The Word - Inner faith!
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Hope all of you are keeping well, safely at home, socially distancing, wearing mask when necessary and getting vaccines when available. Nowadays, death is dancing in the streets of the world. As I am from India, I am trying to keep tabs on the situation. But not sitting glued to the television. If people realize, the TV and news media also show everything with a slight emphasis. This is news, slightly embellished.
But during a pandemic, watching every kind of news that too terrible, heart breaking news is going to bring us down. Everyone talks and tries to do everything for the physical body from the masks, to social distancing, to vaccines to keeping oneself safe. Here, I want to reiterate, I am an advocate of vaccines, social-distancing, masks, lock downs, and quarantines to keep humanity safe. No confusion with that.
But all these are about the physical body. What about the mental, emotional and spiritual body? The true person or being within. If we are always trying to gorge upon any news, whether it is positive or negative news, a background narration of the reality also is happening behind the scene. So, this constant watching of news, data or information is actually going to affect us emotionally and mentally.
We deeply sense and know what is the true reality. We know, the world has been kept as a prisoner by a pandemic. Already the mind is chaotic and tense. Above this, if we are always looking at the news, or browsing every random website. the mind is going to become more confused.
The mind: Let us take an example. Think about a lake, a very calm lake. The lake is very calm, with no waves, currents or ripples. Calm. Now, through a stone into it. That stone creates ripples after ripples and the calmness of the mind is disturbed. A very calm mind is that silent, peaceful lake. Every news, or negative data is a stone that is thrown into that peace of the mind. It is going to create ripples. Then we watch news, after news. Stone after stone after stone.
The mind never gets a break. Ripple after ripples, stress after stress and strain after strain. Now, these news or pieces of information we share with others. The strength of that ripple becomes more stronger and deeper. Stone after stone. The ripples or waves become so deep and incessant, there is no calm lake anymore. Only eddies, ripples and waves. Is there any wonder, the world is moving around crazed? We are constantly throwing stone after stone into our calm lake of a mind.
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| Mind with thoughts as ripples on a lake Image credits - Pixabay.com |
Yes, there is a pandemic and we as a human need to know all the information to protect ourselves and our loved ones. The best way for this is to have a calm and peaceful mind. A wavy, ripple-ridden mind is going to take away the peaceful inner reality and bring chaos. That stressed mind is going to bring more thoughts, that bring more stress. Soon enough we are in a downward spiral of a negative, rabbit hole mind. Many times, humans never realize this negative spiral we find ourselves in.
Did I, do it? Of course. I also have a mind that races with thoughts. Then, soon I find myself upset and stressed out. There were times in my own life where I almost lost my faith, but every time, that one single spark of a candle remained, that one very small flame of the higher Self. That flame never ever died. It always kept coming back up with more might every time life brought its tough circumstances. This small flame of candle, for myself I consider as the Hindu God, Vishnu. This is for myself. But for others, each can choose a higher power that is aligned with their own religion and faith.
This one small flame of Soul or spirit would guide us whether through a pandemic, a personal tragedy or a tough situation. A faith in a power greater than us and our life. Let me bring in another scenario. This has been researched and data collected by a Jewish psychiatrist, philosopher, Victor Frankl, who with other prisoners found himself in a concentration camp during the Nazi regime.
Victor Frankl: He found himself in a Nazi concentration camp among other prisoners. Before that he was a practicing psychiatrist, philosopher and a neurologist with a good practice at a Vienna hospital, one of the only hospitals that allowed Jews to practice medicine. In 1942, with his family members, he was sent to Theresienstadt concentration camp, where first his dad died of starvation and Pneumonia. Later, he, his brothers and mother were sent to the notorious Auschwitz concentration camp, where the other family members were sent to the gas chamber. His wife also passed away due to sickness.
Frankl spent around more than three years in four different concentration camps. During this time, he started asking his fellow inmates a series of psychological questions to understand their feelings and emotions. He noted down elaborate data and information on the fellow prisoners and their mental/ emotional state during the prison time. Remember, we can the same way consider the lock down, quarantine and home staycation as a voluntary prison where we are not allowed the social life we had before. This also is a different kind of isolation.
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| Viktor Emil Frankl Image credits - Prof. Dr. Franz Vesely, via Wikimedia Commons |
But others who could not get to this inner flame of hope and faith, found it very tough to survive the camp. They succumbed to their circumstances. Remember in the concentration camp, every identity of the person was removed, the name, the family, the ancestry, the history, the title, the job, the family members, the possessions, the family heirlooms and everything known to that person.
The only thing they were allowed to keep was their body and the number that was tattooed on their arm. But many times, even that body was not allowed to be kept, as many were marched to the gas chamber or showers where the poisonous gas was let onto them. As of now, this pandemic is making humans do a march onto the ICU, ventilators, or even incinerators or funeral pyres. But what is going to help us in these dire times? Our own inner faith and the flame of hope on a higher power.
To Indians: The next section is for my dear Indians, the country I share my birth with. Remember, we have to first protect ourselves against the diseases. If we are truly trusting in higher power than ourselves, we also need to know, the higher power comes as what we need for that particular time. Don't think Divine only comes in the human form. Everything is the Universe. So, the higher force can appear as the mask, vaccine, the hand sanitizer, the doctor who takes care of us or the nurse who administers the vaccine.
