A lesson in mindfulness from Geet Sethi

Mindfulness really means staying immersed, focused and concentrating on whatever you are doing, without letting your mind wander into the past or the future.

Geet Sethi
Picture Courtesy: The Hindu/Internet

We were guests at the recent annual convention of the Madras Management Association. One of the speakers at the event was Geet Sethi, nine-time World Billiards Champion. Sethi’s talk was inspiring, simple and evocative. He rightly demystified success as being different from the popular notion that people hold of it – which is acquiring name, fame and money. He said that true success is when you can enjoy and love what you are doing. “When you have a meditative experience whenever you do what you love doing, that feeling is success,” he explained. He urged that we simplify our lives. He said that the mind is the most important part of the human experience; and reining in your mind is the biggest challenge, yet the biggest opportunity, you have. Sethi added: “We must stop this incessant wanting in us to grab, acquire and possess more. Keep Life simple. Every time I bought a car or a house, I lost a World Championship. All my distractions were so time-consuming. When I saw the pattern I realized that I was losing focus and concentration on my game. So, when you are pursuing something, stay immersed. Stay focused.”

What Sethi is advocating is mindfulness. While his advice is very relevant for those who are targeting high-performance – like an Olympic Gold or a business target – that requires consistent dedication to the cause over a period of time, even in everyday living mindfulness is key to inner peace. All of us are veterans at worrying. More than the art of living, for which we ironically believe we need to go learn from someone else, we are masters at letting our mind graze in the past or in the future. Resultantly, the mind is never in the present moment. It is only in the now, in the present, that you can find the peace that you so desperately seek. This is why many of us are searching for peace. Practising mindfulness simply means you have to train your mind not to slip away from the present moment. Like any other form of training, this requires diligence and an initial continuous 21-day practice discipline.

Once you learn to control your mind, once you learn to be mindful, then each moment is an immersive, meditative experience in whatever you are involved in, in whatever is happening to you. That, and only that, is the way to being peaceful and happy!  

‘Chop Wood, Carry Water, Be Happy’

Is it really possible to be happy despite your circumstances?

A reader, commenting on my blogpost from a couple of days ago, said: “"Being in the present" and "living within" are the attributes of a finely-tuned mind that has broken the shackles of the mundane day-to-day existence.” He was of the view that this was not easy to achieve and that it involves a lot of hard work.

Indeed. I am reminded of what a factory hand in Pune, who was attending a workshop on “Taking the elevator to Happiness” that I was leading some years ago, had to say: “Bhaashan se Raashan nahin bharta, Sahib!” (“Sir, ‘philosophical’ speeches can’t help us buy groceries/rations to run the household.”) True that. Understanding Life better cannot solve your problems. You still have to work hard, and consistently, on them. But what a better understanding can do is help you deal with Life’s upheavals better. More important, it can help you deal with them peacefully, happily!

Surely, there is no set way to live Life – so no way can be called right or wrong. Living Life completely – facing, accepting and dealing with what you are given – is the way! This is what I have learned from Zen teachings. Zen is not a philosophy. Because philosophy still operates at a mind level. And Zen goes beyond the mind. Zen draws you out of the mind, further, higher. So, when confronted with Life’s inscrutable challenges, you are invited to experience them fully, while learning to transcend them over a period of time – by training the mind – to be able to reach a ‘witness’ stage, to be merely an observer of your own Life. This does not mean inaction. This is a lot of action, a lot of hard work. Obviously, when you try to address a challenge you are facing, you work on finding a solution. If the solution works, great. When the solution doesn’t work, what do you do? You get angry, frustrated, sad, fearful – Zen teaches you to get past these debilitating emotions and experience the true nature of your creation. It helps you understand that everything – including your own Life – is transient, impermanent.

Zen is awareness. Of just the present moment. Being aware does not mean a past hurt, guilt or memory will not rise in the mind. It does not also mean that a worry, of something that is likely to happen in the future, will not arise in the mind. The nature of the mind is that it can only live in the past or the future. The mind knows no present. And Zen teaches you to transcend the mind, go past its treacherous ways, and anchor yourself in the present. In the now.

