Of Finding Safety And Security

How quickly the weekend zooms by! It feels like just an hour ago Saturday morning dawned and now we are already facing Sunday evening blues. 

Today's prompt for journaling asks me a very interesting question: What comes to your mind when you think about what makes you feel safe?

Safety or security is something that every human craves for. Yet every one finds security in different things. For some, it is money. For others, it is the presence of people in their life. For me, it used to be my childhood home and my family. As I grew up, I included friends in the security blanket. When I started earning money, my job became my security. When I got married, another family extended my security blanket. 

But things changed, as they always do. I left my hometown, and thereby my childhood home and shifted to a new place. I left my job and my friends behind in my hometown. In a new place and culture, I realized that security cannot be found in things or people. 

For now, routine makes me feel safe. I am a stickler for routine and I do the same things at the allotted time every day. When I know that there is a routine to be followed, I feel safe and comforted. Call this a crazy or peculiar trait, but it works for me. The days in which the routine gets disrupted, I feel imbalanced and chaotic. Routine has somehow become a solid foundation for my day. 

Prayer makes me feel safe. It has been my go-to since childhood. Chanting mantras calms me down when I realize that I am on the verge of panicking or breaking down. The temple in my home makes me feel secure. The temple in my colony brings me comfort. 

While there are many things that I dread, I also know that they are inevitable. This acceptance makes me feel secure. I know that difficult times will come, but they will pass too and life will move on. This harsh truth gives a perverse kind of comfort. That the wheels of time never stop, and time is the greatest healer, comforts me. No matter how difficult times might be at one point, they will change. 

Morning is both my favourite part of the day as well as the safest part. I love early mornings when the daylight hasn't broken out yet but the birds are already up and active. The sound of the lift in my building going up and down as delivery-guys rush through their deliveries of milk and veggies is a comforting part of the morning. I specially love the time 4 a.m. There is something very beautiful and auspicious about this time. Somedays I wake up and see the time and if it is 4, I feel a strange kind of peace. 

Knowledge makes me feel safe. I often dread diseases and their symptoms but reading about them and knowing what to expect, soothes my fears regarding them. Knowledge is indeed the best security for the mind!

Studying about the Universe both scares me and makes me feel safe. I dread its vastness and infinity. I am also in awe of the same. That I am a part of this infinite void, and I always will be, comforts me and makes me feel safe too.

I guess the biggest security lies in the intangible. Things are temporary, people have limitations but the intangible concepts like prayer, knowledge, the universal consciousness - these are forever. I base my security in these and they do not disappoint me. When things go down in spite of all these factors, there is always that one assuring thought - 'At this moment, almost everything is all right.' This forms the basis of mindful meditation. Nothing grounds the self as this thought. As long as everything is okay for NOW, there is still hope, and where there is hope, things can change for the better!