Posted on by Bewustzijnscoaching

There is no way to stop the mind, it stops on it's own accord.



For the diehards among the blog readers, a shortened version of Osho's satsang.
That it may touch the reader…, as it touched me and also a client when the thrust of this satsang dawned on her.

How to stop thinking?
Thinking can not be stopped. Not that it does not stop, but it can not be stopped. It stops on his own accord. This distinction has to be understood. Otherwise you can go mad chasing your mind.

‘No mind’ does not arise by stopping with thinking. When the thinking is no more, ‘no mind’ is. But the very effort to stop thinking, will create more anxiety. It will create conflict. It will make you split.

You will be in a constant turmoil within. This is not going to help. And even when you succeed for a few moments to stop it by force, it is not an achievement at all, because those few moments will be almost dead, they will not be alive. You may feel a sort of stillness but not silence, because a forced stillness is not silence. Underneath it, deep into the unconsious, the repressed mind goes on working, so there is no way to stop the mind, it stops on its own accord. So what to do?
Watch, don’t try to stop. There is no need to do any action against the mind. In the first place: who will do it? It will be the mind fighting the mind itself, you will divide your mind into two: one that is trying to pass over, the top dog, turning to kill the other part of itself, which is absurd, it is a foolish game, it can drive you crazy.
Don’t try to stop the mind or the thinking. Just watch it, allow its total freedom, let it run as fast as it wants. Don’t try in any way to control it, you just be a witness. It is beautiful. Mind is one of the most beautiful mechanism. Mind is so tremendously powerful, with so many potential…, watch it, enjoy it… and don’t watch it like a enemy, because if you look at the mind like an enemy you can not watch, you are already prejudiced, you are already against, you have already decided that something is wrong with the mind. You have already concluded, and whenever you look at somebody as an enemy, you never look deep, you avoid.

Watching the mind is looking with a deep love, with deep respect, reverence (eerbied), it is God’s gift to you. Nothing is wrong in mind itself, nothing is wrong in thinking itself, it is a beautiful process as other processes: clouds who are moving in the sky are beautiful, why not thoughts moving into the inner sky, flowers coming on the trees are beautiful, why not thoughts flowering into your being. The river running into the ocean is beautiful, why is it not the same with thoughts running somewhere to an unknown destiny. Is it not beautiful?

Look with deep reverence. Don’t be a fighter, be a lover. Watch the subtle nuances of the mind, the sudden turns, the beautiful turns, the sudden jumps and leaps, the games that mind goes on playing, the dreams that it weaves, the imagination and memory, thousend and one projections that it creates, watch…, standing there aloof, distant, not involved and by and by you start feeling that your watchfullness is deepening. Deeper becomes your awareness and gaps starts arising. Intervals, one thought goes and another has not come and there is a gap…, one cloud has passed, another is coming and there is a gap. In those gaps fort he first time you have glimpses of ‘no mind’. You will have the taste of ‘no mind’. Call it taste of zen or tao. In those small intervals suddenly the sky is clear and the sun is shining. Suddenly the world is full of mystery because all barriers are dropped, the screen on your eyes is no more there, you see clearly, you see penetratingly, the whole existence becomes transparent. In the beginning this will be just a rare moment, far and few. Small pools of silence, they will come and disappear, but now you know you are on the right track, you start again watching. When a thought passes, you watch it, when a interval passes (a gap) you watch it. Clouds are also beautiful. Sunshine is also beautiful. Now you are not a chooser. Now you don’t have a fixed mind, you don’t say: I would like only the intervals of ‘no mind’, that is stupid. Because ones you become attached that you would like only the intervals, you have decided again against thinking and then those intervals disappear. They happen only when you are very distant aloof, they happen, they can not be brought, they happen, you can not force them to happen, they are spontanious happenings. Go on watching, let thought come and go wherever they want tot go, nothing is wrong, don’t try to manipulate, don’t try to direct, let thought move in total freedom and then bigger intervals will be coming. Sometimes minutes will pass and no thought will be there, there will be no traffic, a total silence, undisturbed. When the bigger gaps will come, you will not only have clarity to see into the world…, with the bigger gaps you will be able to see into the inner world.

By and by…, but don’t get attached to that to. Attachment is the food for the mind to continue. Non attached witnessing is the way to stop it without any effort to stop it. And when you start enjoying those blissful moments, your capacity to retain them for longer periods arises. Finally, eventually, one day you become master, then when you want to think.., you think…, if thought is needed you use it, if thought is not needed, you allow it to rest. Not that mind is simply no more there. Mind is there but you can use it or not use it. Now it is your decision. Just like legs… if you want to run, you use them, if you don’t want to run, you simply rest, legs are there.

