Good memory, bad memory

Mullah Nasiruddin took his wife to a doctor. “I have come to you after hearing of your great fame as a doctor, can you please treat my wife?” asked the mullah. On the doctor’s enquiry as to the disease, he said, “she has a very very bad memory.” “Oh, so she can’t remember even important things?” asked the doctor. “Oh no, Doctor Sahab, it is just the opposite. She is unable to forget even the smallest little things that happened years back. I am greatly troubled, please cure her,” said the Mullah.
Think about it. We all suffer like his wife did. In reality, the past has no existence whatsoever. It exists in our memory alone if we allow it to exist. The only free time occupation most people have is reliving the past. Mostly bad memories of hurt, shame, or guilt. The choice is still yours to erase your memory files forever. We keep nursing old bleeding wounds of hurt egos and mauled sentiments, and never allow them to heal. You are reliving the trauma again and again, by choice. Many a time those people who caused the hurt are also dead and gone, yet you breathe life into them and make them into a reality. Think. How much precious time you waste and how much emotional energy you haemorrhage on just memory, on non-existent thoughts.
The imaginary present being the only relative reality one is living through, why sour one’s life hankering for that which is not, or re-suffering that which never should have been? A wise one should have a selective memory, delete that which ruins the pure bliss of your mind. The past is a mere illusion, a ghost in your mind. Empty your memory box. Delete, delete, delete.
Prarthna Saran, President Chinmaya Mission Delhi. Email: prarthnasaran@ gmail.com