Material Success and Happiness Through Yoga Principles

by Swami Kriyananda
(J. Donald Walters)

Copyright © 2005 Hansa Trust
All rights reserved.

Lesson Nine
The Importance of Human Values
The Principles
It is common to find people giving more importance to material success than to human values. In terms of what they themselves want from life, this is a serious error. They forget that what everyone really wants is happiness, not the “bottom line” as defined by most people. When we make ourselves displeasing to others, success itself may forsake us, for clients and customers will seek elsewhere for what we offer.
I remember a visit I made from California to Mexico in 1954. At the Tijuana airport just south of the border, some of my countrymen, finding themselves confronted by Mexico’s “mañana” (“tomorrow”) consciousness, complained loudly of the slow pace there. I said to one of them, “Why have you come here, if you want everything to be just as you have it back home?”
Slowness, in fact, has its charms—at least in its suggestion of a culture that doesn’t put money ahead of human values. A change from the northern American hustle and bustle should be welcome to those who can be in tune with it.
In India, the contrast is strong not between one culture and another, but within the same culture. Some Indians show an eager, “get ahead” and “do it now!” attitude. Others appear satisfied to sleep in the sun. That willingness to absorb both attitudes is partly what I mean in naming this lesson, “The Importance of Human Values.”
I think it shows a healthy society to be so variegated. A person might respond to the above example, “But inefficiency won’t bring material success!” Granted, certainly. That isn’t my point, however. I am saying that you will have greater success if you accept that you are a human being, first, and that your clients or customers, or whomever you look to for your success are human beings also, and not money-spewing machines!
Think back to the example I gave several lessons ago of the two bakers, William and Joe. Both men did the same work, and, for the purposes of this discussion, were equally skilled at it. Joe Crumpet also made friends, however, and it was he who really succeeded. The reason is quite simple: Joe liked people. William Baker may have been as dedicated to making bread as Joe was, but his dedication meant less to other people because he wasn’t dedicated also to serving them.
Joe Crumpet’s appeal was to more than the self-interest of others. They enjoyed him as a person. He appealed to their sense of fitness, also. If, for instance, they’d seen him being cruel to others, they’d have been almost as displeased with him, probably, as if he’d treated them cruelly, too.
Human values depend ultimately not on philosophical abstractions, but on human feelings. If you inflicted “punishment” on a rock by kicking it, people would probably not be outraged—at least, not for the rock’s sake. If you kicked at it in anger, they might consider you childish, but any displeasure they felt would be due only to your wrath. As for the rock itself, however, they’d be sorry for it only if they had some reason to believe it could feel pain from being kicked.
Many people in their pursuit of material success are willing to treat others like rocks! They trample over people’s feelings, or simply ignore their feelings altogether as though, where money-making was concerned, the human factor didn’t enter into the picture. They are mistaken, which also is what these lessons are about: They are for helping people to see that the human and spiritual elements are essential to every aspect of life. You will never succeed, at least in terms of your own need for happiness, so long as you ignore the human factor.
Before I met my Guru, many people—students of acting in the theater where I was studying to become a playwright—tried to convince me that nothing mattered except “getting to the top.” It didn’t matter, they insisted, how many people I trampled down in the process. Nothing mattered except my own self. I alone had to be pleased; mine alone was the reality I needed to look out for; I alone counted. Those people had absorbed too much modern existential “philosophy,” which had led them to believe that the only honest attitude in life is to be wholly subjective. It was this line of reasoning, among other things, that drove me almost headlong to the spiritual path.
For it was obvious to me even then that, if I trampled on others in my efforts to “get to the top,” I would also be trampling on myself. The attitudes that I projected onto others would become imbedded in my own consciousness. If I was indifferent to the feelings of others, I would lose my own sensitivity to feeling itself, as a fundamentally important part of human nature. If I lost my sensitivity, I would cease to be a human being, and would become a mere automaton of flesh and blood rather than of metal. What I must do, I decided, was exactly the opposite: I must deepen my own ability to feel, my sensitivity to life and to everything and everybody around me. Some of those theater friends paid me a visit after my conversion to the spiritual path, and departed afterward with the same cynical smiles of inner emptiness.
