Śīla – habit

«If devotion, discipline, mindfulness, renunciation, wisdom or strength is abandoned without reason by him, the person will not live by the end of the sixth month» (Kakṣapuṭatantra 19.32).

I understand, Scorpio, it sounds almost like a threat. Maybe it’s a Halloween joke, you’ll think, or a reference to the day of the dead. No, none of this. You have to think that in the shaiva area practitioner were always a bit drastic, not to mention fanatics. What’s more in the verse śīla is translated as “discipline”, but perhaps it is more correct to think of it as “good conduct”. Śīla actually also means “habit”, “inclination”, “tendency” and generally concerns the way of behaving. It is just habit I wanted to refer to.

Your birthday opens and continues in a beautiful favorable climate. Usually it is very easy to get used to well-being and to attach to it. After you’ve seen how good you can feel, you don’t really want to experience discomfort. Well, when at the end of the month Mars will give you a hard time, try to leave your impulsiveness aside and remember that discomfort as well as well-being depend on you!

IN PRACTICE  

Mala-āsana, garland pose.

Perform this pose every day for a minute.    

Awareness exercise:

Every time you feel the instinct to take immediate action, stop just a moment before acting and ask yourself what kind of emotion lurks behind that impulse. Observe if it is negative or positive, if it is exaggerated, exasperated, exalted or if instead it is a natural reaction, moderate in its intensity.

Mantra of the month:

«Lam»

(it is the bīja-mantra of the first chakra, to be down to earth).