I Need Pest Control for the Mind

As days got busier, my  home got fuller with minute invaders settling down comfortably on windows, walls, kitchen racks and shoe cupboards. Every time, I saw one or more of them, I was reminded of my failure to keep my home in order. An ant in my baking flour looked me in the eye and told me I was not a good baker. A spider just outside my entrance reminded me, I was not doing enough to keep my home clean. Fruit flies on the vegetable shelf silently suggested I was not managing my groceries well.

Sigh! So many voices constantly prodding me to judge myself. I had little choice left but to call in the Pest Control services. I had hoped for a peaceful annihilation of the invaders but I had not earned such a reward yet. The young technician from the Pest Control agency was a happy chattering lad. As soon as he entered my house, he enthusiastically wanted to engage me in a conversation about my pets. Sorry, Pests. Who are they? When do they come? Where do they come from? question? question? question?

Why couldn’t he see I did not want to talk about this? I was not going to admit I had been lazy to keep the dinner plates outside that night. I was not going to admit I had gotten so busy that I was not getting time to take care of my own home.  I was not going to admit I was close to a mental breakdown. So I told him, “They are everywhere. They come in all the time from the garden into our home”. As he busied himself killing all of them, my heart sank at the carnage I had ensued. He sprayed the whole house for over an hour.

As he was leaving, he said, “Ma’am, yours is one of the cleanest homes I have seen! There is not a single cockroach any where to be found! You maintain it quite well! Congratulations!” I averted my gaze and quickly closed the door on his face. I did not want him to see the tears in my eyes. I did not want him to know how much I needed this assurance right now. I scrubbed the whole house for the rest of the day. hoping to cleanse my mind of the negativity that had made room inside of it.

Slowly settling down in a cleaner home, I realized that even though my home was now clean, my mind was still in a mess. It had simply moved on to other problem areas to focus on. College applications, guitar classes, Marathi lessons, garden organization, Diwali preparations, dentist appointments, website upgrades, tax filing, bank accounts. If I kept counting, the list could extend till the moon and back.  I realized that in the past this endless list used to sit happily in the parking lot of my mind. But for some unknown reason, since I started working, this list started to constantly run around in my mind telling me there was not enough time and I was not being a good home maker, wife, mother, daughter, professional and Self.

So I did the only thing I know to do in such circumstances. I spent time praying, meditating and asking my Guru to clean the pests in mind. I asked for acceptance to be me. I asked for forgiveness for judging myself to the point of insanity. I asked for unconditional love for myself and for the world (including all the pests as long as they stay out of my home).

I write this blog as a reminder to self that there are days when we seem to lose it all, not because we have lost something, but simply because we have changed some gear of our life and the car is trying to readjust to the next speed of driving. At this new speed, life chugs, smokes and sometimes even halts for a moment. But as long as we know the speed at which we want to drive, we can always get it back in motion and in a smooth rhythm to the road. Nothing is really lost, somethings have just changed. We need to accept the changes around us and perhaps change ourselves to align to the new speed and the new road.

I know writing my feelings helped me release them out into the Universe. I hope reading my feelings helped you release some of yours into the Universe. I pray for peace for you with yourself and for me with myself. Om Shanti. Shanti. Shanti.