Sue Craig is a busy management consultant from the U.K. A professional running her own business, with two teenage children, elderly parents and in-laws, she was in search of something that would help her stay calm. “I came across passage meditation a few years ago and it really appealed to me,” explains Sue who is on a visit to Chennai, as part of her trip to explore India.
“In this form of meditation, you meditate or focus all your energies on a text — it could be an extract from a scripture or words of wise men or saints and it could be from any religion or faith in the world,” she adds. Sue also volunteers at Blue Mountain Center of Meditation (California), which follows passage meditation and the allied eight-point programmes established by Eknath Easwaran. Eknath has authored over 25 books that help modern-day multi-taskers become more patient with themselves as well as others.
The world, your own
“I was working with a number of clients for business and found myself at the crossroads often wondering if I was doing the right thing. This doubt also came up whenever I snapped at my teenage kids after losing patience with them during an argument. Once I started meditating on this Sarada Devi’s passage, ‘I tell you one thing — If you want peace of mind, do not find fault with others. Rather learn to see your own faults. Learn to make the whole world your own. No one is a stranger, my child; this whole world is your own’, it instantly calmed me. The next time I found myself losing patience, I remembered these words and my reaction was different.” Sue found these words in Eknath Easwaran’s spiritual anthology, God Makes The Rivers To Flow .
“Another passage that I found useful was from St. Teresa of Avila. It supported me in the last days when my mother was passing; it was also her favourite prayer — Let Nothing Upset You,” Sue adds.
