Explanation for Affirmations
The Affirmations as per Sri Anand Yoga SAY are NOT just part of usual type motivational exercise. Their purpose is far more deeper and forms an essential part of SAY. In a way they lay down the foundation of SAY. Each affirmation in the list has its own significance in the overall scheme of SAY. Let us examine each of the affirmations. All the affirmations are interrelated and together they form a whole affirmation of life. It may look like repetitions. But the purpose is to make it amply clear and look at it from different angles - though the core message is very loud and clear - and that is “I am the architect of my life“. Unless this root idea is established firmly deeper in our psyche, all the other exercises of SAY become superfluous.
These affirmations cause inner re-engineering at the deeper levels. When this concept is firmly established in our life, we are filled with unmatched confidence to take on any challenges head on. We may lose some battles, but we will rise again. Because I am the master of my destiny.
It is of utmost importance to do the practice of SAY Rhythmic Breathing (SAY RB)before doing this practice of Affirmations. This will make the Affirmations reach deep inside your psyche with full force and remain there as a living truth of your life. It will cause a significant change in the whole outlook of your life. Without the prior practice of SAY RB, the uttering of Affirmations will only amount to a futile attempt of 'programming' our mind, only to be erased soon enough with the brush of reality.
1 I am incharge of my life
This affirms the core concept of SAY that I am master of my own destiny.. I am not passing the buck of sharing responsibility for the things in my life which are not to my liking or desire.
Yes, it can be convincingly argued that certain situations in my life are/were beyond my control and my life does not offer any choice to me. For example, my boss is whimsical, is having his own personality issues and he is gullible, gets easily convinced and my jealous colleagues tell him stories against me vitiating his mind against me and thereby ruining my career. I had a troubled childhood due to my alcoholic father, etc. For the sake of arguments, let us assume these facts are fully correct and technically speaking, it is really your somebody else who has caused you suffering. Even then, this affirmation holds good. Let us see how.
Suppose you are taking part in a running competition. You are currently standing at the start line in a ‘get set go’ position, along with other competitors. You have taken the start pose ready to start running the moment whistle blows, fully aware that every second counts. At this point somebody from behind or from the spectator calls your name. You answer that call. But in the meantime the whistle blows and you start running late and lose the race. Therefore the lesson to learn is when you're about to start the race, not to pay attention to any other calls but give you full focussed attention to the sound of the whistle. As per the philosophy of SAY, each moment in our life is a fresh moment. It is the start of our new life from now onwards. There are no hangups of the past life. It should be noted that the incidences of past life are not forgotten. They are kept in the archives readily accessible whenever needed as an input for taking decisions for future events. We start our life at every moment, fresh, full of energy, hope and vitality. We do not wish to be distracted with the emotional baggage of our past life. It should be particularly emphasized here that the above example of racing competition has only limited applicability to SAY. It is given only to illustrate the point of not getting distracted and held back by incidences of our past life. Our life is NOT a race. It is not a competition with our fellow colleagues, companions, friends, enemies, brothers and sisters. Life is a happy journey, not a competition. We are taking everybody along with us making a joyful caravan of fellow travellers.
The thought of taking full responsibility of his life and being the master of his own life without any necessity to rely on any external agency of god, guru etc may initially make one feel vulnerable and uncertain. Because throughout his past life he has been habituated to put his baggage on somebody’s else’s shoulder (actually it continued to remain on his shoulder anyway). Taking responsibility for one’s own life may seem like navigating through uncertain terrains and carrying one’s own baggage on his shoulders. But in reality it is not so. Once you are on the path of SAY, the Path becomes clear and the fog of uncertainty dissipates away. You will feel a great sense of Inner Empowerment and Confidence. This sense you have known never before in your life.
2 I take full responsibility for my current state of affairs. I am at present having …….(here state the negative side of you life … physical sickness ….. …..
This affirmation gets into more specifics of your life. It is a continuation of the first affirmation. The first affirmation stated the general principle. The second affirmation specifically states all the negative aspects of your life which are weighing you down. Then it cuts the shackles one by one and makes you free. Again, as explained before, it may be convincingly argued that the current state of your life is really not as a result of the choices you made in your life, but rather, on the decisions forced on you by some external agency. There is no point in being superficial in the affirmations if one is not fully convinced about the validity of statements made therein. We are NOT doing any mental PROGRAMMING into superficially believing some happy state. It does not work. It is in fact very harmful. We can not cheat our mind. Sooner or later it revolts. SAY never ever recommends such methods. SAY is full of SPONTANEITY. Then the question remains as to how can one make this affirmation while fully believing that he is the victim of circumstances.
