BMCM Video Study Guides
Satsang Coordinators Curriculum for
Great Christian Mystics
Lesson One
Introduction: “This month we will be reflecting on the broader outlines of our spiritual growth. To bring our spiritual ideals to life and even just to keep meditating daily is sometimes very hard. This month’s curriculum leads us through an exploration of some inner resources we can tap to maintain our commitment and enthusiasm every day. We’ll start tonight by reading the passage on which Sri Easwaran is commenting in the video.”
Then read aloud the passage “Teach Me” by Saint Anselm:
Be it mine to look up to thy light, even from afar, even from the depths. Teach me to seek thee, and reveal thyself to me when I seek thee, for I cannot seek thee except thou teach me, nor find thee, except thou reveal thyself. Let me seek thee in longing, let me long for thee in seeking; let me find thee in love, and love thee in finding.
Lord, I acknowledge and I thank thee that thou hast created me in this thine image, in order that I may be mindful of thee, may conceive of thee, and love thee; but that image has been so consumed and wasted away by vices, and obscured by the smoke of wrong-doing, that it cannot achieve that for which it was made, except thou renew it, and create it anew.
I do not endeavor, O Lord, to penetrate thy sublimity, for in no wise do I compare my understanding with that; but I long to understand in some degree thy truth, which my heart believes and loves. For I do not seek to understand that I may believe, but I believe in order to understand. For this also I believe: that unless I believed I should not understand.
Then ask the group: “In the video, Sri Easwaran will say that, though we may not have a glimpse of the distant goal, we can know that we have received a kind of blessing or grace simply because we have started to meditate and use the allied disciplines.
“One of the important ways to keep up our confidence and enthusiasm for the Eight Points is to reflect on how our lives have changed for the better. In what way do you see this ‘grace’ or positive force for change in your life, since you’ve started practicing the Eight Points? How do you respond to that force? In what ways do you (or might you) help it to grow?”
When it’s time for inspiration, please watch the first of the two talks on the video tape, “Teach Me” (35 minutes long). For groups not using the videos, please read the commentaries on verses 18 and 19 in Chapter 9 of The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living, Volume 2.
Conclude with 30 minutes of meditation.
Lesson Two
“Last week we reflected on the benefits meditation has brought us, as a way of maintaining and building our enthusiasm. This week we will explore another strategy for keeping the fire of commitment burning deepening our relationship to our teacher within.”
Then read aloud this exercise from the video study guide:
“In this talk, Sri Easwaran says that the spiritual teacher becomes especially vital to the student during periods of intense growth. Our exercise will focus on a method by which you can draw upon your inspiration from Sri Easwaran for support during such periods.
“Sri Easwaran often said that the role of a spiritual teacher is to awaken us to the ‘teacher within.’ As a way of experiencing that process, think of a particular passage or chapter in one of Sri Easwaran’s books or tapes which especially struck you, when you recognized the clear truth of what Sri Easwaran was saying, and how it applied to your life. Such moments, when our spiritual reading awakens a sense of a familiar but forgotten truth, are encounters with the teacher within. Can you recall such passages? What was their effect on you? How did they change the way you see life or yourself or your spiritual practice?”
When it’s time for inspiration, please read The Bhagavad Gita for Daily Living, Volume 1, Chapter 2, verses 1-11.
Conclude with 30 minutes of meditation.
Lesson Three
Note: To prepare for this meeting, please ask members of the group to bring a copy of God Makes the Rivers to Flow with them. In particular it would be helpful (though not entirely necessary) for members to have access to the index included in the third edition (published in 2003), entitled “Using Inspirational Passages to Change Negative Thinking.”
Introduction: “A central theme of the talk we’ll watch this week is the promise that all negative traits can be transformed by using meditation and spiritual training to dwell on and cultivate our positive traits. There is a special art to this transformation. We don’t run away from our problems, but we also do not dwell on them. Instead, we deal with our negative traits by directing our attention to a positive ideal a meditation passage which reveals the bright part of ourselves that had been hidden by the negative.
