Positive Attitude

[Greg Goode]

At 07:59 PM 10/1/97 -0400, Ram Chandran wrote:
>What is the right path of our life?  The seers who wrote the Upanishads
>have this excellent answer: " Life is a bridge; enjoy while crossing it;
>but don't build a castle on it."   The creator of human life gave the
>positive mental attitude as a gift to the new born child.  This gift has
>helped the child to accept everything from everybody.  We better
>remember and learn from the child to accept life, the gift of God.  Let
>us also remember not to teach our bad habits to the children!  With
>positive mental attitude, we can accept the realities of life without
>resistance and fear.   We become the witness of our own life and can
>probably accept joy, sorrow, good, bad, tall, short, beauty, ugly,
>light, dark, past, present and future.  We can stop asking instantaneous
>explanations for everything.


I agree with all this, and most of the rest of this posting.
It's wonderful and inspiring!  A positive attitude really melts all
these problems away!   But unfortunately, a positive attitude
is not the outcome of one or more choices.  It comes of its own or not.  Have
you ever tried to cultivate a certain attitude and been struck by how
stubbornly it doesn't come?  Other times, it appears as if from nowhere,
and you analyze everything in your environment to see what you can do to
bring it BACK again!  It's mysterious and spontaneous. If people could bring
it upon themselves, then everyone would!!  Everyone would be happy!

--Greg

>From  Thu Oct  2 13:11:44 1997
Message-Id: <THU.2.OCT.1997.131144.0400.>
Date: Thu, 2 Oct 1997 13:11:44 -0400
Reply-To: chandran at email.tidalwave.net
To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
From: Ram Chandran <chandran at TIDALWAVE.NET>
Organization: Personal
Subject: Re: Positive Attitude
Comments: To: Advaita List <advaita-l at tamu.edu>
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Greg Goode <goode at DPW.COM> in reply to Ram wrote:

< But unfortunately, a positive attitude is not the outcome
> of one or more choices.  It comes of its own or not.  Have
> you ever tried to cultivate a certain attitude and been struck
> by how stubbornly it doesn't come?  Other times, it appears as if
> from nowhere, and you analyze everything in your environment to see
> what you can do to bring it BACK again!  It's mysterious and spontaneous.
> If people could bring it upon themselves, then everyone would!!
> Everyone would be happy!

        I agree with your comment and let me add more on my own. Positive
attitude can only come with the Grace of God.  King Kulasekhara (well
known devotee of Lord Krishna) has composed in sanskrit a beautiful poem
- "Mukunda-Mala-Stotra" consisting of 53 verses in praise of Lord
Krishna.  In those verses his only request to Lord Krishna is to ask HIM
to remain stay in his heart. The purification of the mind with the total
surrender is reflected in those verses. The idea is very simple. When
divinity stays inside the human heart, the divine qualities such as
happiness, kindness, goodness, generosity and positive attitude come
along with the divinity!  In otherwords, life and positive attitudes are
the gift of God. In advaitic philosophy, divinity is regained with
self-realization. In VisishtAdvaita, divinity is achieved through total
surrender. In either situation, with complete, unity, mind gets cleaned
and remain clean!
        When we have the positive attitude we think differently. Here is a
beautiful quotation on the right attitude. "An act of goodness is of
itself an act of happiness. No reward coming after the event can compare
with the sweet reward that went with it."    Maurice Maeterlinck
(1862-1949). This is another way of looking at the Karma Yoga!

Upanishads contain these two beautiful quotations on positive attitude:
We can never change the world but we can change ourselves to enjoy the
world as it is!    Upanishads
He Who sees all beings in his own Self, and his own Self in all beings,
lives in peace.     Upanishads

In Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna gives the simple rule to get the positive
attitude: Learn to do action without looking for results.  In essence,
avoid the results which are responsible for corrupting the body, mind
and intellect!

Ram Chandran