Welcome to 2014!

In this most intellectual of eras, we are imbued with the philosophy that if we just expose ourselves to good ideas, this will be enough to correct our path. But we see this policy failing time and again for the simple reason that our conditioning has caused us to habituate patterns of behaviour that are counter to the achievement of progressive outcomes. And so even with the best of intentions, we find ourselves individually and collectively tripped up by our fears, habits, emotions and life circumstances, and soon the good intentions have evaporated into the painfully replete pantheon of self-defeated initiatives.

In the Beeja world view, it is all about understanding that we can have all the best software (ideas, intentions) in the world, but if you don\’t have the hardware to run it (a strong, healthy and balanced nervous system) then sooner or later, your system is going to find the new programme either not running so well, or perhaps even completing crashing.

The Beeja way is to get the hardware more fully functional and then, if you wish, you\’ll be in first class condition to upgrade and run your more advanced software (of ideas and intentions). The most interesting and inspiring aspect of it all is that as we develop our hardware, our perceptual and cognitive abilities will increase so much, we will spontaneously get upgrades without even trying (all you have to do is click \’OK\’!).

Without this development, we can try and be mindful and well intentioned as best we like, we can sign up for gym or a new diet etc, but most of the time we will find it a real challenge because our subconscious mind will be trying to pull us in a different direction. This is where the meditation comes in. By using these genius little mantras, we can go beyond the mind, beyond the ego, into our simplest form of being and from there we can rest, heal and develop our nervous system so that we increase our adaptive capabilities and be more present.

So if we put our energies into making the hardware of our nervous system primary, and entreat it to rest and repair time every day (defragging if you will!), then within a few months we find our operating system naturally upgrading and capable of running more and more progressive programming. We then spontaneously start transcending our conditioning and are free to make conscious choices about the changes we would like to see in our lives that we find uplifting and edifying with the foundations of sustainability firmly in place. Now there is a resolution worth making.

For all those who managed to keep up their practise over the Christmas holidays, well done, you have just done it through the most challenging period of the year, good work! For anyone who didn\’t, now is a great time to get back on the meditation express, and by next Christmas your hardware will be so spruced up, your yuletide transcendence will be a walk in the park!