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The art of making right decisions Excerpt of a talk by Maharishi on July 17, 1972 In this lecture, Maharishi describes how daily contact with the field of Creative Intelligence or pure consciousness during our practice of the Transcendental Meditation (TM) technique allows our mind to think and act from a calmer and more expanded level of awareness. This helps us make better decisions and live more of our full potential in life. Maharishi: In this generation, it will be possible for all men to become so competent that everyone will be making right decisions for all good. How this will be brought about by the Science of Creative Intelligence is very obvious. We know, in these days of technology, a small computer will compute small things. A bigger computer will compute much bigger things. A bigger computer has the ability of greater comprehension. An ordinary man without the knowledge of architecture, if he wants to think of how he will construct his house, he will consider things one by one. A well-educated mind of a qualified architect, when he sits at his table to construct the house on the level of his awareness, his quiet, calm mind will comprehend many things at one time. He takes into account the site, the background of it, the need of the owner, and their financial ability. All these various aspects are contained in the awareness of an experienced architect. A layman can only project his awareness on limited channels of the house. And the danger in the ability of only projecting the awareness on limited channels is that the sight of the whole is lost. When an object is well-placed in the proper background, then the value that it offers to life is much more enriching, much more inspiring. And therefore, it is vital that even when one wants to make a decision in a narrow boundary, the decision has to be from that unbounded level where great comprehension is possible at one time. If one is in a boat in the ocean and is surrounded by all the waves, he looks around, but he can’t see a great distance, just because there are waves to obstruct his vision. But if he launches his boat on a quiet day when the wind is almost nil, he finds a calm, quiet surface of the ocean. In whatever direction he looks, he looks far. The vision is more comprehensive when the surface of the ocean is calm. This is just the situation with the mind. When the mind is wavy, its ability to comprehend a greater horizon is much less. When the waves of the mind are calm and quiet in that pure consciousness, the motionless ground state, a field of no activity, such an awareness comprehends a great horizon, a great range. And then, whatever decision is made from that very wide horizon of awareness, it comprehends a greater range of influence. Just as a quiet, calm mind of an architect is able to take into its awareness so many aspects at a time. So this cultivation of a level of awareness which maintains tranquility in the midst of all the activities of the mind inside, and of the environment outside, that state of tranquility spontaneously gives the ability for a greater range of comprehension. And on this level, the mind is like a very big computer which can instantly take into account many aspects and produce the desired channel of performance. So the ability to maintain wide comprehension and project the desired activity is the ability of a developed mind. Developed means using our full potential. The full potential of the ocean on the surface value is when the ocean is calm and quiet. The value of that calm and quiet range of comprehension is in creating a wave which will comprehend a wide range of possibilities. The whole ocean could rise in a wave, and that will be when the ocean has a chance to rise from that quiet surface level. This is the practical value of direct experience of that which we call the pure nature of Creative Intelligence at the source of thought, the transcendental value of awareness.
© Copyright 2015 Maharishi Foundation USA, a non-profit educational organization.
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