An Ipad and the Mountain of Mind
Last week my father got himself an Ipad pro with an Ipencil and everything. Since then I have only seen him use it a few times, but that’s because me and my younger brother never let go of it. This has been the story of every gadget bought by my father.
Anyways, I have been wanting an Ipad pro and an Ipencil for a long time. Mostly because, I am hypnotised by the Ipad commercial with Portugal’s “Feel it still” in the background I.e “On any given Wednesday”. It is the lyrics of this song (I’m a rebel just for kicks) that makes me feel like a rebellious artist, kinda like Steve Jobs himself therefore, making an Ipad seem like a perfect tool for a rebel millennial. So, I finally had the Ipad and I promised myself that I am going to paint a picture on it every day and evoke my inner creativity. Before moving forward it needs to be pointed out that since then, I have painted just one picture (the one you see above) and spent rest of the time watching the entire season of Young Sheldon on it. However, the picture I drew has great significance.
The picture you see above, is the picture of a world where everything is alight. Here everything shines bright, and sound, smell and taste comes from every object. Here the mountains shine bright pink, tastes and smells like cranberry flavoured Foxes, and sound like “One Kiss” by Dua Lipa, whereas the clouds are green, taste like wheat grass and apple smoothie, and sing Kanye West’s “Stronger”. However, unlike our world here the light is black and communication is done through silence. In this world when the lightning strikes, every thing goes dark and silent, and instant peace pervades throughout the world. Here there is a constant cacophony of lights, sounds, tastes, and smells. Therefore in this world, darkness and silence is welcomed and not feared.
I explained the picture to my grandmother who was visiting me then, and the first question she asked me was that, “where does this place exist?”
To which I answered that, “this place exist within each and everyone of us, in our minds. Our mind is always active and alight with pictures, smells, sounds, tastes, emotions, and thoughts. The lowest part of the mountain is when we are wide awake and in action. When we are awake our minds are most active. During this state our minds not only processes all the information received from our five senses but also, responds to them based on our ongoing thoughts, emotions, desires and most importantly, intellect. Therefore, the lowest part of the mountain is most active and therefore most alight.”
“As we climb up the mountain we enter into the realm of imagination. It is a state of being when we are awake, but we choose to ignore our five senses and start entertaining thoughts in our minds. Imagination can be with eyes closed like in bed before going to sleep, or with open eyes like daydreaming. In this state of mind everything is possible, one can instantly become the president of United States or create pomegranate juice out of fire. But most importantly in this state we have complete control over our imagination and intellect. However, because in this state we choose to ignore the information received from our five senses therefore, this part of the mountain it is less active and therefore less glowing than before.”
At the top of the mountain we start moving away from the light of our physical world and start moving towards the light of our mental world, i.e. darkness or nothingness in which everything exists.
“As we fly up from the top of the mountain into the clouds, we enter the dreamland. Here we loose control of our body, imagination and intellect. It is in the dream world where we truly live in our minds, and where anything is possible. It is only in the dreams where one can truly jump from a wing of an airplane and survive without a scratch, or play with a dozen of panthers in one’s middle school’s cricket ground.”
“As we fly higher amidst the randomness of the dream world, the black lighting strikes and everything goes dark. This is the state of deep sleep. In an instant, peace pervades throughout the universe, five, six, seven, eight hours pass in an flash, and the next thing you realise that you are flying down to the mountain of the mind, only to rise up again.”
P.S. The concept of physical world, dream world and deep sleep in not new. It has been thoroughly studied in ancient Vedic texts and the philosophy of Vedanta.
I started painting the above picture with a world in mind where light is darkness, sound is silence, and agitation is peacefulness. As I completed the picture I found a striking similarity between the picture and functioning of the mind.