Episode Transcript
We Americans enjoy a wonderful and powerful way of life, but internally and in relationships, we may wish for better. Join me as we look beneath the surface and gain insights to transform every aspect of your life. My name is Dr. Anne O'Hare, and this is The Spiritual American. Hello everyone and welcome to the Spiritual American. My name is Dr. Anne O'Hare and I'm your host. And today we will be talking about world service. Very interesting topic. I was thinking about this and I think that some people may be very interested in world service. Some people may be very interested in helping the world, have a very kind of, I want to say generous heart. But other people have generous hearts too. But let's say that I have a, I think about other people and I wish I could help in the world and I see what's going on in the world. And I say to myself, I wish. I could do something about it. And it's not so easy to do things physically. I know that some people go do, volunteering and missions and spiritual missions and things like that, which are physical, which is great. But what if I can't do that? Or what if I don't want to do that? If I don't want to serve in that way. So, let's say you're in the camp of, I would like to serve, but I'm not really too interested in going to different countries or going to different areas physically, but I am interested in serving. I do care about the world and I would like to do something about it. So hold that thought. So that's one camp. The second camp would be, I'm not really interested in world service, but I am interested getting better in terms of my mind. Like I am interested in getting control of my mind, feeling better about myself, getting my self respect, feeling calmer, maybe not being so anxious or not being maybe a little bit depressed or whatever it is going on in my mind. Let's say I'm suffering in my mind and maybe I'm not necessarily interested in serving right now because I feel like I'm dealing with myself, but I'm not against it. I just wish that I could get my emotions and my thoughts and my feelings under control. So world service, I'm going to say handles both of those. So whether you're in the camp of, I really want to help, but I'm not really interested in the physical stuff that I've seen, or I'm not against helping, but I got to take care of myself first. Either one of those. Now we're going to talk about world service. And we're going to talk about world service specifically as service through the mind. And I've mentioned that before, there's a name for that. We call it Mansa Seva, Mansa means mind and Seva means service. So service with your thoughts, service with your feelings, service with your good wishes. So how does that work? We have to understand first. How do I access that kind of energy? Because it's not just a fleeting thought that's going to do it. And maybe you can all agree with that. Like if I say, Oh, I wish that there wasn't so much suffering over in this country, or I wish that this wasn't happening, or I wish I, those people who just went through a natural disaster, they're all suffering and, you know, just a thought, it's a thought, it is your thought, but I'm saying that this. World service practice is a way to actually send vibrations and send energy out regarding that situation. So first, I have to access that energy and we call that energy subtle energy or angelic energy. And I was going to talk about the three levels of consciousness. So let's talk about that briefly. So there's three levels of consciousness in Raja Yoga meditation, knowledge, understanding. There's ordinary consciousness, which is what I have now. There's other going on too because I'm aware of it, but generally if I'm sitting on a chair, I'm in Florida, I'm talking to a camera, I'm doing a podcast, that's all ordinary consciousness. It has to do with time and space. It has to do with a body. It has to do with a situation or memories and personality traits and the role that I'm playing and that's all what we call ordinary consciousness or body consciousness. If I move inward a little bit from that. So I'm sitting in meditation and I'm out of my normal thought pattern and I'm moving inward and we're going to move into what I call or what we call the subtle region or the angelic consciousness. And the best way that I can describe this, the example I usually give is let's say you are. You're in a room full of adults, like you're in a room full of 30 people, 30 adults. And somebody walks in with a baby, with an infant. Some lady walks in with an infant in her arms. Now let's rule out the ones that maybe don't like kids or maybe not interested. Take them away. But the, normally, what would be a normal, natural response to an infant coming into the room? You can answer that for yourself, but I'm going to say that the natural response would be you would feel happy, you would feel curious. I feel curious, I feel happy, I want to see the baby, let me see the baby's face, let me see the baby's feet, I want to see, ooh, is it making noise? And all of a sudden that baby, who can't talk, barely knows it's alive, barely knows it has a body, doesn't have a degree, can't give a dissertation, Doesn't have any money, doesn't have a job, doesn't have anything. That baby transforms a whole room full of people just by being there. So what is it about the baby that gives us access to those feelings? Now you could answer that for yourself. I'm going to give two words. I'm going to say purity and innocence. Now, for those of you who are listening who are in the camp of, yeah, world service sounds good, but I got to deal with my mind first. Keep listening. Keep listening. Hang in there. Back to the angelic consciousness. So the baby comes into the room and now all of a sudden I feel happy. I feel sweet feelings. I feel connected. I feel like I want to be with the baby and that baby transformed the whole room with its purity and its innocence. And when I'm in the consciousness of purity and innocence, I naturally feel connected. I naturally feel like I have good feelings, I have good wishes. I want to be close. I'm with the baby. You want to be