Nano-second ‘nirvana’: you are not what you think you are

The simplest way to bliss is to keep reminding yourself that you are not what you think you are.

My laptop crashed this morning. A wave of worry swept through me. My files, my data? But a few minutes into the worrying episode, a certain peace arose from within. I said to myself: "Hey! I am not this computer. I haven't crashed. Let's figure out a way to deal with this."

Responding to Life situations with such trained equanimity works very well. You can try this approach too. First begin with (re)-knowing that you are not this body. You have heard of this from millions of wise folk before. I heard this ‘pearl of wisdom’, one more time, from my friend who recently turned 50. When I sent him a mail wishing him on his fiftieth, he replied saying he still felt young, as if he was in his 20s. “The body is aging but the soul is timeless,” he wrote back. That’s the spirit! Even so, while you know that this is the intelligent way to live, you conveniently slip into the worrying mode over anything concerning your body. For instance, you know, just as I do and everyone else does, that the body will die one day. Yet you grieve over whatever happens to your body. You grow older, you grieve. You grieve if you lose hair, if your hair becomes grey, if you become fat or if your body is affected by cancer. Let's simplify this. When you feel hungry or thirsty, are you feeling so, or is your body feeling so? The body is like a car. And you are the driver. Can a car drive on its own unless the driver wills it, drives it and leads it? The car needs food and that's what fuel, oil, coolant and such are for the car. Clearly, the driver has more power, more control than the car. Similarly the real you, if you can get to know that person within you, is the one you need to be aware of and identify with.  

Once you get to that state of self-awareness, self-realization, when you know that you are not what you think you are, you will be able to handle any 'real world' situation. A computer crashing, a job loss, a break-up, betrayal, financial loss, anything! Realize that you are not your qualifications, job, social position, your bank balance, your worry, your anxiety or your fears. You are truly above all of this. When this realization dawns upon you, you are already liberated and a free spirit. You may not want to believe that you can immediately reach this state. But know that you can be there in a nano-second if you want to. Know also that when you get to this state, you can call it nano-second nirvana, you will be one with the cosmic energy. When you will be untouched. And be in bliss!