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Wednesday, May 2, 2018

Root out pride and arrogance

For some reasons people are aspired to attain or possess certain qualities in order to be eligible or qualified to feel proud and arrogant towards themselves and/or others.

People are being encouraged to cultivate pride and arrogance as well, as somehow they think it's very good/important to be able to be proud and arrogant about something that they think it deserves to be proud of, that would make them feel somehow more stand out, unique and better than some others.

"Do something and be someone that make yourself and other people feel proud of."

People like to encourage and support other people to stay motivated and to be better by telling people, "I'm so proud of you!" People grew up with the thinking/belief/values/aspiration of need to be attaining or possessing certain qualities to feel proud of themselves and also make other people feel proud of them.

"I want to be proud of myself. I want other people to be proud of me."

People would feel inferior, bad, depressed and disappointed towards themselves when they think they haven't or couldn't attain or possess certain qualities that allow themselves and others to feel proud of.

Those who want to attain liberation must contemplate on all these worldly social cultural thinking/belief/expectation, to see the truth of it. All these are nothing but the play of egoism - It's merely the ego that needs to feel proud and needs others to feel proud of 'I' in order to feel satisfied, loved, motivated, appreciated, acknowledged, good, happy, confident and meaningful.

Meanwhile, some people think and believe that they are not at all proud and arrogant, as they are aware of the downside of pride and arrogance, and they don't want to be associated with pride and arrogance, but they aren't aware of themselves are already being over-powered by pride and arrogance. Without awareness, people can be proud of the thinking of 'I am not a proud and arrogant person. I practice humility. I am very humble.'

In Yoga, pride and arrogance is the by-product of egoism born out of ignorance. It's one of the great obstacles that hinders the mind to be opened to learn and practice yoga and meditation, to inquire the truth.

If we sincerely want to learn and practice yoga and meditation, we need to first learn how to identify pride and arrogance and free the mind from it. But, it's really not easy for people to let go pride and arrogance, as it is a part of their strong identity of themselves.

Even many 'graduated/certified/qualified/experienced yoga teachers' are being proud and arrogant towards themselves for having attended one or many 'yoga teachers training courses' attaining one or many certifications or qualifications in this or that, that they had studied and practiced yoga under one or many 'famous' or 'popular' yoga teachers/Gurus/schools, as well as their years of experience in practicing and teaching yoga, or they have recruited certain numbers of yoga students, or they had taught in certain yoga schools or yoga centres or yoga festivals or yoga conventions, or they had participated in some 'yoga competitions' and won certain awards, or they have done such and such charity works, or they have been contributing articles of yoga or being 'interviewed' in such and such magazine or social media, and so on. Most people would justify that their intention of getting all the attention, admiration and publicity is for promoting yoga to more people in the world. But, how pure and true is that?

Two of the common characteristics of pride and arrogance that exist in many yoga practitioners who already have been practicing certain style(s) of yoga for some time, or 'graduated/certified/qualified/experienced yoga teachers' who have attained many certifications/qualifications/experiences from attending different yoga courses and have been teaching 'yoga classes' or 'yoga courses' for some time :-

"I am experienced/qualified/knowledgeable/advanced yoga practitioner/yoga teacher. I know enough and I have long time experience in practicing/teaching yoga. I don't need someone to lecture me about yoga/yoga practice/teaching yoga, or tell/teach me the many things that I already knew."

"This is different from the yoga that I have been learning/practicing/teaching for many years. I don't agree with this, I don't like this. I don't want this."

When there is such pride and arrogance, the mind is closed, being unable to be opened to inquire/investigate the truth of something that is beyond what the mind thinks it knows, or something that is different from or contradicted with the existing familiar practice, thinking and belief in the mind, that the mind doesn't know or doesn't familiar with. We won't/can't learn anything that we actually didn't know but we think and believe that we already knew very well, even if there's a great teacher or great teaching in front of us.

Be free.

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Know thyself. Everything is impermanent and selfless. There is no 'I'. There is no 'I am selfless'/'I am not selfless'. There is no 'I am hurt'/'I need to be healed from hurt'. Non-blind believing, non-blind following, non-blind practicing and non-blind propagating, but be open-minded to inquire the truth of everything. Be free. Be peaceful. Be happy.

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