Management of"Thinking"!

[Guest guest]

Namaste,

 

Recently I came across a short article on “Thinking” by Eckhart Tolle (Author of

The Power of Now), and I thought I would reproduce it, as it does contain

certain aspects, which merits pondering on. In the context of Thinking, and mind

management, I think it may be helpful.

 

“Stop Thinking” –

 

Isn’t thinking essential in order to survive in this world, I am often asked.

Your mind is an instrument, a tool. It is there to be used for a specific task

and when the task is completed, you lay it down. As it is, I would say about 80

to 90 percent of most people’s thinking is not only repetitive and useless, but,

because of its dysfunctional and often negative nature, much of it is also

harmful. Your mind causes a serious leakage of vital energy.

 

This kind of compulsive thinking is actually an addiction. What characterizes an

addiction? Quite simply this: you no longer feel that you have the choice to

stop. It seems stronger than you.

 

Why should we become addicted to thinking, you ask? Because you are identified

with it, which means that you derive your sense of self from the content and

activity of your mind.

 

Because you believe that you would cease to be if you stopped thinking. As you

grow up, you form a mental image of who you are, based on your personal and

cultural conditioning. We may call this phantom self the ego. The term “ego”

means different things to different people, but when I use it here it means a

false self, created by unconscious identification with the mind.

 

To the ego, the present moment hardly exists. Only past and future are

considered important. This total reversal of the truth accounts for the fact

that in the ego-mode the mind is so dysfunctional. It is always concerned with

keeping the past alive, because without it - who are you? It constantly projects

itself into the future to ensure its continued survival and to seek some kind of

release or fulfillment there. It says: “One day, when this, that or the other

happens, I am going to be okay, happy, at peace”. Even when the ego seems to be

concerned with the present, it is not the present that it sees; it misperceives

it completely because it looks at it through the eyes of the past, Or it reduces

the present to a means to an end, an end that always lies in the mind-projected

future. Observe your mind and you will see that this is how it works.

 

The present moment holds the key to liberation. But you cannot find the present

moment as long as you are your mind.

 

The predominance of mind is no more than a stage in the evolution of

consciousness. We need to go on to the next stage now as a matter of urgency;

otherwise, we will be destroyed by the mind. Thinking and consciousness are not

synonymous. Thinking is only a small aspect of consciousness. Thought cannot

exist without consciousness, but consciousness does not need thought.

 

Enlightenment means rising above thought, not falling back to a level below

thought, the level of an animal or plant. In the enlightened state, you still

use your thinking mind when needed, but in a much more focused and effective way

than before. You use it mostly for practical purposes, but you are free of the

involuntary internal dialogue, and there is inner stillness. When you do use

your mind, and particularly when a creative solution is needed, you oscillate

every few minutes between thought and stillness, between mind and no-mind.

 

No-mind is consciousness without thought. Only in that way is it possible to

think creatively, because only in that way does thought have any real power.

Thought alone, when it is no longer connected with the much vaster realm of

consciousness, becomes barren, insane, destructive.

 

It wasn’t through the mind, through thinking, that the miracle that is life on

earth or your body were created, and are being sustained. There is clearly an

intelligence at work that is far greater than the mind. How can a single cell

measuring 1/1000 of an inch across contain instructions within its DNA that

would fill 1000 books of 600 pages each? The more we learn abut the workings of

the body, the more we realize just how vast is the intelligence at work within

it and how little we know. When the mind reconnects with that it becomes a most

wonderful tool. It then serves something great than self.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[Guest guest]

sri mani

 

this was a wonderful post. im so sorry i did not appreciate it.

 

this is the most profound article on enlightenment, thoughts, self,

and mind. it is almost like Sankara's bhASya on the upanishads or like

buddha's teachings in the digha nikaya pitika.

 

i liked it very much. i wonder if members consider keeping the article

in the files area, so that it may be referred to. but maybe because it

was not Sankara's work..... but it is surely worth reading again and

again.

 

maniji, one question abt this, what is its source? if it is some place

on the net, i wud like to read other articles there.

 

-balaji