The Still Point
El Punto de Quietud
An invitation to notice the quiet stillness that is always present beneath the constant movement of your thoughts, sensations, and attention.
The Still Point
Last week we explored diving into raw experience
and discerning what's coming through the senses:
sound, sights, touch, perception.
And what's being reflected in the mind?
All of it, all of what's reflected in the mind.
Thoughts that can be dialogue, images, memories, dreams, hopes, everything.
There's a sense of self that's also a mental image,
that which feels that it's located,
that in us which feels that we're a thing here.
And that is very useful. It doesn't go away.
Sensing and reflecting
It is important to notice the difference.
Experiencing through senses and through the reflection in the mind is everything that we are,
still all part of one experience, one field of experience.
We think of the experience of sound,
we can quickly label it, this is sound.
And what comes through sensation, touch,
we can distinguish that sound and touch.
There's a sense that there's two things.
So bring into your awareness the sensation of touch in your hands.
And explore how that distinction with sound happens.
They seem so different and distant and separate.
This exploration doesn't need any effort,
just invite a childlike curiosity.
Check in with your sensation.
It could be your hands or the breath.
And then just check in with sounds.
See if there's a place where they meet.
They meet at a place with no thought.
The movement of thought
And notice how the movement of thought is a bit like a wavy ocean,
hugging and pulling and pushing into different parts of your experience.
If you can notice that which is jumping,
moving from one thing to another,
it's not you that's moving from one thing to another.
Your attention is moving towards sensation.
It's not you paying attention to one thing and then another.
It's pulled into thought.
It's something within.
Moves into sound, and something seems unstable.
Constant movement.
Experience is like a kaleidoscope, spinning and moving.
Some things stable, others almost jumping around, in constant motion.
Sensations in the body are pretty stable.
Sounds are starting and stopping and coming and going,
and then the mind just playing its images and sounds.
Something is noticing
Something is noticing all of this.
It might feel like you are jumping around,
paying attention to different things,
getting pulled and pushed.
But if you know what I'm referring to,
if you can at times at least notice that which is jumping around,
notice that it must be something that is still.
Something that is so still that it can notice all movement.
This still point is always present.
It's nowhere and everywhere.
Requires no effort.
The mind is going to say, oh, I got it. I perceive it.
Yeah, this is it.
Or no, I don't know. I don't get it.
That's just thought.
Stillness as nature
The stillness is your nature,
as well as the movement, but we lose touch with the stillness.
We overlook it.
But it's always here.
You can't create stillness.
That which hears, that which feels, is absolutely still always.
Notice how the mind can keep jumping around
and our attention moving from this to that.
And it may feel like I am restless
or anxious or uncomfortable or distracted, not getting it.
It might feel like that, might seem like that,
might be so compelling we would want to argue that position, or any position.
Stillness is very subtle.
When we touch it, it seems not very valuable.
We overlook it.
If you experience any kind of movement,
what is it in relationship to?
It still also feels empty to the mind.
It's like an old treasure chest.
It's been abandoned, but it's full of gold.
Anything that captures your attention,
it's just the forest spinning the kaleidoscope.
What is watching?
That which is watching is always still.
The treasure is yours.
Give it a chance.
The effortless still point
The still point is everywhere and nowhere in this moment.
It can satiate all your longings, your deepest longing.
The still point is effortless.
There is something in you always that is making no effort.
And from there, everything that is happening,
no matter what, no matter what crazy dance the kaleidoscope is doing,
whatever movement of life is happening,
from that stillness, everything can be enjoyed,
including the struggles of life.
They're about one taste of the buffet of experiencing.
Stillness and movement
The stillness is our true nature,
and from it the movement comes.
No movement is possible without stillness.
So that which is aware of movement is infinite stillness.
The mind is going wild.
Stories, thoughts, emotions, discomfort.
Discomfort in the body.
That's your experience.
That stillness is noticing the mind going wild,
discomfort, thoughts, emotions.
Just notice there is a stillness which makes the movement apparent.
So when things get challenging,
don't try to control the movement.
Only from stillness can movement be perceived and experienced.
Don't try to manipulate the mind.
Only from the unchanging can change be perceived and experienced.
It is that simple.
Like trying to calm the waves by pushing at them.
Just know that you're the ocean.
Not intellectually, not as a belief.
Keep noticing
Keep noticing the movement:
sensations, perceptions, emotions, thoughts.
Keep noticing the movement.
That which notices cannot be moving.
It's ever present.
The stillness is our nature.
It is empty fullness.
The movement, it's what it does out of love.
We love being in a body, being alive.
The whole struggle is how we create the most beautiful story,
the most beautiful experience,
the incredible flavor of life,
the beautiful pain of not having what we longed for,
the taste of that sweet pain of longing.
You're always, no matter what,
there is that, our true nature,
the empty stillness,
experiencing everything.