Today, when I closed my eyes for a short meditation session, I realised that our existence probably extends to three different realms. The first one is the realm of thoughts, where we spend the majority of our time. Even while sitting in meditation, it is very difficult to escape this realm. Generally, on a very busy day, when we take some time off from work, we spend a significant amount of time coming out of the realm of thought, and sometimes we are so occupied with our thoughts that we are unable to come out of them for even a moment.
The second realm is the unconscious mind. We are not aware of how food is digested inside our bodies. I just had dinner and started writing this blog. I don't know what is happening to the food inside my body. There would be so many activities taking place inside the stomach, intestines, blood, liver, and each cell. However, I am not conscious of the same. Similarly, we have natural inclinations and aversions toward many things, but we are unaware of their root causes because these likes and dislikes operate in the unconscious mind. We are comfortable in the presence of certain individuals, but uncomfortable with a few others. We feel that, but don't know the reason thereof. Probably our unconscious brain recognises a pattern and passes on certain instructions to the conscious brain, which follows them without question. We are not directly aware of the memories stored in the unconscious mind, but we can experience them indirectly. When the unconscious mind interacts with the conscious mind, it does so through different sensations in our bodies. When we are angry in the presence of a person, we can feel the sensations in our body.
The third realm is the realm of energy. We breathe, and the oxygen in our breath converts food into energy that powers the whole body. Within our bodies, energy operates at the cellular level, where cellular metabolism occurs, and various organelles consume it to carry out their functions. We also have that energy in its physical form, which enables us to move from one place to another, lift weights, and perform other physical activities. We also have the cosmic energy that connects us to the rest of the universe.
Generally, we stay conscious of only the first realm. However, when we sit in meditation, we experience all three realms of our existence simultaneously, as if watching three different movies on the same screen. Or to give a better analogy, as if we see the land, clouds and the Sun from the flight. We understand that all three exist within the same space. We can see the wide expanse of the earth. We can also see the clouds coming and going from the flight. We can also see the Sun. We realise that all three exist within the same space. While watching this, we suddenly land on a cloud of thought, and before we realise it, we identify with the thought, and that thought takes us to the past and the future. We suddenly feel the Earth's gravity. The real challenge in this world is to keep working across all three realms without losing awareness that they operate within space. This understanding is the most difficult, especially when we stay in the world of thoughts almost the whole day and don't have time to break the chain of thoughts, even for a short time, due to our constant engagement with thoughts in one form or another.
Comments