BE A YES – MAN
In 1960, Mother Krishna Bai of Anandashram, Kerala, told me something that totally altered the course of my inner life.
“Refrain, consciously, from using negative terms, expressions and judgements. To begin with, stop saying ‘no’ as an answer. For instance, if you want to say ‘no’ to you friend’s invitation to accompany him to his house, train yourself to say, ‘I will come tomorrow’, and abide by that commitment.
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Totally convert yourself from being a no-man to a yes-man. This is advised to make your mind lose its hold on you. The mind’s strongest tong, and the main root by which it subsists, is negativity. By abstaining from using any form of negative expression in your daily life, fifty percent of your insurmountable obstacles in spiritual sadhana are fully overcome. This makes you stronger to pursue further sadhana with less hindrances.”
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Here is an exercise for you. Find out why you say ‘no’, as an answer at all. From where within you do such negative responses sprout?
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The mechanical answer ‘no’ is unavoidable but harmless. How? If someone says, ‘today is Sunday,’ when it is actually Saturday, one can correct it by saying, ‘no’. This is not negativity as the ‘no’ only serves to correct an error (reply’s essence is on the importance of asserting the factual truth). This does not affect or afflict the psyche of the person.
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The calculated, psychological ‘no,’ based on personal want or cleverness with which we avoid responsibilities, circumstances and commitments, is harmful and affects our psyche. Any form of psychological ‘no’ or negative expression, leaves a scar in our psyche. This is called samskara or marked, past tendency, in Hindu terminology. Such accumulated samskaras take grosser roots, get arranged and settle as our prarabdha karma, actions to be executed in our present birth. It is this that involves us in continuous action.
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By not saying ‘no’ and by not using any form of negative expression in our daily life, fifty percent of our prarabdha karma is instantly and spontaneously warded off, asserts Mother Krishna Bai.
So, always be a yes-man. Initially, this will look impossible, irksome and unwanted. But if we pursue this diligently, we will positively experience our daily life becoming lighter, less burdensome.
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