Writing For Spiritual Fitness by Nadeem Mohamed

Writing has always been my passion.

As a kid I was shy and reserved, but when I was given a pen and paper with solitude I would write aggressively. As far as I could remember I would spend most of my afternoons shut in my bedroom writing.

So what did I write about?

Mostly, I wrote about everything.

I wrote about my neighbours.

I wrote about my family.

I wrote about Mishi, the cat, whom I was afraid of. (I still have a phobia about cats.)

I wrote about my fantasies.

I wrote about how I love going to school

I wrote about how I didn’t measure up with the rest of the kids of the neighbourhood.

I wrote to my pen pals. I had several.

Writing had always been my ally. It kept me grounded. It helped me to understand my environment, my family and mostly my self.

Writing opens new avenues in understanding our spirit and how our “I” interprets our external environment. We interpret our external environment using our five senses, namely:

• Sight
• Hearing
• Taste
• Touch
• Smell

Writing develops all these five senses. It brings an element of effortless focus to our lives.

For example, if you are writing about a distant memory about how your abusive, father used to beat your mother while you watched shivering with fear and revolt. Now write down that incident using the below points.

1.      What did you see? (Sight)

2.      What sound did you hear during that incident? Was it silent outside? Did your mother shout and cry? (Hearing)

3.      Where were you standing? Were you barefooted? Were you holding something? Were you leaning or holding the kitchen door? (Touch)

4.      Were you eating something at that time? (Taste)

5.      What aroma could you smell during the incident? Did the kitchen smell with the aroma of cooking food or freshly baked fruit cake? (Smell)

With much practice in writing we will be using all these five senses to the maximum, hence contributing to their expansion of there capabilities.

As all these five senses expand and enlarge its potential with daily use. The sixth sense will also awake from its slumber if we use the five senses to there potentials. It is the sixth sense which gives colour to our life. This colour comes out also in our writings, touching everyone with the ambiance of joy and celebration

Let us go deep into each of the senses and see how they helps us to understand our environment.

HUMAN BEING: AN OPEN SYSTEM

A human being is an open system.

The moment death occurs; this open system turns into a closed system.

A human being who can taste, see, touch, smell and hear is an open system. Let’s elaborate these five senses with examples

1.      We can say a certain food is sour, bitter, hot or sweet by our sense of taste.   Mangoes of the spring seasons are sweet. “I love that sour cream.” “The medicine I was given by the doctor is so bitter.” “The red pepper salad was hot.” Do note that when we bite a piece of mango a bioelectric process takes place on the surface of the tongue. These impulses are sent to a certain area of the brain which processes the whole impulse activity as SWEET. The same goes for the medicine but now the impulse activity is processed as BITTER. The cream is processed as SOUR while the red pepper salad is processed as HOT. The sense of taste comes from our brain which is inside us. The food is our external reality. Mango is not part of us but something outside us. When we want to know the reality of the mango we eat it. Here the internal (sense of taste) and the external (mango) interact and that’s how we come to know something about the mango (that it is sweet). This proves that the human being is an open system, and it can get information from the externals (mangoes) and interpret it.

2.      We can point to things and say “that is a chair”, “that is a ball” and “that is a book” by our sense of sight. Light rays travel from the said object to our eyes, from there an impulse is sent to a certain area of the brain which processes the impulse activity as a chair, ball or a book.

3.      We can discern various frequencies of sounds. That is the sound of a bird singing or that is the sound of an ambulance siren or that is the sound of Nadeem’s voice. Waves of sound travel from the said object to our ear, from which there the impulse is sent to a certain area of the brain which processes the impulse activity as a bird singing, a siren of an ambulance or a voice of Nadeem

4.      The towel is so fluffy. The texture of the floor is rough. Her hair is silky soft. The interpretation of the surface quality is made possible by our touch sense. When we touch something the pressure points of our skin send an impulse signal to the brain via the nerves connecting the brain and the skin pressure points. The brain processes this signals and interprets the said object to be fluffy, rough or silky soft.