curious and so forth, right? So, in angelic consciousness, when I'm meditating, I can bring forth those pure feelings and this is how you do it for world service. I say to myself, I am a soul, my nature is peace, and I wish that every soul feels peace. I wish that all souls and all of nature feel peaceful. Now, for the first group, the group that says, I want to do world service, but I don't want to go on a mission and I don't want to go volunteering necessarily. This is a great solution. Great practice because you can do it anytime, all the time, all day long. That feeling that you have that you want to share something positive with the world. You can do it all the time in your mind. But we have to get into that pure consciousness into that kind of innocence. One way of doing it is to just bring your attention inward and say to yourself, get into a feeling of peace or love. They have to get the, generate the feeling and then share it with everyone. So it's, you generate the feeling, you are experiencing it, and then you're sharing it. And in this case, we want to use the word all, all of nature, all souls, everyone, the whole world. feels peace. Now, what does that do for me? Okay. If I'm in the first camp, it's fulfilling a wish. It's fulfilling a natural wish. I want to give, and this is a way that I can give all the time. And I'm using my mind in a way that is valuable versus maybe how am I using my mind otherwise? The camp number two that says, yeah, that sounds good, but I'm got too much going on in here to do that. I want to say to that camp, I was there it was very difficult for me to like sit in meditation and be quiet and love peace and some people love it. So camp A feel much better in that. in the, that kind of realm, but camp B, my camp, they're not so comfortable there. They're much more comfortable in the scientific aspect. So let me give you some science. If you are in the second camp, the camp of yeah, world service sounds good, but I have my own problems or I have my issues and I can't get my mind to calm down and meditation is off the table in no way. All right. Let me give you some science here. Your mind is working all day long anyway, so think about that. My mind is working all day long anyway. And right now I'm feeling A little bit disheartened, a little bit overwhelmed, maybe a lot overwhelmed. And I feel like I got a lot to deal with. So when I'm hearing about spirituality and meditation, all this, it doesn't make much sense because I'm feel like I'm depleted. So I'm going to say, cause I was there, I'm going to say, try the world service just for a minute. a minute a day, a minute today, today, try it for a minute, one minute, set the timer on your phone one minute and say, mind, everything else is going to be put aside for one minute. And for one minute, I'm going to use my mind and my heart in a way that makes me feel good about myself. If you're in the second camp, it's very important to build self respect. I was not in the first camp. I didn't want to hear, I mean, when I heard the knowledge, this knowledge in Raja Yoga, I knew that it was. Something recognized that it was the truth. So I was going to follow it because I'm a good student, right? If I see something, I'm going to go for it. Scientifically, or I'm going to be a good student. I'm going to go after it. I have determination. Fine. But sit still and be blissful in your, in your peace and just go into merge, into the silence and all. No, no, no, no. So I'm talking to those of you out there that are like that. This is a way that you can start putting a drop in the bucket of self respect. One minute, sit still and say, I'm going to use my mind for world service. Deep down underneath all this stress and all this worry and all this upset and all this feeling of disempowerment. Underneath it all, in my heart of hearts, I really do love humanity. I really do wish the best for the world. I really do. Get in touch with that for one minute. I'm going to tell you that that one minute is more powerful than 50 years of the rest of it. Just like a baby comes into a room and transforms the whole room, pure thoughts, love for the world, unlimited love that's authentic coming from you is more powerful than anything going on in your mind right now. Think about it. Why do we do world service? Well, like I said, my mind is working anyway, so why not use it in a worthwhile way? Why not use it in a way that will, if you're in the first camp, fulfill a wish, like I want to help, so I'm going to do this because I, then I feel good about it and I'm going to do what I want. If you're in the second camp, I want to try to access my pure heart so that I can begin to restore my self respect. I'm going to talk to the second camp again just for a second. And this is, I was there. The life is going on. I'm struggling, I'm working, so externally I'm doing everything I can. But internally, there's a sadness inside. There's something not right inside and it always feels like I can't quite do it. I can't quite fix myself. I can't quite get things the way I want them. I can't, that's a horrible place to be. I was there it's a horrible place to be because you think you're doing everything right outside, but inside it never feels satisfied. I'm going to invite you now to the idea that world service is a way to satisfy that feeling. One minute, get in touch with your heart of hearts. Even if there's anxiety, depression, relationship, whatever, whatever, whatever. Let it be there. Don't even try to move it. Don't even try to change it. Let it be there. Sit in the middle of the storm. Sit in the middle of the storm of your mind. Sit in the middle of it and have courage. I actually love the world and I wish peace and love and harmony for the whole world. That's courage and that energy is going to stimulate your self respect and it could start your spiritual journey, but spirituality is not really about religion, although religion could be a tool, spirituality is about restoring your self respect and being of value to yourself and others. So I'll leave it there. Remember our slogan is heal, empower, and serve. And until next time, take care.
