TOPICS
KATHMANDU, JUNE 28
We all have- whatever our station, profession or resolve -a natural, also refined, ability to express our feelings, or disentangle our apprehensions, while freeing ourselves from the realm of rejection, if not avoidance. The latter, whether agreeable or disagreeable, may not be as casual as it appears to be on the exterior.
Yet, the detail is: the more acquiescent, imaginative, perceptive and mindful we are, the more palpable our approach to life, experience and attentive responsiveness. The moment we are able to grasp, hold and express such a representation, we bring in a sense of reasoning through a spontaneous mechanism - of being receptive to, or observant of a progression that helps us to develop accommodating views, or standpoints, to our own and others' outlook.
Most everyday events, family circumstances, or tensions, foster positive as also negative thoughts; they are not disrupting by any means. They don't need the axis of our 'mindful expanse' to characterising and living with them, or transcending them, or accepting them as a part of our existence. The more knowingly attentive we are of our emotional responses, or more organised our expressions, the better equipped we will be in dealing with them.
All of us are accomplished; each in one's own way. This is distinctive - you'd call it our well-adjusted, yet supple emotional talent, or attribute. It conveys to us, also for others around, harmony, contentment, realisation and achievement.
It provides us with the stimulus to feel free to articulate oneself, while co-ordinating our upright thoughts with good, pleasant, effective and agreeable action. This is equivalent to gilt in its value, or whatever you'd think fits such a positive interpretation.
As the philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre said, "My thought is me: that is why I cannot stop thinking.
I exist because I think I cannot keep from thinking." His maxim celebrates a pleasant-sounding state - of 'mindful awareness', or personalised subjectivity, that also holds our padlock's secret code to taking a balanced, or dispassionate, stance.
When we 'think' to oneself, all of us would be able to perceive the 'echo' of our thoughts, feelings and expressions - and, of others. It guides us to one thing -reason, or our ability to keep distance from the object of inquiry and act without muffled knowledge. It provides us with a mode of living acceptable to ourselves with the facility to know, differentiate or thoughtfully connect our ability to interpreting the palpable distinction between the subject and object. This is what 'walking the soulful sutra' from within is all about - of separating the subject and object with the use of amplified silent reflection.
A version of this article appears in the print on June 29 2021, of The Himalayan Times.