A young man from India many years ago in America laughed as he told me how his grandmother, after listening to a spiritual talk on the radio, would place a flower on the radio—“as though,” he chortled, “the radio itself were aware of what it was transmitting!” After we’d parted, I mulled over his words. His grandmother’s sensitivity, I thought, was greater than his. Granted, the radio itself wasn’t aware, but how else could she demonstrate her gratitude to God outwardly for the truths she’d been hearing? To her, the radio was simply a symbol, as was the flower she placed on it.
We live in a world of symbols. Behind everything we see—behind even other people, and behind our own thoughts—there exists a higher reality than the one revealed to us by the senses. Without a feeling for that reality, we will be unable fully to enjoy any success we achieve, and may become like Howard Hughes in the story I related earlier. Hughes, who at that time was probably the richest man in the world, was asked if he was happy, and responded, “Nah! I can’t say that I’ve found happiness!”
An alternate approach to life is desperately needed nowadays. This approach may not help you to become a billionaire, but the subject of these lessons, remember, is not material wealth, but material success. Our lives are successful when we are happy. To equate success only with wealth misses the point altogether. These lessons can make you wealthy, certainly, if you practice their basic teachings with this end in mind. I hope that by this time in your study of them, however, you will have come to understand clearly that excessive wealth is, in a sense, a kind of failure. It will most certainly be that if it deprives you of happiness.
True success requires sensitive awareness of realities that are outside the narrow confines of your egoic existence. It wouldn’t hurt even to ponder the fact that God’s consciousness is everywhere, and in everything—even in the rocks. The rocks, of course, are not aware as you and I are. They give no evidence of conscious feeling when they are kicked, or even when they are blasted with bombs. However, J. C. Bose, the great Indian physicist, proved that rocks and metals definitely react to stimuli. It has been found since then that knives grow “tired” with overuse, and will keep their tone better if they are given a rest every now and then.
Plants—a rung or two up the evolutionary ladder—are more easily shown to have some kind of feelings. They haven’t egos, but they demonstrate a certain amount of discomfort when they are treated harshly, particularly if the treatment is administered with anger or with other negative emotions.
One day, I and a few brother disciples were planting a heavy young tree on the hillside at my Guru’s newly acquired property, the SRF Lake Shrine in Pacific Palisades, California. Evidently we were moving it too roughly, for our Guru called out to us from below, “Be careful! Can’t you feel? It’s alive!”
When an animal—several rungs further up the evolutionary ladder—is hurt, sensitive people may feel its suffering even more than the animal itself does. They are projecting their own emotions, of course, for animals themselves haven’t strong egos to tell them, “It is I, myself, who am suffering!” The consciousness of human beings is more personally identified with their bodies; thus, they are more capable of feeling pleasure and pain.
We adjudge human values by the refinement of feelings in the heart. Goodness is called that because it brings us closer to the natural peace and harmony of our true being. We consider things evil if they disturb that inner harmony.
When we are kind to others, not only do we invoke their gratitude: We ourselves feel the better for it. This good feeling, moreover, is due to the fact that our consciousness of self expands to include those people’s feelings: We become in our consciousness, almost literally, bigger people.
When we treat others harshly, on the other hand, we are instinctively aware that something is not quite right. People may try to relieve themselves of this uncomfortable feeling by treating others even more harshly! Their discomfort, however, comes not only from having offended against social norms, but even more importantly from the fact that in hurting others they’ve affirmed their own egos and, thereby, their littleness! Any egoic contraction is painful, even if one has not yet developed the sensitivity to understand why. On the other hand, any expansion of awareness, especially of self-awareness, puts us in harmony with what we and all people instinctively want: an expansion of self-identity. For this reason, self-expansion is gratifying, whereas self-contraction deprives us of inner peace and causes us to suffer.
We might compare ourselves to little pieces of glass in the sunlight. The more polished and clean those pieces, the better they will reflect the sunlight. Similarly with us, the clearer our consciousness, the more brightly we shine.
To express this thought more literally, all people feel an urge to know more, to possess more, to experience more, to be more. Expansion is a native hunger of the soul; it spills over into the ego, giving it thereby a desire for self-importance. The ego, however, is not real in itself: It is individualized Spirit, attached to the body by its outwardly directed energy. When the ego contracts upon itself, that contracting awareness squeezes like a band around the heart and deprives it of soul-nourishment. Selfish people alienate themselves from their true nature. Suffering ensues, for when people lose the ability to compare that starved sensation with more healthy feelings, they don’t think of themselves as even suffering, inwardly. They imagine only that other people “bother” them!
