Mind At Ease

One day, a teacher was walking from one town to another with a few of his students. While they were traveling, they happened to pass by a lake. They stopped to rest there and the teacher asked one of his students to get him some water from the lake. A student walked up to the lake. When he reached it, he noticed some people were washing clothes in the water and right at that moment, a horse and cart started crossing through the lake. As a result, the water became very muddy. The student thought, ““How can I give this muddy water to my teacher to drink!”” So he came back and told his teacher, “The water in the lake is very muddy. I don’’t think it is suitable for you to drink.”” After a while, the teacher again asked the same student to go back to the lake and get him some water. The student obediently went back to the lake. This time he found that the mud had settled down and the water was clean so he collected some in a pot and brought it to his teacher. The teacher looked at the water then looked up at the student and said, ““See what you did to make the water clean. You let it be and the mud settled down on its own. It is also the same with your mind. When it is disturbed, just let it be. Give it a little time and it will settle down on its own.”

My Reflection:

How many times have you been overwhelmed by things in your life and react in a way you wish you never? The pace of our modern world tends to put our minds in a chaotic state. Sometimes it's easy to escape the ‘madness’ and other times it can be really difficult. How many times have you let your mind go wild, thinking about to-do-lists, what's happening later in the day, tomorrow’s events, reliving an experience which frustrated you the day before, panicking about work…. a tornado is brewing in your mind and you're getting real anxious because you can’t find the off button to the chaos in your mind. The truth is that you don’t need to turn off your mind, you never will be able to, but you can stop listening to the ‘noise’, stop allowing those thoughts orchestrate your feeling towards life and allow your mind to settle. Be patient with yourself. The quicker you can identify the noise in your mind, you will be able to settle it and bounce back to a state of peace. A peaceful mind is essential for our effectiveness in every day life. It keeps us calm no matter what the situation is. As the above story illustrates… when your mind is disturbed, it’s like mud in water, let it settle down and it will become pure once again.


Have an awesome week!
Darren Zwiers

"When you've seen beyond yourself, then you may find, peace of mind is waiting there". - George Harrison