                                                                                              

This is what happens to us when we are in nature’s lap. Each of us must have experienced that rare moment of completely losing ourselves to an ocean’s vastness or a mountains majestic beauty. Or sometimes losing ourselves to an art form that we cherish – like painting, cooking, music or writing. In those rare moments, you have lost your identity as so-and-so, with such-and-such problems, and have united with the Universal energy. Zen teaches you that this is possible in everyday Life too! Which is why, when a Zen Master was asked, “What is Zen?” he replied: “Chopping Wood, Carrying Water”. These were everyday chores, even for a Master, in those days. And the import is that you have to be “immersed” in whatever you are doing in that moment without letting your mind wander into the past or the future. So, irrespective of what you are doing – or going through – be in it fully.

Image Courtesy: Internet
Copyright with original creator

My experience is that you can be in the throes of a challenge and still be happy if you choose to be. Owing to our bankruptcy, and an inexplicable set of professional challenges, we have a lot of debt on us as a family, and absolute cashless-ness at most times. It is not that I don’t feel responsible or that I don’t recognize the enormity of the task ahead – of rebuilding our business and repaying our creditors – of us. It is not that fear and insecurity – or even the guilt of having caused this financial mess – do not arise in my mind. But my awareness helps me gets past those thoughts, and helps me take actions that I must take every single moment, each day. When my actions don’t bear fruit – as they haven’t over several years – my awareness again helps me stay anchored and get past the grief that failure often brings with it. I sleep well each night and wake up the next day to do another round of ‘chopping wood and carrying water’.

I am not sure I am “successful” with Life, but surely, I am peaceful living it! This may not be the only way to live. This may not even be the best way – may well be contestable, arguable and even admonishable. But it has helped me__and Vaani__stay anchored and peaceful through tumultuous times. Important, we have learned to ‘chop wood, carry water, immerse ourselves in each moment and be happy’!

When you don’t know what to do, just be

The only way to get rid of anxiety is to not give it any attention. 

In some situations in Life you may just not know what to do. Anxiety may then feed on your helplessness. You know that feeling anxious is not a solution __ but you go on fretting, fuming, worrying, fearing, because you don’t have a concrete action plan, a set of certified things you can and must do. This can be both habit-forming and debilitating. You are robbed of your inner peace and, over time, you become a complete wreck.

Several of us have ended up living Life like zombies – just going about things, wearily, while being held hostage by our own anxieties. It all began at some time with not knowing what to do. And it continues to be so, not knowing how to live and what to do about getting rid of our own anxieties!

There’s a way out. That way has always been there for you, in front of you, but you have not seen it because you have been preoccupied. Finding that way and getting on that path requires a simple appreciation and understanding of how Life operates. And how our human mind works.

First, know that there is no guarantee that every problem you face can and must be solved by you. So, accept that it is perfectly fine not to know what to do in some Life situations. Second, understand that your anxiety is always about non-existent stuff. You may be anxious about the past – having done something that you regret. But the past is over. It is done and dead. So what’s so intelligent about grieving the past and being anxious about it? Or you may be anxious about the future – which has not happened, so, in effect, it too is non-existent! What’s so intelligent again about worrying of a future that is unborn? But the human mind thrives on anxiety. It loves the past. It thrives in the future. And so it simply prefers to stay anxious. And you, if you want to get over your anxieties, you need to break that mind pattern of yours. You need to bring your mind to focus on the present. It is only in the present that the mind becomes powerless. It is only when you are living in the present moment that you will be free of all anxiety and you will find inner peace.

Bringing your mind to focus on the present and for you to gain mastery over your mind requires no rocket science. Osho, the Master, often told a Zen story to teach how ingenious some solutions to this universal problem can be:

Bokuju, a Zen Master lived alone in a cave. He would sometimes say loudly, “Bokuju” — his own name, and then he would answer, “Yes, I am here.” His disciples used to ask him, “Why are you calling ‘Bokuju’, your own name, and then saying, ‘Yes sir, I am here’?” Bokuju said, “Whenever I get into anxious thinking, I have to remember to be alert, and so I call my own name, ‘Bokuju.’ The moment I call ‘Bokuju’ and I say, ‘Yes sir, I am here,’ the anxious thinking disappears.”

