Human life today has been made extremely complex where difficulties and problems challenge us from all walks of life. There are people who are struggling to sort out their inner world for a meaningful life, others who are trying to hold together a damaged relationship, individuals who are trying to raise consciousness in society, citizens who are desperate to bring a change in their corrupt political system, those who are seeking to save our environment and others who are tired of extremist perspectives and wish to create universal brotherhood.

The journey is daunting and often people give up. The argument that’s given usually is that one is too small to bring about a change. The person then succumbs to passivity, negativity and hopelessness. This attitude stalls what could have been a forward movement and is responsible for maintaining status quo. What we don’t realise is that neither are we too small nor the problem is beyond our capability. It is actually a flawed psychological attitude that makes success elusive. All of us carry these defective perspectives without being aware. Once we understand this and change ourselves, to our surprise, huge possibilities of individual, interpersonal, social, political and spiritual development opportunities do open up.

While all of us attempt to do a lot, we function from a scattered mind. Our attention is rarely focused as we wish to multi-task owing to our greed, restlessness and sensory needs. The attention, rather than being fully immersed in what we are doing, runs into memories of past and fantasies of the future. Hence we end up wasting a lot of time, develop intense fatigue and execute a poor job. We normally consider attention as a mental capacity; however it is a potential storehouse of energy. Often we dream of acquiring occult powers but ignore the intense energy of attention that we already possess.

The first important step is to become mindful, get a grip on our attention and make it one pointed. Then, whatever we attend to with undivided attention is bound to change.

Also, because attention can run into both positive and negative directions, this power must be utilised in the right manner to achieve good results. But we tend to sit back and allow negative thoughts to take over. Some people constantly see negative things as they have depressive tendencies and find it hard to be hopeful; others do it out of fear so that they can avoid or master their anxieties. There are still others consumed by rage and envy who find solace in imagining disasters.

The Mother repeatedly stressed in her writings that for the growth of consciousness at both individual as well as societal levels, one needs to create positive thoughts with strong will and right intent. She observed that people who let negative thoughts rule their mind create a recipe for disaster at various levels. If our mind dwells on anything negative, we end up attracting it. Therefore, we must make a positive attitude with a definite aim and offer it to the Divine. When we wish for something positive intensely and add our faith in the Divine to it, the goal begins to realise itself.

The essence of the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad is “Aham Brahmasmi” — “I am the Infinite Reality.” Since we carry Infinite Reality within, we need to remember at all times that we are not small. If we have the will, we can make a difference.

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