Is Your Mind Helping?
One of the things the mind does is, it constantly goes on a treasure hunt. Except it’s searching for trash instead of treasure.
When things are fine, what does the mind think about? “What’s wrong now?” “What could go wrong now?” “Doesn’t this mean something’s wrong?” “I know there was something wrong yesterday. I’m sure there’ll be something wrong tomorrow!”
If you are on a treasure hunt, give the mind something else to look for. Instead of looking for trash, look for what’s actually here. You don’t have to do that, but if your mind likes to have something to do, give it something constructive to do as opposed to letting it chew up your life.
One of the ways the mind chews up your life is by looking for trouble so it can help. That’s what it tells you: “You just need to prepare for this disaster.” “You just need to prepare for this problem.” One of its favorites is – “Let me help you deal with this problem that I’m actually creating.” This is what the mind does. You don’t need to feed it.
A simple way to not feed it is to examine the assumptions. Let me qualify what I mean by ‘examine the assumptions’. I don’t mean analyze them or want to figure them out. You’re already doing that. Analyzing assumptions only creates more assumptions. You just make assumption sandwiches.
The delis back East have ten-layer sandwiches. Most of us have sandwiches as tall as the Empire State building filled with all sorts of assumptions. The way to examine assumptions is just to see if it’s what’s actually true now, what’s actually here now, and is the assumption really about anyone. Is there anyone for the assumption to be about?
The other thing you can do is lose interest in the contents of your mind. Most of us are more interested in our mental world and the stories we are making up about the past than in what is actually here now.
Most of us are saying – “Oh yeah, that’s just what’s happening. Who cares about that? I’m more interested in my theory about why it’s happening,” or “where it’s coming from” or “what it means” or “where it’s going” or “what it means about me” as though there actually is a “me.”
What you’ll notice, as you lose interest in all of the mind’s stories, what’s there is this exquisite presence that you are, and the richness of experiencing.
The less there’s an enjoyer, the more there’s enjoyment. The less there’s an experiencer, the more there’s direct experiencing. There’s actually only enjoyment… actually, only experiencing. But we create these artificial, completely made-up barriers to direct experiencing.
There’s never actually any barrier. It’s all mind generated and it has no reality, no independent nature apart from the presence that you are. And it’s very simple… just simply focus on what’s happening here now. That cuts through all of it. Okay?
This blog is an excerpt from the upcoming Inner Circle 4 Audio program.