Choosing Not To Mind The Mind

It is hard to pinpoint the moment that I began to seriously explore mindfulness. It was a couple of decades ago when I had a busy career and a young family. I began to notice that it was getting noisy inside my head. I began to notice that it was hard to turn off the cascade of thoughts at the end of the day. I noticed that even though some of the things I was thinking/planning/worrying about had a very low probability of actually occurring, it didn’t seem to impact the seemingly endless desire of my mind to chew away at them.

Sometimes I would notice I was thinking about work problems, while doing a household task, and silently reciting a song in my head, all at the same time. It was just getting all together too busy in there.

I first turned towards the world’s great religious traditions to seek the peace and compassion of the saints. I learned much, frequently became inspired, and yet it did little to quiet my mind.

I studied myth. Again, learned much, got a sense of the recurring themes in the life journey, but my mind was still noisy.

I started learning about meditation. It took a while to really understand how simple it was, and that it was not about achieving some amazing, transcending experience – even though I experienced a few remarkable states.  And whenever I meditated, it certainly quieted things down for a bit. A 10 out of 10 stress day would be reduced to 7 out of 10.  A 5 out of 10 stress day would be reduced to a 3.  But as soon as I stopped meditating the noise in my mind would begin to pick up again.

I got intrigued with yoga, thinking that maybe a movement centered practice would be a better fit for someone like me who did not really enjoy sitting still for too long.   This led to a pretty deep dive into yogic philosophy (some of the most comprehensive to be found), years of practice, study with many prominent teachers, and eventually a teacher training course and certification as a Registered Yoga Teacher. Yoga helped my flexibility and strength and taught me a great deal about the link between the body and the mind. However, it certainly did not deal a knockout blow to the noise in my head. When I do yoga I am centered with a quiet focused mind. When I stop, the mind slowly starts up again.

It was only when I almost gave up the search in frustration, and actually prayed to find the right teacher, path or practice, to get me to that more sustainably peaceful place that some deep part of me intuited existed, did I finally connect with the teaching I had been looking for.

How ridiculous. It turned out the part of me that was so intent on solving this problem, was the part of me that had no chance of succeeding. That part of me, the thinking, planning, getting-better-at-it mind, was indeed the main barrier to the deeper peace I was looking for.   And all I had to do is stop identify with it.  That’s it. (It may sound too simple. I know I would not have been satisfied with this answer if it was handed to me before I had exhausted myself seeking some way to figure it out.)

My mind is still here. It is part of my experience. It does useful things.  It also continues to do what human minds are wired to do; judge, resist, desire, fantasize, and generally want things to be different. 

The difference is I no longer plant my flag of identity solely with my thoughts or emotions. I watch them come and go, and every hour there is a new monologue.  I just keep taking my attention off them, and putting it on my breath, whatever else is present, or the source of attention itself. Starved of attention and belief, the mind usually quiets down. And sometimes it doesn’t.

It doesn’t matter, I simply choose to no longer mind the mind.  

Where to Shine The Flashlight of Attention?

Our human mind is powerful and wild. It is capable of helping us create the most elegant solutions to life’s most challenging problems, and also prone to wasting exorbitant amounts of time and energy; judging, comparing, resisting, desiring, fantasizing or otherwise driving you crazy.

It is a gift to even notice the mind’s wildness.

It is a gift to be called to explore and attempt to reign in some of the mind’s most outrageous flights of fancy.

It is a gift to notice that in any mind event, there is the mind and there is some part of your awareness witnessing it.

It is a gift to notice that while you may not be able to choose the thoughts, emotions or moods of the mind, you can at any time direct your attention where you want.

It is perhaps one of the most powerful teachings to coach your attention to rest with affection on your heart. Not your physical heart. Not your emotional center or simply the source of all emotion. Rather let you attention rest on the source of everything.

In other words, if your attention was like a flashlight, capable of shining on anything you are interested in, rather than letting it point outward towards, the endless stream of objects (thoughts, emotions, sensations, etc.)  Turn it inward, on the source of attention, and hold it there.

What do you notice?

A Great Spiritual Teaching From India

Joseph Campbell, who studied the myths and spiritual teachings of the world for over 40 years, once observed that the best direction he had found comes out of India.

One of the classic Indian works is the centuries old Avadhut Gita, written by the sage Dattatreya.

An Avadhut is a mystic who has found the knowledge who’s fragrance is wisdom, peace and bliss. Gita simply means “song of. ”  In this classic poem/teaching there is one stanza that I believe summarizes a great spiritual truth. It goes:

A yogi has no particular path;

He simply renounces imagining things,
His mind then ceases of its own accord,
And the perfect state just naturally occurs.

When Dattartreya refers to a yogi, he is not talking about someone in Lululemon gear who can wrap their leg around their head. Rather he is talking about someone who is called by Grace to find the truth of existence.

In speaking of renouncing imagining things, he talks of the voluntary removal of attention, belief and identity from all objects; things, thoughts, emotions, sensations, etc.

Whenever attention in turned inward, away from objects and towards its source, the volume and machinations of the mind subside into the background.

With nothing needing to be resisted, acquired or changed in any way, peace and contentment flourish. Without separation, between in and out, here and there, you and me, all differences dissolve into love.

