Watching the Watcher
Observando al Observador
A student asks about the habit of mentally commenting on thoughts during meditation, which leads to a deeper exploration of the "I-thought," disidentification, and the nature of blissful experiences.
Watching the Watcher
A student asks about the habit of mentally commenting on thoughts during meditation, which leads to a deeper exploration of the "I-thought," disidentification, and the nature of blissful experiences.
I just wanted to share that last week you told us to try having a slight pause after we exhale. I find it very interesting because, if I'm sitting very upright, there's actually a further release when doing that. It seems to me that the diaphragm will go into a sway of its own rhythm. But that only happens if I'm really very upright. If I'm not, then it feels more difficult, almost like it pulls inward. When I do get it right, though, there's a very nice swing to it. I just wanted to share that.
Great. It's a good exploration. There's so much that gets controlled through controlling the breath, unconsciously. Sometimes having a practice that explores changes in breathing can be very powerful.
Can you clarify something from the meditation just now? You mentioned feeling into our breath and also watching our thoughts. Regarding the watching-our-thoughts part: I noticed that I tend to have a habit of narrating to myself. "That's a thought. You drifted." It's very much a commentary. So should the instruction simply be to watch the thought, meaning to be aware of it without the additional commentary?
The commentary is also thought
The commentary is also thought, so it's irrelevant. Otherwise you're trying to control thought. It would only be "watching thought" if you watch it and don't comment. But if a commenting thought arises, that is all still thought. Commenting is also thought, so watch the commenting then.
If you think the task is to watch thought, but thought must not include this kind of thought (the commenting), then you're not watching thought. You're trying to control thought.
I noticed that I would tell myself, "No, no, no, just keep quiet." And then: "There, you're talking again."
Even that. "There you are, talking to yourself." That's another thought. You can notice that thought is creating what is called the "I-thought": the thought of an I, which is just another thought. It's very different from what I could call the "true I" that I was describing in the meditation.
And that true I is the feeling of feeling really nice, peaceful, sometimes vibrating? Is that it?
The true I cannot be described
The true I can't be described. And also, saying "true I" is a misnomer, because there isn't a "true I" as an object. But the phrase helps point to something else.
It's important to note that thinking constructs a mental image, a mental I. Then there is this "true I," which has been called beingness, consciousness, awareness, atman, brahman (which are the same). There are all of these words for it, but if I just use the words, it's going to be turned into another thought.
It's really difficult to point to, but it can be recognized. It can be realized. And then, in a conversation, we could tell that we're talking about or speaking from the same thing. But it can't be named.
Can I attempt to clarify further? I once experienced, for just a very short while, something that felt extremely radiating, vibrating, and very happy. A mega-bliss kind of feeling. Is that part of our true I?
Bliss points to a shift, not the true I itself
That is related to a change. When your thoughts say, "There you are naming a thought, there you are observing a thought, here I am," that commentary is the I-thought. When it's happening, it feels as though it is I. That is the identified, collapsed, contracted sense.
Now, when you notice it and say, "Oh, there's a commentary, I am commenting on another thought," there's an identification happening. But then you could notice that that thought is also a thought, that that I is also a thought. Because when you see that there is a commentary, there is something knowing or noticing the thought-I. That is closer to the true I: that knowing, that recognizing.
What happens is there's a moment, and it could be really small, really fast, where you no longer believe yourself to be the thought-I. Then you could go back into the belief of the thought-I. But the moment you see it, it's a moment of disidentification. The thought isn't the problem. The problem is believing the thought. So if there's commentary and you're noticing there's commentary, that's just noticing thought.
But what you're describing is something different. Sometimes, spontaneously through grace or through practice, there can be a deeper shift in identification where we completely disidentify from a much deeper layer of thought, of mind. In that change, something opens up and is released, and that is often blissful. Sometimes it's also scary. It can at times bring up terror. But often past the terror is a very deep bliss that is also felt in the body, because there's a release, an occurrence of energy.
But that points to the change more than to the true I. It points to an important shift. The key is not to associate the true I with always being accompanied by those sensations. Because what can happen is that this disidentification becomes more permanent, and all that bliss, which can be very intense, can settle and become quieter. That doesn't mean the true I has gone away.
I'm also saying this so that we don't chase the experiences, which can become very addictive.
I need to be mindful about that.
Don't chase the experience, but don't dismiss it either
But it's also very important to have had that experience, even if only once, because it shows you, to a degree that you can no longer deny, the truth of this: that there is a possibility. The trick is how we get lost back again into thought.
I was a mystical-experience junkie myself.
And then?
Then it stopped.