mindfulness Archives - Pranada Comtois

I. Heartfulness over Mindfulness

March 31, 2016 by Pranada Comtois 2 Comments

In response to my slogan “Enriching mindfulness with heartfulness,” a woman wrote, “I wonder what my life would have been like if I had lived this approach.” Her wistful line haunted me for days. I wanted to reach out, hug her, and whisper,

Live it now. As long as you have life, you have choice and chances. Plunge the depth of heartfulness!

I hope my slogan entices others and gets all of us thinking about the differences between mindfulness and heartfulness. Mindfulness grants peace but doesn’t necessarily include heartfulness. Heartfulness awards the deep joy of spiritual love and encompasses mindfulness and peace. In other words, heartfulness gives us peace and love. Because mindfulness gives peace but not necessarily Wise-Love no amount of mindful meditation or focusing on the Now will make us fully happy. We want—need—both peace and love.

Heartfulness is more than getting in touch with our current feelings. When I speak of heart, I refer to the nonmaterial heart and the emotions that radiate from our immortal self. To engage with heartfulness (which automatically generates mindfulness), we need to rouse the self from its slumber and contact spiritual emotions.

The self is an emotional being. We wake up through expression of emotions: not mundane emotions, but pure ones. How do we differentiate material emotions from spiritual feelings?

Material feelings are transient. Moods roam and shift over minutes or months or years, but they inevitably change. The supreme emotional state we most covet, happiness, is ever elusive as a full-time companion. Happiness wanders as it likes. No amount of positive thinking or creative visualizations can exalt happiness into the bliss we want, or force joy to be ever present with us.

Everything material perishes, whether an emotion, a possession, a relationship, a thought, or a feeling state. Time influences all.

Spiritual emotions endure and expand. Pure emotional states, once achieved, exist eternally, because spirit is unaffected by time and space. Additionally, spiritual feelings continue to reach new heights of expression because spirit is unlimitedly potent and energetic. Spirit is not static like matter.

We have attained the prized state of the real self when happiness increases each moment and pure love fully manifests and continues to deepen.

As the self is immortal, its thoughts and feelings are also free from any tinge of decaying matter. A spiritual traveler can arrive home to this exalted state even while still within the material body. Our awakening and subsequent spiritual life hinges on our intentions, motives, and willingness—dogged determination! With one easy nudge at a time, we move the self to revive it until it is able to stand up and walk. Then we’ll dance.

Lamps of Knowledge
Putting down our first and subsequent steps requires light to show the path we’re treading toward the immaterial heart and home. The illumination comes from a combination of lamps. When we light all of them, we’re whisked beyond the material world in a single go. Well, that doesn’t happen overnight. But when heartfulness has fully developed, our movement into trans-space-time does happen in a second.

Patience and practice lead to that moment in time when we are eternally removed from time.

These are the lamps we want to acquire and work to keep lit (upcoming: tips and tricks about how keep the fires going) to brighten our path forward toward our life of wise-love and ecstatic dance:

1. A vision of our self as a spiritual being, who is a spark of the Supreme Self and made of the same elements: being, knowing, and loving.
2. Regular company of others who have developed (or are trying to develop) this vision.
3. Hearing, singing, and chanting sacred sound coming from our transtemporal home.
4. Reading and studying sacred texts from genuine wisdom traditions.
5. Talking with comrades about what you’re gaining from the company of spiritual people, sound, and texts (or problems you’re having—this one is most important for me!)

When you illumine your mind and heart (the material ones) with these lamps, some pretty interesting occurrences begin. Matter morphs into spirit and we start the ride of our lives.

That’s next in Part II in the new Bhakti Series. Come along,

What is Bhakti, the Way of the Feminine Divine?

June 2, 2012 by Pranada Comtois Leave a Comment

Bhakti’s popularity is on the rise. The more interest grows, the more often I hear people ask, What exactly is the Way of the Feminine Divine?

The answers are often inaccurate, ill-informed, not comprehensive, and confusing. I’m determined to change this.

Bhakti is an elaborate metaphysical, mystical, and philosophical wisdom tradition that teaches life is intelligently designed to give us the opportunity to master giving and receiving unconditional love to our Self, others, our environment, and the divine.

To help you understand, I’ll give you a framework by way of a quick comparison.

Bhakti is a way of Being, just as Zen is a way of Being. Bhakti is intentional heartfulness; Buddhism is intentional mindfulness.

Each way of Being has their teachers. Chaitanya is to Bhakti as Buddha is to Buddhism.

The Way of the Feminine Divine can fill some gaping, numbing holes in our collective and individual hearts, give us meaning and make sense of our unique modern experience.

Our desire for pure love and reconnecting with the Feminine Divine is bulging out all over our secular and spiritual lives and we are so close to answers we can practically taste it.

Bhakti is equally applicable for both men and women, yet it is with special interest I encourage women to understand the power of the Feminine Divine and recognize our inherent advantage in developing its perspective and attitude. Women are wired to become generous masters of relationships and givers of unconditional love, though we generally only tap the limited, conditional side of our soul’s potential.

If one of your passions is to become empowered—if you’d like to see other women empowered and in places of leadership; if you support establishing women’s rights and equality, and ending the atrocities and abuse of women and children, then the lynchpin for finally grounding that effort is in our hands when we understand the power of the Feminine Divine and apply it in to transform ourselves and others.

A great responsibility and exciting gift is passed to us. As responsible universal citizens, we can to take the Feminine Divine into both our secular and spiritual circles and far beyond addressing just women’s rights and equality—the world is ill on many fronts.

