Failing to Succeed

FAILING TO SUCCEED

By Martin Hausner (Mahatma Das)
www.tstrain.com

There is No Failure on the Spiritual Platform
Have you ever set a goal and then done nothing about it - or not even set a goal because you were afraid you would fail? I have. This can be discouraging and have negative effects on us. This often happens because of how we view success.

Mass media defines success for us; it’s having lots of money, a beautiful body, accomplishing something significant, etc. There’s nothing wrong with having these things, but to think you are not successful if you don’t have them is simply wrong. In this article I look at success in terms something much more meaningful and important– spiritual success.

Spiritual success means to please the Divine and can sometimes have nothing to do with measurable external results. Since divine service is absolute, you can even SUCCESSFULLY serve God in your mind. In Indian history there is a story of a person who wanted to offer a particular service to God that he couldn’t physically execute. So he decided to do this service in his mind. While in this meditation he touched something hot and he actually burnt his finger!

I often suggest to people to visualize the kind of person they want to be and the kind of spiritual qualities they would like to develop - and see this as an offering to God. Don’t you think God will be pleased if you think how you can serve Him in new and better ways – even if you can’t realize those goals right away?

Just the fact that you make such a goal is service, or what is called bhakti (devotion) in Indian scriptures. And, if we always think about doing something there’s a good chance we will do it someday.

Show Your Heart to God
Making goals reveals your heart and desires to God. Great saints constantly hanker for a level of God consciousness they presently don’t have. So having clear devotional goals expresses the hankering of your heart to God. Even if we are not completely pure we can express simple desires.

Also, research has shown that you are more likely to follow through on a goal if you write it down. Try this. Even if you think you can’t achieve it or won’t follow through, just write it down. You’ll be surprised at what happens. I once wrote down some goals and then forgot about them. But a week or so later I found myself pursuing some of those goals even though I hadn’t reviewed my list. So, for example, if you want to wake up an hour earlier every day, just write that goal on a piece of paper and see what happens. Often, the process of writing down a goal puts that goal into your subconscious and then you start acting on it even without making a conscious effort.

You Can’t Fail
Because divine service is absolute, the effort –no matter what the outcome - is spiritual and perfect. My spiritual master said there is no question of success or failure in divine service because our position is like a soldier who has a duty to fight. We simple do our duty.

THEREFORE THE ONLY FAILURE IS TO NOT MAKE THE EFFORT.

I Went to New York to Fail
My spiritual master was asked by my his guru to bring India’s spiritual message of peace and good will to the West. He didn’t exactly understand how this would happen, but because his spiritual master ordered him to do it, he felt he must try. He knew that anything is possible by the mercy of guru and God, but externally it was not obvious how it would happen - or even if it would happen at all. Some of his associates had gone to London with the same mission, but they were not very successful at interesting people in their message and establishing an organization. When my spiritual master was asked why he chose to go to New York instead of London, he said, “My godbrothers (disciples of the same guru) went to London and failed, so I thought I would go to New York and fail.”

Although he said this jokingly, he was well aware he might fail. But since his guru asked him to come to the West and teach Indian culture and spirituality, it would have obviously been a much bigger failure to not try. Therefore his real success was that he got on the boat to America. He wasn’t thinking, “What if I don’t succeed, what will everyone think of me? How will I be able to show my face again in India?”

Some times we are afraid to fail because our egos can’t take it. And sometimes we are afraid to fail because we don’t want to admit to ourselves that we are not that great.

Blessings for Real Success
My spiritual master was able to establish a mission and made thousands of disciples. Actually he ended up establishing over 100 centers around the world in 10 years. When those external results came he recognized that his success was not due to his own qualifications but due to the blessings of his guru and God. He said that we do our duty and leave the results to God.

Don’t Fail to Fail to Succeed
Self help gurus teach that we shouldn’t be afraid to fail; rather we should fail soon and often because this is how we learn. Those who are afraid to fail rarely do anything great. Aren’t you glad you weren’t afraid to fail when you first attempted to walk? As long as we learn by our so-called failures those failures become the pillars of our success.

So when you think you have failed, just ask yourself, “What can I learn from this?” and then you can give your failure a new name. You can call it a “learning experience.”

Since our effort to serve God is our success, and since the reality is that we often need to fail to improve, we can’t loose by making the effort. But if we fail to fail, then we fail to succeed.
_____________________________________________________________

Exercise

Try to do something for God you are reluctant to do because you think you will fail. Don’t worry about succeeding, just do it. Then if you like, write me and let me know what happened and what you learned. You can reach me at (mahat@aol.com).