Why is it necessary to include human values in your business or other gainful activities? Quite simply because you are a human being, not a machine! The hero in many a modern novel is described as lacking in sensitivity: as “efficient, ruthless, machine-like.” Such fiction might as well add, “He was also dead.” Dead, one suspects, is what the authors themselves are in their own hearts!
Why do you work? Is it only to earn a living? Surely there are other reasons for wanting to work besides the body’s need to eat and be sheltered from the rain and cold. Marxian dogma claims that man will be satisfied if he only has enough food to eat and a roof over his head. This teaching may apply well enough to cattle, but with man, food and shelter are paramount issues only if he is grindingly poor. Otherwise, everyone obviously wants more out of life. He wants comforts and conveniences in addition to the basic necessities. Ultimately, what matters to people is how they feel about things: proud, or wanting recognition, or liking elegance, or—the true “ulterior motive” behind everything we do—desiring happiness.
Don’t ignore human feelings. And don’t make the serious mistake, where your own happiness is concerned, of thinking that how others feel is no concern of yours. Their feelings matter more to you than you may realize, for in treating others well your own happiness expands, and in treating them badly your happiness contracts and causes you to suffer.
Happiness and suffering are relative. A habitually selfish person isn’t aware, except in his deeper self, that he is not really happy. He may imagine that happiness isn’t even important to him—that all he wants is a “good time” occasionally. In this lack of awareness he may even be cruel to others, and believe he is finding pleasure in the cruelty even though his ego, unknown to himself, is causing him to suffer. In his insensitivity, indeed, unconscious of why he is suffering, he will only become more tense both physically and emotionally. He will imagine that the only way he can relieve his inner tension is to strike out at others ever more viciously. He is not aware of the fact that his consciousness is contracting. Thus, his innate desire for self-expansion may expresses itself in time in the form of an emotional explosion. He may become violent, or furious at the world and more determined than ever to hurt others as he considers that he himself has been hurt. Bitter at the way he thinks he has been treated, increasingly angry with the world, and as a result ever more tense inside, he blames everyone but himself.
Such people often end up jumping off a cliff, or shooting themselves in impotent rage. Many suicides are caused by a sense of hopelessness, derived from people’s inability to escape their egos, under whose tyranny they feel suffocated. If the robot-like “heroes” of those novels I’ve mentioned neglect to commit suicide, it is only because they are dead already and no longer capable of feeling anything! Why be a living corpse? Your own nature will demand, finally, that you return to your infinite reality.
If you do business with others in disregard for their needs and feelings, you will deprive yourself even more than them of the happiness which is your basic reason for wanting to succeed in the first place.
Patanjali, in his Yoga Sutras, lists ten “commandments” for spiritual development. His well-known yamas and niyamas encompass the universal rules of behavior for aspiring yogis and for spiritual seekers everywhere. With certain modifications, however, those rules apply equally well to anyone who aspires to be happy. As a student of these lessons, you desire material success—obviously! Remember, however, that without happiness you will not feel that you’ve really succeeded even if you’ve amassed a huge bank account.
First among Patanjali’s ten “commandments” come the yamas, or proscriptive rules: attitudes which demand self-restraint. The purpose of the yamas is to help the ego to find true, as opposed to false, fulfillment. The ego’s impulse, if its attitudes are selfish, is to divert its own natural desire for self-expansion into ego-endorsing attitudes. Patanjali’s yamas help to remove these blocks, enabling one’s spiritual nature to flower as a matter of course.
The first yama is ahimsa, or “harmlessness.” A woman student of mine many years ago met a young man from one of the seedier sections of New York City, who told her that he enjoyed the feeling of power it gave him to carry a loaded pistol in his pocket. It pleased him to think that he could shoot anyone who dared to threaten him. Such people usually don’t live long. I’m sure that your nature, as a student of higher principles, harbors no such potential for violence, but you might, in your desire to succeed, be willing (I hope you are not) to take advantage of others for your own personal gain.
Everyone wants power of some kind. Power is an attribute of the soul. Ego-based power, however, is what many people mistakenly seek. Their dreams of self-importance are like soap bubbles: colorful, larger than the substance they contain, but empty and evanescent. The stimulating popular game of clever one-upmanship is attractive to the ego, and fun for a time, but it leads in the end to an empty heart. True power comes not from pitting oneself against others, but from winning their support. If one harms others, even mentally, he sets himself against them; consequently, he shrinks inward upon himself.
