Healing And Recovery

@mangaii,

All of us went through this cycle multiple times in life despite knowing what is affecting our health and our self-worth. A proper understanding of how our mind works will help us overcome these situations even faster. There are many books available to learn how to be happy but learning about how our mind works make it even easier.

The first fact we need to understand is that our inherrent nature is to be happy which is why our tendency to seek happiness never stops. When does this inherent nature gets clouded? Not even when we encounter an adversity or challenge but when our mind enhances the intensity of thinking about it. In simple terms, it is not what is said or did by others that affects us but how our mind reacts and how long it reacts to it. We all remember the days when there are butterflies in our stomach and we don't even feel like eating or even doing any normal activities.

Our senses and mind have total control over us. Our mind can't accept defeat of its ability to function. There are three parts to our mind consist of Manas (emotions and feelings), Buddhi (discriminating faculty), Chittha (memory), and Aham (Ego). The Ego part gets built by the constant self-appreciation by the mind about itself. We need to learn to differenciate ourselves from our own body and mind. It happens when we begin the sense of gratitude for what we have and begin to accept things that happens in life especially when it is circumstances beyond our control. We need to keep watching our thoughts especially the ones that has profound impact on our mental and physical health. We need to take an inventory of what we store in our Chittha and try to eliminate what is not needed. The mind should be trained to do so. We should direct the mind to keep only the lessons and not the whole pain points. Resetting the mind involves the following actions:

1) Go through the adversities in the mind and allow the emotions and feelings to saturate.
2) Limit that reaction of the mind to a specific period when we are alone and divide that into parts such as a) why such a thing happened, b) what are the possible circumstances that would have ended up with different results, c) what are the lessons learned, d) what part requires response to a third party, e) what external help is needed to overcome those emotions and feelings, f) what part needs to be forgiven even whether it is a mistake by us or by others, and g) what part needs to be forgotten for our well-being.
3) Understand nothing happened already can be changed and the consequences that would happen in future will happen no matter what. Worries are not going to resolve and only make us reexperience the pain we had already been through.
4) Overwhelm us with thoughts that makes us feel very happy even if it involves, dressing ourselves up, spending time in meditation, walking alone, watching the nature, watching a bird to learn how happy it is even when it doesn't know where the next meal is going to come from, etc. We complicate life by making the mind overwork. Life gets better only when it is simple and easy to understand. We are here to be happy and our job is not to make others happy at any cost. If we are able to serve others to bring smile in their face, let us do it but without affecting our self-respect/self-esteem. Whether it is appreciation or insult, let us not allow that to affect us for a long period of time.
5) Divide everything into receipt, reaction and response. Let us choose what we decide to receive and reduce the internal reaction time significantly and respond only when it is necessary and is in the best interest of common good. In my view, quality of our lives is much more important than how long we lived.

 

OP herself had suggested to members who are sailing in "worry boat" or remain ever in "worry mode" as to how to overcome.
I presume she is not asking members any remedy.

A ripe old lady in the morning rush hour at home & in street happened to be an acquaintance from my mother’s temple visit, had made it a habit to call at our home only to worry.
She would try to get attention of every member of my household to her whining. She would pour out gallons of worries involving her "hale and healthy" husband, her working away from home DIL & her spinster daughter.

It appeared that she was enjoying & quite comfortable with worrying all her wakeful hours with a sort of grimace.
My mother suggested to her that from health point of view it is not good for her to constantly worry about anything and everything and she should stop worrying and if required only restricted to a fixed hour at preferably at the temple.

But my boy could not tolerate the old lady’s daily visit to force listen to her worry at our home. Next day when the old lady arrived to worry in a spirited manner, boy requested her to wait for a while - brought a packet in front of her into our drawing room. He tore the packet open and distributed contents of it a little to my parents, my spouse and my daughter. He told all of us to stuff the ears with the stuff given to us and also plugged his ears with the cotton wool from that packet. Then he looked at that old lady and said, “we are ready. Begin your worries and whine away".

The old lady laughed with us and blessed the boy and left.
There was no sign of her at our home till this day.
Many realise at some point of time in future the futily of of mere worrying and toiling for selfish others ( inlaws SIL BIL etc) and remain at their beck and call. But those couples realise early leave the site soon and go for independent establishment raise children to their liking and live the life to the hilt. Thise who live with disagreeable status quo bound to suffer in many unhealthy ways.
At some stage one realise that being a tad selfish and love oneself are an elixir to lead life ahead happily. But one is determined to be happy come what may s/he will. But alas humanity wants only happiness or only sadness- a paradox !

 

@mangaii,

My apologies if what I wrote earlier sounded like an advice. I was vehemently agreeing with you about your OP and felt like adding more to it. After @Thyagarajan Sir mentioned that she is already in better place and was not seeking advice, I felt my above post might have appeared like one. ILs have been considerate and kind to me and I owe my gratitude to them for their kind words. I generally added more for the benefit of everyone in addition to what you said in your op.

I agree it is hard to control and regulate our mind and emotional regulation is even harder. We are all journeying to a better place. I am grateful to you for sharing your experience here which was articulated so well.