Reflections on "How to Do What You Love" by Paul Graham through Meditation
I was reading "How to Do what you Love" by Paul Graham last night and because I loved it so much I decided to write a little more of me into it. I think you should read it first, so Google it and It will magically appear.
When I was young I was happy. My father said, "What is the thing you would like most in the world". I said, "Happiness". He asked if I would not prefer a Rolls Royce but I said no. If I was happy, I would not need a Rolls Royce.
And I was happy with the work at school. Able to do the work but not really interested in it except to go to the limit with it, to find out if my interest continued with it.
People are lucky if they can find and discard interests quickly. Tried that and found the limit. Got bored and moved onto more interesting things.
Moving onto more interesting things is evolution.
Been there. Done That. Bought the Tea Shirt!
Staying with the same thing only means we have not yet seen deeply into it.
This seeing deeply into it also is evolution. But once you have seen, you must move on.
It was sort of like doing a crossword puzzle to find out if I could do it. But ultimately useless. There is no meaning in collecting examinations. Solely as a means of doing something. What?
So, I collected examinations. And through that I collected discipline.
What made me less than happy was the other people. Unpredictable and emotional.
By accident I tried Yoga. At the age of sixteen I got so relaxed and able to access intelligence and energy that I continued to do Yoga every night for many years.
Something I told no-one about because I thought they might deride me. "Keep it secret, keep it safe", said Gandalf.
After working at a Joint Honours Degree in Physics and Electronics, because my ambition at that time was to be another Einstein, I found work problematic. I could not easily engage in aims that were not my true love.
At 21 after studies in art and the history of art I was able to spend 2 weeks creating a hundred paintings all of which I sold. I investigated photography.
I wrote a well received book on Advanced Design Techniques in Software because I wanted to and continued to work in Computers.
People continued to be mysteries.
The way politics and the world worked was a mystery also.
At the age of 28 I spent 3 years exploring Aikido and becoming a Yoga Teacher. I spent one year meditating every night alone. Through this I was luckily able to meet and practice with the worlds best enlightened teachers like Zen Master Hogen and later, a more enlightened Master Swami Satchidananda.
Through years of experience with my teachers in meditation and enlightenment I discovered that the mind was limited. There were faster, larger and greater computers we were connected to which gave better answers. One is called Intuition. Another is called Psychic Vision. My teachers gave me experience of all this.
Once that was attained then people were explained.
Then I started to understand the world.
I am and have always been happy.
Once I understood that my happiness was bound up in the happiness of others I projected to teach Happiness and enlightenment to the World.
It consists of saying, and I am paraphrasing the 5000 year old words of Maharishi Patanjali here, "After all that, here are complete instructions on Enlightenment". "All that", is everything you have ever done. The "Complete Instructions", are on Meditation.
And meditation is the only thing in my life which has never ended up in boredom and because of a limited aim, pain. It keeps going deeper and deeper.
Once you have seen deeply into everything in this world and found it wanting, then you know that the maximal human evolution of enlightenment is the only thing which can make you happy.
People become dissatisfied, fall out of love with everything they do and it becomes difficult because of the traps of money and prestige, responsibilities, old age and lack of energy, to move onto something else which could provide the work which they love.
Then people stop moving on and evolving towards that which they love.
Because they do not truly believe in themselves, they accept something less.
You know, a shark needs to keep on moving if it is to continue pushing water through the gills to get oxygen.
When it stops moving on, then, you have a dead shark.
Keep moving on towards something which you love then life can be happy. But you could still be a shark.
But for thousands of years Masters of Meditation have been saying, "Do not waste your time on useless things".
For thousands of years Masters of Meditation have been telling you, "Enlightenment is Possible".
Understand that even though Hitler, Stalin, Chairman Mao and Bill Gates really loved and love their jobs, ultimately this is not useful.
Only when you ATTAIN enlightenment. Only then is Love and Happiness permanent.