The Beauty of Impermanence

Are you feeling a bit under the weather? Don’t worry too much, it will pass.

Are you feeling great? Good! It will pass too though.

I believe, from practice that there is great peace in accepting impermanence in life. Everything becomes so simple. Having the conviction that ‘this too shall pass’, my bad days no longer consist of ceaseless complaints. Even if happiness and joy become a way of life; a habit, we all have days when nothing seems right. Why am I even up!? We just wish to escape from our own self and return when the mind decides to behave itself again. There is no excitement, no devotional sentiment, no joy, there is just this immense restlessness where energy wants to move. Sadly, when we feel low, most of the time, we allow our energy to move towards negativity.

But the beauty in experiencing life with the knowledge that every single moment, feeling, person and hurdle is fleeting, allows us to sail through those moments with some degree of detachment. If the moments are classified as displeasing, I found it to be in my best interest to let it pass and feel the moment (and maybe procrastinate) without judgement. Although being productive with our time almost flawlessly allows us to navigate through impermanence more positively.

But what about the good moments? They are impermanent too. And knowing this allows us to experience each beautiful fleeting moment with great gratitude and contentment.

Despite the illusory and impermanent nature of the world, though, the ‘I’ within us remains strangely the same. Think about it… the ‘I’ within you on the first of primary school, is curiously similar to the ‘I’ reading this post. This ‘I’ being the centre of the colourful bouquet, surrounded by our tendencies, feelings, experiences, relatives, surroundings which are forever changing. You may call them thorns or roses; the choice is yours.

But after each passing moment, we incessantly go to the eternal ‘I’ within us.

So next time a sales assistant ruins your mood (of course it was their fault! Not mine!), or you feel hurt by the action of others (their fault again! Who’s judging now!?) or even when you are ecstatic from the TGIF feeling, know that it is all impermanent. Even if it’s Monday, that too shall pass, stay course!:)

Of course, I learnt and applied the acceptance of impermanence through the teachings of our dearest Master. He lovingly and repeatedly reminds us of this fact. Simple fact which brings great peace and joy in this ever-moving waterfall called life.

See, even this post was impermanent. You just finished reading it!:)