Part 10 of 46
Creative ideas flow out of the deep silent mind within and if we want to be creative, we need to discover the silence from which all thoughts are born.
‘Discover the silence within the noise’ Yagnavalkya’s teachings to Janaka, Brihadaranyaka Upanishad
SILENCE and noise seem like two opposites. You can’t have one when the other is present, right? If there is clamour all around, how can there be silence? And if it is quiet, how can there be noise? Yet these opposites always coexist. This is one of the paradoxes of life.
Firstly, all noise is internal. It’s a mental creation and has nothing to do with the decibel level outside. The source of your noise is the everyday mind. It’s the mind we wake up to, the mind we dream with.
This mind is always drowned in the clamour. Even if there is feather drop silence outside, the mind can create its own deafening and noisy thoughts. Likewise, when a battle rages outside and a soldier is hit and falls to his death, he probably discovers a silence so profound, all the howitzers and gunfire cannot disturb him anymore.
All silence is also internal. It has nothing to do with the decibel levels outside. You could be in a market or a rave party or a board room, your ability to discover silence amidst noise is what will separate you from the crowd.
Your level of silence is a personal statement. It is an expression of your creative appreciation of this moment. It defines your state of evolution in this life.
Silence comes from a deeper mind, just as thoughts come from a surface mind. This has to be understood intuitively. If you allow yourself to feel silence now, you will automatically touch that mind from which nothing emanates but pure silence. You will discern it as profound and beautiful. You will also figure out that all thoughts emerge from this deep quiet, play for a while on the surface, and merge back into it, much like waves rise from the waters and merge with it again.
If you flow into this silence, you will also touch the fountain of creativity.
Notice how creative people behave. A music director, before creating a new tune, will always fall into a deep silence, then gently rise with a tune. A poet before getting into a writing frenzy will always reflect and move about for a while in silence.
Ask yourself, where are their original ideas coming from? From existing thoughts? No chance. If it was known already it wouldn’t be original. Our creative ideas always flow out of the deep silent mind within and if we want to be more creative, we need to discover that silence from which all thoughts are born.
This doesn’t mean we reject noise. Noise is life. It is the marketplace where we live our emotions, where we toil and sweat, rejoice and weep, hate and love.
Life without the noise would be unbearable. The secret as always is to strike a balance, to flow in and out of both silence as well as the noise.
Vedanta rocks. Discover the silence within the noise and use it to express yourself creatively in the world outside.
Previous Posts >>
( Source: Mani Shankar/ Deccan Chronicle, Hyderabad 8th March 2009 )
No comments:
Post a Comment