Martin;

It’s good to re-start the enquiry.

I agree with you that one’s highest capability of change is within the context of himsels. You can only ask, hope, wish or force others to change. But it is totally up to their own choice, decision and initiative to do something about that, regardless how good or bad the consequences will be for them.

So, our starting point is our very self which seems to me the most challenging. This is so, because when I talk about myself, it brings about some questions to be answered and responsibilities to be undertaken by nobody but myself.

Look at many people,ü who seems to be very influential on people, promising them leadership, guidance and eventually happiness. Most of them does not seem to have even the average level of balance, integration and wholeness in their own lifes, while they promise a heaven to the others.  On the contrary, many of them live a very conflicted and fragmented life on their own. You can include many famous philosophers, ideologists, politicians, writers in that category.

For me, this is not surprising, because if you have certain level of talent to create ideas, abstractions and to put them into words and express fluently against people, you may have an audience to follow you, regardles how capable you are to apply what you say to your own life.

But talking about other people’s expectations, dreams, problems, sorrows, etc,  is far easier than doing something about yourself.

Let’s take the example of a doctor advicing his patient to quit smoking because it  kills. He can very effectively present the arguments to her, and eventually can convince to commit to be a non-smoker. However; it is not very surprising to see the doctor smoking himself, even he tells just the opposite to the others.

We have a saying in our society which is : “Do what the Imam (priest) says; not what he does.”

This is to say: Saying is easy while doing is a big challenge

Coming back to the topic of meditation; I have no question with people who practice various methods for meditation. I use the word “method” on purpose, with that I mean the way you used to (or prefer to) follow to reach the level of quiet state of mind.

I am sure there are many people who have a natural talent to quiet their thoughts and clean their mind, not by effort and struggling, but only through insight.

The key word here is “insight” which reminds me the famous quote of K which is “Truth is a pathless land”.

What I think is; brain is a very skillful device and thought is nothing but one function on brain.

What I think about meditation is nothing but an abstraction because it is all about the known; words, definitions, actions, etc.  We can talk about meditation; but what we talk about is just a word what we created to make an unknown thing, recognizable by us. But what we recognize is the word or the label; not the real think which is still unknown.

The un-thinking or still state of mind, by definition, should not be reachable by thinking about that. We can talk about it endlessly, without getting anywhere.

My humble point against this challenging quesition is; I have no idea neither I could; about that state of mind. Some people tells interesting and appealing stories about that, but these do not help me, either. The difficulty is the definition which eliminates any option to use technniques, recipes, maps, etc, to get where, if it really exists.

You may have experienced on your own, the so-called transfornation of mind through some process. But, as soon as you try to put this experience into words, which is within the very limit of the known, your real experience and insight start fading away and the thought invades back the mind.

Can we agree on the following state: “When there is thought there is no meditation and when there is meditation, there is no tought.”

So meditation and thought can not exist at the same time. Mind has only one state amongst them.

I wonder if I am clear enough on my point to question “meditation” by definition, only.

If I surrender to the fact that, I have nothing to do about meditation but thinking and talking about it; I have only one solid key left to deal with. That isthe  thought, which makes me, in the simples expression. I also agree that I have no natural talent to switch my mind from one state to the other, with or without using some methods.

I am made of thoughts and unless I understand the structure and nature of thought I can never go beyond.

Understanding thought is nothing but understanding how the brain functions to create thought.

Once, I am able to catch a clue about the way brain functions, it may take me to the further understanding of what happens beyond.

To understand thought, I do not have to wait until I find an isolated place, a peaceful natural scene, a place to retreat, etc. Thought is with me and operates at any given time, providing me with countless opportunities to diagnose it.

To do this I can only rely on my brain who creates the thought.
If I can follow the process of thought backwards, this can hopefully take me to it’s origins.

There is a must to take that trip which is “take the thought as it is; without judgement.” This is to say; thought is just a function of my brain. It is neither good, nor bad. It just is! I have no intention to question thought. What I want to is to follow it to the where it takes me.

This is nothing to do with observation because the observer is seperate from the source. I do not want to observe which is thinking.

Does a diagnostic device think about the object, when it functions?

It is inevitable that, to observe thought you will use the means of thought, again. This may seem as a paradox and it actually is when we start. However; the key is: It does not help to negate thinking if we really want to understand it. Neither negate, nor favor. Just follow it.

To dissolve thinking, I will definitely use thinking which is the most powerful function of brain, as we know it.

For me the brain first needs to be discovered, in order to liberate it from the invasion of thoughts.

Take the example of a physician fighting cancer. She needs to understand the cancer first, not to hate it. Cancer is bad for the patient, but not for the Doctor, for whom it is just a problem to be solved.  Doctor’s hating the problem could even make her handicapped against it, eventually resulting in failure.

I believe I should stop here; looking forward to hear from you.

