Are you fully alive?

I share here today, a stirring and inspiring article written by my spiritual teacher and mentor, Pratibha Malhotra.

ARE YOU FULLY ALIVE?

After a fully active day, many find their way in front of the TV or toy around with the tablet or the phone, wanting something more. Some may end up eating extra goodies that they wanted to avoid. The body might feel tired, but the mind isn’t willing to listen. It is not satisfied. This is because, even though one busily moved from one activity to the next, the act was performed mechanically. A part of you was not engaged in them. So, the still-hungry part of you yearns for fulfilment. It continues to look for something, a satisfaction that is undefinable.

Life is a bit like that.

You are not fully alive when you are not present during moments of your day. One is not truly present when one is locked in a wandering mind, or when one wants the present experience to be something other than it is. When one gets busy with what comes next, one bypasses what’s happening in the moment that is now. Most people really invest quite a few of their awake moments in trying to improve a future-conscious moment.

Spending the bulk of days this way, one remains unaware that they really didn’t savor their morsels of life.

Why does one do that? Why do many spend most of their moments thinking about another moment? Either of the gone by past or of that which has not yet opened- so, future.

It is because their brain has acquired a hobby of spending time with itself. This precious organ is tremendously skillful at keeping engrossed in endless dialogue inside the head. Largely, this dialogue is a soup of imaginations, fears, fantasies, regret, plans, gossip and much more. The flavor changes, albeit slightly, from one day to the next, perpetuating the internal conversation, remaining on autopilot mode.

Gradually, this inner dialogue and attention-wandering turn into an effortless habit that crowds most of one’s waking moments. It becomes as ingrained and effortless as breathing, and one doesn’t even realise when it starts or if it can be stopped.

One needs to break free of this habit.

It is helpful to become aware that there is a web, woven by thoughts that inhabit your minds. Have you ever noticed how your mind works overtime to push you to fit into an imagined vision of self, and keeps you on guard with thoughts of physical and emotional safety? Unconsciously, many end up spending a lot of time safeguarding one’s emotional vulnerabilities.

Ease off and soften your expectation of perfection, so you can more easily inhabit the passing moments. It is imperative to feel gratified in all one does, in all acts, and this is possible only if one is more present in the now, than caught in the ‘should be’s’ of things. Participate in everything that life brings for you in your day, without diminishing it in any way.

You are neither your mind nor your thoughts. Recognizing their confining hold on you is the first step to changing the gears…

Love yourself. Step out of living inside your mind, and own your passion and your spirited self.

~Pratibha Malhotra