Mindless driving
I almost knocked down a Cycle rider just the other day. Well, It wasn't like I was travelling 100kmph. It was just about 40kmph. And I got distracted only for a few seconds, and Bam. There was a Motorcycle on the middle of the road and I barely managed to break. And my heart only started to race after the incident as there was no time for it to happen before. Luckily the car behind me did not hit me either. So, I had to write this article on mindful driving.
Nope, I am not going to give you a list of benifits of mindful driving, or give you tips on how to use breath to focus on the road. I am sure you are a better driver than I am. And any mindfulness other than on the road, and vehilcles is going to increase the risk of accidents anyway. Instead I am going to show you a Subtle feature of any journey which can applied to life.
Mindfulness on driving and elephants.
For that matter I have to explain my journey. I travel 186km every week in my car. Four hours on the road. Travelling same route, with a Picturesque land, partly mountains, plains, through forests, and even waterfalls. However, as it is work, It is not like vacation. It is not stress free travel. As I am driving through areas there are wild elephants, I always wanted to see one. And I did not had luck, or unluck for that matter until one day.
While travelling 80kmph on a little bend, for a fraction of a second I looked to my left and I saw two wild elephants fully grown ones, similar heights, looked like siblings, grey in color like two majestic rocks, coming towards the road. And I did not have time to slow down. It was just before dark, and I did not want to turn back as, the elephants looked like real wild ones. There were no other vehicles on the road, or even anyone.
Facts that matters
But the interesting facts are not the elephants.
Although I noticed everything just a half a second (maybe it is not even half) travelling fast, I can describe it to you taking a full minute. So, even I am suprised how much detail is in this half a second.
Secondly, although I can exactly remember things about a half a second of my entire 4hour travel, when I try to remember anything else happened on that journey I cannot. I do not remember anything else happened during that entire 4 hours and for that matter. I do not know anything about entire day. Maybe I do remember some other incidents (which are isolated in memory) but nothing is linked to that day at the moment. Was I not been mindful driving?
Are we photographers of the film called life?
I think that happens to every one of us. We just drift through the time and our mind just picks up snapshots of some interesting facts about the journey. And we make our own album of things what happened. However even from our point of view this is wrong, as that doesn't describe everything which happened. Only when we look at driving, for that matter life, we understand this fact.
We call ourselves, intelligent, experienced selves, carrying this false information, which only is a relative truth to ourselves. The problem I have discussed in detail in the previous article about time. It is not very difficult to understand and I suggest you to have a look.
More importantly what are you going to do with this information? For me it has following effects.
It let's me humble myself, as I even do not know what I have been through yesterday. According to socrates, Only true wisdom is knowing that you know nothing.
It makes me realise limits of my own existance, and limited control or non at all which I have over the so called past, even as a memory.
It makes me question, what is living? Just taking snapshots of a film which is continously rolling otherwise, and call it a life?
What are your thoughts on this drama of life?
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