Asking this question to yourself, calling out your own name, works. Because it breaks the circuit, it interrupts the anxious train of thoughts that are speeding through your mind’s highway. I have devised a simple variation of the same concept. I often tell myself, “AVIS, Steady! Steady!”  Or I repeat a simple mantram (this is what I learned from my guru Eknath Easwaran) or an easy-to-recall inspirational quote. Those approaches too work.

Use whatever method works for you and helps serve as your circuit-breaker. Once the debilitating chain of thoughts is broken, your mind, momentarily, arrives in the moment. Just hold it there, just be, and you will be free of all anxiety. So, in situations when you don’t know what to do, try just being! And feel the difference!

Awareness is your spiritual Caller ID detection facility

Awareness is a state that you can easily attain. By learning to be aware, you can face any challenge or leverage any opportunity that comes your way!

Phones today have Caller ID detection options so that users can choose which calls they must take. So, you can avoid telemarketers, wrong numbers and unknown callers. Just think of how difficult it would have been had there been no Caller ID facility on your phone? You would have been frustrated receiving calls that you had no interest in or answering people who you would have liked to avoid. Quite like the way the Caller ID facility helps you intelligently discriminate or choose between calls, your awareness helps you ignore or deal with negative emotions or energy smartly. Most of the time we get caught up in a spiral of worry, anxiety, stress, anger and self-pity, only because we are not aware that we are walking down that path. One event triggers a negative emotion and we are off on an uncontrolled roller coaster journey feeling anguish and pain. It is only when a new positive event breaks this flow of thought and we actually reflect on how we were thinking till then that we realize the futility in such thinking.

You have an inbuilt feature in you called awareness. You can activate that with the practice of mouna or silence periods. mouna keeps you alert and aware and helps you identify 'unknown' or 'undesirable' or 'pesky' emotions who come calling on you. When you are aware, you choose if you want to worry or get angry or feel jealous or scared of something or if you just want to ignore that 'uninvited caller-emotion'. Activate your awareness mode. Stay blissful!

Still your mind and live in the now

Living in the past or being anxious, or hopeful, of the future, robs you of the present. To live in the present learn to still your mind.

The mind thrives in the past or in the future. In the present, the mind is powerless. Observe your thoughts closely, they are always of the past that is over and done with. Or they are of the future which is yet to come. Living in the past is easy because you have been there – it is predictable and you know what has happened. Living the future is again something that the mind tricks you into – one moment it tells you that the future is unknown and so it is scary. In another it says since we don’t know what will happen in the future let us hope for the best. So, you oscillate between fear and hope, imagining a future that no one has seen. In doing all this, which is living in the past, or in the future, you simply miss living in the present. In the now.

Life however is only in the present. We miss the beautiful opportunity to live in the present because we are held hostage by the mind. In Oriental philosophy they say that the real Buddha is one who has learnt to live in the moment – and one who goes on living from moment to moment. There’s then no guilt or grief about the past. In fact there are no thoughts of the past. And there’s no anxiety about the future. Who needs the future when the present is so beautiful?

To make your mind powerless, to still it, simply immerse yourself in whatever you are experiencing in the moment. For instance, if you are in rush hour traffic – be in it. Don’t think of the day ahead and your running behind schedule. Don’t think of the weekend and pine for it to come back again. In the most practical sense, when you are in a Monday, the weekend is still five days away. No amount of pining for it can bring it any closer. Living in the moment means knowing that Monday will have to be lived through for a Friday to arrive! When the mind becomes powerless you develop phenomenal focus – there’s no clutter, there’s no grief, guilt, fear or insecurity. You simply are. And when you are, you are happy!

You will not suffer only when you choose not to suffer!

Don’t worry about the thoughts that arise in your mind. Don’t try to stop them. You can’t. Just learn to deal with them better.

Yesterday I delivered my “Fall Like A Rose Petal” Talk to a group of 75 Chartered Accountants and finance professionals. One of the young ladies in the audience sought a clarification on a famous quote of the Buddha that I used in my Talk – “Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.” The lady wanted to know what to do when a suffering-related or suffering-inducing thought arises? “I understand completely that a headache is the one causing the pain, while my wishing there was no headache is what’s causing my suffering. I understand this completely. But what I can’t understand is how do I get rid of the wish that there was no headache in the first place? How do I get rid of the suffering-inducing wish,” she asked.

