The Genesis

Credits: Google Images

About five years ago, I had a strange experience. It is a memory that I remember vividly, not just because of its novelty, but also because of how deep in my bones I felt it.

So imagine a teenager sitting on her bed on a sunny November afternoon, deep in meditation. The house is quiet, like it mostly is, with the family members busy with their day’s work. As this teenager continues to meditate in silence, she begins to feel sluggish and sleepy, a common experience for her ( and something a lot of people report while meditating, a feeling of intense calm). Now here’s where things get interesting. As this teenager continues to sit and focus her attention on nothingness, she begins to feel strangely light. It starts with her mind feeling lighter and lighter, and eventually her body weight losing gravity and becoming simply a weightless mass. At the pinnacle of this experience, this teenager feels as if she is floating, or hovering, right above her bed, without feeling the sensation of the bedsheet under her.

I know how ridiculous this episode sounds, and that there are a thousand possible reasons for why my mind perceived the feeling as weightless hovering. But the credibility of the experience is not the point of attention for now. The important thing is, I have had similar experiences of intense calm even while doing yoga over the years. This is what Csikszentmihalyi has probably defined as ‘flow’ in psychology.

How does the human mind and body truly become one unit? How does a mind-driven meditation practice and a body-driven yoga practice bring out the same feeling and outcome for me? I realized over time that these two are not solely mind or body driven practices, that meditation includes intense awareness of your body, and yoga includes intense focus of and on your mind.

This was the genesis of me choosing M.Sc. Psychology (Health and Wellbeing). What better way to understand this connection than having a research-oriented, evidence-based curriculum, that would probably add to my personal understanding of this deep-seated mind-body relationship.

And the course has done that for me. The realizations I have had over the past few months have been eye-opening to say the least, and I can feel the way my lens of perception is changing. How I view the world is changing.

And for now, all I can try is to keep my mind, and more importantly my heart, open to new experiences, understandings and realities.

Before I go, as music is so close to my heart, I leave you with a small musical piece.

Something that reflects my feelings much better than maybe words can.

Piku’s Theme, with an aalaap

Signifying hope, to continue learning