are you safe with yourself?

Famous Chinese painter and philosopher Ching Hao said: There are six essentials in painting. The first is called spirit; the second, rhythm; the third, thought; the fourth, scenery; the fifth, the brush; and the last is the ink.

More often than not a person is left alone with himself and his thoughts. Everyone cannot handle these thoughts. Everyone does not (or cannot) enjoy his or her own company. And this solitude is inevitable, one day it comes. One day, everyone gets to encounter his or her inside talking face to face… Solitary confinement given to hardest and coldest of criminals, leaves them crumbling with fear and paranoia. Solitude is something hard to handle.

Sometimes, it is the most silent moments of life which are the noisiest. These are the moments which really matter.

When a person feels in harmony with himself, if a person feels safety from his own thoughts – he feels secure elsewhere too. When a person isn’t safe from his own thoughts, he can neither be anywhere else.

But you see… these thoughts are no real. Yeah! Thoughts aren’t real. Thoughts are something which are formed somewhere inside our brain. You look at this brain map, structure & functions of individual parts of brain and you will come to know what actually is behind the thoughts. Limbic system, cerebrum, medulla oblongata… every part has a role to play. And that is the fundamental pattern our brain follows. Can’t change that... From the most mundane thoughts of liking something, to the most influential life changing thoughts take shape in the same brain.

Then what is it that gives rise to these incomprehensible thoughts? It is the rhythm. You see. Our whole body is in one rhythm or the other every moment. It’s how we are breathing, how our heart is beating, how the blood is flowing in our veins, how our internal organs are working… all these factors form a specific rhythm inside us and that in turn form thoughts.

All thoughts are mere responses to the external stimuli which have been fed inside us since the time we were born. Have you ever looked at a newspaper without first knowing that it is a newspaper, or have you ever looked at moon without saying to yourself that you are looking at moon? Can you look at Indo-Pak cricket match without getting excited; can you forget for a while that you belong to a country?

Enough!

I went to an SBI bank today since I had to get some Demand Draft work done. Government Bank as it is, opens at 10:30 and so there were some 20-30 people already packed outside the gate of the bank. As soon as the gate opened there was disorder and chaos because everyone tried to get in together. Similar thing once caused death of 96 people in Hillsborough in 1989. The point is this – thoughts, though virtual their existence is, keep waiting at the door of our consciousness to get served, all through the day, every moment. Now if you delay attending to them they are going to create chaos! I mean SBI could have learnt something from ICICI Bank but ‘old habits, die hard’. No matter how stupid or how great a thought is, it demands attention from our awareness, otherwise if left unsatisfied creates turbulence later!

Just need to ask how safe are you with your own company... And next time you get a spate of thoughts just issue them a service token and serve them one by one. Not to forget, open up early, don’t delay!

Godspeed!