Zen: Finding the Way to Harmony & Balance
by Daniel Mitel
Finding Harmony Through Zen
We all love Zen. Zen is unique, as it says that our bodies are holy and our earth is a paradise. No need to look for something outside of us and no need to look for a promised paradise that is not here, on the Earth. It is ordinary, it is simple. All that we need in order to practice Zen is to live now, to enjoy every moment and be spontaneous. Zen is easy; the people who are in harmony with themselves and with the outside world, are Zen Masters!
It is a paradox, but people obsessed with spirituality can lose their harmony easily. There is a famous story about a man’s obsession with money. This man would think all the day about money; his dreams were just about money; how to make money, how to make more money, then how to safeguard his money and so on. Being an exceptional intelligent man, he easily found a way to actually make money. He became rich and in one day he found his way to a monastery and had a chat with a monk. He became very unhappy when he realized that money and richness are useless.
Therefore, he renounced the worldly things to start a monastic life, living under religious vows. He gave up all his possessions and went to a monastery; now he was so against money that if somebody would drop a coin on the floor by mistake he would immediately close his eyes. So, after years of obsession for money, now he was so against it that he would not even touch it or see it.
This is the reason so many people love Zen. It teaches us not to judge. If we say, “This is good” or “This is bad,” we lose the harmony of the moment; we lose the harmony of now. Looking at the facts, at what it is, becomes one of the most difficult things to do. The mind is so involved in everything, that anything we do has a label on it: either “for” or “against.”
Years ago, many people were upset when Osho published his book “From Sex to Super-Consciousness.” They asked Osho to change the title of the book. The very word “sex” combined with “super-consciousness” in the title of the book disturbed them. The funny thing is that some of them did not even read the book. Their mind already gave an interpretation to a simple word without seeing the whole picture.
What is interesting is that when we are against something, we cannot face it, we cannot even understand it. We close the door and it has become an enemy. Unbalanced, we lose the harmony.
When we are against or for something, it is not “we.” It is somebody else. We get everything handed to us. No thought is original! We borrow every idea that we have about something or somebody. Our education, our religion, our culture, all our teachers and friends, our parents and all the books we are reading, all is given to us by the society.
We are not able to see something without judging it. The function of the mind is to divide. It goes on and on, analyzing, cutting, fragmenting, and dividing everything. So, we need a completely reversed process to be in harmony. We need a process that brings the things together, not one that divides them.
If we understand that there are no divisions, and the whole is whole, then there is no judgment. If we understand that what we see and know contains also the unseen and the divine, then truly know Zen. Finally, we are in harmony.
About the Author
Daniel Mitel is a world-class master of meditation, helping people understand the intimate connection to their inner selves, utilizing the ancient system of Heart Imagery. Interviewed and published around the world, Daniel’s books, “This Now Is Eternity” and “Heart Imagery: A Path To Enlightenment,” are highly regarded as some of the best meditation and spiritual guide books. Connect with him on Facebook and Twitter, and discover more at: www.danielmitel.com, www.heartimagery.org, www.motivate-yourself.org