5.      The smell of fresh bread baking in the oven was awesome. The garbage is giving out a rotting smell. Smell is another sense with which we interpret our externals. Waves emanating from the object enter our nose, from there the impulse is sent to a certain area of the brain where the impulse activity is interpreted as awesome smell of bread or rotting garbage smell

The above five sense shows that we are an open system which can take information from the external (in this case, our environment) and interpret it with our sense of touch, smell, sight, hearing and taste.

The Human sense is not limited to these five senses. There are other senses available in the brain, which are lying dormant in the brain. These senses are in that part of the brain which needs to be opened with spiritual practices such as energy works, zikr (japa), prayer and mostly meditations.

MEDITATION AND WRITING.

What are the common factors between meditation and writing?

1. Both require time to be practiced.
2. Both develop awareness
3. Both can be practiced anytime of the day and night.
4. Both contribute to self development

So is writing a meditation? In ancient India writing was considered a form of meditation. This sort of writing was referred to as Likha Japa, where the disciple would write down one single mantra a number of times everyday. Concentration was developed via such writing meditation. In Likha Japa we ignore all other thoughts and just write one single thought again and again. This thought is refereed to as a Mantra.

The writing I have practiced is completely opposite to Likha Japa. I usually grab a piece of paper and pen and write whatever comes to my mind at the moment. I can start by writing about my new jeans I bought at the new shopping mall and then move on to an argument with my brother fifteen years back. The thumb rule is that you should keep your hand moving and write down whatever your mind gives you at the moment.

You might be wondering what connection my new jeans has with an argument dated fifteen years back. What connection could be there with these two incidents which are bridged by the time factor? There is always a connection. As a rule we are not supposed to analyze it but keep your hand moving in writing with whatever flashes in your mind. Keep writing. Do not read. Keep writing. Do not edit.

MANURE OF YOUR MIND

As long as you don’t find any connections with the incidents you are writing about just keep gliding the pen on the paper. There is no need for you to analyze and understand. This sort of writing we do daily is referred to as the Manure of the mind.

Manure has a very stench, distinct smell. The fresher it is, the stronger it stinks. The same goes for our freshly, written writing. It lacks logic. It has no theme. It alienates unity. In other words it’s all a chaos. Such unstructured writing is the doorway to finding integrity and cohesion in our own limited world.

You will see the sun of clarity rise in our writing once we have processed most of the manure of our mind in many sessions of our writing. This happens when all the incidents of our life have been questioned, analyzed, revisited, attacked, befriended in our daily practice of writing. Like the way the stinking manure is added and mixed to the soil to bring a luscious, green produce in our farms, the same way the unitegrated events of our life (manure) brings enlightenment to the mind if each such unitergrated event is given space and voice, non-judgementally in our writing.

So what events of your life are disturbing you? Write about them. Don’t be satisfied with writing once. Rewrite it again. See what new skeletons come out from the closet of your writings. Be elated like an archaeologist for the new discovery in your spiritual territory. But for goodness sake, don’t get stuck in the joy of your discovery. No need to put the skeletons in the museum of your mind and make fame out of it. Make a good burial of your skeletons you discovered and grab your pen and paper for there are more skeletons to be uncovered and put into their right burial place in the graveyard of our spiritual body.

THE THEME OF UNITY

Our unconscious mind is pointing to an important theme in our writing, which will make itself known to us if we take writing as a tool for spiritual growth. The theme I am referring to is UNITY.

Let us see the theme of Unity in one of writings. You can of course use your own writing for this example.

THE RIVER OF LIFE (extracted from my  article Eating for Beauty)

Have you been lucky to live near a river or maybe a stream?

Have you seen how water sparkles and glitters under the falling rays of the sun?

Have you tried to taste water?

A clean water body brings a lot of advantages to the surrounding area. Let’s count some of the blessings coming from clean rivers and streams.

1. A source of life hood for the fisherman.
2. Provides clean drinking water for the animals and humans
3. Can be used for irrigating farms by channeling the supply of the water to farms.

