I’ve been searching for something for more than a decade now.

Something that I could follow or practice that would take care of all my life problems.

An ideal life philosophy.

A word.

A sentence.

A rule.

A method.

Don’t we all want something like that. Especially when you’re an introvert, your ever seeking mind keeps searching for something that can give you some control over the chaos.

Anything that could keep you at peace at all times.

Is there anything like that?

I believe I’ve finally found it.

Let me explain.

 

The experiments that changed me

I got introduced to philosophy in my early teens.

I found it so intriguing, that I read almost everything that I could get my hands on.

Earlier it was just about learning. To satisfy my hunger for meaning. Learning new perspectives so that I can interpret reality in the most accurate way.

As life progressed, I got thrown out into the world.

A world of competition.

A word of relationships.

A world of money and success.

That is when I began my search for finding something meaningful to do with my life.

Now reading and exploring were not limited to knowing but how I could use that knowledge to get ahead in life.

And when you enter the world of desires, you also enter the world of suffering.

The more desires you have, the more suffering you experience.

And to cope with that suffering, we start searching for a cure.

That’s when I entered the world of self-improvement, self-help, self-growth or whatever you want to call it.

But instead of helping me, it completely destroyed my mind.

Sounds crazy right?

This is where it gets interesting.

Ok, here’s what happened.

For example, to do my best work, I needed to be disciplined. Right?

Now remember that wanting to be disciplined is also a desire.

So, I started reading about how I could be more disciplined.

And after spending a few years on this journey, I collected hundreds of perspectives on how to be more disciplined.

Here are some of them:

– Meditate

– Yoga

– Follow a routine

– Eat a clean diet

– Stay away from intoxicants

– Practice celibacy

– Journal

– Breathing exercises

– Sleep on time

– Keep your 5 senses under control

– Practice stoicism

You get the idea.

Fine, I can take that. But if it was only about discipline.

Now every new thing I learned branched out into a hundred other things.

For example:

Eat a clean diet but, what should I eat? Should I follow a doctor or a 108 year old man?

Sleep on time, but what’s the right time? Should I follow a sleep expert or a top athlete?

The more I searched, the more questions I had, the more confused I got.

I had so many answers to every question that I got lost.

How could I know what is true?

That became my new mission.

I got obsessed with finding that one thing that could help me know the TRUTH.

And then, came an insight that changed my perspective on everything I knew.

 

DAY 19 of water fast 

It was 2020.

Stuck in lockdown, I was going through all kinds of things.

One day, I decided to experiment with fasting.

I went on a 21 day water fast. Yes, for 21 days, I had nothing except water.

I do not recommend this at all. This can cause serious problems. If you try it, make sure you have someone around to take care of you.

It was day #19. I had lost all desire to eat. And I lost around 16 kg (35 pounds) of weight.

I looked like a 16-year-old skinny teenager.

Like Christian bale in the film “The Mechanic”

But the my mental clarity was on a totally different level (that was real the reason I took that risk).

I felt still, calm and focused through the day. There wasn’t a single instance where I felt like doing something else than what I was doing in that moment.

It was around 11 pm. I was walking on the terrace. I got tired and laid down staring at the stars.

I was completely still. I felt each breath as it entered and left my nose.

And that was the moment it hit me.

At that moment, I knew I’d never have to suffer again.

Here’s what happened.

 

The one philosophy for life 

As I lay there staring at the stars, that moment was all that mattered.

There was no past, no future. Just that moment.

I had no problems, no stress, no desires, no longings, no needs, nothing.

That moment was whole and perfect in itself.

I believe that was the biggest moment in my life.

Seneca said,

“We suffer more in our imagination than in reality.” 

That’s what I missed.

The suffering was in my imagination.

In my head. In my mind. In not getting what I desired.

Even when I got what I desired, I was still not satisfied.

I started chasing the next shiny thing.. Immediately.

Now whenever I find myself stressing about something.

Or anxious about something.

Or angry about something.

I go back to one thing:

THE PRESENT MOMENT.

I ask myself:

“Do I lack anything right now?”

The answer is 100% of the time no.

My philosophy lives on my laptop screen now.

 

This is the antidote to most of our life problems.

It’s the anxieties of the past and desires of the future that destroy our mental peace.

Seriously, right now, you’re reading this newsletter, ask yourself,

“Is there anything incomplete at this very moment?”

This was the philosophy that led me to write “Awakening”. A 30 day course that shows how our thoughts, emotions, and action are controlled by our desires. And how you can gain control over them by self-observation.

I’m not perfect. I have diverged from this philosophy countless times.

Drowned in the spirals of overthinking, self-doubt, and anxiety.

But whenever I come back to it, I instantly start feeling calm again.

10 seconds that all it takes to connect back to the present.

You know why?

Because only this present moment is the ultimate truth.

Everything else is an illusion. A figment of our imagination. Maya.

And when you connect back to the present, you become one with the source.

Stay blessed,

Karun