3 things I’d learnt in 5 seconds from a near-death experience in the mystical Kumaon valley
Couple of years back, at approximately 9:30 AM IST, I found myself at the bottom of a Himalayan gorge, inside a completely smashed car, wondering- “How on earth did I survive this?”
The night before my accident, and on the advice of my BnB host, I made an impromptu decision to visit the Kasar Devi temple. An enchanting site of worship and meditation, it was built by ancient Kassites who migrated to the region in 900 BC from West Asia. Over the years, Kasar Devi’s magnetism has drawn philosophers, poets, scholars, painters, musicians, bohemian artists, spiritual leaders, scientists and eccentrics. It has been a meditative, creative and learning spot for Swami Vivekananda, Rabindranath Tagore, Jawaharlal Nehru, D.H. Lawrence, Bob Dylan, Anandamayi Ma, Ravi Shankar, George Harrisson, Timothy Leary, Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg and Julia Roberts to name some of the well known few. A band of hippies populated this area named the Crank’s Ridge during the 1960s when it was a pulsing hub of art, poetry, mysticism, and hippie subculture. Amazed at the pull that this hill exerted on great minds, NASA trained its radars on this area, only to find it having an unusual concentration of what is called the Van Allen belt, a collection of charged particles that stick together due to the earth’s magnetic fields. There are only two other spots on earth, Machu Pichu in Peru, South America and Stonehenge in England where such magnetic fields are experienced, making the space conducive to transcendental experiences. (2–5)
Without knowing most of this, the next morning I made my way on a 4-wheel drive to Kasar Devi. We had just crossed Kainchi Dham Ashram, another pilgrimage site for Neem Karoli Baba who practiced bhakti yoga and had advised some of the great minds listed above. His teachings were simple and universal. He often said, “Sub Ek” — All is One. He taught us to “love everyone, serve everyone, remember God, and tell the truth.” (6)
Soon after we crossed the Ashram site, the Bengali in me got busy thinking of the chicken sandwich lying in the back seat. Then, the accident came about very suddenly. The driver took a decision to overtake another car around a sharp corner with no road guards. A bus was coming from the opposite side, the driver braked fast and lost control of steering wheel. Before we knew it, the car was swerving and dropped down the Himalayan foothill gorge. The car turned over three times and crashed against two huge boulders whilst accelerating downhill. On the way down, I had my eyes shut with my body auto-positioned into a straight meditative posture. As I fell, three distinct thoughts crossed my mind.
- Recognizing the scale and nature of the problem (problem definition)
First thought as the car swerved off the road was “ holy #### this was unplanned, I have no idea how high this hill is and none of my family and friends know where I am”.
I have solved a few problems before, as a scientist, entrepreneur and a management consultant but never with such limited knowledge and control in a deathly situation. However even in a crisis, time seemed to slow down to allow me to ask the important questions: what is the scale of this situation I am facing? what resources do I have at hand? how much of the decision is in my control and how dependent am I on other stakeholders?
2. Learning from parallel situations that others have faced (diagnostics and bench-marking)
My second thought was the person who I knew who had experienced a similar car accident — namely my father who had had once been traveling on a mountainous road in NZ. His car had got stuck halfway off the side of a hill — and if he had moved another inch, the car would have fallen deep into the gorge. In that moment, his mind weighed the risk of how he would get out of the car and how to deal with it.
We often dive deep into a solution or a hypothesis not taking the time to reflect on best practices and experiences of other people, companies, countries that have dealt with similar problems and to draw on their insights for our particular situation. This diagnostic exercise doesn’t have to take a long time: it can be done in a matter of hours or weeks; indeed, in this instance, it was was done in a matter of seconds!
3. Bringing the force with you everyday (energy, mental-physical balance and focus)
My third thought was remembering the source of my inner strength. In my instance it was my husband Simon ,who I had got married to 6 months previously.
Since the accident the driver, doctors, villagers, police and family had commented on how resilient I had been, both mentally and physically at absorbing the shock and handling it single handed. Sometimes even as our environment and external parameters are not in our control, we forget that one of our biggest assets is the internal strength to deal with the worst of a crisis. Having a strong mental and physical health allows one to psychologically process a situation and quickly, whilst also physically being able to move with the flow of the problem.
[2021 addition: Through loving oneself we can love others]
Just as I was completely focused in this internal energy, feeling calm and in control for whatever was to come about next… the car stopped. This happened just before it would have crashed into the next huge — and probably fatal — boulder (pictured below). (Funnily enough, I was later told that the car’s progress had been stalled by a set of cannabis bushes on the way down!) The car windscreens were completely smashed and I was right at the bottom of the car as it stopped, on the right passenger seat, fully buckled up. I opened my eyes, observed my surroundings and climbed out carefully. I only had a few scratches, the driver had a couple of deeper cuts, but we both were physically fine. By then other people had gathered up on the hill and kept shouting ‘where is the third person in the car? there was another person sitting in the back seat’. There had only been me and the driver on the ride.
Since this time, I have been able to push myself to overcome my fear of cars and of heights and have fully benefited from getting back under the wheel and getting a full driving license (finally!). However the experience held more personal value: it was a life shock, a much needed accelerator in both my spiritual and career-transformation journey. I have thought of those 5 seconds many times in the last year, and the leanings have only intensified. On the spiritual side I have been able to discipline my meditation to focus more intensely on the energy and embark on the path of a karma yogi. On the career side two key clear messages have been to focus on the values of “Impact” and “Service to Others”. Whilst conquering such fears of risks, I’ve embarked into building the value capital organisation, Global Bio Fund.
References
Originally published on https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/crisis-solving-skills-ipshita-mandal-johnson/
(1) https://traveltriangle.com/uttarakhand-tourism/almora/places-to-visit/kasar-devi-temple
(3) https://www.businessinsider.com/jobs-told-zuckerberg-to-visit-an-indian-temple-2015-9?r=US&IR=T
(4) https://misfitwanderers.com/kasar-devi-geomagnetic/#notable-visitors-to-kasar-devi-almora
(5) https://www.dailypioneer.com/2018/state-editions/the-madmans-trail.html
