The Fear Beneath the Thinking
El miedo bajo el pensamiento
A student explores why expanded states from meditation seem to vanish during daily life, and the teacher points to a deeper pattern: the habitual use of thought to avoid feeling fear, and the illusion that keeps freedom always just out of reach.
The Fear Beneath the Thinking
A student explores why expanded states from meditation seem to vanish during daily life, and the teacher points to a deeper pattern: the habitual use of thought to avoid feeling fear, and the illusion that keeps freedom always just out of reach.
What's coming to me is that maybe I need to get more practiced at noticing when I might be using thought in that way.
It's probably most of the time. As a rule of thumb, assume that whenever you recognize you were completely immersed in a thought world and then snap out of it, that thought was helping you not feel something.
Right. And I think as you said that, I was...
Wait one moment. The question I just asked, the answer isn't to think about it. It's not about thinking about what thought is helping you not feel. It's about going into the space of sensation. You might discover there's a whole reality that's really vast, really profound, and always present. It's scary because it's infinite, unknown, and unknowable. That's what thought is helping you pretend isn't there.
The experience I'm about to describe might be different from what you're talking about, but when I've felt like I've successfully peeled back a good number of layers, it comes with a sense of freedom, openness, and release. I could imagine, though, that if I was cold or hungry or in a difficult state, it would not necessarily feel that way. I would be with those difficult feelings as opposed to feelings of wonderment.
Why can't there be wonderment with hunger or with cold?
I think there can be. The thought that comes up right now is that it can feel difficult for me to be in that state and get through the things I need to do in a day in order to stay afloat.
What do you mean?
Just cooking, and in my case job searching. If I go and have a really good meditation session, I just want to stare at the trees. I haven't found a way to carry that forward.
Retaining openness in activity
So, going and doing things while retaining some of that state. That's a practice, to call it something, though it's not a practice in the sense that it requires repetition. By practice I mean: what to explore or focus on.
It has to do with understanding more deeply, and by understanding I don't mean intellectually. I mean seeing more deeply. If you have a good meditation and you stare at a tree, there's something there that you're enjoying. That same something is also present when you're cooking. It's also present when you're working. But you don't recognize it. You're not seeing what is in front of your face, so to speak.
Taking it a step further: it's also there when you're hungry and cold. Those were the examples you gave of states that could be difficult to be with. You're talking about a state of being expanded. But when you realize the root of what's enjoyable there, it is not a state.
The state of looking at a tree, whatever it is, is a state you get into. The state of working, the state of cooking: there's something present in all of them. The root of what's beautiful, free, and enjoyable, the expansiveness, is there in all cases. There's a confusion around what that expansiveness actually is.
Perhaps I allow the thoughts that tend to come up during those activities to be real.
Can you say that again, or differently?
I'm trying to troubleshoot where I lose touch with that expansion. In a coding project, let's say. What I'm coming up with is that I go into some layers of thought and then, not realizing I'm in the movie theater, go deeper.
The illusion runs deeper than you think
It's more subtle than that, because it's trickier. It's a deeper illusion, like an optical illusion. When you see it, it's actually more obvious.
The expansion you're describing is like this: let's say what I really want is water. I get close to it and touch it with my hand. I'm thirsty, but I touch it with my hand and maybe lick my fingers, and it's like, "Oh, I'm there, I got it." It feels amazing. I was so thirsty, it was so uncomfortable, and now I have the water. But you're barely even satiating yourself. You go back into thirst. You haven't really drunk the glass of water, because you didn't really get it.
When you meditate and get into an expanded state, you're tasting a glimpse of something, but you're not getting the real thing. You're approximating. It creates a sense of, "I am touching something that is what I want, I can taste it, it's great," and then you lose it. Then you get it, then you lose it, then you get it. And you think all you have to do is repeat this until you get closer. That isn't what works.
What works is to see that which you're getting close to is always here. In the metaphor, you always had the water ready to drink.