Note how the surrounding gains from the clean water body

Just imagine the same river is now contaminated with chemical wastes from the industries. Certainly the internal condition of the river will change. The water wouldn’t be life supporting. All the fishes will die. A lot of fungus and weeds will thrive in the murky waters.

We too have river running inside us.

This river is called the RIVER OF LIFE

The underlined words in the above piece of writing are as follows:

1. River
2. Stream
3. Water
4. Sun
5. Fisherman
6. Humans
7. Animals
8. Farms
9. Industries
10. Fishes
11. Fungus
12. Weeds

The above list contains both animate and inanimate items. Now go back to the writing above and see how we unify all these twelve things with the breath of our writing. See how we have connected each object with one another that if you remove a single item from the above writing, the writing will lack vitality and life.

By mentioning each and every item with which we are connected in our daily life brings a special emotion to our conscious. This emotion opens the valve of appreciation and abundance in our life. The emotion I am referring to is GRATITUDE.

See what you have mentioned in your daily writings. Also see what is missing from your writing. Are you trying to avoid something in your life? If you are then it will come out in your writing. Spiritual writing is not about escapism or trying to get sympathy from the readers. It’s more to do with your relationship with the Universal realities. Come on and write me your thoughts about:

1. Sex and Masturbation
2. Your wife, with whom you have divorced
3. That crazy beggar sitting at your house door
4. Your mother, with whom you no longer talk
5. Recession
6. High prices of food
7. Insecurity in your city

Grab a pen and paper and discover the manure of your mind for each topic listed above. Remember with each article we write we are not searching for agreement with our readers. Readers too are human beings who have their own manure of mind. So don’t get frustrated when no body is in alignment with your thoughts and ideas.  

EMOTIONS AND WRITING.

One’s emotional state usually comes out in one’s writing. You can easily glean from the writings of the writer and notice which emotion he is trying to evoke in you. Is he trying to evoke fear in you? Is he trying to plant the seeds of anger in you? Rather is she trying to bring a new dimension of emotions in you?

Just imagine waking up in the morning and reading an article about death in your area with mugging and robbery. As soon as you are done with the article you are so concerned and worried about your own safety. Bingo! The writer was successful in planting the chip of insecurity in your emotional body.

Most of us move around in life carrying emotions which rightfully don’t belong to us. They have all been implanted by our parents, friends, the media, teachers and yes, the religious leader. So if the dominant emotion in your upbringing was fear we will see it in your writing. If sexuality is your dominant thought then eroticism and seduction will be the prevailing theme in your writing. The gist of the whole matter is that whatever sum total of the emotions we have been and are at the moment flows in our life and writings too.

Many of my friends write wonderful poems. The most dominant themes of most of the poems are heartbreak, human miseries, blame games and how life has been unfair to us. Strictly speaking no writer can write about the above emotions unless one has deeply involved in one of those emotions. Sometimes I read them with all my heart and mind and sometimes I just can’t connect to the writer’s emotion.

One can easily glean the spiritual status of the writer from his words.

What I have noticed from years of junk writing is that we process most of our emotions in our writings. Usually what you cannot express in the open to people can come out well in the privacy of your writing meditations. Try this exercise. Get a recent local newspaper. Look at the headlines. What emotions do they stir in you?

The only advice I can give you is that STOP reading newspapers and watching the news. The only thing they do is plant negative emotions in our emotional body. Drop that toxic newspaper and get hold of an inspirational book. See how your emotions and well being sky rockets and brings changes to all facets of your life, including your writing.

WRITING MEDITATION PRACTICE.

So you are ready to start your writing meditation practice. There are namely three factors which you will require for the above practice.

