This is my first blog post in 2018. For the last 15 days, I was meditating. In the depths of darkness in my bedroom. In the cool morning air of my ancestral village. Wherever I see a quiet place. It also meant, reading the books I love. Not the one we read for the fear of missing out. Listening to music. Not the one which is trending. Having quality time with family. Not looking at the social media notifications (infact I turned off all notifications for more than a month). Reading blogs of Shane Parrish and Seth Godin. Not the ‘How To’ stuff. Talking to friends. Not the superficial people around. More like doing the real things – without pretensions.
A month ago, I was reading about SN Goenka’s Vipasanna meditation (helps to see things as they really are) and how it is catching up in Silicon Valley. And the mention about Vipasanna in Yuval Noah Harari’s podcast made me more curious about it. With constant hunger of achieving things and the inability to figure out what ticks, most of us are struggling with something called attention residue. Most of us are scattered as human beings. We are all over there. How do we put our scattered pieces together?
Over a period of time, we have gathered a lot of junk in our souls. When we have an inflammation, we press it hard and the bad blood comes out, it is painful but relieving. During Indian festivals, we clean our homes, throwing all unwanted stuff. We need it occasionally for our souls. Our mind needs to eliminate waste – the residue left by the digital sedimentation and accumulated encounters and conversations with toxic people. Even our computers have an option to restore the factory settings. We need to reset, reboot and reinvent ourselves.
As humans, we explore the deep seas and the peak of mountains. If we can discover the depths of our subconscious, all the answers we need is lying there, you just have to go there and pick those pearls. Meditation is a pilgrimage to your deep mind.
I do not believe in new year resolutions, as it is more willpower-driven and willpower gets exhausted very often and is unreliable. Only systems seem to help achieve things. But one thing can be done, to meditate 20 minutes a day after you wake up and before you go to sleep. That can restore your original settings – which can help you to unleash who you really are. Start today, try 3 minutes a day, gradually raise it to higher levels of consciousness. This is my recommendation for 2018.
All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” – Blaise Pascal.