The cycle of expansion and contraction
You might think, "Well, why don't I notice it?" Because of this sense of contraction and expansion. I'm contracted, I expand, it feels great. I contract, I'm uncomfortable, I expand, it feels great. This is what we do all the time. That's the addiction.
This cycle enables us to be a thing, to be someone. Someone who's doing something in time, trying to get somewhere, trying to get away from something. It enables a form of living that is identified.
The expansion and contraction facilitate that, because there's something that expands and contracts, and I'm the one expanding and contracting, and I am not that which is not expanding and contracting. But you can observe: there's the expansion, the contraction, you can say it's you, but it's actually just your hand, and you're not your hand because you're aware of your hand. There's something that's aware of the expansion and the contraction. That which is aware of it is not expanding and contracting.
So when you go into a state and your body-mind relaxes, expands, that's great. It's important because it helps us approximate. If we live tightly clenched and only relax the hand a tiny bit before contracting again, we never taste it. That expansiveness reminds us something is truly possible. But that expansion is like dipping your hands in the water. It's not the full experience. It's not the full knowing of that possibility. It's just a taste, just a glimpse. And then we can get addicted to the glimpse.
Freedom that doesn't depend on states
That's why I was saying there's an expansiveness that is present even when you're cooking, when you're working, even when you're feeling contracted, even when you're in a difficult state. That's the true freedom, the ultimate freedom. That's what I refer to when I say: it's here now, it's always here. This statement is always true.
If you find yourself forgetting it, it's because you haven't spent enough time seeing through the illusion, instead of trying to create the state of it. Try to see through the illusion of it not being here.
But the obstacle has to do with the sense of self, because you can't have it both ways. You can't know what I'm talking about and still believe you're something you're not. It's one or the other.
In the state of illusion, you can go through the exploration of expanding and contracting. But to know what I'm talking about, what has to go is the belief that you're something you're not. This is where language requires care. When I say, "I know what I am, I am this," that's the belief in being something I'm not.
If you look at your experience, when you say "I," what does it refer to? What is it pointing to? You can know the freedom of that which is always expanded. But there, you cannot know where you are. If you have a belief about where you are, that by definition is a contraction. You are now something rather than everything. And that experience of believing you're something can only happen in the confusion that arises when we experience thought and don't recognize it as thought.
Right. That's a lot.
That's the foundation of the whole house of cards. It's not just "I am." It's "I am" followed by something. And that something is the foundation of what we build, which is the illusion: a thought world made of thought that appears to be something other than thought.
The fear of losing function
I think maybe I just don't have enough experience with it yet. I'm sort of back to where I started. Recognizing the power of thought, either in a defeatist way ("I'll never get a job") or in an arguably positive way ("I'm doing really well, my skills are growing, I'm networking, something's just around the corner"), both of those are tied in with a sense of self.
When you say "I," you're referring to something real. But what it is, that's the problem.
I think the worry is that if I really removed all those layers of concept, I would not be able to speak or feed myself.
Now we're getting somewhere. What was I saying twenty minutes ago? That if you see thought as thought, you will feel something you don't want to feel. Therefore you buy into thought. You just described exactly that. What did you describe? What am I referring to?
A state of total openness to whatever...
No, but you described something that maps onto what I was talking about. I'm being vague on purpose because I want you to see it; I don't want to spell it out. What I described twenty minutes ago, generally speaking, is this: you go into thought and believe it. The pull toward that is not because the mind is some evil thing and you're its prey. You buy into it. You choose into it. You are free. You're freedom itself choosing that. Why? Because you don't want to feel something. And the answer isn't to think about what you don't want to feel. Experiment with it and see what you feel. Go into the feeling.
Now, you just described this. Going to a state where you potentially can't feed yourself. What is that? It's simpler than you think. What is the raw feeling?
The feeling of fear of that state.