Mind is always there,  you have not giving it a rest. Hence, the mind becomes mediocre (middelmatig), continuously used, tired and it goes on and on and on. Day it works, night it works, in the day you think, in the night you dream. Day in, day out, it goes on working. If you live for 70 or 80 years, it will be continuously working. Don’t be violent to the mind, there is no way of stopping it by force. Move lovingly with deep reverence and it will start happening on its own accord. You just watch and don’t be in a hurry.  (…) Meditation is not an effort against the mind. It is the way of understanding the mind. It is a very loving way to witness the mind, but of course one has to be very patient. This mind that you are carrying in your head, has arises out of centuries, millenia..., your small mind carries the whole experience of humanity. In fact to say that the mind is yours…, is not right. It is collective, it belongs to us all, your mind is not yours, it belongs to us all, our bodies are very seperate, our minds are not so seperate, our minds overlap and our souls are one. Body seperate, minds overlapping and souls are one. I don’t have a different soul and you don’t have a different soul. At the very center of existence, we meet, we are one. Don’t try to destroy the mind. I am not in favor of stopping the mind, I am in favor of watching the mind. It stops on its own accord, and then it is beautiful, when it stops without any violence, it has a beauty of its own. You ask how to stop thinking. I say: just watch, be alert, and drop this idea of stopping, otherwise it will stop the natural transformation of the mind. Drop this idea of stopping. Who is the one who wants to stop the mind? The mind itself. That does not work. At the most enjoy, and nothing is wrong, even if immoral thoughts, so called immoral thoughts pass by, let them pass, nothing is wrong, you remain detached, no harm is being done, it is just fiction, you are seeing a inner movie, allow it its own way and it will lead you, by and by, to the state of 'no mind'. Watching ultimately culminates into ‘no mind’. 'No mind' is not against mind, 'no mind' is beyond mind. ‘No mind’ is not coming by killing and destroying the mind. 'No mind' comes when you have understood the mind so totaly, that thinking is no more needed. Your understanding has replace it.

(if you want to listen to this satsang of Osho, this is the link on you tube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFsbHV4uPtU)

www.thehealingcircle.one
LinkedIn: Caroline Ootes
Posted on by Bewustzijnscoaching

What is the key to happiness?



What is happiness?

And is there a key to happiness? If so, what is the key?

Is there such a thing as permanent happiness or is happiness just temporary: it comes and it goes.

Is happiness feasible? Can you do or create 'happiness' or 'being happy'?

Does 'happiness' demand effort from our side, because it isn't there in advance, it can only be obtained through endeavor?

Or is 'happiness' something that happens to you?

What does the word 'happiness' or 'be happy' mean to you? Take the time to examine this... Go inside and ask yourself what 'happiness' means for you in your daily life.

Is happiness in the little things: a sunset, a rose, a look, a smile? So in something outside of us? Or in a state of Being that gives shine to everything that is?

And what do we do with 'being unhappy'? The opposite of 'happiness'.
Happiness can only exist by the grace of its opposite: 'suffering' or 'being unhappy'.

Are we giving ourself permission to be 'unhappy' in the rat race to 'happiness'?

Is happiness possible if we realize that every 'happiness' carries the seed of 'unhappiness', because it is temporary: happiness comes and goes, today you have a great day and tomorrow it is over.
And every 'unhappiness' carries the seed of 'happiness': after rain comes sunshine.

Would the pursuit of happiness be related to the fact that we often feel unhappy?

Could it be that the desire for 'happiness' (fill in: a partner, the right job, a child, peace in the world, recognition, appreciation, harmony, enlightenment) is precisely the cause of our suffering?

Could it be that these same desires cause us to feel unhappy in the here and now, because our attention is elsewhere, focused on realizing a desire somewhere in the future? Because we believe that life as it is, is not fulfilling, is not sufficient...

Not satisfactory? To what? To the image that the mind creates about reality: how it should be. Recognizable? It always has to be different than it is. We don't know a full 'yes'.
'Yes' in the sense that life is good as it is, with all the trimmings.

We 'live' from a 'no'. Because we believe that something is wrong with us, the other person, the world, the circumstances as they are: it has to be different..., says the mind.

