Arjun sat beneath the banyan tree, determined to travel deeper into the silence within. The glimpse he had felt earlier—the vastness, the vibration—had ignited both wonder and fear. He knew now that his greatest battle would not be with the world outside, but with the storms of his own mind.
As he closed his eyes, the world around him dissolved into stillness. Yet, within moments, his thoughts rose like dark clouds. Memories returned—his father's stern face, the mocking laughter of the villagers, the warmth of his mother's arms. Each memory carried weight, tugging him away from the silence.
Desires surfaced too: the taste of food, the longing for comfort, even unspoken dreams of recognition. They swirled together, pulling him into a tempest of thought.
The more he resisted, the stronger they grew. His breath quickened, his body tensed, and soon he felt as though he was being drowned in the flood of his own mind.
Fear whispered: "You cannot escape me."
Desire hissed: "Without me, you are nothing."
Doubt roared: "Why are you even here? Return to the world!"
Arjun's chest tightened. His first instinct was to fight—to silence the voices, to push them away. But then the monk's words echoed: "The river does not fight the storm. It allows the storm to pass, and in time, it returns to calm."
So Arjun stopped resisting. He sat, trembling, letting the storm rage. He watched his fear without running. He observed desire without clinging. He witnessed doubt without believing it.
Something shifted. The storm did not vanish immediately, but his relationship with it changed. Instead of being swept away, he became the watcher. He realized: I am not these thoughts. I am the sky in which they appear.
Hours later, when the sun had set and the stars emerged, the storm quieted. Arjun opened his eyes, his body weary but his spirit stronger.
He understood a great truth: storms of the mind will always come, but they cannot destroy the sky of the soul.
That night, as he lay beside the river, he smiled faintly. The storm had tested him, but within the chaos he had found his first true strength.
The journey within had only just begun.