Do you have a garden in your mind?

A strange question, perhaps. What I mean by that is: do you cultivate the thoughts in your mind just as you would beautiful plants in your own garden? If you plant the most positive thoughts your mind can understand, then you’ll have a beautiful garden in your mind.

But, like a normal garden, if you don’t keep cultivating your mental garden then everything will fall apart.

Just as an untended garden would revert to a wild state, if you don’t look after and feed your mental garden to keep negativity out, then negative thoughts will return just like weeds and slowly you’ll lose all your carefully chosen plants and flowers; your lovingly planted thoughts of higher ideals.

To make the most of your mental garden, work on becoming a master gardener! A wild rose climbing up a fence is a beautiful creation. But the cultivated rose, brought about by loving care and knowing ways, has the most beautiful essence. Likewise, cultivating beautiful thoughts is comparable to growing prize-winning roses.

Maintaining a positive mental approach, means being tolerant of those who don’t have positive thoughts. If you think about it, it’s not so much other people’s negative acts that cause you problems; it’s your reaction to them. You’ll only harm yourself if you allow this irritation to cause you to slip back into old, negative thought patterns.

Although I try to avoid it, there are days when I feel down. I’m lucky, in that it rarely lasts more than a few hours, maybe a day. I know that others may not find it so easy to get out of that frame of mind. Depression and anxiety are curses in the modern world. All I can say is that, for me, when I have taken the first step to getting rid of a negative thought, it becomes easier and easier until finally I can reach a point where I’ll no longer go back to old harmful ways of thinking.

Like me, once you develop the habit of increasing your positive mental activity, you’ll discover an inner harmony which can create a pocket of calm around you. Whenever you see a terrible situation in the world around you, whether on TV or the internet, inner harmony can help you cope with it.

The Rosicrucian teachings can help you look critically at the overall situation and show you practical ways of doing something to help. When meditating, ask for more tolerance in the world, or send mental messages of peace to world leaders. Ask for cosmic guidance for survivors of disasters, so that their situation won’t completely overwhelm them.

Your day-to-day life will be much easier when loving thoughts take root in the soil of your mental garden. When needed, you can draw upon these loving thoughts from within and put them into action. You must allow your inner self to guide you in knowing where and how to help those you meet upon this human voyage. Everyone needs aid and comfort from someone at some time. Through sharing knowledge, experience and love, you’ll join hands in a positive human chain of care that reaches beyond all physical bonds.

You’ll find that when you start to apply what I’ve said to your own life, you’ll find some measure of happiness. Peace comes to everyone with different meanings at different stages of consciousness, and you’re no exception.

For me, peace comes after inner struggle, when I’ve really tried to bring about a more harmonious condition between myself and all positive elements which I can understand.

Tomorrow I may be confronted with yet another struggle, but in the end, I’m confident that I’ll come to know greater peace. Eventually, after much practice, you’ll find that you too have the inner strength needed to better deal with daily situations as they arise.

Through the trials and errors of many incarnations, you and I have learned great lessons. If we wish to be ‘master gardeners’, handling our affairs in the best way possible, and giving our best in service to others, we must keep our mental mood attuned to high purpose at all times and keep out negativity as best we can. If you choose to become a Rosicrucian, you’ve chosen yourself for the hard work upon your own self and dedication for service. Living in harmony with the creative forces of nature and ever searching for more truth, your consciousness expands and becomes ever more all-encompassing. By living harmoniously, you’ll easily find the best place possible for yourself in your new world of Light.

To quote one of our Rosicrucian students:

No true seeker fails to unveil some truth. No honest worker fails to receive some Cosmic blessings. For the Cosmic is indiscriminate, and such blessings automatically occur for those whose time has come through work within their own mental garden.

Adapted by Eve Morgan’s article  in the Rosicrucian Beacon.