Hope, Faith, and the Difference Between Thought and Not Thought
La esperanza, la fe y la diferencia entre pensamiento y no pensamiento
A student asks about the persistent sense that something is incomplete, and the teacher draws a distinction between hope, which traps us in time, and the deeper calling toward complete satisfaction.
Hope, Faith, and the Difference Between Thought and Not Thought
A student asks about the persistent sense that something is incomplete, and the teacher draws a distinction between hope, which traps us in time, and the deeper calling toward complete satisfaction.
All hope is false hope. I distinguish hope from faith or trust when I say that. Hope, to me, only exists in time.
Now, the first thing: don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. What you are looking for, which is complete satisfaction, that's the baby. If that goes out, you can enter into nihilism. So the longing for complete satisfaction should stay alive.
Should still be, sorry, what did you say?
The looking for complete satisfaction. Whatever you're imagining, the shape you're imagining it to be, it won't be that way. It's not going to arrive in the shape you imagine. That is always false and wrong. But just know there is something calling you that is true, deep, and worth listening to.
The trap of hope
Now, the hope. Hope creates time, and so there's a sense that you're waiting for something to happen. That tempts you to look for it in imagination, but you don't realize you're looking for it in imagination. You think you're looking for it in reality, which is in time. And it's not there. The subtle point is: it's not where you are looking for it, but there is something you can find.
That resonates. In a way, I know what I believe. I think you're right. I don't know exactly what it is, but I know when…
You just said "state." The state of complete satisfaction is not a state.
Right, no. What I meant is, for example, I was walking in the streets of Paris and it's not elsewhere. I'm not looking anywhere else for anything that is lacking. It's just right there. I'm not even asking myself, and I don't have that dissatisfaction. But then I do notice that there are many moments where it returns. During the meditation it was interesting because it was so obvious. It was like: stop leaping. Just breathe. And when you breathe, there is the completion. But I thank you, because what you said resonates. There is in me a very subtle sense of dissatisfaction, a feeling that something is not complete.
Clarifying thought from not-thought
You just need to clarify more and more the difference between thought and not thought. When you see that more and more clearly, you will not be able to be tempted to find something in thought. Then you will only look for it where it actually is, which is in what is not thought.
Thank you.
Hope as a lack of faith
I was thinking about hope, and thinking of hope as actually a lack of faith. Because you're hoping something will change, which means you don't have faith in the way things are.
That's coming close to it. I usually use the word "trust" because "faith" is so full of religious connotation. Faith has been weaponized by Christianity and Islam. I'm not as familiar with Judaism, but I would be surprised if it were different. The way it's been weaponized is: you must believe what I tell you to believe, and that is faith, because you have faith in me. But for me, faith and belief are opposites. If you truly have faith, why would you need to believe anything?
Don't believe, see
What I say, I always try to repeat: take this not as something to believe in, but as something to see. Find what it points to in yourself. If it becomes a belief or a concept or an idea, it becomes a kind of borrowed reality, and that is very toxic, even if it comes from me or any other teacher.