Your Mind can be your best friend or enemy

The choice is yours to make, whether you elevate yourself or degrade yourself !!

A copy of Bhagvat Gita owned by Author

I read Bhagvat Gita every day and there are days when I can’t comprehend the meaning of every verse in my first attempt. I try to read it many times until I make sense of it. 99% of the time I do make value out of it, but there are times when everything seems to be haywire.

But today was an exception, The following verse from Bhagvat Gita ( Please see below) made perfect sense in the first attempt itself and I felt enlightened and was very keen to share it with you all.

मनःप्रसादः सौम्यत्वं मौनमात्मविनिग्रहः ।
भावसंशुद्धिरित्येतत्तपो मानसमुच्यते ॥16॥

manah-prasadah saumyatvam maunam atma-vinigrahah
bhava-sanshuddhir ity etat tapo manasam uchyate

Here goes the meaning or valuable insight to absorb:-

Our mind has all the powers to define the state of our consciousness. Just like “As you sow, so shall you reap”, What we cultivate in our minds becomes our external personality. People who assume that they can have negative thoughts inside their mind and the same will not reach others, then it's not true. It eventually becomes their true character and personality.

The ultimate power lies in training the mind to have serene, gentle, controlled, pure, and silenced thoughts.

Henry Van Dyke expressed this very vividly, in his poem

“Thoughts are things.”

I hold it true that thoughts are things;

They’re endowed with bodies and breath and wings

That which we call our secret thought

Speeds forth to earth’s remotest spot,

Leaving its blessings or its woes,

Like tracks behind as it goes.

We build our future, thought by thought.

For good or ill, yet know it not,

Choose, then, thy destiny and wait,

For love brings love, and hate brings hate.

The takeaway from this verse for me is, that we should make every effort to be good, honest, and kind to ourselves and others even in our thoughts!!