The Road Taken

Close your eyes and breathe comfortably.
Imagine you are walking along a long road.
The road is a symbol of your life.
Its first milestone indicates the year you were born.
The subsequent milestones are all the years you have lived so far.
As you pass each milestone, look at your life events up to that time.
Feel the memories that are still fresh.
For all the pleasant memories, put a green flag.
For every painful memory, post a red flag.
Go on walking and go on placing these green and red flags.
At the place where you gained self-consciousness, put a white flag.
Also, continue to look at the faces of people associated with each of these memories.
Who were the people who made a real and positive difference in your life?
Who were your teachers and mentors?
What did you learn from each one of them?
In particular, mark the milestones where you see the influence of your parents.
What did they teach you?
What did you actually learn from them?
Now, go back to the place where you put the white flag.
What was so significant about this point in time?
Who assisted this emergence of self-consciousness?
Look at each of the red flags.
Pull them out slowly and gradually.
Let the images of those painful memories shrink in size.
Shift the color of these memories to black and white.
Let the sounds associated with these memories become dim and inaudible.
Complete this process so that your life’s road is cleared of all the red flags.
As you move forward, make sure that you travel in the glow of white light, the light of spiritual awakening. This light should brighten your path for the rest of the journey.
Open your eyes when you are ready.

Copyright © Surinder Deol 2006