Mind, For Better or Worse Most of Us Seem to Have One

Mind is not a thing. Yet we seem to intuitively “know” or “think’ we have one. Mind combined with language is the basis for “conceptual” understanding. “Mind” is a word, a concept, a label for a formless something that “we” have. And what “we” are, “I” am, in a manner of speaking, is a mind created sense of self. And via mind, “we”, “I”, try to make sense of the world, our existences, and our so-called true nature.

And mind activity, temporarily restricted for the moment to “thinking” versus “imaging,” or “imagining”, is known by “hearing” thoughts, even though they make no sound. Nevertheless, “you” can observe mind activity for yourself.

And what “hears” soundless thinking? Consciousness. Formless awareness. Another invisible “something” we take for granted and do not control. It simply is as we simply are.

But that isn’t enough for mind, as you may attest. Mind wants to “know.” Minds wants to “understand” what it is not capable of understanding – “reality.” And the fact that “mind” may be considered an “illusion” doesn’t change that dilemma and dynamic until something called “awakening from mind” happens.

A fundamental “fact” of our human condition is that everything in form is a manifestation of “absolute reality.” Including our “bodies”, our “embodied awareness”, our “embodied existence.” And also fundamental is the fact that “reality” doesn’t need to understand itself to Be. It simply Is. Only imaginary, illusory mind wants to “know” and “understand” how it is that we are, how it is that it is.

Consciousness without thinking mind’s narrative, commentary, is that which the term “non conceptual understanding” points to. I “think” everyone that visits this site has had a moment or moments of quiet mind, and then subsequently experienced mind activity to the tune of, “What just happened? What was that I just experienced?” And mind’s hunt to find the right words, the right vocabulary, to describe, to make it happen again, takes off racing to wisdom books, satsang, ashrams, retreats, the internet, the meditation cushion, practices and gurus. In short, we start where we are as we are or think we are.

But no matter where we go or what we do, there “I” am – the mind created sense of “me.” And so an important aspect of our human condition is figuring out our relationship towards mind. How does “illusory” mind relate to “illusory” me? How do “I” learn to live with mind? One can try to banish it by calling it illusory. One can extol it as the royal path to knowing and knowledge. One can denigrate mind. One can awaken from its influence. One can flat out ignore it. Or one can observe it, pay attention to it, hang out with it and come to see for oneself what it is and what it is not. And in this process one also may come to learn what one is and is not.

Along these lines of what is and is not, there is an optical illusion on the internet called the Spinning Lady Optical Illusion. By paying attention to certain elements of the image, you can “observe” her spinning clock-wise or counter clock-wise. When I looked at the Spinning Lady, she was spinning clockwise. But for the life of me, I couldn’t get her to spin the other way. And then I was able to. A little internal relaxation, a little releasing of physical tension, a little shift in perception and she, the image, was going the other way.

And I thought about that shift in perception. It didn’t require becoming more aware, more intelligent, more scholarly, more awake, or more knowledgeable. And I wondered if the shift in perception from conceptual understanding to non-conceptual isn’t just as “simple” and “uncomplicated.”

And then something else happened. I asked my wife to observe the Spinning Lady. And as we looked at the same image at the same time, I reported it spinning clockwise while she reported it spinning counter clockwise. I wasn’t struck so much by the fact that our neurobiological, neural circuitry was creating different images in our brains. What struck me was, ‘How often does this occur? That two or more individuals looking at the same thing see completely different things because of neural circuitry biases or conditioning.” And the answer that arose from within was, “Every minute of every day.”

So how do I live with this reminder - that my experience of quiet mind, inner stillness, formless awareness, non-separation very likely is not going to be like yours? I live with the caveat that all I am willing to say, despite the intensity of any realization I may experience, is This is how it seems, feels, looks like to “me”, not that THIS IS HOW IT ACTUALLY IS.