HOW TO SILENCE YOUR MIND??

 

My Humble Pranams to All...!! We all feel upset or get stressed from time to time. How do we handle moments like this especially when we feel anxious or worried about certain things that happen in life? Sometimes we also overreact to a few situations in life and we tend to realize later that maybe we should have handled those situations in better way and in times like so we tend to keep thinking and replaying the same situation in our mind again and again and dwell on how bad we feel thinking about the things that we no longer have control of. So, lets see an example on how can we tackle the situations like this. Once Buddha and his followers were traveling from one place to another and while travelling, they all walked by a lake and after sometime they all stopped by to rest down for a while. At that time one of his disciple questioned Buddha on how can we calm down an overthinking mind? Buddha said to one of his disciples to bring some water from the lake. Then immediately the disciple walked towards the lake and noticed some people washing clothes and so walked some distance from there to get clean water and as he was about to collect water there came a bullock cart and it got struck in the muddy water and the water became very muddy. Disciple waited but the water was still muddy and so he went back empty handed to buddha. After an hour, Buddha asked his disciple to fetch water from that lake now and this time when the disciple went to the lake, he found that the water was clean and so he filled his pot with water and brought it for Buddha. Disciple was so confused as how now the surface of lake was clean and he questioned Buddha on this. Buddha replied that last time water was mixed with the mud and it was unfit to drink but after an hour the mud settled on its own and the water became very clean.  From this story what we learn is that there will be times in life where our mind is disturbed and in times like this we tend to overreact to situations and in turn it causes a turmoil.  Instead for situations like so if we simply remain in silence or give some time to settle down on its own, with the time itself our minds will be calmed down effortlessly. Its better  sometimes to be a little deaf or blind to certain situations in life and it’s not necessary to react to all situations in life especially when we are mentally not healthy. In times like this its best to find some distraction like indulge in things we like e.g., cooking a meal or listening to music or to simply meditate or just chill by watching our breath or catch up with the latest movie on Netflix or at least take a walk outside.  After all we are all humans and its OK to be stressed down or anxious about certain things in life but what’s necessary is we acknowledge those feelings and make peace with the past and move on with the lessons learnt from those situations. The ability to not overthink or take things personally keeps your mind calm and lets remember that a warrior always keeps his mind calm in the face of danger. We must all learn to be a warrior and accept the challenges of life as only a calm mind is an ultimate weapon against all your challenges in life.                          

                                                                                                                                           -Sowmya Raghavan