Magic Bullet

Peace of mind is a much talked about subject nowadays. Men and women are facing difficult challenges at work place, worry about admitting the children in the best schools, build a home and worry about paying mortgage payment on time, buy a car and other household items and worry about paying EMIs on time, take care of unexpected health issues of elderly parents either by making a visit or manage it from a long-distance, address their own health issues, face the challenges of career development, difficulty of relocation from place to place (including international) and adjust to the new environment, difficulty of finding new friends and sometimes face challenges in marital relationship. Everyone is running around like chickens with heads cut-off to meet the regular day-to-day work/life schedule. Their only peace is when they have a deep sleep and even that eludes many as they suffer from insomnia. Even when someone dies, most send a one-liner response, “May his/her soul rest in peace” without realizing that the soul is the epitome of peace.

When peace of mind becomes a major issue, most blame everyone else but themselves. Mostly it is always the boss at work, annoying spouse at home, school principal and teachers, friends, and if they run out of people, finally they blame the fate. Most seek peace from outside. They try Yoga, Meditation, Aerobic exercises, join a Gym, consult an astrologer, seek a Guru, Psychiatrist, Psychologist, Anger Management classes and many more. There is a general saying, “We need to search what is lost in a place where we lost it”. We can’t lose the key in a dark room and search it under a light because it is brighter. Searching for peace outside of us is like searching key under the light after losing it in a darkroom. If we feel we lost the peace of mind, we need to examine our own mind. The root cause of losing peace is the mind and resolution for achieving peace is also about disciplining the mind.

Life is a constant journey between pleasure and pain and without the existence of the pair of opposite, we will not understand the value of either pleasure or pain. The purpose of our very existence is to experience pleasure and pain and learn from them. The insects, animals, birds and even a lot of humans don’t know where their next meal is going to come from. There is a proverb, “The one who planted the tree would water the plant” indicating the one who created us would look after us. There is also another saying, “Everything is happening for a reason or because of our past action”. Does it mean we don’t have to make any effort in life?

We cage the animals and birds if we like to restrain them and clip the roots of the plants to make it not grow further. Similarly, we restrain our mind with unnecessary burdens. Most successful people are the ones who learned how to use their mind to focus on one vision and execute that well and most peaceful people are the ones who learned how to discipline their mind. Mind is a cauldron of thoughts and most thoughts are like a newly cooked meal. We don’t keep them beyond a day as otherwise it would not only become stale but also make the whole mind smell.

Visualize our consciousness as positively energized Proton in the Nucleus of an atom, free will as neutrally energized Neutron closely tied to the Proton and our mind is the negatively energized Electron orbiting the Nucleus. As consciousness (Proton) remains a witness, we need to use the power of our free will (Neutron) to energize itself positively and use its gravitational force to attract the mind (Electron) to change its orbit to come closer to the Consciousness and eventually merge.

The very core of every human being is epitome of peace. In the mind, it is denoted by our capacity to bear pleasure and pain. The mind is constantly attracted to the outside world in search of happiness but our free will should train the mind to search inwards for peace and bliss. The external peace is reflection of our internal peace. We must discover our real identity (not the identity created by our mind) and then only we can achieve peace. We are like human beings who have forgotten our inherent nature. If desire, anger, greed and hatred exist in our mind, peace can’t enter. We must open the window to remove darkness and get light. Peace must be reflected in feelings, words, actions and body language. The mind must be free from all restrains to achieve peace and that is the magic bullet.

 

Dear Sabitha,

Thank you for your first response. It doesn't surprise me that you constantly watch your reactions more than the actions of others, knowing you through our interactions via posts. There is no doubts in my mind that Receipt, Reaction and Response (Three Rs) are very important in life and reaction is part of our thoughts. However, there are many thoughts that originate in our mind for reasons unknown to us without any outside interference. Even those thoughts affect our peace positively or negatively depending on the type of thoughts. Every human being has his/her own way of addressing how to attain peace on specific issues but to be in peace all the time is something we all aspire for. For learning how to achieve that stage, we need to unlearn a lot.

Viswa

 

Dear Rihana,

You never fail to fascinate me with your posts and responses. Every time, I read your posts or responses, I understand how deep and wide your thinking process is. Someday, I will learn from the expression of your thoughts how your mind analyzes such micro-level details. How nicely you have articulated that peace is above the mind level by one simple sentence of yours. All our mental chatter can be stopped once and for all, if we can find our very core which is silence. The Mind (Monkey) is on steroid (thoughts) always and will continue to be. If we learn to observe that mind's chatter as the sound we observe in a fish market, we will find peace inside of us. Like I said in my snippet, most thoughts are deliciously cooked fresh food but don't last long. They turn out to be stale, if we don't energize by acting on them.

If we get to that silence inside of us, we can achieve peace forever. It is like tasting the honey in the flower. Piece by piece peace is achieved at the mind level by solving each thought including reaction and that is like enjoying the beauty of the flower.

Viswa

 

Hahaha. If you are thinking more life times with all your remarkable traits, what can I say about myself? Having said that, I agree deschooling is an exercise that runs into many lives.

Viswa

 

Dear Lakshmi,

Hahaha. Nowadays I trick people to read my post by giving such fancy titles such as Magic Bullet, Doubt and Eye Opener as no one shows up knowing my reputation of writing about spiritual subjects. IL is full of young women like you. Who likes to read this old man's snippets? I am neither a good writer with great topics like Cheeniya Sir nor a great narrator like Sri Ojaantrik. I have no option but to use this bait and switch model. Oh no, now, the cat is out of the bag.

There is nothing wrong in doing Yoga and Meditation but we need to prepare ourselves to produce results out of it before we get involved. As I said, there is no magic bullet other than calming our mind. Once we keep our mind occupied with the present moment, it doesn't drift out to think about the painful past or uncertain future. If our mind is calm, we can make so many decisions that would make our family's future brighter. We can't control anything outside of us and we could control only what is within us.

I saw a recent Facebook post that showed some famous personalities getting a gift with a note, "Most wonderful gift". When they opened it, they found a mirror in it. We are the best gift we have and our future is dependent on the asset called "mind" and how healthy it remains. Meditation teaches us how to control our breath so that we reduce the number of inhalation and exhalation to enhance our life span. Yoga help us to keep our Chakras healthy. Body and Mind work closely with each other and when our body hurts, the mind reacts through pain and when the mind hurts, the body reacts through tiredness and stress. When we watch our breath and control our Chakras, it also helps us to control the mind indirectly (as they are interconnected) but we can train ourselves to remain calm in pleasure and pain through visualization techniques as well. I could be wrong but even though we don't control it, I believe our frightening or pleasant dreams or to train our mind to a large extent.

Viswa