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Solution to Overthinking || Acharya Prashant (2022)
18.9K views
1 year ago
Purpose of Life
Immersion
Wasting Time
Meaninglessness
Mental Health
Meditation
Focus
Desire
Description

Acharya Prashant begins by stating that nobody will ever have enough money, clothes, or have all their desires satisfied. Situations will never be perfect. Therefore, he advises that as a young person, one must figure out very clearly what is worth doing and what is important in life. Otherwise, one's time and attention will be captured by trivial matters. He gives an example of traveling on a bus, looking out the window, and having one's mind captured by some random event for thirty minutes. This is how, he explains, most people waste their entire lives—always occupied, but doing "nothing in particular." If one has nothing truly important to do, one ends up doing nothing, or at least nothing in particular. The speaker contrasts this with his own habit of using his commute time to read, ensuring his driver drives slowly so he is not disturbed. Without such a dedicated purpose, it is easy to get distracted by random things like scrolling through social media or ogling passing faces. He points out the absurdity of getting fixated on a person who is in visual range for only 2.2 seconds. The world can be an unending succession of pretty faces that can make hours fly by, but this amounts to doing "nothing in particular." The entire journey of life can be spent this way, and when death arrives and asks what one did, the answer will be "nothing in particular," despite having always been busy. Acharya Prashant advises having one thing worth living for, which leads to a state of "immersion." He describes immersion as a beautiful word and the only way to live; if you are not immersed, you are scattered. He asks the audience if they have experienced the state of being scattered inwardly. Immersion, he states, is the best meditation and an antidote to all kinds of mental troubles. He asserts that mental illness is a pointer that life is devoid of essence. The one who has something to live for will never be mentally sick. He concludes by saying that if one has a purpose, there is no time to be anxious and no space for fear. When fear comes, one can say, "Sorry, no vacancy." He urges the audience to give all their inner space to something that is beautiful for them, ensuring there is no vacancy for anything else. If you can have immersion in your everyday life, that alone is the best meditation.