The Addiction to Thought and the Taste of Suffering
La adicción al pensamiento y el sabor del sufrimiento
A student asks about the pull of attention outward during social anxiety, leading to a broader exploration of why consciousness seems addicted to the experience of separation and suffering.
The Addiction to Thought and the Taste of Suffering
A student asks about the pull of attention outward during social anxiety, leading to a broader exploration of why consciousness seems addicted to the experience of separation and suffering.
The attention feels very outward, out of the body, and that feels very ungrounded. In a relaxed state, it feels closer in to the body or in the body. I've noticed that in social situations, if I become aware of this, I can almost zoom back into my body. Even if there's discomfort there, it immediately feels more grounded.
Yes, that's naturally so. What I would suggest you look at is this: your attention isn't actually out on other people and then being brought back into your body. It's up in the thoughts about people. It's up in mind and thought, which then gets projected as the image of "people out there" in your imagined space.
The actual perceptual reality is mind. And then you're bringing attention out from mind into raw, direct sensation, into the body. But because you're imagining the people out there, the attention feels like it's coming back from far away. The mind can imagine putting attention on the moon, which is so far away, and then bringing it back into the body, which is so close. But really, attention is getting lost in the thoughts and projections of these people, and what you're doing is bringing it into broader, raw sensation. That's a really healthy thing. It's a movement out of thought into raw, direct sensation.
So it's almost like it's not actually moving. It's just quieting down or something.
The foreground of attention
Attention does move. All that attention is, is a movement of what's in the foreground. If the foreground consists of thoughts about the people around you, and that's the focus, then what can happen is you start to see how much of what's in the foreground is thoughts, how much of what you're focused on is mind stuff. Then that can naturally fizzle out, like smoke, or like a very thin veneer, like a veil. And what was there all the time is the raw, direct sensation.
At the deepest level, nothing moves. But at the level of sensation, perception, and thoughts, there is movement. There is no stillness there; there's always movement. Attention is the part of the mind that constitutes this ongoing movement of what is foreground and what is background. But if what is foreground and background is always determined by this addiction to the separate self, the idea of "I," the idea of a person, then I'm focused on the world of thought.
It's just interesting. It feels so much more vivid than just thought. If I turned my attention to the moon or the plant on my desk, it would be there, but the sensation in the body would be the same. Whereas in a situation where there's some kind of threat or perceived threat, I almost can't feel my body. It's like a whole shift in experience. I guess thoughts are just really vivid, but it feels like more than a thought.
The captivating world of mind
Yes, but it is what I call thought. It is the mind world, which is extremely captivating, extremely vivid. People spend their whole lives captivated by that. Children are all day in the play of thought. It's really magical, very captivating and vivid. What I'm suggesting is that there's a way to heal, in a sense, from the addiction to that, and then come back to it in freedom.
What do you mean by that?
Let's call it before and after. The "before" is: I am unable to function without being completely and constantly immersed in thinking about myself and my life. The "after" is: I do not have any need to be immersed in thought about myself or my life, but I am now free to and able to move toward thought, to enjoy it, appreciate it, marvel in it, and use it. But it's secondary.
What I just described can be quite challenging, because the "before" is what I describe as an addiction. We're very attached. There are going to be many points where the seeing of that meets a lot of resistance, a lot of attachment, and a strong desire not to let go. It's going to feel like life and death. A part of us is going to fight to its death in order not to let go.
A gentler, more gradual path
I'm describing it as a very extreme difference, which it is. But there are also ways in which this movement can be more gentle, progressive, and gradual. The experience you described of moving out of thought into sensation in the body and feeling grounded is a way in which this can be done gently and progressively.
At a certain point, it's going to feel more natural to be regularly immersed in body and sensation, and only once in a while will thoughts dominate. When there is a sense of danger, as you described, which is a thought that could be useful, could be valuable, could be important, there's going to be a connection with the body when that appears, versus being pulled out of the body into the mind where the body has become numbed.
