As fleeting as snowflakes – The Hindu

I love watching snowflakes fall in all their glory. Living in a place where it’s next to impossible to sight them on a periodic basis, my fascination for them is insatiable. I watch them, once in a while, on pre-recorded videos.

Each slow flake has an intricate pattern of its own, varying in its size and shape depending upon the temperature and the amount of water vapour available, as they are developing. Isn’t it a wonder that no two snowflakes are exactly alike, despite the fact that almost all of them are hexagonal in shape?

Snowflakes remind me of the fleeting nature of time and our own mortality. Our lives are full of those small transient moments of ‘now’. While the snowflakes are visible to the eye, our ‘nows’ are invisible. Unless we make conscious effort to catch these ‘nows’ and make them uniquely meaningful to us, they will be lost to us forever.

It was Emily Dickenson who said, “Forever is composed of Nows.” Life comprises of a series of passing “nows”. It’s that working space on the desk which allows us to build the life we want, moment by moment. Hence, it pays to keep it clutter-free. Here the clutter is nothing physical that we can lift by our hands and throw it away. It’s in our worrying thoughts about the future, or in our ruminating mind that keeps going back into the past.

Focusing on the past makes me feel nostalgic or sad, and ruminating about the future makes me feel tense, more often than not. Not dwelling upon the past or the future seems almost impossible, even when I realise that ‘the present’ is the only place, upon which I have some control. Thus, it’s paradoxical that the only position of control is lost in perpetual drifting back and forth. Perhaps there is an evolutionary reason for this.

Our brain evolved to avoid risk, by prioritising survival over everything else. For the early human beings, safety depended upon avoiding constant threats such as predators, poisonous plants and risky situations calling upon our brains to be on a perpetual state of alertness. That’s one of the reasons why it was difficult and dangerous to hold our attention still on one thing and one thing only, for a considerable amount of time. In a relatively safe environment of the modern world, where our brains are required to be more focus-driven than being attention-deficit, we find ourselves in a deep quandary.

It takes practice and concentrated efforts to break free of the mind’s default settings, in order to reap the benefits of not only enjoying the present moment, but also making the most of it, by directing it towards creating the desired future for ourselves.

Mindful living makes it possible for us to make the most of the present moment, no matter how mundane an activity we are engaging it with. It’s possible to derive the most juice out of each moment by bringing to the fore all our senses so as to experience the activity in all its splendour.

For example, as we brush our teeth every day, we can engage fully with the activity, focusing on the feel, smell, and the taste of the toothpaste. This would allow us to reach every crevice, nook and corner of our mouth, making it feel like a vast expanse of a place, and give us a sense of accomplishment by allowing us to breathe in the freshness that it actually calls for. When experienced from the heightened sense of consciousness, even the most mundane can attain extraordinary beauty.

By taking care of our now, we can render our past memorable and our future meaningful.

rao.sujathap@gmail.com