Well, the truth is you can’t get rid of your thoughts. The human mind thinks – research has proven this – 60,000 thoughts a day. A substantial number of these thoughts are about worry, anxiety, grief, guilt, anger, remorse, hatred, fear, jealousy and some of them are plain wishes that do not want certain realities about your Life to be there just now. So, you can’t avoid thoughts. The human mind is like a tennis-ball spewing machine – the sort that helps players train. It just keeps on generating thoughts. There’s no method. There’s no rationale. There’s no way you can switch off the mind. But what you can do is you can train yourself to ignore the negative or depressing or debilitating or suffering-inducing thoughts that arise. And you can, over time and consistent practice, train your mind to be present in the now. In the present moment. Suffering arises only when you wish that your current reality is not what it is. That’s when the mind revels in making you suffer – wish I did not have this headache, wish I did not have a relationship problem, wish I did not have to keep this job, wish I did not have to lose someone I loved. But when you say I have a headache, and let me live with it, then the mind is in the present moment, with the headache and with all the pain it brings along with it. In the present moment, the mind is powerless. And because there is no wishing, and total acceptance of what is, there is no suffering.

So, you can’t prevent a thought from arising in your mind. You just have to learn to deal with each thought. And learn to avoid those that depress you and cause your suffering. That’s why the Buddha says “suffering is optional”. Which is, you have the choice not to engage with such a thought that will cause your suffering. Exercise that choice. When you do that you will realize you can live with the pain, live with the thought that is intent on causing you to suffer and yet you will not suffer. Because you have chosen not to!

Be mindful in the moment

Whatever you are doing, be fully present in it. Then you will taste Life to the fullest, one sip at a time!

Earlier in the day, I was sipping some iced tea that my wife had made. She had topped it with some fresh mint. The tea was delicious. And the mint was refreshing. I enjoyed every sip of it. I simply loved the cold drink. I thought to myself that some tea-picker in Assam or Darjeeling or Munnar may have picked the leaf that was processed with utmost precision, then it must have been shipped to warehouses and then to a neighbourhood store before it ended up in our kitchen. My wife, while making the drink, must have taken so much care to ensure that there was just enough tea to keep the flavor mild – else it would have gone bitter. I was glad I was “present” and “mindful” as I sipped the tea. Because, there are times when I would have mechanically – just as you would have too – drunk it while checking facebook or reading the newspaper or working on my computer. When you are present and mindful of whatever small act you are doing, or are involved in, you see a great celebration of Life in it. When you are absent, you miss the magic in the moment, completely!

Osho, the Master, was, when he was a young boy, one day pulled up by his school principal.

The principal called him and said, “You are almost always absent from class.” 

Osho said, “That's where you are wrong.” 

The principal said, “What do you mean?”

Osho said, “I am always present wherever I am. To be absent is not my style of Life. And what can I do? – this one mile between the school and my house.... A magician was doing his tricks on the street, and I became present there. It was far more interesting than your teachers, and I learned more than I could have learned here – because whatever your teacher is saying I can read in the book, but I will never meet that magician again. And he did such beautiful tricks that when he was finished I followed him to his tent outside the city.

“He asked me, ‘Son, why are you following me?’ I said, ‘You are getting old. Don't you want your tricks to live on even when you are gone?’ He said, ‘That seems to be meaningful! – you can come in. Many people have asked me to teach them the tricks, but not in this way.’ So I have been with the magician. 

“Life is a bigger school than your school. And I am, each moment, present wherever I am. To be absent is not my style of Life, so you please take your words back.”

The principal said, “In that case I will have to see your father.”

Osho replied, “You can see anybody you like, but remember that my father knows me perfectly well. Just let me be informed when you are coming so I can also be present there. You both will be absent – because my father is continuously busy with his business, and you are busy with who is absent, who is present. At least let somebody into that meeting who is present!”

