MIND IS THE MASTER OF LIFE

 

Meditation is the exercise of mind. First of all, we should, therefore, study the mind deeply in order to make Meditation a wholesome and convenient exercise.

There are three humours in the body of man i.e. Vatt (Air), Kaph (Phlegm) and Pitta (Bile) which are said to determine a person’s mental and physical qualities. Desire for gratification, Avarice and Anger are the manifestation of Vatt, Kaph and Pitta respectively. The vitiation of these humours causes a disease known as Delirium. There are mainly four instincts i.e. anger, pride, deceitfulness and avarice. Each of them determines a person’s mental qualities to the extent of its presence in him. They also affect his inborn qualities such as right way of thinking and self-control. The effect left on man’s intrinsic qualities is so minute that it cannot be discerned easily. Fear, affliction, hatred, envy and desire for the gratification of sensual pleasures are subordinate instincts. Subordinate instincts are comparatively less powerful and they do not affect man’s intrinsic qualities directly so much as they affect his physical and mental conditions. Our life is based on multifarious activities. Where there is an activity, there is excitement or stimulation which can be divided into two categories — mental and physical. The suppression of physical outbursts as well as the non-suppression of mental actions leads to diseases; hence we should exercise restraint on mental activities. Once mind is controlled, the possibility of the excessive derangement of the three humours in the body is ruled out. If mind is pure, no diseases like anger can crop up.

A mind is the complex of cognitive faculties that enables realization, thinking, reasoning, insight, and opinion, it is a feature of human beings, but it may also apply to other life forms. The main question regarding the nature of mind is its relation to the physical brain and nervous system — a question which is often framed as the Mind-body problem, another question concerns which types of creatures are capable of having minds.

Whatever its relation to the physical body, it is generally settled that mind is that which enables a creature to have subjective knowledge and intentionality towards the environment, to perceive and respond to stimuli with some kind of activity, and to have a consciousness, including thinking and feeling.

Which attributes form the mind is much debated. Some people argue that only the "higher" intellectual functions form mind, mainly reason and memory. In this view the emotions — love, hate, fear, joy — are more primitive or subjective in nature and should be seen as different from the mind as such. Others argue that various rational and emotional states cannot be so separated, that they are of the same nature and origin, and should therefore be considered all part of the mind. In practice, mind is frequently synonymous with thought: the private conversation with ourselves that we carry on inside our heads. One of the key attributes of the mind in this sense is that it is a confidential sphere to which no one but the owner has access. No one else can know our mind. They can only understand what we consciously or unconsciously communicate.

Broadly speaking, mental faculties are the various functions of the mind, or things the mind can "carry out". Thought is a mental effort that allows human beings to make common sense of things in the world, and to stand for and understand them in ways that are important, or which agree with their needs, attachments, goals, commitments, plans, ends, desires, etc. Thinking involves the symbolic or semiotic mediation of ideas or data, as when we form concepts, engage in problem solving, reasoning and making decisions. Words that refer to similar concepts and processes include consideration, discussion and imagination.

Memory is the aptitude to preserve, retain, and subsequently recall, knowledge, information or experience. Imagination is the goings-on of generating or evoking novel situations, images, ideas etc. in the mind. It is a characteristically subjective activity, rather than a through or submissive experience. The term is theoretically used in psychology for the process of reviving in the mind percept of objects formerly given in sense perception. Things that are imagined are said to be seen in the "mind's eye". Among the many realistic functions of imagination are the ability to plan possible futures (or histories), to "see" things from another's perspective, and to modify the manner something is perceived, including to make decisions to respond to what is imagined.

Mental contents are those items that are thought of as being "in" the mind, and capable of being formed and manipulated by mental practices and faculties. Examples include thoughts, concepts, memories, emotions, percept and intentions etc.

Understanding the relationship between the brain and the mind — Dualism holds that the mind exists independently of the brain,  materialism holds that mental phenomena are identical to neuronal phenomena, idealism holds that only mental phenomena exist.

The timeline of human evolution spans some 7 million years, from the separation of the Pan genus until the emergence of behavioural modernity by 50,000 years ago. Of this timeline, the first 3 million years concern Sahelanthropus, the following 2 million concern Australopithecus, while the final 2 million span the history of actual human species (the Palaeolithic). Many traits of human intelligence, such as empathy, theory of mind, mourning, ritual, and the use of symbols and tools, are already apparent in great apes although in lesser sophistication than in humans.