Our thoughts have prepared for us the happiness or unhappiness we experience.
Hazrat Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan
Related Material by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan
Compiled by Wahiduddin Richard Shelquist – wahiduddin.net
All our possessions, all that we collect in life, all these things which we shall have to leave one day are transitory; but that which we have created in our thought, in our mind, that lives. A person thinks, ‘Some day I should like to build a factory.’ At this time they have no money, no knowledge, no capability; but a thought came, ‘Some day I should like to build a factory.’ Then they think of something else. Perhaps years pass, but that thought has been working constantly through a thousand minds, and a thousand sources prepare for them that which they once desired. If we could look back to all we have thought of at different times, we would find that the line of fate or destiny, Kismet as it is called in the East, is formed by our thought. Thoughts have prepared for us that happiness or unhappiness which we experience. The whole of mysticism is founded on this.
( from the Sufi Message Series, Volume VII – In an Eastern Rose Garden: Mental Creation )
Every good or bad word or deed is reproduced before us, though it seems as in a dream. If we watched Life keenly, we should see how true this is. Joy, sorrow, love, all depend on our thought, on the activity of our mind. If we are depressed, if we are in despair, it is still the work of our mind; our mind has prepared that for us. If we are joyful and happy, and all things are pleasant, that also has been prepared for us by our mind. It is only when our mind works without control that unhappiness, sorrow, trouble, pain, or whatever we experience comes without our intention. No one could wish to create hell for themselves; all would create heaven for themselves if they could; and yet how many allow their minds to create these things for them, regardless of their own intention.
The control of the activity of mind is called concentration in the language of the mystics [ ie (مراقبة) murāqabah in Arabic and Urdu, sometimes spelled ‘murakkabah’. It literally means ‘to observe’ and comes from the same root (R-Q-B) as Ya Raqib, Loving Attention. — Muiz ]. The meaning of this word is often not rightly understood. People are apt to think that concentration means only closing the eyes. But one may close one’s eyes for hours, and still the thoughts keep coming like a moving picture. People are never at rest, never at peace; anxiety and sorrow do not disappear just because they close their eyes. It is concentration that does that. Concentration is activity of mind in the direction desired; our desire dictates in which way the mind is to be active; the mind acts according to our wishes.
( from the Sufi Message Series, Volume VII – In an Eastern Rose Garden: Stilling the Mind )
In point of fact, whatever one makes of oneself, one becomes that. The source of happiness or unhappiness is all in humanity, ourselves. When we are unaware of this, we are not able to arrange our lives. As we become more acquainted with this secret, we gain mastery. The process by which this mastery is attained is the only fulfillment of the purpose of this Life.
( from the Sufi Message Series, Volume X – Sufi Mysticism: Sufi Poetry – Fariduddin Attar )
Commentary by Murshid S.A.M. (Sufi Ahmed Murad)
Samuel L. Lewis
In the first place, thoughts divide experiences between pleasant and unpleasant. By thinking of something as pleasant, one creates at the same time the thought of what is not pleasant. That is to say, there is dualism; there are two thoughts instead of one thought. Whenever the discriminating mind operates, the thought is double; it has two aspects which may be called good and evil, pleasant and unpleasant — these are the fruits of dualism.
All the great prophets have described God’s Realm as a place or condition where there is no day and night. That is to say, it is a sphere of universality, all inclusiveness. When one abandons the fruits of self-action, action is not abandoned but there is no attachment to qualities. Consequently, overcoming an existence which is conditioned in any way, one attains to a state of bliss which leads to highest cultivation of mind.