Osho then told his principal: “Be honest and sincere and tell me: Are you present right now?”

He said, “My God, perhaps you are right. I was thinking of my buffalo – she has not returned for two days.”

Osho said, “You need not be worried, I know where she is. That's the beauty of being present everywhere! I have seen her just by the side of the tent of the magician. Now what do you say: Was it more worthwhile my coming to the class, or finding your lost buffalo? You can go and catch hold of her.”

Osho’s debate with his principal may be a very unique instance of someone being able to challenge conventional thinking. But there’s a great lesson, an unputdownable takeaway in it. Which is, that when you are not present where you are, you often miss Life as it is happening to you. Whether it is in an important business meeting or when making love or when watching a movie or when driving – if you observe yourself closely, you will find that you are really not present. Which is why you are not at peace with yourself and your Life. Try immersing yourself in whatever you do, be mindful in the moment, and see how your Life transforms! Your problems and challenges may still remain where they are, but you will be drenched in peace and bliss!

Ridding yourself of comparisons and envy

Comparing yourself with others is what ruins your inner peace. Drop all comparisons. You are unique. Just as everyone else is.  

A participant at one of my workshops recently asked me, “How do you not envy someone who has everything that you don’t?”

His question was as profound as it was candid. To compare, and often times, even subconsciously, feel jealous of someone is a normal human quality. But if you are aware, you will find that jealousy does not help in any manner. In fact, it ruins your inner peace. It is only through your awareness that you can drop comparisons and stop feeling jealous of someone!

I remember reading a story. A man was sitting peacefully on a mountain top. He was taking in the scenery. It was a beautiful morning. He had had a very rough time in the past few weeks. So, he had decided to trek up the mountain just to get some quiet time to himself. His girlfriend had deserted him. And he had been heart-broken over that incident. But coming here, up the mountain, had helped him greatly. He must have been sitting there for over four hours. And he did not once think about his ex-girlfriend. He did not feel anger or grief. He was able to see how beautiful Life was – just as it was, despite whatever he was going through. Around noon, a young couple arrived at the mountain top. They were happy to be with each other. The man saw this couple and his thoughts went back to his girlfriend and he started pining for her first. Then he was soon angry with her. And in some time, he was jealous of this other man for being able to have a girlfriend when he did not have one himself! The scenery and nature’s pristine beauty did not matter to him anymore. He was angry with Life. He left the place in a huff.

This story is very relevant. For it helps us understand the sequence of events that lead us to feeling miserable about any situation in Life. When the man was “present” in the moment, when he was taking in the scenery, he had no problems. For several hours he had no problems, no thoughts about his past. But the moment he allowed thoughts of his past, of his ex-girlfriend to creep in, he first started feeling uncomfortable, then angry and finally, miserable. This is the way the mind leads you to misery. When you are in the Now, when you are present in the moment, it is actually the state of no-mind. This is when all you are doing is that you are engaged in whatever is happening. If you are watching a movie, you are “in” it. If you are singing, you “are” the song. If you are reading a book, you “are” the book. There’s no past. There’s no future. There’s just you – in the Now!

The mind comes into play only when your attention wavers. Now awareness cannot stop your attention from wavering. But awareness can help you rein in your mind and bring your focus into the present moment. How do you build a higher level of awareness in you? Simple – by constantly training the mind to not interfere with the present. The mind thrives in debilitating emotions like guilt, grief, anger and worry – in the past or in the future. It is powerless in the present. To be sure, you too can train your mind through daily practices like meditation or mouna (observing silence periods).

So, don’t worry about your tendency to compare yourself with others or feel jealous of them. Those are the effects. Go to what’s causing the effect. Which is the mind. Work on training your mind. The more you train to not let your attention to waver, the more you will be present in the moment. And as long as you are present, no painful past or anxious future, can ever touch you. When you reach this state, through repeated practice, your Life will be blissful. Untouched by the scourge of comparison and envy!

Meet the worst, when it happens. Until then – just chill!

When the worst happens, face it. Until then relax – and stop worrying!

