If the shocking statistics provided by the website Really-Worried.com are to be believed, the average urban person spends two hours and fifteen minutes of their day fretting.
Is it really necessary to worry? Not at all, it is a futile exercise of the confused mind. The American humourist, Erma Boombeck, has said it beautifully, “Worry is like a rocking-chair — it keeps you going but gets you nowhere!”
Around 75 per cent of worries are about the future. Most people worry at home (65 per cent), or when they are alone. And over half of those who worried at home did so in the bedroom! When asked when their principal worry times were, over 55 per cent said between 9 pm and 3 am.
Which means the time you should be relaxing in the soft embrace of sleep is stolen by your worries. And if you think that you are going to solve your problems by worrying about them look back at the problems you were worried about.
They look so ridiculously small today. And none of them were solved by worrying. People worry about tomorrow and waste today’s joy. Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow, it only deprives today of its joy.
It seems worrying is a defense mechanism of the mind that wants to avoid reality. The chronic worriers are anxiety-ridden and display physical effects such as difficulty swallowing, dizziness, dry mouth, fast heartbeat, fatigue, headaches, inability to concentrate — to name a few.
A worrying mind is a shallow mind. It is always in turmoil. A silent mind has depth, it is not disturbed by waves, it has trust in itself. So instead of worrying about the situation of the world or about your future Osho’s advise is to spend your precious time in meditation.
Osho says, “We don’t need bigger nuclear weapons to stop the war, we need something totally different. Love will provide the energy, meditation will provide you with tremendous strength. And you will not feel so insignificant, you will feel dignified and significant, because your love, your meditation, your blissfulness is going to save the world. And don’t be worried that you are helpless to do anything.
The idea of helplessness has arisen because you have never been told what your resources are. You have never looked into your resources — your love, your silence, your peace, your compassion, your joy. You have never looked into all this inexhaustible potentiality of your being.
And if thousands of people blossom in love, music and dance, and the whole earth becomes a celebration, then any politician is not going to destroy this world. He will feel helpless; he will feel guilty to destroy such beautiful people and such a beautiful planet.
Amrit Sadhana is in the management team of Osho International Meditation Resort, Pune.
