Worrying

“All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”

—Blaise Pascal

Why is that so?…

What’ll happen if we sit quietly in a room? And why can’t we sit quietly in a room alone? Why is it so hard? 

You know, Pascal was a mathematician; but how accurately he has portrayed the human condition! Let me ask you, do you have that ability—to sit, quietly, alone? 

Aren’t you always restless and worried? Actually, we all are, more or less. But, if we could just sit quietly…without any tension or anxiety, wouldn’t it be a great blessing? 

Nobody seems to have a peaceful mind; a healthy, joyful mind; a mind that is in ease and with an amplitude of harmony. We see the exact opposite everywhere: restless minds; confused, worried and fearful minds. Seems like our default programming! 

So, what’s stopping us from having such a mind? What’s your answer? 

That man? Those fools? Your job? Your husband, or wife? Situations? Health? Okay, let me boil down everything to make things simpler. Anything that you may be losing your essential peace for—boils down to only two things: either it’s situations—be it health complications, financial problems, relationship issues or the like—or, your own thinking process. All our issues come from these two things. 

You can experiment right away. Just answer this: what are you worried about now, or have been lately? Most probably, it’ll be some situation. Right? Now, I want to go a step further: when was the last time you didn’t worry about anything? How long did it last? These are self-assessment questions. It’ll be best if you give these answers. 

Now, what is ‘worry’, to be precise? To think about something is not ‘worry’. It’s when you think fearfully about something, over and over again. Initially, it starts as some tension. Then it becomes a worry. Over time, it may become anxiety. The most extreme form is neuroticism. 

Any emotion, to a certain extent, is not harmful. So, little bit of worry about this and that is fine. It’s even natural because fear is a basic emotion. But, when worrying starts to rob our mental peace, disrupts daily living and creates uncomfortable states within, we can’t ignore that any more. 

Now, you have to understand that worrying, as much as anything else, is a habit. Yes, it’s a habit, but a wrong one. And over time it becomes natural. We have to break the loop completely. 

How not to worry! It’s hard, I know. There are a million things nagging us everyday. The fundamental problem is we are too much identified with the world, too much invested in it. As long as it’s so, worrying is inevitable. You need to cultivate such essential qualities as dispassion, contentment, desirelessness; and at the same time, you should live for a higher purpose. I think this sums up everything I’ve said so far. 

This is the perfect recipe for a healthy mind! What do you think? 

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Feature Image Credit: istockphoto.