K.Kamaraj (1903~1975)

This morning I was speaking to my father. It was a casual conversation that covered all topics under the sun. My father, to illustrate a point, said that one of the best approaches to Life is what former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, and revered statesman, K.Kamaraj (1903~1975), followed. Apparently Kamaraj always said “agattum parkalam”, meaning “let it come, let it happen, we will see, we will face it!”, whenever he was asked for his opinion on “what if” scenarios. The import of Kamaraj’s philosophy is simply that “we will cross the bridge when we come to it”.

I find that approach very valid in everyday Life too – as much as it must have been relevant in politics then.        

All our worries are of a future that has not yet arrived. We imagine worst case scenarios that, most often, really don’t happen. Yet we endlessly worry in anticipation of them. The very nature of a worry is of something unreal. It is always over something that hasn’t happened. Now if worry did not take you away from the reality of the present moment, of the now, it is fine. But worrying means not being present here – in the now. And Life is always happening in the now. So, worrying is futile. It drains you of your focus and pushes you down a spiral of fear and insecurity. This is not to say that you must not see reality. For example, someone you love is dying. The doctors have told you to be prepared to lose her. What I am saying here does not mean you must not see the reality of her death, which is due to happen in some time. Of course, you are sensible and you can and will see that she is slipping away. Her impending death is not the issue here. What may be a problem is your worry that you cannot think of a Life without her. That worry is what needs to be dealt with astutely. You cannot expect that worry not to arise. The nature of the human mind is that it will spew out thoughts, often worries, ceaselessly. When a worry arises, be aware. And tell the worry to subside saying you will deal with the, in fact, any, situation, when it arises. When you say this, in the context of your dying friend for example, you will be able to focus on spending the last few minutes with her “freely”. You will be “present” with her. You will not be consumed by either guilt or grief or remorse or anxiety. You will simply “be” with her.

I have painted this morbid picture here only by way of illustrating this learning in a dramatic manner. Often, our anxieties are not and need not be about Life-changing issues. We tend to project what-if and worst-case scenarios in all contexts in Life. And therefore worrying has become an integral part of our everyday Life. To understand the futility of this compulsive habit of worrying, understand the way of Life. Know that when the future does arrive it will always be as the present moment, as the now. So, when you are worrying, the future arrives, but as the present, but you miss that moment, because you are still worrying about an unborn future. This way an entire lifetime passes by and finally, when death arrives, you realize, when it is too late, you have not lived your Life at all.

I have read of a story that Osho, the Master, often used to say. Three professors of philosophy were at a train station waiting for the train to depart. They were so engrossed in their discussion that they didn’t realize that the train had begun to move. When they did realize, the train had picked up some speed and was chugging out of the platform. Two of the professors managed to scramble on to the train. But the third could not make it. The train left without him. He was in tears on the platform watching his two friends frantically waving out to him from the train, at a distance. A porter asked the man on the platform what made him so upset. He said the man should actually feel happy that his two friends managed to get on to the train even if he couldn’t! The professor replied sorrowfully: “That’s the whole problem. Those two men came to see me off. I was the one who had to be on that train.”

And that is the way it is with all of us. We are so anxious about the future that we miss our trains – metaphorically – in each moment. Such living is simply squandering a lifetime. The venerable Kamaraj’s “agattum parkalam” approach helps us remember that when the (worst) future has not yet happened, there’s great value in just chilling!

Life happens only in the ‘NOW’

As the season’s energy peaks, remember this: living moment to moment, fully, and in complete gratitude, is the best celebration.

Life is a gift. You didn’t ask for it. Yet you have been born and given this lifetime. That you have been created human is a blessing. So celebrate your creation, make your lifetime memorable. Don’t squander this priceless gift away.

There are two factors that inhibit your living fully, intensely. One is worry. Worry is only about the future. It is always about what isn’t yet! And the other is guilt and/or grief. Guilt and/or grief are always about the past. About what has happened – about what is dead and gone. So, as long as you are steeped in worry and guilt/grief, you are not in the now. But Life happens only in the NOW! If you are not present in the now, in the moment, it will be gone – never to return again.

