Misery

1.     Ignorance is the great mother of all misery.

2.     All the misery of the world is caused by the slavery to the senses.

3.     It is the culture of the heart, really, and not that of the intellect that will lessen the misery of the world.

4.     Misery comes because we think we are finite---------------we are little beings.

5.     The ideal of faith in ourselves is of the greatest help to us. If faith in ourselves had been more extensively taught and practised, I am sure a very large portion of the evils and miseries that we have would have vanished.

 

6.    The Great Cause of Misery in the World

The moment you fear, you are nobody. It is fear that is the great cause of misery in the world. It is fear that is the greatest of all superstitions. It is fear that is the cause of our woes, and it is fearlessness that brings heaven even in a moment. Therefore ‘Arise, awake, and stop not till the goal is reached’.

 

7.     Attachment to the unreal will bring misery.

8.     The misery that we suffer comes from ignorance, from non-discrimination between the real and the unreal.

9.     The weak have no place here, in this life or in any other life. Weakness leads to slavery. Weakness leads to all kinds of misery, physical and mental. Weakness is death. There are hundreds of thousands of microbes surrounding us, but they cannot harm us until we become weak, until the body is ready and predisposed to receive them. There may be a million microbes of misery floating about us. Never mind! They dare not approach us; they have no power to get hold on us, until the mind is weakened.

10. The less the thought of the body, the better. For it is the body that drags us down. It is attachment, identification, which makes us miserable. That is the secret: to think that I’m the Spirit and not the body, and that whole of this universe with all its relations, with all its good and all its evil, is but as series of paintings, scenes on a canvas, of which I’m the witness.

11.  There is no misery where there is no want.

 

12.                       What is our real misery : -

Nature is trying all around to suppress us, and the soul wants to express itself. The struggle with nature is going on. Many things will be crushed and broken in this struggle for freedom, That is you real misery. Large masses of dust and dirt must be raised on the battlefield. Nature says, ‘I will conquer’. The soul says, ‘I must be the conqueror’. Nature says, ‘Wait! I will give you a little enjoyment to keep you quite’. The soul enjoys a little, become deluded a moment, but the next moment it cries for freedom again. Have you marked the eternal cry going out through the ages in every breast? We are deceived by poverty. We become wealthy and are deceived by wealth. We are ignorant. We read and learn and are deceived with knowledge. No man is ever satisfied. That is the cause of misery, but it is also a cause of blessing. That is the sure sign. How can you be satisfied with this world?......................THE INFINITE SOUL CAN ONLY BE SATISFIED BUT BY THE INFINITE ITSELF…………………INFINITE DESIRE CAN ONLY BE SATISFIED BY INFINITE KNOWLEDGE------------------------NOTHING SHORT OF THAT.

 

13.  The miseries of the world cannot be cured by physical help only. Until man’s nature changes, these physical needs will always arise, and miseries will always be felt, and no amount of physical help will cure them completely. THE ONLY SOLUTION OF THIS PROBLEM IS TO MAKE MANKIND PURE. IGNORANCE IS THE MOTHER OF ALL THE EVIL AND ALL THE MISERY WE SEE. Let men have light, let them be pure and spiritually strong and educated, then alone will misery cease in the world, not before.

14.  One idea that I see clear as daylight is that misery is caused by ignorance and nothing else.

15.                         Seeing difference is the cause of all misery, and ignorance is the cause of seeing difference.