The more you do that practice, the more the body is going to be present. The sensations are going to be foreground. A sense of danger can appear. The mind's interpretation of that can appear. And then you're going to be able to experience the movement in the body of emotion, of sensations related to that danger: the discomfort, fear, or pain, whatever that is. It's just going to be the body doing its thing. And it's going to be information that you can, with experience, learn from and realize: Is this a real danger? Or is this an imagined projection coming from the past, not applicable in this situation? Or is this actually a real danger, meaning I don't want to be here, I want to move away, or I want to relate to this differently?
Thank you. That makes sense.
The root of the addiction
What is the root of this addiction? Because it is clearly seen that it's contraction, suffering, efforting. You said it's intentional forgetting. There's excitement in the "I" doing the "I-ing" stuff, but then it is seen that it's suffering, a lack of freedom. What is holding on to that? What is the joy of it? Why is it so sticky?
I can only speak for myself, but I think my experience is a universal experience. It's not personal. My experience is consciousness, the experience from consciousness. To me, it's the variety of flavors. At the root of it is the ability to taste tastes that are not possible without that. Even the taste of suffering is delicious.
The taste of it?
Yes. All of its textures, all of its worlds.
So is it like an evolution of the human, just tasting the separation fully until it's realized, and then you're done with it?
I don't think it's the evolution of a human, no. If anything, it's the limitless imagination of divinity.
Would you undo anything?
You can choose. You, as not the person you take yourself to be, can choose. Would you undo anything that you have lived? You, as not the person, would you change anything? And if you're tempted to say yes, "I would rather have not lived such-and-such a thing, I would rather have lived some other thing in the past," that's most likely the person speaking. A mind is a mind.
It's just the fascination with the game, is all it is. Like children losing themselves in a game of imagination. Basically just getting lost in play.
Yes, and that's where you will have your own language. If you relate to what I'm saying, you will speak of it in very different ways. It's like five painters painting the same scene, five poets writing about the same tree. Very different expression, but metaphorically, the scene or the tree is love, is beauty, is divinity expressed, experienced, lived very differently.
To remove the experience of suffering, which is nothing other than the sense "I am limited, I have had a beginning and I will have an ending," that's all it is. There cannot be suffering without that belief. There can be pain, but not suffering.
Pain without the overlay
Yes. This is clearly seen now, that even feeling the direct, raw sensation of pain without the overlay of the suffering "me" is fine. And I guess at some point you come to realize that the thought experience, the overlay, is such trivia. You stop. The fascination with it gets less and less. There's no drawback once you really start feeling that aliveness. The aliveness versus the made-up world. I mean, it was fun for a while, but it's just a movement toward something else.
That's exactly it. It's fun for a while. You can speak from your experience, but also understand that your memory of it might be limited. You have limited memory of how much you've experienced the sense of separation. You only have the limited memories of your brain at your disposal. But you might have been experiencing this for millions of lives.
Separation, or the...?
The suffering fun. The fun, and the horror. The absolute horror that is possible when there is incredible pain. Inhuman pain, which is very possible, very easy to experience in life, combined with the belief in limitation and separation, produces absolute horror.
And I think that's what we see in the world: people acting from pain, causing wars, playing it out. It's all that. So it's almost like we have to get deep enough, to the bottom of it. It's what the Buddha was saying: life is suffering. And that is the first realization. It's an opening to something else, to even look for something else.
The full message of dukkha
Yes, but it's not just "life is suffering." If life is suffering, there is a cause, and there is an end. And there is a way to end it. The first noble truth is quoted a lot on its own, and it should never be quoted on its own. Never. It is absolutely destroying the Buddha's message, because it validates suffering. "Life is suffering. Okay, deal with it."
All he was saying was: be aware, be conscious that there is dukkha, a deep dissatisfaction. Become aware of this, and then recognize, know that there is a cause and there is an end to it. And there's also a way to facilitate the ending of suffering. All of that needs to be communicated, not just the first part.
What matters is that for each being who recognizes dukkha within themselves, the recognition "I suffer" is a first awakening, a first seeing. This is different from "you are causing me to suffer; that should stop." No. It's "I." It's in me. Dukkha is in me.