Fw: [Infinite_knowledge] Slow-Down! Relax...

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BODY MIND BALANCING BASIC CONDITIONS FOR WELL-BEING RELAX INTO LIFE AS IT COMESSociety certainly prepares you for activity, for ambition, for speed,for efficiency. It does not prepare you to relax and do nothingand to rest. It condemns all kinds of restfulness as laziness. It con-demns people who are not madly active--because the whole soci-ety is madly active, always trying to reach somewhere. Nobodyknows exactly where, but everybody is concerned: "Go faster!" I have heard about a man and his wife driving on a road as fastas they can. The wife was telling the man again and again, "Justlook at the map." And the man was saying, "You keep quiet. Shut up! I am thedriver. It doesn't matter where we are going, what matters is thatwe are going with speed. The real thing is speed." Nobody in theworld knows where they are going, and why they are going there. There is a very famous anecdote about Bernard Shaw.He was traveling from London to some other place and the ticketcollector came. He looked in all his pockets, in his bag, then heopened his suitcase. And the ticket collector said, "I know you.Everybody knows you. You are Bernard Shaw. You are aworld-famous man. The ticket must be there, you must have for-gotten where you have put it. Don't be worried. Leave it." Bernard Shaw said to the man, "You don't under-stand my problem. I'm not looking for the ticket just to showyou. I want to know where I am going. That stupid ticket--if itis lost, I am lost. You think I am looking for the ticket for you?You tell me where I am going." The ticket collector said, "That is too much. I was just trying to help you. Don't get disturbed. Maybe you can remember it later on by the time you reach the station. How can I tell you where you are going?" But everybody is in the same position. It is good that there are no spiritual ticket collectors around, checking, "Where are you going?" Otherwise you would be simply standing around without any answer. You have been going somewhere; there is no doubt about it. Your whole life you have been going some- where, but you don't actually know where you are going. You eventually reach a graveyard, that is one thing that's cer- tain. But that is the one place you were not going to, the one place nobody wants to go to, but everyone finally gets there. That is the terminus where all trains end up. If you don't have a ticket, wait for the terminus. And then they say, "Get down. The train goes no farther." The whole society is geared for work. It is a workaholic so- ciety. It does not want you to learn relaxation, so from the very childhood it plants antirelaxation ideas in your mind. I am not telling you to relax for the whole day. Do your work, but find out some time for yourself, and that can be found only in relaxation. And you will be surprised that if you can relaxfor an hour or two hours out of each twenty-four hours, it willgive you a deeper insight into yourself. It will change your behavior outwardly--you will becomemore calm, more quiet. It will change the quality of your work--it will be more artistic and more graceful. You will be commit-ting fewer mistakes than you used to, because now you are moretogether, more centered. Relaxation has miraculous powers. It is not laziness. From theoutside, the lazy man may look as if he is not working at anything,but his mind is going as fast as it can. The relaxed man--his bodyis relaxed, his mind is relaxed, his heart is relaxed--for twohours he is almost absent, in these two hours his body recovers,his heart recovers, his intelligence recovers, and you will see thatin his work. He will not be a loser--although he will not be frantic any-more, he will not be unnecessarily running hither and thither.He will go directly to the point where he wants to go. And hewill do things that are needed to be done; he will not be doinganything unnecessary. He will say only that which is needed to besaid. His words will become telegraphic; his movements will be-come graceful; his life will become poetry. Relaxation can transform you and transport you to suchbeautiful heights--and the technique is so simple. There is noth-ing much to it. For a few days you will find it difficult because ofold habits. To break down the old habits takes a few days. With deeper and deeper relaxation it becomes meditation. Meditation is the name of the deepest relaxation. ALLOW THE WISDOM OF THE BODYThe body has great wisdom--allow it. Allow it more and moreto follow its own wisdom. And whenever you have time, just re-lax. Let your breathing go on on its own. Do not interfere. Ourhabit to interfere has become so ingrained that you cannot evenbreathe without interference. If you watch your breathing, youwill immediately see you have started to interfere. You begintaking deep breaths, or you start exhaling more. There is noneed to interfere at all. Just let your breath be as it is; your bodyknows exactly what it needs. If it needs more oxygen it willbreathe more; if it needs less oxygen it will breathe less. Just leave it all to your body! Become absolutely noninter- fering. And wherever you feel any tension anywhere, relax that part. And slowly, slowly . . . First begin while you are sitting, resting, and then while you are doing things. When you are cleaning the floor or working in the kitchen or in the office, keep that relaxedness. Action need not be an interference in your re- laxed state. And then there is a beauty, a great beauty, to your ac- tivity. Your activity will have the flavor of meditativeness. But people go on making unnecessary efforts. Sometimes their efforts are their barriers; their efforts are the problems that they are creating. There was a lot of confusion downtown during the big snowstorm. Mulla Nasruddin went over to help a fat lady get into a taxi cab. After rushing and shoving and slipping on the ice, he told her he did not think he could get her in. She said, "In? I am trying to get out!"Just observe . . . There are things where if you push, you willmiss. Don't push the river at all, and don't try to go upstream.The river is flowing toward the ocean of its own accord--just bepart of it, be part of its journey. It will take you to the ultimate. If we relax, we will know; if we don't relax, we will notknow. Relaxation becomes the door to that great knowing--enlightenment.http://clevelandohiousa.tripod.com/relax ------------------------------------