Patanjali states that persons who have attained perfect harmlessness, having overcome the desire of the immature ego to impose its will on others—ruthlessly, or cunningly, or competitively—manifest such a power of peace that even wild animals will become tame in their presence.
In support of this statement, on one occasion Paramhansa Yogananda confronted a tiger in the jungles of Bihar. It was well into the night, and the tiger was approaching to kill a cow that had been placed in a stall with the door open, left that way by an absent-minded driver. In the morning, the cow was to pull the Master and a few of his school students out of that jungle in a cart. The Master issued forth into the darkness to close the stall door. The tiger continued his approach, but the Master gazed at it with love, beholding God Himself in that form. So magnetic was the love he emanated that the tiger, instead of springing, rolled onto its back and let the Master stroke it. Then it rose up and stalked away calmly into the jungle.
True power enlists the support of others as well as of one’s own higher Self. Egoic power, on the other hand, is as much a delusion as echoes in a canyon. A strong ego produces a feeling of increasing isolation from what seems to it an indifferent and hostile world.
A musical string instrument needs the support of a sounding board to amplify its sounds. Man, similarly, needs support from others if he wants to succeed in life. The hermit’s “sounding board” is God, but a merchant would be foolish to set up shop in a desert! Our power to succeed in business increases to the extent that we are aware that a subtle connection exists between ourselves and the great web of life.
Harmlessness in business means never to take advantage of others. It means having the good will to serve them, to treat them and think of them as one’s friends. It means recognizing that one’s own welfare includes, in ways both subtle and overt, the well-being of all. Harmlessness flowers naturally as a sense of unity with all life. The joy that arises from this awareness is itself a kind of success. Complete material fulfillment comes from working with a spirit of selfless service.
The second of the yamas is “non-prevarication.” Not to prevaricate means more than not to tell lies. It also means not wishing, ineffectually, that things were other than they are. If you really want to improve matters, do so by all means, but don’t stand limply around, wringing your hands! Work within the frame of what exists, however, not of what you merely wish existed. Face the facts fearlessly and with honesty.
The positive meaning of non-prevarication, of course, is truthfulness. Patanjali phrases the concept negatively because the obstacle to truthfulness is man’s tendency to distort the truth. Patanjali says that this quality, when perfected, confers the power of materializing one’s words and of reaping the fruits of action without acting. In material affairs, the benefit of truthfulness is twofold: First, it carries conviction, for truthful people radiate complete integrity. Second, any words they utter with concentrated will can be materialized, simply because they spoke them.
People who misuse this power, having once developed it, simply lose it again. Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita speaks of people following either the upward or the downward path. One sometimes meets people who can lie very convincingly. They developed that ability in other lives. If, however, they lie in this life they will eventually lose that ability. No siddhi, or spiritual power, and no human ability is permanent until spiritual liberation has been attained. Thus, even if you have the charisma to convince others of untruths, they will “catch on” eventually, and will despise you the more because they once looked up to you. Make it a serious point, then, to be truthful always.
Asteya, non-stealing, is the third yama. If a person tries to attain material success by stealing he may end up in prison. This eventuality, however, is too obvious to require elaboration. Stealing means, in a spiritual sense, much more than merely obtaining things illicitly. Essentially, what Patanjali referred to was non-covetousness: that is to say, not desiring anything that belongs by right to another.
Non-covetousness has an even subtler meaning. It means not seeking to diminish others in their own eyes, or in the eyes of other people. It means not trying to diminish their reputation or credit. It means giving sincere respect to all, and graciously recognizing any success others achieve as though it were one’s own. Asteya means viewing no one as a rival, but seeing others as colleagues and friends. In addition, it means never gossiping about others or belittling their achievements. It means not trying to draw credit to one’s self.
The more you show appreciation for others, the more others—not even the same people, necessarily—will show appreciation for you, in return. The more support you give others, also, the more supported you will feel in yourself.
One who becomes firmly established in the quality of non-covetousness seeks nothing that is not his by right. Such a person develops the power to attract whatever he needs in life. As Patanjali puts it, “All jewels come to him.” Indeed, by means that he himself may not be able to explain, he finds himself ever secure, financially.
