The Incredibles

• I am Ritu Agarwal
• I am a Mindfulness and Holistic Life Coach.
• I am a married woman and a mother of two awesome boys.
• I am, I am, I am.

Don’t we all see ourselves through these lenses and believe that this is all who we are? In the process, don’t we complicate our lives so much that we lose control of our lives and the daily situations, occurrences and happenings decide all our emotions, feelings and reactions?

In my last blog, I wrote about ‘The Fantastic Four,’ the four aspects of our personality that make or break every experience of our life for us. Let us now go a step further. These four aspects of personality, contacts and communicates with the world outside through four integral entities, which I call ‘The Incredibles’. These are: -

• Physical through the Body
• Intellectual through the Intellect
• Emotional through the Mind
• Spiritual through the Consciousness

Constants: The physical body is the grossest aspect of human personality which contains the five sense organs whose function is common to all. Consciousness on the other hand is the most subtle aspect and is the core of the human and is one and same in every living being. Both the Body and the Consciousness are the same for all.

Variables: The variable factors are the mind and the intellect. Mind and the intellect decide whether the experience of every object, person, situation or place in a person’s life will give joy or misery.

Let us understand further. Mind is the seat of all emotions and the intellect is the discriminating faculty that is the judging ability whereby we distinguish the good from the bad the right from the wrong. Generally, the functions of the mind and the intellect are opposed to each other. For example, when a man is overwhelmed with emotions his faculty of discrimination is lost and when acute discrimination prevails there is no room for feelings. A surgeon operating on someone has all his intellectual faculties engaged and emotions are not at play. However, the emotions of the family of the person being operated are heightened and play havoc till the time the operation ends and they get good news.

Humbling the mind and enlightening the intellect is the primary goal. When man can improve his state of mind and develop subtler discrimination, he can enjoy a happier and harmonious life. It is that simple.

Who’s the Boss?

It is extremely unfortunate that most of us did not even know the difference between the mind and the intellect up until now. In our daily lives we do things simply because we feel like doing it. Mind is like a basic secretary in the office. Though the secretary receives the mail, he does not take any action on them. He simply puts them up to the Boss for his direction and advice. If the secretary chooses to act directly, without consulting the Boss there is bound to be confusion in the organization. This is the sad state of affairs about our lives as well. Our mind receives impulses from the external world, and we respond directly without the guidance of our intellect which is the Boss within our body. Naturally this leads to dissatisfaction and discontentment in life.

Life is Beautiful

Living Mindfully is nothing but living with the Intellect always alive. Once every thought is filtered through the intellect and then the resulting emotion or action is allowed to be projected, life is bound to be beautiful.

Mind is like a river of thoughts continuously flowing and the Intellect is the river bank. When the bank is strong, the experiences of our lives are wonderous and the river never creates havoc or flood.