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I have noticed that when one really does accept something for what it is, even if it seems very unpleasant, it frequently stops. You can’t ‘game’ this. If you have not truly accepted whatever it is, it will continue. But when you really do rise above a challenge, sometimes you won’t really need to face it any more.
When I started working at one place, early on I had 3 separate people unleash tremendous anger on me. In one situation the person misunderstood something that had happened. In the other two their anger really didn’t have anything to do with me. I admit I was not without ripples – but while I didn’t understand it, I also didn’t absorb it. Their anger was theirs. I chose not to adopt it. It never happened again in that place with those people or anyone else!
A reader of this monthly eNotes Newsletter sent me a very similar story a couple of weeks ago. The union leaders in his business in India had chased out 17 production engineers in 10 years by abusive behavior. This gentleman declined to play the game. Before long, the workers started treating him courteously. When he asked them why, they told him that what they had been doing ‘had no effect on him.’
To consider this from an energetic point of view: Whatever someone throws at you is ‘just’ energy. If you tighten up, what happens is that energy bounces back at them – and can gain power as it caroms - back, forth and around. If you stay calm, take the energy in, and raise it, the ‘sender’ can’t continue to build on it. And you further develop your own energetic flow.
Work on acceptance. It may be that will lead to some challenge stopping. Whatever life throws at you - the best response is acceptance.
And if it continues? Then you will have accepted it and it will no long bother you! Now that's a win-win.
Blessings and joy.
Timothy
Come join us for Spiritual Renewal Week.
Our biggest week of the year:
Join Ananda Village and residents of other Ananda Colonies, and members and friends from near and far. Dedicate a week to going deeper. It will serve you always.
- Music: Choir songs every day, kirtan, concert
- Spiritual Talks: from Nayaswamis Jyotish & Devi Novak and others of Ananda Worldwide's top speakers and teachers
- Spiritual Companionship: spend a week with others dedicated to spiritual growth
- Meditations: daily led programs and lots of time to go deep
- Q&A: with Jyotish & Devi, Ananda's Spiritual Directors
- Performance: The Peace Treaty by Swami Kriyananda
- Classes: some afternoon classes on special topics of interest
- Dining: Great vegetarian meals every day - and a fabulous Indian Banquet Saturday night.
Inspiration from Yogananda
It is important to realize that in yoga practice, as in any sincere search for God (the one Self, beyond all duality), there is no wasted effort, and no karmic rebound. There is, in other words, no “catch” to seeking God. With any other effort, no matter how glorious the consequences, it is always legitimate to ask, “What's wrong with it?” Only with the divine search is the answer a resounding, “Nothing's wrong!” Even to fail in this quest brings only good karma.
From The Essence of the Bhagavad Gita,
Explained by Paramhansa Yogananda, As Remembered by His Disciple, Swami Kriyananda
The Essence of the Bhagavad Gita
July 13 - Aug 6
Take your spiritual life into an entirely new dimension as you unlock the secrets of this powerful scripture. Swami Kriyananda has called the Gita “the world’s greatest scripture” -- not that its teachings are better than other scriptures, but that they are so direct, accessible, and doable. This full-immersion program will take you deeply into those teachings so you will understand them not only intellectually, but intuitively and practically.
Inspirational Wisdom
Life is so generous a giver. But we, judging its gifts by their covering, cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard. Remove the covering, and you will find beneath it a living splendor, woven of love by wisdom, with power. - Giovanni Giocondo
Raising Calm and Compassionate Children
Aug 5 - 8
with optional add-on day Aug 8
Bring your family for a weekend of fun in the Sierra Foothills at Ananda Village, an intentional community with its own school system.
Enjoy a family vacation and learn valuable parenting skills from extraordinary educator Susan Usha Dermond - teacher, school principal, and author of Calm and Compassionate Children: A Handbook. Learn more …
A Special Gardening Karma Yoga Opportunity
Limited availability between now and August 11th. Come for at least 5 days, stay in a tent, have meals here, join karma yoga meetings, and garden at least half of each day. Small contribution asked. If you are interested, email info@expandinglight.org with Garden Karma Yoga in the subject line. Write a bit about your gardening experience and interests. You will hear back from Lalaan
The 4th Stage of Life: A Spiritual Opportunity
Aug 12 - 14
We will have ‘the time of our lives’ together, celebrating how far God has brought us at this point and looking at the opportunities ahead.
We will focus mostly on the ‘retirement years’, with their many interesting possibilities for living happier and more fulfilled lives.
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Special Events 