All the yamas must be understood as states of mind, primarily. They should not be defined literally only. In Autobiography of a Yogi, Paramhansa Yogananda as a young man in his guru’s ashram raised his hand one day to slap a mosquito. Reconsidering, he refrained from committing the act.
“Why didn’t you finish the job?” his guru asked, sensitively aware of his disciple’s thought-processes. Sri Yukteswar went on to explain, “Patanjali’s meaning was the removal of the desire to kill.”
The fourth of the yamas is brahmacharya, or self-control. This quality, again, refers to attitude above all. It is a state of mind. Outer self-control, unless it is balanced by a sincere attempt, at least, at inner self-control, serves little purpose. For the student of these lessons, brahmacharya is a useful concept in a broad sense, primarily. My purpose is not to make monks and nuns of the students of this course, but to help them to understand the importance of keeping a rein on their energies. Self-control, in this context, refers especially to words and thoughts. Self-control is, in fact, the essential meaning of brahmacharya. Self-control is self-containment, not self-suppression. The more your powers radiate outward from your inner being, instead of “fizzing” restlessly through the senses, the more you will have your energy under control and will therefore be able to direct it effectively, according to actual needs of the moment.
Excessive speech is a great drain on people’s mental energy. This doesn’t mean they should all be taciturn! The “strong, silent type” often exasperates everyone around him by his reluctance to communicate even the simplest thoughts. The “babbler,” on the other hand, commands nobody’s attention, and soon loses the respect of everyone.
Try to be circumspect in what you say. Take into consideration its possible negative consequences on others’ feelings. Show respect for all, if you want them to respect you. The clearer your awareness is in these matters, the more easily you will penetrate through mists of uncertainty to the heart of all difficulties.
Non-greed, the fifth and last yama, is often taken to mean “the non-acceptance of gifts.” The true meaning of this quality, however, is “non-attachment.” Patanjali’s yamas and niyamas must all be understood as attitudes of mind, not as rules of specific behavior. Where gifts are concerned, whether or not a person literally accepts them is a secondary issue; usually it depends on special and particular disciplines (monastic, usually). Our friends will be offended if we refuse to accept gifts from them, given as outward tokens of their affection. My Guru himself, indeed, accepted gifts; I never knew him to spurn them. The virtue he displayed in this regard was non-attachment, not “non-acceptance.” He gave things away to others quite as freely, when he saw that they desired what he had. One time, as a young man, he gave away a motorcycle—instantly and gladly, though he had seemed to prize it greatly. On that occasion, he saw a perfect stranger eying the machine enviously, and said, “Take it! It’s yours.”
It is considered a pious act, moreover, to make offerings—that is to say, to give gifts—to the Lord Himself. Wouldn’t it be deeply distressing to find that our gifts were somehow unacceptable to Him?
The issue of non-acceptance, then, must be understood also on a level of attitude as in the case of ahimsa. None-attachment doesn’t mean we must refuse to accept gifts. Rather, we should refuse to accept anything as really belonging to us, egoically speaking. This attitude may be understood in the context of Sri Krishna’s advice in the Bhagavad Gita, to be non-attached at least to the fruits of action. This, for everyone, is a path to inner freedom.
Non-attachment differs from the third yama, non-covetousness, in an important respect: Non-covetousness means not to desire anything that is not one’s own by right. “Non-attachment,” on the other hand, means not to accept as one’s own even that which is his by right.
An attitude of non-attachment is important for people who aspire to material success. It is far more likely to bring them success than an attitude of clutching feverishly at things. Attachment actually limits one’s ability to succeed, for it prevents him from thinking beyond specific goals, and therefore from visualizing an even greater success. Indeed, attachment even limits one’s understanding of the limitless potentials of success.
Success should be understood as signifying, above all, the feeling of satisfaction one derives from an accomplishment. As long as one lacks that feeling, he will not find true success in life even if he becomes a hundred times over a millionaire.
Attachment is a mind-set, binding one and preventing him from ever finding true happiness. To be happy, it is necessary to be inwardly free. Non-attachment, paradoxical as it may seem, actually attracts prosperity. Indeed, it already is a kind of prosperity!
Such, then, are the five rules of yama, or control. The rules for their opposite qualities, which again are five in number, are called niyamas, meaning non-control. They are:
1.	Cleanliness
2.	Contentment
3.	Tapasya (Austerity)
4.	Swadhyaya (Self-Study)
5.	Devotion to the Supreme Lord

As in the case of the yamas, the niyamas need to be understood in a subtle as well as in an obvious sense.
