“The art of life is a matter of how, like a good sailor, you can use the wind from any direction to keep your ship on the course of health and positive spiritual development.”

–Hua-Ching Ni, The New Universal Morality

The Path of Constructive Life (PCL) involves the ongoing education and continuous application of the formless teaching of the Integral Way. It teaches us how to practically embody our spiritual cultivation in our everyday lives and naturally bring health, harmony and peace to the world. Its application, where our internal cultivation integrates with its external manifestation, utilizes the principles of the tai chi symbol, or the balanced union of yin and yang.

The Path of Constructive Life operates at many levels. The basic teaching is about how to attain the Five Healths: physical health, mental health, spiritual health, moral health and financial health. The teaching brings clarity and depth to each of these five areas. We all face challenges in our lives but by becoming more aware of and learning about the areas that need improvement, we can grow.

The teaching gives us the tools to overcome life’s challenges. As a result, we naturally become more confident and comfortable in life. The foundation for living a peaceful, balanced, and bountiful life can develop through applying the following guidance:

1. Spiritual Health: Purifying and strengthening our spirit through continual self-development. Developing a creative and integrated mind that balances the intellect and the intuition. Integrating our purpose in life and our actions with the universal spirit and the goodness in all of humanity.

2. Mental Health: Managing and refining our thoughts and emotions so as to develop a clear and open consciousness. Having an educated but unprejudiced mind that does not engage in destructive emotions and negative attitudes.

3. Physical Health: Living a constructive lifestyle and refraining from indulging in negative habits or interests. Being actively responsible for our own health by engaging in longevity and wellness practices.

4. Moral Health: Discovering that our true nature is virtuous. Aligning with universal morality to cleanse the entanglements from both the past and the present. Building and nurturing constructive relationships and treating all people equally, positively and kindly. A virtuous being is contented and lives beyond duality.

5. Financial Health: Learning to be in charge of our finances and becoming self-sufficient and self-reliant to enjoy a bountiful financial life. Applying sound fiscal practices that do not harm others. This includes living within our means and sharing any abundance with the less fortunate.

This guidance summarizes the way to live a complete and joyful life. The root and path of a good life and universal harmony lies in the daily habits and attitudes of each person, as those who attain the Five Healths live in tune with the constructive nature of Mother Universe. Such a life offers hope for everyone and for the world. It is not a free gift, however, but grows from our continual spiritual improvement where the simplest approach is to embrace our true nature.

“It seems to me that the bigger purpose of the Path of Constructive Life is to return the world to universal virtue through the attainment of the Five Healths. When this is achieved, Tao, or the Integral Way is at hand. It is similar to learning tai chi movement. First, one must learn the different postures of a form or structure in preparation for removing the ‘framework’ so that one may move with nature, rather than moving forcefully through it. From this perspective it seems that the integral aspect is most essential: on one hand it is the Mother, on the other, the Destination. However one chooses to look at it, the Integral Way is that from which all things flow and will eventually return.”

– Steven Sharkey, student and coach of the Integral Way

Message from OmNi: from the Path of Constructive Life, chapter 32