Best regards;

Ali

Dear Ali,

I’m glad you posted part of our correspondence, and am happy to continue the enquiry. Let’s withhold our investigation of the ‘political’ expression of a psychological revolution until we have a strong foundation in enquiry, and there are signs and evidence that the revolution in human consciousness is igniting.  (By political expression, I don’t mean the low art of politics, but rather the unavoidable necessity of collectively prioritizing and intelligently managing the multi-faceted self-made crisis of humankind–ecological destruction, economic disparity, growing conflict and terrorism, etc.)

Whether the breakthrough in human consciousness is near or not, whether this is the darkest hour of humanity before the dawn of a new human being, or the beginning of a global dark age, we cannot know. There is great urgency for psychological revolution, but all we can really do is question alone and together, awakening insight within ourselves, and, through enquiry, ignite insight with like-minded, self-knowing friends in the work.

There are two questions that have come up in which I’m keenly interested. Let’s see if they strike a chord in you and others. The first is the place of meditation in one’s life, and in this violent and rather insane world. The second, which comes after the foundation of true meditation is clearly established within us, is the question of conscious transmutation and revolution in consciousness.

You posed the challenge by saying that you don’t meditate (in the sense of taking daily walks and sittings in the mirror of nature whenever possible, with the intent of passively observing the movement of thought/emotion in oneself) because, “I would have put my life into the trap of fragmentation while seeking wholeness thru meditation. Fragmented because if you take the meditation as the essence, what will happen when you do not  (or can not) meditate? If you feel balanced when you meditate, isn’t it true that you are out of balance when you do not practice it?”

This is to my mind a most important question. I understand your meaning and concern, and share it, although one has come to the opposite conclusion–if I can use that word without implying a fixed position.

Beyond the unforced ‘practice’ of taking daily walks and sittings in nature (which I’m fortunate to be able to do year around here in California, even during winter when it isn’t raining), what is meditation? That word, like ‘dialogue,’ means many different things to many different people. Almost always, however, meditation to most people’s minds involves some method, technique, and ritual. To me these things are inimical to awakening the meditative state, since they are products of the very mechanism we want to quiet—the mind as thought.

Meditation, I submit, is the brain spontaneously letting go of the dominance of thought through the passive observation of the movement of thoughts and emotions as they arise. It is an unwilled fundamental alteration in consciousness, as the brain goes from living in terms of symbols (words, images, ideas, imaginings etc) of content-based consciousness, to direct perception and insight. Meditation spontaneously occurs when the observer is negated. One negates the observer by ‘catching thought in the act’ of splitting itself off from itself, which takes many forms–judgment, evaluation, analysis, or reaction of any kind to thoughts and feelings as they arise.

For me, it’s necessary to take time each day to sit and observe this movement, with intent but without goal, in order to ‘clear the decks’ and allow the brain using thought to fall silent and come into order. We all experience the chattering mind. I’ve found that to take the time to really listen to the mind, without interference, giving special attention to the divisive habit of the observer, thought grows quiet and a deep balance is restored. There is also new insight, and a regeneration of the brain’s energy and a growth of its capacity.

So I find it quite ironic that you ask: “If you feel balanced when you meditate, isn’t it true that you are out of balance when you do not practice it?” One does indeed sometimes feel out of balance when the meditative state ‘wears off,’ but that illuminates the areas of one’s life that are out of balance and in need of attention. (Why it ‘wears off,’ and what is the breakthrough of illumination in which the brain presumably does not return to thought, are questions requiring further enquiry.)

In short, without taking time to ignite meditation, doesn’t one adapt to society and becomes habitual in one’s daily routines, no matter how much one is self-aware, because the sweep of events and experiences is too much for the brain to gather sufficient attention to slow down and quiet the whole movement of thought?

It’s essential of course to be self-aware during one’s activities and in one’s relationships. Without self-awareness, meditation cannot ignite. But is self-awareness during one’s activities enough? I feel not.

Many people can only take half an hour from their busy days to sit quietly and passively observe, but that, plus some contact with nature, are minimal requirements for transformation, aren’t they? Taking one’s seat, the first question that comes to one, after becoming attuned to one’s environment (sitting outdoors whenever possible, even just in one’s backyard or patio), is: Is the observer operating? When the observer ends in passive awareness of the mind’s divisiveness, attention gathers and becomes as quick as a hummingbird’s wings. As Krishnamurti so often pointed out, the act of attention, in itself, deeply quiets the mind, and opens the door to insight and the sacred. Does this ring true for you?

With the foundation of quieting thought in ourselves through passive observation, we can then take up the question Evrim, one of your readers, picked up on: “Is man’s self-made fragmentation ever more urgently driving a conscious transmutation in the human brain, allowing us to make the next evolutionary leap?”

I look forward to your response.

Warm regards,

Martin