Mindfulness, Entropy, Super Mario and Singularity, the four pillars of Happiness.

By Shyam Pillai, November 20, 2020

Most of us have experienced boredome, and the feeling that time passes slowly when we are bored. When we have to listen to a long lecture in school or spend time on something we do not enjoy, time seems to be abundant. Spend some time staring at a clock and we can fully experience time, with each second, minute and hour passing by really slowly. Spend some time with something uninteresting and suddenly there is too much time available. Life goes in slow motion when we have nothing to keep our minds occupied.

Most of us have also experienced the feeling that time passes too fast when we are occupied with something. When we have to submit an assignment before a deadline, or when we are experiencing something immensely interesting or just having a good time, it feels as if time is running away. Watch an interesting movie and it ends too soon. Watch an uninteresting movie and it takes forever to end.

What does this mean? Why is time so inconsistent? If we can experience time passing slowly when we are bored, why can’t we repeat that experience when our minds are occupied with something interesting? What is time? Is it possible to control time and experience everything that is interesting to its fullest, without time bringing an end to it too soon?

Time is a side-effect of Entropy.

For those who do not know what Entropy is, it is the term given to measure the amount of chaos and disorder that happens in our daily lives. On a larger scale, Entropy is the reason our Universe exists, and is expanding. The big bang, which is the leading theory of how our universe came into existence, supposedly started from a singularity. A single point that contained everything that we know to exist in the universe today. Once the big bang happened, the space that containted this singularity expanded and created conditions where energy was given the possibility to exist in multiple states and not just a single state of existence. To understand more clearly, when we learn a new language, we start off by learning a single alphabet first. We can’t do much with this single alphabet because it can only exist in one state. This is singularity. But when we start learning more alphabets, and learn how to form words with these alphabets, we are entering a state of Entropy, where there are so many possibities of creating different sentences and giving meaning to the language. Similarly, the expansion of the universe created so many states of matter and anti matter, and set the stage for an unlimited number of states for all the matter and anti matter in the observable universe to combine and interact with each other to form galaxies, stars and beings like us.

Now that we undestand entropy, we are also able to understand the actual purpose of time. Time is just a measurement of Entropy. Nothing more, nothing less. The center of a Black Hole is also called the point of Singularity. This is because time doesnt exist at this point. The past, present and future all exist at the same time in the Singularity of a Black Hole, because all the matter and anti matter collapse into a single point. Matter and Anti-Matter are just different forms of Energy. This energy can also be called information. If we start at the center of a Black Hole and Journey outwards, we will see that all the disorder and interactions caused by the change in Energy/Information happening outside the singularity at the center gives birth to the concept of time. If we are not able to measure change, or measure the different ways in which Energy/Information changes outside the singularity, we cannot measure time.

If time cannot be measured without change, then does time exist at all?

Time doesn’t exist. It is just a term given to the measurement of change. This means that there is a way we can take control of this measurement of change and manipulate it to our liking. Change is always happening within us and outside us. The objective of life is to understand this change and take control of it. When we take control, we reduce the chaos of Entropy. When we mindlessly do a task, our subconscious motor controls take over and perform the task. This ends up in a lot of energy being wasted because our subconscious mind has to keep many of our motor controls on standby to be ready to perform these tasks. If we are mindful while doing a task, we will end up using only the essential resources within us to perform the task because our conscious mind takes control. This results in a reduction of energy usage, sort of like an energy saver option. When we reduce energy usage, it results in time passing by slower because there is less entropy. The less energy we expend, the more time we have.

Mindful exercises like meditation gives us the tools to observe all our thoughts and feelings. Beyond just observing these thoughts and feelings, meditation also gives us the opportunity to process all the information using our conscious mind. When we process information using our conscious mind, we are breaking free from the auto-pilot settings of our subconscious mind. This helps us to analyse our thoughts and feelings objectively(without the bias that our subconscious has accumulated over the years) and not subjectively(with the bias of all our past good/bad experiences). Such a process of thought and analysis, free from bias, helps us navigate through every obstacle presented to us by life in a more constructive manner. Meditation unlocks the potential of giving us control over our actions and reactions. This kind of control is essential to be able to efficiently handle the challenges that life presents to us every day.

If we compare life to a video game like Super Mario, would you rather be Super Mario, or the player who controls Super Mario. Mario is always in the direct line of fire, and if he had a mind of his own, he would be severly traumatized from having to try and fail at overcoming obstacles again and again. The player who controls Super Mario is not in the direct line of fire. The player is at the comfort of his/her home and experiencing the virtual life of Super Mario. The player can stop the experience when he or she wants and move on to other things. To the Player, what happens to Super Mario is just a gameplay experience. There is no Trauma or heightened dissapointment because the player is not directly affected physically or mentally by what happens in the game.

Human beings have the opportunity to be Super Mario and the Player at the same time. We can either let our sub conscious mind(Super Mario) dictate how we feel during an experience, or let our conscious mind (The Player) dictate how the experience feels. The difference between the two is that the sub conscious mind takes things personally, and the Player doesn’t.

The best way to experience life is to always remember that we have the option of choosing between being the player and being the person that is being played. We have the option achieve singularity in our minds by observing and deleting unnecessary information before it has the chance to affect us. Like a black hole eating away at a star till the star is nothing but the singularity within the black hole, our conscious mind can eat away at thoughts and process them until these thoughts reach the singularity within our brain, a point where thoughts don’t matter anymore, like how time doesn’t matter at the center of a Black Hole.

This is the biggest challenge presented by life. When we reach a state of Entropy within our minds, we have reached a higher state of consciousness. A state where we can observe life as it presents different challenges to us, and overcome them without taking things personally. This state is beyond the reach of time. This state is beyond the disruption of Entropy. And only in this state can we truly experience the beauty of life. If we do not take the effort to take control of the game of life, we will always be dissapointed and life will just seem like an endless barrage of unhappiness. Prepare your mind to play the game, and top the leaderboards.