You just named it. It's fear. When you say, "I'm not going to be able to feed myself, I'm not going to be able to function," all of that is one thing only: thoughts powered by a feeling. The feeling is fear. You don't even know you're afraid. You might not be able to see it clearly, but all it is, is fear.
Turning toward fear instead of obeying it
So if I simply felt that sensation and experimented further...
The challenge is: are you willing to go toward that fear? Because it works like this. "I don't want to feel the fear, therefore I'm going to buy into the narrative of fear." The narrative says: don't go there, because then you'll be afraid, things are going to go wrong, just don't go there. And you think, "I'm a noble human doing the right thing, which is to think, think, think." But it's actually avoiding fear and giving you a sense of being in control.
So the literal benefit of projecting that "if I really went there, I'd become ineffective and unable to sustain myself" is that it keeps me from feeling the fear.
You have to be willing to take the risk. It's a risk. You have to be willing to take the risk of being dysfunctional, not being able to feed yourself, not being able to work, not being able to be responsible. You have to be willing to take that risk.
But it's important to discern: it's not, "I'm just going to stop being responsible so that I face this." I'm saying go toward what we've been talking about, which is look at the reality of thought and see thought only as thought. Because the more you look, the more you get close to the sense that if you go there, you're not going to be able to function. So the more you go there, the more you get anxious and afraid.
That does not mean you will become dysfunctional. It just means you're afraid you will become dysfunctional. That's a thought in and of itself. And then there's also a sensation, the feeling of fear.
Seeing thoughts and emotions as what they are
All thoughts have to be seen as thought and not anything other than thought. The same applies to emotions. You have to see an emotion as an emotion, not as a reality or a truth. Just to see: this is fear, this is pain, this is sadness, this is shame. It is what it is. It's a sensation. You can name it, but you need to know it in your relationship to it, the taste of it, and to know that it is just a sensation. It's not the reality.
So the sensation of being afraid, where the mind then says it's afraid of not functioning and creates the image of tomorrow-you not functioning: you can know it as just a sensation. It's not the reality of you not functioning tomorrow and everything falling apart. It's just a sensation arising.
So there's something about just feeling that sensation. And also, it's not about deliberately bringing up the sensation and sitting in it. It's about noticing what it is and directly relating with it, which is feeling it.
We don't get past it by provoking it, because that's another addictive process: invoking sensations and emotions and then having a narrative that the more you invoke it, the more you'll be free from it and transcend it. It's about seeing it, being with whatever is, not creating it intentionally. Because that's the same as going into thinking or going into emoting.
Right. So if I was doing that in a non-addictive way, just as with thoughts, I see it for what it is. Here's an emotion, and it's just a sensation.
The loop of thought, emotion, and sensation
And you can start to see that sensations, emotions, and thoughts are all one thing, a little loop. You see the imagination, through images and sensations, of something other than the direct perception of sight, sound, and sensation.
The seeing through thought, the seeing through the emotional space, seeing it as it is: by "seeing through" I mean you are not veiled by the illusion of what is presenting. So the thought "tomorrow I don't function" doesn't fool you into believing tomorrow you don't function. It's just: "I have the thought that tomorrow I'm not going to function." There's a fear that operates at the sensation level, the fear "tomorrow I will not function." It doesn't mean tomorrow you will not function. It means you fear tomorrow you will not function.
What is happening right now? Sounds, sights, sensations. The thought "tomorrow I won't function." The emotion "tomorrow I won't function." And then something looks at all of that and evaluates: what is the reality, what are the odds, that tomorrow I won't function? And it can look at that more clearly, because the narrative is not propelling the emotion. Because you're not avoiding the emotion.
What happens when we obey fear
Ultimately, if we avoid the emotion, we obey whatever the emotion dictates. The emotion, "I will not function tomorrow," dictates. Fear says, "Do what I say and you'll stop feeling me." Since you don't want to feel fear, it's like, "Perfect, what's the plan?" "Don't look at this. If you look at this, you'll feel fear." And fear is saying, "Just listen to me and you'll stop feeling me." And you think, "What's the plan? Don't look at this. Okay. Not looking. Thank you very much."
