The Decision That You Are Something
La decisión de que eres algo
A student describes feeling stuck on the path despite sustained effort, and the teacher explores how the assumption of being a fixed self generates both narrative and emotional suffering.
The Decision That You Are Something
A student describes feeling stuck on the path despite sustained effort, and the teacher explores how the assumption of being a fixed self generates both narrative and emotional suffering.
I recognized a new pattern in me. I think it comes down to the thought about the thought. That's when I get tripped up: the judgment about the mind.
Yes, exactly. Just be curious. What is at the root of this? Get closer to it.
The second thought is a reaction
Our personality type determines whether we decide the problem is the government, our own mind, or our own emotions. I can demonize and become a victim of a government, or a victim of my own mind and my own emotions. That position of victim is the disowning of responsibility and the projection of the true issue, which is: I've decided I am something, and I don't know what I am. That decision, which happened very early on, we keep reinforcing, and that is the problem.
It doesn't seem like a decision. Subjectively, there is simply a perception: "I am this, and I know what I am." There is an experience that seems real. But that's what we can look more closely at, and it turns out to be a house of cards. There is nothing real to the whole construct, and we can slowly disassemble it, or it can all fall suddenly. As it happens, it's painful and scary.
I have put so much energy into this path, and it's been beautiful and effort-filled, but it still seems to escape me. It doesn't hook or click somehow.
I would give yourself more credit. Some people spend decades and are far more lost. You've come a long way. Why would it necessarily be faster for you? You can be patient and celebrate. Patience, perseverance, and celebration. You are closer than a lot of people who are mostly lost, trying to fix the world, making a mess because they think the world is the problem when it's themselves.
Thank you. That was helpful. I recognized a new pattern in me. It comes down to the thought about the thought. That's when I get tripped up: the judgment about the mind.
Exactly. And just be curious: what is at the root of this? Get closer to it.
Ignore the second thought, then look deeper
There is a made-up expression our teacher used to use. It basically means: just don't pay attention to that. Ignore it. So the secondary thought about the first thought, just ignore. But then be curious about what's happening. What's at the root? The second thought is a reaction to the first thought. What is the first thought about? Where is it coming from? What's the nature of what's happening?
If you look closely, there is going to be a sense of "I" not wanting something.
Yes, that's exactly what it is.
Now, don't interpret the solution as "I have to want everything, all of this crap." No, that's not the solution. But it's about looking more closely at that. A lot can then be unpacked and clarified, though it can get tricky.
Sensation and thought as a loop
(A second student) What you were saying just now reminded me of the "something's wrong" theme. Recently I noticed that most of the time there's either irritability or restlessness. It's not very intense, but it's there almost constantly. I had a dream last night where at some point I was somewhere outside, somewhat naked, looking for my clothes. There were other people, and there was a dark hole in the ground. Suddenly hundreds of thousands of black wasps started coming out. At some point I escaped by flying, and then you appeared in the dream and said something like, "It's you. You are the cause." It was exactly what you were saying just now. Later in the dream I was in a bar listening to some people talk, and I realized you were right. I called you and wanted to say, "How the hell did you know?" To me it had seemed like something totally external that couldn't possibly have me as the cause. I found it interesting because it's the same theme. I don't know what the question is exactly, but maybe the dream says something too.
What I hear in how you describe it has more to do with sensation. The previous question was described more through narrative, but in your case it's sensation: irritation, restlessness, felt in the body.
There is a similar approach, which has to do with looking at the nature of that. You can look at what the thoughts might be that are happening around the irritation, around the restlessness. There is a side to it that is more thought-based.
And to the first student, this is related and could be useful. For you, it would be the reverse: look at what the sensations are. The thought process was clear to you, and maybe the sensations are as well, but it's interesting how we tend to recognize one side more than the other.
The vicious loop
It's really a vicious complex, a loop. Sensations and thoughts come together, but then we react more to one than the other. The other one becomes hidden. So for you (the second student), look at the thoughts, the narratives, and the beliefs around the story of you, and that could unlock the sensations appearing in the emotional space. And vice versa when it's reversed, which can happen depending on the moment. Sometimes I get more involved with the thoughts, and then I can look at the sensations.
Only when that whole sensation, thought, and emotion complex is transparent and clear can we start to look at what's really happening. What happens is that something is assumed to be real, and it becomes the anchor of the issue. If the sensation is taken to be a real thing, it becomes the anchor to the whole narrative. If something we believe in (an archetype, for instance) is taken to be a real thing, it becomes the anchor to the emotional reaction. But by seeing the whole thing, we can start to look at what appears to be real when it's not.
I'll say it this way: anything that appears to be real is not real.
How assumed reality generates emotional reaction
In my case, you're saying it's more likely I'm taking certain ideas for reality?
It might not be about you directly. It might be about something else. But the assumption is that once something else is taken as real, a chain follows. For example: "The guy across the room is looking at me in a really unpleasant way, and he shouldn't do that." That becomes real. When that is assumed to be real, it implicitly means I am real as the one this imagined person is having an opinion about. Then, because that is now a reality, I react emotionally to it. The emotional reaction becomes a direct consequence of "the man looking at me with a terrible opinion of me." And then the solution to my emotional pain becomes the man not doing what he's doing, which I imagined in the first place.
You can come up with examples where it's even harder to debunk the reality of this. For instance, if my partner says, "I'm really angry with you because you did such and such," and I actually did the thing she's angry about. Now I can have a whole emotional reaction to that, and it could seem like the only solution is for her to stop being angry. This is what happens. I don't realize that she could be angry and I don't have to have an emotional reaction that then makes the whole thing worse.