“Let’s take a few minutes to reflect silently on our lives and choose a negative trait that we’d like to address. Once we’ve done that, let’s each choose a passage from God Makes the Rivers to Flow that embodies a positive ideal opposite to the negative trait. If you have the third edition of God Makes the Rivers to Flow, refer to the index entitled ‘Using Inspirational Passages to Change Negative Thinking.’”
After about 5 minutes, when people have chosen passages, pose this topic for discussion: “Now let’s spend a little time discussing the exercise. Let’s not talk so much about the negative traits we’re addressing, but about the positive qualities we find in the passage we’ve chosen. How might we make those qualities more present in our lives?”
When it’s time for inspiration, please watch the second of the talks on the video tape, “The Art of Prayer” (32 minutes long). For groups not using the videos, please start reading “Weak in Love,” in Chapter Two of Seeing with the Eyes of Love.
Conclude with 30 minutes of meditation.
Lesson Four
Introduction: “This week we will conclude our curriculum on resources for spiritual growth, with a focus on time. We will be reading from a chapter in Sri Easwaran’s Seeing with the Eyes of Love in which he says that we all have the capacity to be continuously and deeply loving all day. Where we fall away from that ideal, it’s simply because we haven’t yet learned fully how to love. Let’s start our discussion by reading an excerpt from that chapter:”
When Thomas a Kempis confides to the Lord, “I am weak in love, and imperfect in virtue,” he is saying, “Come teach me. Come help me. I need this skill desperately; for I can see that my own capacity to love is but a drop compared with the ocean of love I have glimpsed in you.” And this is just what the Lord has been waiting to hear. “God is bound to act,” says Meister Eckhart, “to pour himself into thee as soon as he shall find thee ready.” No one expects to learn tennis just by thinking about it, or calculus, or windsurfing. If you’re serious, you’ll put aside time for practice. It is the same with learning to love. It takes time.
Then ask, “In what ways has slowing down given you more time to love, and to grow spiritually? Probably all of us can slow down more. What might you change about your life in the coming year to give you more time for this important skill of loving others?”
When it’s time for inspiration, please read (or continue reading) from “Weak in Love” in Chapter Two of Seeing with the Eyes of Love.
Conclude with 30 minutes of meditation.
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How to Use This Curriculum
The BMCM monthly video series presents a special opportunity for BMCM Satsangs to enrich the content of their meetings and coordinate their program with the Center and with other Satsangs. Each month many of our Satsangs will be following this program, which has been created by workshop presenters at the BMCM, based on programs at our Tuesday night Satsangs in Petaluma and Berkeley.
This video curriculum is not required. The choice of which of our approved formats to follow is up to you and your Satsang. We understand that not all groups have access to a TV and VCR for showing video tapes. While the videos are a great aid in using this curriculum, it is also possible to follow it without the videos, using the questions for reflection and readings that are contained in this curriculum.
We do recommend this curriculum (and especially the videos) as an ideal way for a new group (or a “Satsang of One”) to get well grounded in Sri Easwaran’s core teachings and to feel more “in touch” with the Center. If you would like assistance in deciding on a format, please feel free to contact us at the address below.
The choice of when to start using the curriculum is also up to you. Week One, therefore, may end up being the second or third week of the month. That’s fine. But we do suggest that you follow the order of the weekly curricula as they appear here. For groups that meet monthly, you may want to use only the weekly sections that include videos, or to cover two weekly sections if your meeting is longer.
We have tried to make this Satsang curriculum flexible enough that it can be used completely within the Eight Point Format, as outlined in the Satsang Guidelines. For your “Eight Point Focus” you can continue to cycle through the Eight Points weekly or monthly as it suits your group, and use this curriculum to deepen your study of Sri Easwaran’s teachings.
For those of you who distribute messages via email to your Satsang, feel free to forward parts of this email to members as a preview of the coming month’s program.
We are eager to hear about your experiences with this curriculum, and welcome your feedback. Please send it to:
satsang@nilgiri.org
or
Robbie Nichols
BMCM
P O Box 256
Tomales, CA 94971
Copyright (c) 2003, Blue Mountain Center of Meditation