Slipping away from spiritual ideal is very common for many people. Here are few thoughts on the matter.
Going through a day without the ideal in mind is the first
indication of a slip in spiritual life.
Swami Vivekananda declares, ‘If a man with an ideal makes a
thousand mistakes, I am sure that the man without an ideal makes fifty thousand.’
But, unfortunately many spiritual aspirants lack a clear understanding of the ideal
and so fail to ‘apply it practically to the details of daily life.’ Hence,
Swamiji advises, ‘And this ideal we must hear about as much as we can, till it
enters into our hearts, into our brains, into our very veins, until it tingles
in every drop of our blood and permeates every pore in our body. We must
meditate upon it.’
Explaining how a sadhaka slips away from the ideal, the
Vivekachudamani states, ‘If the mind ever so slightly strays from the ideal and
becomes outgoing, then it goes down and down, just as a ball inadvertently
dropped on the staircase bounces down from one step to another.’
Even a slight digression from the ideal makes the mind
descend toward sense objects. Just as the ball inadvertently slipping from the
hands on the top stair, bounces to the second, fifth, ninth and finally falls
to the bottom of the stairs, even so the mind slips and gathering momentum,
finally crashes into a sensate, bestial life.
Source – Vedanta Kesari
September 2017