Sunday, October 3, 2010

reflections on consciousness

i've been reflecting lately on the nature of consciousness. or moreover, reality. well, actually, they're very entwined, so both.

and as such, i've come to the realization that everything we experience is thought. both the thoughts unseen in our minds, and our external world - the image of which is generated in our minds. thus, it too is thought. our entire reality around us is simple mindstuff. thought. so the question, then, is what lies beneath the thought? for with the revelation that the reality into which we have invested so much is as ineffable as a cloud splayed across a sky, we must beg to realize what lies beneath. or above. or to the left, as we see that such concepts, too, are mere thoughts.

through meditation on the concept of reality as a thought, i am realizing that beneath the thoughts lies silence. upon meditating on all of this thought-ful-ness, the mind naturally defaults to the silence of realization - realization that it is the mind itself which creates all the suffering it experiences. so in this silence, there is nothing - no thoughts, no fleeting desires, no concepts, no biases. just stillness. and it is from this stillness which thought arises - from which our reality arises. thus, silence is a more basic aspect of our nature than thought. yet, some may still see a problem; a loophole in this philosophical logic. that problem is: how does one know that silence itself is not just a thought? what makes silence more fundamental than thought itself? if silence also arises in the mind, is silence not just as superficial as thought itself?

the answer to this, is that the silence one experiences in meditation on reality is not, in of itself, thought - it is realization of nothingness. silence is not tangible in the same way as thought - silence is, in of itself, nothingness. pure nothingness. indivisible nothingness.

nothingness is everlasting; infinite. complete void of all things. and because of this, nothingness is our true nature. indivisible, all is one in oblivion. our thought; our reality; all that constitutes our universe does not exist. it is nothing - it is not nothing - it is all things in nothingness.

a difficult concept to communicate in words. but if you will, take a moment to sit back, close your eyes, and imagine nothingness. complete void. not a concept of nothingness - no, not something which can be visualized - but even beneath that. once you have an idea of nothingness, observe and disregard even that, for in the moment of conception, that nothingness turned into somethingness. meditate deeper, and see that this ocean of stillness beneath your thoughts is your true nature - infinite, and nothing.