One sure way of expunging worry and guilt/grief is to understand Life deeply. Ask yourself – What am I afraid of? What am I worried about? What am I grieving over? What am I feeling sorry for? When you examine these questions closely and try to find their answers, you will find that invariably you will connect back to fearing a loss – of something you possess, of someone you love or perhaps, the loss of your own Life. But dig deeper and you will reckon that you came empty-handed and you will go empty-handed. All that you gained here in this Lifetime, including your relationships and your memories of this experience, will not go with you when you depart. So, where is this fear of perceived loss coming from? Only when you internalize this truth, will you awaken to living joyously, in the moment!

Drop all your worries. Get rid of your guilt. Let go of all grief. Life is not about doing. It is about being. When your whole being is tuned as a thanksgiving to Life, you will be soaked in abundance and bliss! This does not mean inaction. This means acting with total awareness. This means living fully – maximizing the opportunity to live and celebrate each moment!

Have a magnificent Sunday…

Hopelessness leads to awareness

To be hopeless is a great boon, an opportunity – use it!

We often come across situations where there is no hope. In such times, what stares at us is a wall or complete darkness. Fear and insecurity in such situations is a natural response. But the moment fear takes over, any chance of you coming out of that situation are eroded. So, even as fear lurks around, choose your hopelessness to remain focussed in the now, in the present. No it is not difficult. If you understand hope you will be able to understand what hopelessness truly means. Hope is an aspiration of a future which is yet to arrive. So, when you are hopeless, it really means you see no future. Which therefore only means that, since the past is over and the future doesn’t exist, what you are left with is the present moment.

As Osho, the Master, has said so beautifully: “When there is no hope, you are. When there is no hope, the present is.”

Which is why hopelessness is an opportunity to live in the present moment. For when you have nothing to look forward to, then you can only live from moment to moment. Having lived this way for months and years now, let me tell you, it is a beautiful, awakening, humbling experience. Because you witness how magically Life goes on, without you controlling any of the influences – particularly, money, food, clothing and shelter – that you have been conditioned to believe are key to living.  

Hopelessness is still a desire. When you are pining that there be hope. And when with your human mind and vision you can’t see one, you despair, but even then, from deep within your heart, you continue to hope. Which means you expect a change in the situation. But true awareness is when you have transcended expectation, desire, hope, hopelessness and are simply with Life, living in the now. That’s when you have given up expecting anything from Life. And you simply are.

If you carry your guilt for too long, you are as good as dead

You cannot enjoy Life when you are continuously feeling guilty. Almost all the time, we are making decisions in Life. Some of them work well. Several blow up in our faces. If we start feeling guilty for those decisions that misfired, we will be stuck in the past. When you are not present in the now, in the moment, how can you enjoy it?

Of course, guilt cannot be avoided totally. It has to only be faced, and overcome, with awareness. Every time something does not go per your design, or expectation, you are bound to feel responsible, and accountable, for the outcome. So, you cannot but feel guilty. But if you are aware that guilt is debilitating, that it is a wasted emotion, that traps you in the past, you will successfully overcome it!

First, however, try and understand why you feel guilty. We human beings have this notion, both through our education and upbringing, that we are in control of our lives. So, when things don’t go according to what you envisioned them to be, you hold yourself responsible. In a very subconscious, yet sure, way, your guilt is always a manifestation of your ego! “I should have been better prepared”, “I should have thought through this better”, “I should have planned for a worst case scenario”, “I should have not taken this decision or made this move”…these and more emotions are bound to gnaw at you from within. But do you recognize the existence of the big “I” in each of them? That’s your ego screaming out aloud! Your guilt is the shadow of your ego – it goes on vainly reminding you that you are all powerful and now that your power did not work in the current context, you have failed yourself, you should now brood over your action! You should, therefore, wallow in self-pity and guilt!  

