Do
you love your mind? For many people, the answer is “no” or “not all the
time.” They often feel trapped inside their thoughts and emotions,
at the mercy of a host of uninvited guests – the fear that roams the mind at
will, the dark depression that takes up residence and refuses to leave, the
anger that blows through the circuits and ignites in turmoil.
Ancient
cultures recognized the mind’s restless, unreliable nature. In India, the most
common metaphor for the mind is the wild elephant, and in Buddhism, the mind is
compared to a monkey peering out through the five senses. Monkeys are
notoriously impulsive, liable to do anything without notice. To cope with the
frustrating antics of the monkey mind, the vast majority of people try to tame it
– but that method never works. The mind only becomes wilder when we try to
control and confine it. The solution is counter intuitive: to experience peace
and calm, we have to free the mind. When it is free, it settles down and
becomes a channel for peace. In freedom, our thoughts and impulses flow in
harmony with what is right and best for each of us.
How,
then, can you set your mind free? The first step is understanding that your
mind traps itself by spinning an elaborate story about who you are and what you
believe, and then fiercely defends that story. Observing this human tendency,
the philosopher Jean Jacques Rousseau wrote, “Man is born free, but everywhere
he is in chains.” The most common story the mind tells is that you are your
ego, a fixed “I” that is separate from the rest of the world. If you believe
this story, it keeps you in bondage. The ego is limited, subject to fear, and
consumed with the idea that it has to know what is going to happen in order to
feel safe.
The
truth is that we don’t know what is going to happen. Really feeling safe,
peaceful, and content comes from experiencing your true self, which is
pure spirit, unbounded in time and space. When you know the real you isn’t
inside your head, you have been set free, like awareness itself. Embracing the
wisdom of uncertainty not only frees you from the ego’s illusion of control, it
puts you right in the middle of the joyful flow of cosmic creativity.
Meditation
is one of the most powerful practices for awakening to your true self and the
peace that lies within. In meditation, you go beyond the mind’s noisy
chatter and chaos into inner quiet and expanded awareness. You begin to see
that you are not your thoughts, emotions, and the stories you tell yourself. As
you experience this silence on a regular basis, your mind begins to shift.
Instead of being dominated by fear, guilt, and other forms of inner pain, it is
dominated by a quiet, steady state. From this state blossoms a sense of
well being and a feeling that you are safe. If you remain on the path and keep
experiencing inner silence, peace dawns and then joy and bliss.
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