Let me tell you a Story about someone whom I have never met, but she governs every waking moment of my Life. One of the things I adore about her is that she keeps me methodized and zeroed in. But don’t be dazzled just yet because she is playful and deceiving too. And if I don’t play along, she assures to leave me burgundy in the end. I am of course talking about… my Mind, who with her dual nature is both a support and a threat to me.
They say: Before History, there was Storytelling, but they don’t mention that before Storytelling, there was a Mind that conceived it and between you and me, she is quite proud of being the architect of Stories.
When I was 16 and sitting in a small garden of a raising hermitage located in the Sonipat District in Haryana, I was first introduced to her enigma by my Spiritual Master. In an age, where an average teenager would spend his time exploring the then newly launched social media platforms like Myspace and Hi5, playing Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell on PlayStation 2 and going head over heels in love with the two leading actresses of the era, dancing on Dola re Dola in the film Devdas, I was taking baby steps in becoming aware of the Mind, who makes a prodigious servant but an appalling master.
It has been 16 years since I took that first step in a supple tangerine outfit, and yet I am on the same terrain as before, because clearly, discerning and then transcending the indiscernible Mind is not a piece of cake. In my school days, I was taught that to understand something, I must learn how to perceive it first – the way it looks, the way it feels on my skin when I move my hand over it, the way it smells, the way it tastes etc. But no one in school taught me about the Mind, who I or anyone for that matter, cannot touch, cannot soak, cannot burn and definitely, cannot see.
I ask you, my reader. Where is the Mind in your Body? Is your Brain your Mind? Or is it your Heart? Or is it somewhere hiding behind the Pancreas or running through the Spinal column? What about the soles of your Feet or is it resting in your Hair? Enjoying lunch with your Stomach perhaps or is it making plans with the Neutrophils in shutting down a saffron wound you had a while back?
It is difficult isn’t it, to locate the geographical location of the Mind. Yet she exists, which makes her even more inscrutable and not to mention, enraging for the researchers.
It took me ample time, including the period I spent with my Spiritual Master under the emerald shade, to deduce that the Mind can be seen, but in a roundabout way i.e. through Memory. You see, the distinct part of the Mind is the Memory, which gives birth to all the thoughts and counter-thoughts that we bow to.
Without Memory, there can be no thoughts to yield and counter.
A Quick Example: You are reading my Story right now. You accurately read that the Title of the Story is THE ENIGMATIC MIND, and the Subtitle of the Story is DISCERNING THE INDISCERNIBLE. Now, every word that you read is etching in your Mind and becoming a Memory. After the conclusion, you will judge the story with your Mind. Tag it either as “I like it” or “I don’t like it”. Remember the Mind works in duality, meaning it always juggles between two highly plausible choices, leaving the intellect Black & Blue in the end.
Now in future if you come across a similar prose where an Author is describing his or her Mind, your Mind will activate a Memory of you reading this Story. Then recalling what you felt after, you will eventually associate this, with the Story you are at that time reading.
You must be wondering, how I observed all of this about you in such a quick succession, isn’t it?
Trust me, I am not a Shvetyan (a wizard-like individual from my Debut Book Naira Blake and the Mountain of Gauz) and you are highly skilled too, because in a way the Mind that is bestowed to us, is only a small fragment of that colossal collective Mind, which governs all the Planets and Universes in the space above us, albeit subtly. And in spite of all of us being the very same on the subtle level, we revolve around 9 different emotions at any given time, oscillate between 5 different states of the Mind manifesting from the 5 different maladies of the Mind, that makes each and every one of us different and unique, both in good, bad and in some cases, neutral way.
Talking about mine or anyone’s Mind in 1000 Words is beyond the bounds of possibility. I am stuck at 933.
In conclusion, there are just two things that I would like you all to pay attention to, to know and possibly implement in your lives, before I put a closure on this Story. And those things are Gratitude and Detachment. While keen observation will assist you in discerning the Mind, it is Gratitude and Detachment that will support you in transcending her. So today, before you immerse yourself in your respective plan of action, express gratitude for everything you have and practice detachment for everything redundant.
For when the mind becomes unclouded, it transcends and when it transcends, it leaves behind Freedom.
Pure. Serene. Cerulean Freedom.