| A Second Life |
|---|
| — This Is Your Last Chance — |
As the habits of your heart and patterns of thought gradually loosen, your heart itself will begin to relax and soften.
That is certainly true.
And yet, in reality, it is not so easy.
One could simply say, "Well, that is because they are habits," and leave it there.
But instead of giving up so easily, let us try to work through them somehow.
Before beginning the work of correcting these inner habits, however, there is something important that must first be confirmed.
Are you maintaining a healthy rhythm in your daily life?
Please make at least these two things a priority:
Go to bed early and rise early.
Avoid overeating and excessive drinking.
In other words, establish a balanced rhythm in your daily life.
Why is this so important?
Because "reflection upon the mother," "reflection upon external dependence," and the most important practice yet to be discussed — meditation — all require both physical strength and mental energy.
Personally, I believe that disorder in one's daily rhythm reflects disorder within the world of consciousness itself.
Originally, the world of our consciousness is already in a disturbed state.
And yet we exist here now precisely because we are trying to recognize that disorder and escape from it, even little by little.
The human body carries many desires and impulses.
At the same time, however, human beings also possess reason.
And modern people, having received education and social conditioning, usually restrain the more chaotic aspects of consciousness from fully surfacing through bodily behavior.
Beneath the surface, intense movements may still exist, but there remains a certain delay before they erupt outwardly and escalate.
However, once disorder in consciousness begins affecting even the rhythm of daily life itself, then an eruption may occur at any time.
When one's daily rhythm begins collapsing, it is as though a countdown toward the explosion of distorted consciousness has already begun.
And once things reach that stage, it becomes extremely difficult to observe one's own heart and engage in self-correction.
That is why you must never assume that such things only happen to others.
First, you must learn to manage your physical body properly in order to prevent the eruption of distorted consciousness within yourself.
In other words, regulate your daily rhythm, and within that stability begin truly managing yourself in the deepest sense.
So please understand clearly:
Maintaining balance in daily life is profoundly important.
Now then — how should self-correction actually proceed?
As I wrote in Chapter One, the first step is to practice both:
Since I already discussed "reflection upon the mother" to some extent in the previous chapter, I would now like to speak a little more about "reflection upon external dependence."
Even if you have never belonged to a religious organization or spiritual group, and even if you have no interest in fortune-telling, charms, or rituals, the consciousness of external dependence still exists firmly rooted within you.
Generally speaking, people think of external dependence as things such as:
Even praying before ancestral graves or Buddhist altars is a form of external dependence.
And even those who have never done any of these things still carry within their consciousness the world of external dependence.
Human beings have layered this consciousness upon themselves repeatedly through countless reincarnations.
That is the history of humanity.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that the world of external dependence has completely covered the world of human consciousness.
For that long — unimaginably long — humanity has forgotten its true nature.
And for those who have devoted themselves deeply to religion, spiritual practice, ascetic discipline, meditation, religious texts, energy work, qigong, or similar pursuits — the situation becomes even more intense.
The amount of desire swirling within the consciousness that sought such things is enormous.
If your heart becomes truly sensitive and you direct your awareness toward that inner world, you may even feel as though the energy stored there could blow your physical body to pieces.
The first thing is simply to realize how much energy you yourself have accumulated.
This realization must come through your own "reflection upon external dependence."
As I wrote in Chapter One, the warmth of the mother discovered through "reflection upon the mother" is what gradually collapses the world of external dependence that we have built within ourselves.
That is exactly right.
Without coming to know the warmth of the mother, "reflection upon external dependence" cannot move forward.
Instead, suspicion and doubt may begin arising within you.
And when that happens, self-correction itself may seem impossible.
Even so, at precisely such moments, continue observing your own heart carefully.
Suffer completely.
Wrestle deeply with confusion and doubt.
Tell yourself honestly that this work is not easy, and then challenge yourself once again.
And please realize as soon as possible that the distorted consciousness within you is actually overjoyed because a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity has finally arrived.
This is truly so.
Because consciousness has suffered and struggled for so long within darkness, the moment it touches even the faintest thread of kindness or warmth, it erupts into overwhelming commotion.
That is why so many voices begin arising within you.
It is almost like a spoiled child who does not know how to express joy properly.
And in order to truly receive this within your heart, there is only one essential thing:
You must encounter the warmth of the mother through "reflection upon the mother."
Then, as the two wheels of "reflection upon the mother" and "reflection upon external dependence" begin turning together smoothly, and as you devote your energy toward self-correction, you will finally encounter the true self long forgotten in the distance.
And when that meeting with your true self finally occurs, you will understand that life itself is joy.