Seven days to begin
One line and one small practice a day, from seven different masters, for someone who has never done any of this.
Arise
उत्तिष्ठत जाग्रत प्राप्य वरान्निबोधत ।
क्षुरस्य धारा निशिता दुरत्यया
दुर्गं पथस्तत्कवयो वदन्ति ॥
kṣurasya dhārā niśitā duratyayā
durgaṁ pathas tat kavayo vadanti
Arise! Awake! Having found the great ones, learn. The path is sharp as a razor's edge, hard to cross—so the poets say.
Vivekananda took his motto from the first line. Note that the verse does not promise it will be easy.
Vivekananda took his motto from this verse and dropped the second half. Keep it. The path is a razor's edge; nobody serious has ever said otherwise. Begin anyway.
Sit for five minutes this morning, upright, doing nothing. That is the whole of day one.
Aspire
Aspiration is an act of the will and one can always aspire.
You do not have to feel spiritual to begin. Aspiration, Sri Aurobindo says, is an act of will—available at any moment, in any mood. The feeling follows the act, not the other way round.
Once today, stop and turn inward with a wordless call for whatever you most need—peace, clarity, help. Ten seconds.
Pick one path
You must stick to one path with all your strength. A man can reach the roof of a house by stone stairs or a ladder or a rope-ladder or a rope or even by a bamboo pole.
Ramakrishna practised every path and then told people to stick to one. The stairs, the rope and the bamboo pole all reach the roof; switching between them reaches nothing.
Choose one name or form of God, or one practice, that you already have some feeling for. Write it down. Do not change it for a month.
Do not find fault
If you want peace of mind, do not find fault with others. Rather see your own faults. Learn to make the whole world your own. No one is a stranger, my child; the whole world is your own.
Sarada Devi's last message. Peace of mind is lost first through fault-finding, and regained by turning the same eye inward. It is the least glamorous instruction in this library and the most reliable.
For one day, notice each time your mind criticises someone. Do not stop it; just see it.
Strike a light
If the room is dark, do you go about beating your chest and crying, “It is dark, dark, dark!” No, the only way to get the light is to strike a light.
Vivekananda's answer to every kind of darkness: do not describe it, do not lament it, strike a light. The practices on this site are matches. None of them work until struck.
Do Vivekananda's opening: sit erect and mentally repeat, “Let all beings be happy; let all beings be peaceful; let all beings be blissful.” Three times.
Feed someone
Ma, I am with you in the house all the time. You are not away from me. The work that you are doing—cooking with your own hands and feeding the people—that is the highest sadhana for the householder.
Neem Karoli Baba answered every question about enlightenment with food. He told a housewife that cooking with her own hands and feeding people was the highest sadhana. Take him literally.
Feed someone today who is not expecting it.
No fear
அச்சமில்லை அச்சமில்லை அச்சமென்பதில்லையே
இச்சகத்துளோரெலாம் எதிர்த்து நின்ற போதினும்,
அச்சமில்லை அச்சமில்லை அச்சமென்பதில்லையேThere is no fear, no fear, there is no such thing as fear — / though all the people of this world should rise against me, / there is no fear, no fear, there is no such thing as fear.
Achamillai achamillai achamenbathillaiyē / ichchagaththuḷōrelām edirththu ninṟa pōdhinum, / achamillai achamillai achamenbathillaiyē
Bharathi made his whole religion a refrain so it would work as a mantra. There is no fear—not because nothing bad will happen, but because the one who fears is not who you are. Sing it.
Learn the first line by heart. Say it aloud once. Then look at the Journeys page and choose where to go next.