Few
days ago, It was 7:00 AM in the morning and the weather from the window looked terrible.
There is hardly any sign of sun and I could see few drops of rain falling and a
fog collected on the windows.Do I need to go for a walk in this cold,
chilly,
windy day and what if I get caughtup in the rain, somewhere on the road. Just,
take it easy, relax for some more time, get some extra sleep and then go to
work,cancel your plans of morning walk for today - announced my mind. Thanks
for
your
kindness and advice but, going for the walk is the most important part of my
day. Morning walk freshens my mind, I love the fresh air, birds chirping and
the light of morning sound. Most importantly, it gives me a time to introspect,
plan
my day and on a practical level, this is the only time of the day, I am out
there in the open air, giving my mind and body bit of exercise. Otherwise, I
work all day sitting in front of Computer, in a closed office environment. So,
come
what
may, I am going out for my daily walk even if that means, carrying an umbrella
- and off I went. Sure enough, I was amply rewarded for my hard work, this is
what I found. A beautiful rainbow.
Its
interesting that in Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna talks about the importance of
controlling the mind.
Bhagavad-gītā
As It Is 6.6
bandhur
ātmātmanas tasya
yenātmaivātmanā
jitah
anātmanas
tu śatrutve
vartetātmaiva
śatru-vat
Translation
& Purport by Srila Prabhupad
“For
him who has conquered the mind, the mind is the best of friends; but for one
who has failed to do so, his mind will remain the greatest enemy”.
The
purpose of practicing eightfold yoga is to control the mind in order to make it
a friend in discharging the human mission. Unless the mind is controlled, the
practice of yoga (for show) is simply a waste of time. One who cannot
control
his mind lives always with the greatest enemy, and thus his life and its
mission are spoiled. The constitutional position of the living entity is to
carry out the order of the superior. As long as one's mind remains an
unconquered
enemy,
one has to serve the dictations of lust, anger, avarice, illusion, etc. But
when the mind is conquered, one voluntarily agrees to abide by the dictation of
the Personality of Godhead, who is situated within the heart of everyone as
Paramātmā. Real yoga practice entails meeting the Paramātmā within the heart
and then following His dictation. For one who takes to Kṛṣṇa consciousness
directly, perfect surrender to the dictation of the Lord follows automatically.
So,
this is the story of our life every moment. You want to do something and your
mind immediately gives you different suggestions. So, what you get is what you
put into it.Just like GIGO - Garbage in, garbage out in the field of computer
science
or information and communications technology refers to the fact that computers,
since they operate by logical processes, will unquestioningly process
unintended, even nonsensical, input data ("garbage in") and produce
undesired,
often
nonsensical, output ("garbage out"). Similarly, our mind is also like
a computer. It will take the inputs, impressions that we give to it and when
the time comes, it will give out whatever we have fed it with.
Once
I heard, a Lecture where the speaker explained wonderfully about the mind and
how it makes or breaks a person. It was a simple incident but, left profound
impression on my mind. Once, two friends from a small town planned to go to the
nearby City to get an important job done. They need to catch a train early in
the morning around 5:30AM, go and meet an higher official to talk about their
retirement benefits and pension etc. The plan was to meet at the train
station and the second friend never turned
up, so the first friend went alone to the city, got his job done and came back
in the evening. Then, he met his friend who
failed to turn up at the train station and the reply was like this. I am
sorry, I could not make it.I actually wanted to come but, two street away someone
told me that, there is a stray, mad dog that had bitten number of people, so it’s
dangerous to travel alone. And, also I don’t have small change, had a 100 rupee
note. And, who knows, what if the Staff at the Ticket counter does not have the
change. I loose the rest of the money. And, also it was rainy, cold. What if I
slip and break my leg or something...And, so on. Apparently, the person who had
so many excuses never got his pension paperwork done and even left his body
without getting that work done in his lifetime. One good stick is enough to scare a stray dog, 100 rupees is
nothing compared to the benefits that are going to come and as Bhagavathm
explains, “padam padam yad vipadam na tesam”, in this material world, in every
step there is danger. That means, there is an element of risk in everything
that you do but, that should not stop one from doing right things. Because,
even if you are not doing anything and sleeping in your house, things happen.
Let
me quote the above verse completely, because it is so wonderful..
“Srimad
Bhagavatam 10.14.58
samasrita
ye pada-pallava-plavam
mahat-padam
punya-yaso murareh
bhavambudhir
vatsa-padam param padam
padam
padam yad vipadam na tesham
TRANSLATION
by Srila Prabhupad : For those who have accepted the boat of the lotus feet of
the Lord, who is the shelter of the cosmic manifestation and is famous as
Murari, the enemy of the Mura demon, the ocean of the material world is like
the water contained in a calf's hoof-print. Their goal is param padam,
Vaikuntha, the place where there are no material miseries, not the place where
there is danger at every step”.
Ok,
I actually started off writing this by talking about Benefits of going for a
morning walk but, was inspired to write about mind control. To sum up, please
take care of following things –
Weakness of Heart – Lord Krishna called
this Hridaya Daurbalyam. Arjuna, who was the greatest Warrior (was of course put into illusion by Krishna,
so that Bhagavad Gita can be spoken) became completely weak, his body was
shivering, his Gandiva Bow slipped from his hand and refused to fight.So, when
we give chance for these things like doubt, indecision, loss of faith in ourselves, loosing sight of our
goals,
Resistance to change – The first thing a man
does is to resist and try to stop the change from happening.We want to control so
many things in life.Stop old age, control temperature by Air Con or Heater so
on. But, change is inevitable, part of life and that’s why so many
organisations these days are coming up with Change management, how to cope up
with change.
Bad Habits – Which are due to
wrong association and company. As someone said “ A man is known by the company
he keeps”. It’s important to have the right company and take up a right path in
life. If one is trying to be a millionaire, he cannot go around with beggars
and expect to become one. Of course, that does not mean that a beggar cannot
become a millionaire and even though he is
a beggar, his role models should
be that of millionaires. Of course, ultimately man proposes and God disposes,
but that desire and personal endeavour should be there. Rabbits don’t line up
tigers mouth. It has to go out and hunt for them.
