The Illusion Of Ordinary

If someone asked you what was your most extraordinary experience in life, what would you want to say? The responses could be many ranging from as simple as tasting an extraordinary food to birth of their child or getting the dream job or winning a jackpot lottery. How does the mind decide what was an extraordinary experience? Mind scans the memory of all the ordinary events and fishes out one that was most impactful. Something that was stored with a feeling of great deal of happiness and excitement. This is how the mind functions. It labels and categorises all experienences. In doing so, it creates the category of what we call Ordinary. 
what sort of experiences the mind categorises as ordinary? All the things are repetitive or routine or mundane or boring are marked as ordinary. We wake up, brush teeth, have our tea, go to work, do household things, pay bills. These things do not carry much weight, there is nothing exciting about them. These things are ordinary. This is the great illusion of the mind, the illusion of the Ordinary! We remain totally unaware of this.This illusion convinces you that life is a chain of repetitive and dull events that we call as ordinary. They are mechanical and do not carry any significance. The extraordinary experiences are some rare grand occasions, exotic holiday or some high achievement. They are the most significant events.Those are the moments that are to be lived for. Such high experiences are of course very few in anyones life and rest of life is ordinary.

But why do we say that the sense of ordinary is an illusion ? Isnt it true that the extraordinary is what everyone looks forward to? Actually, this is the illusion the mind creates. The mind has evolved to prioritise new and significant stimuli over routine ones. It organises experiences stores them in memory attached with a story. Anything due to habit or which is familiar is ordinary. Something which breaks the pattern of repetition is special. This is a natural function and tendency of the mind. It functions by creating these contrasts. So humans are tricked to believe that those repetitive, routine things are ordinary.

*The wonder of ordinary*
Society also led us to believe that certain things are special like festivals, achievements, milestones.Rest of the things like eating, walking, cleaning ,breathing etc are ordinary. We have inherited the ideas of ordinary and extraordinary through our conditionings.Therefore, from childhood, a person begins to chase novelty. A new or rare event feels extraordinary while the regular things fade out as ordinary. When we grow older, we stop paying attention to the ordinary because it feels dull. This filter of the mind has greatly helped in survival, but it has also filtered out the wonder of ordinary. We have missed the extraordinary-ness of the ordinary.
The dullness is not in the routine, it is in our perception. Notice how often we say that nothing special happened today. Is it really so? Think again, today your heart pumped lakhs of times without fail, your lungs breathed air. The body performed miracles without you giving any thought or effort. Is that ordinary? If we pay attention, there is nothing in life that is not extraordinary. Even the ordinary water I hold in my glass is the same extraordinary substance that had carved valleys, nourished and destroyed civilisations and at the same time carries life in every tiny living cell. But in our rush, we drink it thoughtlessly as if it were nothing. This is the illusion of mundane.The moment we remove the label of ordinary, we will be able to see the marvel of life. Life in its most basic form itself is so astonishing and every moment will leave you in awe.
 Think of a child who is exploring everything for the first time. He has not labelled anything as ordinary or extraordinary. For him any trivial thing is exciting. A stone in hand is a treasure and a muddy puddle is his ocean of exploration. As we grow older, this excitement disappears, not because the world becomes less magical, but we stop paying attention. This illusion of ordinary keeps sustaining as we sleep walk through life. The moment you awaken, nothing remains mundane. The miracle of existence emerges from the mundane. In our daily rush, we fail to notice simple moments. We hurry through them, with mind somewhere else. We complete the mundane tasks and treat them as stepping stones to achieve something big. Their purpose is to lead you to the next big event in future. But the Truth is there is no greater event. This present moment is not for the preparation of something extraordinary in life, it is life itself! This so called ordinary moment is-Life. 
Take something as simple as drinking water or having your tea. You can gulp it down while scrolling your phone or you can bring the attention to the act of drinking. How it feels on the lips, passing in the throat, is it cold or warm, feeling its taste. The action is the same but the awareness of it makes the difference. Awareness transforms the simplest acts into something profound. In presence of awareness, you live the present moment fully without thinking what comes next. Time itself feels different. You will realise that the line between ordinary and special exists only in the mind. In awareness, the illusion of ordinary will reveal itself. We are so much caught up chasing the extraordinary that we forget that extraordinary is already here in the little details of daily living, which we overlook.

*Experience the vastness of ordinary*
So begin to treat life not as a series of tasks to get through. Instead, be there fully whatever is in front of you. Wether it is doing the cleaning, ironing your clothes or writing a mail. When you begin to pay attention, you will discover that every small thing involves the whole existence. It is not separate and independent. Having a meal may seem an ordinary thing but if you notice that grain of rice and trace it back how it came into existence. It has captured within itself the sunlight, water from the clouds, nourishment from the soil, and the human hands that planted, harvested and prepared it. The ordinary rice is an extraordinary packet with the universe condensed within itself. Pick up anything in everyday life and you will find the universe connected in that. They are not small things, they are the universe manifesting itself in miniature.
Whatever daily work we do, even though may seem humble or ordinary, it is part of a larger whole. A bus driver drives people to their destination and holds together the fabric of the city. A teacher shapes the future generations, a farmer sustains all the people. So no role is ordinary because it is essentially part of something larger than itself. Each ordinary work is the part of a larger picture. When we are distracted and restless we overlook this, but the moment we pay attention we find the amazing mystery of the ordinary. We escape the ordinary and wait for the extraordinary to happen. We want to find happiness in something more, something larger than life. In this expectation, we miss the only special thing we have in hand which is the Now, this moment. When we stop demanding those special moments, we will be able to see that every moment is already special.
 In this awareness, all the mundane work will no longer seem like a burden. Joy will appear in simple things too, watering plants or folding clothes, walking to the bus stop. When you stop chasing the extraordinary, you will be freed from its grip. This is peace and freedom. You no longer depend on something special to happen to make you feel grand. You will not wait for the next exciting, flashy big thing to happen in life. 
 
Recognising the ordinary cultivates the powerful sense of Gratitude. Appreciating the little things, automatically shifts the mindset from lack to abundance and prosperity. You will not need to spend money on those exorbitant workshops that claim to somehow develop abundance mindset. Abundance is right here, right now. You need not purchase it. 
When we begin to notice the extraordinary-ness in ordinary, the world become infinitely beautiful and interesting. Everything will become a source of joy, be it the pattern of clouds, the complexity of a spiders web, or the happening of day and night. No moment will be boring. Everything will give you reasons to explore and experience.

*Try doing this*
Make a list of things you find ordinary. Take one thing and think about it. For example a leaf. The first thought will come - Oh its a simple leaf ! Overlook that thought and ask what this thing really is? Many things will come up..like it is a tasty food for the caterpillar, or it is part that balances the air we breathe, Or is it a safe home for the moth to lay eggs or it is like a tiny solar panel that converts sun to food. You will be to appreciate that the simple leaf I am looking at is anything but ordinary. Always approach any experience with a beginners mind, as if you are seeing it for the first time, without any preconceptions. Question why is the sky blue, How does my hand know when to move. When we pay attention and question the ordinary, we break the illusion of the Ordinary.

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The Illusion Of Ordinary

Neelam Nimare