A distraught mother of 15 year old boy was unable to convince herself that she is doing the best for her son. Although I tried to convince her that not just children but adults are also suffering from the syndrome of ‘TOO’ as I call it, she just couldn’t come to agree. The syndrome of ‘too’ is TOO many options, TOO many choices, TOO much availability, TOO many distractions, TOO much pampering etc etc. It is not just the children even adults choose to distract themselves whether looking at their phones, scrolling through social media or activities of no consequence or value, these are typical of our daily life syndromes.
That brings me to mindfulness-the most desirable state of mind.
In the present context of life it does seem to be a far cry, with the daily achievement goals, speed, multiple activities, plethora of options for activities, being by yourself does appear to be a not so fascinating choice. Someone who once attended a vipassana course mentioned how after number of days he suddenly found that stillness in him while walking toward the meditation centre. In that thrilling moment he discovered the oneness with his surroundings and the mind was blank with no thought, completely still. He could ‘feel’ and ‘hear’ the sarroundings but no thought, just the feel. It was healing and euphoric.
Number of ‘speakers’ want to learn the technique which will help them achieve mindfulness. People forget that mindfulness is a philosophy, it’s a way of living, there are no techniques to it since it is an experience of emotion. Once you understand the philosophy practice is what you can do. We need to embrace it in our daily lives and create the internal environment for deeper realisation. Our internal environment in conjunction with external situations then gives the opportunity to watch things as an onlooker with out being judgemental. That’s a tough one since we grow up with our convictions and beliefs and the boundaries created are often judgemental.
The ability to live with all our emotions, right or wrong and to be the same with others is complex not just complicated. Human beings are so guided by emotions that being an onlooker and being detached in all situations is not quite simple. But therein lies the key the journey of self discovery and to combine it with self expression can involve number of tools as meditation, self expression in any art form, writing or just being able to spend time with your self in solitude. The syndrome of ‘TOO’, as I mentioned earlier, is not helpful either.
Sometimes in the outdoors I see a child just sitting by herself and gazing and I do feel she is probably meditating and in the mindful state we so desire, before I go up to ask her….penny for your thoughts.
Sent from my iPad
