The Ephemeral Mind
By its very nature the mind is transitory. Like a flowing river, it drives itself with the mood of the moment. Like a chain-link, it attracts one thought with a succeeding one; which itself is born from an idea in the earlier thought. If we take an example; of children building blocks, only to collapse at the whiff of the wind or imbalance caused by too many blocks; the moment the mind recognizes the weight of such succeeding thoughts, the chain collapses and all of a sudden the intellect recognizes the fanciful movement of the mind.
The beauty of concerted effort at meditation is that, the intellect becomes powerful at detecting this ephemeral, transient, passing, temporary and fleeting mood of the mind. Honey-bees, butterflies and many other insects are known to fly from one flower to another and suck a little bit juice from each of them. But the beauty of these insects is that they never stick to one flower. They move continuously. We are different; we return back to enjoy the pleasure of certain pleasant thoughts and also to brood over some unpleasant thoughts. This constant retreat and reaffirmation of the pair of opposites determines whether we remain happy or unhappy. Through meditation, we perfect the art of recognizing this jumping-jack nature of the mind at all times, and arresting the mind from carrying our prudence and rationale away. It also helps us to know who or what we are, in contrast with what we think we are.
Inspired performance can come when we have an ideal to follow. When there is something far higher than ourselves, or our limited knowledge about ourselves, which beckons us. I remember mentioning in my first post during the preparation for Kaliash Yatra, that a pilgrimage is a means to an end and not an end by itself. The 18 weeks that I spent in writing to my friends, whilst preparing for the pilgrimage, was a time when probably the mind & intellect, in perfect unison, encouraged me to write my innermost thoughts which resulted in publishing “Eighteen Steps to Kailash”. On my return, I wrote a thanksgiving, called “Shiva and Me” promising myself that I would put our memoirs of the visit into a new book. That was August 2012 and now we are in early 2013. How I have got swamped by my work and personal preoccupations; but not a moment has passed without my telling myself to muster the strength to start again. Has it been the case of a lack of inspiration or is it the mind taking over the intellect; I really wonder.
Yesterday morning during my walk, I met a friend who was strolling his dog. In the excitement of seeing my friend, I rushed towards him, only to realize that his dog, faithful as it was to its master, advanced menacingly towards me. My friend warned me against coming near and I retreated. This little event set me thinking about the animal nature of the human mind. Gurudev was fond of saying “Man is an Intelligent Animal”, indicating that the discriminating intellect that man possesses is what distinguishes him from an animal. But it is a matter of introspection for each one of us to know, what part of our behavior and actions are oriented as “man” and what part as “animal”.
Sufi teachings include a simile which suggests that our Inner Spirit is like a porcupine, the more you beat it with the sticks of sufferings, the fatter the porcupine of the Spirit will grow, ultimately leading to self-realization. How many of us really believe that the sufferings that come to us in this life are but His calls to us to travel towards our Inner Self? I wonder!
Prem & Om
Suresh
By its very nature the mind is transitory. Like a flowing river, it drives itself with the mood of the moment. Like a chain-link, it attracts one thought with a succeeding one; which itself is born from an idea in the earlier thought. If we take an example; of children building blocks, only to collapse at the whiff of the wind or imbalance caused by too many blocks; the moment the mind recognizes the weight of such succeeding thoughts, the chain collapses and all of a sudden the intellect recognizes the fanciful movement of the mind.
The beauty of concerted effort at meditation is that, the intellect becomes powerful at detecting this ephemeral, transient, passing, temporary and fleeting mood of the mind. Honey-bees, butterflies and many other insects are known to fly from one flower to another and suck a little bit juice from each of them. But the beauty of these insects is that they never stick to one flower. They move continuously. We are different; we return back to enjoy the pleasure of certain pleasant thoughts and also to brood over some unpleasant thoughts. This constant retreat and reaffirmation of the pair of opposites determines whether we remain happy or unhappy. Through meditation, we perfect the art of recognizing this jumping-jack nature of the mind at all times, and arresting the mind from carrying our prudence and rationale away. It also helps us to know who or what we are, in contrast with what we think we are.
Inspired performance can come when we have an ideal to follow. When there is something far higher than ourselves, or our limited knowledge about ourselves, which beckons us. I remember mentioning in my first post during the preparation for Kaliash Yatra, that a pilgrimage is a means to an end and not an end by itself. The 18 weeks that I spent in writing to my friends, whilst preparing for the pilgrimage, was a time when probably the mind & intellect, in perfect unison, encouraged me to write my innermost thoughts which resulted in publishing “Eighteen Steps to Kailash”. On my return, I wrote a thanksgiving, called “Shiva and Me” promising myself that I would put our memoirs of the visit into a new book. That was August 2012 and now we are in early 2013. How I have got swamped by my work and personal preoccupations; but not a moment has passed without my telling myself to muster the strength to start again. Has it been the case of a lack of inspiration or is it the mind taking over the intellect; I really wonder.
Yesterday morning during my walk, I met a friend who was strolling his dog. In the excitement of seeing my friend, I rushed towards him, only to realize that his dog, faithful as it was to its master, advanced menacingly towards me. My friend warned me against coming near and I retreated. This little event set me thinking about the animal nature of the human mind. Gurudev was fond of saying “Man is an Intelligent Animal”, indicating that the discriminating intellect that man possesses is what distinguishes him from an animal. But it is a matter of introspection for each one of us to know, what part of our behavior and actions are oriented as “man” and what part as “animal”.
Sufi teachings include a simile which suggests that our Inner Spirit is like a porcupine, the more you beat it with the sticks of sufferings, the fatter the porcupine of the Spirit will grow, ultimately leading to self-realization. How many of us really believe that the sufferings that come to us in this life are but His calls to us to travel towards our Inner Self? I wonder!
Prem & Om
Suresh
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