What Is Mind

“What is mind and where is it located?” is a question that occurs to all of us regularly. I was listening to one of the most tarnished and so-called saints. It is so interesting that they all start with a humble background, good knowledge gained from their Gurus, with genuine interest in helping the common public but later the wealth that they build and the name and fame they gain makes them change their focus. In one of his earliest discourses, he shared some interesting perspectives about the mind. Whether he followed it himself or not is a question we should ask.

Among all the species, human beings have difficulty in accepting nature as is and the mind is a cope up mechanism that is built by the human beings to reconcile their differences with nature as it exists. When they reach the stage that nature is immutable, is when they are accepting reality. Most human beings’ mind is built on three factors such as fear, guilt, and anxiety. Sometimes, the mind is analyzing the guilt created by their actions in the past and other times, it is worried about the consequences of something projected in the mind or the concern of what could happen in future.

The problem is we learn when to stop eating, when to stop sleeping, when to wake up, when to exercise or stop exercising, and so on but never know how to stop thinking. No one taught us how to stop thinking about something. Even if we change our mind through distractions, those thoughts come back again and again.

In other direction, we may visualize so many things positively about our future and when it didn’t happen as we thought things should happen, we may face disappointment. We don’t perform actions without any expectations. We don’t enjoy what is gifted to us in the form of life. In the form of reconciliation, we fail to recognize the invaluable gift of life that is given to us, loving interaction that awaits us with fellow beings and fellow species, and the world that exists for us to enjoy.

Instead of using the tools that are gifted to us wisely and effectively, we waste those tools in regretting the past or feeling anxious about the future without enjoying the present. In the process we destroy these tools that are given to us as a gift to become obsolete and unusable. These tools have capabilities to build a beautiful place for us to live or self-destruct. Once we learn how to look in to find out our thoughts, analyze them, we can begin making some positive impacts in our lives.

For example, one can sit in an isolated room, have a recorder in front of us, and document every thought that runs in our mind by speaking about it. May be after an hour, we should listen to it carefully and find out why such thoughts come through our mind. This might help us to understand the fear, guilt, and anxiety that are built deep inside our mind. I am sure some of you has tried different methods to overcome depressive tendencies, please share them here, so that it can be useful to others.

 

It is true our mind and soul are in conflict with each other most of the time. While mind enjoys separation and independence, soul is looking for unity, integration, and cooperation with the rest of the world. While brain is only one organ in the body, every organ in the body has its own built-in intelligence to function. For example, the heart functions independently to send blood to the brain so that it can function smoothly and the lungs separate oxygen and mix it with our blood stream and so on. Frankly, the mind is something that is built out of our experience in the world with inputs coming from the senses. This is a castle that is built over a period of time based on likes and dislikes, desires, attachments and many more.

 

You are right that mind is not an independent organ. There are so many masters who described the mind in different ways. While the saint I had quoted says it is nothing but a coping mechanism to reconcile our independence with the nature around us. There are others who say it is nothing but a cauldron of thoughts or like a cloth built with desires and attachments. When the thread is removed one by one, the mind will disappear. Nirvana (Self-realization) is attained only when this cloth (Desires and Attachments) is removed. It is easier said than done. The mind will do everything to keep us aloof and independent. The Ego has to be crushed and the underlying deep conscience that is longing to connect with the rest of the people and species should prevail over the stubborn mind.

The one who conquers the mind, conquers the world as the world that is perceived is the making of the mind. We think we are independent but we are tied inseparably with the energy that surrounds us. Even plants and trees communicate with each other about the danger that one is expected to face. Cooperation, compassion, and care are built into our system. We get our energy from what is surrounding us. If we don't have this support system, we will cease to exist. Even though animals don't communicate visibly to the human beings, you would notice that there is a rhythm to how they move between place to place looking for food and water. There is a system that exists when the birds fly together helping each other.

Once I did a complete research to find out who found out the Jet stream that enables the planes to fly at 35,000 feet so that the aircrafts can take advantage of the jet stream that exist in the atmosphere with less fuel needed to fly. I landed on how a particular bird migrate from one continent to another by using this jet stream without a need to take food to use energy for days. This is not to trivialize the scientific inventions but to tell how much we can learn from the nature.

We learn fortitude and vision when we see the ants accumulating food for rainy season. When we see spider, we learn what is determination. When we see dog, we learn about faith and gratitude and we see parrot, we learn how to be committed to the spouse. We learn patience when we see donkey carrying so much weight for miles. Time is the teacher, world is the scripture and God is the friend and our heart is the preceptor. I think the humanity suffers because of negligence of duty, lack of courtesy, lack of humility, ego, and envy.

The following documentary series explains how the world is interconnected:

Part 1-
Part 2 -
Part 3 -

Viswa

 

Dear Balajee,

Thanks for responding to this post and I always enjoy your response. I think soul comes into existence with 2 instruments called body & mind. Some divide it into 3 called body, mind, and intellect. But Mind itself is divided into Manas, Buddhi, Chittha and Ego. We have 3 gunas called Rajasic, Tamosic and Satvic which influences how we interact with the world on different circumstances and situations. We also have 3 stages called waking, dreaming and deep sleep state. During deep sleep state, mind is inactive which is why we feel fresh when we wake up.

While the body changes as we age, mind changes as record our experiences through senses. Chittha is where all our experiences are recorded and Manas uses it for emotional reactions whereas Buddhi uses it for discrimination. But what I have learned is what is projected by the mind to us is a combination of what we see and what we perceived in the past and recorded in our Chittha. Hence the world each person see is not the same. The mind does it because it is impossible for the mind to analyze and interpret everything in split seconds and hence it gives only a projection which it considers as closer to what we are experiencing.

True awareness is when our mind is neither thinking about the past nor thinking about the future. When it remains in the present and perceive what is really happening is when it is truly in awareness. That is when one can consider as a true Being.