THE POWER OF THOUGHT
Posted by ADMIN
We have all seen pictures of Uri Geller bending spoons and stopping watches from running. He was able to do this by focusing the power of his thought to where it developed and projected kinetic energy thereby allowing him to perform such feats. Every once in awhile an anomaly such as Geller comes along to show us--in a crude form--that there is power in thought. People marvel at a demonstration of this power, but soon go on about their business, oblivious to the real message: that there's more to this process called thought than just trying to decide what's for dinner.
The great scientist George Washington Carver wrote that he held a peanut in his hand and then just thought about it, whispering to it, "I want you to tell me all about yourself." Eventually, Carver was able to develop all kinds of useful products from the peanut because the power of his thought got the peanut to reveal all its secrets. Therein lies one of the most powerful pledges of the Ancient Wisdom: that if you will concentrate your thoughts on an object or a symbol and send your best thoughts to it along with a request to reveal itself to you, it will do so. It might not be overnight, but eventually one's thoughts will be able to penetrate behind the surface layers and get to the very soul of the object. Open Sesame!
Nicholas Roerich, the great Russian painter and philosopher, used to play among the turgends of St. Petersburg--large mounds of earth which carried artifacts from the Stone Age. Roerich would dig through the mounds all through his childhood and find artifacts and examine them, eventually presenting his finds to the government museum. But more importantly, because of his intense interest in his find, Roerich opened up a channel of thought directly to the Stone Age and from this was able to "see" back into history. Out of this came many great paintings and, of course, the libretto to the "Rite of Spring" which he produced along with Stravinsky, Nijinsky and Dhiagelev.
Yes, concentrated thought is the "Open Sesame" to all doors; all the secrets of Nature and the tenets of the Ancient Wisdom. Still, such secrets will not be revealed unless one lives a life worthy of them. Nevertheless, thought is the key and anything which develops the concentration of thoughts is most useful in one's life. The best ways to develop the concentration of thought is through meditation and the arts.
Why is thought so important? Because thought generates action and action generates karma. Right action, the kind that mitigates past karma, can only come from right thoughts. Thus, if our thoughts are pure, our actions will be pure. Pure thought does not mean that we avoid life and shut ourselves up away from life. It means that we try to think of others first--to be considerate of others--and that our motivations are selfless. Again, this does not mean that we do not think about fulfilling our own needs, but that our first thought is of others. This can only come about through testing ourselves in daily life. We have to have the courage to try and the courage to go on after we fail, because failure is only the prelude to success.
Above all, thought should be constructive. Thought, of itself, is a neutral action. It is the will and motivation behind it that determines whether one's thoughts will be pure, creative and constructive, or else mean and destructive. Thus, it is precisely thought which nourishes life, because our body reacts biologically to the nature or our thoughts. Truly, then, as Jesus taught, "as a man thinketh; so is he."
A good thing to watch is whether our thoughts are limited, i.e., do we often say "I don't believe that," or "I doubt that." When a person says, "I don't believe that," what they really are saying is that they are in possession of all knowledge in the universe and nothing can exist outside of that which they themselves know. This is limited thinking. It is always much better to listen and reserve judgment rather than jump in with a statement of non-belief. It makes for a very untenable social situation anyway.
Unfortunately, schools do not teach one to think. That's why the Western Mind is so linear and subject to manipulation. Thinking should not be considered as some kind of abstract psychology, but as a practical method of memory retention, attention, concentration and observation. In Rudyard Kipling's great novel "Kim," the young boy is taught the "Great Game," as intelligence-gathering was sometimes called, and is given lessons in observation, concentration and attention. The Lord Buddha would deliver an hour's lecture to his students and at the end ask them how many times he had crossed the room. Perhaps the first requisite of thought is to learn that every action has a reaction. This is the foundation of all the CIA intelligence gatherers who do nothing but read the world's newspapers. They understand that if one door closes, another must open somewhere. That is how their minds have been trained and they apply this concept to every article they read.
Finally, and to return to the theme of the first paragraph of this essay, thought is energy. Thought can be more powerful than electricity and faster than the speed of light. Thus pure thought attracts possibilities, repels unwanted negative energies, creates beauty and heals. Thought plays the biggest role in our daily life, so it is certainly something we should be concerned about and not just accept as an abstract of existence. Truly did Descartes exclaim, "I think; therefore I am."
Plato
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