When a vaccine is available for our physical health, it is arrogance and ignorance to reject it, thinking God would heal us directly. What if that God is coming in the form of a vaccine? Then, rejecting the vaccine is actually rejecting the God, correct? So, don't think the higher intelligence can come only in the form humans long for, but that power can also come as what we need for that particular time. This is the divide humans are finding between science and spirituality. Deeply religious or spiritual people think science is superfluous and deeply scientific people think spirituality ( I am not much a fan of organized religion, but more of spirituality) is idiotic. But both has its importance in our life.
So, first my words towards spirituality. As humans if we think that the higher intelligence comes only as a human or a magical being, it is pure absurdity. In these times, if a magical being comes, we would be terrified, rush and hide under our covers. So, the divine during modern times would come as a vaccine that saves us from the pandemic or the mask that protects us from the disease. So, anyone who is not availing is actually rejecting the help that is being bestowed. We learn that the higher power is omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent. So, shouldn't we think of the same power or potency of the Universal intelligence that is entwined in that vaccine dose? We should. Same way, the doctors, nurses, hospital workers and the emergency management workers who are extending a helping hand all are divine in human form.
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| The protection against Covid-19 - The vaccine Image credits - Pixabay.com |
Now, we have done all the measures like masks, social distancing, vaccines, and availed all the hospital facility for our health. This is for the physical health of the body. But what about our emotional and mental health. Remember the calm lake and the ripple ridden lake of a mind? A calm mind is going to keep us free of stress and strain. But a chaotic mind is going to bring stress and strain even with the vaccines, masks and all the other help we are being provided. Here is where a calm mind and an inner faith on a higher intelligence is needed.
We always discuss spirituality in this blog. So, the higher power first comes as a vaccine or mask or a doctor or nurse to protect us physically. Then, the same higher power comes as a faith or an inner candle of light that burns with hope and spirit within us. It is actually the human mind that cannot embrace this concept of two realities- that of the physical outer reality of science and an inner spiritual reality of emotions and mind. This is why science is not able to fix all the problems of the world. Sure, it can fix the outer problems by use of vaccines, PPEs, masks, bridges, roads, buildings, trains, planes and travel.
But it is not able to fix the inner emotional or mental reality. That is why even with every kind of physical luxury being given by science, science is not able to fix the human misery or sadness. Because above physical reality, humans have a huge inner mental and emotional reality. So, it is utmost important to take care of this inner spiritual realm of mind and emotions.
Inner faith: How? This is where an inner trust and faith in a higher grace is needed. I have had deepest of word wars/ debates with my atheist/ science friends. My question to many is why are the atheists even with their confidence in science feel a deep doom and gloom? Let us come back to the story of Dr. Viktor Frankl. He found that people who where able to find this inner faith and hope had a greater chance to be more healthy in the concentration camps. Their inner spirit and hope brought lesser diseases and weakness for them.
Putting the faith in a higher intelligence, they did everything, so that they could survive the concentration camps. That inner spirit or in the case of a believer the faith in a higher intelligence kept them going for another day. So, those with an inner hope and faith survived more than those with no faith. The same dynamics can be applied here, during a pandemic. Wear the mask, socially distance, quarantine and avail every medical help that is available. But above that have an inner hope or spirit that things would become normal as soon as that time appears.
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| The inner light of the spirit or the Soul Image credits - Pixabay.com |
Along with a pandemic raging around, if we also become stressed and strained, the immunity and the effect of the medicine to heal is going to be down. Remember the doctors or the nurses administer the vaccines. But the body produces the immunity giving cells, immunity and the health. So, a calm and cool mind with emotions brings the optimum homeostasis to have the best outcome towards a healthy body. As a healthy body produces a healthy mind, a healthy mind also produces a healthy body.
So, during a pandemic it is utmost necessary to keep a healthy mind and emotions. Because that is going to affect the way the body is going to function and bring out immunity, the necessary health and healing. But don't think that having a calm mind is also not to be so peaceful that others treat us like a doormat. No. That is not okay. Because each being comes with their innate value that is inherent in them. So, deep values and needed boundaries should be developed, that we can exist within those values with inner calmness and peace.
So, coming back to that inner lake of calmness, whether it is a concentration camp, pandemic, stress, strain or other being's bringing their chaos into our lives, (They do. We live in societies and people have thousand different problems) we need to put our own values/ boundaries and maintain our inner state of calmness. It is this inner reality that later brings our outer reality. If we allow all that outer chaos and the whole world confusion to rule our own inner mental set up and realm, most probably soon we would find that outer chaos creeping into our inner reality, starting to reflect it in our outer reality.
Whether we accept it or not - Our inner reality reflects outside. So, if we allow every circumstance, pandemic, people, news, chaos, hate, rage, anger, or misinformation to rule our inner reality, that chaos is eventually going to show up in our outer reality as well. Remember, we need a very healthy body and mind during a pandemic to develop a very strong immunity, health and healing. So, would stress and fear bring in that needed immunity and healing if we are always terrified and fearful? No.
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| Our inner reality reflects outside Image credits - Pixabay.com |
So, during a pandemic and a tough time of the world, develop the inner reality of a deepest calm mind that observes everything, but doesn't allow the incessant stones to be thrown into that calmness whether from the news, social-media, other people or circumstances. The calm lake of the inner reality of a peaceful being! This is the best help and support we can give to our loved ones, family and friends during this pandemic. So, take all the necessary measures, be calm and peaceful as a silent, observant lake of a being! That is the best thing we can bestow on ourselves and our loved ones!