My offering to you today is a story that I have excerpted from my book, Inner Mastery, Outer Impact.

Have you read Inner Mastery, Outer Impact? If not, and if you’re enjoying my newsletter, I have a feeling that you will find this book a worthy read. It will help you explore questions on how to be true to yourself in the modern world, where to turn to for wisdom about your inner core, and how exemplary people, both everyday and iconic heroes, have cultivated their 5 core energies — Purpose, Wisdom, Growth, Love, and Self-realization — and grown their impact in the world.

Here is the story.

High up on a mountaintop, a monastery housed an abbot and some monks. It had once been a thriving community, but in recent years it had fallen on hard times. Few visitors came, donations were down to a trickle, and young men had stopped joining the order. The garden was unkempt, and cobwebs covered the chapel ceiling. Behind this outer decay lay an inner decay. The monks didn’t get along; arguments frequently broke out over petty things, and they blamed one another for their problems. The aging abbot felt greatly demoralized about the future of his beloved monastery but didn’t know what to do.

One foggy winter evening there was a knock on the monastery’s door. A highly regarded rabbi from the region had come visiting. He stayed for five days. The monks looked after him with great care and respect. It didn’t take him long to observe the monastery’s challenges. On the final day of the rabbi’s visit, the abbot confided in him and sought his counsel. The rabbi nodded, but didn’t offer any answers. Later, as he sat with the monks for dinner one last time, he thanked them for their warm hospitality. Then after a pause, he spoke again in a hushed tone. “Brothers, I know these are hard times for all of you. But do not despair. I have seen the Messiah. He is right here, among you. Your monastery has a bright future.” Then he bid farewell and left.

The monks were stunned. In the days that followed, they engaged in a flurry of speculation. “If the Messiah is among us, who could it be? Perhaps Brother Patrick? After all, though he is occasionally absent-minded, he is also warm to everyone. Or Brother Nelson? He has a bit of a temper, but it always comes from a place of deep caring for our community. Brother Jacob? He’s constantly berating us about how we’re not on time with our prayers and our meals. We’ve started to avoid his company, but sometimes it feels like it is God who is trying to discipline us through him. Then there’s Brother James, too. He has such humility and devotion in the way he goes about doing his duties, and he never pushes his own ideas. Could it be… me? I did join the monastery with a pure purpose, I feel so much peace when I am in the chapel, and two of our monks come to me regularly for guidance on the scriptures.”

In small but tangible ways, day upon day, the monks started to change. Now when there was disagreement, they would make an extra effort to respectfully listen to one another. When they passed by a fellow monk, they would nod and smile lovingly. If a monk became irritable, others would give him the space to recover without judgment. They started to discover qualities they much liked in one another. They woke up each day to pray deeply in the chapel, walking out inspired to take on their duties. The monastery became a hive of devotional activity. Residents from neighboring towns started to attend services, seek counseling, and volunteer their time, drawn by the monks’ presence and peaceability. Some spiritually inclined young men applied to join the order.

Occasionally, the abbot’s thoughts would turn to the past, and he would silently marvel at the wisdom of the rabbi whose words had triggered this transformation — and at the faith of the monks in trusting that the Messiah was in fact among them, and within them.

Perhaps within you and within me too there is a mystic in the making. When we start our day with that awareness of our best self, when we affirm it in others around us, when we act in every moment in concert with it, then, over time, we become our best selves — as individuals, as families, as organizations, as communities, as nations, as humanity.

It struck me as I wrote this newsletter that this is what we will be engaging in at our retreat on Inner Mastery: Activating Your 5 Core Energies that’s happening on October 24-27 in Santa Fe, New Mexico. I will be conducting this retreat in partnership with my colleague Taylor Parker. At Ojo Spa, we will take on practices that can help us draw on the divine spark at the core of life, at the core of every experience, at the core of every person we meet — and at the core of our own being. When we do so, we indeed become mystics in the material world — zestfully engaged with the opportunities and challenges each moment brings, from a place of noble intention and calm perception.

As our gathering of truth-seekers in Santa Fe jointly pursues this beautiful quest, we will find it ennobles our interactions, our relationship-building, and the community we form together. We will discover how each of us can shed the shackles of limiting habits and beliefs of the past to intentionally approach our full potential. For there is such remarkable soul-wisdom, soul-love, soul-peace, and soul-joy that silently lie in waiting at our core. If the opportunity is right for you, and the time is ripe for you, then consider joining us for this retreat in October.

Warmly,
Hitendra

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