Cleanliness, the first niyama, means purity of heart, above all. In the business world, purity of heart means not to entertain hidden, ulterior motives. Be clear about your true intentions. The more you view your work as a service to others, the more others will sense your generosity and have confidence in you. Ulterior motives unmask themselves, sooner or later. They are revealed sooner, moreover, in a person’s eyes and general demeanor.
Consider a statement I’ve often heard made by shopkeepers in India. At the end of the day they’ve said to me, “Sir, if you will buy from my shop I will be lucky, for you will be my first customer today.” I wonder how shopkeepers manage to make this plea with a straight face! A wiser merchant would show interest in the customer’s luck, surely, not in his own! Much better would it be if he simply made people feel that he was glad to see them.
Contentment (santosha) is the second niyama. Scripture describes it as the supreme virtue. Contentment is akin to non-attachment. As I stated above, if you can be inwardly non-attached it will be easy for you also to be contented. Contentment, however, should also be practiced deliberately; it should not be sought in acquisitions. Joe Crumpet, in the example I gave earlier, was a contented man. As a result, he attracted more customers than William Baker, who was basically discontented. Contentment in the Self, even in the face of adversity, wins the respect and friendship of everyone, for it is a quality that everyone desires.
Tapasya, austerity (the third niyama), for the businessman means living an uncluttered life, in a consciousness of inner freedom. It means not casting about for unnecessary ways of keeping oneself busy. Austerity is necessary for the achievement of calmness and concentration. It is also necessary for achieving success, whatever one’s field of activity. One who knows what he wants and directs his energies toward that achievement is far more likely to succeed than one who hopes vaguely to succeed, but isn’t quite sure how to go about it. An uncluttered mind is a clear mind. It is essential for all forms of accomplishment.
Swadhyaya, the fourth niyama, may be understood simply, without a long explanation, as Self-awareness. Swa means the Self; dhyaya means study. More is meant here than introspection, however, and more, certainly, than “study of the scriptures,” as this niyama is often translated. Swadhyaya means Self-awareness. This is a state of consciousness, which again should be developed deliberately. Even in the midst of a busy day at work, you can listen inwardly for higher guidance. Inspiration awaits you at the edge of your awareness, trying to guide you rightly. Inspiration, more than most people realize, is the highest secret of success.
“Devotion to the Supreme Lord” is the last niyama. This is something many modern businessmen brush away as being of no consequence to their work. Remember the story of Krishna, however, in the Mahabharata, when he offered a choice to the two generals of opposing armies in the war of Kurukshetra: either the support of his entire army, or himself, present during the struggle, but not taking active part in it. Duryodhana was happy to receive the support of Krishna’s whole army. Arjuna was wiser, however. He told Krishna, “Lord, wherever You are, victory is ensured.”
The Supreme Lord does not participate directly in His universe: He works through channels, inspiring them because of their openness to His inspiration. The materialist receives only occasional hints of the Lord’s presence within—hints he grimly ignores! People who have faith, however, understand that without inner guidance and inspiration even the best undertaking is fated to crumble to dust at last. Without this final niyama, material success will forever recede from your grasp. Even if you succeed in grasping it momentarily, it will slip quickly away like water running through your fingers.
The yamas and niyamas, taken together, produce the ideal human being, with the highest sense of values. Human values are exalted not because society demands that we abide by them, but because they are what we ourselves want, if we have any discrimination. Armed with these ten principles, we must surely succeed at anything we attempt.
Human values help us to actuate the basic rule of success, which is simply this: Do what works, not only at the moment, but long-lastingly.
The Application
Much of what I have written in this lesson so far might have been placed under this sub-heading, “The Application.” For with human values, more than with most subjects, the principles spill over into their application. Really to understand a human value is to see it in relation to its highest potentials. Human values should be judged, moreover, by how well they work in action, and particularly by how well they work in our own lives.
A human value is anything that lifts us toward higher awareness and true happiness. We can apply this teaching by always asking ourselves, “Does what I am doing lead me up the ladder of awareness, or down it?”
To apply this teaching in your work, concentrate more on your inner feelings. Don’t become so immersed in what you are doing that you become “thing-oriented.” (That purely materialistic outlook makes one a mere robot.) Remember above all that you are a human being; what you achieve is secondary to what you are.
