I had followed the instructions of most who had written meditative guides and sought the “no-mind state,” sought to force my “mind” to stop racing, sought a “super-conscious state,” sought in morning meditation to have “a spiritual experience” that would result in a peace that would last throughout the day, sought to have an overwhelming, “emotionally-raptuous experience.”
[Continued from 29 August 2005]
F.: Next, I must admit that my "personal" meditative work was like all my other spiritual workaholism. With unbounded effort and obsessive practice, I “did” meditation in a fashion that many others equaled but that few surpassed. After thousands and thousands of “meditative experiences,” realization still did not come. Neither did anything close to emotional sobriety or real peace. A vision that was key to the understanding came at the end of a day when, physically exhausted, I lay on a carpeted floor and dozed off. While awakening, the vision came. All the bells and whistles and meditative aids and practices were for nil because I found no guides that suggested I should take pointers into consideration. I had no one offering sound pointers anyway, so I had no chance at all of practicing meditation as originally intended. Instead, I had followed the instructions of most who had written meditative guides and thus sought the “no-mind state,” sought to force my “mind” to stop racing, sought a “super-conscious state,” sought in morning meditation to have “a spiritual experience” that would result in a peace that would last throughout the day, sought at other times to have an overwhelming, “emotionally-raptuous experience.” Yet I failed miserably to reach "my" ultimate goal and could not force "my mind” to alter to "my will” or to "the will of an unseen power." To test how capable persons actually are of controlling their own mind and thoughts, I invite proteges to conduct an experiment. Right now, I want you be sure that you do not picture a monkey hanging by one arm from the limb of a tree in a jungle. Anything else that comes to mind is fine, but continue the exercise. At all cost, do NOT picture a monkey hanging from a limb, one fist closed tightly around the limb of a jungle tree, the other arm hanging loosely by its side, the monkey swaying back and forth in the air. Are you NOT picturing a monkey? Avoid at all cost the imagining of a monkey. DON’T see a monkey hanging, a monkey swinging from a limb, a monkey screeching out its monkey sounds. Uh oh. I suspect you’re picturing a monkey. Please stop it. Force yourself, if you must, not to picture that monkey that is still hanging from a limb, still swinging back and forth, its free arm swaying at its side. DON’T picture a monkey. So how did you do with that experiment at controlling "your mind" and your thoughts? Has it been suggested to you by someone that you have the ability to control "your mind"? Has it been suggested that an entity in another realm can control "your mind" and change it to "your" advantage? Has it been a goal to be able to calm "your mind"? Has a quarter-hour to an hour of meditative work been effective in freeing you of a troublesome, variable mind during all of your waking hours? If not, might another purpose of meditation exists, and might that purpose actually free you of the illusion of mind, once and for all? Please enter the silence of contemplation. [To be continued 30 August 2005]