But remember your awareness is far more powerful. When you attain a state of self-realization, where you understand that nothing is being done in Life, in the Universe, by anyone, that Life is happening on its own, your guilt disappears. This is not escapist thinking. This is the truth. Whatever has happened, was bound to happen, even if you were to murder someone! If it could have been avoided, it would have not have happened. Being trapped in your guilt and by brooding, nothing is going to be achieved. If anything, you will be dead, because you are not living in the present anymore, even if you are biologically alive! In the Hindi movie Raanjhaana (2013, Aanand L Rai), Kundan, played masterfully by Dhanush, sits on the banks of the Ganges brooding over the death of Jasmeet (Abhay Deol in a cameo), which had been caused by circumstances triggered by Kundan. An anonymous man with a camera confronts Kundan and says: “You look like you have murdered someone. Your face says it all. No religion can grant you forgiveness for taking the Life of another human being. So, no point in feeling guilty over what you did and what has happened. You are not going to attain salvation sitting like this by the Ganges. So, get up, go, go do something about your Life and make things better by living your Life fully, meaningfully!” Kundan gets the message and takes charge of his Life the best way he can! What the film’s nameless character told Kundan applies to you and me too. There’s no point drowning yourself in guilt over anything – the best you can do is to try not to repeat the same action, pattern, decision, whatever that misfired, again. That’s all!

The moment you let your guilt get the better of you, you are as good as dead. You, me, we all, are but small cogs in the big wheel of an inscrutable cosmic design called Life. And Life happens, not because of you or me, but inspite of us. When this awareness dawns and remains in you, you will see each guilt-forming moment as an opportunity to learn, and unlearn, and keep moving on.

Trick your mind to get rid of anxiety

In some situations in Life you may just not know what to do. Anxiety may then feed on your helplessness. You know that feeling anxious is not a solution __ but you go on fretting, fuming, worrying, fearing, because you don’t have a concrete action plan, a set of certified things you can and must do. This can be both habit-forming and will cripple you. You are robbed of your inner peace and, over time, you become a complete wreck.

Several of us have ended up living Life like zombies – just going about things, wearily, while being held hostage by your own anxieties. It all began at some time with not knowing what to do. And it continues to be so, not knowing how to live and what to do about getting rid of our own anxieties!

There’s a way out. That way has always been there for you, in front of you, but you have not seen it because you have been preoccupied. Finding that way and getting on that path requires a simple appreciation and understanding of how Life operates. And how our human mind works.

First, know that there is no guarantee or requirement that every Life problem must be solved by you. So, accept that it is just perfectly fine, ever so very often, to not know what to do. Second, understand that your anxiety is always about non-existent stuff. You may be anxious about the past – having done something that you regret. But the past is over. It is done and dead. So what’s so intelligent about grieving the past and being anxious about it? Or you may be anxious about the future – which has not happened, so, in effect, it too is non-existent! What’s so intelligent again about worrying of a future that is unborn. But the human mind thrives on anxiety. It loves the past. It adores the future. And so it’s simply ecstatic to stay anxious. And you if you want to get over your anxieties, you need to break that mind pattern of yours. You need to bring your mind to focus on the present. It is only in the present that the mind becomes powerless. It is only when you are living in the present moment that you will be free of all anxiety and you will find inner peace.

Bringing your mind to focus on the present and for you to gain mastery over your mind requires no rocket science. Osho, the Master, often told a Zen story to teach how ingenious some solutions to this universal problem can be:

Bokuju, a Zen Master lived alone in a cave. He would sometimes say loudly, “Bokuju” — his own name, and then he would answer, “Yes, I am here.” His disciples used to ask him, “Why are you calling ‘Bokuju’, your own name, and then saying, ‘Yes sir, I am here’?” Bokuju said, “Whenever I get into anxious thinking, I have to remember to be alert, and so I call my own name, ‘Bokuju.’ The moment I call ‘Bokuju’ and I say, ‘Yes sir, I am here,’ the anxious thinking disappears.”

Asking this question to yourself, calling out your own name, works. Because it breaks the circuit, it interrupts the anxious train of thoughts that are speeding through your mind’s highway. I have devised a simple variation of the same concept. I often say, “AVIS, Steady! Steady!”  Or I repeat a simple mantram (this is what I learned from my guru Eknath Easwaran) or an easy-to-recall inspirational quote. Those approaches too work. As will yours.

So, use whatever helps you as a circuit breaker. Once the debilitating chain of thoughts is broken, your mind momentarily, arrives in the moment. Just hold it there and you will be free of all anxiety. To stay free forever, all you need to do is to practice to keep your mind focused perpetually on the present! Try this. And feel the difference!