Wednesday 9 October 2013

The Ritual of Personal Reflection(Excerpts from the book The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari)



This is a ritual that emphasizes the power of inner contemplation.It helps one connect to a dimension of their being that they never knew they had.Personal reflection is the habit of thinking, thinking enough to thrive.
It requires one to get into the regular habit of personal introspection.Ardent followers of this ritual list all that they do and think about in a column and assess each one of them in another column.By confronting your activities and thoughts in a written form,one can ask themselves if they were positive in nature and if so make a resolve to continue giving their precious energy to them as they would pay dividends in the long run.                                                                       If they are negative one should come up with a clear course of action to get rid of them.


 According to these teachings,it is a perfect world, with a perfect life. All of us have the power to control our days. We have the power to live our dreams.When we look at what we do, how we spend our days and analyze our thoughts, we give ourselves a benchmark to measure improvement.We can only improve tomorrow if we know what we did wrong today.


The book further says that,there is nothing wrong with making mistakes. Mistakes are part of life and essential for growth. It's like that saying, 'Happiness comes through good judgment, good judgment comes through experience, and experience comes through bad judgment. But there is something very wrong with making the same mistakes over and over again, day in and day out. This shows a complete lack of self-awareness, the very quality that separates humans from animals. Well it's true. Only a human being can step out of himself and analyze what he is doing right and what he is doing wrong. A dog cannot do this.A bird cannot do this.Even a monkey cannot do it. But you can. 

This is what the Ritual of Personal Reflection is all about. 


Figure out what is right and what is wrong in your days and in your life. 


Then set about making immediate improvements.







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