Why It’s Crucial to Curb the Mind that Daydreams
Many people know and understand the importance of being present when a “negative” circumstance arises in life, and it is quite self-explanatory. The pain of the situation and unbearable stories of the mind sometimes gives you no choice except to be present. However, the key to developing a more permanent state of presence is having the discipline to catch yourself in idle moments especially when a “positive” circumstance occurs. The excitement generated has the potential to take your mind for a wild ride, essentially making you completely mind-identified once again. Since you are satisfied, content, and excited about the story the mind is creating, you allow your consciousness to get stuck on it. It is this same mind that will throw you down in the dumps again when something doesn’t seem to go your way.
A relatable example would be planning a vacation that is a few months away. It is completely ok to think about the future while booking flight tickets, booking hotels, and planning an itinerary. The issue arises when you constantly allow the mind to use the upcoming vacation as fuel to feed excitement to you NOW, even though the vacation is not happening for a while. Here, it’s important to accept the present moment and stay there even if it is not as enticing and is not giving you any happiness. You don’t allow yourself to constantly daydream about it and make the relatively unbearable present moment more bearable. Decide that even the boring moments are just as beautiful, important, and worthy of your attention. Even if nothing interesting is happening in life, it is OK!!! It is only when you have the resolve to develop this that presence becomes more rooted within your being.
The fight the mind will put up with this is it will tell you that all happiness in life will then be lost. But, as this practice continues, you realize that what you thought was happiness was just restlessness. It’s just the egoic energy that creates more duality. Within the excitement is fear and pain waiting to be experienced, at the flick of a switch. True happiness comes from not being identified with this and peace is what becomes of utmost importance. It is that peace and presence that makes you radiate, glow, and seem like a genuinely happy person.
