Negative Qualities must be Uprooted and Destroyed

You must have patience and forbearance, but at the same time, you should know under what circumstances and in what manner to use them. As we have shown, there are situations in which you must temper your outward expression of forbearance. You need to use your discrimination to know how and when to express the quality of forbearance, which should be ever firmly established in your heart.

Forbearance and patience are indicators of your inward state. They are instruments which you use to counter the negative qualities that are within you, the unwholesome character traits which come in the way of realizing your divine truth. Consider the ability to exercise forbearance in difficult circumstances as a test. It is in these times that the negative qualities buried within you will rear their heads and will tend to manifest themselves in wrongful or harmful actions. Welcome such difficult situations as challenges and opportunities to expose and destroy these negative qualities. You do this through your forbearance, patience and restraint, when otherwise your impulse would have been to use words or actions to harm. It is only after you achieve patience and forbearance and establish them firmly within you, that you will develop the inner peace and equanimity that is needed in order to understand the true principles of spirituality and divinity.

There are many negative qualities which must be completely shunned by devotees. In particular, you should not have any attachment, any hatred or any jealousy within you. If you have attachment, hatred and jealousy, even in the smallest measure, you will not be able to progress spiritually. Attachment, hatred and jealousy, and their hand-maiden anger, are the great enemies of devotees. They are the opposites of patience and forbearance. We will take up these negative qualities next and learn how to completely uproot them.