Robin Sharma said, “The mind is a wonderful servant, but a terrible master.”
Interpretation of this message guides us to see that treated as a tool the mind is a very valuable asset that can provide us with a great deal of assistance; however, the moment we choose to put the mind in charge it turns into a liability.
So how does the same entity play such different roles? The mind has the power to depict our reality in any way that it chooses. Should it choose to view a situation as catastrophic it can cause us to fall into despair. Alternatively, if it were to view an event as favorable, it could guide us to joyful bliss.
The illusion sculpted by the mind becomes our experienced reality at any given event. I use the term illusion to emphasize that the experienced state of the mind is a transitory process that is not rooted in any external reality. What gets created at any given moment is the perception of schemas being translated which the mind interprets as good or bad. In doing so the mind assigns value to our experience.
Let’s look at the concept of ‘Illness’. We view it as a destructive force that takes over our lives, but what if like everything else it is simply a state of being, not good, not bad. What is illness if we simply remove its negative connotation? Could it be an eye-opening experience that diverts our attention to something we have chosen to ignore? Could it be a wakeup call regarding a much-needed change in our lifestyle or mode of being? Could it be a chance for us to reevaluate unhealthy routines that dominate our lives? Could illness be beautiful gift wrapped in an ugly package?
The brain is conditioned to quickly assign a value to everything we encounter. We view loss as harmful and success as ecstatic. What we cease to notice is the potential positive hidden in every loss and the possible negative obscured in every gain. We are too focused on the superficial meaning of each event to shift our attention to its depth. What if our task in life is to learn to view each experience without getting lost in its cosmetic meaning?
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