When you are on the path of SAY, you are making a fresh beginning of your life. Take an example of a house warming event when you are moving into a new house. You will first clean the house. Paint it. Decorate it. Keep fresh flowers in a vase. Make the whole atmosphere auspicious and pleasant. Making this second (as well as all the others that follow) affirmation is like such acts of cleaning your new house. Your new life is like a new house into which you are soon moving in. You can not put all the dust on the floor under the nice decorative carpet. Similarly, the junk of these specific negative sides of your life (physical illness, relationship issues etc) will be thrown out of your new life with this affirmation. It is not the question of JUSTIFICATION of your current sorry state of affairs. We are inaugurating a fresh new life. The question of justifications for your current state of affairs is not argued this way or that but it is made IRRELEVANT in the new scenario of your life. Take it as a process of RESETTING your life, just like you reboot the computer if it runs slow or hangs up.
3 My life is under my command. I am under no obligation, commitment, duty bound or compelled in any way ……. …...
As is explained in the beginning we are looking at the core affirmation from different angles. This is one such angle. When I say that I am not duty bound, it does not mean I am avoiding responsibility (as Father, Mother, Son, Daughter, Husband, Wife etc). But we are radically changing the way we look at it. The words duty and responsibility give the feeling of ‘load on shoulder, shackles, something which holds you back, ties you down etc’. This sense of duty and responsibility sucks the energy out of you. There are people who spend their whole life under these shackles of duty and responsibility. They always look at some future point on the timeline of their life when they hope to get free of these shackles (e.g. when their children grow up, when give up their job and start their own business and then one day it flourishes etc) and start leading a free and happy life. SAY firmly believes that time is NOW to be free and happy and not at some future point in time. One may be a ninety year old person, but still he can have a fresh start of his life when he is on the path of SAY. The key to understanding this affirmation is in the centre of consciousness from which we operate. In the outer centre, we may operate like an ordinary person in our old ways - or rather APPEAR to be operating that way to a third person. But in reality we begin operating from our inner centre of consciousness. At the inner centre we are free. There are no shackles of duty or responsibility. We live our life as per the CALL OF OUR HEART in the inner centre of our consciousness. You will then breathe in a fresh breeze of air in the vast canvas of your life.
4 I am now making a choice to live a healthy life, to enjoy life to its fullest extent, to have nice relationships with others.
This affirmation reasserts my resolve to be in charge of my life. The key word here is CHOICE. I am living as per my choice and not getting dictated by somebody else. Throughout SAY path, this concept of FREE CHOICE and SPONTANEITY is evident. Here I don’t say ‘I want to enjoy life to fullest extent’. Rather I say ‘I make a conscious choice to enjoy my life to the fullest extent’. It is very essential to fully grasp this core concept of CHOICE. Throughout our past life we have been groomed to think in the way of ‘wanting’. After you enter the path of SAY, you will start thinking in terms of ‘BEING’. Instead of wanting to be happy, you are BEING in a happy state out of your own spontaneous and conscious choice.
5 I am consciously denying other persons, particularly (here name the persons who you feel are the origin of your stress …. ….
In the drama of our life we act out as per the script written by somebody else. In SAY we are our own scriptwrite of our life. There are many characters in our life who cause us emotional stress. Whatever one may decide to lead a happy life, these characters will always extract their pound of flesh from you and cause you misery. No more. When you are on the path of SAY, you deny these persons this privilege. You write your own script. This affirmation asserts this state of your mind. The other person may continue in his old way, but he will not be able to cause you emotional stress. Here one may try to logically argue that I am helpless in the situation. He abuses me and causes me emotional stress. I have no control over him. The key to this situation lies in understanding the way our mind works. You are programmed to feel bad when somebody abuses you. It is not in the intrinsic nature of things to feel bad about it. We need to change this programming and neutralise it. Again this happens in your inner centre of consciousness. If it is necessary to give him back for his abusive behaviour, you may go ahead and jolly well do that. You may even show your anger. You may even be abusive to him in a double measure. But all this in your outer centre of consciousness. In the inner centre you will always feel compassion for him. As you progress on the path of SAY the full understanding of this process will dawn on you. At this juncture, it is enough to make this affirmation with full sincerity.
6 I am giving special thanks full of gratitude and love to …… I have forgiven them ….. ….
Having a sense of gratitude towards your parents is of utmost importance in SAY. Irrespective of whatever may be your thinking of any shortcomings in bringing you up and taking care of you, you must always be grateful to your parents. Of particular importance is your mother. Apart from the rules of ethics, morality and of Dharma behind this rule, there is a deeper level spiritual aspect. During our nine blissful months in the womb of our mother, we are nourished by her though umbilical cord. This cord gets snapped when we take birth in this world. But at the spiritual level, this cord exists throughout our life, even after the death of our mother. We continue to get spiritually nourished from our mother even though it may appear that physically we are separate. When our relationships with our parents are getting strained or distant, this spiritual umbilical cord gets stressed out. It anyway still continues to nourish us. But the full flow of nourishment is not there. From the mother's side, she will always give full nourishment to her children, whatever may be the state of relationship. But due to the stressful or distant relationship, we deprive ourselves, through our own deeds to get full benefit of this nourishment. When we show gratitude to our parents, we reinforce this spiritual umbilical cord and make it fully functional and get fully nourished from our mother. It should be noted that showing gratitude and love does not necessarily mean we always agree with their unreasonable demands or commands. But while not fulfilling their wishes, in our heart we should always be loving and full of gratitude. When one practices this principle, the occasions of not fulfilling the wishes of our parents become lesser and lesser. Our father has always thought good of us and strived his best to give us food and shelter and grooming and protection. Whatever may be our grouse against him for not doing it to our expectation, still it is of utmost importance FOR OUR OWN SAKE to have a genuine sense of gratitude towards your mother and father.
