Vigilance ( extract from” Comentaries on the Dhammapada ” by the Mother)
Vigilance means to be awake, to be on one’s guard, to be sincere – never to be taken by surprise. When you want to do sadhana, at each moment of your life, there is a choice between taking a step that leads to the goal, or falling asleep or sometimes even going backwards telling yourself ” oh later on, not immediately” sitting down on the way
To be vigilant is not merely to resist what pulls you down ward, but above all to be alert in order not to lose any opportunity to progress, any opportunity to overcome a weakness, to resist a temptation, an opportunity to learn somethoing, to correct something, to master something. If you are vigilant, you can do in a few days what would otherwise take years. If you are vigilant you change each circumstance of your life, each action, each movement into an occasion for coming nearer the goal.
There are two kinds of vigilance, active and passive. There is a vigilance that gives you warning if you are about to make a mistake, if you are making wrong choices, if you are being weak or allowing yourself to be tempted, and there is the acive vigilance which seeks an opportunity to progress, seeks to utilise every circumstances, to advance more quickly
There is a difference between preventing yourself from falling and advancing more quickly
And both are absolutely necessary.
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See also
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