Give Up One Thing – Om Swamiji

As in today’s Zoom Satsang Swamiji asked us to give up one thing and only one thing neither two nor three. It could be sugar, tea, coffee, alcohol or any other bad habit or addiction, which we constantly thought about all the time and found it hard to get rid of.

After watching this live telecast, I got confused what should I give up.

I contemplated on the first option – sugar; I hardly ate one-teaspoon sugar per fortnightly. The sweets I prepared are mostly without any sugar and are mainly jaggery, honey, dates or raisins based. I do not add sugar in milk, mango shake or any other smoothie. It was not a thing that consumed on regular basis.

I moved to the next option tea, coffee and alcohol. I drank neither tea nor coffee. Moreover, I am teetotaler.  

I consumed good amount of processed foods like biscuits, namkeen, rusk, khakhada, bread, buns, paav etc but during my Sadhana, I completely abstained from eating any processed food as it might contain some onion or garlic flavor or anything that should not be consumed during Sadhana furthermore I preferred to eat simple home cooked food without onion and garlic.

Occasionally, I ate chole bhature and I could give it up for some time. However, it would be of no use as nearby Haldiram outlet was closed in lockdown. Samoosas, golgappas, pakoodas and bedmipuri all fell in the same category.

When I could not find anything much to change in my food habits so I tried searching other emotional and mental practices, which needed some change. I loved watching movies and had watched many movies from Bollywood, Tollywood and Hollywood. I could even watch movie in any foreign language without dubbing or subtitles in English or Hindi, the two languages that I understood well. From past near about seven or eight months I had not watched any movie as I was busy doing Sadhanas as suggested by Swamiji. Therefore, it was also not a correct option to give up.

I did not have Netflix, Amazon prime or Cable subscription because I did not own a T.V. but I had huge bookshelves for keeping my books on different subjects. As I had stated earlier that I loved to watch cartoons but after following Swamiji’s instructions in ‘Attainment of Siddhis Part -3’, I stopped watching cartoons or news while having my meals. Now, I only watched cartoons occasionally, mostly when I was not feeling well or feeling a bit low. With mostly grey hair on my head, if I said I gave up watching cartoons it would sound more like a joke than a serious task for a spiritual seeker.  

I could give up lies but I was already practicing it from quite some time.

What should I give up?

Most of the time my mind is engaged in planning or preparation of the future. Slowly and gradually, it shifts from positive planning to negative thinking and then I find myself caught in negative thoughts, feelings and emotions worrying about the future that do not exist and that events or situations will never happen in the future. May be I overthink! As Swamiji has said in ‘A Million Thoughts’, “No imagination: Don’t imagine what may happen in the future.” I am giving up negative thoughts and nonconstructive imagination related to future.

I will welcome the future with my open heart as MA’s blessings! 🙂

Dear readers, so what are you giving up?