong with us. It doesn’t take a great genius to see what’s negative in life, but it requires a remarkable person to take full responsibility for one’s self and do what’s necessary to change. We are the problem, and being the problem, we are also the solution to the problem. We just have to learn how to use the tools we were born with to transform our inner problems to an open heart.
People are like broken down cars needing desperately to go to the shop. They need a master mechanic to teach them how to quiet the mind, open the heart, and transform the hundreds of inner tensions that are killing them into positive energy. People run to therapists, to priests, to gurus, to rabbis and teachers to gain insight into the causes of their inner mess, but rarely, if ever are they shown techniques they can use to work on themselves. Much advice is offered, words of wisdom, good insights into the cause of problems, but little or nothing that can be used to dredge up blockages that manifest daily as crippling tensions. They’re never told that the mind and breath are like spiritual and psychological Draino. When we finally master them and learn to use them consciously, they will unclog the chakra system and free us of negativity that’s poisoning our conscious and unconscious lives. They are tools to be used in the craft of meditation, organic tools we’re born with that have a real purpose: to transform whatever is killing us into a life-giving force. They can take the dark, depressed nature of a human being and transform it into a loving, heartfelt person filled with positive energy and a zest for life.
What’s missing in the lives of most people is mastery of the craft of meditation. If they want to be a doctor or a lawyer or a plumber, musician, actor or whatever, they take the time to study the craft. But, when it comes to oneself, we assume that the inner turmoil will just cease. We deceive ourselves into believing that we can make it all better, not realizing that psychological barnacles build up on the walls of our inner ship until the ship becomes so congested it can barely function. Years go by and the turmoil turns into deadness and we no longer have the creative spirit to live wonderful lives. We accept confusion and deadness as the order of things.
The whole aging process blinds us to reality. All it takes is the time to learn to master the craft of meditation and to use that craft to transform whatever is killing us into an open heart. One’s need must go so deep that he or she attracts a qualified teacher who can pass on the craft of meditation. Then, it must be used every day to dredge up negative energy and to free one’s self from the real prison that we have created: the inability to live with joy and love, with wisdom and compassion, and a deeper sense of our own worth as human beings.