If you decide to extend your life to live beyond 100 years, it is necessary to decide why it should happen.
When you get old your body deteriorates
And if you have not finished the business that you have planned to complete during your lifetime it is absolutely necessary that you should look after how your body will be when you grow old. The strengths of the body is also important. It is not possible to maintain the same looks that you have enjoyed in front of your mirror when you were young. Just before ending this paragraph I went in front of my mirror to compare how my body looks have changed since I was in my mid twenties. It was a few months after I had celebrated my eightieth birthday. The looks that I had on my wedding photograph and the photos in my album were so different that I would not have recognized them if they were in any other place. The beard that has grown since my wedding looked grey in the face of the grandfather that was standing in front of the mirror.
Now I find it difficult to sit for more than thirty minutes to complete the work that I have undertaken. However, with my experiences in the recent past I have a strong belief and a strong conviction that I will be able to live for another twenty years to complete the life’s business that I have planned.
My professor-friend who has just celebrated his ninety-second birthday takes the bus to go to the town. Of course, he uses a walking stick to support his aging body. Recently I met an old person at one of the pharmacies in the vicinity and when I talked to him he revealed that he has four more years to complete his century. That was what his cricket playing children have been talking of. Another four more to complete the century.
The mind is more important than the body
If the memory fails you will be in your way to one of the suffering realms: we call it “the hell”. If your memory fails there could be more unexpected uncertainties.
When I was discussing the name of this novel with my computer bureau, one of the visitors who was waiting there to get one of his jobs completed used the words, “You are a bloody fool. To ask people to live that long to suffer.” I managed to keep my cool although three or four girls who were there started laughing. I talked to him without getting agitated and gave him one of my visiting cards. He looked at it and said he has once visited our office in the company of his brother to get something done. Now when I am thinking of the blessings that he had given me I feel very happy for being able to take it with a laugh. That was because I have been using meditation for a long time to strengthen and control my mind.
If somebody insults you in public…
If somebody insults you in public what exactly could be the result? When he called me a bloody fool, all those who were listening to him laughed, because I did not respond to that insult in the same foolish manner. From what the others had told me subsequently, I have come to the conclusion that my reputation as a cool-headed mediator has expanded.
One has to enter into a fool’s paradise before he or she bursts out with a volley of insults at one or several contacts he knows of. The paradise is transformed into a hell if the person who receives the insult decides to get into another fool’s paradise by resorting to punish the person who started the insult. The end of the vicious circle could be very damaging. It could even end up with one or several murders. The best alternative is to ignore the insult as I have done.
Verbal insults don’t hit or injure your body
Verbal insults don’t hit or injure your body; only to your mind or the heart; rarely your reputation. If possible the best alternative is to ignore it. Going behind it and taking corrective action or punitive action is getting closer to another catastrophe. This is where your meditation helps you. If you have a good control of your mind—I would not want to use the word complete—because it is humanly impossible.
To extend your lifetime even by a few more years…
If you are planning to extend your lifetime even by a few more years, getting into meditation to control your mind is absolutely necessary. It is the control of your feelings. If you find it difficult to control your feelings, the unacceptable feelings will weaken your whole body. Sometimes it is possible that the people who live with you might have the problem of calling for an ambulance to transport you to a hospital without any delay which could even be the end of their patient’s life.”
Excerpted from an unfinished book By Nihal S Dissanayake
You can find several books by Nihal Dissanayake on Amazon.
READ: First Chapter of the Award-winning novel,THE HAPPY RAJ: The Kingdom of Happiness By Nihal S. Dissanayake
READ: First Chapter of From Sin Ship to Happy Raj: I Don’t Belong To Me, another book in The Happy Raj Saga Series By Nihal S Dissanayake
Photo by Nandhu Kumar from Pexels
Meditating into Happiness 