Are you happy'? Stop a moment before reading on.
What is your answer to this question: Are you 'happy'?
Where do you say 'no' to? What doesn't meet your expectations?

And can the 'I' be happy?
The 'I' that strives for..., the 'I' that doesn't want this, but that (something else), the 'I' that disapproves and approves, the 'I' that sets so many conditions on life itself, the 'I' that has so many opinions and judgments?

If being happy is not possible for the 'I', then the question arises whether permanent happiness exists at all? Or is permanent happiness a fairytale?

The only way that I know to true happiness is 'awakening'. Being at home in the Self. Get  get rid of all the demands we place on life (on ourselves, the other and the world).
Live Life as it comes and goes, without assumptions. 
In the heart, out of the head which has all kind of ideas about 'happiness'.

And then I listen to the words of Osho:

'Life moves from perfection to perfection. Not from imperfection to perfection. No, life moves from perfection to perfection. '

Nothing needs to be improved or changed: all is well. Precisely all those efforts that it must be different than it is, is the cause of 'suffering'.
Awakening is about happiness that doesn't come and goes, happiness that is permanent. Call it Pure Awareness, Consciousness, Love, Light, the Buddha Nature. Then you are at home, at home in the Self that transcends light and darkness, the Self that knows no polarities (happiness/unhappiness), the Self that doesn't set conditions and makes nog demands on existence. The Self which is neutral, full of love.

Does that mean that there is no emotion or experience of sadness or pain anymore?
No, emotions appear and there can be pain. And that is it: there is an emotion or there is pain. If you don't have an opinion about that, then there is what there is: an emotion/pain. But at the moment that identification takes place with the emotion or the thought, then there is charge, then you are a prisoner of the mind, you believe the thought (I am worthless), in your mind it is really true (you are rejected), you are convinced that something is being done to you by someone else or by certain circumstances (you are fired), you make it personal (I am not good enough), a 'story' arises..., yes..., then there is 'suffering'. 

As awareness goes deeper, identification with the mind dissolves, which doesn't mean that you can't get caught now and then, but the identification is superficial and short-lived.

And yes..., coming home to the Self is a gift, then life is fulfilling and a deep sense of gratitude arises from the heart..., for everything that is..., as it is.

PS I lie on the massage table and listen to mantras. A thought appears: you have just written a blog about 'happiness', but how do you see the death of your daughter that took place in the summer of 2016? That is a great suffering? That is a big loss? That is terrible, isn't it? Yes, that is a big loss. Certainly... And yes, there were tears and strong feelings of loss...

And then Lao Tse (a philosopher from the 6th century BC) blows through me: 'Don't go that far to say that the death of your daughter brings bad luck (suffering). All you can say is that she is dead. That's a fact. Whether it brings misfortune or a blessing, you don't know, because this is only one fragment of reality. Who knows what else will follow?'

Yes, I don't know. And I don't need to know either. I can share what I experience now, six months after her death: total neutrality concerning her death, a neutrality that is loving, a neutrality that transcends attachment. Every now and then Simone blows through me, a warm wave, there is a heart connection, a connection that transcends death and life. Of course it is a great loss, a pity that she is no longer here on earth, we had a deep connection... And it is what it is: she is dead. And that's it.

What I also know is that Lao Tse speaks from the Source, the Source of Love that is neutral, the Source that knows no judgments. Is the death of our daughter a blessing or a curse? Who will say it? Everyone will be inclined to say that it is a curse. But what if you are at home in the Source? In the Self... where no form of polarity (unhappiness/ happiness) is present, because it is neutral. Not neutral in the sense of 'lifeless, death', but neutral in the sense of an unconditional 'yes'. Is it then still a blessing or a curse?

Discover it, meditate, find a living master who can guide you, who sees through your structure, who rattles your foundations. It takes a lot to defrost, to dismantle the structure (the ego/mind/conditioning/ convictions/beliefs/attachment/security/safety). The transformation process to Light, through all layers (physical, emotional, mental layer) is an enormous transformation. Years of fatigue, various physical complaints, the recognition of the black swan in me (which I experienced as a painful process)..., it wasn't easy but more than anything in life - worth it. Meditation and self-examination and a living master are the keys to 'happiness' for me.

Wake up, wake up.
That is the path to true happiness.

'Life moves from perfection to perfection. Not from imperfection to perfection. No, life moves from perfection to perfection.'


www.thehealingcircle.one
Linked-In: Caroline Ootes