THANKS GIVING

What is meditation? Meditation is being in the present moment. Any act that we do, when we do it with our mind and heart, with all attention and awareness, it is meditation. Let us take the simple act of eating. Invariably I chose eating since it is a favorite activity for me. For all of us, after a certain age, eating is no novelty. We eat like a zombie. We eat irrespective of whether we are hungry. We eat whatever is offered in front. We eat while watching the television, reading the newspaper and even while talking. We take eating for granted, it becomes like an instinctive act. The finger touches the food and places it inside the mouth. By the time we swallow the first, the next bite is waiting at the door of the mouth. While at home we hardly realize the taste of the food not to say anything about the hard work that has gone behind the preparation of the meal. The body feeds itself while the mind is busy with other important activities.

But suppose we start eating with full awareness. What would it seem like? We should involve all our five senses in the process. Let us look at the chapatti first. It is whitish brown in colour. A hot chapatti has an aroma which is sweet and earthen at the same time. We touch it to see that it is soft at some places and brittle especially on the surface. We tear it open, touch it to the dal and place it inside the mouth. The taste is neutral, just sufficient salt and sweet. It’s different. Either the dal or the sabzi tastes better with the chapatti or may be the chapatti tastes better with dal or sabzi. Whichever way, who cares when the combination tastes so great. The crunching and chewing creates its own sound which is music to the ears. Hmmmm…..! This is bliss, this is happiness, and this is paradise. And to think of it that we get such a wonderful moment atleast two times a day, day after day. If only we were aware!

Now let’s take our awareness a little deeper. Before the chapatti landed on our plate, it was in the form of flour. Somebody with a lot of love and caring kneaded it and tossed it over the tawa before it became perfect. It has to be perfect in all corners because a half baked chapatti does not taste so good. So either a mother, or a wife, or a sister, or a cook put in a lot of hard work to make this for us. Let’s go further deep. Before it became flour, it was in the form of wheat grain and lay in sacks in factory godowns. It had to be lifted and carried by labour to the grinding mill, where it was converted to flour and packed by machines. Before the grain came to the factory, the grain was with the wholesale merchant’s godown again being handled by labour. Before the wholesale merchant, the grain was chaffed and cleaned by the farmer and his family. Even before that, it was in the field, drenching in the rain, in knee deep irrigation water and with the farmer bending on his back, protecting it from insects and watching it grow. A lot of people have spent very valuable time and energy to see to it that the chapatti comes to our plate. We should be aware of them and be thankful and grateful to them with each and every bite that we eat. When we become so aware, we are in meditation.