1. Pen: Invest in a good writing pen. Have a variety in hand. Some prefer smooth nib pens while others prefer the thick ones. The idea is that the pen should be able to glide with the pace of your writing hand. Abruptness of the selected writing pen will be a disadvantage. Investing in good pens will save us a lot of trouble when you are amidst a writing session and don’t want to be irritated by your screeching pen, which does not glide as fast as the thoughts and emotions flowing from our mind to our writing hand.
2. Papers: You will need a lot of papers, notebooks and writing pads. Choose whatever sounds right for you. I usually prefer the cheap 32 pages notebook. Don’t invest in something expensive and fancy. Once I bought a thousand page journals (The one with a black hard cover, just like the accountants ledger book). I have only filled one page on it since the day I bought it. When we buy such fancy notebooks we feel inclined to write only good and worthy stuff in it. As I had recounted several times in the article that we write whatever comes to our mind. DO NOT ANALYSE. DO NOT READ. DO NOT EDIT. It’s very hard to follow these three golden rules in expensive journals. That has been my experience. Get a cheap supply of notebooks whereby you can feel free to write whatever you feel. And I mean whatever you FEEL.
3. Time (Commitment): Be ready to invest time in this new spiritual practice. Just like in our normal meditation it is emphasized to continue the practice daily preferably the same time and place. Writing meditation too demands the same commitment. The fruits of continued meditation practice are peace and clarity in ones life’s while writing meditation practices go a step farther than the normal meditation. Not only will peace and clarity will be yours but you will finda new way of communication with yourself and the world at large. This new method of communication will be the power of your written words. A power so strong, so immutable that it will bring all your thoughts from the spirit realm to the physical realm in the forms of words. You can start by practicing writing for fifteen minutes every day. You can slowly add time to your every day schedule. A caution to be noted is that we should not be too rushed to add time to our writing schedules. We should only lengthen our practice time when we are ready to dive our soul out in the extra time given to us. Please do not convert the writing practice time into a ritual. If you have got a commitment or something more important to do at the scheduled time than leave your writing aside and attend to the needed emergency of the moment. Writing meditation is not a cult so there is no need to feel overwhelmed with failure and guilt when you miss a single writing session. On the other hand we should not be so hooked to our schedules that we forget all about our writing practices. We should remember that nothing flows until energy is directed to it.

The above three factors are the most important aspects which we need to consider now and again during our writing practices. The most difficult to do justice to out of the three is the time factor. I have noted in my case that mostly I “play” around with this rule. Sometimes I can be so much in flow that I can spend my whole day locked up in my home writing, and sometimes days pass by and I fail to even hold my writing pen. The period of absence spent away from your writing desk is referred to as the WRITER’S BLOCK.

WRITER’S BLOCK

Writers block is a period when one’s creativity and expression comes to an unexpected halt. There is no need to get worked up when one faces this temporary close down. It’s normal and in fact it has many advantages. This usually happens because of one of the following reasons:

1. Expression: Before you express and write the article concerned you need to express or write something else. There are many times I would start a certain newsletter with vigour. The writing is full of energy and words flow like water flowing from higher to lower ground. Suddenly, the flow stops and the connection between your thought and writing hand are barred. If you insist on continuing you will find that the writing turns out to be loose, murky and out of control. There is no connection whatsoever with your previous thoughts and your new thoughts. These new thoughts are culprit causing your writing to stall. So what do we do? All we need to do is keep writing whatever our mind has revealed. This new mind vista often represents our unconscious unintegrated life events. Give them an open welcome. Let its spirit flow on our writings. These un-welcomed school of thoughts will soon exhaust there life energy on your writing pads. There echo will go more and more distant. In the end all will be silent. More refined thoughts will greet you. They will have all the raw materials on how to complete your newsletter.

2. Emotions: Anger is the most dangerous emotion which can bring the sign “On the Path to Death” to your life. If you are angry than your reasoning and logic faculty will depart you. Every thing will be seemed fuzzy. So if your inner world feels anger then the outer writing will also point to anger. Anger has its own way of finding its venting pipes. I have noted that when I get a surge of anger feelings during my writing sessions then these feelings dam my stream of creativity. It abhorrently announces that I am here to stay. When such emotions show up on my mind’s door I usually leave my work. This usually goes on for days, until my surprised family members would ask me that I haven’t been writing lately. When such heavy emotions show up its best we express them there and then through our writing. If we don’t these emotions will linger through out your day causing empty fun seeking in order to avoid dealing with the emotions. I have spoilt many hours, days and weeks in writer’s block and all that was needed was to let in the uninvited emotions (anger, guilt, frustration etc), give them a voice on your paper and soon they will be gone forever.

