Cultivating Passion

"The Art of Effortless Living"
Chapter 11 - Cultivating Passion

Wouldn't life be easy if we could guide ourselves completely by listening to inner guidance? We wouldn't have to make any decisions ourselves. We'd just abandon ourselves to letting our higher selves take the reins, knowing that we could rest in the certainty of going in the right direction. We'd be totally surrendered.

Wouldn't it be great to live with total abandon to God? To have that sensitivity and awareness of God directing our path so that we wouldn't waver or worry.

In real life, however, surrender is not so easy. Most of us would rather stay in the illusion of control even if that makes our lives harder. We'd rather pretend that if we can just keep on deciding how things are going to go, then life will turn out better. But control is an illusion. It's when we try to control the outcomes of our relationships that we find frustration and disappointment, when we try to control our bodies that we get sick, when we try to control other nations that we end up in wars that destroy us all.

Commitment depends on character, and character includes such qualities as poise, forbearance, kindness, patience, courage and more. we aren't born with these traits. If we have them, it's because we cultivate them...It's because it's so easy to get distracted by daily events and pressures that so many of us don't develop character to a point where it can bring deep rewards...One moment we're all for living with high ideals, and the next moment we're complaining to friends about how awful the world is.

...We have to develop consistency, commitment and sincerity...Strength of character is about having inspiring ideals, and pursuing those ideals is what makes life an act of passion.

...Passion is not something that happens to us. It is a way of living that we develop.

If we want passion, we have to focus our attention on what lifts us higher. Things that lift us higher are the only things that can hold our attention over the long term. They cultivate our capacity for commitment.

Perhaps this is what has been missing for me...focus on what is greater than myself. God is in my life, and I believe God is a great and awesome God. But then I put myself in the equation, and suddenly I believe that I have power to block God's greatness...just by being a mere, ordinary person. What?!

(quote from Vivekenanda) - If a man with an ideal makes a thousand mistakes, I am sure that the man without an ideal makes fifty thousand. Therefore, it is better to have an ideal. And this ideal we must hear about as much as we can, till it enters into our hearts, into our brains, into our very veins, until it tingles in every drop of our blood and permeates every pore in our body.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. Mark 12:30

Chapter 13 - The Art of Personal Relationships

The more empowered we are within ourselves, the more readily we can give up the need for payback from other people. The more we give up the need for payack, the more able we are to support them in a productive manner, even when they cannot give back to us.