First, let your mind be trained in the direction that you are needed to develop the harmony between heart and brain which is a vital source of concentration.
Now, you need to indulge yourself in that and for doing this, you have to learn heartspecific behaviors. Actually, this harmony is the matter of the heart since heart is upon which all decision-making rests. Brain performs the thinking and pondering but heart guides that thinking and pondering to finally produce a decision to do or undo any piece of work.
This is the reason that the Holy Quran declares that their hearts are locked, so they are unable to understand (63:3).
Another issue is that how to replace the brain-specific behavior with Heart specific behavior?
First, remember, heart-specific behavior is one in which you are governed by an overwhelming consciousness that you are no more dependent on all worldly possessions, gains and interests since you belief that these possessions and interests and likewise all benefit and loss in your life is in the mighty hands of Allah the most powerful.
A relevant issue therefore is that how to enable yourself to go on learning the heartspecific behavior in terms of your observations and experiences of the everyday life?
The above point of view also suggests that a heart-specific behavior is one in which your primary consideration belongs to others (with the point of view of serving them) instead of your own self or self-interests. Similarly, your relationship with God like the rest is a ‘self-other’ relationship in which you establish your identity as an obedient creature of God.
So a highest form of this type of behavior is that when you submit to Allah for the sake of Allah by bowing down yourself and thus negating your proud self completely.
So the saying prayer with Khishaat (the awesome state of heart due to the presence before Allah, the Irresistible) is purest form of heart-specific behavior. Therefore, Prophet (SAWA) held that the best in reward is such remembrance of Allah which doesn’t involve tongue but one’s deep core of heart.
Exercise
The best way of enhancing heart-specific behavior is to keep yourself do more and more positive things and think little. Here, thinking means the constant brooding over a matter by pre-occupying your mind in the risks involved.
To this effect, don’t keep busy in counting the possible loss or benefits in the pursuits done by you n the different walks of life. So never let your mind occupied by your perceived interests or benefits while engaging in any sort of activity no matter that activity is done with a view to purely promote yourself-interests.
Prepare yourself to develop the habit of shifting the burden of your desires and dreams to the Almighty Allah that every loss and benefit is in His powerful Hands.
View your thinking, attitude and state of mind in solitude: do you enjoy the same level of sincerity to your family and friends as you show to them in their presence?
View your thinking, attitude and state of mind in solitude: do you enjoy the same level of sincerity to your family and friends as you show to them in their presence?
It is in this way that you can understand the condition of your heart. To this reason, that person cannot be a hypocrite or Munafiq whose prayers in solitude are better in quality and taste than the prayers performed in the company of people—when others watch him or her. So the best way of cultivating heart-specific behaviors is to perform optional night prayer or Tahajid prayer regularly in a manner cutting yourself off from all worldly thoughts and the matters of worldly loss and benefit. This causes to mitigate the difference between a person and his or her core-self.
This mitigation of difference increases the level of concentration in one’s life. Remember, the needed harmony between heart and brain in part inflows to a person able to view oneself. And, in part, this is the outcome of controlling one’s greed and pride. Actually, these two diseases which you attempted to diagnose in the previous mega stages are still not easy to be remedied.
However, the grand and awesome experience of viewing your core-self is better likely to empower you to control and overcome these major vices of your core-self.
Note that when these two vices are uncontrollable, this causes the core-self to be “Nafasi-Ammarrah”—a condition where one is unable to grasp and practice the needed harmony.
