Some Practical Aids to Living

Conscientious living is difficult but extremely joyous and rewarding. I am putting down here some practical aids to living that I found helpful from my long, lived experience.

• You are a subject; you are not an object to be used and manipulated.

• You are a person on your own right. You are not any better or worse than anyone else as a person. No one is big or small.

• Do not lead; do not follow; be led by your own inner light.

• Do not imitate, though imitation may be necessary in one’s early life as all can follow good models; observe the world and the living around you, learn from all, and select what helps you without doing violence to your inner being.

• Be always a student of life.

• Learn from the school of hard knocks; adversities have precious lessons for life.

• Every bad happening contains a message for life; learn to interpret the message contained in it to guide your life.

• Adversarial and unpleasant situations, if taken in the right spirit, will purify and strengthen you instead of making you a bitter person.

• Change the world by changing yourself; when you change, the world automatically changes as you are a part of the world, and you will not be disappointed. Your business in this world is not to change anyone anyway.

• Put into practice first the very advice or suggestions you want to give to others.

• Give to others the freedom you take for yourself.

• Do not preach what you do not put or intend to put into practice.

• Say what needs to be said, and do what needs to be done courageously.

• Do not carry in your head evil and toxic persons who wronged you or betrayed your trust; become wiser so you do not place yourself in similar situations; consider the loss as the costly fee you gave to learn a little more about humanity. In spite of all your cautions, you will still be deceived. Nonetheless, be more cautious, but do not stop trusting lest you stunt your own growth. Besides, humanity cannot progress without trust, and a life without trust and faith is no life at all.

• The good you do for others always comes back to you in some form though not necessarily from expected persons. Besides, doing good is being part of human, and does not require any reward as it is its own reward. Being good and doing good are a beautiful way of being. 

• Criticize persons only when your love for them is stronger than your criticism; when your near or dear ones begin to resent what you think is helpful criticism, stop it because they will not be able to benefit from it anyway.

• Things could always be worse. Be grateful that they are not worse than they really are.

• Let no one condition you or program you without your conscious permission.

• The opportunities that we get to help others and make their lives more bearable and worthwhile are truly privileges to celebrate life and bring humanity back on its track toward its destined course.

The above guidelines may help us examine our own contribution to humanity. For those who love and have a positive outlook on life, everything ultimately works unto good.

Swami Snehananda Jyoti