021324

Tuesday, February 13, 2024

2:00pm  Tita is reading from a book I would like to read called Mindfulness for Everyday Living.  I just emailed the author with my blog.

Tita:  This is called experiencing oneness.  

"Mindfulness encourages deep experiences beyond the divisive field of thought so that we realize our intimacy with all things.  Deep changes come to our lives through a different sense of things when the belief in self and other loses its substance.  

At first glance it might seem peculiar in a book on mindfulness to refer to Rene Descartes, the 17th century philosopher regarded as one of the most important influences upon Western thought in the last three hundred years.  As a young man Descartes realized the significance of scientific knowledge based on mathematics.  He believed that science would establish objective truth as being self-evident.  He held the view that there was a certainty in scientific knowledge not found in other views of reality.  He relied on the principals of mathematics to prove his point, holding tightly to the belief that scientists can deduce a phenomena of nature through the various branches of mathematics.  

He also arrived at arguably the most famous philosophical statement in the Western world.  Cogito ergo sum meaning I Think, Therefore I Am.  Descartes insisted that we must be willing to doubt everything, but we cannot doubt that we think.  From this conclusion he proceeded to provide a methodology for scientists to think through their scientific investigations and conclusions.  

Mindfulness practice also encourages the willingness to doubt everything without exception, including the statement cogito ergo sum.  It endorses the quiet determination to experience a mindful state of not-knowing, in innocence and humility, so that the truths of life reveal themselves.  This means turning cogito ergo sum into a question.  I think?  Therefore, I am? or I think, therefore I am what?  

The great teachers of mindfulness practice in the East, particularly in the Buddhist tradition strongly emphasize the questioning of our existence.  The questions of who am I?  What am I?  Am I? are regarded as the toughest of all spiritual contemplations.  The investigation into the nature of the Self has the power to blow apart all of the assumptions and images under which we live.  This kind of mindfulness practice with the question Who am I? at its center points to the essence of spiritual realization.  

The purpose behind the inquiry is to wake up.  When we truly wake up our old life and identity wrapped up in conventional existence ends, as if we had been living in a dream.  

Descarte's cogito ergo sum had a three-fold impact on Western consciousness.  One, it gives authority to the supremacy of thought.  Thought then becomes the instrument by which we define the world through scientific analysis.  

Two, it places thought in a unique category, cut off from the body, the emotions and the rest of the world.  Thought is granted an exclusive and objective role in defining the real world. 

It relies upon thought to isolate and pick out features of phenomena such as the body, energy or matter to establish a scientific standpoint.  It inevitably leads to a reductionist view of existence.  

Today's world.  

        Understandably impressed with scientific achievement we have developed a questionable degree of confidence in the army of scientists attempting to resolve the various crises that we face in our lives.  Television news programs, documentaries and newspaper articles often tell us about the latest scientific breakthroughs and offer glimpses of the brave new world.  Yet, the problems of humanity and the environment still seem greater than the long list of scientific achievements designed to resolve them.

Our mindfulness practice reminds us to engage in full participation in the adventure of existence, rather than acquiring the dethatched, clinical view of the scientists who has persuaded him or herself that they know reality.  We do not have to treat the world as a complex machine determined by a range of mathematical laws.  We do not have to subscribe to the viewpoint that accompanies scientific beliefs that the world exists for our benefit.  Once you have broken down elemental matter and reconstructed it in our laboratories.  Whether in a constructive way, such as advancements in healthcare, or in a destructive way, such as the production of sophisticated weapons.  

Mindfulness practice strongly doubts the view that we exist in order to engineer the world to our satisfaction and to exploit its resources to our advantage.  Descartes may have changed his world view if he had witnessed the explosive rise in the Industrial Revolution, underpinned by scientific research and its cost to global life.  We delude ourselves if we imagine that we can master the world.  It is in this respect that mindfulness has a radical aspect. 

        Many practitioners of mindfulness, including countless Buddhists, forget the importance of deep inquiry as a feature of mindfulness.  Without the questioning mind, the practice becomes viewed as a means to live a calm, stress-free life, with an air of inner peace about our demeanor.  There is certainly much virtue in such a way of being, but we must regard inner well-being only as a major step towards radical realizations, so that we are not afraid to go beyond our thought-driven view of existence.

Mindfulness explores the full range of human existence in everyday life.  A general inquiry with a practical methodology takes the circumspect view of fixing reality into any kind of framework, scientific, philosophical or religious.  This may all seem abstract and theoretical to many readers, but mindfulness practices require a willingness to change our world view.  The main point to remember is the value of a holistic view of life where a sense of participation rather than domination and ownership takes priority.

Views about reality get passed down from one generation to the next.  We practice mindfulness to overcome materialistic views of existence and desire for ownership as our priority.  Embedded deep in our mind we have come to believe that living in the real world means supporting scientific materialism and economic development as the only view that matters.  Mindful living expresses care, concern and respect for people and the environment.

Victor:  I am glad I randomly picked that page for you to read from.

Tita:  "Today we find ourselves living in culture that sustains the separation of the mind, the body and the world, while reducing everything to subatomic particles and DNA as a basis of reality.  In the space of a generation there is an increasingly held view that interdependence, the great web of interconnection reflects more accurately the way things are.  Mindfulness practice establishes the web of interconnection as central to our understanding of the nature of reality.  With that as our basis we consider this connection in all of our dealings with the world.  It may not be too long before the world view of Descartes belongs a view belonging to the second millennium.  Instead, we will experience reality through the web of interdependence.  

I fly regularly to different parts of the world to give teachings on meditation and spiritual enlightenment.  In a single flight from London to New York, as a passenger I must accept responsibility for the aircraft's emissions that are as much as from the average use of a car.  I don't own one for one year.  In my public talks I sometimes remind listeners of this uncomfortable fact.  I believe my visit to another country to teach is justified provided that my teachings contribute directly and immediately to people committing themselves to a more moderate lifestyle as an ethical value in the process of mindfulness.

Like Descartes, we often adopt the view of the separation of mind from matter, but we have other experiences that refute that standpoint.  Let us take a simple example.  You are spending a day outdoors, perhaps walking in the mountains, spending time by the sea, observing a beautiful sunset or idly watching a river from a bridge.  You experience a deep sense of oneness, of unity, a pervasive and harmonious uninterrupted presence of nature that is free from any division.  This unshakable dimension dissolves divisions including the beliefs that this is me in this spot and this is out there and what is out there is not me.  

Suddenly and rather unexpectedly, all scientific and religious standpoints seem irrelevant in such an experience.  It is not that these experiences are particularly rare or encountered only by mystics.  The chances are that many readers have experienced spontaneously in meditation or in a sudden change in consciousness and energy, this unitive sense about life.  It is an authentic experience revealing an extraordinary oneness of existence that dissolves the assertion of the division of mind and matter."

        That was from page 61 that you randomly picked.