Let’s take our roles as spiritual activists.

I like Bhakti as a way of Being. My life is rich beyond measure; I find peace in even the most distressing, disorienting situations.

This state of Being did not come without a price. I paid dearly and I’d like to help you avoid some of the spins and pitfalls I took and reach sustenance faster than I did.

My blog Little Ways of Being™ is my attempt to offer you this service. I’m committed to assisting you in your journey to bring more genuine love into your life, enhance your relationships, grow your creative muses, find your pure Self, your voice, power, and gifts, gain mastery over your emotions with a wide-open heart, and allow you to tap into the power, intuition, and guidance of the Feminine Divine and pure love that controls and inspires everyone.

Understanding the way of the Feminine Divine and the state of Being in heartfulness, is simple to grasp, but takes practice to live. You’ll find a wealth of practical and intellectual material here to quench your thirst.

However much you choose to investigate the Way of the Feminine Divine, I believe you’ll find Bhakti worthy of attention, fascinating, elegant, interesting, provocative and very practical. There is truly a valuable nugget in Bhakti for everyone. Please take yours.

Please stay for a while and explore. Join our growing community to bring more heartfulness to our mindfulness and sign up for the newsletter. Come back and gather more inspiration. Feel free to ask questions and let me know, How can I be of service to you?

I look forward to getting to know you. A million hearts for you and those around you,

Welcoming the Feminine Divine

May 31, 2012 by Pranada Comtois 1 Comment

Living from our hearts gives us the wisdom, power, and intuition to fulfill our deepest yearnings, harmonize our relationships, ground us as our pure Self, and launch our voices and gifts into the world for lasting impact. I have seen firsthand how thousands of women have been transformed by living heartfulness, or Bhakti.

The global dialogues of our collective quest is so strongly rushing toward the mysteries of the heart and pure, unconditional love, that even the American business market is saturated with language like “come from your heart to develop your marketing strategy” and “become a heart-centered entrepreneur.” Every day I see more examples.

We are the most educated, independent, and powerful generation of women in history. We are savvy about cultures, traditions, and spirituality around the world. We hanker to dynamically contribute to our personal and global families and change the state of our world to bring a brighter future for those who will come after us.

Then why do we still feel a driving need to cut through what holds us back from our life purpose even though we have diligently applied ourselves to develop more vibrant relationships, nourish a deep sense of purpose, and accomplish worthy goals? Why do we still seek to assuage anxiety, depression, and stress? How will we fulfill our noble, pressing desire to be an agent for world change?

Let’s turn to the heart of who we are for possible answers.

The core attributes of our soul are the feminine characteristics love, compassion, service, generosity, and wisdom. Deeply owning these pure states by living them from our spiritual core, removes all the obstacles holding us back from being the hero/ine of our journey.

Most of us try to carry out our worthy feminine enterprise using a masculine mindset of strategizing, controlling, dissecting, and analyzing. While there is nothing wrong with integrating masculine energy, using it to activate the Feminine Divine will never work. We become receptacles to allow the Feminine Divine to come in; we don’t try to outsmart our lives and force this state of Being. Our approach, therefore, is our first challenge to enter Bhakti.

Others wistfully wane about the return of the feminine and its nourishing, healing powers. Somehow, the thinking goes, simply being a woman and accessing our femininity holds the answer to becoming genuinely heart-centered and able to unconditionally love. But we confuse mundane feminine and the Feminine Divine, and we don’t have a clear concept of the archetypal Feminine Divine. Our muddled thinking, therefore, is our second challenge in awakening the Feminine Divine.

The tools, training, and support you’ll find here will give you the riches and gifts of heartfulness that will help you blossom, flourish, expand, and usher the Feminine Divine into your heart. Whether you’re dealing with human dilemmas, or seeking to further your spiritual experience, the Way of the Feminine Divine can enrich your life.

The Way of the Feminine Divine is not a program or a system I have made up, rather I have simply translated the essence of a profound wisdom tradition that has been practiced for millennia to achieve this state of Being. I’m uniquely qualified to offer you this rare access into the tradition that is solely dedicated to developing and expressing the Feminine Divine.

During the first half of my forty-year-Bhakti practice, I lived in ashrams in the United States and India as an ascetic submerged in daily practice and learning rigorous philosophical foundations. Afterwards, I made my home an ashram with a sacred space and built two multi-million dollar businesses to support my family. In between my personal evolution and professional successes, I was a mom and wife. I taught seminars and workshops on Bhakti, and lead international campaigns for women’s spiritual rights empowering thousands of women. In other words, like you, I deal with the nitty-gritty, messy parts of living in the modern world.

Who I’m serving on a given day varies. Today I hope to serve you and make your acquaintance.

Please make yourself at home and join our growing community to bring more heartfulness to our mindfulness. You can become part of the tipping point that is set to launch us into a renaissance for women and the world. To a moment now to sign up for my newsletter.

A million hearts to you,

Bhakti is a way of Being, just as Zen is a way of Being. Bhakti is intentional heartfulness; Buddhism is intentional mindfulness.

I like Bhakti as a way of Being. My life is rich beyond measure; I find peace in even the most distressing, disorienting situations.

However much you choose to investigate the Way of the Feminine Divine, I believe you’ll find Bhakti worthy of attention, fascinating, elegant, interesting, provocative and very practical. There is truly a valuable nugget in Bhakti for everyone. Please take yours.

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