Chetan Prabhakar
We all have fear of future as the future is uncertain, and as conditioned human beings, we prefer familiar suffering, then, uncertainties. There is a story of a man who used to pray to God to reach on the peak of a mountain, and one day, God acceded to his prayers, picked him up and left him on the peak, now, at night, while walking this man lost his balance. While falling down, he got hold of a tree, thinking that there is an abyss in which he would fall. He again prayed to God for help. God came and said; leave this tree, but now, this man did not even believe God, and said, how can I leave this? If I leave, I would fall down and die. God acceded to his wish and left. Now, when the sun arose in the morning and, in the sunlight, the man saw that there was a good small plateau just a few inches below his feet, where he could have rested the entire night.
We all are like this man, we believe in the God for everything, but don’t believe him when it is about the future, its fears and uncertainties. We want to make sure that we take care of the future in the present and do not actually live the present. We try to teach our kids that study today to have a bright future, and give them a lot of stress in the present. We work too much and remain in stress in the present and save money for the future, because we have been conditioned to think, that future is only going to bring rainy days, and then, when the future comes, we again run for the future and running become a never-ending process and we realize this when we reach to the end of our lives. Can we stop running and really live our life which is available only in the present moment.
Future doesn’t always bring rainy days. I am not saying that we should not plan for the future but we should not worry about the future and give more importance to the future than the present. Mind is everything, what we think we become. If we think the future will become rainy days, it is definitely going to bring and if we think, the future is going to be beautiful, it is going to be. Just live the present moment to the fullest which in itself is a preparation for the future. Enjoy your present to enjoy your future. Nobody knows what happens in future. Nobody knows if we will be there for the future because everything is impermanent so are we and our loved ones. So, if we don’t spend good time with them in the present, what is the assurance that we will ever have lovely moments in the future. Memories can only be made in the present moment. Present moment is the only moment which we can live as per our wish and future as usually is uncertain. It is better to be surprised by the future than to predict it. A predictable future cannot bring anything surprising and interesting. We can even enjoy our pain, if we know how to live in the present moment.
We all are busy in acquiring materialistic things, but have these materialistic things actually brought true happiness in our lives. Success without happiness is nothing. If we become successful and not happy, does success make any meaning in life and on the other hand, if we become truly happy then we can also enjoy our success. So, let us try to become happy before successful in order for us to enjoy our success. Let us meditate and use spirituality to become truly happy. The venerable Sir Sri ParamhansaYogananda has given two approaches for life:
“Money first; God can come later! who knows? Life may be too long.
God first, money is his slave! Who can tell? Life may be too short.”
Hence, we need to be mindful to adopt one of the aforesaid approaches in life. We are running after success as we think being successful shall make us happy but it is otherwise, true happiness will bring real success in our lives. As Happiness is the prime purpose of human life, hence, Happiness is Godliness. And Mindfulness is one of the easiest paths which can lead us to true happiness.
Mindfulness is an art which will help you work on your karma in the present. Karma is not only physical action, but Karma is of three kinds which are thought karma, speech karma and action karma. Thought is the beginning of karma so if we work on our thoughts and keep them positive; our speech and action karma will become positive. Hence, the practise of mindfulness will keep you to remain positive in every situation and will also give you the ability and confidence to change the things which you cannot accept and accept the things which you cannot change, which will give you wings to fly and live a happy and successful life. As it is said, ‘be happy now, success will follow, do not fear the future, as the future is uncertain, and it is better to be surprised by it.
Practise:Just rewind your life and see how your life continued and try to find out how much did you plan and did everything happen as per your planning? Just reflect.
(The author is an Advocate and a Life Coach)
Follow our WhatsApp channel
