On Thought Power
Swami Sivananda
While light
travels at the rate of 1,86,000 miles per second, thoughts virtually travel in
no time.
Thought is
finer than ether, the medium of electricity. In broadcasting, a singer sings
beautiful songs at Calcutta. You can hear them nicely through the radio set in
your own house at Delhi. All messages are received through the wireless.
Even so your
mind is like a wireless machine. A
saint with peace, poise, harmony and spiritual waves sends out into the world
thoughts of harmony and peace. They
travel with lightning speed in all directions and enter the minds of persons
and produce in them also similar thoughts of harmony and peace. Whereas a worldly man whose mind is full of
jealousy, revenge and hatred sends out discordant thoughts which enter the
minds of thousands and stir in them similar thoughts of hatred and discord.
If we throw a
piece of stone in a tank or a pool of water, it will produce succession of
concentric waves travelling all around from the affected place.
The light of
candle will similarly give rise to waves of ethereal vibrations travelling in
all directions from the candle.
In the same
manner, when a thought, whether good or evil, crosses the mind of a person, it
gives rise to vibrations in the Manas or mental atmosphere, which travel far
and wide in all directions.
What is the
possible medium through which thoughts can travel from one mind to
another? The best possible explanation
is that Manas or mind-substance fills all space like ether and it serves as the
vehicle for thoughts, as Prana is the vehicle for feeling, as ether is the
vehicle for heat, light and electricity, and as air is the vehicle for sound.
You can move
the world through thought-force.
Thought has great power. It can be transmitted from one man to another
man. The powerful thoughts of great
sages and Rishis of yore are still recorded in the Akasa (Akasic records).
Yogins who
have clairvoyant vision can perceive those thought-images. They can read them.
You are
surrounded by an ocean of thought. You are floating in the ocean of thought.
You are absorbing certain thoughts and repelling some in the
thought-world.
Every one has
his own thought-world.
A thought is a living thing. A thought is as much solid as a piece of
stone. We may cease to be, but our
thoughts can never die.
Every change
in thought is accompanied by vibration of its matter (mental). Thought as force needs a special kind of
subtle matter in its working.
The stronger
the thoughts, the earlier the fructification.
Thought is focussed and given a particular direction and, in the degree
that thought is thus focussed and given direction, it is effective in the work
it is sent out to accomplish.
Thought is a
finer force. This is supplied to us by food.
If you read Chhandogya Upanishad – the dialogue between Uddalaka and
Svetaketu – you will understand this point well.
If the food
is pure, thought also becomes pure. He
who has pure thoughts speaks very powerfully and produces deep impression on
the minds of the hearers by his speech.
He influences thousands of persons through his pure thoughts.
A pure
thought is sharper than the edge of a razor.
Entertain always pure, sublime thoughts. Thought-culture is an exact science.
What is this
world, after all? It is nothing but the
materialization of the thought-forms of Hiranyagarbha or God.
You have got
waves of heat and light and electricity in science. There are also thought-waves in Yoga. Thought has tremendous power.
Everybody is experiencing the power of thought unconsciously to a
greater or lesser degree.
Great Yogins
like Jnanadev, Bhartrihari and Patanjali used to send and receive messages to
and from distant persons through mind-telepathy (mental radio) and thought-transference.
Telepathy was the first wireless telegraph and telephone service ever known to
the world.
Just as you
take physical exercises, play games such as tennis and cricket in order to
maintain physical health, you will have to maintain mental health by radiating
the right thought-waves, by taking Sattvic food, mental recreation of an
innocent and harmless nature, change of mood, relaxation of mind by
entertaining good, ennobling and sublime thoughts and by cultivating the habit
of cheerfulness.
Every thought
that you send out is a vibration which never perishes. It goes on vibrating
every particle of the universe and if your thoughts are noble, holy and
forcible, they set in vibration every sympathetic mind.
Unconsciously
all people who are like you take the thought you have projected and in
accordance with the capacity that they have, they send out similar
thoughts. The result is that, without
your knowledge of the consequences of your own work, you will be setting in
motion great forces which will work together and put down the lowly and mean
thoughts generated by the selfish and the wicked.
Thought is
the greatest force on earth. Thought is the most powerful weapon in the armour
of a Yogi. Constructive thought transforms, renews and builds.
The far-reaching
possibilities of this force were most accurately developed to perfection by the
ancients and put to the highest possible use.
For, thought
is the primal force at the origin and back of all creation; the genesis of the
entire phenomenal creation is given as a single thought that arose in the
Cosmic Mind.
The world is
the Primal Idea made manifest.
Courtesy: Sri Aurobindo’s Action,
Dec., 2003