What I'm proposing is the complete opposite.
What I described earlier as wisdom can come from seeing thought as thought and emotion as emotion. I would define thought as imagined sounds, imagined images, and imagined sensations. The imagined sensations are what we call emotions. And there's an overlap with actual sensation. This is why it's really tricky, because the body, through chemistry, through electrochemical movements, produces physical sensations. The heart can race. A lot happens with the body that makes it all feel more real.
If I'm afraid of a snake and I imagine a snake and my heart starts racing, the reality of the imagined snake becomes even more real, and it's very hard to see through all of that. Ninety-nine percent of the things we're running away from are imagined. We're running away from this moment, always, because we imagine that in this moment there's a horrible snake we cannot be with. The mind will say, "But there are snakes sometimes." Yes, but not really. It's very rare. The amount of distress we're in is vastly disproportionate.
From emotions to feelings
You can take this as an experiment in trusting, giving it the benefit of the doubt, that you're actually running away from feelings and emotions. When you get through emotions, you're going to encounter feelings. That's something else. That's where you move from the minor leagues to the majors. Feelings have a much more raw, real, energetic power, but it's the same process. You learn to be with them. It's all just energetics, all sensations, all movement.
All of this requires us to be able to touch whatever is coming up. At the core, there's going to be an energetic that feeds the feelings, that feeds the emotions, that feeds the thoughts. At that core, the energetic is what I've described many times as fear and pain, the essential fear and pain. There are all the ramifications of it, but once you get to the essential, it's a pain and a fear about the same thing: the ending of me.
As you get close to it, it feels like you are coming to the end of yourself. It feels like that. What is actually happening is the ending of what you believed you were, what you believed you are. The ending of the illusion.
We don't always want that. It's important to know: a big part of myself doesn't want this. Even as I'm wanting it and working toward it, a part of me does not. I'm avoiding and running away. You might come to a point where you start to see these two energetics: the wanting of that freedom and the avoiding of it. What we want the most is what we're most afraid of.
Sometimes there is a pulling back. I see in my experience a kind of "no, don't go there." I've heard you say that's a choice, and I'm exploring that, but sometimes it doesn't feel like a choice. There's the wanting of freedom and then there's the part that's afraid of it. What can feel frustrating is that sometimes that "no" just happens, and I don't catch it until I notice there's already a rejection. I'm just sharing that it doesn't feel like a choice.
The automation of avoidance
You're recognizing the reactivity. It seems automated, right?
Yeah, sometimes. Or maybe every time. I have to explore, I think.
What you're describing and what I've been talking about are the same thing. What I'm referring to is a choice at a deeper level. Something at a deeper level is choosing to say no, to avoid. That can be seen when you see what is gained from that reaction.
It's like we've created all of these levels, all of these rooms. At each deeper level, at each deeper stage, we've made choices, and we can decide to go back. We've been doing this from very, very young. We make choices, we go to the next level, more choices, and all of the older choices are still activated, still happening. Then at some point, we realize we want to change this. We start going back, we start to introspect, we start to look closely at the activities of the psyche, thoughts and emotions. We start to see there are deeper and deeper levels of choices, to the point where we can even see how we chose to do all this and then forgot about it.
I think I'll explore that. The pulling back, if I reflect on it in this moment, is like wanting control. "No, we're not going to go there because I want to control." Or maybe sometimes it's also seeking pleasure, the pleasure of the story.
It's so powerful, so seductive. There's this "me, me, me." I'm here doing all this. And then something is at the same time calling you. It's like a longing to unravel this and see through it, while you're saying, "No, no, no, me, me, me." But something's calling you. That's why you're here. You're listening. And that which is calling you is you.
I think I need to sit with that a bit, and with the sensations that are there. Thank you.