15 Laws of Life From Swami Vivekananda What You Need to Keep in Mind 1. Love Is The Law Of Life: All love is expansion, all selfishness is contraction. Love is therefore the only law of life. He who loves lives, he who is selfish is dying. Therefore, love for love's sake, because it is law of life, just as you breathe to live. 2. It's Your Outlook That Matters: It is our own mental attitude, which makes the world what it is for us. Our thoughts make things beautiful, our thoughts make things ugly. The whole world is in our own minds. Learn to see things in the proper light. 3. Life is Beautiful: First, believe in this world - that there is meaning behind everything. Everything in the world is good, is holy and beautiful. If you see something evil, think that you do not understand it in the right light. Throw the burden on yourselves! 4. It's The Way You Feel: Feel like Christ and you will be a Christ; feel like Buddha and you will be a Buddha. It is feeling that is the life, the strength, the vitality, without which no amount of intellectual activity can reach God. 5. Set Yourself Free: The moment I have realised God sitting in the temple of every human body, the moment I stand in reverence before every human being and see God in him - that moment I am free from bondage, everything that binds vanishes, and I am free. 6. Don't Play The Blame Game: Condemn none: if you can stretch out a helping hand, do so. If you cannot, fold your hands, bless your brothers, and let them go their own way. 7. Help Others: If money helps a man to do good to others, it is of some value; but if not, it is simply a mass of evil, and the sooner it is got rid of, the better. 8. Uphold Your Ideals: Our duty is to encourage every one in his struggle to live up to his own highest idea, and strive at the same time to make the ideal as near as possible to the Truth. 9. Listen To Your Soul: You have to grow from the inside out. None can teach you, none can make you spiritual. There is no other teacher but your own soul. 10. Be Yourself: The greatest religion is to be true to your own nature. Have faith in yourselves! 11. Nothing Is Impossible: Never think there is anything impossible for the soul. It is the greatest heresy to think so. If there is sin, this is the only sin - to say that you are weak, or others are weak. 12. You Have The Power: All the powers in the universe are already ours. It is we who have put our hands before our eyes and cry that it is dark. 13. Learn Everyday: The goal of mankind is knowledge... now this knowledge is inherent in man. No knowledge comes from outside: it is all inside. What we say a man 'knows', should, in strict psychological language, be what he 'discovers' or 'unveils'; what man 'learns' is really what he discovers by taking the cover off his own soul, which is a mine of infinite knowledge. 14. Be Truthful: Everything can be sacrificed for truth, but truth cannot be sacrificed for anything. 15. Think Different: All differences in this world are of degree, and not of kind, because oneness is the secret of everything.
Hare Krishna ! It's all beautiful. It is also said that sincerity is the first and most important thing. Swami Vivekananda also said, " Be sincere to the core of your heart". I had the compassion and grace of the Lord to sit at the feet of Ma Indira Devi, who often used to tell us that the most important quality of a seeker is sincerity. Love, Kumar.
Discrimination - viveka - is also a very important quality. Without it, one is susceptible to believe all sorts of stuff.
How ironic. I was reading one of Swami Vivekanadaji's books this weekend and this quote jumped out and has been my reflection of the week: ""Enveloped in Tamas, however much you may be, know all that will clear away if you take refuge in Him by being sincere to the core of your heart".
Hare Krishna! From BBB..... Discrimination - viveka - is also a very important quality. Without it, one is susceptible to believe all sorts of stuff. Very true, Bill. Love, Kumar.
Hare Krishna! From Nicole...... How ironic. I was reading one of Swami Vivekanadaji's books this weekend and this quote jumped out and has been my reflection of the week: ""Enveloped in Tamas, however much you may be, know all that will clear away if you take refuge in Him by being sincere to the core of your heart". Dear Nicole, I took the Vivekananda-quote readily from your post only ( In Simplicity thread). Vivekananda always stressed on Sincerity, Simplicity, Discrimination (As BBB said it) and Love. Love, Kumar.
Hare Krishna! From Blue Meanie .................This is the first time i'v ever heard about this man. He is incredible... Dear Blue-Meanie, It is nice to read your simple and honest statement. There is always a first time for everything and it is always nice to know something for the first time. We talked about Narendranath Dutta who was born in 1865 in Calcutta (India) and died in 1904 (Also in Calcutta) at a very young age of only 39. He was one of the greatest sons of this mother earth. From Narendranath Dutta he became known to the whole world as a sadhu (Saint), Swami Vivekananda by name. He was one of the twelve great disciples of Avatar-purush, Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa. He was a Yogi who believed in selfless works for the upliftment of the poor, down-trodden and helpless people. What Sri Ramakrishna had wanted through him was to do work for the people considering God resides in them. That is exactly what he had done in his short span of life - doing service to the mankind as doing service to God. With love, Kumar.
Hahaha...woops. Wow Nicole, way to not pay attention to you wrote. hahaha... wow. Vivekanandaji also talked a lot about determination and not giving up and I really think that combined with all those things that you have just mentioned that he is really an inspirational figure and he gives a lot of really really practical and inspirational advice.
He is also well known as one of the first (if not the first) people to bring Hinduism to America (and later also went to England). He spoke for the first time at the Chicago Parliment of Religions in 1893. He became very well respected and gave many lectures all over the US.
http://www.btinternet.com/~vivekananda/ You can find a lot about Vivekananda here, including his bio and complete works.
