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Worry a product of ego
You worry either because you don't get what you want or because you get what you wanted, writes Dr KK Aggarwal.
If you can solve your problem then what is the need of worrying? And if you cannot solve it then what is the use of worrying? - Shanti Deva
One does not experience worries or suffer from anxieties during deep sleep or anesthesia. The consciousness, which is our true self, is also free of worries. Worries are therefore, a mental creation. They represent a privately created establishment where one prefers to live with one's own choice and does not want to get out of it.
Shanti Deva has rightly said that, in both the situations, whether one can solve a problem or not, worrying has no place. It is often said that you worry either because you don't get what you want or because you get what you wanted. Worry is a byproduct of ego and ego is brought about by ignorance.
Human nature primarily has only two emotions. First is love and secondly, it is fear. Love is the basic nature of every human being and represents the true heaven. All other negativities are privately created hell.
There is nothing like hatred. It is absence of love, which causes hatred. By changing the perception, one can remove the hatred and start loving again. Remember nobody can hate anybody unless one has loved him/her.
The hair of a man turns gray if he worries (Sivananda). Worries impair digestion, bring exertion, and reduce vitality and vigour from the mind. Worries, when combined with fear and anger can kill a person in no time. Worry weakens the will. A worrying habit is generated in the mind and these thoughts recur again and again like a cycle.
According to the Bhagvad Gita and Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, the treatment for any negativity is to think opposite. Opposite of worry is cheerfulness. According to the Vedic philosophy, one is not completely dressed unless one is wearing a smile on the face.
Smiling and loving are the keys to internal happiness and peace. Developing this as a habit keeps one cool even in difficult situations. The simplest way is to start smiling as a habit, and later on, it will get incorporated as part of one's consciousness. The attitude in life should be "even this bad time will pass away".
According to the law of karma, one has to pay one's debts. It is better to pay it now in the form of a temporary sickness than to accumulate it and get a permanent disabling sickness later, making one bedridden during one's last days of life.
Every action, good or bad, should be taken as an opportunity to learn and should be analysed in terms that it is still better than the worst, which could have happened.
One has to learn to live in the present and not regret about the past and worry about the future. Worry is not for the past or present but for an imaginary future. By worrying for the future, one spoils the present, and it is the present, which shapes the future. Inspite of asking yourself, "What I want to do?" one should ask, "What is right for me to do?"
(The writer is a senior Physician, Head Department of Cardiology and Deputy Dean Board of Medical Education-Moolchand Hospital, President-Heart Care Foundation of India, President Delhi Medical Association and Member-Delhi Medical Council.)