3. Doubts: Doubt is the greatest enemy of mankind. It can bring your life expression to a stand still if you are not familiar with this perpetrator. Doubting thoughts can be something like:

• “I can’t write”: If you entertain this doubt than be sure that you will never pick up a pen to write.
• “You can write only this much”: If you had not entertained the above thought. Then you will proceed with your writing until a new doubting officer greets you. This doubt will bring the concept of boundary in your writing. It will highlight doubts like your writing limit is 200 or 300 words. You can’t go beyond this imposed limit. Usually such doubts are self imposed. I have broken such doubts and gone to write articles containing more than 5,000 words.
• “Your vocabulary and grammar is not upto the standard”: We all have our limits. The best way to break our limit is to start with your limit. Use the words and grammar you are familiar with, even if it is of the standard of a nursery school. Write your heart out with the tools available to you at the moment. Nobody will notice your language barriers if your project reflects your heart energy. An error or two discovered in your writing shows how closely and with laser sharp attention your work is being scrutinized and being attended to.
• “You can’t venture into this topic”: The most doubting topic I have ever written was “Me, Her and Sexual Bliss. I had armies of doubting soldiers behind me whenever I sat to write and research this topic. “You will spoil your name”, “people will not appreciate such bluntness on sex” and “You will rot in hell” were some of the doubt soldiers behind my back. Despite all these thoughts I went and finished the article. Today this article is the most read one on my website and with the most feedback. The only thing I can say with a definite tone of authority is not to leave any topic unattended when you sit to do your writing session. Who knows today’s junk writing might be the crown of all your cherished writings on your website.

The above three causes are the ones which pillar the foundation of Writer’s Block. Remove one pillar and the whole writer’s block mansion will come crumbling down. So next time you get stuck in your writing sessions, you just need to see whether the cause is expression, emotion or doubt. Always know that you are in control and everything will flow smoothly.

THE ALCHEMY OF WRITING.

Here I want to venture into the topic of writing for others. In here, I am not referring to the junk writing we do everyday. Here we are entering the realm of logic and rational writing. We are no more in the realm of fantasy with which we process most of the “manure of our mind” in fictional writing during our everyday writing session.

In writing for the masses, four important elements needs to be considered. These four elements bring all your “processed” junk as a clear shining diamond, readily acceptable in the rational market of the masses psyche.

So what are the four elements of public writing?

They are as follows:

1. The Element of Air
2. The Element of Fire
3. The Element of Water
4. The Element of Earth

The Element of Air

The element of Air rules the realm of our thoughts. When you choose a certain topic to write about, the next thing is to organize the thoughts you want to convey in your writing into a priority list. For example, if your chosen topic is about Growing Roses, then your hierarchy of thoughts will be like as follows:

1. Preparing the rose bed
2. Seeding
3. Watering and nurturing the seedling
4. Special care, in case of other conditions
5. Harvesting

We can’t start with thought No.3. It kills logic and sends rationality for a visit to the mortuary. Linear thinking always supports rationality. So first we prepare the rose bed by adding manure and weeding and it goes on linearly, whereby the end of one thought brings life to another.

There is no room of fantasy and surprise in the Air element.

Air Element is most refined in Spiritual and Philosophical writing.

The Element of Fire

The Element of Fire rules the realm of inspiration. So does you article inspire your readers? Let’s take the topic of Growing Roses again. Have you written it in a way that anyone who is interested in planting roses can appreciate your article?

Promise the readers a good harvest of roses if they follow the rules of planting. Throw a paragraph or two of your harvesting experience. Remember if you have not experienced growing roses the readers will know from your bland writing. Do not under estimate the reader’s intuition faculty

Your inspiration should be contagious through your words to the reader.

Fire Element is most refined in Motivational Writing

The Element of Water

The Element of Water rules the realm of Emotions. So what emotions do you want to evoke in your readers?

