A Life in Harmony
I 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 our lives 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 who are obsessed with spirituality are easily losing their harmony. In the early 90’s I had a very good friend that had an obsession for money. He would confess to me that 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 do this. He became rich and one day he called saying he wanted to tell me something important.
We met and he told me that he is was very unhappy. He had just finished reading Paul Brunton’s book “A Search in Secret India” and he realized that money and richness are useless. He also told me that he was ready to renounce the worldly things and start a monastic life, living under religious vows.
So he gave up all his possessions and went to a monastery in Carpathian Mountains. I passed by a year later and saw him. He was so against money that when I dropped a floor by mistake he immediately closed his eyes. So, after years of obsession with money he was now so against it that he would not even touch it or see it.
I looked at him and ask him, “What is this hatred against money? What are you afraid of? A few years ago you used to dream about money all the time.”
He said, “Money is evil. If I touch money I will never see Paradise – I will never see God.”
I smiled and told him, “You do understand that this place where you stay was created with money – actually with alot of money. And half of the things you have here in the monastery were bought from the city with money, right? The sugar you just put in your tea now was bought with money!”
That is the reason I 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 has become one of the most difficult things to do. The mind is so involved in everything. Everything we do has a label on it either “for” or “against”.
I still remember many years ago, how people were upset when the master teacher, Osho published his book “From Sex to Super-Consciousness”. They asked Osho to change the title of the book. The very word “sex” in the title made them disturbed. The funny thing is that some of them didn’t even read the book! Their mind already gave an interpretation of the book by this simple word.
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 becomes an enemy. We lose the harmony. We become unbalanced.
I want to say something even more interesting. Everything has been given to us. No thought is original! Every idea that we have about something or someone is a borrowed thing. 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 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 and dividing everything. So to become harmonious, a complete reversal process is needed: a process that brings things together not one that divides them.
If we understand that there is no division and the whole is Whole, than there can be no judgment. If we understand that what we see and know contains also the unseen and the Divine, then we are in harmony.
Daniel Mitel
www.danielmitel.com;
www.heartimagery.org
Daniel is a world traveler helping people understand their intimate connection to God. He started to teach Zen Meditation in 1981 and between 1981 and 1992 he was practicing “the spinal breathing” meditation; later he found out that, in fact, he did practice the Kriya Pranayama of Kriya Yoga Great Master Babaji. Since 1996, he is teaching worldwide Meditation Day Workshop and Heart Imagery Workshops. After couple of years spent in meditation in North of Tibet, in 1999, Daniel created “The School of the Heart”. Ten years later, in Toronto, he created “The School of Meditation”. Daniel is an Ambassador of Peace and Diplomat of Love in the Embassy of Peace. International lecturer and Martial Arts Master (Tai Chi Master and Karate Traditional Black Belt 5 DAN in WJKA – World Japan Karate Association), Daniel is dedicated to inspiring the world to move from violence to peace and from anger to love. Throughout his work, workshops and spiritual conferences, Daniel changed the life of thousands of people. After Tibetan Great Lama Masters, Daniel worked with a group of well known Masters from different schools of meditation (Osho, Dalai Lama, Paramahansa Prajnananda, Ana, Di Yu Ming, Sadhguru, Drunvalo Melchizedek, Jasmuheen, Anastasia) who train their students to be in the Heart. Now, together with his own workshops (Meditation Day and Heart Imagery), Daniel Mitel is bringing Awakening The Illuminated Heart and Luscious Lifestyle Program workshops out to the world. By teaching all these spiritual seminars, Daniel is sharing a message of hope and possibility to anyone who wants to experience a new understanding of life; an understanding which comes from the heart. Drunvalo Melchizedek appointed Daniel in the first Council of School of Remembering: Awakening The Illuminated Heart (ATIH) Teacher’s Council. As a Mentor of Drunvalo Melchizedek’ School of Remembering, Daniel was helping and teaching ATIH teachers from all over the world. Daniel is blessed to work with children, teaching them Tai Chi and Meditation.In the last years, since he is visiting teacher in Montessori Schools, Daniel changed the life of hundreds of children through his work. Interviewed all over the world and constantly invited to write articles in magazines and on-line publications (Spirit of Ma’at, Collective Evolution, Vision, etc.) Daniel is one of the most prominent Master of Meditations known worldwide showing the inner power what you can achieve using your Heart’s unconditional love. Daniel’s book “This Now Is Eternity” is highly regarded as one of the best meditation and spiritual guide tool now available in iBook store and KOBO!