A mind of one’s own

My Yoga teacher is a true blue Gandhian. He insists that Yoga is not just a form of exercise but a way of living.

During a class, he asked if any of us remembered where and how we had left our footwear. Some started thinking, some tried to peek outside, some smiled sheepishly — but none of us remembered. “The first step towards being a Yogi is to be mindful of your thoughts and actions — all through your waking hours. Try to achieve that,” he said and moved on to contorting.

Being mindful — in other words, to have presence of mind — this phrase does not exist in my dictionary. The only things I don’t misplace are my body parts and that is because they are attached to me. Keys, remote, cell phone, anything that can be misplaced, I misplace.

Out of curiosity, I tried to observe how others operated. To my dismay, everyone seemed to know where their things were. My husband always had the house keys handy, my daughter knew precisely which one of the hundred pockets in her school bag held the pencil box, and even the neighbour’s dog knew where he had buried his bone.

That was it — my situation had to be amended. I repeated the phrase “a place for everything and everything in its place” a few times  and I was all set. After a couple of hours and a few things duly put back in their places, I gave up. I found myself scurrying around for the keys and the mobile as usual.

“How did I study or hold a job all these years with such a drifty mind?” I Asked myself. Some pondering and some systematic debugging and bingo! I knew what was wrong — it was all because of multi-tasking. I enter the house pouring over the freshly delivered credit card bill. The keys and my hand-bag are left to themselves. I read a book, flip a couple of newspapers, catch up on TV — all while signing my daughter’s school diary. So how can I remember where I left the diary or the pen afterwards?

Geared with this insight, my new mantra was to tackle only one thing at a time. However tempting it was, I do not log on to the net while I am on the phone with my mother. I resist texting a message while I am packing my lunch. I even consciously avoid all thoughts unrelated to the task on hand. But it is all so against my grain, it is too much hard work! It is truly seems easier to search around a bit than control my wayward mind. But since everyone seems so gung-ho on this ‘power of now’ concept, I have also decided to stick with it.

In today’s class the teacher started “What is ‘Tapas?’ It is not going to a forest and living on fruits but to be disciplined in our day to day life. Try to do the same things at the same time every day. Weekend or weekday, stick to the same routine.” I certainly would love to try this one but one thing at a time, remember?

Vanishree is the proprietor of EasyLib.com, the first online library in Bangalore