A quiet Mind

When I realized that I had lost my voice, the first reaction that kicked in was despair. I am a teacher and like a singer a teacher’s main tool is her voice. No I had not got teachers nodes or anything of that sort. A throat infection ignored was screaming to be heard and had translated itself to a complete silencing of the vocal cords.

I trudged to school like an unwilling schoolgirl wondering how I was going to get through the day.

“It’s okay,” I tried to comfort myself. It’s a Saturday and as the children won’t be coming in there will not be much talking to do.”

But there were teachers all over the place when I reached school. As question papers were being readied, tempers were frayed .It was a busy day at school and I had no voice.

I settled down before the computer to type my paper and once my colleagues found that I could not speak, they left me alone. As I found that I just could not communicate the compulsion to have my say to, give my opinion, to offer some help died down. My mind sort of understood that there was nothing I could do and began to focus on the task at hand- setting a question paper. Once the work was done ,I settled down into the position of an observor.

The drama became more interesting when the bell rang for recess. Over cups of tea , I found human nature unfold itself. Gossips circulating, jokes were cracked ,opinions exchanged. All I could do was to just observe it all. When a colleague took the opportunity of me being ‘tongue tied’, to make a snide remark she had being dying to make all these months, something in me rose to retaliate but the words didn’t-could not come out. I became aware that the energy that had risen, died down. Maybe because I observed this energy too, I realized that it meant nothing, the snide hurtful remarks went through me and I knew even if I had a voice I just had no need to retaliate. The remarks weren’t about me though they were directed at me.. It was just about someone else having a bad day.

I also realized that I was very well able to take part in all the other positive vibrations circulating around the coffee room. I could smile at the friends trooping in , touch my friends hands in gratitude when she placed a comforting hand on my shoulder and giggle at jokes .I didn’t need a voice to enjoy the good vibes and It was good that I didn’t have a voice to retaliate to the nasty ones.

Once everyone was back at her desk, a kind of calmness settled down in me. It was as if my mind understood that it wasn’t of any use churning up thoughts as my vocal chords were paralyzed for the day. Perhaps if I had watched television or a movie I would have missed this quiet mind as the mind would have reacted to what I had seen on screen. Now with the practical mind zeroing in on the task at hand, the rest of the mind settled down and the task at the physical level being accomplished in a short span of time,I was free to  touch the deep layers of mind.

Here it was, in the middle of a busy school day! The stillness I had attempted to get in meditations.

I went home to spend the rest of the day in silence. No need to shout when my dog barked, no need to answer any phone calls or answer any questions there too.

By the time it was evening the stillness had grown deeper and when I sat in meditation the silence deepened into a blissfulness that coursed through every cell.

Two mornings later (after a round of antibiotics,) when I woke up I tested my voice feeling rather like a bird does when she is getting ready to sing.

Yes, it was in full form, rested and raring to go. I could speak. Yippee! I paused .There was a hint of sadness in me. It was almost as if I was good bye to silence.

Hey stop it,” my inner voice I had befriended during the two days of silence spoke up.”Now you know mauna means not merely physical silence .It means silencing the mind. That’s all you need to do. The rest falls into place. When you speak it will be only because there is really some thing coming from a deeper level of you that will make a difference in the world.”

I scrambled out of bed thankful for my voice knowing it was a valuable tool that I was in control of and that I could use to my advantage and relegate it to the backseat when it was not needed.  I had had a glimpse of the deeper silent mind and I knew the joy tucked away in its fold. I also knew that the way to reach that deep stillness was to give up effort- effort to create an impression, to create a relationship, to defend a point of view, to analyze, to justify, to label ,both at the mental and the physical level.

I had been practising Mauna these past few years but it had only been at the physical level .I decided that I would observe silence as part of my weekly routine-a day when I would drop into the silent mind sans TV, sans phone calls, sans mind chatter. I would have a rendezvous with myself.

Truly some of life’s greatest lessons come in the disguise of problems!