The ego is confusing. It’s not your enemy. And you already know that very often it isn’t your friend. It can cause a lot of trouble. If you have too much of it, you may be blind to it—while it’s obvious to everyone else. If you have too little, you can’t function in this world. [...]
The ego has two very positive aspects, the Ego of Aspiration and the Ego of the Sage. They must be used to overcome the third, the Ego of Suffering. The root cause of the ego of suffering is fundamental ignorance. It is the delusion that, “I am this body, this mortal personality. Happiness comes from [...]
” The deepest wish we have is to feel the harmony and peace of an Open Heart. And if we want that strongly and ask for it, the universe will support us” – Ram Giri Click Here to play video time: 4:22min
Life will always have its ups and downs. This is inevitable. And in this continuous change, in this unpredictability, life meets beauty in its entire dimension. Here is where I ask myself and I invite you to do the same: How am I dancing with life? Am I meeting life with a balanced and peaceful [...]
When depression is not depression but disillusionment, it still feels like depression. But in reality it is the first step toward the recognition of your inherent freedom and peace. Dis-illusionment is the beginning of waking up from illusion. It is a difficult stage with enormous promise. What is the illusion that is about to be [...]
I’m in the prime spot for Flamenco here in Miami, in a restaurant on Calle Ocho (that’s ‘8th Street’ for you gringos), right in the heart of Little Havana. The place is bubbling with excitement. Tonight there is a performance by Miami’s First Lady of Flamenco Clarita Filgueiras, and Natalia Merino, a famous dancer from [...]
For Jane it’s her weight. George thinks he is not a good enough provider for his family. Since the kids teased her in school, Carol believes she is not pretty. This is how we carry our hidden pain with us like a snail carries its house. And every so often we withdraw right into it, [...]
In the light of 9-11 and the killing of Osama bin Laden we understand the reactions of revenge and of hatred. Their expression was easy enough to see in the outburst of joy at his death in many parts of the US. It made some of us rather uncomfortable. That we are staging the equivalent [...]
There are countless levels of consciousness. No one lives on one level permanently, it shifts and moves, but more or less we have most of our experiences on a stage of awareness to which we are most habituated. Within this stage we strive to be happy and to avoid suffering. And we also strive to [...]
Question: “Sometimes it is hard for me to feel my Heart. What can I do?” Ram Giri: The mind has a tendency to run after distractions. This is caused by the subtle desires of the unconscious mind. It is an addiction that keeps the mind agitated and focused outward, away from the Heart. It is [...]
“One can’t believe impossible things,” Alice said. “I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”[1] We’re all Alice. We can’t believe what we cannot yet believe. [...]
From a Buddhist perspective, busying ourselves with worldly activities is a form of laziness, because we’re lax in self-cultivation. Our lives are so busy in modern society: Our appointment books are completely full and we’re always running here and there. We often complain there isn’t enough time for the Dharma. However, whenever we have a [...]
The prominent futurist Ray Kurzweil says that in 2045 computers will be one billion times more powerful than all human intelligence today! So what will the most important functions for human beings be if thinking is so much more effectively done by machines, knowledge is readily available and we have come to the end of [...]
You would never do this to yourself consciously. You, like everyone else, do not like to suffer. And yet, you, like everybody else, are sometimes subjected to the hidden force of self-sabotage. Committing yourself to a practice to awaken to your higher potential and to end the pain in your life is a sure way [...]
“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” ~ Jalal ad-Din Rumi ~ Was born on September 30, 1207 (Persian poet and mystic, 1207-1273)