Sympathy?

Fear?

Joy?

In your article about Growing Roses what emotions have you stirred up in the readers?

What did you feel when harvesting the roses? Did you feel great tilling and weeding the rose bed?

The most important emotions I have found to hypnotize mass readers is FEAR. I am not making this up. Don’t you read the newspaper everyday? You might reply that I read the newspaper to read the current affairs of the world. To that I would say the motivation behind the reading is not just curiousity but its curiousity coated with bitter sugar of fear and insecurity.

What do the stars say about me?

Has the stock market plunged?

Has the price of fuel risen up?

Water Element is most refined in Novel writing and Journalism.

The Earth Element

The Earth Element rules the realm of making lasting connections. Growing roses is a common world wide activity. Sharing your insights and thoughts about it connects the writer and the reader on a common ground

The writer gives explicit procedures in his article and if followed by the reader they would have cultivated a common experience of harvesting and planting of roses. The Earth element breaks the barrier of exclusiveness between the writer and the reader and brings them on equal altitude of understanding.

Don’t we share the Earth with other six billion people?

Not only do we share the earth but we all share the same common experiences.

Earth element binds humanity with its set of laws about oneness

Earth Element is most refined in Geographical and Historical Writing.

For an article to be well written it should have all the four elements about writing properly balance. If one of the elements outbalances the other the writing will appear dry and lack equilibrium.

HOUSE CLEANING BY WRITING.

We all are aware about the power of our sub conscious mind.

The Sub conscious mind is the store house where all our unprocessed events of life are stored within. All those which you call good and bad memories come to your conscious mind from this source.

So what is a memory?

A memory is a back lock of a number of thoughts attached to each other by the energy of your emotions. If the emotion is positive then the memory is termed good. The memory is termed bad if the emotion associated with it is negative

For example, if I told you to write about your parents many people will shudder with fear as all those bad memories will come to their conscious mind associated with the word “father” and “mother”.

In writing we open the flood gates of the subconscious mind and ground those emotions by giving them the much needed space in our writing. By doing this we diffuse a certain amount of charge from the said memory. That’s why we feel so relieved and light after a session of candid writing.

Such writing demands radical honesty from us.

After a number of such writing topics on a given topic all the charge holding the thoughts together will be diffused. Now it’s no longer a memory. The memory has been broken into a number of neutral thoughts. Now try writing about your parents again and you will notice that your thoughts and emotions about your parents will no longer match to your previous writing. This juncture of writing signals to the maturity and evolvement of our consciousness.

Writing is not only therapeutic but it also promotes the expansion of consciousness into new realms. Gratitude Journaling is a good example where we expand our consciousness by counting the blessings in our life. An example of how to start and write a Gratitude Journal is given below.

God I am grateful for:

1. A good refreshing night sleep

2. My blanket which keeps me warm all the night.

3. My fan which keeps me cool on hot nights

4. The birds singing outside my window

5. Mrs Anjali, our neighbour, sent me my favourite brownies

6. The bank receiptionist helped me filling the saving account form

7. My brother called me from UK to enquire about my health as I was sick for last two days

8. I helped my neighbour with cleaning his backyard.

9. I bought my sister in law a birthday gift.

10. Helped my wife with the laundry

FAST FORWARD.

The below poem by Anju Makin summarizes the whole article in a few lines.

Drops of ink
Splashed on paper
Scattered thoughts
Feelings wrought
My wounds glow
Emotions flow
From hand to the pen
My own Zen
put pen to paper
maybe a caper
under a seize
what a tease
I begin to write
Feeling bright
slowly at first
a dam bursts
furious pace
my thoughts in a race
fighting to get out
the mind shouts
one by one
half begun
let me plant
giddy and scant
the seeds sprout
feeding doubts
I am done
my mind undone

The trance breaks
Catharsis wakes
Lie spent
My heart bent
Celebrate
Meditate

(Posted with permission from the writer)

Well, its time for me to start my writing meditation session.

Would you like to join me?