The Avadhut directly realizes, at our essence, we are fundamental, unchanging, blissful, impersonal, all pervading, awareness. It is the same Self in all.

Steve

If At First.....

Making important changes in your life, career or business is not easy. Overcoming years of conditioning in your thoughts, emotions and behaviour requires time and a good deal of effort. It often requires more than one attempt.

Many change initiatives are abandoned at the first sign of back-sliding.  However big change is almost always harder than you expect it to be. There are many setbacks, many lessons on what doesn't work, and many times when you have to endure a good failure or two to learn the necessary lessons you require to finally push through to success. 

The more you prepare for a change, the more emotions you involve, the more support you line up to keep you on track or remind you why you are doing this - the greater your chances of success will be.

Some people believe it is better to try and fail, than it is to never try at all.  However, there is enough good science, best practices and professional support available, to potential changers these days, that if you are committed you can make the change. And if you are serious about making some important changes, don't let a few steps backwards deter you.

The Irony In Seeking

To anyone who has a calling to find; truth, a deeper connection to life/God/love, their true self, The Self, or any of the many euphemisms for the fruits of inner journey, this calling manifests into seeking.  There is a deep sense that the truth is out there somewhere, and if you only access the right; teacher, training, mentor, knowledge, practice, etc., and put in your time, enlightenment will be yours.

The irony in seeking is that this part of us that is seeking, is the biggest barrier to the greater experience of; peace, love, bliss, harmony, connection, etc. that we intuit is possible.

The truth is, in this journey, ever step you take is a step away from where the answer is found. Ultimately, it is just an idea you have about yourself, that believes an idea about what needs to be; different, acquired, or accomplished, to obtain some imagined better state.  If you let go of all the ideas and imagining, what do you experience now?

As the poet Rumi explained, "Your task is not to seek for love, your task is to seek and find all the barriers you have built against it."   

Don't Bother Trying To Be Stabile

Many individuals looking for greater peace and happiness in their busy lives run into their share of obstacles.

One of the most common is the belief that once you have become aware that more balance is possible, you should somehow become stabilized in this new, improved place and be unaffected by life’s daily dramas.

Perhaps you have established a few simple, daily routines; exercise, quiet times, breath work, meditation, gratitude journaling, etc.   And while the benefits of any of these activities may be subtle, you can immediately feel the difference.

Typically, any of these sorts of practices make a good day great, an average day better, and a bad day more tolerable.  But they do not make you bullet proof.  There will always be certain circumstances or people that will get your goat and catapult you back into reactions that you may have hoped you had left behind forever.

Don’t despair. You are not hopeless. You are just human.

It is an unreal expectation to imagine that your best intentions and practice will somehow stabilize you in some perma-zen state that will leave behind all your old conditioning. (Even Jesus, the Buddha and all the Sages and Saints had their bad days too.)

Forget about trying to stabilize yourself in some perfect state.  Forget about judging yourself as being a master at this or completely hopeless. Your job is to simply remember you are that which is observing the coming and going of all states, thoughts and emotions.

The Mind As an Obstacle to Peace

In my life and business coaching practice, I run into a lot of people looking for more success and happiness in one form or another. Occasionally, some of these clients have concluded that their greater fulfillment is not going to be found in usual playgrounds of additional accomplishment in their; career, relationships, hobbies, fitness, fame, or their bank account.

And anyone who has ever had a deeper calling, who has genuinely longed to find what it true and lasting in life, has inevitably run into a few predictable roadblocks associated with  the limitations of the human mind.  Because changing, reasoning with, convincing, pacifying  or sustainably satisfying the mind can seem like an impossible job.

Fortunately, there are many solutions offered.  Various spiritual traditions attempt to solve this problem by offering the a seeker a particular set of long-established, widely-held beliefs, coupled with the invocation that it is a virtue to have faith and not to question.  This works for billions of people, and yet causes others to flee.

Other spiritual traditions teach elaborate practices to still the mind. This approach can keep many people busy for years. Yet, whatever stillness is momentarily achieved, quickly evaporates and sends the seeker back to do yet more practice.

If you are lucky, and ready, you may run into a teacher that can help you realize that any attempts by the mind, to manage the mind, will at best provide limited and temporary benefit.  Ultimately, the conquest of thought is the simply, direct, recognition that you are not your thoughts.  A thought may seem very close, intimate and personal, yet you begin to notice the real, unchanging you, is what is witnessing thought.

I am pretty sure I read this type of instruction a few hundred times from a variety of sources before I was ready to actually personally explore it.  And finding the appropriate guide is a matter of timing and grace. However, once it is directly verified that you are more than your mind, you will come to see that mind is really not your enemy. It is simply one of the many ways the energy of life expresses itself.  All thoughts and emotions, and all life circumstances do in fact come and go. And there is an unchanging part of you that really does witness it all without affect.  Further, this part of you needs nothing, resists nothing and thus is always quite content.

So, ironically, it is only when the mind stops seeking its own improvement or dissolution, that it is truly at peace.   And it is only when you stop identifying with or trying to control the mind, that you can simply ignore it out of relevance.

It is there. It is useful. But it is not who you are. It is just part of what you experience.