7 I am sending loving energy to the whole Universe and all her inhabitants.
When one does this affirmation, he at once establishes BOND with the Universe and all her inhabitants. Just think of the time when all the humanity on this planet practices this affirmation.This Universe will get HEALED instantly and it will by itself bring in happiness and prosperity on the planet. SAY is not a solitary path. It is a CARAVAN of Pathiks (Co-Travellers) in celebration of life. When one sends loving energy to the whole Universe and all her inhabitants, he is inviting the Universe to join him in the caravan. What a nice and exhilarating feeling it is!
Love bonds with the thing or the person you love and hate detaches, separates, alienates the thing or person you hate. With so much hatred around us and inside us, there is a nagging sense of isolation in the midst of a large circle of friends and relatives. This isolation causes our energy to get saturated inside of us. Bonding with the Universe and its creatures makes this energy flow like a freshwater stream.
Here we have to note that Bonding is not the same as attachment. One can have a loving bonding and at the same time have detachment. This is one of the master keys of SAY.
8 Life is Joy, Happiness, Bliss.
This is again a reassertion of the main theme of SAY. After sending loving energy to the whole Universe as per the affirmation no 7 above, we reassure ourselves that life is joy and happiness. It is that way anyway, whether or not we understand and realise it in our life. Our realisation enables us to participate in the play. This affirmation signifies our consent to participate in this happy and joyful play of life.
9 From now on, I am making conscious choices to live life the way I want and nobody can stop me or put difficulties in my way in realising my desire.
This affirmation reasserts the core theme of SAY - I am the architect of my life. How can I be in the driver's seat unless it is I who makes conscious and fully aware choices about the path I take in my life? If I am driven by my instincts and passions rather than by my fully aware and conscious being behind my outer being, then my life gets driven hither and thither by the stormy winds of my instincts originating from my inflated Ego center. The Ego centre gives birth to the tendency of greed, jealousy, anger, hatred and attitudes.
The second part of this affirmation states that ‘nobody can stop me or put difficulties in my way of realising my desire’. It is the other side of the same coin. The meaning of the first part is more explicitly stated in this second part. We come across many players in our life like our spouse, boss, lover etc who may cast a shadow on our life and dictate our life. There is no point in blaming them for our misery. It is we who have given them the reins of our life, consciously or subconsciously or compulsively. Difficulties may still arise. But we do not get dictated by these difficulties. As a prudent measure, we may at times go with the wind. But always keep at the back of our mind that we will find a way out of this situation and have a life of our choices.
10 I am now feeling Peace. All the tension has been released. I am consciously living in all parts of my body.
This affirmation is a closure to all the 9 affirmations we made earlier. These 9 affirmations are also meant to cut the shackles which have tied you down. As a result of the freedom we enjoy, there naturally comes a feeling of peace. The tensions get released. One starts to live in the body rather than in the mind in a conscious way.
It is again emphasised that these affirmations are not part of positive motivations to programme the mind. This will then have a very superfluous effect on our mind. It will soon wither away with passage of time. The affirmations in SAY are not to be ‘spoken’ but ‘FELT’ inside of our heart. Initially one may have some difficulty in ‘feeling’ it but as one progresses on the path of SAY, this comes very naturally in his heart. It is also clarified that after one progresses on the Path and naturally feels these affirmations in his heart and they become a part of his everyday, every moment life, it will then not be necessary to specifically devote time for this exercise. One may at times skip them. Once in a while, the person should refresh his mind with these affirmations. It is also absolutely necessary to innerly keep ‘reflecting’ on these affirmations in an ongoing manner and to trap the moment when one gets digressed in his actual behaviour from the core philosophy of these affirmations. For example when one feels dejected, annoyed, angry, hateful, jealous, sad over any incident, one should immediately innerly get back to himself and find out the root cause of these feelings. One is sure to find the root cause in violation of one of the affirmations. No point in feeling guilty or remorseful for this or for one’s helplessness preventing it. Any sense of guilt or remorse or dejection is totally taboo in SAY. It is enough that one has spotted the crack in his armour. When one is on the Path and diligently follows the tenets of SAY, sooner or later, he is sure to gain mastery over his instincts. We are going to have several other SAY practices along with these affirmations and they all go on reinforcing each other on the way.
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