Practicing swadhyaya (self-awareness), observe the feelings of your heart. Direct them upward, and then outward: upward, toward your higher Self; and outward, to embrace all humanity. Particularize those feelings in the individuals receiving your services.
Whenever you have a decision to make, don’t ask yourself whether such-and-such an idea is pleasing to your ego. Think upward, rather: Ask yourself whether your higher Self is pleased. Feel the response to that question in your heart, and see whether that feeling conveys a calm sense of rightness, or, on the contrary, conveys a restless uneasiness.
Next, visualize the people who will be affected by your decision. Don’t merely take a poll of their opinions, for opinions, generally, are not reliable guides. Try, instead, to visualize how they feel in their deeper selves, not in their emotions. Do you sense happiness there? Think of them on a soul level: Are their souls, so to speak, smiling?
I’ve practiced these principles for many years, and am confident in sharing them with you. Whenever I’ve found that my heart says No to a proposition, if I’ve allowed myself to be persuaded to act contrary to that feeling I’ve found that things simply didn’t turn out as any of us really wanted. When I’ve followed my deeper feelings, on the other hand, everything worked out well.
We cannot control the actions of others, but we can at least determine what we do. Often I find that people actually do smile when a decision I’ve made shows concern for their higher interests. The decision may come upon them quite unexpectedly, but what they usually say, in the end, is, “It feels right.”
Meditation
Visualize light descending into the world from Infinity. Focus it on whatever you are doing. Don’t mentally divorce what you are doing, in the effort to succeed, from the totality of what you hope to accomplish. Remember too, what you really aspire to is happiness. This means knowing who and what you really are, and what your true role is in the cosmic drama.
You will live in this body such a short time: only a few years. You must take seriously whatever happens in this ephemeral life. Nevertheless, keep your sights on changelessness. The best you can manifest is only a limited ray of the infinite light. Offer that best up to God, from whom all good things come. Ask His blessings on what you do. If you hold your most mundane actions up to His light, you will find everything in life becoming sanctified.
Affirmation
“I am an actor in the drama of Infinity. 
I will do my best to fulfill the cosmic plan for my life.”

Points to Remember
1. You will have greater success if you accept that you are a human being, first, and that your clients or customers are human beings also, and not money-spewing machines!
2. If we are indifferent to the feelings of others, we lose our own sensitivity to feeling itself. What we must do is deepen our sensitivity to everything and everybody around us.
3. Goodness is that which brings us closer to the natural peace and harmony of our true being.
4. In treating others well your own happiness expands, and in treating them badly your happiness contracts and causes you to suffer.
5. Patanjali’s ten “commandments” for spiritual development, the yamas and niyamas, help the ego to find true, as opposed to false, fulfillment.
6. The first yama is ahimsa, or “harmlessness.” True power comes not from pitting oneself against others, but from winning their support. Harmlessness in business means never to take advantage of others. It means recognizing that one’s own welfare includes the well being of all.
7. The second of the yamas is “non-prevarication,” which means more than not to tell lies. It also means not wishing, ineffectually, that things were other than they are. Face the facts fearlessly and with honesty.
8. In material affairs, the benefit of truthfulness is twofold: First, truthful people radiate complete integrity. Second, any words they utter with concentrated will can be materialized, simply because they spoke them.
9. Asteya, non-stealing, refers to non-covetousness, not desiring anything that belongs by right to another. It also means
giving sincere respect to all, and graciously recognizing any success others achieve. Asteya means viewing no one as a rival, but seeing others as colleagues and friends. The more support you give others, the more supported you will feel in yourself.
10. One who becomes firmly established in the quality of non-covetousness seeks nothing that is not his by right. Such a person develops the power to attract whatever he needs in life.
11. The fourth of the yamas is brahmacharya, or self-control. The more your powers radiate outward from your inner being, instead of “fizzing” restlessly through the senses, the more you will have your energy under control and will be able to direct it fully toward the actual needs of the moment.
12. Non-greed, the fifth and last yama, “non-attachment,” means not to accept as one’s own even that which is his by right. Attachment prevents one from thinking beyond specific goals, and therefore from visualizing an even greater success. Paradoxical as it may seem, non-attachment actually attracts prosperity.
13. Cleanliness, the first niyama, means purity of heart, above all. In the business world, purity of heart means not to entertain hidden, ulterior motives. The more you view your work as a service to others, the more others will sense your generosity and have confidence in you.
