Whatever we are doing, believing, thinking, desiring, understanding, feeling – if we are not aware of them while aware of ourselves in the present – we are asleep, and all are but embers of a dream.
There are many people who fast, whose fast is nothing but hunger and thirst. There are those whose prayer is no better than wakefulness and hardship. The eating and drinking in case of the former and sleeping in the latter’s case is a far better option.
Do you become spiritual by performing ceremonies and rituals…? Ceremonies and rituals sometimes give a certain sensation, so-called uplift. But they are repetitious, and every sensation that is repeated soon wearies of itself.
Those who read books cannot understand the teachings and, what’s more, may even go astray. But those who try to observe the things going on in the mind, and always take that which is true in their own minds as their standard; never get muddled.
