Observation is security against hurt

The following is an excerpt from a samvaad (dialogue) session with Acharya Prashant.

Questioner (Q): Acharya Ji, If we see things and move quickly, are we not observing them?

Acharya Prashant (AP): See, it’s like this when you’re not observant and you look at something, you go back into your own world or into the thousand other worlds that you have, and then with a jerk, you come back to that thing that you are observing. So, you have not observed the whole movement of the thing, right?

You observed the thing when it was there then you went away and when you came back then the thing was here, already here. Now, your total period of observation is confined to that interval and this interval (Indicating hand here and there). That is a total period for which you observe. But how much has the thing moved in that interval from there till here? The thing will appear to have a lot of pace. It is not that the thing had pace, it is just that you had removed your eyes from the thing.

If you are driving and you’re not observant, you are not looking at the truck coming at you and you suddenly wake up when the truck is about to hit you how do you feel? Is that moving fast or slow? The truck is moving so fast for you that you now can’t even swerve and save yourself.