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"for meditation you are supposed to be free of such thoughts" This a pernicious falsehood. It's possible to achieve, but even most advanced meditators aren't s

by KingMob 14y ago

"for meditation you are supposed to be free of such thoughts" This a pernicious falsehood. It's possible to achieve, but even most advanced meditators aren't spending long stretches of time thought-free. Wrestling with your concentration and being aware of what you're experiencing is meditation. It's pernicious because it leads people to believe that they're not any good at meditating, since they look at their mind and are aghast at how cluttered and chaotic it is. The fact that you now start to see it, IS meditation. You were doing just fine.

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gnosis 14y ago
A lot depends on how you define "thought". If you define "thought" as any kind of mental experience (including "sensory" experiences such as simply experiencing the external world), then I would agree that our minds are "cluttered and chaotic", as they are filled with this experience whenever we are conscious. On the other hand, if you define "thought" as a sort of verbal "inner dialogue", then I think it is possible to go through long periods of time without it (both in meditation and in more ordinary states of consciousness). I am only a begginer at meditation, so I can not speak from personal experience regarding what deep, committed practice in meditation could achieve, but I have read many accounts of people in the Buddhist and Hindu traditions claiming to get beyond any kind of conceptualization or "thinking". Certainly, there are also traditions which claim something like "nirvana is samsara" (that the "true" world or reality is the same as the "illusory" world or reality, in some profound sense that only the enlightened individual can grasp), that even in the enlightened state, what one does is "chop wood, carry water", same as in the non-enlightened state. So, some could argue, even deep meditative states could be just as "cluttered and chaotic" as ordinary states of consciousness. But this is not the only or necessarily even the most dominant view.

by KingMob 14y ago

deleted 14y ago

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gnosis 14y ago

A lot depends on how you define "thought". If you define "thought" as any kind of mental experience (including "sensory" experiences such as simply experiencing the external world), then I would agree that our minds are "cluttered and chaotic", as they are filled with this experience whenever we are conscious. On the other hand, if you define "thought" as a sort of verbal "inner dialogue", then I think it is possible to go through long periods of time without it (both in meditation and in more ordinary states of consciousness). I am only a begginer at meditation, so I can not speak from personal experience regarding what deep, committed practice in meditation could achieve, but I have read many accounts of people in the Buddhist and Hindu traditions claiming to get beyond any kind of conceptualization or "thinking". Certainly, there are also traditions which claim something like "nirvana is samsara" (that the "true" world or reality is the same as the "illusory" world or reality, in some profound sense that only the enlightened individual can grasp), that even in the enlightened state, what one does is "chop wood, carry water", same as in the non-enlightened state. So, some could argue, even deep meditative states could be just as "cluttered and chaotic" as ordinary states of consciousness. But this is not the only or necessarily even the most dominant view.