Choosing wisely and unwisely, along with the consequences that follow, constitutes the greater part of our human lives. We will all make many wrong choices in our time. Don’t be tempted to withhold from making the wrong choice because you think you need to be good, or in order to be worthy or righteous. This is a subtle misunderstanding.
The only way for wisdom to really bear fruit in this life is to move and act from a space of understanding. The goal here, as with all things in this life-long project of self-inquiry, is understanding.
Understanding requires that you meet what is trying to move out of your inner state into an expression in the world. We begin with mind in all things, and then it moves outward into an expression.
This can be either wise or unwise, skilful or unskilful. This is what eventually affords us with wisdom or what the Buddha referred to as ‘Right View’. Right View is not a claim there is an objectively correct solution for everything, rather it indicates a correct way of looking things. It speaks to our orientation. Are we wanting to be right, or are we wanting to understand? Are we wanting justification in all we do, or do we want to see deeply into the way things really work?
In some ways we are better off making mistakes again and again if we don’t understand yet – but at least choose with your eyes open. Then you will learn something. When understanding arises for you, it will have substance and lasting value. You will then have the capacity to be grateful for the mistakes you have made and see how graciously you have been humbled and corrected.
A lot of people find this mysterious, but it really needn’t be. If you know what to look for, it won’t be mysterious. The small windows with which you see into unconscious patterns of behaviour, when used regularly and with ongoing commitment, eventually allow you to see more. The windows gradually become wider, allowing for a broader view of things within.
Many things are so small that we are content to simply let them fly, whether it is making a comment, using a certain tone, allowing something to privately irritate us, or withholding affection or appreciation from someone as punishment. This is because we don’t tend to be aware of the total impact of our small errors.
If you want to get grit out of your shoe so that you can stand and walk comfortably, you don’t just want the biggest pieces out, nor do you only want most of the small bits out – you want all of it out. The smaller pieces will bother you even more when there is less grit in there.
It is the same principle with your inner environment.
If you want peace, you need to look at every tiny factor that contributes towards an outward movement from misunderstanding. Grit in your shoe is grit in your shoe – one subtle interruption to peace of mind is an interruption to all of your peace of mind, not just a part of it. The False Self can be deluded into thinking that it wants certain particularly troublesome pieces of grit out so that it can focus on keeping the others, but that is the power of delusion for you.
Some suffering actually works for ego as a convenience, other suffering not so much. If you want to get rid of your suffering but keep your unreasonable expectations, or your long-standing arguments, your progress in self-discovery will be impeded. You can only go so far when you place artificial limitations on your process of inquiry.
A lot of writers on this subject tend to hesitate from giving specific examples. I’m not sure why this is the case. I think it may be because when we are given specific examples, it is seen as a little like being spoon-fed, and the idea is that it may reduce our capacity to independently assess for ourselves whether an act expressed is unconscious or in harmony or with the truth of who we truly are.
It makes sense to me that we can’t just be given beliefs or moral principles to fall into alignment with, because this would disregard the role of understanding. I feel that in some cases, being given specific examples does serve to shine some light on the kinds of things we are looking for in this type of exercise. Perhaps not all the time, because we do need to learn a measure of independence in this arena. We should be able to look for ourselves with fresh eyes and discover what is pertinent to us, not because someone who thinks they know better has told us that this behaviour is wise – this won’t help much.
The Buddha is reputed to have once said:
“…just as a goldsmith would test his gold by burning, cutting, and rubbing it, so you must examine my words and accept them, but not merely out of reverence for me.”
The Buddha was first and foremost a human, and he was being totally upfront with us about our shared human interest in discovering for ourselves the value of what is said, not the projected image of whoever appears to be saying it.
You don’t need someone you think is enlightened telling you what you should and shouldn’t do. That wouldn’t be revolutionary, that would be old hat. Do you really want to give the power of your mind away so easily? What if it is the only realm of jurisdiction that you really have? What would you do with the knowledge of an enlightened being if you didn’t totally understand it? Would you keep it in your head, like a treasure kept in a box?
Again, understanding is paramount – you need to know what it is, how it works, how to use it – otherwise it is no good. If I write a sentence, I anticipate that it will be tested by a discriminating reader, not swallowed hook, line and sinker. If you test what is said, you are practicing what the Buddha taught; you are practicing wisdom. If you do not test what is said, but you take hold of it anyway, you are practicing idolatry or false religion – even if what is said is true.
This is what a baby does. A baby will suck anything that is put into its mouth. If we want to be adults in this world, if we want a life that reflects our maturity, we can’t afford to just take anything in without knowing what it is. Abandoning all discrimination is not the same thing as faith.
I will give some examples of typical unconscious patterns, not to tell you what is wrong and what is right, but to help open your eyes to areas of your life which you may need to examine in order to foster skilful living. There will be many areas close by that require similar attention. As always, the responsibility for a thorough investigation lies with you.
Maybe no-one has told you this before, but I have total confidence in your capacity to examine your inner world in a balanced, healthy and truth-conducive way.
It is not a chore; it is one of the most beautiful things humanly possible. The results remain to be seen. I do not withhold an attempt describe the results in order to be mysterious, but to respect the freshness of your own experience. Suffice it to say, those who have gone before you in this venture have discovered that all we have to lose in self-inquiry is that which is not real to begin with. Then you can marvel at what remains.
I will now share some brief examples followed by a specific thought form that might accompany them, and afterward, a general explanation of how these contribute to our suffering. Some of these may be things you have noticed before either in yourself, or perhaps in others. We are all particularly adept when it comes to noticing symptoms of falsehood and delusion in other people.
