Open Your Heart To Love

By Chris Arribbat

Our lives and the circumstances we live in are largely the result of our own thoughts and beliefs. The sum total of our thoughts, if they are positive, will result in a positive life for us. The converse is just as true. If we think negatively most of the time, we tend to attract negative circumstances into our life. This great truth is known to all mystics and ancient sages. They may have said it in different ways but they all point to the same thing. The Buddhists know this as the Law of Kamma. Jesus said, "You reap what you sow" If you plant an apple seed, you get an apple tree. The seed is your thought imprint. The apple tree is what is manifested in your physical world. The ancient Egyptians called this phenomenon.

If you look carefully at yourself, you'll realise that how you respond to a certain situation is largely dependant on your core beliefs. If you believe that the world out there is a dog-eat-dog world, you'll respond in a certain way. You'll put on your guard when you deal with people around you, with a greater degree of mistrust and apprehension. This is a common mindset in the business world. Contrast that with your mindset when you're in a sacred place, for example in a church or a temple. Your responses toward people in such places are entirely different from your usual dealing with your business associates. Even your words become softer and gentler. Your entire mannerism changes.

we will understand that whatever we get out of our lives is a result of what we have planted in our mind. Our past mental imprints determine our present situation in life, and the mental imprints that we plant now will determine our future situation. The ancient sages liken this to planting a garden. If we want a beautiful garden, we will have to selectively plant beautiful plants. What is equally important is that we must constantly pull out the weeds. Without doing that, our garden will be overrun by weeds, obscuring the beautiful plants. Likewise, to plant for a beautiful life, we must select only the mental imprints that we want, and constantly weed out the useless or harmful mental imprints. This, of course, requires constant mindfulness. We need to continuously guard what goes pass our conscious mind into our subconscious mind.

At the end of each day, review your day and count your blessings. Write these down in a little note book. You may call this note book your Gratitude Book. By doing this consistently, you'll be retraining your mind to focus on the positive aspects of your life. Why is this important? Because like attracts like. The more you focus on the positive in life, the more positive things will come your way. Altruistic Joy Altruistic joy is a concept borrowed from the Buddhists. It means rejoicing at other people's good fortune. This practice counters our tendency to be envious of another person's success. Each time we rejoice at other's success, we are basically planting joyful imprints in our mind, thereby sowing seeds of joy for our own future.

To open our heart to love, we must learn to love ourselves first. To do that, we need to start by forgiving ourselves for all our shortcomings and mistakes. We need to stop blaming ourselves. We stop blaming others and circumstances. It does not mean that we do not accept responsibility for our actions. What it does mean is that we recognise our weaknesses and mistakes and wish to give ourselves another chance to make our life work for us.Forgiveness is an expression of compassion. Our compassion should not be extended to just other beings but also to ourselves. If we are not compassionate to ourselves, it is difficult to show true compassion to others. So forgive yourself. - 31857

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