14. Contentment (santosha) should be practiced deliberately; it should not be sought in acquisitions. Contentment in the Self, even in the face of adversity, wins the respect and friendship of everyone, for it is a quality that everyone desires.
15. Tapasya, austerity, means living an uncluttered life, in a consciousness of inner freedom. Austerity is necessary for the achievement of calmness and concentration. One who knows what he wants and directs his energies toward that achievement is far more likely to succeed.
16. Swadhyaya, the fourth niyama, may be understood simply as Self-awareness. Even in the midst of a busy day at work, you can listen inwardly for higher guidance. Inspiration awaits you at the edge of your awareness, trying to guide you rightly.
17.“Devotion to the Supreme Lord” is the last niyama. The Supreme Lord works through channels, inspiring them because of their openness to His inspiration. People who have faith understand that without inner guidance and inspiration even the best undertaking is fated to crumble.
18. Concentrate more on your inner feelings. Direct the feelings of your heart upward, toward your higher Self; and outward, to embrace all humanity, especially to the individuals receiving your services.
19. Ask yourself whether your higher Self is pleased. Feel the response in your heart, and see whether you feel a restless uneasiness, or a calm sense of rightness.

Workbook Ideas
by Joseph Bharat Cornell
Embrace a Larger Reality
In the American Southwest a school teacher once asked his students to draw a picture of themselves. “Most of the children,” he said, “completely covered the paper with a drawing of their body. My Navajo students, however, drew themselves quite differently. They made their bodies much smaller and included in their drawings the nearby mountains, canyon walls, and dry desert washes.” To the Navajo, the environment is as much a part of who they are as are their own arms and legs.
Patanjali, the great exponent of yoga, said that when one no longer identifies with his little body, he experiences himself in all bodies. Swami Kriyananda tells of the time when Paramhansa Yogananda was having difficulty walking because he was in a deep state of consciousness. He said to Kriyananda, “I am in so many bodies, it is difficult for me to remember which body I am supposed to keep moving.”
Practicing the following meditation will help you consciously affirm, and intuitively experience, your oneness with Life. While doing this exercise in the California Mountains, one woman said, “At first, I felt as though I were composing a picture; then, suddenly, I found I was the picture.”
A. Expanding Circles Meditation
•	Find a pleasant place outdoors with a distant view and an interesting foreground. Look also, if possible, for natural movement of some kind—like a rippling lake or swaying trees.
•	Sit down, close your eyes, and become aware of your body.
•	Then open your eyes and extend your awareness beyond your body just a few feet to include the nearby grasses, rocks, and insects. Feel yourself moving and becoming alive in them. Try to feel that you are in everything you see, as much as you are in your own body.
•	Do this for a couple of minutes. When your mind wanders, gently bring it back to what’s before you.
•	Now broaden your awareness to include the nearby shrubs and trees. Relax and allow your attention to flow spontaneously, from the closest grasses and pebbles to the nearest trees.
•	Continue expanding your visual awareness gradually in stages until finally it reaches the distant ridges and vast blue sky. Feel that everything you see is part of you. Finally, let your awareness flow freely to whatever interests it. Feel inside yourself the sky, the trees, the waving grasses.
•	End your meditation by repeating the following prayer by Swami Kriyananda:
I feel myself in the flowing brooks, in the flight of birds, in the raging wind upon the mountain, in the gentle dance of flowers in a breeze. Renouncing my little, egoic self, I expand with my great, soul-Self everywhere!

If you live far from a city park or greenery, try this exercise in the early morning or evening hours when there is less human activity. Be conscious of the space around you. Feel yourself moving and living in everything you see and hear.

B. Create a Harmonious Work Environment
Excessive self-involvement separates us from Life; practicing the yamas and niyamas affirms our unity with Life and makes us more expansive and empathetic.
Create a more harmonious atmosphere at work by practicing the following virtue:
Ahimsa or Harmlessness
•	Ask yourself, “Am I giving my full support to everyone at work?” If the answer is no, identify which individuals you’re withholding your energy from.
•	Whatever your reasons for doing so, meditate on the harm you do to yourself, and others, by withholding your love and support.
•	Visualize these individuals as you imagine God views them. Think of how much God loves you, and that He loves everyone equally.
•	Throughout your day, see your colleagues as children of God.
•	Feel God inside of you, lovingly blessing His children through you.