Seeking Spiritual Guidance From The Higher Self

I got E-zine from Asoka Selvarajah for this month. He is an inspiring teacher, one that I admired as much as Dr. Jonathan Parker. Here is the article that will continue help anyone to stay on course for seeking spiritual freedom.

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Much of what we think about habitually is negative and unproductive. Not only are most of the thoughts we have the same as the ones we had yesterday, the majority of them are also unhelpful and do real harm to our bodies, minds and spirits.

Fully 80% of illnesses are psychosomatic in nature, i.e. are self- inflicted as a result of the quality of our thoughts. The effect on our minds is equally devastating. We are anxious and fretful, forever concerned about things that are none of our business, projecting the worst on the future and calling it worry. Generally, we use this miracle mind of ours against itself.

The mind is at war with itself and with its surroundings. Your ego consciousness seeks to protect its own existence. In doing so, it introduces the illusion of massive separation between you and the rest of the universe. Only by doing this can it preserve its own existence and value to you. If you should come to realize your oneness with all of creation, and recognize the presence of your Higher Self, who stands ready to give you
full liberation from ignorance and illusion, what further use would you have for the ego?

Through perceiving reality with the powers of everyday consciousness alone, we have short-changed ourselves. We have fallen short of all we are capable of and were designed for. Instead of watching the actors on the stage, we are engrossed with their distorted shadows on the backdrop curtain. Moreover, ego consciousness cannot help you with your spiritual quest. The most you can really do is prepare yourself for the unveiling of
truth that will definitely come when the Higher Self reveals itself in your life. The reason the everyday consciousness is powerless to assist is because the spiritual realm is alien to it. It knows nothing of it. The ego was designed purely for life here on earth, via the uses of our five conventional senses!


Some Obstacles To Inner Guidance

When it comes time to listen for inner guidance, it is important that you have no in-built bias against the answer that you may receive. Realize that you may not know what is in your own best interest. However, the Higher Self always knows.

There is very little purpose in asking for inner guidance if there are certain answers that you are unwilling to accept. Otherwise you are merely seeking justification for what your conscious mind has already decided upon, or else seeking a boost to your ego. This has to be more than a mere intellectual gesture. You have to strive for true openness with yourself. Otherwise, you will be in danger of merely perpetuating the traps
of self-delusion that have held you thus far.

Often, our questions arise from a lack of control over our own lives, or a desire to control external circùmstances and people. Most of our doubts and frustrations in life arise from this direction. The Buddha taught that our greatest obstacle to spiritual progress arises from a refusal to accept “what is”; the things that we cannot change and must learn to accept with grace. The Christian tradition would re-phràse that to “accept
God's will”. Our obsession with resenting situations or people over whom we have no control whatsoever is the primary source of our unhappiness!

You should seek to develop acceptance of some of the most frustrating situations in life. They are actually our greatest growth opportunities, if we deal with them in a calm patient manner. You can use them for rapid growth, both emotionally and spiritually. Such an approach may even cause those situations to evaporate. Once the lesson they have been trying to impart has been fully integrated into your life, there is no need for the experience to continue.

Remember that your guidance could come in one of a million different ways. Perhaps whilst reading a book, the solution is there before you. Or perhaps it will come in a dream. Your worst enemy may suddenly spit out the very guidance you need with
pure venom in his voice or it may come during a night out with your best friènds. And yes, it may even be a quiet voice or intuition in your head. In whatever form it may appear, an open-hearted willingness to hear without pre-judgment is essential. Only then will you recognize the answer when it presents itself.

Allow all thoughts in without initial pre-judgment. Let the Higher Self do the judging and focus you in towards the correct guidance. The answer may not come when you expect it, and it is likely to be in a completely unexpected form. Hence, patience and continual inner communion must be maintained. Learn to wait and to keep asking again and again until you are satisfied.


Copyright 2001. Asoka Selvarajah. All Rights Reserved.