When you deliberately leave certain books out to imply to others how complex or intelligent you are. “I’m great. I know so much – people love me”.
When you want to demonstrate to strangers that you are capable of walking or driving away from the traffic lights with a high reaction time. “I am faster than you. See?”.
When you walk, speak or move a certain way hoping that others will make the connection that there is something very special or distinguished about you. “I am a dark horse – I am very sophisticated”.
When you feel a sense of desperation when you want to win an argument, defend yourself, or make a point to others. “I just have to be right and express my opinion”.
I have given just a few examples, because we really could fill a book with them. I know some of them seem juvenile, but we do carry a lot of misunderstandings all the way from childhood through to adulthood in only superficially modified form – it is all a way of begging for love, worth and attention.
We don’t need many examples for the spirit of these movements to be identified. You can sense the place within you that they emerge from. More generally people just call this suffering, but in Buddhism, this is referred to specifically as ignorance. It is a gut-level sense of being a separate being, a fragment of the universe that defines itself as so small that it must be promoted and defended in order to ensure its foothold in existence. It is ignorance in the respect that the attitude is in ignorance of your true nature.
Our true nature rests in unity, and doesn’t need to be promoted or defended. Interpersonal advertisements are not a tool of the true self, which has no need to show strength, skill or virtue. Being itself establishes worth, and understanding will reveal this.
Every little thrill that you get when you entertain any one of these deluded thought forms is strengthening and supporting that separate sense of self. When a spider builds a web, it has to maintain the structure constantly, making repairs and adjustments in tension here and there, otherwise the whole thing will decay and fall apart. The false self is doing the same thing.
Every minuscule portion of energy you send its way will keep the whole operation running – and an ego can subsist on very little energy for a very long time.
Have you noticed what happens for example when you really make an effort to look attractive, and you haven’t received a compliment about your looks for a long time? If that sort of thing is really important to us, we might start to remember a time where a compliment did make us feel wonderful, if however very briefly, and relive it all over again. Or, we might fantasise about a fictitious scenario.
This helps an ego in starvation mode so that the sense of a separate self is held more firmly in place. What would otherwise happen is the pain of withdrawal might become so great that the deficiency of the personality structure is itself called into question. This variety of ‘rock-bottom’ event could provide the critical mass needed to awaken out of the mind’s dream-state, so the False Self tends not to let that happen.
I say this in some regard to appease the honest part of your curious mind, but please respect that none of this is to be believed. It is to be explored and investigated by you.
These brief examples I have given you may seem paltry and trivial, but like the grit in your shoe, every tiny bit contributes and something small can ultimately result in a great deal of suffering.
None of this is of any use if we don’t arrive at some measure of true insight, allowing for the relief of suffering. I wouldn’t mention these small things otherwise. What I most want you to see about them is the way in which they promote a certain aspect of you while simultaneously denying another. You should also see how each of these brings two things with it – thrill and suffering, inseparable like two sides of a coin.
Do you get a sense with each of these examples how the tiny revenue of excitement that is a reward in each one of them contributes to keeping you locked into a worldview in which there is a separate ‘you’ there, stretched between duality of values, worthy or unworthy, good or bad, strong or weak? See whether you can get a palpable sense of what it feels like to be rewarded chemically and psychologically with each of these, because this is the thrill of the ego, the False Self.
The tiny thrill is a poison that is making you sick, because you have misunderstood through a culture of learned ignorance. You thought that the only way to feel anything was to be addicted to thrill, and then confuse that with happiness. You actually got it totally backward – thrill is suffering, and real joy comes through peace which is the absence of suffering.
We all got it completely backwards.
It is all the small links in the chain that bind the addiction to personal identity. Each one is worth examining, because you might just find the chain falls away altogether with a little persistence. Successfully understand one dysfunctional energetic form deeply within your mind and heart, and you will be well on the road to understanding them all and discovering a peace without boundaries.
We were all caught in the same honey-trap. This may be embarrassing for a time, but that too is a natural phase. See what it feels like to give yourself some peace and let that embarrassment and shame go – we don’t need to make another victim identity out of it.
When we use a sense, or a muscle, we know what happens. Our abilities become clearer, stronger. Our task in inquiry is just the same way. We develop an acute awareness of when energetic movements within our minds or hearts are coming from a place of separation, wanting to isolate ourselves as an identity – the special one, the rebel, the hero, the holy man or the victim – and we sense keenly when movements originate from a sense of unity.
The latter are harder to spot, especially at first, because they are spontaneous, and lack of premeditation that the movements of separateness thrive on. This is why the unity that moves through you is sometimes referred to in Buddhism as sunyata or emptiness.
It isn’t that there is literally nothing there, it is that unlike separation, it doesn’t depend on structured form and content to maintain its abiding existence. This is why it never feels compelled to promote or defend itself, and why it feels peaceful and secure without clinging to anything even though change is happening all around it.
Sadly, many people in this life will never come to know the value of this because of just how deeply we have been collectively enthralled by the addictive conditioned states that the modern world excels at producing. The truth is, you can’t serve two masters, and you can’t bend two bows.
I have confidence that what is true in us wants so profoundly to express itself through us, particularly at this time when our established human ways are consistently failing us, that those of us who are called to the responsibility of self-inquiry will meet this task head on, and likely with rapid success. Not only is this peace waiting for us in our own lives, but it is waiting to be shared with every entity in all times and places.
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Simon P Murphy is a Nelson-based esotericist and philosopher, and author of His Master’s Wretched Organ, a brilliant collection of weird fiction stories.
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