By Swami Shrutananda

According to the National Science Foundation, 80% of our thoughts are negative and 95% of our thoughts are repetitive. WOW. That is a lot of negative, repetitive thoughts! 

Also, most of your thoughts are about other persons, which means you are running repetitive negative thoughts about other people most of the time. You may be ruminating about something that was said or happened yesterday or decades ago.

Every time you run one of these memories, you are living through it again. Triggered by the “fight or flight” response, your adrenal glands release cortisol and adrenaline, the stress hormones.  

Your body and mind suffer from this barrage of chemicals of negativity. Your tailbone tightens, your stomach hurts, your heart rate increases, your blood pressure soars. You suffer from anxiety and insomnia. Unfortunately, this is how most people live.

The ancient sage Patanjali defines memory:

Anubhuuta-vi.saya-asa.mpramo.sa.h sm.rti.h

 — Yoga Sutras 1.11

Memory is not allowing an experience to escape from your mind.

– Rendered by Gurudevi Nirmalananda 

When a past experience comes up again and again, you are grabbing it back so it won’t escape from your mind. Why? Because you have built an identity around it. 

Your mind works hard to hang on to it so you can use it as a crutch to prop up your identity. Each one of those memories begins with “I am.” I am a thoughtful person. I am an honest person. I am an injured person.    

For example, I may have an identity around what I do, “I am a great cook.”  If someone critiques the delicious food I made for them, my identity of “good cook” is threatened. Maybe they say it needs less salt or longer cooking. Or that they “have had better.” If they don’t like my cooking, I feel that they don’t like me.

But this is not the problem. There is an underlying problem, truly the only problem you have. You don’t know your Divine Essence. Therefore, you want everyone to support your shaky identities. When they don’t, your mind runs negative thoughts, slicing and dicing those people, those situations and perhaps even yourself.

This is called the human condition. It is your starting point. Yet your human capacity is to know the One Divine Bliss Reality — your own Self. Then you no longer look toward other people to support your identities and fulfill your needs.  

How can you come to know? Patanjali gives us a more positive way to use your memory:

Vita-raaga-vishayam vaa cittam.

– Yoga Sutras 1.37

Quiet your mind and uplift your state by thinking of a Great Being.  

– Rendered by Swami Nirmalananda Saraswati

When you catch your mind spinning reruns, choose to remember a Great Being. Using your mind’s capacity to concentrate, focus on the one who lives from the Self. This is the Guru. In yoga, you focus on the Guru. How would you feel if you thought of them now? Two minutes from now? Two minutes from then… 

The Guru lifts you out of your negativities and gives you your own Self. Such a Guru lives in a state of Self-Knowingness, Beingness and Bliss. Remembering such a Guru gives you the inner experience they live in. As you remember them, your experience of Self deepens within more and more.

Svaroopa^® yoga and Svaroopa^® Vidya Meditation are a yoga based in relationship with a Self-Realized being. Such a yogi shows you what Self-Realization — the knowing of your own Divine Essence — looks like. They give you the inner experience they live in. They know the specific yoga practices you need for becoming Self-Realized. Being in relationship with such a living breathing teacher is essential.  

Swami Nirmalananda is such a Siddha. She lifts you out of the muck and mire of your mind. It’s so easy! You simply use the power of your memory to remember her. This triggers an inner shift, deepening you into the Self that you already are.

I have found that remembering the Guru frees me from negative thoughts about other people and myself. When I see where my mind is headed, I make a choice and remember my Guru. I do this in the midst of life as well as in meditation. It always calms my mind, settling me deeper inside and opening me inward to my own Self.

If you don’t know such a Guru, I’ll share mine with you. She wants to be available to you. Get to know her by attending her programs in person or online. Every Wednesday and Sunday, she offers the teachings of yoga along with deep meditation. 

Every month, she writes a free Teachings Article. In her free Q&A programs, ask about your spiritual process. You can even ask questions about how to be in relationship with other people in your life while on your spiritual path. Check out our calendar!

She wants you to receive the greatest gift of all, which she got from her own Guru, Swami Muktananda. He gave her the gift of her own Self. You can receive this gift. Fill your mind full of the Guru. It is the easiest and best way to fill your mind with your own inherent Divinity.